Regis was reading in his chair by the window a few days later, listening to Charlotte mutter under her breath. Despite her more normal workload now—his majesty of Adife had arrived yesterday afternoon—he was still allowed in the library while she was working, since he was quiet. He suspected that she’d have rather been alone, so she could focus without worrying about anyone watching, but since the point of his stay was so he could see her as she was when no one was watching Charlotte was trying to be kind.

Charlotte’s muttering turned into a mimed conversation where one voice was high and complaining while the other one was snapping and exasperated.

“Why,” she said, and he looked up to see her staring at some papers on her desk, the quill bending in her hand, “can’t I say that to his face?” The quill broke and she looked at it for a moment, blushing, before setting it aside on a blotting cloth and choosing a new one. Then, blushing even more, she glanced up, as if she’d forgotten she wasn’t completely alone.

Their eyes met for a moment, and then she cleared her throat and went back to work.

“You see?” she said as they walked down the halls to the dinning room for lunch. “That has to have broken at least part of the illusion that I’m not a heavy complainer.”

When Regis couldn’t think of an answer for that she sighed as if she’d taken silence to mean she was right.

The problem was that Regis couldn’t figure out how to tell her, without sounding offensive to the King of Adife, that he was pretty sure she had ever right to be upset today. While Adife was never exactly friendly to Pearlessagate, Regis was pretty sure this particular king was being extra condescending—towards everything from the country to the food to Charlotte herself—and outside of the library Regis hadn’t seen a hint that the many subtle comments had gotten under her skin. He admired her control and restraint, especially when the king talked about his daughter—she was Charlotte’s age, but married, with a son and another child on the way, and the king kept calling her a ‘good child’ and saying she was a ‘perfect daughter’ and a ‘perfect princess.’ Everyone else in attendance had reacted, even if only to reflexively tighten their grip on whatever they were holding, but Charlotte had stayed entirely calm, and kept managing polite smiles and small talk.

If they were still back in the library Regis might have said something, but out in the open halls, especially when Adife was known for its intricate spy network—Geo might be able to block them all everywhere, but that seemed a risky assumption—he figured he should follow Charlotte’s example and keep more critical thoughts to himself. The last thing he wanted to do was make this more difficult for her.

He also wasn’t sure what Charlotte would say if he admitted that he actually found her quiet, behind-closed-doors reaction kind of cute.

The king was no less condescending to her during lunch, and Charlotte bore it like the queen she was. Even when she calmly called him on one of his more blatant snubs, it was with regality. Regis didn’t stare at her in admiration, because of etiquette, but when Nem caught his eye she looked knowing.

After lunch Charlotte had meetings of various kinds and a fitting for the ball in two days, so he spent the time with Nem. They walked around the orchard and talked about her irrigation system overhaul, Irene’s war, and everything else interesting that the other had missed. She had to see the royal library, Regis insisted, or she’d never seen any library.

By dinner Regis felt cheerful. Cheer wasn’t a usual emotion for him, enough that Nem looked smug about it. Oddly, when Charlotte smiled at him in welcome it wasn’t quite like usual. Perhaps she hadn’t had time for her pre-dinner snack.

After dinner was a play, and Regis sat next to her, but she still seemed out of sorts. It shouldn’t have bothered him, since she had to be tired, and he knew she was stressed, but it still did.

Charlotte only had an hour the next morning in the library, and Regis could tell that she was still unhappy about something. She had every right to be. The King of Adife had looked smug during breakfast, so the renegotiation likely wasn’t going well on Pearlessagate’s side. She broke another quill, this one while she was writing so it ruined the nearly-full sheet. She stared at it for a moment with her princess expression, but then she blinked, betraying the odd shine to her eyes.

“You can’t even take five minute breaks?” he asked.

Charlotte looked up in surprise. “Oh. No. I wish I could, but by all rights this letter takes two hours and I only have one. Now I have to rewrite it. You don’t have to stay, you know—the day is lovely and I’m not trying to keep you cooped up in here.”

Regis went still without realizing it. At the moment she was some mix of half girl half princess, and unless he was mistaken she’d just asked him to leave.

“I’ll leave if you want me to,” he said.

“No,” she said, “that’s not—” she looked out the window. “Nem’s here, and I don’t want to steal you from her.”

“Nem’s not why I’m here,” he said.

“Of course,” she said, turning back to letter, “never mind, forget I said all of that.”

When her hour was up she looked the letter over ruefully. “No, I can’t send that. I’ll have to finish it tonight. I was hoping to get to bed early, but oh well.”

Regis got up to walk to the door with her. “Remember,” he said, “he’s just sore they lost the, ah, Addavian gift.” A few hundred years ago Irene’s Gift had been known as the Addavian gift, and as far as Regis knew no one in the Addavian royal family had forgotten it.

Charlotte’s smile broke out from behind the carefully controlled look, laughter in her eyes, but when he opened the door for her one of her ladies in waiting was standing with her hand poised to knock, and she hurried Charlotte away.

Regis didn’t see her again until the night after that, at a ball held for all of the nobility or otherwise higher class in the area. Then she took the first dance with him, and he managed to get her to laugh. He laughed more than he should have, happy to see her happier. He didn’t think the happiness was fake. Perhaps negotiations were going better. The King of Adife made an appearance, but didn’t dance. Instead he was watching her carefully. Regis noticed it, since he couldn’t dance more than a few dances with her, and he spent a lot of time watching her.

Otherwise he spent the time talking, or at least being talked at a lot. Iles was the dukedom he lived in, after all, so he’d met most of the people in attendance—and, of course, the story had spread far and wide. He hadn’t looked forward to that. At least most were too polite to reference it, but he could read curiosity in their expressions. Instead they asked him how life was, what he thought of the palace—polite sorts of things.

“Have you seen the royal library?” the lord Trint asked.

“Yes,” Regis said, and didn’t tell him that it was open to everyone. He’d move there.

“Is it as fabulous as everyone says?”

“More,” Regis said. “I’ve never seen so many books at once, and that was only the main room.”

Trint asked him a little more about it, but then hesitated. Regis waited, wondering if he, like everyone else, would simply move on, or if he’d say something. He could be blunt. Trint took a drink from the glass he was holding, studying him. “I’ve always wondered why you went to the fighting contest every year. You’re more of a scholar than a fighter.”

Regis wasn’t sure he’d go that far, but didn’t contradict him.

“And how is the illusion breaking going?” he asked.

Regis shrugged. He wasn’t going to tell him that he’d only found it wasn’t an illusion.

Trint was still studying him. “I do have one question—I hope you won’t be offended. It’s a natural one. Everyone’s thinking it.” Then he paused.

“What is it?” Regis asked when Trint seemed to be waiting for an answer.

“Are you sure you won’t be offended?” he asked.

“I don’t know yet.”

“Is it just to get close to a princess? A brush with royalty?”

Regis had been watching Charlotte, hardly paying attention, but at that he turned to stare at Trint in utter amazement.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“It’s a natural question,” Trint said.

Was that really what Trint thought? That he’d lied about why? Could Trint possibly actually—Regis decided that was disgusting and walked away.

He found himself at the refreshment table before he turned back to the dancers as the song ended and they drifted to the edges of the floor.

The question had to have been on Trint’s mind for a while to ask it that blatantly. He knew Trint well enough for that.

Who else thought that? Two seconds’ thought told him that Trint was right about it being a natural question. Did everyone else think that of him?

“Stop clenching your hand muscles like that,” someone said, and he turned to find Charlotte next to him.

“You’re not dancing?” he asked. There was another one starting up.

“Dancing all night is not my idea of a good ball.”

Regis had to smile at her, and looked down at his hand to carefully relax the muscles without dropping the glass. At least he hadn’t seized up completely. Nem had been working on him for years to stop him from doing that.

“What did he say?” she asked.

Regis stopped his hand from clenching again. He might break the glass. “Nothing important.”

“Come now,” she said, “Geo will already feel uneasy that you don’t look furious even though my guess is that you are.”

“Is it that easy to tell?” he asked with a sigh. “Nem will scold me.”

“It was her worried glances as much as anything,” Charlotte said, “but I’ve been around you a lot the last week, and I’ve seen plenty of your emotions. Almost all of them are subtle changes, and if you can catch the subtlety you can call them what they are. Right now you’re angry.”

“I stupidly didn’t realize what other people might think—what ulterior motives they could accuse me of.”

“Then they’re the stupid ones,” she said.

Regis could feel himself blushing. “Is is that obvious?”

“You’ve even convinced Geo.”

Now Regis stared at her, so shocked he vaguely thought he might end up breaking the glass anyway.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Charlotte said with a smile, “he still thinks you might be spying on me, or have all sorts of twisted motivations that might involve assassinating me or something equally as horrifying, but he can’t deny the obvious.”

Regis picked a bite-sized raspberry cake from the table so he didn’t have to look at her while her eyes laughed.

“The more innocent you act the more suspicious he is,” she said when he could look at her again. She was still smiling. “That’s his way. Now, tell me where you are in the book about Irene’s war.”

“Oh,” he said, “I’m rereading it now. I just reread the chapter about the ball.”

“I love that chapter so much,” Charlotte said with a yet wider grin. “I would adore Tanaya for that moment even if she’d done nothing else in the war.”

“Her strength is amazing,” he said. “I’d almost disbelieve it was possible except—” he cut off before he said he saw the same strength in Charlotte. “Well, they did win,” he added hurriedly.

“I wish I had that kind of strength,” Charlotte said. “They faced impossible odds. On the young side of teenagers, and they did it anyway.”

“At the end they were sixteen,” Regis said.

“Doesn’t count,” Charlotte said promptly. “They’d already kept their resolve long enough by then that it wasn’t exactly a surprise when they kept going.”

Regis shook his head. “Lesser women would have crumbled.”

“Is that why you say sixteen, so you can call them women instead of girls?” Charlotte asked.

Regis paused. He had said that. “No,” he said. Then he frowned to himself. The term girl sounded—not weak, but without responsibility. So why did he think of Charlotte as the girl and the princess?

Because Charlotte the girl wasn’t the one who took the responsibility of a queen. She did, in some ways, but she was so young. So carefree.

“Girls aren’t the ones carrying backbreaking loads,” he said.

“So most females aren’t women,” Charlotte said, and Regis smiled, realizing he had implied that.

“I suppose I only apply that to teenagers—or worse, younger—who have that kind of load and carry it willingly.”

“So you could call a nine-year-old a woman?” she asked.

“I hope I never find out.”

Charlotte was quiet for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” Regis said. “That’s a serious topic, and this is a ball.”

“No,” she said, “this is a conversation.” She took a small treat from the table and tried it. “So,” she said, focusing in that, “have you had enough of watching me mutter darkly at papers?”

Regis paused, taking a moment to follow the topic jump. “Why?”

“It seems like it would be boring,” she said.

“The library isn’t bad,” he said.

“Is that all?” she asked.

“No.”

Charlotte was smiling, and shook her head. “I break quills in frustration and you don’t call me complaining and troublesome?”

“Complaining would be shirking,” he said. “As far as I can tell you still only complain about things you have a right to.”

“I complain about his majesty of Adife,” she said, trying to keep the smile on her face. “I should expect that.”

“Why would that make him any less unpleasant?” Regis asked.

“Alright, you don’t seem to mind much complaining,” Charlotte said. “But those quills are expensive.”

“Really?” he asked. “They look exactly like the ones Nem and I use, and Nem’s thrifty enough we get them from birds one of our neighbors plucks.”

“They can’t be that similar,” she said.

“Well, I haven’t seen yours up close,” he said, “but I swear they’re from the same type of bird.”

“Maybe it’s the cut that makes them expensive,” she said.

Regis shook his head, trying not to smile too much. She was just smiling, too, so he could hardly help it.

“And no,” he said, “that doesn’t make me think you’re troublesome.”

“Surely it’s a fault,” she said.

“I suppose,” he said. “I never said I thought you were flawless.”

Charlotte wasn’t smiling anymore. “Now that’s dangerous.”

“Why?” he asked.

“That’s a conversation for another time,” she said. “In the meantime, would you care to dance?”