It is not clear whether Swaziland's ground-breaking court case pitting a schoolgirl's mother against the king will continue as scheduled on Tuesday.

Zehna Mahlangu was made a royal fiancee in a traditional ritual at the weekend, effectively making her the king's 10th wife.

The king is following in his father's footsteps

Earlier, the 18-year-old was seen in public in the company of four of the king's nine other wives for the first time since she disappeared in September.

Ms Mahlangu's mother alleges that her daughter was abducted and had gone to the country's high court to seek her release.

Judges at the high court on Friday refused to obey an order from the palace to either drop the case or resign.

A lawyer for Ms Mahlangu's mother told the BBC he was now waiting to hear whether his client still wanted to press charges against the monarch.

'Relaxed'

When Ms Mahlangu appeared in public, she looked relaxed and "her body language suggested she was not being kept by the king against her will," a South African newspaper, the Saturday Star, reported.

"She smiled all the time when the public scrambled to catch a glimpse of her," the paper said.

King Mswati's first wife is a practising lawyer

King Mswati, Africa's last absolute monarch, is above the law but has come under pressure in recent years to introduce democratic reforms and abandon polygamy.

Ms Mahlangu's mother went to court seeking the release of her daughter, saying she was taken away without parental consent after the king chose her and two other young women at a reed dance in September.

The court has been trying to get access to the teenager, who is kept at a royal guest house, to find out whether she actually wants to become the king's 10th wife.

Unprecedented

The 34-year-old king announced in August that he planned to marry once again, two months after marrying wives number eight and nine.

This is the first time the mother of a prospective Swazi Queen has taken legal action against the royal family.

Women rights activists have rallied behind the mother.

Ms Mahlangu will officially become King Mswati's wife when she becomes pregnant, according to AP news agency.

The BBC's Tom Holloway in Mbabane says that one of the three young women selected as a prospective bride with Ms Mahlangu is now to be handed to a 60 year-old chief.

Official biographers say King Mswati's father, Sobhuza, had scores of wives during his 61-year reign, which ended when he died in 1982.