Chapter Three: The first meeting

"What?"

"There's an intruder-"

"I know, I heard you the first time." He cut in impatiently. "How do you know and why wait so long to tell me?" He asked anxiously. Bless his heart, he was always worried about her.

"I just discovered it while Livia was talking. It's the shoes, the person wasn't wearing the palace sanctioned shoes." She explained, pacing in front of him.

"What if they just forgot to change?"

"You know they have heavy protocol when it comes to these things. Plus," She paused. "They were Pelagios made. I'd recognise the leather and craftsmanship anywhere."

"Why do you think they snuck in?"

"If I knew, I wouldn't be telling you. I'd be out there stopping them."

"Maybe it's a thief?"

She shook her head. "Shoes are too expensive to be that of a common thief. The posture seems regal too, not something that a person just imitated. Besides, if they were just a thief, they wouldn't need to come to this hall where we're all gathered. Its too big of a risk unless they were actually after one of us. Which i highly suspected is me."

"Assassination attempt then?"

"Possibly. I'm sure more people than Livia and Lucius were furious about the trial results. They've definitely been preparing to house Livia for years and then I come in, throwing the whole plan off." She bit her lip, a nervous habit she had yet to get rid of. She already prepared herself for the trouble that would come with being chosen by the council, but this wasn't quite part of the events she had zeroed her mind on.

"So what's the plan?" Aulus said, gearing up to fight.

"I need you to stand down and do nothing."

He faltered. "What?" Looking at her like she had gone mad. Which, to be fair, sounded like it.

"I need you to stand down and do nothing." She repeated. "Don't alert the guards, I have my personal ones who will be discreet. I told you about this just so I could have you as back up." She said firmly.

"So what are you planning to do if we can't alert the rest of the palace about the intruder?"

"I'm going to find them. The person I saw had the build of a man but you could never be too sure. He walked in with Livia's guards." She said, sighing heavily.

"...You suspect she has something to do with this?" He asked, voice going lower with worry.

"It's possible. It's also possible he hijacked one of her guards and the poor fella is hurt somewhere now. That's why I didn't ask the others to grab the intruder as soon as I noticed. I'll find him and find out what they want, if he wanted to kill me or the rest of the family, he could have easily tried when the Empress left. There's no use causing problems on my wedding day, goddess knows when next they'll find a good enough date for it."

"I understand."

"I'm leaving now. I need you to track me with the crystal, just in case something happens."

He scoffed. "I was going to do that anyway, even if you said not to."

She smiled and squeezed his hands gratefully.

"Be careful." He whispered to her back as she walked out of the hall to find the imposter that had found their way into her space.

*****

She walked around the empty halls of the palace, knowing the intruder wouldn't stick to the places with people, but wouldn't be too far from the main hall as well if he was actually targeting her. She wondered if he was a magic user to be able to maneuver the palace security system, brute force alone was not enough to defeat them and they could only sneak in if someone withing the family brought them. She sighed, hoping her sister wasn't stupid enough to be part of this.

Livia was ambitious, yes. A pompous ass who had made Analeigh's life hell since they were old enough to understand their positions in the palace, but she wasn't a fool. She would gain nothing from this, other than getting exiled when discovered. If she truly did plan this to harm Analeigh, it was sloppy. Certainly not her best work.

She soon got tired of walking around in her heavy robes over her equally heavy dress so she stopped to take them off.

'I'll just wear them back once it's time'. She thought, no use logging extra weight around when she would possibly have to fight whoever snuck in.

She undid the tie at the back of the robe and carefully placed it on the hooks usually reserved for the servants coats. She considered folding it and placing it on the floor but thought about the reaction she would get if her maidservants saw that. Amaryllis might burn her with her eyes if she even heard about it so servants hook it is. She moved to take off the headpiece given to her as well.

It truly was a wonderful work of art. She found that it was her perfect size too and briefly wondered if the spell on it also included resizing, like her personal armour that she stole from her brother and made her own. She was still studying the pretty headdress when she felt a presence behind her.

She moved just fast enough to dodge the swing of the blade just at her elbow, looking back to see a masked man, definitely the sane man she saw before, gearing up to swing again.

She dodged the attack barely, light on her feet but obviously no match for the master swordsman this person definitely was. She kept dodging and walking backwards until her back hit a door of a room, just like she wanted. She swiftly entered the room, which held some of her father's prized swords that he kept on display, picked a katana and parried the next attack as soon as the man caught up with her.

She was by no means weak or unused to sword fights, as she had practiced all through her childhood and teenage years with Aulus, the palace guards and at some point, even Lucius. This person was skilled, blocking each attempt of hers to land a hit so calmly she felt he was toying with her.

"You know, the proper thing to do at a wedding is to greet the bride and wish her a long life of prosperity." She grunted, blocking off another harsh attempt at landing a hit on her shoulder. So far, this person seemed to be playing around, not using his full strength. It angered her but she supposed she should be grateful he wasn't actually trying his hardest to kill her. Being underestimated always worked out in her favour anyway.

Making a half step turn, she threw out a few needles she had up the sleeves of her dress just for this moment. Evidently the other person didn't expect it cus she saw his eyes widen, the only visible part of his face, before trying to dodge it. Unfortunately for him, and very fortunate for Analeigh, one landed in his upper arm and he grunted in pain.

"You're lucky I didn't carry the ones with fatal poison today, you're not going to be able to move that arm for some minutes though." She grinned, happily using the side of her sword to hit him in the shin. He barely flinched, she noted, either very good at feigning nonchalance or having a high pain tolerance. Both possibilities amused her, it had been a while since she fought someone actively trying to hurt her.

With one hand out of commission, she found it easy to fight back, even enjoying it now that she wasn't actively fighting for her life. She watched as he moved expertly with his good hand, apparently unfazed by his dominant hand being useless, she felt a hint of jealousy at that. She wished to be that good at sword combat.

"Who are you?"

Silence.

"Who sent you?"

Silence again.

"Why are you here?"

...you guessed it again. Silence.

"Hasn't anyone ever told you that being silent when being addressed is rude?" She said, increasing the frequency of her attacks. She was slowly getting used to his fighting style, obviously heavily impaired by the fact that he wasn't using his dominant hand.

"Hasn't anyone ever told you that using dirty methods while fighting is dishonorable?" He spoke for the first time, voice unnaturally gravelly and rough. He was distorting his voice on purpose, she realized, so it had to be someone that had an identity to protect. She mentally combed through her guests and hoped to the goddess that her sister wasn't actually so stupid to do this. Not because she cared if she was exiled, but she definitely didn't need public scrutiny on her ascension. It was bad enough that news about her family's objection to her position had been spread to other noble families, she didn't need her first act as Queen to be the banishment of her sister. As much as it would please her to do it, the general public wouldn't take kindly to it as family was supposed to be above everything. The court of nobles would be against her too considering Livia was a court favourite. Everythng about this situation put her at a disadvantage and she hated it.

"I hardly doubt the ministry of ethics would fault the heir apparent to the throne for doing whatever she could to avoid getting killed by an assassin." She grinned when he huffed in frustration when he missed a hit once again.

"Good point."

"What a logical fellow, are you sure you can't put the sword down so we can chat?" She narrowly missed the sword being buried into her stomach.

"I'm afraid that can't happen, what if you decide to kill me instead?"

"Fair point. Would you believe me if I said i would never do that?" She grinned, dancing around him to land a hit at the back of his thighs.

"I'm afraid not." He sounded amused as he stepped back a few paces, no longer within her range, swinging his sword in a very characteristic way that Analeigh recognised in an instant. She stopped moving.

"I can't believe I didn't realise it all this time."

"What?" He asked, doing the move again and hitting the wall behind her instead her arm, thanks to her moving out of the way.

She reached into the open sleeves of her dress and threw out a new set of needles, this time lodging three in his other arm. She threw another set at his legs, making him fall down with a yelp. Once she was sure he was fully incapacitated, she stepped over him with a sword, pulling off his guard mask, smile no longer on her face.

"What exactly do you think you're doing?"

On the floor, looking pathetic and bullied, was her dear husband-to-be.

Prince Leonidas Pelagios.