Chapter song: Wait by M83
- Her -
She could feel him staring at her, she always did. He was supposed to watch her, it was part of his job, but not like this. The heat of his gaze hit her back and she felt it warm her. His presence was as reassuring as it was unsettling. Ever since that very first day she felt something from him. They barely spoke, she was afraid to, but she felt like she knew him. She was terrified of what it meant.
He's forbidden to you.
The frequent self reminders did nothing to squelch her thoughts.
For two years now he was in her orbit but always out of reach. The Moon to her Earth, his pull affecting the tides of her life. And although it was him who followed her every move, it felt like she was always searching for him.
Today she sat in the library. It was the only place where she felt she could truly escape. She found her favorite secluded spot and began to disappear into a classic fairytale. The feeling of his eyes on her pulled her out immediately. She pretended to still be reading for a while, enjoying the sensation of being observed by him. She tricked herself into thinking the attention was separate from what he was obligated to do. It always led to disappointment, but it was pleasant while it lasted.
She promptly closed her book and stood up to leave. She made eye contact and then purposely brushed past him too closely.
She wandered the palace aimlessly, a mixture of boredom and discontent making every movement laborious. She'd just turned twenty and spring was in full bloom in Midyat. It was normally her favorite time of year, the weather warm but not yet blistering hot, everything in bloom, and an air of newness that invigorated her. While those feelings had returned to her this year, they were tinged with the melancholy of another year wasted. If she was honest she was where she expected to be at this age, and at every age in the conceivable future, but she just wasn't fulfilled . As a small child, before she understood the full responsibility of what being royal meant, she dreamed of being a doctor. And while now she knew better, that desire to go out and learn, to help people, never left.
She'd lost count of the amount of arguments she'd had with her father over the years. Begging to go to a normal school like other children, pitching a fit every time he left without her on a trip to handle foreign affairs, crying when he refused to send her to University in Istanbul. The people called her Princess, but really she was a prisoner. Held hostage by her father's fear and left with no friends or other family members to share the burden. That wasn't completely true now, she had Melike, but she was hired to help so even though they were friends, there was always an underlying tone of coercion. Her mother had passed away shortly after giving birth to her, so she carried the guilt of being born while also carrying the weight of being the King's sole heir. It would have been a lot for anyone, but without the freedoms her title normally would have afforded her, it was nearly unbearable.
She closed her eyes as she strolled through the garden, listening to his solid strong footsteps several paces behind her. This way it was easier to dream that he was walking next to her rather than behind. Maybe she was still in the fairytale world she read about back in the library. Maybe one day he would don his armor and mount his white horse and come sweep her off her feet.
Then she lost her balance and the first thing she saw when her eyes flew open was his lean form making quick strides toward her. And she could have sworn she saw his eyes turn more green and red rimmed with worry the closer he got to her, but then everything blurred and details didn't matter when the darkness of sleep pulled her under.
