Felicia leaned out onto her balcony, sighing and dangerously close to crying. Her usually happy demeanor was diminished for some reason today. Why would that be?

Prince Antonio waved giddily at her from far, far below. Rainbows should have been popping out of him to emphasize his extreme joy. "I'll look forward to the wedding! Byeee~!" He shoulted to Felicia's father, while keeping his eyes upon Princess Felicia. Antonio was a childhood friend of Felicia, and was the heir to the throne to a neighboring kingdom.

But he was also the reason Felicia was currently so unhappy.

She let out a dissatisfied "Ve…" and ran into her chamber to cry again.

She did not want to marry Antonio. Sure, she loved him, but only as a brother figure. Felicia loved everyone in the same way that she loved the Spanish prince. She somehow felt that he wasn't the one for her.

Prehaps he had mistaken the multiple hugs and kisses on the cheek they'd exchanged through out their whole lives as love? Felicia presented everyone she knew with these displays of affection. However, the prince was pretty famous for being very dense. Sure, Prince Antonio had the most handsome looks out of everyone she knew, but he meant the same amount to her that everyone she was friends with meant. Though he didn't realize he was just like everyone to her… She was waiting for the special someone who wasn't like everyone.

Earlier today, Antonio had come to the Vargas Castle and asked Felicia's father, King Romulus, for Felicia's hand in marriage. Romulus, whom was equally dense as Prince Antonio, approved it and the two men decided who Felicia would marry and began planning the wedding.

All without Felicia's consent.

She wept and wept in her room, when the door opened all of a sudden and her close friend and servant, Keiko Honda, scrambled inside as she noticed Felicia's sobbing.

"F-feli-chan, please don't cry… a-ah…!" the flustered Japanese woman said as she tried to comfort her friend. Luckily, Keiko had known Felicia would be upset, and had taken precautions depending on exactly how upset she was. Keiko produced a bowl of fresh pasta.

Keiko was not a dense idiot like most of the people involved in Felicia's life. She had observed that Feli only considered Antonio as a friend, and that Antonio had a one-sided love for the princess.

When the bowl of spaghetti appeared, Felicia's tears vanished, though the girl was still obviously upset. "There, there. Felicia-chan… is there anything I can do…?" Keiko asked, knowing already that she could do nothing more than comfort the princess.

Felicia hiccupped before speaking and asking the most obvious thing. "S-stop the wedding?"

Keiko shook her head in dismay. There was nothing she could possibly do to stop the wedding. Romulus had his heart set, so there was no stopping him. She couldn't physically be an obstacle either… it could only get her put to death, and Felicia would end up married anyway if she did that, making Keiko's death meaningless.

Felicia resumed crying.

/

Lovina fought sleep ferociously. She had worked until very late last night; she could barely fight her tired lids from sliding down and dropping her into the world of dreams. She poked herself with a needle, as she'd done several times within the last minute.

The needle bit into her skin farther than usual, the pain provoking her to yelp loudly. "D-damnit!" she yelled.

The shop owner furiously flew into the room where her workers were doing their jobs of sewing and such. "Lovinito! Stop yelling, mon ami! You know the punishment if you make me too angry…" He winked suggestively. "If you cause trouble for my magnifique clothing store, I will cause magnifque problems for your vital regions, oui?"

Narrowing her hazel eyes, Lovina frowned defiantly. "No way in hell will that happen."

"You KNOW that you work for me, right? You have such a large debt to pay and I can easily have you put to death for this large finance infidelity…?" He half growled and half yelled angrily, gripping the sides of her face in his hands a little too tightly.

"Francis, it isn't her debt, it is her mother's!" Bella cried out, to stop the girl from being either beaten or raped like many girls who had worked here before her. "She's young! She is probably going through a stage!" Bella was roughly a year older than the girl, but she always stuck up for those younger than her to her uncle, Francis.

"Little neice, her mother is dead now, and she owed me quite an amount. If Lovinito here doesn't pay for it, I'll have practically been robbed!" Francis let go of the Italian girl's face. "Oh! Look, more customers~!" Francis sang, mood almost instantly. He finally left to go wait on them and flirt with the women shopping at his store, Francis's Fabulous Finery Boutique.

Bella's distant cousin, Ludwig, had gone unnoticed until now. He sat in the corner working on nice shoes. "You shouldn't have talked back." He instructed Lovina.

"Like I want your advice, Potato Bastard." She grumbled and went back to work.

/

That morning, Princess Felicia woke early, still moping. Only a few people noticed that she was down, because everyone else was either too oblivious or too excited about the wedding to notice Felicia's out of character behavior.

Felicia was now keeping a different plate of pasta with her at all times to ensure that she didn't burst out crying in front of everyone. Keiko approached her. "Feli-chan, you can't possibly eat pasta at all times… you'll run into health issues, and I do not wish to see that happen to you…" Keiko was mentally hurting herself for giving Felicia the pasta in the first place. She was too much of a masochist.

The princess nodded her head in her small, depressed way, and sat down the plate of fettuccini. As she did so, King Romulus fluttered around the corner.

"Felicia, dear, great news~! You're going shopping in town today for your wedding dress! Isn't that fabulous~!" He sang, and disappeared around the corner again.

Now, normally Felicia would dance at the word 'shopping', but because she was acting so uncharacteristically, she stayed in her gloom and accepted the fact that she was going shopping without enthusiasm.

Little did she know that today she'd find the key to her freedom.

/

This pretty much follows the storyline of 'prince and the pauper' only with Hetalia.

Belle is equal to Belgium. I just felt like making her Francis's neice to help the story along.

Please be nice; this is my first multi-chapter, 'kay?