Disclaimer: Pffft. I wish.

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The ground started shaking violently and she lost her balance, fully preparing to land on hard ground, only to be caught in his warm embrace. Her mind immediately flashed back to that day all those years ago.

Flashback

She’d been so terribly bored. Her etiquette instructor had commanded her to practice sitting properly and ladylike while the woman herself had excused herself several hours ago. Or rather, it felt like several hours ago in the young girl’s mind. In reality, it had probably only been a few minutes.

She considered escaping for a moment but there were guards outside patrolling the hallways and they’d surely tattle on her to Madame Estelle. Then she would be in trouble with the etiquette mistress and her father for skipping out on lessons. He didn’t want her to embarrass herself in front of her kingdom, after all. But it was just so boring! Letting out a sigh of disappointment, once again, she shifted her position so she didn’t slouch. It was so hard being a princess sometimes.

There was a thud as a pebble flew in through the window and hit Natalia in the back of the head. She twitched for a moment before moving to the window with an irritated expression on her face. The honey-blonde looked down to see her childhood friend, Luke, outside with another pebble in his hand, ready to throw. He dropped it when he saw her though.

“What is it?” she hissed, still a bit cranky from being forced indoors all afternoon to practice something that she’d learned when she had been in diapers, and then having a dirty rock hit her clean, light-colored hair, which was easy to stain. And now there was a clump of dirt on the carpet. Lovely.

“Do you want to go for a walk?” he called up to her, gesturing to the cloudless sky and the bright sun shining down on the Capital of Light. Only the Nobles level of the city received any sunlight at all, seeing as it blocked the rest of the city. It was incredibly tempting, as anything was better than staying seated for the next hour.

“Father will be angry with me for skipping lessons!” Natalia replied irritably, even though that’s exactly what she’d wanted to do. But her duty as a princess to her people was far more important than her own personal desires… right?

“Just tell him it was my fault!” he answered exasperatedly. She really was too goody two-shoes for her own good. “Come on, Natalia, it’s such a beautiful day…”

Agh. Trust him to know exactly what to say.

“How do I get down?” she looked around the room for something that might help her lower herself. Luke looked around outside before his face brightened and he pointed to something right beside the window. Natalia leaned out the window to get a good look at it. At first, she saw nothing out of the ordinary so she leaned her entire top part of the body out. Unfortunately, she did not have acrobatic grace and lost her balance.

She screamed as she fell out of her second floor window. Below, Luke’s emerald eyes widened in panic before he instinctively flung out his arms and caught her bridal-style. Both were in shock for a few moments before Luke recovered and gave her an impish grin.

“You know, I didn’t mean ‘jump out your window’ when I pointed to that pipe,” he looked at her with amusement on his face. She craned her head to look up at her window to see a water pipe running down beside it. The honey-blonde girl let out a sigh as the adrenaline of the moment wore off.

How could she be so careless about her own life? If Luke hadn’t caught her in time… She shuddered at what would’ve happened.

“Thank you for catching me, Luke… Now can you put me down?”

End Flashback

“Remember the last time I caught you like that?” he smiled dryly. However dry it was, it was still a smile and that was enough for Natalia as she gave him a warm smile in reply.

“Yes…I do.”