#guard caretaker
@silverwhisperer1 asked what happened to the characters in THISprompt and, uh… It got me thinking. So I did this. Enjoy!
The King is back in the castle. He’s sitting right next to her. The Princess should be glad. She missed her father so much… But it’s hard to have the energy to feel anything at all these days.
She sees the world behind a veil. The outline of things is blurry. She hears sounds from the other side of a tunnel. Present and past fuse into one. Reality and dreams, the same. People around the room are surrounded by sudden golden halos, by terrible dark clouds. She cries because she doesn’t know the difference. Big, soft hands clean their tears, but they’re unfamiliar.
She sees lords and ladies and her father and her dead mother. She sees healers so many times she deems them as part of the furniture. But her gleaming eyes keep scanning the room, trying to find who is supposed to be there, who used to always be there before the world changed so painfully.
She takes a long time to understand what’s missing.
Guard.
—
“She’s been calling for you again.”
The head of the guard stops halfway in their motion, the stone for sharpening their sword still touching the blade. They look at one of their most loyal guards and tries to suppress a sigh.
“She’s feverish. She’ll say anything.”
“You should go see her, Guard… We don’t know…” The Guard stops under the Guard’s heavy stare. “It’s just… She’d want to see you in case she…”
The Guard goes back to sharpening their sword, even though they have done it several times these past few days. It seems like it’s never sharp enough. It’s never rid of the blood that stained it just days ago. When they had to give three strikes. Three strikes under the screams of a cowardly man dying.
Screams that still haunted their dreams.
And now their princess… No. The princess. She could never be theirs.
“I can’t see her. Not yet.”
They hear the Guard turning to leave, but their hand hovers over the doorknob.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know how she feels about you. Or that she doesn’t know how you feel about her.”
Silence fills up the room when Guard leaves.
—
The Princess is swimming.
Her mother took her swimming, all that time ago. In a lake near their summer home. In the hot sun, the water is fresh and she smiles as she splashes around. Her stomach twists. The person still laying in a bed knows what happens next. What this little royal girl finds in that summer day.
A child, nearly dead on the bank of the lake. Starving. Sunburnt. Just about her age.
A child they would take home with them. That would be everyone’s child, growing amongst the staff, training with the guards, just as much a part of the castle as the walls. A child that would grow into the person they could always trust.
“Guard.” Her sore throat murmurs.
“Right here.” They answer, from the darkness. She opens her eyes, looking around. A wet rag is taken off from her forehead, unveiling their sight. A tension she didn’t know was inside of her loosens. Her muscles slowly relax and she finally feels the pain in them. She feels every drop of sweat in her skin, the wet rags that are turning warm in trying to lower her temperature. “I’m here.” Guard repeats, pushing away the hair that is plastered against her face.
“You took so long…” She complains and she hates the way her voice whines.
Guard flinches like they’d been struck.
“I’m sorry.”
When she blinks, she sees leaves and sunshine and hears the murmur of the fountain. She feels her lungs constricting, she remembers only thinking one thing. Get to Guard. Guard can help. She opens her eyes and some time seems to have passed.
“How did you know?” She asks, to Guard’s surprise. She raises her hand weakly, where her small cut has lost the black color but still has sickly touches of green.
“My mother. I remember… The smell.” Guard never spoke much of their apothecary mother, of their life before bandits destroyed their home and forced them to run. “I should have known when I saw the ring.”
Darkness is calling Princess, but she forces herself to stay conscious. She squints and blinks, trying to clear her sight. She sees the bags under Caretaker’s eyes, the shake in their hands. They look just as pale as she is, laying in a bed for who knows how long.
“Are you okay?” She asks, weakly searching for their hand. Caretaker looks like they hold back a sob. They look everywhere but at her. And yet, they have the audacity to nod. “Don’t dare lie to me. I’m your best friend. And dying. And your future queen or whatever.”
Guard’s eyes glint.
“You’re not dying.”
“Well, it sure feels like it.” Every word makes her tired, but she could never hold herself. Not close to them. She gasps, recovering her breath. “Just… Tell me what’s on your mind. I’ll take it to my grave.”
Guard frowns. They look around, but there’s no one else in the room but a nurse who is pretending to be very particular about some bandages. Guard sighs.
“I failed you.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“I did. I shouldn’t have ignored my instincts. I should have never let him step on our land. I should have been more open so you’d trust me about this marriage thing… I should…”
She gathers all the strength she had to squeeze their hand.
“You saved me. No one else would know where the poison came from. It had to be you.” Her fingers are getting weaker and weaker as she feels unconsciousness claim her. “It had to be you in that lake that day. It had to be you that day with me.”
Guard takes her hand to their face, like an object of faith, like it will grant them strength.
“You’ll never need to worry about him again.” The Guard’s promise skids over her feverish skin.
“I doubt that.” She sighs, her heavy eyes slowly closing, but giving them a tired smile either way. “Lords have a tendency to get away with things like this.”
“He didn’t have a tendency to get away from my blade.”
It was so low, Princess doesn’t know she really heard it. A gasp coming from the nurse in the room is the last thing she remembers. This and the soft kiss the Guard leaves between her fingers as they stand up to leave her rest.
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