x  

 And there he was, Captain Lu holding out his hand helping me inside the carriage. When he finally sits across from me, he nodded once then looked away. Wordless for hours, I learned that Captain Lu is as silent as a statue. He didn't even move. No thread in his suit shifted, his hair had not even swayed. He simply just sat there looking out the window watching everything we passed.

    After sometime, I found myself finally lulling into sleeping with the day's events fully dragging me to feel every ache and tire. When I awoke, sun had risen already and Captain Lu finally stirs in his sit as I catch him looking at me.

“Good. You’re awake. We are almost there. I wanted to brief you of what’s to happen next. But if you want, I can wait until you’ve eaten breakfast. We still have half of the day ahead of us. I just nodded not trusting how I sounded first thing in the morning. 

    We finally stopped after a short while and he hands me a tray of food; bread, fruits, something in a bowl and even treats on the side. 

“I didn’t know what you wanted…” He was suddenly wordless. I wasn’t sure why. He avoided looking at me and opted to just push the tray to me. I took it slowly and placed it beside me. I picked up the apple and wiped it against the tunic underneath my jacket. Captain Lu just watched me with disdain.

“We have a lot of work ahead of us.” He says it with contempt. But I had no energy to think of what he meant or even talk to him. I was so hungry and surely sleeping sitting down is the worst way to go about traveling. I bite my apple and paid him no mind. Interested only in what’s first. Food. 

    After eating and drinking some water, I had finally faced him and looked his way. 

“Aren’t you going to eat?” I offer the tray beside me and he only look at me replying. “I’m not hungry.” But he takes it anyway and sits it next to him. 

“Now about what to expect. We will arrive at the castle ground in a couple of hours. There you will be ushered in to your designated room right away by mistresses. You will not leave that room until they deem you clean and presentable. From the looks of it, it’ll take some time.” I shot him a glare, because he’s been looking down on me since yesterday. He’s startled by my reaction clearing his throat first before he continued.

“You will follow your mistresses’ instruction and you will join the participants later that evening. Then, you will have your first test.” He cuts himself scared he might’ve said too much. When he spoke once again, he changed the subject completely. 

“You are very privileged to be picked for this. There were thousands of entries and only you and twenty-nine others had been lucky enough to participate.”

    Now he was downplaying the situation. I wanted to scoff but decided to hear him out some more.

“This is a royal tradition. To solidify the kingdom, the queen to be is chosen among the daughters of Ardea to solidify the relation of the throne with it's people. It's of great opportunity but there are rules."

    Here he was trying to sell it to me again. I don't understand why he kept on repeating it. It's not like I had refused. It's not like I could jump out of the carriage and run back home going back on my word. It irritated me how he made me feel. Like he continuously was judging me and was already making his judgments as we speak. Sure I was odd to look at first hand with my trousers and boyish tunic. I'm sure my hair tucked under my favorite cap didn't help a bit. I was just everything not queen-like or "lady-like"

"You must be born and bred as one and you must be ‘unattached’. Now, you are ‘unattached’, are you not?” He finally shakes me out of my thoughts.  Unattached.   What does that even mean? The question had half surprised me and fully confused me. Unattached. Was he talking about me being with someone else? Of course I wasn’t attached to anyone. I was a loner and had never even dated once in my life. The closes to a boy-girl interaction was with Kai and he was... my thoughts jumped back to the events in my room before I left. The chaste kiss, the trusting words that he'd wait for me. That certainty in his eyes that I'd come back for him. Isn't that why he chose to take care of my father? Isn't that why he vowed even though, as my father had put it, he already had a lot in his plate? Friend. I remeber my father's emphasis on the word just yesterday.  It was a warning. I get that now. He was warning me to Kai, just as he always was to me, a friend. 

“Because the boy who jumped out of your window is suspiciously much like an ‘attachment’.”

    Suddenly my mouth shuts and I couldn’t find the words to answer him back. I was never attached to Kai but what happened last night had been proof that there was something that I now wanted to know more about.

“He’s my best friend. He just wanted to say goodbye.” I said earnestly. It was the truth and I wasn’t really lying about anything. 

He pauses with a thought before he spoke again. 

“Good. Because if you were found to have an ‘attachment’ outside the castle, you will be reprimanded in the harshest way. Do not forget that your soul purpose of being there is to be the best candidate for the Crowned Prince.” Captain Lu now leans forward closer to me, lowering his voice.

“That means you have to at least try your best despite your aversion for the position or you’ll be reprimanded as well and be found guilty of squandering the tax payer’s money.” Somewhere in there there was some kind of playfulness. And despite my obvious fear and anxiety, he managed to enjoy my reaction and grinned to himself. He straightens up again wiping any look of regard from his menacing threat. 

“Now you may ask me anything, Ms. Kim Hei-Ran.”

“Ren.” I corrected.

Captain Lu had obviously disliked my reply shaking his head and on his teeth. 

“You’re not trying Ms. Kim. I can charge you right now—“

“Ugh. Fine!”  I almost yelped scrambling to be heard. It made Captain Lu smile and somehow he looked years younger than he seemed. 

“Fine, fine I’ll try my hardest.” I paused thinking about anything I needed or wanted to know. But nothing urgent came to me but a nagging question in the back of my mind.

"What is the Crowned Prince like?"

    Captain Lu if not confused was clearly not suspecting the question. The smug smile he had suddenly been erased in mere seconds of my questioning.

“What the Crowned Prince is like, that is your first question?” His interest had suddenly been apparent. He crosses his arms evidently deep in thought. When after a minute had passed and still he didn’t answer but just continued to furrow his brow, I spoke once again.

“What? Was that the wrong question?” I was still cautious of my actions. I hated feeling uncertain, but I just promised I’d try a bit harder. So, here I was looking more flustered than ever. This next question had made him smile again, now smirking as he really delved in my flustered state.

“No, it’s not that.” He eyes me carefully now. 

“You are quiet charming without you even knowing.” And somehow I made him smile again because now there was a hum in agreement and now a chuckle as I pinked and stirred on my seat in discomfort. I hated being scrutinized like this. As if he knew it was well to stop teasing me already before my resolve obliterated into little annoying tantrums and refusal, he finally changed the subject and answered me properly.

“The Crowned Prince is well deserving of his title. He is the most qualified for his position and he’s been bred since birth to be a leader. He has no aversion for the position as well. Taking full acceptance of the responsibility, he took it head on easily without hesitation. I will stand by him as long as I live.” 

    The words had surprised me. From the look in his eyes he was sincerely proud of his position next to the future King of Ardea. The genuineness of his words made me wonder how well he knew the Crowned Prince.

“You sound like you know the Prince very well.” I coaxed. Easily he settled somehow changing and realizing as he began to speak about the Crowned Prince not as his future king but as a friend.

“Prince Sehun and I...we grew up together. I trained along side him and we’ve grown closer through the years. I trust him with my life, and I’m very certain he feels the same way since he made me the head of his personal guards.”

    And for the first time, since I met Captain Lu, I had a slight inkling to soften and relax. He looked his most genuine as if he were just Lu Han talking about his best friend Oh Sehun.  I can just imagine the two playing and training as Kai and I had done so all of our lives. Climbing trees or rather helping Kai climb the tree to spy on the girls swimming by the creek. Or running toe to toe away from the said girls as we’re chased from getting caught. Or Kai and I sleeping under a tree down by the creek because his father had come home too drunk, and he was scared of what useless punishment he’d meet if he was to stay. 

    He studies my face and I catch him examining me once again.

“Tell me more about him. His favorite food, his favorite pass time. What kind of friend he is.” Curious interest slips out, escaping my lips one after another. I couldn’t help but succumb to my curiosity as to what kind of person this Prince Oh Sehun to make such a man like Captain Lu speak so highly of him.

    Captain Lu laughs and he began to tell a story easing in to the conversation casually. He laugh before he’s even started and I knew it had to be a good anecdote that’ll be closest to recollection of the Prince.  And I was right, I was clutching tight to my stomach by the end of it all as Captain Lu had comically, out of character of course, spoke about the first time Prince Sehun had seen a woman or the time, he lost his underwear down by the lake. He even admitted to having to wear girl clothing once to cover up for his majesty and that by itself had me rolling in my seat. 

    Captain Lu had nothing but good stories to tell, showing his pure friendship with the Prince as I could only compare with what I have or had with Kai. As he spoke one anecdote after another, I watch him with glee and amazement because, underneath the firm and reserved exterior of his red suit, Captain Lu is really just another young adult like me. Eager to please, eager to grab hold of life. 

    Our conversations had evolved from funny anecdotes to personal accounts and somehow within the next couple of hours, I have learned more about Captain Lu than I’ve learned about the Crowned Prince. And that is much to say since, everyone of those stories had always included the Prince. But the casual exchange, had showed me another side of the stern Captain. And it intrigued me as to how we’ve gotten this far. 

“You’re a good friend, Captain. I’m glad to hear you are this devoted and sincere to the Prince.” I do not really know what came over me but it was honest through and through, every word of it.

“You already sound like a Queen.” And his eyes lit up, face widened with a genuine smile. 

    It had been high noon already after the laughter had died out. We began talking about what we should’ve been talking about to begin with, the schematics of the whole situation. Rules were the topic of the discussion. And although it may seem like an innocent and simple list to contain the competition, and maintain the peace in the house without bringing down the high court and their majesty, Captain Lu had assured me that it would be more grueling and competitive, even very ugly. As ugly as the word ‘competition’ is and I could see it in his eyes as he had mentioned it over and over again, there really is no other word for it. He says he thinks of it as the only way to weed out the best of the best and that is why he fully supports it.

“I only want Prince Sehun to finally settle down with someone who really cares for him, not as a Crowned Prince but as a person. He deserves someone he can trust. Someone he can confide in and simply let him be himself even if it’s in the confines of their chamber. He’s never known freedom. And this maybe the only things closest to it.”

    And again, I couldn’t help but let my heart swell with his pure love for the Prince. It was sad to think that someone as important as the Crowned Prince would hate anything about his upbringing. But now that I think about it, all of Captain Lu’s recollection had nothing more than he and Prince Sehun pushing their luck within their constraints. There were constraint. He wasn’t allowed to go outside the castle walls. He had only mention the Prince practically spending all his life with him and his head mistress who practically raised him since he was a young child. Forced to learn combat and read books, study languages and philosophy, sit through meetings with the high court since puberty, it seems like Captain Lu could be right about one thing. This competition may be the Prince’s only chance to exercise his freedom of choice, since everything had already been decided for him since birth. 

“After Phase One, you are to move to the castle and begin the actual competition. I warn you. That is when the true nature of every participant comes out. Do not trust so easily. If you want to lay low you may do so just to earn enough pay to sustain for a couple of years. But I beg you to try at least to be desirable for the Prince. He is really worth the fight once you get to know him.

“Wait, yesterday you said I had no shot whatsoever. So why do you keep asking me to try now?”

He stiffens then clears his throat seeming to have done too much. He began to fix himself wanting to be nonchalant about it.

“I don’t know... I just, I just figured, if you were able to befriend me, I would think you’d do great befriending the Prince. You know he doesn’t have very many.”

Befriend. That's what it was. He had confided because I easily befriended him.

  And that’s when suddenly the carriage stopped. Captain Lu had altogether changed his demeanor and became the man he was the day before. Aloof and stern, I couldn’t help but see the obvious distinguished change in him. He sighs and pressed his lips looking as if he’s disappointed our conversation had finally ended. 

    I look outside the window and I notice the castle walls. The massive grey blocks stacked way up high and guards piled around and above it. We were at a checkpoint. He pulls the curtains down in every window and I tensed as somehow I felt like something was wrong. The look in Captain Lu had not been calm, someone who just needed to go back to his duties. He looked as if worried and suspicious. 

“What’s go—“ But he brings his finger to his lips and he urges me to be quiet. 

    I tried to listen to the conversation just beyond the carriage. 

“The last participant, sir.” The coachmen beckons the guard. 

“You’re late.” The guard says with condescending tone. 

   There was a distinct silence after, and then the carriage had began to move again. I wasn’t aware that I had been holding my breath until the carriage started to rock and Captain Lu Han held my hand. 

“What are you—“ I began to say but he looked at me with worry before he retracted his hand straightening himself. 

“You were shaking.” He started to say. 

“I'm not sure why.” I answered terse but truthful. I hadn’t had a clue as to why I’ve been so scared all of a sudden. 

    Captain Lu clears his throat and then he was urging me to look behind the curtain. And what I saw was the most amazing thing ever. I’ve heard of stories of what inside the castle walls would look like, all depicting something magnanimous and grand. And how they were all wrong. This was more than grand. This was spectacular, luxurious with every bush trimmed and every leaf tucked in perfectly to hold it’s shape. The blue water of the fountain that lined the pathway had been clear water sparkling against the rays of the sun. It was perfect lighting to line the road. Nothing out of place, not a single thing at all. For some reason, I had been fooled. When I craned my head to finally see the castle, everything else seem to have no end. 

“I will take my leave first, Ms. Kim Hei-Ran. It was a pleasure to have gotten to know you. I hope, for the sake of this kingdom that I see you soon in the castle. We need more people as genuine and true to themselves as you have been to me. Thank you for the conversation. It had been awhile.” Captain Lu smiles too easily and looks at me with intent. 

“Thank you. If your descriptions of the Crowned Prince is as certain as you are, I too will be glad to serve him wholeheartedly.”

We bow to each other and suddenly the carriage stops again. 

“See you soon, Lady Hei-Ran” And the door to the carriage opens and he climbs out in haste without another word. The doors closed once again and the carriage began rocking as it continued down the road. A couple of minutes later, the carriage stops once again. This time I knew it’s my final destination. When the doors opened three women awaited by the door and a coachman had offered his hand to me. I want to guess it’s by habit since, nothing about how I look, warranted any help.  The older woman in the middle gasps and began to look at me in disgust. 

“Oh my!” She eyes me up and down before she and the rest of the women hauled me inside grabbing tightly at my jacket in a haste. There were clusters of women loitering the foyer, thankfully none of them noticed my entrance. I supposed the participants were starting to get acclimated with each other. I was half ready to dive in and begin right away but the mistresses had just about pulled me in haste once again as we weave through the corridors and finally stepping into a bedroom like we were being chased. 

“My the dear god. What do you think you're wearing?” She eyes my ragged men’s jacket and with my too big tunic peeking beyond the seams. Then she walks around me and tugs on the trouser I wore and just kept shaking her head. Finally she pulls on my hat and I somehow became defensive holding it in place as a habit. I never liked showing my hair. It made me more woman-like as I guessed would be more appropriate in this situation. So after a grunt and intense glaring from the old hag, I finally let go of my hat and gave in. 

    This time, her face had changed completely. There’s something in the way she looked appeared to be scared or shocked at the same time. But I couldn’t be certain. 

    Then, there were knuckles cracking behind me and I turn to see one of the women readying herself as she dove in pulling at my garments one by one. It took a lot for me not to scream as they undressed me. I was by the time we reached the washroom with a tub that smelled of perfumed oils covered with flower petals. And it had been the only reason I’ve forgotten my shy aversion to being stark in front of strangers.  I have never in my entire life seen anything like it. Kai had sought out a girl once who was bathing a long time ago and I had a short glimpse of the old tub of water in a gritty outhouse. But this washroom, this stone tub, no pool filled with flower petals, I wanted to jump into it myself.

    It was enticing and it should because I’ve never had a luxurious bath like this with the pool as big as a Koi fish pool. The too warm water had been everything my body needed, never knowing it wanted because it soothed all the aches and pain I had from the training I’ve had this week with Kai and the long travel with the Captain Lu Han to get here. It all had been too perfect until the women began to scrub hard over and over and over again with different things in the same spot. There was a rock, a sponge-like thing, loofa one of the women named it and another smoother sponge as the bath neared its end. The other girl, youngest as she looked compared to the other two started to massage my head and hair with something sweet and minty. She prodded and deeply massaged my scalp until it was painful but it had all ended with her combing through the strands and for the first time, I didn’t feel a single tangled knot as my hair would like to do. After the whole ordeal in the tub, I’ve managed to be surprised with everything after and fell into slackened nap as the ladies pulled and tugged, prodded and poked every inch of my body. It hurt like hell. But my body was too tired from the travel that I passed out in the chair as they continued with their work.

a/n: to my small number of subscribers
and awesome commentor, THANK
YOU THANK YOU! For even looking
at this and reading, peaking your interest.
I've posted again just because I'm too
happy. The male lead(s) will be revealed
soon. Hope you stay to find out. Again, 
thank you for readin.