I walk quietly down the castle halls, careful not to make a noise. I curse my body for making me stay up this late, it’s the 5th night in a row. I take the stairs down to the palace gardens, stepping into the cold night air. I sit on the ground, letting the floral scents fill my nose. I lay back in the grass, looking up at the stars. 

“I should bring Emma out here sometime,” I think to myself. Suddenly, a loud voice breaks my quiet peace. 

“ELIZABETH BRIGHTHEART! And what exactly do you think you’re doing?” 

I sit up and whip my head around, seeing my father’s loyal advisor, Sera, walking towards me. 

I groan and stand up. “I’m sitting here because I can’t sleep. Obviously.” 

She stares at me. “You need to be sleeping, you have a busy day tomorrow. And even so, you can’t be outside this late! You could be taken, or worse killed, by a witch! Come with me right now Elizabeth, we are going to your father.” 

“It’s Eliza, and I can do what I want. I’m the princess.” She grips my wrist and drags me along. 

“That’s not what your father named you, and I will respect his choice and call you that. I know you are the princess and all, but that increases your chance of getting attacked by a witch.” I sigh as she knocks on my father’s bedroom door. 

“Sir! I know it’s late but your daughter was being foolish again.” King Zorath Brightheart stands in the doorway. 

“Again? Well come in, we will address this and nip it in the bud quickly.”

I enter the room and follow my dad to his desk, slumping in the chair across from him. “Tell me, my dear Sera, what was my daughter doing so foolishly?” 

“She was found sitting in the garden alone, in the dark, at night, when she was supposed to be sleeping.” 

I roll my eyes, “I still don’t see the problem with this.” 

“Elizabeth, you know witches still exist and are still a danger, especially to the royal family,” My father says, sitting back in his chair. 

“See, here's the problem. I don’t really see the huge issue about witches. Everyone’s told they are some huge threat, but really, they are just misunderstood people that can do things we can’t. What's so wrong about that?” 

“They have killed us, Elizabeth. They killed your mother.” 

“Only because we provoked them first, weren’t we the first ones to kill just because we were scared of their powers? We just killed them, instead of talking about it and being smart we resorted to violence, and war, and battles, and years of ongoing fighting, because we couldn’t see them as humans and only monsters who could do things we can’t? That seems like idiotic bullshit to me. So yeah, they killed mom. But we have killed thousands of them. We have torn apart families and shown no mercy, and we call them monsters? I don’t get it dad. I don’t get why we need to be so afraid of them when we clearly have the upper hand. So what if I get kidnapped or killed? Doesn’t matter because we will just take more of them.” I get up from my chair and head towards the door. I’m not dealing with this shit tonight. 

I open the door, “Goodnight dad, I’ll see you tomorrow.” I head back down to my own bedroom, passing by my older sister—Evelyn’s— door, hoping she’s still awake. I notice the lights off, indicating she’s asleep. Which figures, I don’t know why I thought she’d be awake, she needs her damn beauty rest, or so she calls it. I arrive at my bedroom and enter, flopping on my bed as my cat, Poe, comes to bother me. I look up at her and pet her head. I get up from my bed and pick her up. 

“You don’t hate witches, do you Poe? Of course you don’t, because you're a responsible cat, that won’t kill off entire populations,” I put my hood up on my sweatshirt, put Poe down, climb into bed and start petting Poe again. 

“This is why you’re my favorite,” I yawn. “G’night, Poe Poe.” I close my eyes, letting sleep succumb me. 

~~~~~~~~***~~~~~~~~~

I wake up to the sun shining in my eyes. I internally curse my body for waking me this early, I had only gotten, what—like 3 hours of sleep? If that. I get up out of bed and walk over to my bathroom. I look at myself in the mirror. I really do look like shit. My eyebags are deeper than yesterday, my hair’s messy, and I look hungover. I groan again and start getting ready for the day. I had a few hours to kill before I had to go play princess for my dad and arranged husband, so I decided to pay my kitchen friend, Charlie, a visit. I head down to the palace kitchens, ignoring guards as I did so. When I arrive there I spot Charlie’s boyfriend Hunter, sitting on the counter. Charlie himself is talking to his mom about the luncheon they have to cook for. 

“Hey Eliza!” Hunter says waving. 

“”Sup,” I respond, walking over to them. “What are you guys doing?” 

“Charlie’s talking to his mum about the lunch thingy you have to go to with Mr. Princey, and I’m here for Emotional-Boyfriend-Support.” 

Charlie smirks, “More like ‘Emotional-Annoying-Support.” 

Hunter gasps dramatically, “You wound me, my love.” 

Charlie smiles and pecks his nose, “You’ll get over it.” 

I roll my eyes, “You guys make me feel so fucking single.” 

Hunter laughs, “Loser.” 

I go over to the coffee pot in the back and flip him off, pouring myself a cup.

“You look hungover, were you drinking again?” Charlie observes. 

“No, I’m just sleep deprived.” I respond, sitting on the counter myself. 

“What’s new, you’re always sleep deprived.” Hunter comments.

“Shut up dude, it’s not like I want to be.” 

“Well no shit, but you might wanna get that sleep schedule back on track. You do have a wedding coming up, don’t you?” Hunter remarks.

I groan.“Don’t remind me. I’m trying not to think about it.” 

He smirks, “Yeah, pretty sure you’re big fat lesbian dreams of running away with Emma take up a lot of space.” 

I blush a deep red. “Shut it!” Hunter and Charlie laugh. My sister Evelyn comes through the doors. 

“Elizabeth? Come on, we have to get you ready for the luncheon with Xavier and his father,” She says, completely ignoring Hunter and Charlie. 

I look at her quizzically, “Evelyn, it’s only 9. The luncheon’s at 1:00. I have 4 hours.” 

“Doesn’t matter,” she responds. “You have to go get something for me anyway. I ordered some lotion from the apothecary in town. You know the owner’s daughter, don’t you?”

I nod, “Yeah. It’s Emma. We’ve been best friends for years.” 

“Oh well, I don’t really care about your social life as long as it’s not with witches,” She shivers, I roll my eyes. “Anyway, that will take a bit, especially if you want to hang out with Emma, and then you need at least an hour and a half to get ready…” 

I put my coffee down and get off the counter, “Yup got it, Sis. Bye Hunter, bye Charlie, I’ll see you guys in a bit.” I follow out of the kitchen behind Evelyn. 

“Good, now you are out of the room with the peasants,” She says as we walk to my bedroom. 

“What? What's wrong with Hunter and Charlie?” I ask, not knowing what she means. 

“They are peasants, we are royalty. We shouldn’t spend our time with them,” She responds, matter-of-factly. 

I roll my eyes, “Really? Charlie and his mom run the kitchen, and could easily poison us anytime they wanted to. Hunter is a knight trainee who is really good at what he does, even if it’s to protect a bitch like you.” 

Evelyn gasps, “Language Elizabeth.” 

I roll my eyes again, “No. And why were so fine with me hanging out with Emma?” 

Evelyn blushes, “I need that lotion, and the main ingredient is technically illegal here but it works the best so I need you to keep on good terms with Emma so they can keep giving me the lotion with the ingredient.” 

I smirk, “Oh so you're into illegal lotion ingredients, interesting.” 

Evelyn blushes deeper, “Do not tell father or you are dead, Elizabeth.” 

I smirk again, stopping at my door, “Oh I won’t. And I’ll be back with your illegal lotion in around an hour.” I close the door behind me as I step into my room. I grab my jacket off the hook and snatch the pouch of the ingredient Emma wants for her own ‘potion’ making that they can’t get because it’s used by witches. I head back down the hallway, exiting the castle and breaking into a run as I reach closer to the town.  

I reach The Timberharrow Apothecary and knock on the door. Emma’s dad, Cedric Timberharrow, opens the door. 

“Princess? You must be here to see my daughter?” He asks, in his raspy voice. 

I nod, “Yes sir. Is she home?” 

“Yeah, she’s in her room,” He steps out of the way for me to enter.

I nod again, “Thank you.” I walk down the hallway I have been down hundreds of times to the room I have some of my best memories in. I open the door and find Emma reading on her bed, her hair and herself covered in hair dye.

“Hi,” I say 

“Hi,” she responds. 

“Are you dyeing your hair?” I ask. 

“Yeah, I made some using natural ingredients. I needed a change.” 

“What colors?” I ask, closing the door and sitting in her desk chair. 

“Light pink and light blue. Light pink on the top with blue underneath,” She responds, marking her page in her book.

“That’ll look really cool.” 

“I hope so. Anyway, did you bring it?” 

I stare at her blankly, “Bring what.” 

Emma laughs, “The thing I asked for? The Eclipse Grass?” 

“Oh shit, yeah. My bad,” I pull the pouch from my pocket and hand it to her.

“How did you even get this?” She asks, taking some out. 

“The royal nurses use it sometimes in medicines, I personally think that it’s because they don’t want other people getting a hold of it.” 

“Bullshit. Do they think just because we have access to witch materials we will become one?” 

“I guess. Like you said, it’s bullshit,” I play with a piece of fuzz I found on the floor. “You wanna know what happened to me last night?” 

“Hell yeah,” She responds eagerly and smiles. 

I forget what I’m going to say for a second then start retelling last night's events. Emma makes the occasional comment like ‘Damn’, ‘Well that’s bullshit’, or ‘Real’.

After I finish telling her, I look at the clock on her wall. It reads 10:45. I remember what my sister told me. 

“Ah shit. I gotta go. I have a fucking ‘luncheon’ with my arranged husband and his father. My sister told me I need an hour and a half to get ready for some reason,” I stand up. 

“It’s okay, I have to finish up with my hair anyway. This hair dye has sat for way too long,” Emma also gets up. “I’ll see you later, okay?” 

I nod, “Okay.” We both just stand like that for a second before we both blush and look away. 

“Bye, Em!” 

“See you, Eliza!” With that, I start walking back up to the castle.