Chapter Text
Robin Buckley wasn’t particularly happy with her life, but she wouldn’t trade it for anyone else’s. Most of the time she got to be around normal folks, do her hobbies (such as wandering the woods) without anyone complaining, and best of all, she got to live in a castle with 3 meals a day. The only downside to this was that she had to escort tons of prissy princesses, but oh well, that comes along with being a maid in waiting. She was sent to the castle when she was eleven and supposed to take care of the future queen. King Steven Harrington didn’t seem to ever propose to someone, though. There was a new princess she had to show around almost every two weeks. Most of them were rude and stuck up, but one, about a year ago, had stuck out. Princess Thompson. She had been dreamy and sometimes sung to herself. Robin was mesmerized and had never really moved on—still hoping to meet someone like her again, but until now luck hadn’t been on her side.
On this faithful day, a new princess was set to arrive.
Robin jumped out of bed, just a little too late to be on schedule. It only took mere minutes for her to put on her skirts and brush her shaggy blonde hair to make it more presentable, even though it would be pinned under a cap the whole day anyway. After giving herself a final once-over in her mirror, she put on her comfortably worn-in shoes and hurried to breakfast.
The servants breakfast hall was crowded, so, as always, Robin fled to the table nearest to the kitchen—where Nancy had already prepared a plate for her.
“Overslept?” Nancy quietly asked while pushing the plate over to her. The cook was usually rather strict but empathetic with Robin and most of the others. They’d become friends after Robin discovered how good Nancy was at “gathering intel.”
“Maybe, not like it matters though.” She said, digging into her food.
“Oh, c’mon. Be nice, I’m sure it won’t be that bad.”
To that the blonde just let out a lighthearted scoff and kept shoveling down her food like she hadn’t eaten in days—that gained her a disapproving glance from Nancy.
She hung around in the kitchen for almost an hour longer than she had to. That often happened when Robin could find the time—turns out talking to Nancy while she did the dishes was oddly calming.
They’d talk about things Robin had picked up from the commoners she spoke to on a regular basis and gossip about things Nancy heard about King Harrington occasionally.
Overall, he was a great king. When he had overtaken the kingdom, he had assured everyone a happy life. Different than other kings, he hardly took any harvest of the poor if he could help it; rarely did he even throw parties where even the common folk got invited to the palace. Nonetheless, there were rumors. Rumors about how he didn’t propose to a single girl and, as some said, didn’t look interested in ever doing so.
Nancy thought gossip was silly, but it was amusing to see how invested Robin got, even if most of the rumors likely weren’t true.
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Eventually Robin slipped out of the kitchen to stroll around the forest behind the castle; after all, she wouldn’t really have time for that anymore, with a new princess to take care of, so she used her chance to really take in how pretty the forest was.
The trees were tall and covered most of the forest in shadow, which made the speckles of light that did make it to the floor look like freckles. The ground was covered in dark green moss, and a few small flowers were breaking through from beneath it. Robin crouched down to pick one of the flowers; it was delicate and this beautiful shade of lilac—it reminded her of Tammy. She really had been one of the few, if not the only, princess Robin really enjoyed having to take care of.
After that she wandered the forest for a little longer, carefully picking some more flowers while dreaming after the princess she had “lost,” not that there would’ve ever been something between them.
As it so happens, time passed, and Robin had to hurry to make it to the front gates. Her skirts were muddy at the rim, and the cap covering her hair had become a bit loose—the princess would just have to live with it now. At least Robin hoped she’d just live with it.
She leaned against the wall while watching the stablehand, Jonathan, open the previously mentioned gates.
“Who pushed you into the mud?” The lanky boy asked ever so quietly. He did have a snarky grin on his face, though.
“No one, you dunce! I went on a walk.” Robin grumbled before giving her attention back to the gates.
It took another mere minutes before the carriage went through, and Robin put on a bored smile. The second the princess stepped out of the carriage, though, Robin's face lit up. She was dashingly beautiful with her coppery hair and her freckles—which looked like the light hitting forest floor. She might’ve been the prettiest girl Robin had ever seen.