The Princess and Her Knight

The palace was too quiet for my liking.

After the disaster of the Royal Hunt (and more or less breaking my arm—but who's counting?), Mother and Father had decided I required "quiet reflection." In practice, this meant being confined indoors with a never-ending parade of courtiers bearing fruit baskets and sympathetic smiles.

I despised it.

"I'm like a flower dying in a vase," I muttered one afternoon, yanking Whiskers onto my lap. He protested loudly, but I was emotionally needy, and he was very bad at saying no.

My etiquette instructor, Miss Beatrice, lingered near the window, pretending not to notice as I collapsed with great suffering onto the divan. She straightened a vase of drooping roses, likely trying to deliver a wordless lecture on dignity.

It did not work.

I flung my head back. "Trapped! Caged! Shackled by my own noble blood!"

Whiskers let out a sigh so pointed, I considered awarding him an honorary title in drama.

At least the court gossip proved mildly entertaining. News spread through the palace like wildfire through dry straw: tales of the hunt, of my "untamable spirit," of poor Elias carrying me back to the palace like some tragic heroine plucked from the pages of a romance.

I'd overheard two maids whispering this very morning.

"Did you hear?" one breathed. "Young Elias is begging the master-at-arms to train him. Says he wants to be a knight!"

"A knight?" the other gasped. "For her? Can you imagine?"

I had almost dropped my tea.

A knight? My knight?

The thought settled in my chest like a spark in kindling. Elias—the quiet boy who kept to the shadows, who never pushed, who simply saw. Elias, who had leapt into the woods without hesitation and carried me home as if I were precious.

My Elias. Who had made a vow with more conviction than most kings.

And suddenly, the palace didn't feel quite so quiet anymore.

That evening, I stole a moment alone in the library. Moonlight poured through the stained-glass windows, painting the floor in fractured jewels. I pressed my forehead to the cool glass, thoughts whirling.

I wasn't supposed to have knights yet. That came later, after declarations and ceremonies and scrolls sealed in wax. For now, I was merely a decorative royal—ornamental and inconvenient, with too many opinions and not enough obedience.

But perhaps—I didn't need to wait.

If Elias wished to be my knight, I wouldn't just allow it.

I would claim it.

Not with trumpets or titles. Not yet. But with something truer.

Vow for vow. Heart for heart.

He would train. He would fight. And when the world came crashing in—the weight of duty, the sharp tongues of courtiers, the impossible expectations—I would not face it alone.

He would be there, standing between me and the storm.

And I, Charlotte of House Everbrook, would never fall without a hand reaching back for mine.

A slow smile curled across my lips as I traced a finger along the chilled stone windowsill.

"Very well, Elias," I whispered into the moonlight. "Train hard. Because one day, I'll ask you to kneel."

Not as a servant.

As mine.

I straightened my crooked crown and swept down the hallway with purpose, already dreaming:

The princess and her knight.

Not from a fairy tale.

From my story.

And heaven help anyone who dares stand in our way.