Breaker 1: A loyal partner only

“Th-!” Liliana made an unintelligible shriek.

The look on her face was one of panic or so it seemed to Eclair. 

This was totally uncharacteristic for Liliana’s previous self. 

Seeing the always cool princess with an expression like that surprised Eclair, she thought the princess would love the news, why not? Didn’t her highness talk about Lord Gawain with fondness just the other day? Was the prospect of getting ever so closer of meeting the Prince, be the reason why the princess was in such a panicked state? Wasn’t that also kind of cute in someway?

“There is nothing to worry about your Highness! I’m sure Lord Gawain will fall in love with you the moment he sees you at the next dance!” Eclair tried to cheer her up but her happy expression of an understanding friend froze for a second.

As the name of the guy further sinked in on Liliana , Eclair realized that it wasn’t the face of a worried lady but one of anger, teeth started to show on her face too, still kinda cute though…(only Eclair could ever think this)  but it was still weird and worrisome, had she made a mistake? why? wasn’t she a maiden with worries about meeting her destined partner?

Certainly not! The Storm Princess was seething and just as quickly as her face had turned blue, it turned into one of anger. 

Eclair couldn't hear her the first time, since Liliana couldn’t help herself but speak so fast that it had turned into an unintelligible shriek but, she was ready to correct herself, now with a fire coming from the bottom of her guts.

“That lying-snake like-conspiring-Bastard!” Making a stop every word to make herself be clear, Liliana squashed an imaginary insect on her fist while thinking on the guy.

Well, it would be pretty obvious to say, but Eclair was completely lost now, what the hell was she supposed to say? Was the princess angry at her? Or at Gawain? If so, why?

Seeing her friend’s surprise, Liliana immediately tried to correct herself and fix the situation.

“Ah, no, I…, I thought about it! Yes, I thought long and hard - ” The princess said while she sat back trying to look all composed.

It wouldn’t be wrong to say that if anyone was to enter the room at that moment, they would see a confused looking Eclair as a girl full of annoyance and Princess Liliana as a villainess seating with her legs crossed and holding her laughter with her hand while looking all mighty in her hubris.

Of course, this wasn’t the case, it was just a product of both of their evil looking eyes and features combined with their efforts of trying to compose themselves. At the moment, the princess was only thinking something really simple, how could she avoid looking like a total lunatic who just smashed a cup and yelled out of nowhere?

“- I believe, he is not suited for me” She continued.

“I-is that so? I thought Lord Gawain was pretty nice though? Doesn’t he look nice? Compared to the rest of the foreign royalty, he’s far the better looking one” Eclair did have a pretty good and albeit shallow point.

Gawain was the first prince of the Kingdom of Brilum, and he was basically the perfect human specimen of beauty, blonde with sweet blue eyes that melted anyone who laid his eyes on him.

It her past life, Liliana had fallen for this, and she had tried her best to be his partner, that turned out to be a big mistake, huge mistake, but now she knew. 

He absolutely detested her. No matter what she did, he would find a way to make it so any wrong in the Empire was her fault and hate her even more for it, he was one of the reasons she had died in the first place, he was actually the guy who signed her execution!

With an irritation on her brow, Liliana's slim eyes looked from one side to another, before focusing on a bookshelf on the other side of the room, searching for anything that could give her something of an answer to her, at the moment, undeserved hate of the prince.

“That’s true to a certain extend, Eclair.” Liliana, having found her answer in a way that would not make her seem insane with her actual reasons was.

“You see, I…yes, I was reading a romance novel not long ago.”

“My!” Eclair was surprised, no one could really tell if she was following along or if her expression was true towards the act of reading...

“And I learned many things about people like him.”

“Really?” Eclair was paying close attention.

“Really. Imagine this, there is the Prince and a princess, but only the princess has interest in him and not the other way around, this is clear, like water. But why does the prince never say anything to her? He is either a coward… or a bastard!” It was all going alright, really, she had the right sort of idea to make her analogy with a romance novel but right at the end Liliana started to get pumped again with her inner anger.

“!” This was not obvious to Eclair who was really paying attention.

“You see, I have no doubt in my heart that he hates us. People like him…People like him! might look all nice, but I know they are just twisted! One moment they tell you something nice, you follow them and then…BOOM!!! They tell you how much they hate you! Just because you are you!!” Liliana stood up and used her arms to express her revelations.

“! Does the prince hate the Empire!? How could he!?” Eclair was taking everything as truth without a grain of doubt, and hating on the Imperial princess was just about the same as hating the whole Empire.

“He does and he’s a schemer! That’s why, Eclair, we should look for someone who looks at us and not the other way around!” Dropping her conclusions, Liliana got closer to Eclair and held her friend’s shoulder.

“We might look like innocent flowers but! We are not to be messed with! Hell, ‘if’ we like someone… first! we need to make sure they are proper, nice, and above all! - loyal!” With that, she pointed at Eclair’s heart as if revealing a truth of the world.

In a roundabout way, she was saying ‘looks aren’t everything’ but neither Eclair nor Liliana thought about that like so exactly.

Eclair seemed to have had a revelation of her own, completely different from what the princess was trying to convey, since any minded person would think that with pointing at her friends heart she meant “loyal to one’s heart” but to the princess who only wanted to make her speech more grand, only meant a literal kind of loyalty, the kind that would not waver with bribes or rumors and would certainly help someone escape death if necessary and definitely not sign on their execution.

“I see! Your highness is so knowledgeable! I will take your words to heart and rethink my own judgment henceforth.” Eclair found her highness words truly marvelous, she didn’t even doubt it when she mentioned they both looked like innocent flowers, and that was an utter and blatant lie, they could make kids cry with just looking at them in a mean way, but maybe you could say it was a matter of the perspective of who said it, right?

“Would it be alright if I borrowed some of these books, Your highness?” Eclair now seemed interested in the source of romantic knowledge, not once in her life had she ever been interested in reading as she was now.

“Book? What-Ah, sure I do have some…” Liliana said without giving it another thought. There had to be something interesting around, she would just ask some of her maids to recommend her one to hand Eclair.

It is obvious but what might have looked like an excuse to Liliana was in fact, something like a self taught lesson, deeply ingrained into her mind.

It was true she had absolutely no interest in Lord Gawain anymore because she knew he had no interest in her in the first place among other obvious things… And could you blame her? The guy had basically ordered her execution. That really put a big X across her mental image of him along with a huge sign that said ‘DANGER’ As one of the people she needed to be wary off, at all times, since he had been a key player in the success of the Empire’s revolution after the Kingdom o Brilum interfered in the name of ‘justice’.

“My…” Eclair was deep in thought.

Liliana turned around to get herself another cup of tea before looking back again to Eclair and wonder.