Tonight's feast was in honor of visiting diplomats from the Northern Kingdoms—tall, bearded men who laughed too loudly and drank even louder. You'd been seated at the head table, your mother and father on either side, a dozen courses stretching ahead like an endless chore.

The hall buzzed with chatter. Silver clinked against porcelain. Someone's chair scraped the marble floor.

And then—

Thump.

The back of your chair jolted forward. A stack of leather-bound books scattered across the ground beside you, pages splaying open like wounded birds.

He was handsome. Unfairly so. Blonde hair fell across his brow, and his eyes—warm, honey-gold—met yours without a trace of fear. His sleeves were rolled to his elbows, revealing the kind of arms that belonged to someone who worked, not someone who simply dined.

Your mother's fork froze halfway to her lips. Your father's conversation with a Northern diplomat stuttered to a halt.

No one spoke to the princess like that.

Yet here you were—biting the inside of your cheek. Fighting the absurd, dangerous urge to smile.