edited

|Adara De Clare|

I am going to fall into the stream and get mud everywhere. It must have been my imagination however, because the Prince catches me. I'm one foot from the edge of the stream when he catches me.

Once I realize that I indeed did not fall into the stream, and the Prince made good on his promise of catching me, I inhale and exhale deeply.

"Oh my gosh, please tell me there's no more jumping or anything like that." I rant, feeling as if I'm going to faint.

He chuckles and I feel his chest vibrate. Why do I feel that? Oh right, because I'm technically still pressed against his chest and my arms are around his neck.

"There's no more like that, in fact, we're almost there." He puts me down and he takes my hand, smiling at me.

Goodness, what happened to the Prince and where is he? He is being way too nice and sweet to me, for my liking. He'd usually be cursing at me and telling me what an insect I am. Fun words. I know right.

As he holds my hand, guiding me through the wilderness, I look at him confused. With my eyebrows creased, I look at his relaxed, calm face. For the first time, he looks calm. Usually he's pissed, upset and aching to kill someone.

His eyes glimpse a sight of me and he squints his eyes in confusion. "What? Is there a bug on me?" He asks, looking up and brushing his hair and forehead.

I cover my mouth with my hand and I giggle, "No, it's just. . .why are you acting like this?" I ask him and my voice gets smaller and smaller. He looks at me confused.

"What do you mean?" He asked the question so innocent, it's as if he really doesn't know that he's acting very differently.

"Acting like this. Being kind and sweet to me. You're not treating me like an insect beneath your feet like before." I tell him and he nods, hearing everything I said.

He sighs, "I guess being around a specific person may change you." He says, maintaining a normal tone of voice. As if he's being honest.

Is he being serious or is he messing with me? He's never done this sort of stuff before. I wonder what happened to change him.

"I'm serious. In other words, we're here." He stops and I take the time to observe where we are.

We're not at a place for murder nor are we at a place of doom. In fact it's the complete opposite. It's beautiful. It's filled with perfect green grass, looking as if it came right of that movie about that girl with super long magic hair. Rapunzel, I think.

It looks so soft and comfortable, maybe if I lay down in it, I'll instantly fall asleep. It looks gorgeous.

The trees create a circle around this mini-clearing, and their branches cover over each other, making a natural umbrella from the sun. It's perfect. It's perfect for literally everything and anything. If you want a secret safe place to relax or do whatever you'd be completely alone, no one would come here.

Not to mention that beautiful waterfall I can hear from here. It's definitely a waterfall. It can't be anything else. I turn to the Prince with wide eyes.

"How did you find this?" I ask him, my mouth open. This is literally paradise.

He walks closer to me, and he places his arm around my waist. I jerk a little, looking up at him in an instant.

What is he doing? He never does this outside of public. When we're in private, he always makes sure to keep his total distance from me. What changed? How did it change? How did he change?

"I was wandering around this place, since I wanted to know my territory." He starts.

"Meaning you wanted to see if there was anyone hiding out here to punish them?" I ask him and he bites his lips.

He holds his head down as if he was in shame of sorts, "I guess, you could put it like that. Anyway, I was searching the woods and I came across this place." He looks up to the trees, holding his hands up gesturing to this entire place.

Imagine that happening, wow. You're just wandering one second and the next you've found absolute paradise. That cannot be a coincidence. This place is too perfect to be just a coincidence.

"Woah, that's amazing" I tell him, looking at the scenery.

"Anyway, when you talked about our relationship, somehow I was reminded of this place and I wanted to show you." He puts his hand in his pocket.

I turn to him, laughing nervously, "Why would you want to show this to me? Don't you hate me or something?"

He breathes and his chest heaves a little. "I don't hate you, Adara. I wanted to show you this place because not only is it beautiful like you, it's also private."

Hold on. Did he just call me beautiful? I'm literally going to faint. Ahh! Wait! Can't he hear all my thoughts about him?

I look at him, trying to find any giveaway on his face to tell that he was listening in but I find nothing. Maybe he heard it and shut it out or he has an amazing poker face. I don't know which one is more likely. The Prince himself is an enigma.

I'm wary.

Still, he called me beautiful.

Large amounts of blood rush to my cheeks and it rushes throughout. I smile hard, holding my head down. I bite my lip, trying to get rid of it. He doesn't need to know that his words actually have an effect on me. It would do wonders for his ego, something I don't want.

"What do you mean it's private? What do you want to do?" I ask him, stepping back a little and his hand that was around my waist, falls.

As if an answer to my question, he lies down on the grass with his hands on the back of his head, propping it up.

He sees my hesitance, "Come on, it's very comfortable and the breeze is perfect." He tells me, giving a chef's kiss.

I twiddle my fingers together, "What about our clothes? Your suit? Won't they get stained?" I ask him and he laughs, obviously what I said amused him.

"I've been coming here for a very long time, they do, but it washes out. You can wash your dress, can't you?" He asks me, raising an eyebrow, and I laugh in embarrassment. My cheeks heat up even more.

"I can!" I retort, feeling defensive.

Instead of lying down on the grass, I sit. I turn my head, looking at him. His eyes are closed and the wind blows his hair around. The wind here is literally just perfect. It's not too windy but just perfect for you to not get hot. I love it here, I could literally stay here forever.

"What's your middle name?" He asks me out of nowhere and I blink twice. That's such an odd question to ask. My middle name? Is this him trying a hand at small talk?

"Umm, I don't have one." I tell him and he opens his eyes.

"Me neither." He tells me and my eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

This has to be the first thing he's ever told me about his name. I still don't know it and honestly it's a bit embarrassing but I mean, it is his choice. It's his name after all.

"Do you always wear a suit?" I ask him, noticing the designs on his suit I didn't before. It has a flower-like shape etched with gold thread but it can barely be seen. It looks beautiful.

"No, only for formal situations. When I'm King I will have to though." He answers.

"You're pretty sure that you're gonna become King, huh?" I ask him.

"Well, I am an only child so yes, I will. Even though the King won't admit it, he knows I will." The Prince tells me and I nod.

"Okay." I say.

"Do you always wear dresses?" He asks, closing his eyes again.

"No, but I mostly do. I love dresses and the color green," I take up a leaf that fell on my dress then I let the wind get the best of it, blowing it away into the forest, "What's your favorite color?"

"Don't have one." He answers as soon as I finished my question.

"Wow, so there's not a single color or a collection of colors that you like more than the others, even if it's just by a little bit?" I ask.

He shakes his head, "No. I've had thousands of years to think about it, but I still don't." He answers.

My eyes nearly pop out of my sockets, "What? You're thousands of years old? For real?" I ask him. I wait for him to say that he's joking but he doesn't.

"I was born in the A.Ds. It was the time of bad hygiene, humans were dumb and were in their makeshift homes, vampire monarchy ruling everywhere, injustice, lack of technology and did I mention dirty people?" He says it all with his eyes still closed.

I cringe, "Ew, that sounds like a horrible time." I comment.

"It was, the only people with good hygiene were royals and only a handful of them took advantage of that." He admits.

"Ew, I'm hoping that you were among those handful of royals?" I hope as I ask him.

He opens his eyes and deadpans at me, "No, no I wasn't. I was a baby, my days were spent going outside and playing in the mud with the horses." He tells me.

"I meant when you got older, like a teenager." I say.

He creases his eyebrows at me, "Uhh, I became a teenager in the 1600s or even later." He tells me. He continues explaining when he sees my sheer confusion.

"Vampires don't grow normally then stop growing when they become eighteen or whatever, that's a myth because that's what it looks like to humans. We grow as normal but it's delayed. One year of aging for us is way different and slower than a human's. We get old but we're immortal. We don't die unless something kills us," he tells me and my eyebrows shoot up, "Surely you learnt this in school?"

I shake my head, "Nope, I doubt anyone knows about this." I tell him and his eyebrows shoot up now.

"Wow, it's been thousands of years and they still don't know. Classic humans." He laughs a little.

I roll my eyes with a smile on my face. I get it though. They age slower than we do along with other specialties. It makes sense why we wouldn't know by now. By the time they age generations have passed. They'd stay the same age by the time we're born and when we die. Hah, must be fun.

Just then, something funny comes to mind, "Hey, wanna start planning how we can end our relationship once the contract ends? I think it would be really fun if we did it in the most dramatic way possible." I tell him, cracking a smile.

He looks at me, all the fun from his face gone. What's wrong?

"No." Is his answer and he turns away from me.

"No? Why not? It'll be fun. Imagine how it will be for us to end this fake relationship but no one will know it was fake?" I smile wide, and he clenches his jaw.

Suddenly, he sits up and he looks me straight in the eyes.

"It's not fake." He tells me and my eyes widen. I'm taken aback. I blink. Another blink. Then another.

"What?" I ask him, my voice breaking a little.

What does he mean it's not fake for him?

"This relationship isn't fake, not anymore. That's why I brought you here. To show you that I trust you, and for you to know that this isn't fake anymore." He tells me.

I'm still not processing this. I need to wrap my head around this. I can't. I desperately need to but I can't.

"So, you. . .like me?" I ask him, my words come out rather slow.

He sighs and he looks away from me, "Possibly."

A wide smile breaks out on my face. "Aww, you like me, like you really like me." A blush appears on his face and he holds his head down, trying to get rid of it.

Hah! Now you know how it feels. It sucks doesn't it, your highness?

'Shut up.'

I laugh, doubling over onto the grass.

"You're cute." I admit, holding my own head down and he looks up at me with surprise evident on his face.

We say nothing for a few seconds. He stares at me, I stare at him. I look into his brown eyes and he looks into mine. Blush on both our faces, we don't look away. Suddenly, his stare becomes very intense and I look away. Instead, I look in the direction I hear a waterfall.

"Nikolai." He says and I look back at him.

"What?" I ask him, confused.

"That's my name. Nikolai." He repeats and my mouth falls open and my eyebrows shoot up.

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