Chapter Text
The grass was muddy and wet from the rain a couple days ago, the feeling of the wet soaking the back of Dipper's tank top after being down on the ground for possibly the 4th time during this training session combined with the rising sun shining in his face that made him have to squint to even attempt to see the knight standing in front of his fallen form. In a nutshell this was humiliating,
Pathetic even.
Dipper was almost as frustrated with himself just as much as the trainer that was supervising the training was. The trainer scoffed and snapped his fingers.
“Again, Pines, improve your form, you looked like a newborn deer with how you positioned your feet,” The trainer addressed coldly. Dipper knew that the guy was only doing his job but he seriously wasn't being helpful, forget being supportive! Hell, what did improving his stance even mean? What part of it was he supposed to improve? Dipper got up on his feet and held his sword awkwardly, unsure how he should hold it so he adjusted multiple times until he felt he was holding it correctly. The trainer gestured to the seasoned knight to start the new sparring match. The knight in front of Dipper smirked down at the teenage boy, attempting to strike his arm, Dipper barely parried the attack in time by sidestepping. Dipper’s heart rate increased swiftly, it's a sparring, it's fake, Dipper constantly reminded himself in his head but apparently his body had a mind of its own. His heart kept racing, he felt frozen in place once again like in other sparring and before he knew it, the seasoned knight knocked out the practice sword from Dipper’s hands. Dipper automatically went to reach for the sword that clanked softly once it hit the muddy ground. Dipper gulped, his body feeling like it was shivering despite the warmth of the sun being on him, the shadow of the other knight was almost casting over Dipper like he was a rabbit in the presence of a wolf. The knight chuckled mockingly.
“You didn't even lift your sword in that sparring, that's 5-0 Pines,” The knight spoke, saying Dipper’s last name like he wanted to spit all over it and shimmer it in dishonor. Dipper’s eyebrows furrowed together at the words of mockery but he kept his head low in shame and humiliation. The other knights overheard and joined in.
“He couldn't even slash a threat if he tried, he'd probably run and throw away his sword like a coward”
“Maybe we should place him on dish duty, or the stables, he'd still find a way to mess that up somehow”
The mocking words continued, Dipper put his hands up to his ears, trying to drown out their words and harsh laughter at him and his techniques. Why should he care anyway? He's only doing this for the pay…
For the pay he reminded himself,
But that didn't take out the sting in their bites.
Dipper felt a mix of irritation and a pit of embarrassment well up inside him when they kept going, he shut his eyes for a second. His brain pounding against his skull, his heart racing like a rabbit that drank 3 gallons of posca. He did this until he heard the trainer's voice break through the fog of insults.
“Alright! You all are wasting your time ridiculing a new recruit. Sir Pines you are dismissed” The trainer said quickly, those last words, those last miracle of words felt like getting a drop of water when dying of thirst. Dipper looked at the trainer, then to some other knights. Dipper didn't say anything, only nodding and getting his stuff that was in a corner of the training grounds and stepping inside.
~
Dipper sat in his barracks on a bed while writing in a leather bound journal that had a patched pine tree on it. The other knights he bunked with weren't there yet which gave him time to prepare for their own possible cruelness. Dipper closed the journal, running a thumb over the pine tree, remembering how Mabel told him that she made it herself in her freetime. It made him miss his twin more, especially since Mabel wasn't there to stick up for him. He knew he should've tried to stick up for himself, but he didn't, and it felt like he couldn't. What was he supposed to say? They were right,
He was just a farmer boy,
With no previous skills to being a knight,
Just a clumsy, farmer boy was all he was.
Dipper stared at the ceiling, thinking while disassociating all at once, Dipper closed his eyes, before opening them back up and sitting up.
He might've been a farmer boy,
But that doesn't mean he can't learn right?
~
Dipper spent the next few days practicing his technique, especially when there wasn't practice and knights around to comment on his performance, he drew stances from books he picked up in the castle library about swordsmanship and tried doing them. Alongside that, he also read up on offense and defense and how to do both better. His improvement was slow and almost agonizing once he realized it.
But hey, improvement is improvement right?
One evening though, he was practicing by himself on the training field. Talking under his breath, hopefully to a ghost since it was probably crazy of him to do so. Dipper worried about that briefly from other solo training but convinced himself there could be a possible ghost floating around that could be interested in what he was doing out there. Dipper eventually heard footsteps approaching after 20 minutes into practice, it sounded like they were coming from within the castle. Dipper stiffened, his arms attaching to his torso as he slowly turned his head to look.
And oh-
Why is the princess standing there?
~
Winter, in a very brief way to put it, was exhausted. Her body aches under all the frills and ruffles and whatever else was on her dresses she wore from being up with duties more often than not. She needed sleep, if she didn't get it soon she was going to collapse and not get up for another month. Winter yawned, her gloves hand going over to cover her mouth while the other hand held a book with a letter she was writing to the royal court about needing more funding for special occasions and spontaneous conflicts. Winter dropped her hand to hold the book upright as she wrote what she wanted to say in the letter. Winter heard muttering while figuring out the right wording in her letter, her feet paused at the sound of…a person's voice? Winter looked over and saw the doorway that led out into the training grounds, her eyes scanned the areas before landing on a messy brown haired boy. One of her eyebrows raised, she got closer and stood in the doorway, just watching him for a moment. The boy had already noticed her and looked up. His dark eyes meeting hers, Winter bit her lip in thought before speaking.
“Good evening,” Winter greeted, worried a little about getting caught staring at the boy in a way.
“Ah! Uh- you're the- you're the-” The boy stuttered, he looked around for a moment. He didn't find the words immediately so Winter said something.
“I'm the….?” Winter trailed off, ushering him to finish his sentence.
“You’re the…the princess…” The boy finally managed to say, Winter nodded and gave a small smile.
“Indeed, I am in fact, the Princess of Piedmont"