Summary: Belle just wants to enjoy traveling through the land and finding adventures, alone that is. Unfortunately for her, she has caught the interest of none other than Ben Finn. And she's probably the only woman in Albion to try to get him to stop flirting with her. As a matter of fact, she wants him to leave her alone. Forever. Of course, dispite her attempts to get him to go away, Ben isn't going to be leaving her alone until he figures out exactly who she is.
PROLOGUE
Belle leaned against the castle wall next to the front courtyard's entrance with her arms crossed over her chest. A large, happy crowd had gathered in the castle's front courtyard to cheer for the new queen as she received her crown. While she didn't show the same excitement as the crowd, she was happy that Logan was no longer on the thrown, but that wasn't why she had showed up.
She held a lot of respect for Albion's new queen. As a princess, she had left the luxuries of the castle and personally helped the people of Albion and fought her own way to the thrown. But what Belle respected most was the queen's ability to return to the confines of what was now her castle.
Belle knew that it was something she would never be able to do. She shivered at the thought of having to settle down and stay in one place. That just wasn't her. She needed to explore and find new adventures. She wanted to see everything the world had to show her.
She brought herself out of her thoughts when she thought she felt someone looking at her. She looked around; the crowd seemed uninterested in her though. After a moment she was going to shrug it off and return to her thoughts when she looked up to the balcony and saw a soldier staring at her.
He had sun colored hair, and a prominent jaw and chin. He still looked a bit worn out. "Probably from the battle," she thought. She also noticed that he wore a captain's uniform, rather than that of a guardsmen or normal soldier.
Belle cocked an eyebrow and tilted her head, to figure out why he was staring at her. That was when he seemed to realize that she had noticed him staring at her and he straightened up a bit. They stared at each other for what seemed like minutes before booming voice sounded.
"All hail! The Queen of Albion!" the knight who Belle recognized as Sir Walter Beck bellowed. The new queen stepped out as the large and eloquent double doors opened for her. That was when the soldier looked away and towards the queen.
The queen confidently walked up and into the center of attention, allowing Sir Walter to place the crown on the queen's head, making the crowd go absolutely crazy with excitement and cheer. Belle smiled softly and clapped her hands, "Good luck, my queen."
-Ben-
As the crowd cheered for Albion's new queen, I decided to try and steal another glance at the woman who had been calmly leaning against the castle's walls while everyone else had been too excited to keep quiet. She had black hair, pulled back into a ponytail. It wasn't anything fancy, but it was a bit of fresh air so-to-speak. It was a lot nicer to see compared to all the powdered wigs and boring buns of Bowerstone.
Her skin appeared to be gently kissed by the sun. It wasn't fair like the fair ladies of Bowerstone's higher classes, but it wasn't too tanned or dirty looking like the working woman's skin. I guess she wasn't from either one of those classes, perhaps she didn't even fit into one.
Her clothes weren't too unusual. She wore the female highwaymen's trousers and boots, not elegant, but definitely not repulsive. I also remember that she didn't wear the top shirt and jacket that had been designed to go with it. She actually wore something a bit more unique, a brown corset with a white, very short sleeve shirt underneath it.
She was definitely different, and I have to admit, coupled with the slim, yet curvy figure she had I was interest, even more so when I got to watch her walk away.
Not that I was looking at… Well, okay. Maybe I was. But I still wanted to know who exactly she was. Unfortunately, I was not able to find out that day. The queen went back into the castle, followed by Walter, who forced me back into the castle as well.
I went looking for her the next day, after Logan's trial. My mild anger at the queen for letting Logan live for some reason still did not make my curiosity about this strange and attractive woman die.
I had originally asked Walter, and he said that he didn't seem to recall anyone living in Bowerstone with that description. I was going to ask the queen too, but, well, Walter told me to shut up. He also told me to just forget about the woman and think about what was ahead of us, but you can probably tell how much that worked.
I ended up looking casually for a few days, not really searching, but still asking about when the opportunity came to me. The only things I was able to find out about this woman was that she hadn't stayed in the tavern in the town square and that only one person seemed to recall a woman with that description. Unfortunately that person was the city guard who had seen her come into the city… And of course, leave only a couple hours later…
Defeated, I decided to do as Wally said and to forget about the woman. I had to forces on training soldiers and preparing for the threat of the 'Darkness'. Besides, it wasn't like I was going to ever see the woman again anytime soon. As a matter of fact, she would probably never even come across my path again…
…Or so I thought.
Author's Notes
Alright! I hope you enjoyed this! I will hopefully get the next chapter up soon. As you can probably tell, this isn't going to be a Ben/Princess story. I decided to go with something a little different.
Anyway, I want YOU the readers to name our queen! Leave a name for her in the review along with what you think of our little tale.
