“When I was a little girl, my breathing affliction never seemed as frightening as it does now. Back then, my mother would be the first to help me feel less afraid when I couldn’t breath. She’d act as though I just needed to go a little slower for a moment. She would rub my back, and speak quietly, but… better yet, she… she always looked at me calmly and… lovingly. Like there wasn’t a bone in her body that believed that there was a reason to be scared.” Alina let out a long shaky breath and gripped her interlaced fingers more tightly.

“It made me feel like it was just something that occasionally happens and I shouldn’t worry.” Alina felt her voice rasp as she recalled the familiar soft hands of her mother's hands working soothing gentle lines on her back. The warmth in her gaze, the beautiful smile on her face…

“It wasn’t until I was eight that I noticed that father always needed to leave the room when it happened, and… it was then I learned that he couldn’t see me like that without getting frightened, and he couldn’t hide it. Sometimes he would apparently cry and beg the Gods to stop making me suffer outside the room while I’d have an attack. It apparently was even worse when I happened to catch a cold. It taught me to be scared because… well… he was scared. A King. My father… My father who was always in control and kind… I wondered if it meant I was secretly dying…”

Reese Flint turned and stared at the Princess, his bruised face turning sorrowful.

“I told my brother about it, when he came to visit from Sorlia– it was during his first year training under Duke Iones, and… he told me that both he and my father would be terrified out of their minds together when it happened, and that it was just because that he and father loved me too much to ever see me struggle for a moment of my life.”

“Your brother has always adored you,” Reese reminded with a small smile.

“Yes… h-he gave me my first lute when I had told him I wanted to learn, and father hadn’t wanted me to because he was worried I’d have more attacks as a result. My brother, though, he… he said he was still frightened for me. He just did it because he still wanted me to be able to do what I loved.”

Reese nodded, a glint of gladness in his eyes as he beheld the Princess whose eyes had yet to move from the window.

“Then… when… my… when she… when my brother and her got sick… he got better, and she didn’t, and I wasn’t… I wasn’t allowed to say goodbye to her because… because my father didn’t want me to get sick, too. He begged me, and said how sorry he was, and I… realized how helpless I am. How weak I am. The best I can do is not worry others, and be alright for them. Especially when my brother changed.” A darker look passed through Alina’s eyes that seemed foreign to the normally kind and innocent Princess.

“My brother came home less and less, and… he always looked tired, and sad. Father was that way when he’d come home, too. Even if we hadn’t seen my brother for months, it was as though they made each other worse, and I didn’t want to add to that. I wanted to be as… as fine as I could be, so that things could maybe get better somehow. But then he… my brother… he stopped coming home and writing. Now being alone with my father it feels like…”

“You aren’t allowed to be strong, nor are you allowed to be weak,” Reese finished softly.

Alina nodded as tears dripped off her cheeks. “If I can’t be strong enough to be there for my father who… is growing weaker as he gets older, and my brother is nowhere to be found… I think… we’ll crumble.”

“So this is why you wanted to marry the Troivackian King. He was strong enough,” Reese speculated slowly.

“Well… yes. He… he wanted me to be strong. He didn’t get frightened when I had my breathing episode. He instead gave me control even when I felt at my weakest, and I thought… and felt like… he was someone who could help me become… what I always wished I could be. He believed I had the potential to be strong enough to be Queen of Troivack, and it made me feel incredible. Powerful, and capable, and it was intoxicating.” Alina couldn’t help but feel her chest flutter at the memory of facing the room of courtiers as she told them of her engagement, or the times when Brendan wouldn’t move out of a room without her nod of permission…

“So why did you break off your engagement with him? Our dear Katarina mentioned that he was now an ex of yours…?” Reese asked curiously.

“He… He revealed that he didn’t think I’d be able to rule beside him as a partner. Instead, I’d be in charge of managing the Troivackian noblewomen, but again under supervision and I’d only be able to change things to a point. It once again felt like I was being treated as weak, or… breakable, and… and he…” Alina swallowed. She almost felt too embarrassed to say the next part aloud, but she couldn’t taint her story with any half truths.

“He revealed that he had been discussing with his court, and he himself had been considering… us not having children given my weak constitution. The suggestion of him taking a mistress came up and he didn’t refute it immediately.” Cheeks burning, Alina felt her hands grip into fists yet again.

There wasn’t a single sound aside from the crickets outside for several long moments.

“That poor… beefcake of a man… oh… oh no…” Reese gasped, caught between a moan and a laugh. “Gods did your father maim him himself?”

“Glad my pain is so amusing to you,” Alina remarked glibly as her throat tightened. “No, my father didn’t hurt him. Viscount Ashowan magically blasted him off of Daxarian soil.”

Reese let out a loud laugh that had him gasping in pain then clutching his side and groaning.

“Ahh… I always knew that redhead was going to be a great wealth of material for my ballads…” he managed through gritted teeth before righting himself against the wall again.

“So… that’s my story.” Alina decided to finish her monologue then and there with a long weary sigh. For some reason telling Reese everything had completely dulled her emotions.

“Hmm, well… might I offer you a bit of my worldly insight?”

Resisting the urge to refute the bard and instead try to go to sleep, Alina turned to face him expectantly.

“Name a single woman who could have taught Brendan Devark, a King of Troivack, a man who was crowned at the age of seven, with his mother bowing before him and excluded from his education from that time on… who could have taught him what the other side of marriage outside of politics would be?”

“He has made it perfectly clear he believes love has no place in the marriage of a King.”

“Yes, and who taught him that?”

“His… advisors, and… tradition. I’m sure his parents must have–”

“Assuming for a moment that his advisors were politically uncorrupted, what would their biggest concern be for their King?”

“That he make wise decisions and ensure the stability of Troivack.”

“Right. So him not having an heir and opening up a war for the throne would be…?”

“A problem,” Alina admitted though she was narrowing her eyes as she did so. “Then why not have children with me? Why does it have to be a mistress? Do I really matter so little to him that–”

“--He loves you so much that he is terrified of you dying,” Reese interrupted with a chuckle.

“If he loved me, then talk of a mistress wouldn’t be on the table!” Alina snapped furiously, her ire over the situation reigniting anew.

“His advisors have led him to safety as an adult, and have clearly been loyal through something I don’t think anyone can really understand, Princess. A boy leading a kingdom. He is not going to dismiss them immediately, even if he wanted to deep down.”

“What makes you the godsdamn expert on nobility, hm?” Alina demanded hotly, her restraint on her frustration dwindling dangerously low.

“Your Highness, I have served two different noble courts and seen far more of the world than you ever will. I have seen true depravity and evil, and I have seen true nobility and good. As fun as it is to act as foolish as I please, it doesn’t mean that is all that I am. The reason my songs ring true is because I can see the nature of people. The peace my music has brought my soul, gives me this gift.” Reese eyed Alina steadily then, his face serious, and his voice unwavering.

“That man loves you far, far more than you love him, and I could tell that the first day I laid eyes on you two. You are the light in his abyss of darkness. He loves you the absolute best way he knows how, just as your father does. By protecting you, and being himself to the fullest.”

Reese’s words shook Alina to her core as Brendan’s description of the abyss that hounded him echoed in her ears.

She could feel the power of the bard’s words, and knew he was right somehow…

“Princess, he has known you and been your lover for a few weeks, but been a King for nearly twenty years. One of those roles is going to be a little more natural to him, and you can’t expect to rule as his equal immediately as you are. You need to be patient with yourself, with him, and with the situation. That is, if you want to try and reunite with him.”

Alina stared at Reese in silence, the lump in her throat growing.

“Though, I’ll be honest with you, Princess, if you decide to pass on him, I may try to take a run at climbing that tree of a man– honestly… he looks absolutely delic-”

“Reese, for the love of the Gods, please shut up now,” Alina interrupted the bard’s fervid musings while turning away from him so that she could lay on the floor with her back turned to him.

He had given her a lot to think about, but… there was a chance none of that would matter because right at that moment, Brendan was somewhere far away, and there was a growing possibility that she would never see him again.

*

Alina awoke the next morning, feeling a rattle in her lungs that immediately ignited a cough.

Wincing and noticing how warm her face felt, she slowly sat up, and glanced outside where the fire had been successfully snuffed out. She could see Dexter sitting on the ground with his back against a tree, his arms crossed in front of his chest.

It was clear that he was still alert though as his face remained tense, but still.

Alina coughed again.

She hated waking up feeling dewey, but worst of all, she hated having to shout that she needed the bathroom.

“Excus–” her voice was cut off by a far more aggressive coughing fit that didn’t end after a few gulps of air… instead, after her third breath, she found it being inexplicably cut off.

Leaving her gasping.

She pitched herself forward, her eyes watering, she couldn’t breath, couldn’t make a sound.

“What’s going on with you? Hey! Hey! Stop that! We aren’t going to fall for whatever plot you think you have figured out.” The rustling from the ground just outside the blind signaled that Dexter had risen to his feet.

“She has a breathing affliction, she isn’t pretending,” Reese called out as he struggled to sit up to try and help her.

Dexter scoffed as Alina continued to fight for a clear breath on the floor, completely oblivious to their discussion. “Like I’ll believe anything you say, you–”

Alina went limp.

Both Dexter and Reese stared at her startled.

“GOOD GODS, YOU DAFT IDIOT!” Reese winced as the effort of shouting hurt him. “MAKE SURE SHE’S BREATHING!” he hollered while trying to move closer to the Princess despite the pain in his ribs becoming blinding.

“Alright! Alright, you just stay still,” Dexter ordered while trying to remain in control of the situation despite his face betraying his concern.

Slowly, the mercenary reached his hand down near Alina's nose, extending his fingers out to feel for breath.

After a moment, he let out a breath of relief. “She’s breathing again.”

Reese let his own body go limp as he thanked the Gods he didn’t have to bear partial responsibility for the Princess’ death.

“She’s running… hot though…” Dexter frowned as he noticed the red in Alina’s cheeks and gently turned her onto her side while placing his palm against her forehead.

After a moment of quiet thought Dexter dropped his chin to his chest. “Godsdamnit… why does this bloody job just get more, and more…” he trailed off unable to finish what he was murmuring as he shook his head, aggravated

“Probably because it’s a job that involved kidnapping,” Reese wheezed with a grimaced smile.

“You know it’s your own fault you crossed Roscoe– and that you abandoned your daughter in the first place,” Dexter growled back while glaring at the bard’s battered form.

With great difficulty, Reese managed to shift his head so that he could raise his eyes to meet the mercenary’s, and with a breathy laugh replied with,

“--And it’s your fault for not releasing the Princess and the daughter of Finlay Ashowan. While my consequences have been grave, and to a point, deserved, I’d take them ten times over before facing what awaits you, Mr. Dexter."