Just Out of Reach (A DK Fanfiction)

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Fear. It's normal for anyone to feel fear, to have their heart jump to their throat and their breaths come out ragged. It's what makes us human, what makes us normal. She felt fear just as everyone else did, she had her moments where she thought she wouldn't survive another day, where she thought she'd be stuck in the moment for the rest of eternity.

She hated being afraid. She never thought she had to be when high walls of stone protected her home, and tall, strong people guarded her family, yet it still happened. She still felt fear, and she still felt suffocated.

She came from a long line of royalty, that line of blood dating back hundreds of years, and never once has the ruling king, or the ruling queen, made it above the age of fifty, for something always happened. Someone always attacked.

She didn't want to live a life as short as that, she wished to grow old and become wise, giving advice to those younger than her during the end of her days. She didn't want to live in fear, either. Every day she wondered if it would be her father, the king, final day. If it would be hers, too. It was not unheard of for enemies to murder, or steal and sell, the princess of the king they targeted. It's happened before, to many kings and to many of the royalty in her family, from hundreds of years ago.

She honestly kind of hoped her family line would end, so that they no longer had to live in this curse of death. She wouldn't be surprised if an angry witch had placed it upon them, in spite of their old laws of burning their kind if we suspected someone to be of it. That law no longer lived, and many witches and wizards wandered the kingdom with magic and beauty. In fact, if it hadn't been for her father, King Seungcheol, witches and wizards would not be able to live in peace with the rest of the population, for he had removed that law and enforced safety to the magic folk.

How much did it take for just one of those magic folk to lift the suspected curse and save her family? A lot more, it seemed.

"You're not listening." She hears Seungcheol grumble, his eyebrows furrowed as he fiddles with his rings. Her head snaps to face him, a sheepish smile gracing her lips as she stares at her sulking father, "I'm convinced you lack the capacity to concentrate, at this point," He tuts, his eyes squinting in mock anger, his eyebrow-raising as he stares at her. The pair sits in the throne room as people line up left and right to report things to her father and the royal guard. These days are her least favorite days because they are the days when the risks skyrocket. No one knows if someone will come today to attack her father, to end his life.

So no, she had not been concentrating, but it was because she was overthinking and worrying about the safety of herself and her father's safety. "I am concentrating," she reprimands quietly, sitting up straighter and lifting her head when Seungcheol gently smacks her knee. He turns back to the crowd, shaking his head in disbelief.

"Now you're just lying," he stifles gently, folding his hands on his lap. She follows suit, clearing her throat and pointedly ignoring him. A man enters from the door, and her eyes cut to watch the new person walk into the hall. He's giant, with long scruffy hair and old, raggy clothes. His skin is marked and dirty, and there's a sword installed around his waist.

And that feeling comes back. The fear, the anxiety, the nerves that she hates so much. Any suspicious person that enters is an easy threat to her. Hates it. Hate, hate, hate.

She tenses up and watches him near. There's an angry glint in his eye as he gets closer, and she can't stop her heart from jumping to her throat as her fists ball in her lap. The guards around them spot her change in nature and stand up straighter, keeping an eye on the new man who entered through the door, too.

He gets closer to the staircase leading to their thrones when she's about to move to stand up, but a hand that comes from the left of her, where a specific other person usually stands, lands on her shoulder and squeezes it gently. Her stormy gaze finds his clear one, a gentle smile gracing his lips as he shakes his head, "He's not a threat, princess," he reassures, nodding his head towards the man.