The Princess's Servant

32. The Ride

Sybil hoisted herself onto her horse, glad to be out of her puffy dress. She wore farmhand clothes with boots and pants and was much happier for it. The two of them aimed their rides at the treeline and started forward.

"This servant of yours... What does he look like?"

Sybil had just saddled her horse when the question came. She should have been expecting it, really— how else did she think he would help her look?— but she found herself unprepared to answer.

"He has, uh, brown hair," she started. "Brown eyes... Linen clothes. I don't know, he looks like a servant," she finished.

Sebastian gave her a skeptical side-eyed look as he took hold of the reins. "A servant who looks like a servant," he said. "I'll keep my eyes peeled."

The princess let out a breath and held her leather reins tight as she knew what had to come. "Ugh," she breathed more than spoke. "There's something I haven't told you. A reason I brought you along."

Sebastian looked to her.

"I have a strong suspicion you might know the boy I'm searching for."

"Me?" The servant asked. "Know a Lailoyan?"

Sybil smiled a sheepish smile. "See, there's the rub. He isn't entirely... Lailoyan."

"Okay?" Sebastian replied. "What is he?"

The princess looked at him with bright blue eyes. "He's Wardian," she said.

Sebastian took his gaze to the road. "Wardian," he replied.

"Aye," the princess nodded, and she brought her gaze to the road too. "He was servant to Prince Holden until an unlucky game of dice landed him in my..." She thought for a moment. "Care."

Sebastian nodded back. "A servant to Prince Holden... Very well," he said. "I shall help you in your quest."

The princess fought the impulse to stop her horse. "I must admit, I thought you would take some convincing." An almost nervous laugh crept into her voice. "You're from the royal palace, aren't you?"

The servant cut her a wary glance. "I'm from the Wardian palace, but I'm not from the Wardian palace," he said. "Surely you've noticed my eyes, my hair, my country backwater manner of 'speak.' I am as Lailoyan as you," he told her. "And as a Lailoyan, it would bring me considerable joy to see a Wardian in chains."

Sybil raised her eyebrows at this. "You don't like your own masters?" She asked.

Sebastian offered the princess a look that nearly made her regret asking the question. He turned his sight back towards the road.

"Not even Prince Holden?" She asked a little too quickly. "The man you're searching for," she justified.

"Prince Holden's the exception," Sebastian told her, his eyes floating to the shimmering grain. "But then he's hardly Wardian."

"What does that mean?" Sybil asked, entirely at a loss for what he could be saying.

Sebastian opened his mouth, but then closed it when he met her wide-eyed expression. He took his eyes from hers and cleared his throat. "I mean he's gentler than the others. Kinder, maybe. Softer," and that last word came out a little bitter, but he couldn't help it. Prince Thomas would need him to speak kindly of Prince Holden for the sake of the union, and so he would. But he wouldn't lie, either. And he certainly would spout praises of a man he had so very little respect for.

Fortunately for the servant, the princess grew quiet. He hoped that she, too, would think little of a man who spent his days dallying and stringing words like beads into webs while all the sun's daylight passed him by. He knew that for his master's sake, and Ward's sake, and certainly for his own sake that this marriage had to occur. But he hoped if only for Sybil's sake that she would see what he himself saw: that Holden was no man worthy of a princess as fine as she — that Holden was no man at all.

"He's a romantic," Sybil summarized.

Sebastian felt the bumping of his horse beneath him as he headed leg after leg into the woods. "That's one word for it," the servant replied. But he was relieved in some capacity that this girl foolishly believed Holden to have a positive quality. And then, to check the validity of his assumption: "I take it you're a romantic too?"

The princess's gaze fell dead on the floor, and a strange smile that Sebastian had only seen on but one other's lips crossed the doll girl's face. "I'm something," she replied.

And suddenly, at that, Sebastian felt very unsafe.

A/N 2: PLEASE VOTE <3 voting is the number one thing that promotes stories. If you leave a vote i will answer any one question ~~