The skewer tasted as it always had: salty and a dash of spice, with crispy charred edges and a juicy center. I took small bites while Tomas devoured his, even licking the wooden stick after he was done.

  “My Lady. It’s so good to see you and the young Lord again,” the old lady said as I approached her stall, nodding toward Ben up ahead. She pushed my hand back when I offered her a few coins. “How can I take payment from our savior? You know, we were all so worried when we heard they left you down in the dungeon alone. Nearly dragged out your good-for-nothing party members when we got word that you miraculously appeared back at the Lord’s Manor.”

  “Drag… them… out?” I gulped.

  Justin was right! They were going to get lynched.

  “Please… they were all injured and near death. I made them go back.”

  “Of course, you would say that, child. One of my boys told me he heard you sing. Said it sounded like the voice of an angel. Stirred him right back up onto his feet, healing him whole.”

  “I wish I had heard Jo sing,” Tomas grumbled, his boyish face pouting.

  The wizened woman cracked a scraggly-toothed grin at Tomas. “Me too, boy.” She handed him another sizzling skewer. “But you seem awfully close to the Lady, enough to make the young Lord jealous.”

  “Ben’s not jealous,” I protested, but then I caught him staring at us before one of his friends pulled him away.

  Tomas puffed out his chest. “I’m Jo’s special friend.”

  “Really? I heard she’s promised to someone very special. I hope he forgives us for being the reason her face is marred.”

  “Wait a minute. That’s not the reason...”

  Tomas cut me off. “That’s what makes her so beautiful to me.”

  The old lady cackled. “You are a wise boy.” She dropped a couple of wrapped candies into Tomas’ hand. “Enjoy your dance.”

  The stall owner waved me back when Tomas dashed off to the next stall.

  “My Lady. Know that a strange, rather short and dirty foreigner with straight black hair has been asking around about you the last few days. She seems rather suspicious, so none of us said a thing, but others might have.”

  “Thank you…” My words trailed as I looked at her expectantly.

  “Wyla, my Lady. Old Wyla’s always at your service.”

  We caught up with the others perusing the various stalls. They were all enjoying themselves. Their cheerful faces glowed softly under the light of the lanterns. Boys and girls laughed, stuffing their cheeks with candied apples, cream-filled buns, and sticky taffy threads.

  The velvet and suede of Ben’s noble friends, and frills and lace of my maids’ new dresses joined the sea of rough linen and pilled cotton. No one batted an eye at Ben lining up to bob for apples from the barrel, or at Claire and Nellin bursting into manic giggles when the bottles they were trying to fish out dropped.

  Here amongst the lively music, the warmth from the bonfire drifting in, and bubbling conversation from the throngs of village children, they were all just kids enjoying the festivities.

  It was funny that I was the one out of place. I was stuck staring as streams of villagers passed me by, giving me a wide berth. I had been one of them once: a village girl running and laughing with her friends past festival stalls. A laughter that had grown more faded and tired over the cycles, until I could barely manage a hollow croak as my friends left me behind.

  It didn’t matter. This was but a brief interlude before the fighting and the searing pain.

  I shook my head, stumbling a step. That sense of vertigo had taken hold of me in the midst of my self-indulgence.

  A little girl ran up to me, cute with pigtails, looking actually five. She stared at me with large eyes, holding up a single blue flower in her small dirt-smeared hands.

  I bent at the knees, dipping my head forward. A prick of my scalp, and she stabbed the flower into my hair. The dam broke, and a deluge of other kids followed, each stabbing another flower until my hair was overflowing with them.

  Miona appeared out of nowhere and fixed my hair, staunching the drip of flowers as I walked.

  She cradled the overflow against her chest. “I will hold these for you, My Lady. Your hair can’t hold any more.”

  “No, place them in a basket. No one will take them. Go have fun with the others, please.”

  I nudged her lightly toward the festival grounds.

  Tomas ran up to me and presented me with a painted egg.

  “I won it at the dart contest,” he declared proudly.

  I turned the egg in my hand. It was dyed with blue waves and dusted with gold glitter, like stars over the sea. “It’s beautiful. I will treasure it then.”

  “No, it’s cream-filled.” He pulled a ribbon attached to the egg, and the top half came off, revealing the firm egg white underneath. “You and I are each supposed to take a bite out of it.”

  “Okay?” I could sense some innuendo behind this, but it felt harmless enough to me.

  I took a bite, and it tasted of egg white with sweet cream underneath, exactly what I expected.

  Tomas took a bite, and a smattering of giggles and cheers rippled around us.

  So it was some couple’s ritual. I had never heard of it, but since it didn’t involve any physical touching, [Virtuous] didn’t react.

  Basically harmless, except for a little blush on Tomas’s face.

  Ben stormed over to me and grabbed my hand. “It’s time for the dance.”

  “But she said we could dance together,” Tomas protested.

  Ben’s eyes flared at him. “This is our tradition.”

  For all of three years…

  But I didn’t make a scene of it. With Ben being so busy at the Academy, we hadn’t been able to see much of each other lately.

  I’m sure he felt bad about not being there while I was trapped in that delirious haze.

  Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

  I patted Tomas’s arm. “It’s alright. We can dance afterwards. Like I mentioned, this isn’t a very formal thing. It’s just for fun.”

  Ben led me toward a circular clearing before the bonfire. The light from the wreaths of flames danced over the dirt, and a line of people had already gathered around it.

  “He’s just a kid, Ben.”

  Ben was silent, his face tense as he pushed past the line and around the band of musicians.

  At the center of the dance area, he turned to me.

  “He’s the prince. And his mother plotted the attack.” He pulled me in against himself. A few notes were plucked as a fiddle was being tuned. “Father told me. And he told me you stopped him from going to the king about it.”

  “It’s better that way.”

  “Why? So you could use her against the Queen? What have you gotten yourself into, Jo?”

  Ben called out to the fiddler. “A slower number to start please.”

  He turned back to me and led me into a simple waltz. He had gotten a lot better with his dancing. “I didn’t mention this last time, but your face when you left the garden with the Queen… The despair. I had never seen you like that before. Please let me help.”

  I followed his steps, my hands pressed against his as we moved before the heat of the bonfire. “It’s complicated. Let me figure out what I want first, and then I can tell you.”

  He bit his lip as he looked into my eyes, his fingers tightening around mine. “That evening, when you were screaming at the dinner table, that sound ripped me apart inside. I felt so powerless.”

  “I’m sorry, Brother, that was entirely my fault.”

  He stepped around me and led me in a simple turn with enough flourish to draw cheers from the crowd.

  “I’m not going to let the Queen or anyone else take you away.”

  A new tune started, more lively and upbeat, and the crowd surged onto the dance floor. Claire took Ben’s hand and twirled him away from me. Tomas took his place, a wide grin stretched across his face, and we started dancing as well.

  People were singing and laughing as they hopped and spun about. No room for heavy words or discussions, just simply losing oneself to plucked notes and the beat of the drums.

  We exchanged partners and danced in a line. I hooked my arms around my girls, Ben’s friends, and random villagers. Even little kids that came and grabbed my hands.

  I danced with Ben some more as well. By the end of it he seemed more relaxed, laughing with a warm cider in hand like everyone else.

  He’s also still just a kid.

  —

  “Wow, the moon looks so large and round tonight,” Tomas said, sitting on a log beside me as we watched the dancing wind down. Couples were trickling away, leaving only clusters of kids and singles. The bonfire was dying down to red lines crawling over the charred husks.

  “It’s a harvest moon. And you’re right, it does look beautiful.”

  The moon sat alone high up in a cloudless, velvet-black sky, its enormous body radiating a haunting reddish-orange like the embers of the dying flames.

  Tomas scooted closer to me. “Jo, I’m sorry about letting it slip that it was your idea. I just couldn’t figure out any other way to convince them.”

  “I doubt my name helped much.” I smiled gently down at his innocent face. “I shouldn’t have pushed you into doing that anyway.”

  “Don’t… Please don’t give up on me.” He reached for my hand, and I extended it to him. “I don’t want to be just someone you’re saddled with.”

  “You’re not. I was just asking for too much.”

  “I know you don’t want this arrangement.” Tomas said bitterly, clutching my hand. “Can you see the future, Jo?”

  I frowned, shaking my head. “Where did this come from?”

  “When you choked me, you said I would betray you. Your eyes were so serious and so sad. You also said it before. It’s like you knew it would happen.”

  I forced another smile. “That was a memory. I’ve been betrayed in the past, and I can’t let go.”

  “Memory? But…”

  “I’m strange, Tomas. I’ve memories of another me that’s been betrayed over and over. That’s why we aren’t a good fit. It’s better if you go with someone innocent with a clean slate.” I gestured over to the smoldering remains of the bonfire. “Not an old and worn-out soul like me.”

  “I don’t want innocent and clean!” he cried, his grip tightening. “I want you! I want your violet eyes looking at me! You’re the only one who sees. I want you talking to me! Your voice. Your words! I can’t get them out of my head!”

  My eyes drifted to the bar above his head. It was orange like the moon above.

  Sighing, I shook my head. “You’re going to have needs that I can’t fulfill. I know this from the past.”

  I had often wondered why [Virtuous] would not allow me to kiss or even think passionately about someone that I was in a proper relationship with.

  How would a wife be [Virtuous] and have children?

  It didn’t make any sense, until I realized [Virtuous] was just a condition in a game. A condition unique to one general: me.

  I was not meant to live past nineteen. I was only meant to be the Maid.

  A terminal condition.

  “I know you know a lot better than me… but, I want to try. Don’t you?” The golden of his eyes reflected the moon as he pleaded.

  Again, what do I want?

  I was pulled in so many different directions: by my past memories, and my present sensibilities, by the schemes of my own and others.

  And by the conflict over what I had been.

  Perhaps there’s some part of me holding back because I had been a him in the distant past?

  “Don’t you at least like me a little?”

  His words pulled apart a knot inside me and I laughed cathartically.

  I'm overthinking and worrying too much again. He’s just a simple, innocent boy. No harm can come from him breaking things off. I’ve already made sure of that.

  “Begging doesn’t suit a prince.” I reached up and pinched his cheek. “Of course I like you, and I care about you. Else we wouldn’t be here. But I do want to give you a fair warning.”

  After the tension faded from his face, I continued. “Now your discretion does need a bit of work…”

  —

  We were still talking when I sensed a presence approaching me from behind. I turned, and the little girl with pigtails yelped, jumping back.

  “I’m sorry, Lady Blue Flower. But, please, I really need your help!”

  Now, staring at her more closely, I saw that in addition to her hands, her face was smeared with dirt as well. Streaks of tears trailed down her cheek.

  “What is it?”

  “My mother…” She rubbed her swollen eyes, sniffling. “She went to the plague house to take care of my brother. But now… she’s the only one left there. I heard she’s very sick.”

  A burst of sobs racked her before she managed to hold it down. “Please, she’s all alone. They said you’re a saint. Please… sing to her.”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t have my voice because I’ve been sick. However…”

  [System Rebuild] had throttled my attributes, which had locked down my [Divine Knight] abilities, but… my gaze shot down to my bracelet. I hadn’t used the ‘clear one ailment’ charge of my bracelet in quite a while.

  It’d been basically wasted.

  Now, there was a mother dying alone because she sacrificed herself to take care of her son.

  The tightness gripping my chest made me want to laugh.

  Of course, I can’t let it go.

  “Take me to her. There’s something I can try.”

  “Wait, Jo. You can’t go to a plague house after you just recovered!” Tomas cried out.

  I waved the old guard captain over. “I will be fine. That kind of sickness won’t affect me.”

  Tomas spun away, his eyes darting about wildly before settling upon the figures of Ben and his friends. He was about to shout at Ben when I pulled him back.

  “I know you care for me. And I know I had gotten hurt when I said I’d be safe before. But can you try trusting me again?”

  Tomas’ shoulders slumped and he slowly nodded.

  After I made sure the guard captain would escort Tomas back to our inn and keep him there, I took one last look at the festival grounds. The lanterns were still lit, but stalls were shutting down: grills fires extinguished, racks being covered, and carts rolled away. Festival goers still milled about in scattered groups.

  Ben was laughing with his friends.

  My maids were talking to a few villagers, some of them must have had family here that they hadn’t seen in a while.

  I can slip away.

  As I followed the little girl down the cobbled stone street, I sensed another pair of eyes trailing after us. Not the guards or my girls. This one was more intense, a piercing gaze boring down my back.

  Whoever it was moved quickly between the shadows, always staying out of sight when I snapped back. But I could taste the sweet and bitter lining of their soul.

  It wasn’t hard to guess who this might be.

  I had already been warned.