Chapter Text
"Oh. There you are. I was wondering when you'd find me."
Vanessa is perched on the edge of a stone fountain tucked away at the far end of the town square, legs crossed beneath her pale pink gown, one slippered foot swinging idly as if she has not a care in the world. A small wooden boat of cinnamon-glazed apples rests in one hand, and the hood of her cloak is down despite the fact that she is in public, where anyone might recognize her at any moment.
Mike stops a few paces away, letting out a sigh that is equal parts relief and annoyance.
"Your Highness," he says, somewhat relaxing now that he's no longer frantically scanning the square for her. "You can't keep doing this."
"Can't I?" An amused smile curves across her lips, head tilted just so, looking the very picture of innocence.
Princess Vanessa Afton is many things, but innocent has never been one of them.
Mike knows this better than most.
In the two months he's been assigned as her personal guard, she has slipped out of the palace more times than he is willing to count, vanished through the servant's passages when she was meant to be asleep, and even bribed a poor stable boy into letting her ride out alone without an escort.
When King William Afton first assigned Mike to the role, he informed him that none of Vanessa's previous guards had lasted longer than a month. The last had endured two weeks, and the one before that had asked to be reassigned a mere three days into his rotation. Vanessa has outsmarted, humiliated, and charmed her way past countless royal guards before him, and somehow still managed to smile her way out of every reprimand she earned.
Mike, to his occasional regret, is still here. Whether that is due to his own persistence or Vanessa's lack of intervention, he is not entirely sure.
"The palace has been in an uproar for the better part of an hour," Mike says, stepping closer as though she is a wild animal he intends not to spook.
When he initially realized she had disappeared again, he first checked the west gardens, where she often went when she needed to clear her head. Then the little hidden alcove in the library, where she liked to hide when she did not want to be bothered. After that had come the stables, the orchard, even the roof — he had once found her up there in the middle of the night, claiming she needed "fresh air" — and finally the square.
Vanessa pokes her wooden fork into an apple, casually shrugging her shoulders. "And yet here I am. Entirely unharmed."
"That is not the point."
"It seems like a very good point to me."
More often than not, when Vanessa slipped away, she ended up in town. Mike had learned that it was not because she wanted to throw the castle into turmoil — or not only because of that, at least — but because she wanted to know the kingdom she was meant to rule one day.
That was, perhaps, the most maddening part of all.
If she only slipped away to be reckless, it would be easier to stay angry with her. Easier to scold, to drag her back behind the palace gates, to remind himself that she was impossible and leave it at that.
But Vanessa did not come to town only for trouble.
She came because she liked to walk the square at dusk, when the shopkeepers were beginning to pull in their signs and the streets weren't so crowded. She liked speaking with the merchants and buying flowers from the mother and daughter at the corner of the main strip. More than that, she liked hearing what people complained about when they did not think anyone important was listening.
What she liked most of all, Mike suspects, was being somewhere people looked at her and saw a woman before they saw a crown.
Which is not a good enough reason for a princess to wander off alone, but still.
Mike exhales slowly through his nose, trying to find a singular thread of patience to hold onto. "Why did you run off again?"
Vanessa finally slips off the edge of the fountain, brushing at the side of her gown with her free hand. It is one of her simpler gowns, the skirt falling closer to her legs, which at least keeps her from drawing quite so much attention. "Perhaps I wanted you to come looking."
Mike has to resist the urge to roll his eyes, though only barely.
"Then next time," he says, "you might consider saying so instead of vanishing without a word."
Vanessa's smile widens, looking all too pleased with herself. "Where would the fun be in that?"
The late-evening sun catches in her hair as she steps closer to Mike, turning the gold of it almost honey-blonde. Mike straightens instinctively, as though good posture might somehow make him seem less aware of the fact that Vanessa, in only her slippers, still has to tip her chin down a touch to look at him properly.
Despite being shorter, Mike is not a small man. He is broad-shouldered, strong-armed, and more than capable of handling himself, which is rather the entire reason he was assigned to her in the first place.
Vanessa still has a way of making him feel strangely off balance all the same.
She saunters close enough that Mike can catch the faint sweetness of her perfume, the sugar and spice of her apples, and the cool, watery scent of the fountain still clinging to her. She tips her head to the side, a knowing look in her eyes as they rake over his face and down the silver of his armor, pausing for a moment at his sword before drifting back up. She then holds out the little wooden boat between them, the corner of her mouth quirking upward.
"Would you like one?"
Mike blinks, a little startled by the question. "No, Your Highness."
"Why not?" Vanessa asks, face brightening as she spears another apple with her fork. "They're still warm."
Because taking food from her feels too much like indulging her, he thinks, and he supposes he has done enough indulging for one evening by standing here instead of immediately leading her back to the palace.
"What I would like," Mike says evenly, "is to escort you back home."
A sly look crosses her face then, one Mike has come to recognize as a warning for whatever trouble she means to cause next.
"You may escort me back," Vanessa says, her tone full of mock solemnity, "after you have an apple."
Mike looks at her for a long moment, already knowing there is no version of this conversation in which Vanessa backs down first.
"Must I feed it to you myself?" she presses, brow arching as she nudges the boat a little closer.
Mike would not put it past her, and he's had enough of her games for one evening. Begrudgingly, he takes the fork with the apple caught on it, glances around as if someone important might be watching, then carefully bites into it.
It is annoyingly good — not that he expected otherwise — warm and soft and cinnamon-sweet. He hands back the fork as he chews, and Vanessa looks so unbearably satisfied that Mike feels a fresh wave of exasperation wash over him.
"Well?" Vanessa asks, piercing her own apple cube and popping it into her mouth. It dawns on Mike then that they have just shared a fork, but he makes the choice not to acknowledge it.
"They're good," Mike admits quietly, earning an overly content look from Vanessa.
"I know," she hums, as though she had a hand in making them.
Mike only gives her a look, then steps closer, lifting a hand to the hood of her cloak. He draws it back over her hair, careful to shadow her face before anyone nearby can get a better look. They're close enough that Mike can see the flecks of gold in her irises, bright against the sea-green color in a way that feels far too pretty to be any real concern of his. He steps back, suddenly aware of how little distance was between them, and clears his throat to try and rid of the warmth creeping up into his face.
"Now," he says, gesturing towards the road that leads back to the palace. "May we return home, Your Highness?"
Vanessa sighs with theatrical disappointment, but she falls into step beside him easily enough, balancing the little wooden boat in one hand as they leave the shelter of the fountain and make their way through the evening square. "If we must."
The sun is steadily setting, painting the sky in rich hues of orange and pink and gold. As much as he resents Vanessa's habit of slipping out unattended, Mike often finds that he does not entirely mind the walk back to the castle. The air near the square always feels different — fresher somehow, something warm and earthy and familiar — and he has always been fond of evenings like this, when the hum of the kingdom lulls his mind into a state of serenity. It reminds him a bit of being a boy again, running about the town until the street lanterns were lit and he had to return home for supper.
"Must you walk so far away?" Vanessa asks suddenly, her voice cutting gently through the peaceful silence they always fall into on their journey back. "It's only us out here."
Mike had settled into his proper position once they began walking — behind and a little to the left of Vanessa, close enough to intervene if needed, but far enough that she would not feel crowded. She slows just enough to glance back at him over her shoulder, clearly expecting him to abandon protocol simply because she asked.
Mike slows as well, but does not step up beside her. "I am where I ought to be, Your Highness."
Vanessa makes a face at that — some small, offended look that on anyone else might have seemed childish — and stops walking entirely, waving a dismissive hand.
"How dutiful," she says dryly. "Come walk with me."
Mike does not move at first. Vanessa lifts her brows at him in silent expectation, her hood shadowing the upper half of her face but doing nothing to hide the unmistakable shape of her impatience.
"Your Highness—"
"Oh, don't Your Highness me," Vanessa scoffs, fully turning to face him now, the movement nudging her hood further back on her head. "I've simply asked you to walk with me, not commit treason."
He folds his hands behind his back to keep from doing something foolish, like reaching up to tug her hood into place again or taking her elbow to guide her back into motion. He glances down the road instead, scanning the tree line, the grassy pastures, and the low stone walls that border the path back to the palace. There is no one close enough to overhear them, no sign of movement beyond the tall grass waving softly in the evening breeze.
Mike hesitates for a moment longer, hoping his reluctance is obvious, then finally steps beside her with a quiet exhale.
"There," Vanessa says, her voice lilting as she turns and starts walking again. "Was that so difficult?"
Mike grimly thinks that Vanessa has a way of making everything difficult, and he keeps his gaze fixed ahead instead of replying.
For a little while, they return to walking in silence.
It is not an uncomfortable silence, exactly. Mike has never been one to fill the quiet simply for the sake of hearing his own voice, and he had been somewhat surprised to learn Vanessa did not care for idle chatter either. Most people around her seemed determined to either entertain or impress her, and as much as Vanessa delighted in provoking others, she did not often seem to enjoy being performed at.
After several minutes, Mike can feel Vanessa looking at him, pulling him out of the calm his mind had begun to settle into.
Not just glancing, but looking.
The kind of looking that makes Mike feel all too aware of himself — of his posture, his uniform, of the measured strides he takes without thinking because years of royal guard training have taught him exactly how a man in his position ought to move — and he can't help but wonder if he's done something wrong.
He risks a glance in her direction and finds that she is not looking at him with her usual leering sort of amusement — the expression she wears when she knows she is being especially unbearable and has no intention of stopping — but something quieter, more earnest, as though she is lost in her own thoughts and doesn't even realize she's staring at all. Or perhaps she does realize, Mike thinks, and is simply waiting for him to meet her gaze.
"Is everything alright?" Mike asks, the question quieter than he intends. Vanessa suddenly blinks at him, as though surfacing out a trance.
"Yes," she says, clearing her throat.
Mike waits, but she says nothing else. He is not quite sure he believes her, not when he notices her turning the little wooden fork over absently between her fingers. In the two months he has spent trailing after her, Mike has learned more of her small tells than he ever meant to — the restless bounce of her leg during particularly long council meetings, the way she bites at the skin around her thumbnail until it bleeds, the constant need for her hands to be occupied whenever her mind is elsewhere.
He looks ahead again, out towards the winding road and the last glow of sunset sinking behind the hills. The palace lanterns are not yet visible, but they cannot be too far away now.
"If something is wrong," Mike says after a moment, keeping his gaze fixed ahead rather than on her, "you may tell me."
Vanessa is quiet long enough that he assumes she means to let the question die there. Then she lifts one shoulder in a small, careless shrug, lips pursing slightly to the side.
"Nothing is wrong," she says. "Not exactly."
She glances sideways at him, as if checking whether he will press. When he does not, she exhales softly through her nose.
"I was only thinking," she says at last, "that if you are to be my guard, I should like to know you."
The words startle him so much he nearly stops walking altogether.
For a moment, Mike says nothing, turning the request over in his head. He finds himself wondering whether Vanessa has ever asked this of her other guards, or if this curiosity is reserved for him alone. He knows he has lasted longer than any of them, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. Had she known any of them? Had she wanted to know any of them? Or does she only want to know Mike?
It is, Mike realizes, a rather inappropriate thing to consider.
He forces the thought away immediately.
"You know me well enough, I think," he finally says, nudging a pebble off the path with the toe of his boot.
"No." Vanessa gives a soft, amused huff. "I know that you are very serious and overly fond of rules. I know that you are excellent with a sword, and that you disapprove of nearly everything I do. I know that you are impossible to lose, which is quite unfortunate for me."
She turns to look at him again, her wry expression smoothing into something unreadable. "But that is not the same as knowing you. Not truly."
There is something faintly melancholy in her voice, as though Vanessa has never truly known anyone well enough at all, and Mike finds himself trying to think of anyone she is genuinely close to.
The only person who comes to mind is her head maid, Lorraine — though Vanessa has only ever called her Lola — who has been with her since she was an infant. She is a kindly woman, her hair gone silver at the temples and the corners of her eyes creased with age and years of patience that only come from dealing with a princess like Vanessa. Recently, she had mentioned to Mike that Vanessa seemed rather fond of having him as her guard.
Mike had not known what to make of that.
He still does not.
"There is really not much to know," Mike says, finally spotting the edges of the castle as they begin to rise over the hill.
It is a rather pretty castle, white stone with black slate roofs and tall, narrow towers that cut cleanly against the darkening sky. The outer walls stretch wide across the hill, adorned with wandering ivy that has begun to climb near the older western wing.
Mike grew up with the palace always there in the distance, grand and lavish atop the hill, untouchable in the way the moon is always too far no matter how high he reaches for it. Even now, walking towards it with the princess at his side, some small part of him still expects someone to notice he has come too close and tell him to turn back.
Vanessa hums another mirthful sound, casting him an unconvinced look. "That is certainly not true."
Mike smiles to himself at that, lowering his head to watch the road so she will not see it. Vanessa has a rather irritating habit of always noticing when he smiles, as though she is the only person in the world capable of coaxing one from him.
He supposes that is not entirely untrue.
"Why do you want to know?" Mike asks, just as the crickets begin to chirp quietly around them. He has always found the sound soothing, and makes a mental note to leave his chamber window cracked open tonight so it can drift through while he sleeps.
"Well," Vanessa says, swirling the last of her apples around the little wooden boat, though they have likely gone cold by now. "You know plenty about me already, I think, and you are with me at almost all times."
She falls quiet for a moment, her expression turning thoughtful.
"I just…" she adds, softer this time. "I do not like the thought of being watched over by someone who still feels like a stranger."
Something unfamiliar stirs in Mike's chest, threatening to rise and tighten somewhere near his throat. He had never really thought of it that way before. To Mike, this is simply duty — he is meant to watch, to protect, to apparently walk her back to the palace at least once a week — but to Vanessa, it is something more personal than that; it is the act of placing her trust and safety in the hands of a man she hardly knows.
Mike tries to imagine if the roles were reversed — not that he would survive a day as a prince, because he is not the sort of man people look at and immediately envision a crown on his head — and finds that the thought does make him uncomfortable, the idea of being followed everywhere by someone whose birthday or middle name he does not even know.
He knows Vanessa's, of course. Those were the sorts of details drilled into him early on, along with the rest of what a royal guard is expected to memorize.
Vanessa Elizabeth Afton.
Born twenty-eight years ago on October twelfth.
Mike glances at her from the corner of his eye, though she is no longer looking at him. Her gaze is fixed somewhere out in the pastures, as though she is not expecting an answer so much as quietly leaving room for one, if he chooses to give it. Perhaps it is that simple gesture that finally gives Mike the confidence to speak.
"My father," he says, "was a drunk."
Mike had not meant to say it like that — so bluntly, with no warning and no graceful way around it — but now that it is out, he knows there is no taking it back. He catches the way Vanessa turns sharply towards him, but Mike keeps his gaze fixed on the road ahead, already bracing for pity or some quiet apology he would not know what to do with.
Instead, Vanessa only looks at him.
When he sneaks a glance at her, he realizes there is no horror on her face — nothing that makes Mike feel like some wounded thing she stumbled upon on the side of the road — but something more contemplative instead, as though she is trying to fit this new piece of him into the version she had already built in her head.
Mike swallows, fighting the urge to shut down the conversation. "He was a coward, too. He left on my eighteenth birthday."
Mike finally turns to face her fully, and her expression shifts into something almost revolted, as though his words have left an acrid taste on her tongue.
"My sister was not even two when he left," Mike continues, the lanterns along the palace walls growing more visible the closer they get.
"You have a sister?" Vanessa asks, finally breaking her silence. Mike finds it almost funny that this, apparently, is the part she chooses to latch onto — not the drunken father, but the sister.
Mike nods. "Her name is Abby. She's nine now."
"Abby," Vanessa repeats, as though committing it to memory. "That's a pretty name."
Mike smiles to himself, nodding in agreement. "I also have a brother. Garrett. He's seventeen."
Vanessa hums a contemplative little sound, still turning the tiny wooden fork over and over between her thumb and forefinger. Mike finds himself wondering whether she even realizes she is doing it, or if her habits come on unconsciously — the same way he never notices himself picking at the calluses on his hands until the skin beneath is red and raw.
"So you are the eldest?" Vanessa asks. There is something akin to recognition in her voice, something almost tender and aching that makes the question feel less like acknowledgement and more like consolation.
Of course Mike knows of Vanessa's younger brother — Prince Michael — though only in the distant, ceremonial way all palace guards are expected to know members of the royal family. If he did not know better, he might almost think that distance has been arranged on purpose, given how often Vanessa and Michael's schedules seem to conflict. The two of them are rarely seen together outside of meals or formal events, and Mike has never been able to tell how close they truly are.
"I am," Mike says, adjusting his grip on hilt of his sword.
"And your mother?" Vanessa asks next, reaching up to push the hood of her cloak down and off her head. Mike has the urge to draw it forward again, but with the castle in sight and no one else on the road, there is no real reason to. The darkening twilight shadows her face more kindly than the hood had, so at least Mike no longer has to strain to make out her features.
"My mother is a baker." Mike smiles fondly to himself as memories from his childhood come rushing back. "She works at the shop on the corner between Briar and Willow."
Vanessa's face immediately brightens. "The one with the blue awning?"
Mike suddenly stops walking, unable to contain his surprise. "You know of it?"
Vanessa lets out a soft giggle, a saccharine sound that Mike realizes he does not hear as often as he would like.
"Of course I know it," Vanessa says, her tone a bit dulcet and playful. "They make the best honey cakes."
Mike feels a strange sense of pride in hearing her say that. He has heard plenty of people praise his mother's baking before, but there is something different about hearing it from Vanessa. Perhaps because she has eaten food from golden plates, drank age-old wine, and attended feasts with entire tables full of delicacies Mike has only ever seen from his place against the wall — and yet sounds sincerely fond of a honey cake bought from a crooked little shop with flour dust in the windows.
"She is very good at what she does," Mike says proudly, walking again so that they are not any later returning home than necessary. Vanessa falls into step beside him, her attention fixed solely on him in a way that leaves him feeling unsettled.
"And you grew up there?" Vanessa asks.
"Nearby," Mike replies. "In the village along the Dewhaven River."
Mike finds himself missing the river frequently. He spent his summers there more often than he spent them at home, running barefoot along the muddy bank with Garrett trailing after him. Mike remembers the warmth of those days more than anything — the sun on his shoulders, the smell of wild grass beneath his feet, his mother calling their names from the riverbank with flour still dusted on her apron because she had come straight from the bakery to fetch them home.
He hasn't been to the river since Abby was born.
"Do you miss them?" Vanessa asks, the question so soft that Mike almost pretends not to hear it.
It would be easier, he thinks, to let the evening sounds swallow her words. Easier to keep walking, to focus on the castle gates growing larger in the distance, to remember himself and the armor on his body and the princess beside him, who has no business knowing the tenderest parts of him.
What is about her that makes Mike want to answer?
Thinking about it makes his skin prickle hot underneath his uniform.
"Every day," Mike admits, exhaling through his nose.
Vanessa goes quiet again, and when Mike looks over, he catches her worrying at her bottom lip with her teeth.
"I'm sorry," she eventually says, and there's a sort of guilt in her tone that only makes Mike feel worse for being honest. "I know it must be hard, given…"
Given me, Mike thinks.
"Given your position," Vanessa finishes, smoothing her gown down with her free hand. She gives him a quiet smile then, the sort that barely touches her mouth and does not reach her eyes at all.
Mike does not answer right away. The road beneath them has turned from dirt to gravel now, and they are close enough that he can make out the silhouettes of guards pacing along the outer wall.
He should be relieved.
Instead, he finds himself wishing the road were longer.
"When the letter asking if I would like to join the royal guard came," Mike says at last, "I nearly refused."
Vanessa slows at that, though she does not stop entirely. Her brows draw together, the faintest flicker of confusion crossing her face.
"Why?" she asks.
Mike considers giving her the simplest answer.
Because it was not the life he imagined for himself. Because the palace had always felt too far away. Because men like him did not belong in halls made of polished marble and candlelight.
All of those things are true enough.
None of them are the truth.
"My family needed me," Mike says finally. "After my mother had Abby, she was… not herself anymore. Then my father left, and she had to take extra shifts at the bakery just to keep food on the table."
Mike blinks away the sudden burn in his eyes. "There were days when it felt as though she had disappeared without ever leaving the room."
Vanessa does not interrupt him, so Mike keeps speaking, even though every word feels as if it has been dragged out of some dusty, locked-away corner of himself.
"She loved Abby," he says, because that feels important to make clear. "She loved all of us. I never doubted that. But after Abby was born, there were days when she could hardly get out of bed. Other days, she would work until her hands shook, then come home and cry because she had burned supper or forgotten to mend Garrett's trousers."
Mike does not look at Vanessa. If he does, he thinks he may lose his nerve entirely.
"I thought it was some sort of mistake," he continues. "The letter came only a month after my father had left, and I had a mother who needed help, a brother who got into fights because he was so angry and frightened, and a baby sister who would scream herself hoarse unless I was the one holding her."
A breeze slips across the road then, catching loose strands of Vanessa's hair and tugging them across her cheek, but she doesn't seem to notice. Her gaze remains fixed on him, steady and intent and searching, and Mike wishes suddenly that she would look elsewhere. At the castle, at the road, at the lanterns flickering awake along the palace walls — anywhere but at him.
"And," Mike says, hating the way his voice threatens to crack, "I thought if I left, I'd be no better than my father."
Mike glances at her quickly before looking away again, the humiliation of having said too much warming his face and tightening in his throat until it hurts to swallow.
"So why didn't you refuse?" Vanessa asks quietly, the slightest rasp in her voice like she's parched or perhaps trying not to cry. "Why did you come?"
Mike doesn't answer for a long while. It is a fair question, he supposes. One he has asked himself more times than he cares to admit, usually in the quiet, half-lit hours before dawn when his body is sore from training and his mind is too awake to grant him any mercy.
Why am I here?
Mike swallows, feeling the answer press against his teeth.
"My mother made me," he finally admits. The faintest smile pulls at his mouth despite himself, because he can remember the conversation as if it only happened yesterday. "She told me I would be a fool if I did not jump at the opportunity."
Vanessa smiles small at that too, though it disappears as soon as Mike catches a glimpse. "She sounds very wise."
"She is," Mike admits, a soft laugh escaping him before he can help it. "She caught me with the letter above the fire. I was going to burn it."
"Burn it?" Mike glances over, surprised by the faint note of disbelief in her voice, and finds her looking at him with her brows lifted just slightly.
"She took the letter from me," Mike says, the fond smile from earlier only widening. "Snatched it right out of my hand. I remember being so angry at her for it."
Vanessa exhales, almost as if she's relieved.
"She told me that staying would not make him any less gone," he continues. Mike takes two more steps before realizing Vanessa is no longer walking. He turns back to find her standing in the road behind him, moonlight spilling pale over her hair, outlining the shape of her and glinting in her eyes.
"She was right," Vanessa says softly, taking a step closer. It occurs to Mike that he should, in fact, step back, but something keeps him rooted in place.
"I know," Mike says, swallowing hard as she stops a mere two paces away from him. "I didn't at the time, but I know now."
Vanessa watches him for a long moment, and Mike cannot help but feel as though she is seeing too much of him.
Not the polished armor or the sword at his hip. Not the guard who stands beside her at council meetings, or the man who pulls her hood over her hair in crowded squares, or the poor unfortunate soul tasked with keeping her from getting herself killed in the name of boredom.
Him.
Just Mike.
It is a strange, unsettling thing to be looked at that way.
"I'm glad you came," Vanessa admits softly, the smile crossing her face almost bashful. "I know it was not easy."
Mike does not know how to answer that. The words lodge themselves uncomfortably in his ribs, too warm and too earnest to brush aside.
"I send most of my wages home," he says, because it feels easier than actually replying to that. "My mother does not have to take as many shifts anymore, Garrett has been apprenticing with a blacksmith, and Abby sends drawings as often as she can."
That finally pulls a real, genuine smile from Vanessa, her looking down at the wooden boat still cradled in her hands. "I should like to meet her one day."
A sudden image of Abby and Vanessa together fills Mike's mind, and he has to look away again as warmth creeps into his face. He is grateful for the dark, and for the fact that he is turned away from the palace lights, where Vanessa will not be able to catch the color rising in his cheeks.
"She would love you," Mike says before he can stop himself.
Vanessa's smile brightens, but it's almost shy, as though it truly matters to her what a nine-year-old baker's daughter might think of her.
"You think so?" she asks, so earnestly Mike can't help but smile too.
He huffs quietly, lowering his gaze to the gravel beneath their feet. "Abby would like anything involving castles and princesses."
"Well," Vanessa says, something amused threading back into her voice, "I am very good at both of those things."
Mike smothers a laugh before Vanessa can look too pleased with herself, gesturing toward the castle. "Come, Your Highness. You must return soon, before the rest of the guard comes searching."
They begin walking again, though with the palace walls looming so close, Mike falls back into his usual position behind her. He misses her presence beside him, but knows better than to let himself dwell on it.
"Sir Schmidt!" a voice shouts from the castle gates, clearly sounding overly relieved at the sight of him not returning alone. "You found her!"
"I often do," Mike mutters, quiet enough that only Vanessa can hear. Her shoulders shake once, her hand rising quickly to her mouth to catch the laugh before it escapes.
"Your Highness," he says, almost breathless, dropping into a bow the moment the two of them are near enough. "Thank God. His Majesty has been—"
"Furious?" Vanessa supplies lightly, and Mike does not miss the way her royal composure pulls taut over her all at once, like a puppet suddenly drawn up by its strings.
The guard hesitates, nearly wincing. "Concerned."
Vanessa hums. "How touching."
The other guard looks to Mike then, silent question in his expression. Mike gives the faintest nod, the one that says yes, she's safe, unharmed, and difficult as ever.
"I found Her Highness in the square," Mike says, his voice steady again by some miracle. Vanessa's gaze cuts toward him, but she says nothing.
"The king has requested that she be brought to him at once," the guard says.
Something in Vanessa's posture changes, subtle enough that perhaps no one else would have noticed. A slight tightening through her shoulders, the smallest shift of her chin, lifting as if to make herself taller or colder or less reachable. Her hands fold neatly before her, hiding the wooden fork and the little apple boat against the folds of gown.
"Very well," Vanessa says, nearly a mumble.
They brush past the guard beneath the archway, and some of the tension in Mike's body eases now that they are back on castle grounds. The courtyard entrance is rather beautiful at night, with lantern light spilling warm across the pale stone paths and the gardens turned silver beneath the moon.
Mike falls into pace behind her again, the shape of duty settling over him like a cloak. It is easier here, at least. Easier to remember what they are when there are walls and guards and watchful eyes to remind him.
Halfway across the path of the courtyard, Vanessa stops, and Mike stops with her.
For a moment, she says nothing, standing there with her back to him. They have stopped between the main gates and the archway, far enough from both that the guards stationed at either end cannot overhear.
Then she turns.
"Mike."
His name from her mouth stops him more thoroughly than any order could have.
It always does, because it is the only thing Vanessa has ever called him. She does not seem to care much for formalities, discarding them as easily as the tight silk gloves she hates but is forced to wear for royal events. He remembers clearly the day he was first brought before her, introduced as Sir Mike Schmidt, only for Vanessa to glance him over one time and say, "It's wonderful to meet you, Mike."
In hindsight, that should have been his first sign of trouble.
"Yes, Your Highness?"
Vanessa's mouth softens, though it does not quite become a smile. She looks tired now, he thinks. Not in the way one looks tired after walking too far, but in the way one looks tired after remembering there is nowhere to go where their own life cannot follow.
Her gaze flickers briefly towards the gate, then back to him.
"When we are alone," she says, voice quieter now, "would you call me Vanessa?"
Oh no.
"That is not…" Mike trails off, because he has no idea how to finish that sentence without sounding like a fool.
Vanessa watches him for another moment, then gives a small, humorous smile, one brow arched. "Allowed?"
He exhales. "Wise."
That seems to surprise her more than he expected, with the way her gaze drops to the ground between them.
"No," she says quietly. "I don't imagine it is."
Mike should agree. He should let the matter end there. He should tell her that the king is waiting, that they have already delayed too long, that it would be best for them both if he remembered his place and she remembered hers.
This princess is going to be the death of him, he thinks.
"Only when we are alone," he murmurs, looking around for watchful, prying eyes. "Only then."
"Only then," she repeats, her eyes lifting to his.
Mike gives one small nod, already regretting it and knowing, with terrible certainty, that he would agree to it again if she asked him twice.
"How generous of you, Sir Schmidt." Vanessa doesn't look at him as she says it, already walking again, but Mike hears the levity in her voice.
"Do not push your luck, Your Highness."
He leads her through the entrance hall, giving short nods to the guards they pass, who all look so relieved that Vanessa has returned in one piece it is nearly amusing. He walks her past the darkened windows and the golden pools of lantern light until they reach the door of her father's study, and Mike does not miss the pained exhale Vanessa releases outside of it.
For a moment, he says nothing.
Neither does she.
The door looms before them, tall and dark and polished to a shine. Mike has stood outside of it plenty of times before, quiet and dutiful while voices carried low through the wood, but he does not think he has ever hated the sight of it more than he does now.
Vanessa's hand tightens around the little wooden boat of apples, then passes it to him without looking. She squares her shoulders then, face smoothing into something composed and distant. The girl from the road disappears behind the princess so quickly that, had Mike not been standing right beside her, he might have convinced himself he had imagined her entirely.
But then she looks at him.
"Thank you," she whispers softly, her gaze fixated somewhere on his armor. "For finding me."
Mike looks down at the little wooden boat in his hand, at the smears of cinnamon and syrup left behind, and thinks of the square at sunset. Of her perched on the fountain with her slipper swinging. Of her smile when he finally took the apple from her fork. Of the way she had listened to him speak of his family as though every word mattered.
Then he looks back at her.
"Always," he says quietly.
Something flickers across Vanessa's face, faint and delicate and gone almost as soon as it appears. Behind the study door, a shadow shifts beneath the crack of light, and Mike reaches for the handle, fingers curling around the cool gold.
"Vanessa," he murmurs.
Her eyes snap back to him.
The name is barely more than a breath, soft enough to be swallowed by the distant hush of the palace before anyone else can catch it.
"Good luck," Mike whispers.
Vanessa's lips part around the smallest, saddest smile.
"Thank you, Mike."
Then he opens the door for her.
Vanessa steps inside without looking back, and Mike closes it behind her with more care than he needs to.
For a long moment, he stands there in the hall with her empty apple boat in one hand and the memory of the evening replaying in his mind. Then he straightens, folds his hands behind his back, and takes his place beside the door.