Rosabella's fingers closed around a book that was nestled on the bookshelf, and she stood up from her spot on the floor. Her back was still facing towards her bed, where Daring sat, making faces at himself in her tall floor mirror.
She ran her fingers over the cover of the book in her hands, feeling all the subtle ridges and indentations in its design. King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Her copy had beautiful gold details in the portrait of Arthur himself, and its title was written in a complex calligraphy style that must have taken ages to design and perfect.
Simply leafing through its old, familiar pages felt like seeing a friend again.
She wondered out loud, "Have you ever read the legends of King Arthur, Daring?"
He laughed in his usual regal tone. "One has little time for reading when he is saving damsels and looking handsome."
She rolled her eyes even though he couldn't see. "They're really interesting. I think you should give them a shot sometime."
"Thanks, but, ah, no thanks, Rosabella."
"Oh, come on, they're not so bad!"
She turned around and walked over to him, extending the book towards him. "Why don't you just keep it for now and think about it?"
When Rosabella approached, Daring looked away from himself, and looked at the book instead, one eyebrow raised.
"Aw, just a few pages?" She took his hand and gently put the book in it. "Just a few."
His hand held the book loosely, preventing her from letting go of it, or else it would fall to the floor.
He uttered, "No."
Rosabella's shoulders dropped and she frowned. "Not even for me? Well, why not?"
Daring didn't look at her, sighing as his eyes hit the floor.
It was her turn to raise her eyebrows. "Daring?"
"I can't, Rosa."
"You can't?" She thought for a moment, and then felt horrible about pushing him. "You mean… you can't read?"
He sighed. "No, I can read. I just… it's hard reading anything difficult, and I can't read much at once. I've always been like that."
He lifted his head and acted like he hadn't looked dejected two seconds beforehand, his familiar dazzling grin on his face. "Never really needed to! I mean, I've already got A's in every skill a hero requires - sword fighting, dragon slaying, heroism 101. What more does Prince Charming need?"
He extended the book back towards Rosabella, patting the top of it with his free hand. "The cover is pretty grand, though. Reminds me of myself."
Rosabella looked at the cover, then back at Daring. She wasn't expecting that response at all, and it made her incredibly sad. He acted like this problem didn't bother him, but he couldn't hide much from her. If this brought him down, it couldn't have been easy to tell someone, even if it was her.
She got an idea.
Her hand found his, and she intertwined their fingers. "In that case… could I read it out loud to you? You can sit next to me and listen. If just the picture of the king reminds you of yourself, his legends certainly will, too."
He looked thoughtful for a second. "Well..."
Rosabella squeezed Daring's hand.
"...I suppose if you wanted to read one of those things out loud, we could try that. You're reading all the time anyway, I may as well know what's going on in those books of yours."
She grinned at him, giddy at the thought of taking someone on an Arthur adventure for the first time. "I'll start the fireplace. You grab a blanket."
Three hours later, Rosabella and Daring had only gotten part of the way through the book.
The fire had deflated some since it had first been lit. However, it still crackled and illuminate the room with an orange glow, despite its size.
It would have taken them less time to get to that many pages in, but interruptions in the stories were made for Daring to ask questions (almost every one of them answered with "wait and see"), and for Rosabella to add trivia and thoughts she had rattling around in her head. And she had a lot of those.
When she looked over at him, her eyes were droopy, but he was staring intensely at the book. He blinked hard. "Well? What's the next one? How does it start?"
"Daring, it's eleven o'clock at night. You need to get back to your dorm, we have class tomorrow."
He got the puppy-dog eyes he got when he wanted something. "But we aren't finished!"
"We can finish tomorrow if you want," she said, smiling sleepily.
He crossed his arms under the blanket. "Fine, alright. Deprive me of this. I'm fine, I suppose."
She straightened his crown, paying no mind to him. "I'm glad you like it, because these are my favorites. Tomorrow, after we finish these, we can look through my bookshelf for something new to read."
"Something new?"
"Of course. There's stories of all kinds, not only about knights and kings."
"Let's do one about a princess next. I mean, the ones about me are the best ones, but princess stories sound fun, too." Daring pulled the blanket tighter around both of them, his arm finding its way around her shoulder.
Rosabella hugged him back, the cozy warmth from Daring, the blanket, and the fire combined making her even more drowsy. "Of course."
The open book sat in her lap as they held each other and listened to the fire.