“I love to be someone you consider your friend.”

Aldrik considered her for a long moment. His lips parted slightly and his eyes scanned her face. Vhalla wasn’t sure what he was looking for. Aldrik inhaled sharply, opened his mouth. Vhalla’s heart skipped two beats. He deflated and avoided her expectant stare.

“You should get ready to meet Father,” he said softly. Aldrik stood and adjusted his double-breasted coat without so much as a glance back at her. “I will return in thirty minutes.”

Vhalla tried to get in another word but the door had already closed behind him. She drew a quivering breath. “I love you, Aldrik,” she whispered into the silent air. The next breath was shakier than the last, the breath after was stuck in her throat with a pained whimper that she could only dislodge by releasing the tears.

Vhalla balled her hands into fists and buried her eyes in them. She had to compose herself; this was not the place or time to lose her wits over being in love with the crown prince.

First, she attempted denial. It wasn’t possibly love. She’d almost died, and he’d held her, he’d given her comfort. She was just clinging to him in an emotional state. Vhalla laughed with a hiccup and a rasp. She wasn’t sure if she had ever loved before, but she knew that this was it.

Then she tried to blame it on the Bond or the Joining. Clearly, it had affected both of them in multiple ways that was barely understood. It was creating something out of nothing. It had always been there as long as she had known him.

No, for as little she knew about the Bond academically, Vhalla was confident in her feeling of it. She felt the extension of herself into him, the calm his proximity brought from having that piece near her again. The Bond was a door, a window, a Channel; it didn’t alter them, it just gave them access to what lay beyond in the other. It let the truths they tried to keep hidden be exposed.

Finally, she attempted reason. Vhalla assured herself that it was simply a result of spending so much time with him on the march. Even Prince Baldair mentioned the needs one will have naturally. She saw him every day, he was her teacher, and it was easy to develop feelings for someone in such a position. Vhalla looked down at her palms. It wasn’t just the march.

Vhalla sighed, reclining onto the bed. She wasn’t sure when it had happened. Closing her eyes, she let the memories come in a painful flood of quiet sobs, looking at them in a way she never had before. Was it the moment he dropped those papers everywhere, when she stayed in that rose garden a minute longer than she had planned, his apology? Perhaps it was the moment he had run to her side, casting away whatever official duty he had when his brother and father returned South. Was it the minute her heart fluttered when he confessed he wanted to see her again? Or knowing he had begun to go out of his way for her? Could it have even started before she knew who he was but relished his mind through that beautifully curved script?

She realized that whenever it had happened, she had loved him before the moment he had seen her with Sareem. When her heart tightened with worry that he would think she was someone else’s. She had loved him when she had chosen to wear the black gala gown rather than an appropriately colored one. She loved him when she wanted nothing more than for him to stay by her side in the palace and never go off to war again.

Everything after had just been denial.

Vhalla opened her eyes and placed a hand over her mouth, muffling her tears. Now she knew. She knew that she was hopelessly in love with a man who would eventually leave her life. It was an earth-shattering revelation. Even if somehow they managed to stay near to each other by living in the palace, he would someday be the Emperor. He would marry someone befitting of his station, and she’d have to kneel before him and the woman who would be her Empress and mother of his children.

He had said titles didn’t matter, that he could give her any he wanted as the prince or Emperor. She’d believed him because she wanted to. She wanted to think it could be simple and beautiful. Vhalla had never told him why she was so wounded by Elecia’s words. That she wished for nobility to make it acceptable in the eyes of society for her to be around him. Not just as a friend, but as a lover. If he knew, he likely would’ve never said anything of granting her whatever title she wished.

The door opened suddenly, startling her. Snapping her head to the entry she saw Larel holding a small bundle of clothes. Vhalla tried to smile, she tried to be strong, but she only found herself crumbling again.

“Larel,” she choked out weakly. The other woman ran over, dropping the clothes on the foot of the bed and placing her hands on Vhalla’s shoulders.

“Vhalla, what is it? What hurts?” Larel inspected her bandages quickly.

Vhalla shook her head, dropping it into her hands. She couldn’t handle the concern; she couldn’t handle the shame for why she was breaking apart.

“Vhalla, please,” Larel pleaded.

“I love him,” she whispered through a ragged breath.

“What?” Larel asked, leaning closer.

“I love Aldrik.” Vhalla searched the other woman’s expression for something, anything.

“Oh, Vhalla,” Larel enfolded her into a warm hug. The motion shattered her control and Vhalla openly sobbed into Larel’s shirt. “Hush, hush ... What’s so awful about that?” Larel leaned back slightly, tilting her head to look at her.

“Because, because he will never want someone like me. Because I am not good enough to even deserve half of what he’s given me. Because, at the end of everything, no matter what we are, he will leave. Because I think he’s wonderful, and everything I will never have. Because ...” Vhalla took a shuddering breath. “Because, I don’t know if I’ve ever loved like this before and it terrifies me.”

Larel gave her a kind, tired smile. She ran her hand through Vhalla’s hair and pulled her close again. Larel stroked her back, and Vhalla allowed herself to shamelessly take in every comfort the other woman offered and then some. Eventually her initial panic—compounded through fear and despair—weakened and her tears returned to the realm of control.

“Vhalla,” Larel finally said. “I will not tell you what way is best. I cannot even pretend to know.” She sighed. “I will tell you that once something is broken with Aldrik, it is very difficult to fix it.” There was a sincere sorrow in the softness of Larel’s voice. “I will also tell you that you’re right, in this way it’s likely impossible for you to be anything permanent in his life. That if you try, you’re probably going to be met with heartbreak. You have to decide if the moment, however long it lasts, is worth overcoming that fear. Is worth him.”

Vhalla sighed, sitting up and rubbing her eyes. She wondered when Larel became so insightful and wished that the wisdom had been in her life much earlier than just the past year.

“To him, I’m just a—” Vhalla wasn’t sure what she was to the crown prince. She was more than his subject. Student didn’t seem to quite cover the extent of their relationship. A friend? Even that seemed laughable; she couldn’t ever recall holding her friends as she had held him before. “A ...” Vhalla paused, she didn’t have a good answer.

“I wouldn’t say just anything about you, Vhalla. I think you’re a lot more than you give yourself credit for. Especially to him.” Larel met her eyes with an unwavering stare. When it became clear she had no more words, Larel shifted, picking up the clothes.

“You’re going to meet the Emperor soon. I figured you’d want a change of clothes; I hope I chose all right, half isn’t dry yet.”

Vhalla considered Larel’s choice. Tan leather leggings with a gray woolen long-sleeved tunic. They smelled like crisp morning air, and the lack of grime further confirmed that they had been washed.