There was a sun rising in Romanda, and the house on the shore was the first to bear witness to its light. A blond haired woman in a simple white dress sat upon a rock on the edge of a cliff. She had been up for an hour or so, and the warmth of the sun was warming her chilled body.

For Ovelia, this was her first morning in her new home. No longer was she the princess or queen of a place filled with betrayal and self-loathing. No longer was she bound to the rules of nobility. Now she was free from all that. Yet, as it was the start of a new beginning, she was unsure of how she would be able to handle it.

That was something the former princess had wished she had gotten rid of back in Ivalice. Her incompetence. She could live with anything else, but her uncertainty was something she could be without.

Sighing the woman lowered her chin, "Were I never born at all."

Footsteps in the grass behind her caused her to turn her body halfway to see a familiar face. A tall blond haired man in a white shirt and brown trousers and with a small sword in his left hand.

"Ramza?"

The man named Ramza Beoulve, a young man who wasn't much older than twenty but had seen many battles that had given him many years of maturity, went up to the rock where the woman had been sitting. "My apologies, Ovelia, I woke up and I couldn't find you."

"It's alright Ramza, I couldn't sleep."

He sat down next to her, being fully awake now and being used to getting up at the crack of dawn he wasn't tired at all. "Still the same nightmares?"

She shook her head slowly, "Less so, I felt a little uneasy and couldn't keep my eyes closed."

She had been living with Ramza and his sister since the day they had retrieved her from a distrustful king. She had a bad stab wound in her abdomen and she had nearly died from the blood loss. But a bit of magic and a lot of rest she was back to her feet in no time. She owed Ramza for two big saves in her life. Well, three, if she were to be honest.

Saving her from a man she hated, saving her from Ivalice and its troubles, and the most important part...saving her heart from darkness.

That last one had been Delita's fault, but Ramza had saved her from that.

Feeling comfortable in his presence Ovelia scooted closer to him. "May I ask you a question?"

"Yes," he answered right away.

"Why did you come back to Lesalia?"

Lesalia had been the home city of Ovelia and her husband Delita in the aftermath of the Lion War. She ruled over it but it was all Delita. Delita who made the decisions, Delita who used her like everyone else before him.

Then she tried to kill him, her anger boiling over, but she was unsuccessful. He almost killed her too.

Then Ramza and his people had arrived and took her away from Delita without a scuffle.

She had never known why Ramza had come back after being branded a heretic and faked his own death. She had never been answered, but now was as good a time as any.

Ramza took a breath before he finally answered her, "I was meaning to kill Delita."

Ovelia gasped, "Why?" She had always thought Ramza was a noble man who wouldn't go to the level of revenge.

But Ramza wasn't done explaining. "But when I found him, standing over you wounded, I couldn't bring myself to take him down. I was disappointed in the man he had become, but death would not have been justice for his actions. So, I took you instead and he let me go without a word."

This revelation surprised the former princess, "So he never truly cared about me."

Ramza couldn't speak about that, as he had only caught the end of Delita's stabbing of Ovelia. He only knew that Delita had been a noble person once, but the world had turned him into a cruel man. He was better off forgotten, and Ramza had not tried to think about him in the months since he had left Ivalice.

Yet, as the ordeal within Ovelia settled and Ramza tried to put his past to the back of his mind, their inner conflicts had an unseen side-effect.

It had brought the two closer than either of them noticed. Only Alma, Ramza's younger sister, had taken notice and had tried to bring them to closer. She had been largely successful but at the same time Ovelia had tried to not push herself onto Ramza.

For his part, Ramza left himself open to her. Having never in a romance before he tried to take it slow. Hand holding was all he did so far, but that had been fine with Ovelia.

Like now as her hand went across the rock and locked with his, he tightened his grip on her fingers as they watched the sunrise.

"Thank you."

Ramza turned his head in time to see Ovelia lean into him, placing her head on his shoulder. He relaxed, "For?"

"For saving me."

The young man smiled lightly, not wanting it any other way. "Now you can make your own future, unbound by the past."

"I won't be alone, either. I have you."

That she did, and Ramza knew it.

"And I have you." He would never use her or put her in danger. He would protect her and love her forever. He pledged this on the Beoulve name.