Gwendolin

Hi, my name’s Gwendolin, and I’m an alcoholic.

I had my first drink when I was 14. It was a big fancy dinner and ball that my father held to celebrate his victory over some other king somewhere. I don’t really remember the details. But I was allowed to sit up on the big table and was served wine along with everyone else. I think I threw up in the moat afterwards.

But this was back before the interregnum so it was galas and balls like there was no tomorrow. Since I was ‘of age’ it was expected that I would attend and I did. It was fun you know, fitting out new dresses, dancing with hot young guys. And there was alcohol. Always alcohol, as much as you wanted. I learnt to take it easy after the first disaster, but by the time I was 16 I guess I was drinking heavily 4 or 5 nights a week. Then it went from drinking at parties to drinking by myself. It was always easy to get a page to run down to the kitchens and bring up a bottle of wine or even some spirits that I could drink in my chambers. It wasn’t long before I was drinking everyday.

I guess I was what you would call a ‘functional alcoholic’. I didn’t really have much to do around the castle except wait to be married off one day to a prince from a neighbouring kingdom. The only time I was in public was at whatever ball was being held, and let me tell you, once you’ve danced the foxtrot with the Ambassador of Whereverthefuckistan while talking about the weather for the thousandth time, it takes very little effort to present a calm and demure front to the world, even if you’re completely blitzed inside. Which I generally was every time.

Of course the time came when I was introduced to my husband to be, Jojo. He was nice enough, but we only met once before we got married. And of course, we had a big fairytale wedding. I was drawn up to the cathedral in a white carriage drawn by a dozen white horses. My dress cost a sizeable portion of the royal treasury and had a train thirty foot long. After saying our vows, a hundred white doves were released from a window. It was, reportedly, the most beautiful and elaborate wedding ever held in the capital.

I don’t remember a single second of it. I had a flagon of vodka snuck into the carriage and I necked most of it while we were waiting to get the horses all hitched up. But, by all accounts I was a resplendent bride so, there’s that I guess.

Then the fights started. It caught me off guard to find out that Jojo actually cared about me. He would beg me to stop drinking. I mean, my parents never took an interest in what I did, and all of my ‘friends’ either didn’t know, or were too scared to say anything about it. But Jojo was someone on my own level who wanted to help me. So of course I rejected his help. I had been living my own life this way on my own terms and I had become so dependent on drinking that I hated being told my life was a mistake. I was a goddamn fucking Princess, alright? The daughter of the fucking King! Living in a fucking CASTLE on top of a fucking MAGIC MOUNTAIN. And you, you jumped up son of sheepherder king who was the self declared lord of three-fifths of fuck all are going to tell ME what to do? I don’t think so, sonny.

So we would fight on and on and on. But on the outside we were the ‘perfect couple’, always happy, always content. I think what helped a lot in those early years were my pregnancies. I cut back when I was pregnant, which led to Jojo being happier with me and I wasn’t as angry with Jojo. For a few years there, we did have a fairly normal life. But after Gertruda, our third child, I had become pregnant with our fourth. I guess something went wrong and I had a miscarriage and was told I would not be able to have any more children.

Well, that tipped something off. I got in a carriage and went to our country estate without telling anyone and proceeded to write myself off for the next two weeks. When they finally dragged me back to the castle, Jojo and I had one hell of a fight. He blamed me for the miscarriage, I blamed him for it. It was bad. We eventually settled down into a cold war. He gave up on me, stopped trying to fight my drinking. And I kept drinking. And drinking.

Most alcoholics have a moment of clarity when they realise they have to stop. Mine was a little more vivid than most. You all know about the Night of the Red Knives and the coup. Well, what you don’t know is that after they had cut off the king’s head, they came for his family. I had been drinking of course. I was so dead drunk that I had passed out in the privy, covered in my own shit and they never found me. It was only the next morning when I woke up, oblivious to what had happened and saw the bodies laid out in the courtyard...

So here I am. Queen Gwendolin de Rhohindera, first of her name, Guardian of the Moonlit Isles and Warden of the Northern Reaches. It has now been 3,542 days since I last had a drink and everyday is a new challenge.