Alex Zandra

(continued from Part IX | Act I | Act II | Part XI)

Lou sat on the bed as the Prince went about his bedroom getting dressed. The morning light seemed dimmer; sounds, muffled. She was still stunned by what he'd told her: he wanted her to leave.

All those years spent wrapped in her old body felt like a footnote, a series of unremarkable events leading to the moment when their lives magically, dramatically intertwined. The majority of her time in the body she now called her own had been spent here, in his castle. More than the village where she had been born or the city where she had trained, this was her home. This is where she belonged, within these walls. At his side.

And now, he wanted her to leave.

"Loulou?" the Prince asked, waving his hand in front of Lou's face. "Are you there?"

She snapped to attention, looking up at him. She opened her mouth, but no actual words would come out. She didn't even know where to begin. Was he upset with her? He didn't look upset. They'd just had a lovely, intimate heart-to-heart... Frederic's interruption notwithstanding. Was this one of his plans? No, he usually looped her in, at least superficially, instead of acting like nothing was wrong. Then what? Why did he want her to go away?

"I asked you, where are you planning to go now?" he asked, putting on the form-fitting leather jerkin that served as the base layer of his armor. "I'll have a ride prepared for you."

"I... I don't..." Lou began to say, unsure where her sentence was going. Eight months into what she had resigned herself to be her life from now on, she'd seen a glimpse of something better; something so pure and joyful she had never even imagined could exist, let alone be within her reach. Now that she held it in her hands, she didn't want to let it go. She wasn't ready to let it go. She could barely conceive of a world beyond these walls anymore; a world that didn't include him.

"Oh, you should get dressed first," the Prince said, meticulously pulling and adjusting the sleeves of his shirt under those of the jerkin.

"Right. Right. Sorry," Lou said absent-mindedly. If nothing else, getting dressed would buy her some time, at least. She looked around from her position. Where had her dress gone? Had the Prince really just thrown it somewhere last night, or had she dreamed that part? She pulled her wayward apron free from the curtains, clutching it for a modicum of privacy while she hunted down the rest of clothes. Part of her found it very funny that she was self-consciously hiding the body the Prince had lived in for over two decades, but the rest of her didn't feel like laughing right now.

She found her work dress draped over the back end of the desk. She quickly retrieved it, and began putting it on. "Is there..."

"Loulou, don't wear that! Let me get you something decent, it's the least I can do." He threw open one of his dressers, rooting through some clothes that had clearly not been touched in months. "Where did I put that, I could've sworn..."

Lou stepped aside as the Prince emptied out most of the drawers out onto the bed. Maybe this was a misunderstanding. Maybe he just didn't realize how important it was for her to stay. Why else would he be so casual about dismissing her like this? Why else would he be treating this like any other morning, when it was one of the most important moments of her life? "Is... is there a way," she began to say before being cut off by a large ball of cloth and fur bouncing onto the bed.

"There it is!" the Prince exclaimed as he pulled a carefully-folded blue dress from the very bottom of the piece of furniture he'd been excavating. "Always meant to wear this one, never got the chance. I think it'll look wonderful on you."

"Thanks," Lou said quietly as she received the garment. "But, I was wondering if there was a way for me to... is that my cloak?" She put the dress down on the bed and rushed over to the familiar-looking ball of fur, unrolling it like it was precious parchment. The thick brown cloak, the blue wolf pelt wrapped about the shoulders... that was hers alright. Her companion of a dozen winters and a dozen more. "I'd forgotten all about it! Why was it in the back of an old dresser? When I wasn't wearing it, I always kept it on display."

The Prince winced at the thought, looking at the paintings and finery already present on the walls. "Loulou, it's a ratty old wolf pelt on a cape."

"It's one-of-a-kind!" she replied, holding it open; standing up on her tiptoes and stretching her arms up so the bottom didn't touch the floor. "Grandfather showed me how to make it after my first hunt. I wore it every day I could."

"Yes, I remember," the Prince said with a chuckle. He took the cloak from her hands and turned it around to get a good look at it; came face to face with the wolf's head that rested on the left shoulder. "I suppose I should have given it a little more reverence. The famous cloak of the Wolf of the White Woods." He folded it back up—more properly, this time.

"Only here. Back home I was just Lou." She looked at the cloak in his hands. "You didn't wear it?"

"One time, you-know-when. It was already around my shoulders when I came to. Once I took it off, I never put it back on. It was always more your style than mine." He put the folded cloak on his desk, amidst the papers.

Lou nodded, pensive. "Is that why you shaved off the beard?"

"No, I shaved off the beard because it was so scratchy. You're not mad I shaved it off, are you? How did you ever stand that thing?"

"It took a really long time to grow! It was a commitment. I guess I got used to it."

The Prince smiled. "Is that why you didn't ask Gaston to cut your hair short?"

Lou blinked, feeling the color rise in her cheeks. "I... I s'pose so," she said, gathering up her long blonde locks as she slipped on her new dress. "I think it's a good look," she said, carefully getting one arm, then the other through their respective sleeves.

The Prince walked over to his carefully-arranged stack of armor plates from the night before, getting ready to layer them on. He shot her a smile. "It is a good look. It suits you very well."

Lou took a deep breath. She had tried and failed to ask this question multiple times already, and now the anxiety at being turned down was threatening to become overwhelming. Maybe this was all in her head. She needed to go ahead and ask. "About what you said... Isn't there a way I could stay here?"

The Prince let out a light chuckle as he picked up the first armor plate. "Loulou, your little disguise was very good, but it wasn't going to last forever, especially with all the dignitaries going in and out all the time. One person would figure it out. Then another. Sooner or later, someone would put two and two together, and then you'd be in danger—or worse, a bargaining chip. That was the main reason I wanted you away from the castle, remember? You have to think of your own safety now." He buckled the piece of metal in plate, fussing with the leather strap. "Could've sworn I mentioned it in my letter."

Lou tried to keep her beating heart in check. The Prince hadn't said no; he was just preoccupied with her safety. And really, who could blame him? Lou knew this feeling like the back of her hand. This was good, or at least, not that bad; there was hope of convincing him. The Prince was one of the brightest minds of his generation, after all. So long as the logic was sound, he could be reasoned with. And he was nowhere near as stubborn as she was.

— end of preview

...read the rest of this chapter on my Patreon!

all chapters FREE for EVERYONE to read on Patreon after 7 days,
available by clicking the link above
☆ don't want to wait? become a patron to read the new chapter right now! ☆

(continued from Part VIII | Act I | Act II | Part X)

"If you had just one night with the Prince, what would you do?" Chiffon asked, twirling the broom in her hand before moving on to the other side of the banquet table.

"Define one night," Sleeves said as they moved from place to place, artfully folding napkins and setting down cutlery. "Are we in his room? Do we have privacy? Can I choose what we're doing with our time?"

"Let's see..." Chiffon pondered as she methodically swept the next section of the upper hall. "Yes room, yes privacy. I think choosing what you're doing is kind of the whole question."

"Easy, then," Sleeves said with a grin. "I'd win the castle off of him."

Dusty laughed from her side of the hall. "What makes you think you could beat him? As a matter of fact, what makes you think he'd even agree to bet that? What do you have to wager that'd even come close?"

"Hey, hey! That's a lot of questions all at once," Sleeves replied, wagging their finger as they sat down in one of the chairs. "First, I know I could beat him. I just need a few rounds to figure someone out, you know, find their weak point. And then I clean 'em out." They put a hand on the backrest and leaned over to the diminutive figure painstakingly scrubbing the floor that Chiffon had swept. "No one's unbeatable," Sleeves added with a self-satisfied smile.

The shortest of the maids did not reply, continuing her work.

"Hey be nice to Glasses, she just survived an intruder attack," Dusty yelled as she cleaned the fixtures. "Besides, you got lucky the other night and you know it."

"I got lucky and clever." Sleeves hopped back to their feet and resumed their work. "And so we get to the second part of my plan: work my way up while I wear him down. I'd start small, let him win a few, make small talk, and then when he's good and confident, BAM—I get him to make a big bet. And I win. And I keep winning as he tries to get back what he lost."

"That's pretty smart," Chiffon said as she rounded another corner with her broom. "But it's gonna take a lot of games to work up to a castle, won't it? Is one night enough?"

"That's where the big bet comes in. I pull out my trump card: a lifetime of servitude. Now I may not look like much, but I made it here and I do good work, so over a few dozen years that's gonna measure up to a decent pile of coin. I'm confident I could bet that against one of the more valuable baubles in his room. And then that's it, I've got my foot in the door. The rest is just fun and games." Sleeves hopped up onto a bench and bowed with a flourish. "By the time the night is over, I would score myself a castle."

Glasses mumbled something as she shimmied by on her hands and knees, gradually catching up to Chiffon. "Oh yeah," the latter said, repeating the scrubbing maid's words, "a castle's got a lot of moving parts. Are you sure you could handle it?"

"I wouldn't," Sleeves replied, "of course it's too complicated. I'd just let the Prince occupy it in exchange for a modest stipend. In fact, I'd even let him sleep in his old bed! Naturally, it'd be my bed at that point."

Glasses suddenly jostled the water bucket she was dragging along, almost spilling its soapy contents out onto the floor. She quickly collected herself and resumed her work.

"There it is, I knew that's where you were going with this," Dusty said. "You could have just said you'd sleep with him! Why the roundabout answer?"

"I'm gonna make the most of it! Sleeping with the Prince is fine as an answer if you settle for just the one time, but if I play my cards right..." Sleeves grinned. "I can have as many nights as I want."

"You okay there Glasses?" Chiffon asked as the smaller maid doubled over for a moment.

"M'fine," she replied, proceeding to scrub under the nearby bench.

Dusty went back to the supply cart near the door to get a fresh cloth. "That's all well and good if you win, but what if you lose that big bet? You sure you're willing to risk your whole life on one game?"

"Oh I'm sorry," Sleeves replied with bluster, "I didn't realize we were shaping reality here! It's a hypothetical question and I answered it, no need to read so much into it. Although..." They grasped their chin, pondering. "I guess losing wouldn't be too bad. Who better than the Prince to give a lifetime of service to, eh? And that way, he'd never let me go."

There came a plaintive noise under the bench. Then, a moment later, a resounding THUD as Glasses hit her head on the underside.

— end of preview

...read the rest of this chapter on my Patreon!

all chapters FREE for EVERYONE to read on Patreon after 7 days,
available by clicking the link above
☆ don't want to wait? become a patron to read the new chapter right now! ☆

this exact "super smart delicate princess + invincible bodyguard" dynamic but then they swap places so the princess has all the skills AND the stats & now the bodyguard is put in a position of vulnerability where they have to re-examine the entire way they judge their self-worth because the person they cared for has become self-sufficient

my heart is beating faster just thinking about all the high-quality feels that premise could produce

...maybe for my next next next book

( Cover | Act I | Act II | Part II)

"Were you able to watch the coronation?"

"What I could see from La Cime's rooftop terrace, anyway. What about you?"

"A friend's lover rented out his Uptown balcony for a party."

"Oh, lucky!"

"Hardly! It was elbow-to-elbow and the company wasn't that great. Honestly I should've gone with you, regardless of how I feel about La Cime's hors-d'oeuvres."

The two socialites at the next table merrily chatted away over their extravagant drinks of syrups and whipped cream stacked as high as the café would allow. Lou kept to herself and her unadorned cup, preferring her morning coffee to be black. Or at least she used to; today was the trial run of milk and sugar, in moderate amounts. On the barista's recommendation.

"Did you hear Helena got seats? Courtesy of her current admirer."

"Ugh, she would."

They clinked glasses and took a sip, sharing this moment of unified frustration in solidarity.

"But lords and ladies, Her Majesty looked incredible!" She paused. "Is she still her majesty? You know, after... everything?"

"I think so? That's what everyone at La Cime was saying. But I feel that our ruler's just got that, you know, Prince kind of air. Feels wrong not to change the title altogether. Has the Crown said anything about it?"

"Ugh, no, not yet! The whole court's still very tight-lipped about it. Even the language they used during the coronation was frustratingly vague! Maybe Her Majesty's still making up her mind about it." The socialite smirked. "I wouldn't blame her one bit, given the body she's got now!"

"Right?? Get my fainting couch ready!" Her friend made a mock fanning gesture with her hand. "Well, if an evil witch-or-whoever decided to bring chaos to my kingdom by fusing me with one of my knights, I'd count myself lucky she picked such a looker!"

"Ahaha, I know!" The socialite looked out over the city, furrowing her brow. "Did they say what happened to the other two halves? It still feels like we didn't hear the whole story about that whole incident."

"What, the knight's soul and the princess's old body? I heard they were destroyed in the fusion. Only half of each survived, is how one of the castle's servants put it."

"Huh. Well then Her Majesty must be counting her lucky stars things turned out the way they did, and not the other way around!"

"Hah, can you imagine? Maybe that was the witch-person-thing's goal all along, get rid of our strongest warrior and greatest mind with a single curse."

"Maybe. Lucky for us, we ended up with a brilliant warrior instead of an airheaded pretty face. Still, it was a very pretty face." The socialite caught Lou's gaze, and for a brief moment they made eye contact. "Heyy, kind of like yours!"

Lou shrank in her seat, abruptly stooping over to stare into her coffee, hoping to evade the lady's eyes—finding her own staring back at her instead, from the reflection in the liquid. Maybe she could still escape this conversation.

Her hopes were dashed as she heard the socialite's friend turn around in her seat. "Oh wow, you're right! Hey, you're a dead ringer for the princess, you know that? I mean, the former princess."

"I, uh," Lou muttered as her face went red. She wasn't ready to talk to upper class people. Least of all women. Least of all about this. "I... I s'pose so."

The socialite leaned forward, eyes narrowed. She held up her hands in a strange gesture, fingers interlocked around an opening, blocking out some of Lou's hair and current outfit—leaving only her face. "Dead ringer is right. Hey, did you work at the palace or something?"

"B-bodyguard," Lou blurted out, immediately regretting it. She had plenty of time to plan for this, plenty of time to prepare any number of more likely explanations in case this question ever came up! But she hadn't spent a lot of time thinking about it. She couldn't. She wasn't ready.

Both ladies looked at each other, dumbfounded, then back at Lou. Then the second lady's face lit up. "Oh! Oh," she snapped her fingers, "one of those lookalikes!"

The socialite followed suit with a big smile. "Yes! What are they called... royal decoys! For Her Majesty's protection, right?"

Lou nodded, her face burning. There. They would hopefully be satisfied with that. Then she could excuse herself and run far away from this café, hopefully never to remember this exchange ever again.

The closer of the two ladies reached over and gave Lou a friendly pat on the arm. "Oof, tough luck, eh? I'm guessing this whole thing put you out of a job. Hopefully you've got some other skills to get by on, right?"

"Oh, you know how cushy those royal jobs are," the socialite said. "She's probably set for life, right? It's not like she can do anything else with that face."

"It is a really pretty face, though."

"Oh, for sure, for sure!"

The two upper class ladies returned to their chat and their overly sweet morning drinks, much to Lou's relief. Maybe she could come back to this café, then, and not have to write it off entirely. Just as well; there were few enough places in the capital where she felt welcome. This place was nice. Quiet (for the most part), bathed in sunlight for most of the day, and with a breathtaking view over most of the city.

Lou took a sip of her coffee, then pursed her lips. Milk and sugar weren't really her thing, not even now. But that was alright. She brought the cup to her mouth and took another gulp; bigger, this time.

She'd get used to this, too.

— this flash fiction is becoming a book! use the navigation menu at the top to read on; previews are posted here on Cohost, with full chapters in early access on my Patreon!

Read this chapter and more on my Patreon!

all chapters FREE for EVERYONE to read on Patreon after 7 days,
available by clicking the link above
☆ don't want to wait? become a patron to read the new chapter right now! ☆

in case you've missed it, I've been writing this knight + princess body swap story for the past couple weeks and putting the full chapters up on my Patreon—and they've started unlocking for the public! you can find the link to full chapters at the bottom of each post, along with a handy link to the next one.

I hope you like it! :D (okay back to the writing mines)

god I love these two so much

(from my ongoing story Her Majesty The Prince, found under the tag of the same name)