A/N: God, will these two shut up? This is not your story, Allen Schezar! At least, it wasn't supposed to be! (Or, maybe, not yet, dammit!)

Also: oh crapmonkey. This story is going to be way longer than I intended.

One Last Thing: I'm not meaning to make Marlene sound like a slut. A tease, maybe. But a good-natured one – the kind that everyone knows can't go far, because, well, she's a princess, and her virtue goes to the highest bidder on the treaty table, not some nameless alcove-partner.

I suppose that that was when it started to go badly.

I still placed a significant value on our friendship, though, and finding out his secret the way I found out most of Marlene's was not the way I should have found out.

It had been nearly a week since I yelled at him. I had felt bad as soon as I could calm down, but strangely, I had not had the time, what with helping my family plan a royal funeral, to hunt him down. And I did not come across him by accident.

Except once.

It was Marlene's favorite alcove, and I heard her whispers coming from it. I was certainly not above eavesdropping.

"I don't know what I would have done. You are so kind, and I…I needed that. I've never had that, and I wanted it so badly…" her voice trailed off, and I couldn't hear what was said next. Then she became audible again.

"What does it matter to my father? I have two other sisters who can be married off for plenty of good, one-sided treaties in exchange for a daughter. And one of them can be the queen. I don't want to. I just want you."

Then there was the sound of kissing, but not the sound I'd heard before, this time it was, well, I blushed. There was no giggling, no sounds of quick pecks. This was the sound of something a little more amorous.

And then I heard a man's voice, the volume still low, and it took me several words into his sentences before I recognized the speaker.

"Marlene, it's just not done. No king would let his daughter just run off with a knight, even a Caeli knight." My suspicions piqued.

"Allen," she breathed, and with eyes as wide as saucers, I felt my chest constrict.

Allen was in there with my sister. Allen and Marlene. Oh. God.

I didn't stay for the rest, but turned and ran down the hallway, back the way I came, around corners so quickly that I nearly tackled several assorted laundresses and handmaidens, and went straight for my room, where I slammed the door and threw myself into my comforter and pillows.

I laid there for several minutes, taking deep breaths that sort of hurt, and my head started to ache, and then I huffed and decided I couldn't think of why I should care.

But before I could really explain to myself that it had nothing to do with me, that we were friends, that was it, the tears came. Then the sobs, and I didn't know what else to do but bury the sound in my pillows. I cried until I didn't have any tears left to do more.

Once I'd finished with that, I turned to lay on my back, carefully avoiding the wet spot on my pillows, and let out a sigh, trying like hell to objectively reevaluate the situation.

Marlene and Allen. Allen and Marlene. Allen and my sister. My sister and Allen. My sister and my best friend. My best friend, my best friend that I…I sort of loved. Sort of? Was I really that upset at 'sort of'? No. I did. I loved him. He was my best friend, and there had been something else I had felt for some time. But it was good the way it was, he confided in me, and I in him. We shared our lives with each other, and wasn't that what love was?

But I hadn't said anything, and he hadn't picked up on anything. And he found someone else.

Oh god, please don't tell me Marlene is playing with him like with one of her palace guards or courtiers.

I buried my face in my pillow again, and, like I'd done so many times before, I buried my own feelings in favor of my concern for him.

Please don't break Allen's heart.

# # # # #

I waited for him to tell me, waited for him to tell me that he was in love with my sister. It had to be love, right? He wouldn't just kiss any girl in an alcove, right? And what was that they were saying? Father wouldn't approve? Someone else could be Queen? What exactly were they planning?

But he didn't tell me. And he didn't tell me. And he didn't tell me. Conveniently, we had hardly seen each other in a week.

And that only served to turn my concern and compassion into anger.

I sat eating my breakfast with my sister, and gave her withering looks, hoping she would let something slip.

"What are you going to do today, sister?"

Marlene just smiled and ho-hummed. "I don't know…maybe go riding or something."

Oh, so she thinks she's going to tryst with my friend again, eh?

"Allen and I are going to the market."

She nearly dropped her spoon, and looked up at me in surprise. "Allen…Allen Schezar, the Caeli Knight?"

I smiled and took another bite of my oatmeal. Oh, this is going to be fun.

I nodded. "Mmm-hmm."

"And…how do you know him?"

I narrowed my eyes at her, trying not to let the smile play around my lips. Instead, it shone through my eyes. "Marlene, since when do you care about my friends?"

"I…" she stammered. "I don't. Just. What exactly are a princess and a Caeli doing playing around in the marketplace? Besides the fact that you are much too old to be out without a chaperone."

"A chaperone? Why what better chaperone than a Caeli? Besides," I dipped my spoon into my oatmeal, breaking apart the gelatinous chunks, "we're been friends for years. It's no big deal. Father doesn't care."

This time the spoon clattered against the bowl before hitting the table. I couldn't resist one last remark. "And how do you know him Marlene? It's not like you hang around those men anyhow."

I could tell she was trying not to blush. I knew she hung around those men. The entire city of Palas knew that Marlene had a soft spot for a uniform.

"I..I've seen him around."

"Oh," I said.

Liar.

And once again, without even realizing it, I had put my foot squarely in my mouth, and encouraged exactly what I was trying to stop.

# # # # #

"Marlene's personal guard?!" I nearly screeched.

He actually raised an eyebrow, as though I were the one out of line.

"Yes, Eries. Apparently your father seems to think that Marlene is old enough that she needs to be chaperoned around – she's a princess, after all."

So am I. So?

"And I'm what, chopped liver?"

"Eries, don't be disgusting. Besides, what's your problem?"

"My problem is," I paused. Did I really want to go into what my problem was? "My problem is, my sister doesn't need a personal guard, because she never does anything but sit around and gossip with those contrite little noblemen's daughters, and why did it have to be you?"

Okay, so that was only partly a lie. I know perfectly well why she needs someone to chaperone her. But why did it have to be you? Don't you see what's happening? Why are you lying to me?

He shrugged. He was really going to play this all off like he didn't know what was going on. So much for being close friends. How long had this been happening and he hadn't breathed a word of it to me? I felt particularly venomous at the thought of one more person not thinking I was important enough to share their life with. I faded into the background, the middle princess, the one who didn't look like my mother, didn't have her beauty, not like Marlene and Millerna. God, even their names rhymed.

"I guess because I'm still new to the Caeli, I haven't been given a permanent post yet, and…" he trailed off and shrugged again. He turned away from me, reordering the tack on the stable wall, deliberately not looking at me.

I sighed. No more of this pretense.

"I know you kissed her."

He froze, and then began tucking bits of leather around the saddle, as though I hadn't spoken.

"You should have told me, Allen."

That got him to look at me.

"Told you what?"

I let out a laugh more bitter than I had intended. "Told me what. Well, the fact that you were making out with my sister in her favourite alcove for one."

He swallowed, his face trying to decide between total disclosure and being angry with me to throw me off.

He opted for disclosure, and for a moment, I felt bad about what I was going to tell him.

"I…I love her, Eries. She loves me."

I stared at him, and he couldn't look at me. He knew he had done wrong keeping it from me, after all the years where we told each other everything, and somehow he kept this, his biggest secret from me for…however long it had been going on.

And the guilt panged me, my next words were both exactly what I wanted to say, and at the same time, I could see in his eyes that he did love her, and I didn't want to break my best friend's heart.

"She's betrothed, you know."

His head snapped up. "What? No. She would have said."

I pressed my lips together, my heart tearing itself apart with conflicting emotions. I wanted him to hurt like I was hurting, and at the same time, wanted so much to shelter him from it. The only thing that came out of my mouth was sarcasm.

"I take it back, she needs a chaperone because someone has to watch over her, make sure she's kept all princessly pure until her marriage." I was going to say more, something about foxes and chicken coops, but at the look on his face, I regretted my harsh tongue. I tried to make it better. I swallowed my own feelings and said what he wanted to hear, instead of what he needed to hear, or what I wanted him to hear.

"She probably just isn't ready to tell you. It's her duty to marry whomever Father chooses. She doesn't have a choice."

This didn't make it any better.

He opened and closed his mouth, but could not reply.

He slid down the wall until he sat, awkwardly, on the straw that littered the floor of the stables. I still stood, looking down at him. He looked like I felt. And all the bitterness and anger I felt suddenly fled from my body – I couldn't stand seeing him like that.

I sat down near him, tucking my ankles under my knees. I reached out to take his hand, and he let me, gripping it tightly, even while he stared straight ahead, not at me. I bit my lip, unsure what to say.

And so we sat there, hands entwined, and I didn't want anything more from that moment.