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Prince Cheng Xiaoshi was never alone. With endless servants, advisors, teachers, trainers, all vying for his attention, he was always being pulled in different directions. He hated it. But his one constant, the one person he didn’t mind was someone sworn to be by his side. Sworn to protect him. His faithful knight, Sir Lu Guang.
His knight was very in-tuned with his Prince’s needs. As soon as he noticed him getting too overwhelmed with the day-to-day workings of being royalty, he would clear his throat, place a hand on his sword, and wordlessly clear a path. After ushering the prince out of the crowd, he would fall in line, six steps behind his royal charge. Always six steps.
Prince Cheng Xiaoshi used to never mind the distance between them. It was nice to know that there was someone trustworthy guarding his back. It was his job, after all, to protect him. But lately, there was a strange feeling gnawing away at him whenever he thought about the man behind him. A feeling he wasn’t sure he could explain. But out of the corner of his eye, he could sometimes catch Lu Guang looking at him in a way that encapsulated the way that Cheng Xiaoshi felt, so maybe...just maybe...
As time went on, and the feeling grew, he began to get frustrated with the distance. “Perhaps, today, you could walk beside me? I’m feeling that my left side needs ample protection today.” He tried, as they walked down the corridor. Lu Guang remained six paces away, but shifted closer to his left side. Cheng Xiaoshi scowled. “Sir Lu Guang, I order you to walk beside me.”
“Your Highness,” Lu Guang’s voice was soft, but there was a touch of strain, as if he too, felt frustrated at the distance between them. “Your Father, the King, dictated this distance so that I may best protect you. Now, shall we continue to the library?”
“No.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “No, I’m going to go for a ride.” He felt like he was on fire, and had to get away. Before Lu Guang could do anything to talk him out of it, he took off running toward the stables.
Lu Guang swore under his breath and followed him. Of course he did. He would follow the idiot Prince no matter where he went. It wasn’t as if he didn’t understand the Prince’s frustration. He, too, had felt the change in their dynamic. He too felt...more of a connection than that of one between a Knight and His Prince. But it wasn’t as if anything could be done about it. Six steps away, that was where he was ordered to be.
“Your Highness,” Lu Guang breathed, as soon as they reached the stables. “I understand you are feeling restless, however–”
“We’re going riding. You’re going to ride next to me. That’s an order. If not I...I...” The Prince searched for a suitable threat, but found himself lacking. “I’ll...Punish you fiercely,” he finished lamely. The stableboy handed Cheng Xiaoshi the reins to his horse with a bow, then worked to saddle Lu Guang’s. The Prince looked his knight in the eyes. “Please, ride next to me. Just for a bit?”
Lu Guang nodded, unable to ignore the desperation. “Of course, just for a bit. However, I advise–” Prince Xiaoshi held up a gloved hand, stopping him once more.
“Don’t talk me out of it. Don’t tell me that I have something else to do. Just get on your horse, and ride with me. I...I need you.” His cheeks felt warm. “To be by my side.”
With a shake of his head, both at the prince and the gathering storm clouds, Lu Guang ignored sense and mounted his horse, riding side by side with his charge, as promised.
It hadn’t always felt so strange between them. In fact, it was a recent development. Four months prior, there had been a fever that rolled through the Kingdom. It hit the Outer City first, laying down many farmers and merchants. Then it struck the nobility. The entire royal family fell ill, with the Prince suffering the worst of it. The palace Healers did all they could, but after a while, it felt like the only thing they could do was keep him comfortable.
The King recovered, and the Queen. But the Prince remained ill, tossing and turning fitfully as a fever wrecked his body. The Sweating Illness was what they called it. Lu Guang stayed by the Prince’s side, unwilling to leave, despite the dangers it posed for him. He wasn’t going to let his charge suffer alone. Every night, after the Healers left, Lu Guang would climb into bed with the Prince and hold him. Trying to keep his shivering body warm. And trying to let his unconscious mind know that he wasn’t alone.
“Gods above, if you heal him, if you bring him back to me, I promise...I will never stray from my course,” he would whisper in prayer. “I will watch over him until I can no longer.”
Slowly, but surely, the illness worked its course, and the Prince recovered. “You’re an angel,” he murmured to Lu Guang, one night, still a bit addled from fever. “You saved me. Brought me back to life.” The Knight did not respond with words, he merely took his Prince’s hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Love you,” Cheng Xiaoshi mumbled, as he drifted back to sleep.
Love you.
Love.
You.
Lu Guang exhaled. A Knight was allowed to love their Prince. But for a Prince to love a knight...that was a problem. He would stand resolute in his duty. In his promise to the Gods. Six steps behind. Watching over as was his duty.
They hadn’t been riding for too long before Lu Guang felt the first drop of rain. “Your Highness.”
“I’m not going to listen to you telling me to go back to my duties,” Cheng Xiaoshi responded, his voice full of petulance. “I told you, we’re going for a ride together. Nothing will stop me–Oh.” He finally felt the rain.
“There’s a guardhouse, just up ahead,” Lu Guang suggested. “We can wait out the rain there? It’s hardly fair to make the horses ride in such weather. Let alone making your poor knight do it. And you certainly won’t be going off alone.”
“Alright, I get it. Yeah, the guardhouse. Whatever. Lead the way.”
The two tied up their horses at the little stable, then took shelter. It was a simple building, but stocked well enough with firewood, and rations. Not that Lu Guang intended for them to be there that long. He lit the fire and sat Cheng Xiaoshi down in front of it.
“So, we’re stuck here. In the rain. Care to explain this strange and sudden attitude you’ve been having towards me?” He studied his Prince, with a frown set firmly in his face.
“I haven’t been having an attitude. And even if I have, who are you to question your Prince?” He pulled off his gloves and held his hands in front of the fire. “It doesn’t matter. Just leave me alone until the rain stops.”
“It matters enough that you demanded to take your horse out in inclement weather. It matters enough that you seem to be angry with me doing my job. Are you dissatisfied with my work? Would you prefer I be reassigned, and you given a new knight?”
“No! How could you...” His frown morphing into shock. He cleared his throat. “That...that would not be necessary, Sir Lu.”
“So formal. You haven’t been that way since I was a squire. Now, tell me what’s the matter.” He sat next to Cheng Xiaoshi. “Please? It’s just us, Your Highness.”
Cheng Xiaoshi’s heart hammered uncomfortably in his chest. “Nothing feels the same. After..after the Sickness. How can you...How...” He waved his hands uselessly, trying to get his point across.
“How can I, what?” Lu Guang asked, voice careful. His own heartbeat steady. For now at least.
“How can you walk behind me? I thought you loved me!” Royal hands jumped up to cover his mouth, as if that could make the words come back. The rain outside picked up intensity, filling the growing silence between them.
Lu Guang reached out and carefully removed the Prince’s hands from his mouth. “Why do I walk behind you? That is my job, Your Highness. Six paces so that I may watch your back. Six paces so that if there were to be any danger, I would be able to see it and swiftly dispose of it. Six paces so that I’m near enough to push you out of harm’s way, if need be.” He squeezed the hands gently. “As for your other point, well, I do.”
Cheng Xiaoshi looked into Lu Guang’s eyes. Always so guarded. Always scanning. Always watching. But this time, they were staring back into his own. “You don’t act like it. You...you stayed by my side during my sickness. And then you went right back to...to being my shadow. I told you that... Didn’t I? Or was that the fever...”
“You did. You told me that you loved me. I wasn’t certain that it wasn’t the fever. But it was nice to hear regardless.”
“Then...” His words failed him as Lu Guang held his gaze. He didn’t even know how to put what he wanted into words. It wasn’t as if he were a fool. But didn’t he deserve to love and be loved? He started to pull his hands away, but Lu Guang tightened his grip.
“What do you want from me, Your Highness?” The quivering in Cheng Xiaoshi’s mouth told the story before the Prince’s own voice could. Ever the dutiful knight, he leaned forward and kissed him.
His lips were soft. Sweet. Everything that Lu Guang had imagined them to be. He could feel his Prince smile against him. They broke apart after a moment. “I want you to call me by my name. At least when we’re in private like this. And I..I want you by my side, not six paces behind, whenever you’re able. And I...I...” There was a wildness to his eyes, a frenzied joy that hadn’t been there since they were kids. “I want to hear you tell me that you love me.”
Lu Guang nodded, an amused smile pulling at his lips. “Alright. I think I can do that. Is there anything else?”
“No. That will be all, my faithful knight.”
“As you wish.” He leaned forward, closer and closer to Cheng Xiaoshi. The Prince blushed, but remained where he was. “I love you, Xiaoshi,” he whispered into the Prince’s ear, before quickly pulling him in for another kiss.