A candle residing in my fist, and a wish to pass this trial without being caught—these were the three things I took with me, as I pulled a cloak down, over my nose, then entered the library.

My legs were trembling. I was not stable. I had been drinking. It had been weeks since I had seen it, the monster that had made a home within her gaze. Soon, it would take over her spirit—I wanted to make sure Soon never came.

I could not say, why I cared so much. It was more than a yearn to be a doting sister, because, we were not sisters. We were not friends. It was difficult to claim we were acquaintances either, especially not when she had cried in my arms two nights ago. Especially not, when she had told me, “I would rather wed you, Lyra, he knows nothing about who I am, or what I want.”

But the thought of us together was quite the preposterous one. I was not bright like Princess Eileen. My hair was the color of dirt, and my eyes could often be compared to the sky when it stormed. There was nothing regal about what I transpired—perhaps this was what made it all the more difficult, once I realized I wished so dearly to have her lips on mine. To know what she would taste like.

Forbidden. It was forbidden, just like the books, whose pages I shuffled through with swift motions, in hopes of finding a cure. Starlight always came before the fall of a great leader, I had seen it happen too many a time with my own eyes to continue denying its existence like the others would.

In times like these, I often recalled my first night away from home, and the vision I’d had. I never told anyone, of course—they would have tossed me to the wolves and called me a heretic.

Although I was not truly alive, I did not want to die just yet.

From between the pages of the last codex I opened, fell an envelope whose paper was creased and yellowed with age. I opened it. It was addressed To Whomever Finds This.

I slid the thin sheet inside the hidden pocket of my cloak and shut the strange tome.

I took off, away from the smell of books and candlewax, forgotten ghosts in hallways, portraits that always stared too much.

The hallway that led to my quarters seemed to grow in length and darkness the later it got. My breaths were heavy. Each of my exhales smelled of ale. At the prospect of running into a soldier or a guard, my fingers trembled and tapped the skirt of my dress.

I arrived in front of a wooden door. I could not shake the feeling that I was being watched. As my hand lingered against the golden handle, one push inside revealed a dusty bedframe. A harp that would never be mine, yet could have been, with the amount of times that I had played it. And the frail shape of Princess Eileen’s taut frame.

The Princess rose from my mattress, and how ashamed I was that she had ended up sitting on such furniture. Everything in my room was a disaster! Princess Eileen did not deserve to be in the presence of items that were in conditions as terrible as these.

My heart thumped within my ears as the Princess approached. The back of her gown slid towards me like a snake would across the cold, stone floor.

I shut the door.

Her palm found my jaw. I let it stay there, and I indulged in the rare bliss of keeping her undivided attention. “Lyra,” she said, “I could not find you in the mess hall.”

My hand came to rest atop hers. Her warmth was one I welcomed. “Perhaps, Princess, I did not want to be found.”

We both knew I was lying. I dearly wanted her to look at me, in the same way that I saw her on the daily. “Princess,” I echoed, as my grip tightened around her skin. “You should not be here.”

Princess Eileen did not reply with words. She pressed her lips to mine. Soon, her tongue was parting my teeth, and I could do nothing but be weak in the face of this woman’s touch, for she owned my heart, and my heart hoped that—if only for a little while—perhaps, I owned a piece of hers, too.

“I depart tomorrow,” she told me, “with him.” As her fingers threaded themselves through mine, her hand hiked up my skirt. “Please, Lyra—just for one night,” she whispered. “Let us not play these games anymore.”

I made love to Lyra until sunlight rose across the land and it was time for us to say goodbye. The Starlight had departed from her gaze. When I opened the dratted letter I had found before I’d fallen apart in her arms, I understood why. If your intentions are true, then, she will be saved—but, at a price, it read.

My love for her was as true as love could be. I would have rather died, than let her fall into the madness that had been on the brink of possessing her spirit. I figured the price was letting her go. Knowing she would be all right filled me with a certain sense of peace.

Although I could not spend a single night without remembering the one we’d shared, I wanted to believe, that I had done a good deed.