chapter title: girls in white dresses
01. How the princess of Prospit marries the Prince of Derse and no one is very happy about it but they pretend anyway .
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The Princess of Prospit is lovely, you think, all tan skin and dark hair and glass emerald eyes that you swear are made of starlight, especially when she smiles. Except she isn't smiling now and the stars in her eyes are a little dimmer but she's still lovely and you still love her.
"I don't want to be married," she says, tears running down her cheeks and it breaks your heart (unevenly, because things hardly ever break right down the middle), "I don't want to be married to him."
You hold her close to you, your chin rests on top of her head and you can hear her little hiccups, her tears spill onto your shirt. "I know," you say and you wish there was more you could do rather than just hold her for this little while.
"I love you," she says and looks up at you desperately, "I love you." Her voice breaks off at the end and it takes all your willpower not to kiss her right then and there because tomorrow she gets married to the Prince of Derse (the other Prince of Derse, your older brother) and will no longer be yours (not that she was ever yours in the first place really).
Your willpower isn't as strong as you thought it was though, and you kiss her anyway and hold her anway for a long time because maybe then you will melt into each other and never have to leave and this won't be the last time you get to have her like this.
"I love you too," you say and you wish, desperately, that this didn't have to be the last time.
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(except it isn't the last time at all. the night of her wedding you sneak into the room she's staying in and pretend not to notice how beautiful she looks in that white dress as you lead her to the balcony and ask her to run away with you.
she doesn't even hesitate as she takes your hand in hers)