Sylviane opened her swollen eyes and looked upon the dim cabin that she was staying in. She was still sitting on the floor with her back against a corner. Her reprieve in the past -- the final memory of her childhood -- had come to its end.

She couldn't even remember what happened afterwards. The remainder of that trip had passed in a blur.

But ten years old or not, she could no longer be a child after that.

For more than a decade since, she had walked the path of a crown princess. Her father had become her foremost tutor, instructing her in every affair of state through his daily tasks. Privy council, military council, assembly of lords, diplomatic audiences, legal consultations, et cetera... she had attended them all.

Her daily schedule ran from dawn until dusk. She initially had one day off a week plus two hours of free time per day, yet even that slowly vanished over the years.

There were times when she absolutely hated, hated her father for forcing her through it all. Crown Princess? She never once cared for her exalted rank and title. All she wanted was to be able to leisurely study and play at her own pace alongside others of her own age. She never wanted every boy to bow and every girl to curtsy before her, to speak through a false mask of cordiality and distance. She wanted to laugh and talk with them as friends, just as she had with Pascal and Cecylia during her time at Nordkreuz.

However when she finally gathered enough resolve to lash out at the Emperor, it was he who stole her thunder by faltering first:

"I'm sorry, Sylv," the Emperor whispered back, his pained eyes a visage of exhaustion. "I know you never wanted this, but... I don't have anyone else left. I have no other choice."

Sylviane had never felt as ashamed of herself as that day. She had sworn to herself that she would never, ever try to abandon her father again.

Yet the Imperials weren't satisfied with taking only three-quarters of her family away.

Yesterday evening, Sir Robert finally revealed to her the truth behind why Sir Reynaud arrived in Nordkreuz. Sylviane came face-to-face with a crying Elspeth -- the younger sister of Lady Lindsay de Martel, commander of the Highland Guard and the Princess' martial arts instructor.

A tear-streaked Elspeth informed Sylviane that her royal uncle, Duke Gabriel of Atrebatois, who had marched south from the Belges region of northeastern Rhin-Lotharingie with an army of 30,000, stormed the capital of Alis Avern in a military coup d'etat. With the aid of the Knights Templar, Gabriel had butchered his brother Geoffroi, impaled the Emperor's head upon a pike, and burned the rest of the corpse in a final act of desecration.

Sylviane was no longer the Crown Princess. She had been denounced as an apostate's daughter, and everything she had toiled for the last decade of her life was gone.

Worst of all, she was now truly alone in the world. The last of her family had been snatched away, by what she knew without doubt to be an imperial plot.

Sylviane couldn't hold her composure after that. She had dismissed her armigers and secluded herself in a dark corner of her unlit cabin, where she silently wept the whole night away.

The sun fell and rose again. The tears ran out and left her with swollen, itchy eyes. But the orphaned, royal daughter couldn't be bothered to care. All she did was seek comfort in the sanctuary of her own mind: to reminiscence through memories of the past, memories of happier times.

In the darkness of her depression, she had even pulled out her engraved dagger. It had been a present from her father as part of a long Gaetane family tradition: to give every child, male or female, their first live weapon at the age of ten.

After carefully removing the sheath, Sylviane stared into the faint metallic reflection for what seemed like minutes. She could see the deadly glint of its razor-sharp edge, the vicious curvature of its blood groove.

She could end it all -- the pain of loss, the despair of defeat, the endless exhaustion of a now pointless life, resigned to nothing but helpless solitude.

Following her father's footsteps had been everything to her. She might not have wanted to be the crown princess. Yet without it, she had nothing left.

Slowly but surely, her trembling hands turned the dagger towards her own chest, her very heart. Sylviane squeezed her eyes shut as she felt the sharp tip press in between her breasts...

That, however, was as far as she went.

Try as she might, she couldn't bring herself to commit the ultimate sin.

It could be cowardice. It could be weakness. However it was also because her conscience had called out to her being, screaming with everything it had to make her stop.

Not only the Holy Father, but even her parents would never forgive her had she committed suicide. She would have gone straight to hell, never to see her mother, her father, or any of her brothers again.

Sylviane had gasped with breathless anxiety upon her realization. She had tossed the gleaming steel dagger away as though it was burning her hands. It had skidded across the floor before coming to a rest near the doorway. In the hours since it had been forgotten about, as the despondent princess returned to staring at the empty air through hollow, bloodshot eyes.

She couldn't even die cleanly -- that was the true worthlessness of her life now. The love of the Holy Father had evaporated away, and without it only the weight of a dead spirit remained.

Sylviane never heard the repeated knocking, or the calls in her name. She never noticed at all until the door opened to the sharp sunlight outside, framing the silhouette of a man and her armored maid.

"Holy Father in heaven," came a horrified but otherwise familiar voice. "Sir Robert, Kaede, wait outside. Shut the door, Mari."

Sylviane never bothered to even look up at the intruders. It took all her willpower just to crack open her parched lips:

"Mari... I told you to leave me alone..."

"You also claimed that you were no longer the princess, and we no longer had to follow you," Mari replied in a stiff voice as she closed the door and leaned against it. "If you wish to rescind that order, I will gladly offer you my head as punishment."

"You should have fetched me earlier, Mari," the male voice reprimanded as his figure crouched down. He picked up the abandoned dagger before handing it to the Lady's Maid.

"Apologies, Your Grace, but I thought she would recover as usual after a day or two of rest. I didn't think it was this bad until morning when I peeked in and saw this on the floor," she emphasized the dagger before tucking it away.

Sylviane at last recognized the familiar voice. The man was Pascal. He was much older than in her memories... and he was also the last person she wanted to see right now.

More precisely, he was the last person whom she wanted to see her like this.

"LEAVE!" She shouted at him with a hoarse voice, before pulling her knees in and burying her face between them.

Even during her worst moments, Sylviane had refused, utterly refused to cry aloud. The dignity of a princess was all she had left. If others saw her in such a miserable state, they would lose what little respect they had remaining.

"Sure, once you kick me back out." Pascal spoke almost casually as he walked over and sat down on her bed, no more than a pace away. "Your skills at that have improved considerably over the years. I am sure you would have no problem if you meant it."

Sylviane could feel her eyes trying to conjure more tears.

I do mean it! She thought. She seriously, truly wanted him to leave right now, before he could glimpse another look at her disheveled appearance and tear-stained face.

Yet it seemed even this, even her own personal space, had now slipped beyond her control.

"I don--I don't need your help!" Her voice cracked as it finally rose to a delayed yell.

"Of course, Your Highness," Pascal replied as a matter-of-fact.

There was no room for him to be here. She had no need for his self-righteous pity. Yet how could she force his departure without revealing her shameful state? Or perhaps, as a tiny voice rode against waves of staunch denial: is his absence what I really want?

An awkward silence hung over Sylviane's clouded thoughts for nearly a minute before Pascal broke it again:

"Where is Hauteclaire?"

The temperature seemed to plummet as silence returned. Sylviane felt her lips, her jaw, her whole body begin to tremble as the last vestige of her control cracked under a new tide of depression. Of all things, he had picked the worst topic to remind her. Even the noble and saintly phoenix could no longer tolerate her cursed existence.

"Gone," Sylviane barely murmured at last.

"Empath," Mari commented from her spot by the door.

"Riiight," Pascal drawled out with a full return of his most annoying habit. "Your depressive episode became too much for him..."

Sylviane felt it like a stab in the gut. She didn't even deserve pity from her fiancé, who only scorned upon her failures and sins before she departed from this unforgiving world.

"--Probably just out taking a stroll though," Pascal finished after a momentary pause, too little too late for the deep wound he already dealt.

"Why don't you just leave... You don't have to pretend to be my fiancé any longer," Sylviane muttered out with her last reserve of energy.

It pained her to say it. But beneath all of their casual intimacy, the betrothal between Pascal and her was a political arrangement from the very beginning. Now that she had lost all value, what possible purpose would their marriage still serve?

"Since when did I ever have to 'pretend' to be that?" Pascal almost snorted out.

Though before she even had a chance to rekindle hope, his truthful follow-up stabbed straight into her heart:

"I admit, I rather hate the prospective 'Prince Consort' title. Yet even that fit me better than how you approached your 'Crown Princess' role. Really, it did not suit you at all."

His words burned like searing acid, melting away the already-shattered armor of her dignity and pride.

Sylviane no longer even had the will to defend herself, nor the mental energy to retort. All she did was stay in her curled-up, protective embrace while pretending to ignore his incisive words.

"Do you remember when we first met?" Pascal said as he lifted himself off the bed. He sat down on the floor this time, his voice coming in from less than an arm's reach away. "It was kind of like this. Except I had to stand still for ten whole minutes without moving! Even my feet went numb that time. All because you insisted on pretending you were asleep. And now what? You are ignoring me again?"

Sylviane wanted to tell him that nobody was forcing him to stay, that he was more than welcome to leave at any time. However her throat was no longer responding. She couldn't even will herself to push those words out.

"Fiiine," Pascal sighed aloud as he leaned back against the bed. "I shall just sit here and keep talking to myself all day. On the hard floor, with my butt aching, next to this impertinent, unlovable princess whom, after ten years of engagement, would not even give me a free hug."

A faint memory brought awareness that those last two words formed one of Pascal's favorite jokes. Yet there was nothing funny in the context he expressed it through. Was it merely inappropriate or outright derisive? Her threads of judgment could no longer process its truth.

"Did you know that even Kaede gave me a free hug within a month after we met? Of course, she also gave me three broken ribs, so I guess it rather balanced itself out. Though the point is that she could at least express herself properly, even if it hurt to be on the receiving end..."

Why don't you just marry her then...

Sylviane was long past the luxury of envy or jealousy. She might have even whispered her thoughts out loud, to offer her blessing for a union that would at least leave him in trustworthy hands.

However this time Pascal did not wait before pushing on:

"You, on the other hand... even a decade ago you were totally not cute. A princess should do this. A princess should be that. That was all you thought about, all you seemed to live for...!"

The tone of his complaints rapidly escalated. Even his hands had joined in through dramatic gestures, as told by the faint swishing of air.

"I mean seriously! Which nine-year-old child who loves her parents does not cry when kidnapped to a foreign land by brutish troops? But noooo! Those rules did not apply to you!" He declared in an exaggerated voice. "You would not let me see you cry. You would not even admit that you were scared, or that you simply missed home!"

It was unpleasant to hear such criticism, to hear the apparent disapproval that Pascal had held all along. None of it even mattered any more, not after Sylviane lost her princess role.

Yet her thoughts would not let go. Her feelings could not let go. Even as her exhausted mind steadily zoned out, even as her logic stopped processing his words, her subconscious still clung onto the tone of his voice, the flow of his speech.

Perhaps there was a comforting warmth in his words after all. His emphasis was neither sarcastic nor condemning. Rather, it whined with disapproving familiarity, backed by a protective concern reminiscent of her father's love.

It both energized and aggravated her at the same time. Pascal might be many things. But a father figure to her was something he would never be.

Then, as though she had been shaken out of a reverie, her thoughts returned to a bitter silence. Pascal had stopped. However it had only been a respite before he mounted his philosophical 'peak':

"...Oh right. That was what Kaede called it -- you just had to be a special snowflake."

For a brief moment, Sylviane found herself stunned at this conclusion. Annoyance began to bubble up inside her as her lips twitched at Pascal's complete and total hypocrisy, which only seemed to worsen as his tirade went on:

"Do you know how annoying that was? You would not throw a tantrum, or show your tears, or even do something childishly annoying. Nooo," he drawled out peevishly, "you had to pretend that everything was just fine, that they were doing a marvelous job keeping you locked up. Meanwhile I had to guess at what you wanted -- to bribe the guards, to talk to the maids, to appeal to father on your behalf..."

She was a 'special snowflake'? Pascal had spent his entire life ignoring every law of man and concealing every weakness beneath his pride. The only difference between her 'princess' and his 'prodigy' was that he should have been wearing a frilly dress!

But then, that was also where they diverged.

'Childish' never quite described him. Though Pascal wouldn't have stayed quiet either. Instead, he would have irritated his overseers in his own way.

With a deep, exasperated sigh that seemed to carry more years than his age, Pascal finally settled down from his lengthy rant and returned to soft-spoken words:

"Sylv... you know I was never good at guessing what other people wanted. We shared many similarities back in the day, so I often scored right. But the more you matured into a lady, the less I could guess what you were thinking..."

It was true that his 'prodigy' and her 'princess' personas held common ground. Yet that was also mostly superficial.

Pascal was a gifted child, an exceptional individual wherever he went. As an impertinent boy, he chased away even his tutors and learned to accomplish everything in his own way. To him, life was an endless opportunity for a boundless mind. Being an officer might not be his favorite profession, as he always held a love for magical innovations. But it was nevertheless a career he would walk with joy and pride.

Meanwhile, Sylviane had been anything but 'special'. Raised in the palace as the least gifted of three siblings, she had grown accustomed to going with the flow. Traits that people wanted to see, qualities that brought others to approve -- she had crammed them all within her mind, plastering them over herself. For someone who struggled just to meet her responsibilities, being the heir was an unenviable duty to which she had little choice.

Yet what did that make her? Was she just a reflection of the 'princess' others wanted? Did she still have an identity of her own?

Her mood swings, her jealousy of others, her hobby of collecting adorable garments to dress Vivi in, her desire to dominate Kaede that had nearly caused a rift between her and Pascal...

--Who would wish to claim such eccentricities as their own?

"...You have always kept weakness to yourself, Sylv, always kept others at arm's reach," Pascal heaved another sigh. "Sure, I am your fiancé. I just have to accept it 'as is'. But do you really expect to go through life, treating everyone around you as one of your subjects, your subordinates? Do you think those of us who view you as a friend would appreciate that? To see not the real you, only that mask you claimed as your own?"

His exasperated voice rose in pitch with every word, highlighting the annoyance behind them until it became an almost shout:

"Sure, most people in the royal court are vultures. But never forget that some are on your side! How long do you expect them to keep groping in the dark before they say 'screw it, I give up on trying to help!'"

As his frustration faded from the air, Sylviane sensed Pascal shifting to stand back up.

He had been her fiancé. He had been on her side. It was not her intention to keep him in the dark, but she had done it, not once but twice in just two recent months!

Her heart instantly lurched on the brink of eternal despair. No, she didn't want him to leave. No, she wouldn't be able to stand his cold back! Just as she didn't want to die, she couldn't even fathom losing his support!

Though was it too late? Had he had enough? Was 'screw it, I give up on trying to help' an expression of his own beliefs?

Of course...

Why would he tolerate her for a third time?

No. Please, her thoughts screamed out at last. I don't want that. Anything but that!

Then, as her fingers struggled to reach out, as her throat trembled to call out, Sylviane finally felt the presence of a sincere touch.

It began with a palm on her shoulder, soon echoed by another warm presence on her other side.

For a brief moment the princess almost tried to shake him off. It was an instinctive reaction, fortified by years of prideful demeanor.

She did not need to be consoled. She did not want to be coddled. A true princess would not need any of that!

--Even if she did.

However, Pascal never gave her the chance to decide.

Sylviane felt a crushing embrace wrap around her half-buried head and bent knees. His arms had slipped around her back. They squeezed hard and forced her head into the protective warmth of his firm chest. Meanwhile his desperate whispers finally reached past her ears, past layers upon layers of broken emotional armor and devastated mental landscape, and appealed to the depth of her soul:

"I do not pretend to replace your father, Sylv. I do not want to either." He declared. "But I do want you to know, to understand it in your heart, that the world is not over, and not all is lost! You still have those who love you, who care for you, who believe in you and will fight alongside you!"

Pascal's voice no longer held the firm control of his usual self. It no longer slowed with his aristocratic drawl or even carried his usual air of superiority.

With his knees pressed against the floor, the man Sylviane once considered 'unchivalrous' pledged his solemn oath to his princess through begging pleas:

"So please -- stop bottling everything in just this once! Let me share your grief and your pain. I am not some outsider. I am your fiancé, your family, your future husband! Show me what you truly, honestly feel, and let me offer all I can to help!"

In that final moment before the dam cracked and broke, before her reservoir of suppressed emotions poured out in a great flood, Sylviane finally came to realize the truth that she had denied herself for years:

Pascal didn't like her just because he found her to be a 'beautiful', commendable princess.

He loved her because he had accepted her for whom she truly was.