The barrier surrounded the kingdom from the north side, with the five cities each protecting parts of it. Some of the cities had erected fences or walls to protect themselves, but city Three was closer to the forest, and kept a system of strong, magically enforced trees to separate themselves from the outside.

There was a gate marked by border posts with guards standing by, and beyond that, were some of the royal mages waiting for Reyna. A small crowd of civilians was huddled off to the side somewhere, that some of the knights were attempting to disperse, but Reyna focused instead on the barrier.

She could feel the magical energy coming from it even from a distance. Energy that stiffened and loosened her body at the same time, her mouth turning up into a scowl she couldn’t find the strength to hide.

The head wizard lead her closer to the barrier. There was no set line or marking where the barrier began, but Reyna could feel the sudden heavy air as they passed the border posts, the electricity pulling them closer to the outside, but repelling them at the same time.

‘If the barrier was any stronger, it would be producing thunder every few minutes,’ the head wizard proclaimed proudly.

Reyna raised a hand to get closer to the magic. He was right, but was it strong enough?

‘We would need a special suit just to pass through it,’ some other wizard joked.

                                                   **__**

‘What’s next?’ she asked Damien as she finished answering some of the workers’ questions. They had been inspecting the trees and the barrier for some time now, the afternoon sun now peeking behind the clouds. She had had the workers go through every spell and every seal, and they had walked around quite a bit, examining the barrier as it wove around the trees.

‘Lunch,’ Damien said with a smile. Reyna let out a sigh of relief.

‘If you don’t mind the cold too much, we can have lunch in the town somewhere,’ he said unexpectedly.

‘What-? Really?’

‘Sure. I can ask the carriage to drop us off in the town centre.’

‘I-Sure! Yes. Let’s go.’ She didn’t know what was happening, but Damien was smiling as he led the way, and she followed him gladly.

The carriage- a regular, horse-drawn carriage this time- stopped at the marketplace fountain, and Damien gave some instructions to the driver and waved him away. They really were alone.

Reyna grinned as she looked around at the marketplace, with bustling shops lined in narrow streets and kiosks and street vendors in every nook and cranny. The air was cold, and she pulled her robe around her, but her cheeks were definitely warm as she turned towards Damien.

‘Why did we never do this before?’

‘I thought you might want to see the city before we leave.’

‘Well, don’t you think I want to see the capital?’

‘But you’ve lived there for some time,’ he said. ‘Oh but we can go if you feel like it, that’s not… Just let me know.’

They moved deeper into the street, manoeuvring around people and stray cats, vendors’ cries and people’s conversations filling the air. All sorts of shops were jumbled together, with shoe shops and potions shops stacked together, and street vendors selling dogeared books next to cafés and burger shops.

‘What do you want to eat?’ he asked.

‘Will you eat with me this time?’ she tested the waters.

‘Of course.’

‘Oh.’ Now that she got the answer she wanted, she didn’t know what to say. ‘First time.’

Damien hesitated for a moment, before he said, ‘The Advisors usually want me to maintain decorum.’

‘The Advisors!!!’ She raged and stopped in her tracks, letting out an angry burst of magical energy that disturbed the ground under them. ‘What do the Advisors have to do with anything? I swear-‘

‘Alright, alright!’ He grabbed her shoulders. ‘Reyna-!’

She drew in her magic when he said her name; the first time she had heard him say it without a title.

‘Hey,’ he said gently, as she continued to glare at him. ‘I know. Reyna…‘ he paused, and slid his hands off her as he continued, ‘my lady, I know. I’m your knight. I don’t answer to them.’

A few people had started noticing them and staring, giving them a wide breadth after the show of magic, although they were soon overtaken by the new stream of shoppers unaware of the situation.

‘Let’s move away from the centre,’ Damien said. ‘You haven’t told me what you’d like to eat.’

‘I want what you want,’ she said huffily. ‘And that’s an order.’

He laughed. ‘If that makes my lady happy.’

Half an hour later, they were sitting on a bench in a corner between two buildings, the chattering of the crowd far away. A few trees stood around them where the cobbled street broke off to the muddy ground below.

Damien passed her a warm white lunch container. Reyna rested her cold fingers on the lid before opening the box of bun kebab they had bought. It was a warm toasted burger bun with a kebab, green chilli sauce and onions, and they had lemonade to wash it down. She eagerly began eating and ignored Damien for the first few bites.

‘It’s good,’ she said to him finally. ‘I don’t have street food often.’

‘Oh, I grew up on street food,’ he said. ‘As a kid, I would go buy the cheapest plate of whatever the vendors close to my house threw together. I can’t say if it was healthiest… but I’ve never had anything better.’

They talked a bit more casually now, Damien telling her a bit of court gossip from the old king’s time, about the Advisors and the mayors, and their grumblings about an outsider being queen.

‘They’re forgetting how much in deep water they were when the barriers collapsed,’ he said, shaking his head.

‘I don’t really care,’ she said, taking a swig of her lemonade. ‘I only said I would help out because you asked. I don’t care as long as they listen- and if they don’t, well, I have ways of making them listen.’

‘Yes, I know,’ he said with a grin. ‘I have full faith you’ll strengthen our borders from the forest- perhaps even stronger than before.’

Reyna smiled back at him, but she didn’t say anything as the weight of what she really had to do sunk down on her.