Lone Blind Star - Chapter 2: Whirlwind of Due Dilligence
Words are spoken but nothing is said.
The princess’ eyes snapped open to the cold kiss of metal against her brow. Her thief leaned over her sleeping form, a trembling gun clutched in his hand. His voice was low and edged with fear as he growled, “Thank ya kindly for the trouble of patchin’ me up but I’m leavin’ now. And you ain't gonna tell anyone I was here or I'll ruin this pretty little face of yours."
Cecilia held his gaze, searching for some sort of familiarity there. The moment she saw it she took a gamble, disarming him in one fluid motion. Her cream-white hair cascaded over her shoulders like a silent waterfall as she instantly turned the tables. The gun clattered to the floor and she stomped her foot on it, a subtle yet clear claim of victory.
“Did you just..?” He stared at her, stunned, as she leaned over him.
“Rest,” she commanded. “You can barely stand.”
His eyes narrowed, suspicion clouding his face. "This some trick, ain't it? You’re just waitin' for a chance to call the guards."
"Why would I do that?" she countered.
“‘Cause I’m a thief and I clearly ain’t supposed to be here.”
She gestured with her chin to the door behind them. "My personal maids are right behind that door, you know, but here we are. Alone. I could've called them anytime." Cecilia knew he was vulnerable. She could probably conquer him easily in this state if she wanted to, but why would she? This was the chance of a lifetime.
He frowned, confused. "And why’s that?"
She took a seat next to him and stared down at the coffee table, an uncharacteristic shyness coming over her. "I, uhh, really admire you.”
"Admire me?" He couldn’t help but laugh. “And what business would a crown princess have admirin’ a thief like m’self?” He thought this sheltered princess had no idea of the real world if she was idolizing a thief. But he didn’t know her. Of course he would think that.
"I mean, I know we just met, but I’ve been reading all about you for months.” She smiled a little sadly, adding quietly, “I feel like I’ve known you forever already. Ahem. Anyway, I won't be calling anyone anytime soon, so you can stay hidden here."
"They can still get inside, can’t they?"
"They won't. Not if I don't call for them."
He tried to smile but it looked more like a grimace. "Your pretty little palace is all in an uproar about me bein' ‘ere and you’re sayin’ they won't barge in?"
"Intruders typically don’t make it this far, so there's nothing for you to worry about as long as you stay here.” They shared a little knowing smile. He had made it this far, technically.
“Sure,” came his curt reply. If the crown princess of Walden was offering sanctuary for no discernable reason and at no cost to him, who was he to say no? He might as well try to get as much as he could out of her naïveté.
She smiled. "Good." She leaped to her feet and held out her hand. "Now, let's get you to bed.”
"Yours?" he said, surprised.
She laughed. "Is there another bed in here?"
He paused. “Well, I seriously thought there might be. I can’t believe the crown princess can be so accomadatin’,” he teased.
She helped him back to her bed and thought a moment after setting him down. “Wait,” she mumbled and then turned to him with a look of horror. “What’s your name?”
He laughed so hard he ended up wincing and clutching his side. “Ya say you admire me but ya don’t even know my name?”
“The papers never mentioned it. Doubt they even know it.”
“Oh, they know it,” he replied with a smile. “M’name’s Ingram.” He scratched the stubble along his jaw. “Ingram Clayton.”
To bide some time to figure things out, Cecilia told her maids to tell the staff to leave her alone until morning. Such a request wasn't unusual—she made similar requests when deep in translating work—but the abruptness did make them a little suspicious.
The first night was awkward. She had just hung her thief's clothes to dry when he called from the bedroom, "Ya sure you want me in your bed?"
"Of course," Cecilia replied.
"Then, where're you going to sleep?"
She remained silent as she leaned over the side of the tub and turned on the water. She watched it slowly fill, as if by doing so her own mind would do the same. Finally, she said, "You called me sunshine earlier—after I cauterized your wound."
"Did I? I apologize, your high-ness, I didn't mean to," he teased, pretending to forget. The truth was that he remembered the sight of her vividly, the image burned into his mind together with the pain. White hair that seemed to glow in the sunlight and golden eyes that mimicked the sun. But those were royal traits and he detested the nobility and what it represented.
"No, I didn't mind it," she said, baffling him.
"Huh?"
"Actually," she continued, turning to him, "could you keep calling me that?" Her expression was calm, sincere, with not a hint of retaliatory humor.
He stared at her, blank faced, but quickly recomposed himself. "If that's what you'd like. Sure."
She smiled. "Thanks," she said and shut the door. After her bath, she came over in her nightgown to sit on the side of the bed as she brushed her hair. She gazed out the window and said, "Where're you from?"
"As in, town? Or region?"
"Whatever you want to tell me."
"I grew up in a port town through the mountain pass."
"Oh, Lighthouse Peak?"
"Ya know your geography."
"Of course," she said. "As the next queen, I had to memorise all major port cities."
"Do y’wanna be queen?"
She shrugged and tossed her hairbrush over into the dirty clothes basket. "It was never my choice." She turned to her thief, ready to change the subject. "Tell me about your first heist. The one where you stole Baron Lorn's heirloom locket."
He grinned. "That wasn't my first heist. That was just the first one that caught the attention of the national press."
She leaned back on the bed against his legs and looked up at him with expectant eyes. The casual intimacy and the way the princess behaved bewildered him. He didn’t know how to act with her so often defaulted to something cool and mysterious. That was the air of a thief, right?
"So tell me about your very first heist, then. I want to hear,” she said.
He pursed his lips, a playful gleam to his eyes. "I'll tell you about my heists if you tell me about that magic you do. I've never seen it before."
The princess' face practically lit up. "Fair," she said, putting it mildly, and dove into an explanation of how old magic relied on living essence. In reply, he told her about the time he stole a chicken for the starving family nextdoor. It wasn’t real, but she didn’t need to know that. Like that, they conversed easily into the night, swapping stories and explanations, until falling asleep halfway through.
The princess perched at her desk early the next morning, pen in hand, staring down at the blank paper confounded. Ingram leaned over her shoulder and said, “Hey, Sunshine, what’cha writin’?”
"You should be resting," the princess said sternly, but she couldn't stop grinning, relishing in the nickname he'd given her.
"Ya can't seriously expect me to do nothin' but lay around in bed for the whole week?"
She tried to give him a look of disapproval but it quickly melted at his devilish grin. "Okay, but take it easy." She saw how tightly he gripped the back of her chair and added, "Does it still hurt?" Clearly the analgesic wasn’t fully effective.
"Oh yeah it hurts all right but nothin' I can't manage," he replied, hobbling over to the lounge chair opposite the chaise. "So..?" He gestured to her pen with a flourish of his hand.
“Trying to come up with an excuse for everyone to leave me alone. Something believable.”
“What’cha got in mind?”
She thought a moment. “I’m going to tell everyone I’m depressed because I never got to see you while you were here.”
He laughed out loud. “Well, it's true they never found me. Ya think such a lame excuse'll work?"
"Don't worry. Just… when they come—no matter what happens—stay in the bedroom, okay?"
"Sounds good to me, Sunshine," he said. He pushed himself up off the chair and hobbled his way back to bed.
The princess wrote a letter to her father requesting to self isolate due to depression over the failure to capture the cowboy thief the previous night. It read more like a diary entry than a formal request, which should draw just enough ire. His Majesty's portly figure arrived an hour and a half later, forcing himself into his daughter's parlour.
“You want to what!” the king yelled as he crossed the threshold into her personal space. There was a certain shrillness to his voice sent Cecilia on edge. It reminded her too much of when she was a child. Weak, uneducated, vulnerable.
Her reply came quietly: “I simply made a request to be granted solitude for a designated period of time. That is the extent of my appeal.” The king’s retinue exchanged scared looks, knowing full well the fit they would have to deal with later.
“Impossible,” the king replied. “Guests are arriving tomorrow and will be staying until your coming of age ceremony in six weeks. It’s your duty to host them. Consider it your first official public task as crown princess.”
Miffed but unwilling to back down, she ventured a compromise. “Your Majesty, I humbly assure you that upon the conclusion of the one-week period for which I have requested, I shall wholeheartedly dedicate myself to fulfilling all the obligatory responsibilities associated with my title.”
The king crossed his arms, eyeing his daughter carefully. “All of them?”
She knew what he was hinting at and sucked in her bottom lip. “All of them.”
“Hm.” The king paced around back and forth. “I’ll allow it. I’ll see you in one week, then, daughter.”
Cecilia breathed a sigh of relief as her father's presence disappeared from the room. The sound of his booming voice and the rustle of his entourage echoed through the hall, her anxiety slowly fading as he went. Ser Anjali, now standing in the king's place, seemed torn between pride and concern—glad her charge had stood up to the king but worried about the price it cost.
“Are you all right?” Ser Anjali asked.
Cecilia realised she would have to lie to her knight, too. “Yeah. Just really sad about not getting a chance to see—”
“Not that. He’s the king, sure, but he’s also your father. He shouldn’t be yelling at you like that over asking for some personal time.”
A heavy, wet lump formed in her throat. “It’s fine. Really. I’m used to it.”
Ser Anjali's brows furrowed in concern, her expression one of regret. "I must apologize," she said, voice tight with worry. "I received a report that claimed the cowboy was injured during his escape. I deeply regret not being able to capture your thief as you had requested." She bowed her head in apology, her self-criticism evident in how deeply she lowered her head.
“It’s okay, Anjali,” Cecilia reassured her. “Raise your head.”
"But, Cecilia—"
"Believe me, it's all right. That's why I asked for this week to myself. To get over it."
Ser Anjali nodded slowly, trying to understand her friend’s need for space and time to heal. "Right. Of course. Shall I have Fiona bring breakfast?”
"Thank you." Cecilia watched her knight leave and then fell back onto the lounge chair feeling like all the energy had been sapped from her.
Ingram carefully emerged from Cecilia's bedroom, his expression clouded. He couldn't help but feel a twinge of emotion as he overheard the exchange between the princess and her father, the weight of which leaving him a little confused. He felt like there was something crucial he was missing but didn't have the guts to ask.
Cecilia forced a smile as she turned to face her thief. "Oh, you’re still awake? You didn’t hear that conversation, did you? Hehe. I hope you rested well," she said, her voice carrying a touch of hollowness. "Some food should be here soon. I think I'm going to take a nap after we eat. Do you mind if I use the bed?"
Ingram ran a hand through his dark brown hair, his gaze shifting away momentarily. "It’s your bed," he replied, his tone guarded.
The princess noted his unease but decided to press on with her charade of normalcy. "Um, well, while we wait, how about I change your bandages?" she suggested, motioning towards the medkit under her desk.
He hesitated for a moment before nodding in agreement. "Sure."
Cecilia had him sit down on the chaise where she deftly changed her thief’s bandages, hinting at a life beyond tea parties and gossip. "Sorry if my fingers are cold," she murmured, though he thought her hands felt quite the opposite—so warm and so alive. It had been too long since someone last touched him without malice.
"It’s fine," he replied, a hint of amusement in his voice that belied his attempted stoicism. He raised a brow as he perused the contents of the medkit. “This ain’t a normal medkit, is it?” he asked as he picked up a packaged tourniquet.
A little embarrassed she replied, “No. It’s a trauma kit I lifted from the guard infirmary years ago. I should probably get a new one.”
He gave her a skeptical look. “What’s the crown princess need with a trauma kit handy under the bathroom sink?”
“You remember where I grabbed it from?”
“That ain’t an answer.”
She sighed and admitted, "Accidents happen when you try to learn sword techniques in secret."
Ingram hesitated before saying, “But you’re the crown princess.”
“So?”
He was momentarily taken aback. "Ain’t you forbidden from fightin’?"
She pulled back, clearly upset. "Excuse me? I decide for myself what I want."
Ingram held his hands up defensively, realising he hit a sore spot. "Sure,s ure! Anythin’ you want, Sunshine."
Later that day, the thief paced around the princess’ bedroom like a caged animal. The afternoon sun casted bars of light through the tall window blinds, reminding him of his time in confinement.
"You shouldn't be moving around so much," she admonished.
Halting at the door, his voice rough, he said, "Sunshine, what do you see in a man such as m'self?"
The princess looked up at him from her chaise in the parlour, her focus pulled from the book she was reading. "What do you mean?"
Her thief shifted his weight and avoided her gaze uneasily. "What was it about those articles in the paper that made you believe in me?"
The princess closed her book with a thump. "You've never killed anyone," she said matter of factly, as if insulted that he would doubt her. After all, she had been obsessed with the man for months already.
“So it’s not my devillish good looks you’re after?” he teased.
“No!” she said, tossing a pillow at him.
He looked at her seriously. "What if I told you I have killed someone?"
She did her best to remain unfazed, even returning to her book. "I wouldn't believe you."
He grinned. "What if I told you I was once confined to a tiny-little-jail-cell and that ever since, being stuck in one location causes me great anxiety?"
"Does it, though? Did that really happen to you?"
He shrugged and glanced out the window. "Who knows?"
"I don't know what that has to do with whether you've killed someone or not, but you can open a window if you're feeling claustrophobic. I wouldn't recommend poking your head outside, though, what with you in hiding and all."
"If you say so," he said and waltzed to the nearest window and cast it open. A refreshing breeze blasted him in the face, carrying the scent of freshly cut grass and roses through the princess' chambers.
The princess took a deep breath in. "Smells nice," she said.
He sat back down on the side of the bed and smelled the air, letting his thoughts drift. “Indeed it do,” he mumbled, the smell reminding him of his hometown. The real one, where children played on the grassy lawns spread out around the village as their parents worked in the many ceramic workshops. He laid back and let the bittersweet nostalgia fill him up as he drifted off to sleep.
The next couple days came swiftly for the princess and her thief. She changed his bandages twice a day, making sure the area was clean, and covered his wound in a thin layer of analgesic ointment at least once a day. Meanwhile, the palace was a hive of activity, filled with the usual frenetic energy that preluded royal parties. Dignitaries and nobles arrived from all over, bringing with them a sense of opulence and wealth.
"Where're you headed off to?" her thief asked one night, noticing she had changed into a white blouse and dark brown slacks.
"I'm out of bandages and need to get more," she said as she tied her loose curls up into an assortment of tendrils. She slipped on a pair of dark brown boots, pulling the laces hard. "You stay here while I sneak into the guard's infirmary."
"You're not—" he began but stopped himself. What was he going to say? You're not going alone? He chuckled to himself. Like that was something he would actually say.
The princess looked up at him, satchel slung across her body. "What was that?" she asked, completely oblivious. She was ready to go and wanted to head out as soon as she could.
"Don't worry 'bout it. Just don't get caught."
"Hmph. Like I would," she retorted with a smirk. She grabbed her cloak and, for the first time in days, left her private chambers.
Ingram couldn’t take his eyes off the door after she walked out, as if her visage lingered there. He slapped himself after a few minutes, shaking her from his mind. Something was coming over him, he felt it, and it had to do with the princess. That girl must've done something, he thought, and became a little angry. But he couldn't stay mad at her. He couldn’t.
He turned and made his way over to the bed, taking a seat on the edge. He questioned why had he allowed this young woman tend to him when he normally wouldn't have? The last couple months had worn him down, he admitted to himself, but that didn't serve as enough of an excuse. Something else was biting at him from the edge of his mind, just out of reach, elusive and intangible.
He heard a door open, startling him. "Back so s—"
"What was that?"
It was another woman's voice. He dove across the bed, clenching his jaw when he landed on his injured side, and climbed into the nearest wardrobe.
"I didn't hear anything," said another woman.
"We should head back, Dahlia," Fiona said, fiddling with her braided reddish-brown hair. "Lady Stella-Cecilia isn't here."
"Are you crazy? Fiona, this is the perfect time to see what she's been up to," Dahlia said and immediately went over to the princess' desk to investigate. "Look, she completely cleared off her desk." She wasted no time in rummaging through the drawers, her hands sifting through stacks of parchments and quills. "No letters, no notes, no translation drafts. It's like she hasn't been doing anything at all. Something’s up."
"Well, she did say she was depressed..." Fiona said, looking down at the empty desk. It made her a little sad to see. "It's like she has a broken heart. I wish we could do something for her."
Dahlia had already moved on to the princess' bookshelves, scanning them for any noticeable change. "Why? She's gonna get married to that margrave's son and forget all about that boorish criminal soon enough. If I were her, I'd have already married someone extremely eligible by now."
"I don't like him," Fiona said.
"Who?"
"The margrave's son! He's rude to the servants and talks as if he owns Lady Stella-Cecilia. Nobody owns a person."
"Say that again to a slave and see what they have to tell you," Dahlia quipped.
"Oh, I'm sorry, Dahlia, that's not what I—"
"Anyway, you shouldn't badmouth him like that. He's our next king, after all."
"Not anytime soon," Fiona said defiantly. She trailed behind Dahlia into the bedroom, her eyes following her coworker's gaze as she surveyed the room.
"Can you not just stand there?" Dahlia said. "Go look in the bathroom."
Fiona sighed. "I don't even want to be here."
"Then why are you here?"
Valid question. Initially, Fiona was against the idea of Dahlia having free access to their lady's chambers, but now she couldn't help be curious as well. "Okay. What am I looking for?" she said and pushed open the washroom doors.
"I don't know. Anything out of place."
"Uh, Dahlia, would men's clothing be considered out of place?"
"Our lady has some men's articles, doesn't she? That's not strange."
"No, I mean, a man. A single man."
"What?" Dahlia spun around and sprinted to the washroom. Her eyes widened at the sight of Ingram's vest and duster hanging from the bath curtain ring.
Fiona scanned the bedroom. "Do you think he's in here? Should we look for him?"
Dahlia was furious. She grabbed Fiona's wrist and dragged her back to their room. "We're getting the king."
"What?" Fiona shouted. "We can't talk to him!"
"Then we'll get Ser Anjali. She can talk to him." She huffed. "How did no one know this was going on the entire time?" she growled.
Ingram stayed within the wardrobe, immobile as he processed what he'd just heard. His cover was blown and he knew he should be getting ready to leave as soon as possible, but the only thing he could think of was the princess' engagement.
Cecilia navigated through palace corridors towards the guard infirmary, using servant passageways to stay hidden. The trauma kits were lined up on low shelves next to the door so all she had to do was sneak inside, grab a bag, and book it.
She peered in through the glass window of the door and was relieved to see only a handful of knights inside. Waiting for a moment when no one was looking, she crept into the infirmary. She had barely lifted the bag when she heard the thunderous footsteps of several knights approaching from down the hall. Cecilia ducked behind a fabric curtain just as the infirmary doors burst open.
"Doctor, is the captain here?" a young palace guard asked.
Knight Captain Ezra Moore's strong voice answered from the other end of the room. "What happened?"
“The crown princess’ maids found evidence of the thief in her chambers.”
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