Mira’s days at the Royal Academy had settled into a comfortable, predictable rhythm. Mornings were spent in rigorous lessons—history, politics, magic, combat, and so on—followed by afternoons in the library or temple halls, where she refined her spellwork without classmates looking over her shoulder and wondering where she had learned her style of casting. Evenings were quieter, shared with a small circle of acquaintances who quickly became friends, including Prince Lazroth, who had become something of a close friend despite his royal standing.


    That was how the Academy was, for the most part. Those who attended rarely cared who was who unless it came to dating—one of the few things she’d avoided. Mira didn’t talk about it, and she didn’t partake in it. Why would she? Her grades, especially in combat classes, offered her more than enough to focus on. Besides, she was happy enough. She had built something here. A life. A steady, if carefully measured, existence where she could simply be a student rather than the queen no one could know about.


    Haros, much to a margin of unwanted dismay, had not been part of it. Not really.


    He had been a fleeting presence at best, more rumor than reality. Suspended, vanishing for months at a time, returning only long enough to cause some scandal before disappearing again. Lazroth was short of excuses and rolled his eyes at the latest antics and gossip. Some claimed Haros had been expelled outright—twice. Others insisted he was in some secret training, preparing for the role he could not run from. Whatever the truth was, it hadn’t concerned Mira. She had stopped looking for him in the sea of faces long ago.


    Lazroth told her not to worry, and on the late nights when they sprawled on her floor and recited history facts for exams, she wanted to believe him that everything was fine. Most days, it felt that way, but something in her gut said times were changing. Or maybe it was the letters coming in from Ysara reminding her of the duties she’d soon be taking on and her place among the Priestess Order. The dedication for the baby in Matemirid, whenever it was born, the Pelcatera wedding of the grand duke and his partner’s sister—unfortunate and awkward, but still needing blessed—and the long awaited retirement of the earl of the northern region of Tallus, which had cause a political stir as far north as Edithir. And then there was that matter.


    Ysara, like many of the other priestesses, was still upset about Haros and his stubborn rejection of tradition. The pressure was building for him to choose a partner. He’d already delayed it far longer than any others. The High Priestess had a schedule for the summer that they’d meet in Edithir, Mira in tow, and demand he make his selection. It was long past due. Then Haros had made a scene at school, a fight from what Lazroth said, with one of the other boys—a kid from Tallus with a sharp tongue. Danren, his closest friend, had been suspended for a month over it, and Haros hadn’t been seen for the better part of a year. He’d made a name for himself as a troublemaker, and it seemed he’d finally done himself in, and the school had put him out.


    And then, one ordinary afternoon, he came back.


    He came back, sauntering in through the front gate as if he’d not missed a single day. Much to Mira’s surprise, no one batted a lash at him. Except for her. She had been walking through the open-air corridor that overlooked the training grounds, her mind preoccupied with the lesson she had just finished, when a ripple of excitement passed through like a wave of magic filter in on the breeze. She stopped sucking in a breath as if she’d just come up from the water, and frozen in place. A distant call, a roar of something she didn’t recognize, filled her ears.


    Then she heard his name, spoken with the same disappointment she’d come to find was associated with him at every turn. ‘Oh, that flirt, Haros,’ the girls would say. And ‘Haros…’ the boys would groan, half hoping he’d leave them alone. Yet there was a constant undercurrent of admiration for his brash nature. He had a magnetize about him. Mira’s eyes turned first, barely glancing down until she heard his name spoken from familiar lips.


    “Haros,” Yvin scorned, “you’re late!” Her long, blonde hair whipped back and forth as she jogged over to him. She had become a beauty worthy of envy at the school, and the way Haros looked at her—he didn’t even notice. Of course, even if he had, she had eyes for only one person and that was Danren.


    Did he know they’d started dating while he’d been gone? Probably not, she figured. Lazroth wasn’t the gossiping sort, so he wouldn’t have told him even if he’d seen him. Aside from holidays, Lazroth never left campus.


    Mira turned, leaning over the railing as he came into view. Her breath caught, and her eyes rounded, slack-jawed and stunned. He was taller, much taller. Broad-shouldered. His features had sharpened, all traces of boyhood gone, replaced by the angular confidence of a man who had seen and done things beyond the Academy walls. His lovely raven hair was a touch longer, falling messily over his forehead, and his expression was one of amusement as Yvin jabbed a finger into his chest. No longer were they eye to eye. He towered over her and everyone else.


    “You think I’m going to miss your graduation?” His voice, low and sultry, carried in the air and found her with ease.


    Mira tensed, recognizing it from her dreams and the long days the priestesses spent inducing vision through smoke and incense. They were obsessed with her magic and longed to know what the future held for them. Ysara said it was the same for all queens, that her vision of a man awaiting her was simply a blessing to the Styxin women bestowed by the goddess. It was to guide her to the next heir. Mira didn’t entirely believe that, and then, without warning, his eyes found her.


    Mira froze. Unable to blink. To think.


    Recognition flashed across his face instantly, followed by something warmer. Familiar. He smiled slowly—not the easy, arrogant grin she had seen him flash at others, a wrinkled nose and bubbly laughter, but something else. Something more deliberate. Haros turned, quick to head for the corridor stairs, leaving Yvin annoyed with her arms crossed in the field.


    Mira gulped and turned away before she could understand why.


    <hr>


    Haros had never cared much for first impressions. They were often misleading and nothing more than a picture of what people wanted everyone else to believe. Which was fine enough for a girl he thought was cute, one worthy of stealing a kiss from one night and never bothering with again the next day. And, for the most part, he had spent years perfecting the art of making a terrible one, mostly for sport. But as he watched Mira duck away and disappear into the crowd, he felt an unexpected jolt of frustration.


    There he stood in the middle of the corridor, brows furrowed and confusion coloring his features. While there were a lot of ways people reacted to him, recently more favorable than not despite his lingering reputation, turning away wasn’t one of them. Not for girls, anyway. Or some boys. Depending on their preferences… or fluidity to those preferences. Regardless, people didn’t run from him. Not usually. And she had recognized him. He was sure of it. But she had avoided him—on purpose.


    Haros blinked, unsure what to make of it, then shook his head to clear the confusion.


    It didn’t make any sense. Most people either feared him, worshiped him, or wanted something from him. But Mira? She had seen him, processed his presence, and chosen to leave before he could so much as say a word. It wasn’t the first time she’d done that, but at least those other times, there was a good reason. She was headed to class, to the library—a place he’d been banned from without supervision after accidentally setting a fire—or to some study group he wasn’t invited to. She lived in her own world of priorities, and he was on the outskirts. But this? This was different.


    It was infuriating.


    And, for reasons he couldn’t quite name, kind of thrilling. He bit the corner of his lips, hesitating to admit to himself that while other girls were quick to fawn over him, especially since he’d shot up in height and his bone structure had revealed something they liked about his face instead of pudgy cheeks, the idea that Mira wasn’t one of them intrigued him. Dangerously so. As though she’d not taken up residency in his mind for the last six years, since that very first day he’d met her. What was it that made her special? Her eyes, he decided. They were pretty. And she was kind.


    Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    <hr>


    Yvin and Danren had sat with him while he should have been in class, while he should have been sitting but instead was pacing. The more he’d thought about Mira walking away from him as if he were a stranger—which in truth he partially was, and couldn’t quantify what lived between them as much more than passing acquaintance—had morphed from curious thrill to irked frustration.


    Danren groaned, flipping his head back against the couch. “Why don’t you just go talk to her? It’s practically lunch time.”


    “I can’t just talk to her,” Haros stopped in the middle of the living room, turning to Danren as if his suggestion was insane. And it was, all things considered. “She walked away from me.”


    “All the more reason to talk to her,” he waved a hand, rolling his wrist as he sleepily explained, “and to let me get a nap before my exam.”


    “I told you an all-nighter was a bad idea.” Yvin gave Danren a gentle pat on his leg, then turned to Haros, “And he’s right. You should just go talk to her. It’s not like you have trouble talking to any other girl.”


    “You’re barely a girl,” he chided, a smirk on his face as if he hadn’t been the first person touch her breast the summer the puberty hit her almost as hard as it hit him. As if she’d never had his dick in her mouth… which he felt a little bad about, but Danren had blown him, too and that made them even. Or a trio. It wasn’t really clear where the line was drawn, but he didn’t have it in him to ask a ruin a good thing.


    “Do you think maybe the reason you don’t want to talk to her,” Danren said, sitting up, “is because you might actually like her?”


    “She’s cute,” Haros correct, dismissing the allegation.


    “For you, that’s basically the same thing,” Yvin said, eyeing him as his face twisted with disgust.


    “I have standards.”


    “You’re whore.”


    “Fortune telling slut.”


    “Worm.”


    “Hey, come on,” Danren interrupted, stepping between them with his hands raised. “Just go talk to, have lunch or something. It’s not a big deal. And Yvin,” he turned to her raising his brows, “leave him alone and I’ll do that thing you like…”


    Her face turned a brilliant red and she huffed stepped away from the would have been argument. “Fine, but you had better go talk to her, or I’m never giving you another fortune reading, Haros.”


    “I bet I could pursuade you,” he grinned, winking at her and knowing with certainty he could.


    “Stop it, you whore,” Danren grumbled, shoving Haros by chest and stepping around him to his bedroom door. He threw it open and motioned for Yvin to join him for what Haros was certain wouldn’t be just a nap. He couldn’t prove it, but he was sure they were having sex.


    Left along to his thoughts, and not wanting to stick around and listen to his two closest friends get closer with each other, Haros strolled down the walkway along the courtyard. It was nearly midday, and the hardest part of striking up conversation should have been cutting through the throng of students as they shuffled toward the dining halls. He crammed his hands in his pockets as he came to the cafe, rarely used for more than a quick meal—everything was pre-made and unimpressive. Mira sat neatly on a stone ledge beneath the flowering willow tree, her lunch in her lap, flipping through an old book and her toes barely skimming the ground.


    “You’re avoiding me,” he announced, dropping onto the ledge beside her without invitation. He leaned back on his arms, looking her over and half expecting her to stare up at him with the same sort of awe and wonder he found in Amberese every time he showed up unexpectedly.


    Mira startled, her chest pushing out as her shoulders pulled back. She snapped around, her eyes darting up to his before she quickly looked away. It was just Haros. She let out a short, sharp breath and regained her composure. “I am not.”


    Haros smirked. “You definitely are.”


    She sighed, setting her book down. “If I intended to avoid you, I would have succeeded. Is there something you wanted?”


    “Wanted?” He scoffed. “I wanted…” Oh shit, what was he actually wanted from her? Why was he going to this effort? The pause grew louder. “…to talk to you.”


    Mira blinked at her book, shut it, and then looked at him curiously. “What did you want to talk to me about, your highness?”


    For a long moment, he fixated on her eyes, wondering how it was they could be the shade of brown and amber, with shadows of obsidian, but then his mind brought him back with a jolt of arrogance. “You’re the temple girl who waved at me like a lunatic our first day here.”


    Mira stiffened, her mouth screwing tightly shut, and Haros immediately regretted his choice of words.


    “I mean,” he corrected quickly, “it was cute.”


    Her face flushed—a reaction that sent a wild vibration through him, awakening every desperate hormone he had that knew damn well he was more man than boy. Then, in a flash, her jaw flexed, and her face went blank. She stood up, packed away her book in her bag, and threw the satchel over her shoulder.


    Unintentionally, his eyes slid from her face, to her back, to the narrow of her waist, and trailed down her legs before coming back up to the hemline of her skirt. His lips parted as his thoughts raced ahead to what her panties looked like, what she looked like… what she tasted like. And that was something he genuinely knew almost nothing about. He had done only a handful of things with a handful of people, but something about Mira struck a particular desire he hadn’t expected.


    Haros leaned back, stretching out his legs. “What have you been up to these past few years? Kissing boys?”


    She hesitated, gripping the strap of her bag. “Studying. Training.”


    “Sounds thrilling.”


    “It is.”


    Haros studied her profile. The way the afternoon light caught in her hair, and her hands fidgeted slightly as she came back around and sat down. A peace offering and willingness to indulge his interest in her. His gaze drifted lower, to the delicate curve of her mouth and the soft pink of her lips, before he forced himself to look away. His heart rolled in a chaotic splendor of beats, and he shifted uncomfortably.


    “You have an accent,” he blurted.


    Mira turned sharply. “What?”


    “Your accent. It’s different.” He looked at her again, eyes narrowing not out of suspicion but a vague amusement and wonder. He’d not ever heard anyone with an accent like hers, but many that were similar. Hers was… cleaner, purer, and lighter. “Where are you from, Mira?”


    Her expression shuttered. “Nowhere important.”


    That was a lie. He could tell. “You grew up in the temples. You must have come from somewhere, darling.”


    And there it was again, that blank look and the chill it sent reverberating through him. “Everyone comes from somewhere, but no one cares if about that unless you have an accent, right?”


    Haros blinked once, and before he could say anything, he snapped his jaw shut. She had a good point. A great point. And before he could say anything that reflected an iota of an apology for being inadvertently rude, she stood abruptly, gathering her things once more.


    “I should go,” she said quickly.


    Haros panicked, jumping to his feet. “Wait, I didn’t mean—”


    “It’s fine.” It wasn’t. And she walked away.


    Haros deflated in a long slow breath as the petals of the willow blossoms scattered around him like rain. He stood there, staring after her with a sinking feeling in his gut. He had just made a complete fool of himself.


    <hr>


    Haros found Danren after class, glowing as he’d managed a good grade, a good nap, and an orgasm, and swiftly threw himself into the chair across from him with a dramatic groan. his hand slid down his face, which was better not to show. Hell, even Carin could tell he had humiliated himself. Not to say he didn’t appreciate the blowjob to make him feel better, but he was admittedly still feeling anything but better.


    Danren hummed but didn’t even look up from his book. “That bad, huh?”


    Haros crossed his arms. He’d been gone most of the day and had skipped class, and that was all he could come up with to say? It wasn’t just bad, it was awful. Every time he tried to screw his head on straight, his thoughts went back to her and the way he’d made a complete ass of himself. He wanted to pretend like he didn’t know why her opinion of him mattered so much, but he knew. He felt it with every raced heartbeat and sudden shortness of breath. Every sudden erection at the thought of her brown eyes staring up at him, and the flaccid flop staring down at Carin’s freckles and being disappointed it was someone else. He knew because it made him wander like a lost idiot the way Danren had a year and a half ago when he’d finally decided he’d ask Yvin on a date.


    “I think I accidentally fell in love,” Haros breathed, staring at the ceiling and waiting for the inevitable chastising.


    Danren finally glanced at him, almost impressed at his easy confession. “Let me guess—Amberese?”


    Haros scowled. “No.”


    Danren stared at him for a moment, expecting a correction.


    “She’s not really that kind of girl,” he clarified.


    “Could have fooled me,” Danren replied, then raised an eyebrow. “Icarid, then?”


    Haros blinked. “What? No! Why would—” He cut himself off, realization dawning. It was meant to be a private matter with Icarid, nothing public or open. Icarid wasn’t exactly comfortable with his preferences, and neither were his parents. “Wait, do people think—”


    Danren smirked. “You’re not exactly subtle.”


    He groaned again, burying his face in his hands. “This is a disaster.”


    Danren chuckled, leaned over, and patted his shoulder. “Welcome to the club, your highness. Love’s a bitch.”