Freedom, However Fleeting
The palace had a thousand eyes, but tonight, they were all looking in the wrong direction.
Nana slipped through the servants' entrance like water through cupped hands—there one moment, gone the next. Her elaborate hanfu lay discarded in her chambers, replaced by something simpler: a short silk dress the color of cherry blossoms at dawn, cinched at the waist with a plain cotton sash. She had found it in the laundry quarters, meant for one of the younger maids. It made her look less like a princess and more like something from a fairy tale—a girl who belonged to the wind and the night, not to thrones and duty.
Her hair, usually pinned and adorned with jade ornaments, now fell loose down her back, held away from her face with a simple ribbon. Her feet, accustomed to silk slippers, were clad in worn cotton shoes that allowed her to run.
And run she did.
The festival called to her like a siren song, all golden light and distant music and the promise of a world she had only glimpsed through latticed windows. Her heart hammered against her ribs—part fear, part exhilaration, entirely alive in a way she hadn't felt in years.
The market square sprawled before her like a painting come to life. Lanterns hung from every stall and doorway, casting warm amber light over the crowd. The air was thick with the scent of roasted chestnuts and sweet osmanthus cakes, incense and night-blooming jasmine. Vendors called out their wares in sing-song voices that wove together into a symphony of commerce and celebration.
For the first time in her life, Nana felt like she could breathe.
She wandered through the crowd with wonder written across her face, her eyes wide as a child's. Everything was new, everything was beautiful. The way the firelight danced across copper wares. The sound of a street musician's erhu, its two strings singing out a melody that spoke of longing and homecoming both. The press of bodies around her—not servants bowing, not guards standing at attention, but *people*, living and laughing and existing in their own orbits that had nothing to do with her.
She was invisible here. Anonymous. Free.
A delighted smile curved her lips as she paused to admire a merchant's display of painted fans, then moved on to watch a puppet show that had children squealing with laughter. She bought a sugar sculpture from an elderly woman—a butterfly so delicate it seemed impossible that it wouldn't simply float away—and tasted sweetness on her tongue that had nothing to do with honey and everything to do with stolen moments.
This. This was what she had been missing. This simple, perfect freedom to exist without the weight of a crown she didn't yet wear.
She didn't notice the shadow that followed her through the crowd, silent as smoke.
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---🐚🐚🐚
The Hunter Watches His Prey
Rafayel moved through the festival crowd like a ghost among the living—present but unnoticed, there but not *there*. People parted for him without realizing they were doing so, some unconscious instinct warning them that the beautiful stranger in dark robes was not someone to be close to.
But they never looked twice. Never questioned. Because monsters were supposed to be ugly, weren't they? Monsters were supposed to have twisted faces and gnarled hands and eyes that gleamed with obvious malice. They weren't supposed to look like fallen angels with purple-blue hair and features that belonged in poetry rather than nightmares.
That was his greatest weapon. Not the blade at his hip, not the elemental powers that thrummed through his veins, but this face that made people trust him until it was far too late.
He tracked her movement through the market with the patience of a predator, his eyes never leaving her small form as she darted from stall to stall with unchecked delight. She looked so *young* like this, stripped of her royal trappings. So fragile and small among the press of bodies, like a single flower petal carried along by a stream.
So easy to lose in the crowd.
So easy to protect.
He caught himself on that last thought, his jaw tightening. *Protect*. The word had surfaced unbidden, unwanted. He was here to *use* her, not protect her. To win her heart so thoroughly that she would give it to him willingly, and then—
The fishtail mark pulsed hot against his forearm, as if in rebuke.
Rafayel forced himself to stay focused. This was reconnaissance. Learning her patterns, her desires, the shape of the loneliness that drove a princess to risk everything for a few hours of freedom. All useful information for the game he was playing.
That was all this was. Information gathering.
Not the way his chest had tightened when he first saw her slip out of the palace, her face lit with nervous excitement. Not the way something in him had shifted when she smiled at that sugar sculpture, the expression so pure and unguarded it hurt to witness.
*Stop*, he commanded himself. *You're better than this.*
But was he? Or was he exactly what he'd always been—a fool who couldn't stop his heart from reaching for someone who had already forgotten him?
He watched as she paused by a cage of gerbils, her fingers curling around the bamboo bars as she cooed at the small creatures. The merchant—an old man with kind eyes—was explaining something about their care, and she listened with rapt attention, as if the habits of rodents were the most fascinating subject in the world.
She was so absorbed that she didn't notice the commotion at the edge of the market.
But Rafayel did.
Royal guards, their distinctive armor catching the lantern light. Six of them, moving through the crowd with purpose, their hands on their sword hilts. Searching. Looking.
For her.
He saw the moment she noticed them too. Her body went rigid, all that joy draining from her face like water from a broken vessel. Her eyes widened with something that looked like betrayal—as if the world itself had promised her this one night and then snatched it away before she'd even had time to savor it.
*No*, her expression seemed to say. *Not yet. Please, not yet.*
Then she ran.
Nana's feet carried her through the crowd with desperate speed, her breath coming in sharp gasps. The festival that had seemed so welcoming moments before now felt like a labyrinth designed to trap her. She ducked around a fruit vendor's stall, nearly colliding with a woman carrying a basket of moon cakes, mumbled an apology she barely heard herself say.
Behind her, she could hear the guards calling out, their voices carrying over the festival noise. "The princess! Anyone who's seen Princess Angelina, please alert the guards immediately!"
Shame burned hot in her cheeks, mixing with panic and a grief so acute it felt like physical pain. They were going to catch her. Drag her back to the palace. Lock her away even more tightly than before, because she had proven herself untrustworthy. Her father's face would be so disappointed, so *hurt*, and she would spend the rest of her life watching the world through windows.
*Please*, she thought desperately, though she didn't know what she was praying for or to whom. *Please, I just wanted one night. Just one night to feel alive.*
She darted into a narrow alley between two buildings, her back pressed against the rough brick wall, and felt tears begin to stream down her face. They came hot and fast, born from frustration and fear and the crushing weight of a freedom that had lasted less than an hour.
"Oh please," she whispered to the uncaring night. "I just finally felt free here..."
Then the world shifted.
Strong arms wrapped around her—not roughly, but with a certainty that suggested whoever grabbed her had done this before. She was lifted as if she weighed nothing at all, lifted and moved deeper into the shadows of the alley with a speed that stole her breath. Before she could process what was happening, she found herself pressed against a wall with broad shoulders caging her in, blocking her from view of the alley entrance.
A hand covered her mouth, gentle but firm, muffling the squeak of surprise that tried to escape.
"Shh," a voice murmured near her ear, low and smooth as dark water. "Be still."
Nana's heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird, but she obeyed. Partly from shock, partly from the strange sense that this stranger—whoever he was—meant her no immediate harm. She could feel the warmth of him through the thin silk of her dress, could smell something like ocean salt and night-blooming flowers, could sense the controlled power in the arms that held her.
Footsteps pounded past the alley entrance. The royal guards, still searching.
"—thought I saw her go this way—"
"Check the next street over, she couldn't have gotten far—"
The voices faded, moving away, leaving only the distant sounds of the festival and Nana's own thundering heartbeat.
For a long moment, neither of them moved. The stranger's hand remained over her mouth, his body still sheltering her, as if he needed to be certain the danger had truly passed. Nana found herself looking up, trying to see his face in the dim light of the alley.
What she saw stole whatever breath she had left.
He was beautiful in the way that dangerous things often were—sharp edges softened by shadow, features that belonged in paintings of celestial beings rather than on mortal men. His hair caught what little light filtered into the alley, revealing shades of purple and blue like deep water under moonlight. But it was his eyes that arrested her. They were the color of twilight oceans, vast and ancient and holding depths she couldn't begin to fathom.
And there was something in those eyes—something that flickered and vanished too quickly for her to name. Recognition? Longing? Pain?
But that was impossible. They'd never met before.
Hadn't they?
Time seemed to suspend itself, stretching the moment into something longer and stranger than it should have been. Nana felt her pulse slow from its panicked gallop to something deeper, steadier. The fear that had driven her into this alley was evaporating like morning mist, replaced by a warmth that seemed to bloom from the center of her chest.
*Safe*, something whispered in the back of her mind. *You're safe with him.*
Which was absurd. He was a stranger who had grabbed her in a dark alley. She should be terrified.
But she wasn't.
Slowly, carefully, the stranger removed his hand from her mouth and took a step back, putting a respectable distance between them. The loss of his warmth felt strangely acute, like stepping from sun into shade.
"Oh—" Nana's voice came out breathier than she'd intended. She cleared her throat, tried again. "Thank you so much..."
The stranger regarded her for a moment longer, and she had the unsettling sense that he was fighting some internal battle she couldn't see. Then something in his expression shifted, smoothing into something friendly and open. He offered her a slight bow—casual, not the deep formal thing people did for royalty.
"You're welcome," he said, and his voice was like silk drawn over steel. Soft, but with something harder underneath. "Though perhaps running through dark alleys isn't the wisest strategy for avoiding guards?"
There was no judgment in his tone, just a hint of amusement that made Nana's cheeks flush.
"I wasn't thinking," she admitted, then added with a rueful smile, "I've never been very good at escapes."
"First time sneaking out of the palace?"
She blinked, startled. "How did you—"
"Your dress is too fine, even simplified. Your hands have never done hard labor. And you move like someone who's spent her life indoors." His lips quirked in something that wasn't quite a smile. "Also, the guards are shouting your name through the market."
Nana winced. So much for anonymity.
The stranger tilted his head slightly, studying her with those impossible eyes. "What's a princess doing in the market square, risking her father's wrath for a few hours of freedom?"
"Living," Nana said simply. Then, more quietly, "Or trying to, anyway."
Something flickered across his face again—too quick to catch, gone before she could interpret it. For a heartbeat, he looked almost... sad.
Then he smiled, and the expression transformed him into something even more dangerous than before. Not because he looked cruel, but because he looked kind. Approachable. Like someone she could trust.
"Well then," he said, offering her his hand with an elegance that suggested nobility of his own, "shall we make sure this escape is worth the trouble?"
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🐚🐚🐚
Rafayel had made a mistake.
He realized it the moment his arms closed around her, the moment her small body pressed against his chest, the moment he breathed in the scent of her hair and felt every carefully constructed wall begin to crack.
This was supposed to be strategy. Calculated. A rescue that would position him as her savior, her secret friend, the one person who understood her longing for freedom. The beginning of his plan to win her heart.
But the moment he touched her, something in his chest had *shattered*.
She fit against him like she'd been made for that exact space—like his body had memorized her shape across a hundred years and a lifetime of changes. The bond mark burned hot enough that he was surprised she couldn't feel it through his sleeve, pulsing with a recognition that transcended memory or reason.
*Mine*, it seemed to say. *She's mine, she's always been mine, how dare you plan to hurt her—*
And when she'd looked up at him with those wide, trusting eyes—gods, those *eyes*—he'd nearly broken right there. Nearly told her everything. Who he was, who they'd been, what she'd meant to a boy who had waited for her until waiting became his only purpose.
But he didn't. Because he was stronger than this. Because he had to be.
So he'd smiled instead, played the charming stranger, offered his hand like this was all part of some grand game rather than the slow dismantling of his resolve.
*This is reconnaissance*, he told himself as she slipped her hand into his, her fingers small and warm against his palm. *You're gathering information. Learning what makes her happy so you can use it later.*
*This is strategy.*
But if it was strategy, why did his heart race when she smiled at him? Why did something in his chest loosen when he led her back into the festival crowd, her hand still in his, her trust given so freely it felt like both gift and weapon?
He showed her the market through a local's eyes rather than a princess's. The best food stalls—the ones that didn't look impressive but where the owner had been perfecting his recipe for forty years. The street performers who were genuine artists rather than just spectacle. The quiet corners where you could stand and watch the festival flow around you like water around a stone.
He bought her things she'd never tried before. Candied hawthorn berries on a stick, each one glossy and red as a jewel. Soup dumplings from a vendor who made them with paper-thin wrappers that burst with scalding broth when you bit into them—he warned her to be careful, but she bit anyway and yelped at the heat, laughing through the burn.
"You tried to warn me!" she said, fanning her mouth, her eyes bright with tears from the heat and the laughter both.
"You didn't listen," he replied, and for a moment, it felt so *easy*. So natural. Like they'd done this before, like this banter was worn smooth from years of use rather than freshly minted.
Like they were friends.
Or more than friends.
*Stop*, he commanded himself. *This isn't real. You're making her feel this way. You're the spider and she's the fly and the fact that you're enjoying the web doesn't change what happens when she reaches the center.*
But it was getting harder to remember that with each passing moment.
They walked side by side through the festival, and something about the night made the usual formal distance between strangers feel wrong. So when their shoulders brushed, he didn't pull away. When she pointed at something with delight and grabbed his sleeve to make sure he was looking, he let her. When she laughed at a puppet show and unconsciously leaned against him, he told himself it meant nothing.
He was lying, and he knew it.
"Look!" Nana's voice pulled him from his thoughts, bright with wonder. "The lake! And the lanterns—oh, they're so beautiful!"
They had reached the edge of the festival grounds, where the market gave way to the great lake that gave the Riverside Kingdom its name. The water was black as spilled ink, reflecting the stars above and the lanterns being released upon it. Dozens of them, hundreds, each one a tiny vessel of light and hope floating across the darkness.
It was beautiful. Even Rafayel, who had seen the bioluminescent depths of Lemuria and the way phosphorescent algae turned the ocean into liquid starlight, had to admit it was beautiful.
But not as beautiful as her face, watching them.
"Can we?" she asked, turning to him with such hope in her eyes that something cracked further in his carefully maintained armor. "Can we launch a lantern too?"
He should say no. Should make some excuse, maintain the distance he needed to see this through. Every moment he spent with her was another thread binding him to someone he was supposed to sacrifice. Every smile she gave him was another nail in both their coffins.
"Yes," he heard himself say. "Of course."
*Fool*, his mind whispered. *Fool, fool, fool.*
But his heart was louder.
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🐚🐚🐚
To be continued