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BIG ROCK BEACH, MALIBU, CALIFORNIA

Saturday, August 20th, 20xx

Sunset

Even from half a world away, Maka Albarn’s father still manages to ruin her day.

Her day, and perhaps even more tragically, the beautiful view of the sun setting on the Pacific Ocean.

She supposes, though, she shouldn’t place the blame entirely on him; she had lost track of time. Somewhere along the way down the shore, between the sand in her toes and the cool salt water lapping at her ankles, between the shorebirds skittering out of her path and the abandoned sand castles slowly sinking back into the shifting earth from whence they came, she had forgotten all about her weekly check-in call with her father.

When she pulls her phone out of the back pocket of her shorts and answers the call on the second ring, she doesn’t expect her day to be ruined, either. She expects nothing more than a routine update.

“Papa,” she presses the phone to her ear and stops walking. “Hi.”

“Sweetheart!” his voice says through the speaker of her cell phone. “How are you, my little Petal?!”

“I’m fine, Papa.” She averts her eyes from the horizon and turns away from the ocean, starts walking up the beach. “Just out for a stroll to watch the sunset.”

“Another reminder of the miles that separate us,” the tone of her father's voice turns melancholy in an instant. "The sun is setting on your day when mine has only just begun."

“Papa, don’t start,” Maka warns. The last thing she needs right now is another one of his weepy, snivelly, ‘I-miss-my-darling-daughter-so-much’ episodes. “Tell me about your week. How did the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new town square building go?”

Maka had been on holiday in the States all summer, after graduating in May with a Bachelor’s degree, which she completed in a mere three years. As far as the citizens of her country knew, their beloved princess was taking such an extended holiday so far from home as a reward, to relax and let loose a little, because what better time to take a long vacation than the summer after finishing school?

Truth be told, though, it was less a leisurely vacation than a self-imposed leave of absence from her life back home.

Because back home, she isn’t just a princess; she is the only child of His Majesty King Spirit Albarn, One Hundred and Forty-First Monarch to reign over the European nation of Bellemorte, and therefore the sole heir to the throne. She'd also just celebrated her twenty-first birthday this past spring, which meant she was now of age to be crowned queen.

Even after three months on the opposite side of the globe, she still hasn’t fully worked out why that thought frightens her so terribly.

Back home, Maka's destiny as Bellemorte’s next queen looms before her, every single stepping stone on the path to her future already laid out for her, and the burden of living up to her people’s expectations is nothing short of suffocating.

Back home, her every move is scrutinized, her every choice weighed against her father's reputation - and even worse, against the memory of her mother, whose legacy still lingers like an expectant ghost even after all these years.

Back home, it’s getting hard to tell who parents who when it comes to her relationship with her father, and she loves her Papa, she really does, but taking care of him has just become yet another responsibility heaped upon her shoulders.

So this vacation is her escape.

For her mental health’s sake, and to truly discipline herself to enjoy the time off, Maka would only permit herself to think about her royal responsibilities and ask for updates on how things were going back home during these weekly phone calls that her father insisted on.

"Oh, it went fine," her father answers, nonchalant and dismissive, and like he hadn't spent the past few check-in calls stressing himself into oblivion about this very thing. "Great, actually. The Prime Minister handled most of the logistics and gave the remarks. All I had to do was pose with an oversized pair of scissors."

"That's wonderful, Papa. I can't wait to see pictures.” She’s made it far enough up the beach now that she can see the stretch of cars parked along the access point walkway. She spots Kid next to the limousine, ever the watchful bodyguard - although, as head of security for her father and therefore the entire royal court, he would probably bristle at being referred to as simply a 'bodyguard'. He stands like a grim shadow, a specter in stark, all-black contrast against the soft neutral tones of the surrounding landscape and the golden light of the setting sun. His hands are folded behind his back and his eyes are hidden, as they most often are, by a dark pair of sunglasses. “And the opening session of Parliament? That was the day after the ceremony, wasn’t it?"

There is a beat of silence from the other end of the line then - the first sign that something is amiss. Maka slows her pace, her eyebrows knitting together in concern.

"Papa?"

She at least succeeds at keeping her voice mostly even. Maybe there was a blip in cell coverage, and he just didn’t hear her question.

As if on cue, Kid inclines his head and unclasps his hands from behind his back, as though he could sense her mounting distress.

"Maka, sweetie," her father finally says, but she knows that tone - awkwardly pitched, almost rehearsed - and she feels her stomach drop. Kid opens the rear door of the limo for her as she approaches, and she ducks into the backseat. “I think maybe we should save this part for when you get home-”

"What happened?"

"Honey, I really don't think-"

"What. Happened."

Kid, now comfortably seated in the driver’s seat of the limo, pauses with his hand on the ignition. His golden eyes peek out from over the top of his shades, and Maka meets his gaze in the rear-view mirror.

On the other end of the line, her father takes a deep breath.

“W-Well, angel… now that you’re twenty-one,” he begins. “There was much talk about your ascension to the throne, and when you will be ready to do so. I expected this topic to come up in Parliament, so I had a response ready, that you and I would talk about it when you get home in a couple of weeks. But… sweetheart, there's… one thing we forgot to account for.”

“And what,” Maka says through gritted teeth. “Is that?”

Another pause, and then:

“There’s an old law on the books that requires a princess be married before she can be crowned queen.”

For some reason, despite the white-hot anger rising inside her like a wave cresting at the surface of the ocean, she laughs. Maka honestly, truly laughs, because it's so absurd and so downright sexist that she refuses to believe it at first.

"What's so fu-"

"You're joking," she cuts him off. "Tell me you're joking? There's no way Bellemorte has such an antiquated marriage law in place?"

"I'm afraid it's true, Maka."

Her father's voice is grave, more so than she's heard in a long time, and it stops her laughter dead in its tracks.

"B-but… but Papa, you can't… can't you… do something about it? Overrule it or something?"

"You and I both know that's not how our monarchy works, Petal."

Of all the things about this conversation that could have sent her over the edge, its the childhood nickname that makes Maka snap.

"So that's it, then?" She spits. "When I get home you're just going to let Parliament marry off your only daughter? You're seriously going to stand for that?!"

The world rushing by outside the limo starts to slow, and she vaguely registers Kid pulling the car over to a stop on the side of the road.

"Oh, I'm not going to let Parliament marry you off, Maka. If you must get married one way or another, I'll be selecting the suitors myself."

She nearly breaks her phone clean in half.

"What did you just say?"

Kid shuts the engine off and removes his glasses from his face.

"Maka, please, be reasonable here -"

"I will not! Be reasonable! With a good-for-nothing father who thinks he can just sell me off to a prince or a duke of his choosing like I'm some… some pawn! Some play-thing!"

"Maka, that's enough," Spirit bellows, and Maka flinches, because she can't remember the last time her father raised his voice at her. "You are acting like a child. You are the heir to the throne of Bellemorte, the next ruler of our great country. We cannot put off your coronation forever. Do you think your mother would approve of this behavior?"

"Do NOT," Maka seethes, her voice low and deadly. "Bring Mama into this."

Hot, stinging moisture pricks at the corners of her vision, and she takes a deep breath, blinking back the flood of tears that she knows are coming.

"Maka-"

"I'm done," she says, with as much finality in her quavering voice as she can muster. "We will continue this conversation when I get home."

“Oh, don’t you hang up on me –”

She hangs up on him.

Scarcely before in her life has the press of a button been quite so satisfying.

There is a long, awful silence in the limo then, broken only by the soft sounds of Maka crying. She doesn't know how long Kid watches her wordlessly in the rear-view mirror while she utterly sobs.

When he finally speaks, his voice is as calm and collected as it always is.

"Do you want to talk about it, Your Highness?"

Maka sniffles, wiping insistently at her watery eyes even as the tears keep flowing.

“I - I don’t…” she stammers, truly unsure how to even begin to make any sense of all the emotions currently coursing through her. She slumps against the leather seat back with a frustrated sigh. “What even is there to say? You heard everything.”

“It matters not what I heard,” Kid responds. “Of far greater importance to me is how you’re feeling, Princess.”

Maka crosses her arms and chews on the inside of her cheek.

“I just - I can’t-” she flounders, trying and at first failing to find the right words. “I can’t believe this is happening. It’s so… unfair.” She sits up a little straighter, lifts her head a bit. “How could I have not known about this stupid marriage law all these years? How can Papa possibly be okay with it? Why didn’t he fight back against Parliament? Or at the very least…” she trails off. “Why didn’t he even think to ask me how I felt about it?”

Kid nods in understanding.

“You’re angry with him for disregarding your feelings.”

“I’m angry with him and with Parliament,” Maka retorts. Her voice is more steady and the tears have stopped flowing now. “Prime Minister Barrett has known me my entire life. He knows I’ll make a far more competent ruler than Papa could ever hope to be. And Papa’s been ruling by himself for over a decade. Why do I have to be married in order to rule?”

“Do you really want me to answer that question?” Kid’s golden eyes find hers once again, though this time, he’s turned around in the driver’s seat to face her. She holds his gaze for a long, heavy moment, letting the silence stretch between them in the limo.

“No,” Maka sighs, a thoroughly defeated exhale. “No, I don’t.”

“Your Highness, if I may," Kid's eyes soften. "Have you considered… that perhaps marriage wouldn’t be so bad? I’m sure there will be plenty of fine suitors for you to choose from. Surely you’ll take a liking to one of them?”

“Ugh,” Maka scoffs, her expression darkening as she turns her attention to stare out the window into the busy street. She reaches up to run a hand down the side of her face. “Marriage… I don’t know, I’m sure it will be fine someday, when I feel ready for it. But it's the principle of the matter. I don’t want it to be at the behest of anyone but myself.”

For some reason, Kid chuckles at this.

“Well, Princess,” he turns to face forward once more, sliding his glasses back onto his face. “Unless you can find some dashing young American boy to fall in love with you and propose to you within the next two weeks, I’m not sure you have much of a choice.”

Maka's eyes snap away from the window and back to Kid. Her mouth falls open as an idea starts to take shape in her mind.

“Yeah..." she says slowly. “Yeah… that’s it, isn’t it?”

Maka can no longer see the expression in his eyes, but she doesn't miss how Kid's eyebrows go up.

"Your Highness? I’m not sure I follow."

Screw getting married, screw even falling in love - all she needs is someone to pretend.

To pretend to be in love with her. So hopelessly, helplessly, head over heels in love that he's already proposed and is willing to uproot his whole life, move to Europe, and become her consort. A fake fiancé, to get out of a forced real engagement, and to get back at her dad and Parliament, too, for thinking they have any right to dictate her choices.

She can hire someone for that, can't she?

INCLINE VILLAGE, LAKE TAHOE, NEVADA

Saturday, August 20th, 20xx

Late evening

Even from an entire state away, Soul Evans's best friend still manages to ruin his night.

Okay, maybe "ruin" is a bit of a stretch, but Blake does have a knack for being an absolute shitlord, and Soul is thoroughly irritated.

Blake: bro! How's my favorite boy toy doin'? That one rich bitch treatin' you good?

Soul rues the day that he'd divulged the truth about his job to Blake. Why hadn't he just fed him some crap story about being a traveling music instructor, that he takes house calls and travels around the country giving wealthy assholes' kids piano lessons? Blake would totally have believed that.

Soul: if you ever refer to me as 'your favorite boy toy' again, I'm blocking your number.

Blake: rude. Is that any way to treat the one person in your life who loves you for you, sparkling personality and all, and not just 'cause you're a pretty boy?

Soul rolls his eyes so hard it's a wonder they don't disappear backward into his head.

Soul: right.

He sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose in resignation before typing a reply.

Soul: anya's fine. Same shit, different wedding.

Soul looks up from his phone to halfheartedly reach across the refreshments table for a stuffed shrimp. Along the way, his eyes scan the crowd of wedding guests in an effort to locate his client. He spots her about halfway across the ballroom, laughing and chatting with a couple of other women - one with jet black hair styled into two wispy pigtails, the other with auburn hair pulled up into a loose bun. Her childhood friends Tsugumi and Meme, he deduces, based on the vague descriptions she had supplied him with before the wedding.

He supposes he ought to go make like a good hired boyfriend and introduce himself.

His phone buzzes again, and he looks down to another message:

Blake: yeah, cuz you go to enough of these fancy-schmancy parties to get bored of them. Next time I swear I’m crashing as your plus one.

Soul starts to type a response explaining that he can’t take a plus one to a wedding when he himself is the plus one, but decides it isn’t worth the effort halfway through typing it.

Soul: I will literally never bring you along on a job as my plus one. Besides, this is my last gig, remember? I know I told you that.

He had attended a lot of weddings as a hired date in his time as an escort, but this one would be his last.

He pockets his phone and grabs another shrimp with his other hand before taking his leave from the buffet of fancy hors d’oeuvres. He makes his way across the ballroom and over to Anya, adjusting his tie and running his fingers through his hair as he does so.

“Pardon me, ladies, I’m terribly sorry to interrupt,” he announces his presence as he comes up behind Anya, one hand going to the small of her back. “Anya, darling, there you are. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

She giggles as he pulls her in for a hug and presses a quick kiss to her forehead.

“Oh, Soul, stop it, this place isn’t that big,” she tosses her long blonde hair behind her shoulder as she looks up at him. “I was just catching up with the girls. I told you about Tsugumi and Meme?”

“Of course,” Soul releases Anya from the hug and turns to face her friends. “Where are my manners? Call me Soul. It’s lovely to meet you both.”

He extends his hand to the black-haired girl, who immediately blushes and averts her eyes as she nervously reaches out to take it.

“Ts-Tsugumi. My name is Tsugumi,” she starts, her voice barely more than a murmur. When Soul dips his head to kiss her hand, she emits a squeak so high-pitched he can’t help but wince as he releases her hand from his grip.

“Oooh, Anya. This is your boyfriend? Goodness, he looks even better than the photos,” says the brunette friend. “I’m Meme.”

She extends her hand out to him, and Soul turns on the charm. He flashes her a smile and bows as he takes her hand into his own.

“Meme, it’s a pleasure,” he lifts her hand to his lips and presses a kiss against her fingers. “I’ve heard so much about both you and Tsugumi. Anya just adores your friendship.”

He lets his mouth linger there for a moment, smile never faltering as he looks at her up the length of her arm. Her cheeks have pinked and her eyes have grown wide.

“The… pleasure is all mine,” Meme says with an air of wonder in her voice. “Anya, wherever did you find this one?”

Anya smiles smugly as she lifts her glass of wine to her mouth, her feathery eyelashes fluttering shut for a moment.

“San Diego. Spring break,” she says simply, as if Meme’s question had been a stupid one.

It’s not technically a lie. They had met during spring break, though it was two years ago now. Anya had hired Soul back then to spend the week with her at her family’s third home in La Jolla after she had been through an awful breakup. Then, she’d hired him again about two months later, to make her ex–boyfriend jealous at her sorority’s summer mixer.

And ever since then, Anya Hepburn, only daughter and young heiress to the Hepburn family hotel conglomerate, had been one of Soul’s best - and highest-paying - regular clients.

He had agreed to spend this past week with her leading up to her father’s wedding out of state, on the Nevada side of Lake Tahoe, and then attend the wedding posing as her boyfriend, but when he informed her that it would be his last job as an escort before quitting, she did not take it very well.

“Better spring break than I had,” Tsugumi sighs, more to herself and her own drink than anyone else. “I got food poisoning.”

“Ugh, Tsu, it’s because you drank the water,” Anya quips back. She gives her wine glass an impatient swirl. “Everyone knows you don’t drink the water in Mexico.”

“I didn’t drink the water,” Tsugumi deflates a little at the admission. “I put ice cubes in my vodka soda once when I was there. Once!”

Meme snorts out a laugh.

“I’ll bet that was a nasty hangover.”

“Well, ladies, it has been so wonderful meeting you,” Soul interjects, wrapping an arm around his faux-girlfriend’s shoulders. “But I’d like a word alone with Anya now, if you don’t mind.”

“Yeah, sure, a ‘word’,” Meme snickers. “Call it whatever you want. We’ll cover for you if Anya’s parents come around asking for her.”

“Appreciate it,” Soul says with a wink as he turns, leading Anya away. She follows him easily, leaning into his side without protest.

“Eager for some alone time on our final night together, hm?”

“Yup,” Soul’s tone of voice is flat, almost disinterested, now that they’re out of earshot of Anya’s friends, though he doesn't completely drop the facade of loving, polite boyfriend - his arm remains tight around her shoulder to keep up the charade. “Right after an important pit stop at the open bar.”

Anya clicks her tongue at him, but it's lost on Soul whether it's in disapproval or amusement.

Nor does he care, quite frankly.

One more night. Just one more night and then he’s free.

Free from escorting, free from wealthy, snobby, old-money girls and their shitty, self-important parties. Free from this double life among stuffy, rich assholes, playing the ghost of his old self.

Free from the clutches of paying his own way through college, and on to pursuing what he actually wants to do with his life.

"Ah, Miss Hepburn. And Mr… I'm sorry, what was it?"

They’d arrived at the bar on the far side of the ballroom, and now an elderly, bespectacled bartender in a double-breasted suit jacket stares expectantly at the two of them.

“Soul. Just Soul,” he’s careful to avoid using his surname, or any semblance of his full, legal name, while working escort jobs. “Just here for one more drink before the last call.”

“Yes, yes,” the bartender nods. “What can I get you?”

“Macallan, eighteen-year. On the rocks, please.”

When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Or in this case, when attending one of the most high-profile weddings of the year for one of the country’s richest families, take advantage of the open bar and order the expensive stuff.

“Of course, of course,” the bartender nods again. He turns to Anya. “And for the young Miss Hepburn?”

“I’m good, Vincenzo, thanks,” Anya lifts her half-full glass of wine. “Still savoring this cabernet.”

Vincenzo bows his head before turning to pour Soul’s drink.

A few short moments later, Soul has a glass of whiskey in one hand and Anya’s fingers laced tightly through the fingers of his other hand as she leads him out of the ballroom at a brisk pace. He eventually figures out where she’s taking him, and when she rounds a corner and pushes through exterior doors that open up to the mansion’s inner courtyard gardens, the quiet night air on his face is a relief to his senses.

“Any particular reason for the change of scenery?”

“I want to finish my drink under the stars,” Anya says as she releases his hand. They’d wandered far into the courtyard, through a meandering maze of gardens dotted with topiaries and stone sculptures, stopping now beside a gigantic fountain near the center.

“Fine by me,” Soul smirks. He lifts his drink to his lips and takes a long pull from it. He’s grateful for the privacy and a chance to drop the lovey-dovey act; it had been a long day of formalities and playing the role of polite, doting boyfriend in front of way too many judgemental strangers, and honestly, he’s exhausted.

“How about a toast, you and I,” Anya lifts her wine glass in the air, takes a wobbly step to steady herself as she does so. “To our last night together. And to my father’s…” she pauses, tilting her head and scrunching up her face in concentration. “Fourth? Yeah, fourth marriage.”

Soul’s eyebrows go up in amusement.

“Just how many glasses of that cabernet have you had tonight, Anya?”

“Enough to keep up the act that I’m just absolutely thrilled about Stepmom Number Three,” Anya hiccups. “And enough that I’ve decided that maybe I do believe in true love after all.”

Soul barks out a laugh as he raises his glass. He lets it clink gently against Anya’s before bringing it back for another big gulp of whiskey.

"Breaking news, local heiress who's been having a paid escort pose as her boyfriend for two years declares that love is real, actually," he snickers. "Tune in at eleven pm to find out more."

There's a beat of silence before Anya gives her best, slightly tipsy attempt at an impressed whistle.

“Wow,” she blinks, takes another sip of her wine. “That was rude even for you, Soul.”

"Add it to my resume under 'character traits'.”

Anya brings a hand to her face, holds her chin for several seconds as if deep in thought.

“Rude, sarcastic, incredibly lazy, full of self-loathing, and perpetually grumpy,” she lists, lifting a finger for each item. "For an escort, you have a pretty shitty personality.”

“You’re the one who keeps hiring me.”

At that, Anya laughs, a sharp, high-pitched sound that pierces the peaceful silence of the garden.

“Yeah, I do," she admits with a wistful smile. "Because you’re smoking hot, and a former rich boy yourself. So, like it or not, you know your way around these kinds of parties. And,” Anya takes a big gulp from her glass, draining the last of the wine from within. “Because you're fucking amazing in bed. Best sex I’ve ever had.”

“Awe, thanks, babe. You’re not so bad yourself,” Soul smirks, and he knows Anya believes him, even though she's literally paying him to make her happy. He probably says something along those same lines to every client that he ends up sleeping with, and they all believe him.

Anya sets her empty glass down on a nearby ledge and levels him with a look that’s every bit as salacious as it is intoxicated. Her eyes flicker upward, in the direction of the house, and then float back to his face as she takes a step forward, closing the distance between them.

“Speaking of…” she leans into him dramatically, makes a show of wrapping her arms around his neck and seductively draping her body against him. “We gonna take this upstairs already, or what?”

She doesn't wait for his response to move in for a kiss. Soul sucks in a fortifying breath, and repeats the same mantra that's been getting him through the entire day as her lips press to his throat: just one more night.

“Sweetheart, I thought you'd never ask.”

MALIBU, CALIFORNIA

Saturday, August 20th, 20xx

Late evening

Hours after the call with her father, and from within the safety and privacy of the cocoon of blankets she'd constructed around herself, Maka sits in her vacation home bedroom, cross-legged on her bed, clad in her silk pajamas and steadfast determination in the set of her brows, as she stares at the open screen of her laptop.

More specifically, she stares at what's on her laptop screen: dozens upon dozens of smiling, conventionally attractive male escorts.

She's thankful that this agency refers to them as such - escorts - and not something more… lewd. She is not hiring this person for casual sex, and she has no trouble reminding herself of this fact as many times as is needed to maintain her resolve while she scrolls through potential fake fiancé candidates.

She's hiring this person to do a job, and that is to pretend to be engaged to - and madly in love with - her.

Her, the Crown Princess of Bellemorte.

So whoever she chooses, he needs to be an absolute professional. The cream of the crop. The very best this escort agency has to offer.

But, realistically, Maka supposes she should define some slightly more tangible minimum qualifications.

What she needs, she realizes with a surge of excitement in her chest, is to make a list.

She wriggles herself free from her nest of blankets and shimmies off of her bed, bound for the top desk drawer on the other side of her bedroom. When she returns to her post in front of her laptop, she's armed with her favorite notebook, a pencil, and the bedtime snack of pretzels, baby carrots, and hummus that the waitstaff had left outside her bedroom door.

She returns to her post armed and ready.

Maka flips to the first blank page in her notebook and begins to list out her ideal candidate:

1. Age: 21 - 25; absolutely no older than 26
2. Higher class background/familiarity with basic etiquette (someone who knows how to waltz, the different uses for dinner forks, that sort of thing)
3. Traits that would piss off Papa (tattoos, piercings, interest in music/art)
4. Ability to relocate to Bellemorte with me for at least 4-6 months
5. Attractive????

She pauses after the fifth item when it occurs to her that she really isn't even sure what she finds attractive in a potential romantic partner. Her eyes drift back to the computer screen to see if any physical traits jump out at her. After scanning the options currently on-screen, she wrinkles her nose and adds one more criterion:

      6. Profile photo NOT SHIRTLESS

The sheer number of men posing in some degree of nakedness in their profile pictures is staggering. She does not want to deal with a fake fiancé who is that full of himself.

Unfortunately, there are probably hundreds of male escorts in the greater SoCal area, and the vast majority of them are shirtless - or worse - in their profile pictures.

This might be harder than she thought.

After what feels like an eternity of scrolling through an endless sea of half-naked male model looking types, one profile photo catches Maka's eye.

Soul - 22 - Los Angeles

He's within her desired age range, and not only is he fully dressed - automatic points earned there - he looks sharp and put together in a crisply pressed pinstripe suit and black tie. With a dark red dress shirt beneath the suit and a lopsided, devil-may-care smile on his face, he manages to look like both a bad boy teenage heartthrob and the very picture of elegance and refinement simultaneously, which makes Maka curious enough to click on his picture.

She pops a hummus-laden carrot into her mouth, and starts reading his bio:

"At 22 years old and with only one semester of college left ahead of him, Soul is one of our youngest escort options currently available - but don't let that discourage you, ladies and gents! As the second son of a wealthy, well-traveled family, Soul comes from a sophisticated background and has life experience well beyond his years."

"Mrrrrrrroww?"

A familiar meow and the distinctive sound of tiny paws hitting the mattress pull Maka's attention away from the screen. She looks up and finds the inquisitive amber eyes of her cat staring back at her.

"Blair! There you are," she leans forward, reaches out with both hands and pulls the cat into her lap. Blair happily obliges, body going limp and malleable immediately. Maka presses a kiss to the top of her head, right between her ears. "Do you want to help Mama pick a fiancé?"

Blair cocks her head curiously and gives another soft meow, as though her interest is piqued. Maka swears that her cat is almost eerily human sometimes.

Blair curls up contentedly in Maka's lap, and the princess continues reading:

"As part of his upbringing, Soul has traveled to over twelve countries on six continents, and has plans to travel even more once he graduates this summer with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Music Theory & Composition.

When he's not traveling or wowing his clients with his charm and razor-sharp wit, Soul enjoys writing and performing his original music compositions (he plays three instruments!), sight-seeing around California from the back of his motorcycle, and attending as many local art shows and architecture tours as he can fit into his schedule.

In terms of companionship, Soul believes that a strong connection beyond just physical attraction is key to a positive experience, and he strives to create this connection with all of his clients. As a result, he has one of the highest returning customer rates in our entire agency. Whether you're looking for an experienced companion to join you for an international getaway, a wedding date to impress your friends and family with not only looks but dancing skills (Soul has eight years of ballroom and contemporary dance lessons under his belt thanks once again to his upbringing), or just a handsome, attentive partner for a romantic night in, Soul’s got you covered.

For rates and availability, please fill out the contact form below."

By the time she's finished reading, Maka's eyes are bugging out of her face and she practically has to pick her jaw up from out of her lap.

A music major! A motorcycle! Ballroom dancing experience!

She's all but hit the jackpot with this guy!

She shoves another carrot into her mouth and hurriedly clicks on the provided photo gallery to see more pictures of him - of Soul.

She brings up the first picture, and really, truly takes a good look at him - she had been so excited about him simply having all of his clothes on in his profile photo that she hadn’t really registered any of his other features.

In the photo currently displayed at full size on her screen, he’s wearing that same suit - pinstripe, blood red shirt - posing with his hand on the knot of his black tie as though adjusting it, a smirk on his face and eyes looking somewhere slightly off-camera.

He’s certainly… striking looking. His meticulously styled hair is very, very light blonde, so light that it could practically be considered white, and she immediately wonders if it’s natural or if he spends a fortune on bleach to maintain such a pale shade. She squints, inches her face closer to the screen to try to deduce what color his eyes are. Rich, velvety, almost reddish-brown, she thinks, though it’s hard to be sure with the lighting and the angle of the picture.

“Mrrrrrrrrrah!”

Maka startles at the sound of Blair meowing again, louder and more enthusiastic this time, and she looks down to find her cat staring very intently at the laptop screen, her pupils wide and her tail swishing back and forth.

“Blair? Is something the matter?”

The cat practically springs out of Maka’s lap, batting out a front paw to tap at the keyboard and subsequently hitting one of the arrow keys.

The picture on screen changes, advancing to the next one in the gallery.

This time, he’s dressed more casually, in dark jeans and a leather jacket, as he leans against a garishly orange motorcycle with his hands shoved into his pockets, and his face sports that same devilish grin from his profile picture.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh, that leather jacket is definitely doing it for her.

Closer scrutiny of his anatomy reveals facial piercings - left eyebrow and too many to count in his ears - and that’s definitely doing it for her as well.

Just looking at this picture of him sends heat rushing to her cheeks and stirs a funny little flutter in her chest. She’s almost embarrassed at her own body’s involuntary reaction, which is completely silly because it's just an image on a screen - it’s not like it’s actually him, this male escort who she hasn’t even met yet, who’s lived his entire life on a completely different continent than her. It’s not like he’s going to notice her staring.

So she lets her gaze linger for just a little while longer.

Maka stares at his face and his smile and the black headband he wears to keep his hair pulled back, and the only thing that snaps her out of the reverie is yet another, much more insistent meow from Blair.

She tears her eyes away from the image and realizes her teeth are digging into her lower lip, and her cat is looking at her from where she sits next to the laptop with an almost smug look on her little feline face.

Okay, so she’s learning a few things about herself tonight - maybe she likes the bad boy image a little bit. Maybe she thinks this guy - Soul - is… handsome, or whatever.

But choosing a fake fiance whom she actually finds attractive is really just an unexpected bonus. More importantly - her Papa is going to hate him, and that’s the whole reason she’s even on this stupid escort website in the first place.

She advances to the next image.

In this one he's laying on a beach under the California sun and he’s shirtless, but she can’t even find it in herself to be irritated or put off by it, because oh man, her Papa is going to hate him.

He has tattoos.

A staff populated with music notes wrapped around his right forearm; piano keys aligned vertically down the side of his left bicep. A bizarre half-sun-half-moon mashup with an unsettlingly human face on the side of his right shoulder.

And those are just the ones she can see in the photo. There may be even more in… other places on his body.

There’s also a long, almost patchwork-looking scar plastered across his bare chest, from his left collarbone all the way down to his right hip bone, and she gasps when she notices it.

There’s got to be a story behind a scar like that, and it's probably traumatic, but even still she can’t help but think it suits him, in a way.

Looking at it somehow feels too… personal, so she advances to the next photo one last time.

This one is more serious, almost somber in tone - a side profile of him sitting at a piano bench, his long fingers poised elegantly atop the ivory keys and his eyes downcast in concentration. It's soft and vulnerable and artistic in a way she cannot hope to understand - a complete contrast to how he looked in the picture with the motorcycle.

Blair mews again, softly, as she nuzzles her head against the laptop screen.

“Well, Blair, what do you think? Have we found our Mr. Right?”

The cat’s only response is to flop over on top of the keyboard and start purring.

Maka slides off the mattress with a smile on her face, crossing the space between her bed and her bedroom door in a flash. She presses her finger against the intercom beside the door frame, and barely a second later Kid’s voice crackles through the small speaker.

“Yes, Your Highness?”

“Kid, I need you to help me with something. Something very important.”

INCLINE VILLAGE, LAKE TAHOE, NEVADA

Sunday, August 21st, 20xx

Morning

Soul wakes up to far too many notifications on his phone.

He groans at the sound of his alarm going off, his hand fumbling blindly in search of the source of the noise. When he’s finally silenced the infernal sound, he shifts his position in bed and opens his eyes slowly, squinting at the readout of the time displayed on the digital alarm clock face.

9:30 AM. Too damn early, but he’s got a flight to catch out of Reno in a couple hours.

He reaches for his Blackberry and wakes the screen up, and the notifications pour in.

A couple of text messages, a missed call from his brother. A handful of emails, most of which he suspects are junk mail, but he opens his email browser just in case.

There’s an email reminder from the USC bursar’s office that his final tuition payment is due this week, as well as one from his advisor confirming that he’s in good standing to graduate. A couple of messages that should have gone to the spam folder that he quickly deletes.

And one other email, from an address he doesn’t recognize.

OFFICIAL CORRESPONDENCE FROM THE GOVERNMENT OF BELLEMORTE

Soul sits up in bed, the covers sliding down his bare chest as he does so. Next to him, Anya makes a soft grunt of displeasure in response to the disturbance. He blinks, rubs at his eyes until his vision stabilizes enough to read the body of the email.

“Dear Mr. Evans,

On behalf of the government of Bellemorte and Her Royal Highness Princess Maka Albarn, you are cordially invited to an audience with the princess at her vacation home in Malibu, California. Please report to the following address promptly at 18:00 hours on Wednesday, August 24th…”

This… is definitely fake, he decides. A prank, it has to be.

There’s no way in hell the royal court of any country would have any kind of business with him.

He sends the email to the trash after barely skimming its contents, and then flips over to his text messages.

There’s one from Blake that he missed last night.

Blake: have i told you recently that you’re an asshole? and here I was going to invite you out for drinks tomorrow night when you get back from tahoe.

Soul chuckles, an amused smile creeping onto his face as he types a reply.

Soul: whew, thank goodness. thought i was losing my edge there for a second.

Soul: drinks sound great. name a time and place and i’ll be there.

And with that, he scoots out of bed and pushes himself to his feet, bound for a cold shower before tackling the long day ahead of him.

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES

Sunday, August 21st, 20xx

Evening

When Soul arrives at the bar nearly twelve hours later, he expects nothing more than a laid back evening with his best friend.

"There he is! My main man!"

Blake is already seated at the bar counter with a mostly finished drink in hand when Soul walks in. He swivels around on the barstool with a wide, obnoxious grin plastered on his face in greeting.

"The fuck are you so happy about?"

Soul slides into the empty seat next to Blake, a hand extended to return his friend’s high-five. The high-five transitions into their secret handshake, the one they’ve been doing since middle school, and even though it’s the cheesiest, most uncool thing in the world, Soul doesn’t even have to think twice about it as his hands go through the motions; he could do the stupid handshake in his sleep.

“I’m happy for you, obviously. Happy that you get to see my handsome face after a long week with all those rich chucklefucks.” Blake lifts his drink and takes a long pull from it, and when he slams it back down on the counter the glass is empty. “How’s it feel to be done with that double life forever?”

“Fine, I guess. Hasn’t really sunk in yet,” Soul replies. He starts reaching into his jacket pocket for his wallet, but a wave of Blake’s hand stops him.

“I got it, man. We’re celebrating tonight. Don’t sweat it.”

“Thanks, bro,” Soul smiles. Blake turns his attention to flagging down the bartender. No sooner does Soul give his drink order than does he feel his phone vibrating in the pocket of his jeans. He pulls it out and raises a brow in confusion.

The caller ID reads a phone number he doesn’t recognize.

“Hang on, Blake, I’ll… be right back,” he finds himself saying. He pushes off the barstool. “I'm gonna see what this call is about.”

It's probably a spam caller or a wrong number, but for some reason he feels compelled to answer just to be sure.

He starts heading for the front entrance of the bar, and answers the call.

“Good evening. I am calling to speak with Mr. Solomon Evans of Adonis Touch Escort Agency. Is this he?”

Soul stops dead in his tracks, his hand pausing on the door and his spine going ramrod straight.

“Who the fuck is asking?”

The owner of the voice on the other end of the line - one that Soul does not recognize - clears their throat before responding:

“My name is Damien Mortensen, Junior. I am the head of security for the royal family of Bellemorte, and I am calling on behalf of Princess Maka Albarn.”

"I beg your fucking pardon?"

"The princess is interested in booking your services for an extended duration. Did you receive our email outlining her request?"

"I… Yeah, I got the email, but… what the hell, how did you even get this number?" Soul says, not without a hint of hostility in his voice.

There is a pause on the other end of the line, and then:

"Perhaps I failed to make myself clear earlier- I am the head of security for the monarchy of Bellemorte. I am the end-all-be-all when it comes to the safety and well-being of the Crown. Princess Maka Albarn is under my care and protection during her prolonged holiday stateside, and I have the authority to act on her behalf - an authority that not even the King himself possesses. I have top security clearance in the United States as well as in forty-six other countries, and diplomatic immunity in dozens more. Bypassing your agency's privacy protocols was mere child's play for a person of my caliber. Do you understand me, Solomon Edgar Anthony Evans?"

Soul blinks a few times. Squeezes his eyes shut and sucks in a deep breath.

"Y-yes," his voice cracks when he speaks, so he clears his throat and tries again. "Yes, sir."

“Good,” Damien says. “That’s what I like to hear. Now, about my lady’s inquiry.”

Right, the email from this morning, which definitely wasn’t fake after all. The email that he had only skimmed at best, before sending it promptly to the deleted items folder.

Shit.

“O-of course, sir.”

He isn’t even sure he knows who “Princess Maka Albarn” is or what she looks like, let alone what her inquiry was - something about accompanying her back home to Bellemorte for a few months? He’s vaguely aware of the small country’s location in Europe - just south of Switzerland, he’s pretty sure - and the fact that their governmental system is a constitutional monarchy. Was that the country whose queen passed away suddenly all those years back?

He racks his brain to try to remember something, anything, concrete or specific about Bellemorte, or its royal family, or its princess.

He wishes he were at home, back in his room and in front of his computer with the ability to run a quick Google search.

“I’ve already requested all of the appropriate background checks on you, and provided they come back clear, my lady would like to book your services starting on September 1st, the day that she returns home to Bellemorte,” Damien continues on, matter-of-factly. “Of course, she would also like to meet you in Los Angeles once or twice before then to discuss the terms of her arrangement.”

Something suddenly snaps Soul out of the state of disbelief that he’d been in for the past several minutes, ever since Damien Mortensen, Junior had dropped both of his middle names on him.

“Hang on just a second,” he says. “Look, I’m flattered that your… that your princess is interested in booking me for an extended service, and yes, technically I’ve got room in my schedule. But I’m actually supposed to be done escorting. My last job was this past week and I’ve told my agency to take down my profile this weekend. The princess… must have found it right before they deactivated it.”

There is a long beat of silence from Damien, then, so Soul continues.

“But… but there are plenty of other very professional and qualified guys in the agency she can choose from. I’m sure any of them would love to-”

“My lady was quite adamant that she wanted you and only you, Mr. Evans.”

Soul opens his mouth but no words come out. He’s too thunderstruck to even correct that horrendous salutation.

“I-”

“Whatever rate you would normally charge for this type of service, we will pay you double. Money is no obstacle here.”

That gives Soul pause.

“...How long does the princess want me to accompany her in Bellemorte, again?”

“Four months, at a minimum.”

Soul’s mind reels. The longest he’d ever traveled abroad with a client was three weeks.

“Well, I would… have to sit down and write everything out, do some calculations and all that, but… my usual rate for travel companionship is five hundred dollars per day, not including travel and transportation expenses.”

“My lady will pay you one-thousand per day,” Damien says without a moment’s hesitation. “And of course, we’ve got airfare and ground transportation in Bellemorte covered.”

Soul's eyes widen at the offer, a hand going up to run through his hair in bewilderment.

A thousand dollars per day, for a minimum of four months would be… well over one hundred grand.

He may be completely fed up with escort work, and finished paying his university tuition payments after this week, but purely from a financial perspective, he'd be a fucking moron to pass this up. That amount of money would guarantee that he'd live comfortably for at least a year after the job ends. It would guarantee that he'd be able to continue to support himself while he searches for a gig in the music industry.

It would guarantee continued freedom from his parents.

"Mr. Evans? Are you still there, sir?"

He had been stunned into silence for longer than he'd realized.

"Y-yeah," he croaks. "I'm here."

"I understand this is a lot to consider. If you need to think it over for a few days, that's perfectly alright," Damien continues. "But at the very least, can we ask you to commit to meeting with the princess at her home in Malibu on Wednesday? She can answer any additional questions you may have about the arrangement."

Soul tips his head back to look up at the darkening evening sky and takes a deep breath.

Fuck it.

He may not have completely read the email detailing the specifics of the request, but whatever it is this princess wants him to do for four months, surely he's endured worse. Surely, it's worth one hundred thousand dollars.

"You know what… yeah. Yes," he responds. "Yes, I'll be there. Please tell the princess that I accept her client request."

Chapter Text

MALIBU, CALIFORNIA

Wednesday, August 24th, 20xx

About three o’clock in the afternoon

"Are you absolutely certain that you want to go through with this, Your Highness?"

It's about the two-hundredth time that Kid has asked Maka some variant of this question in three days.

Since the very moment he’d hung up the phone call with Soul on Sunday evening, her bodyguard has done nothing but make his complete and utter disapproval of the entire scheme abundantly clear ("What a positively vulgar young man. Such a foul mouth. If I would have had to endure one more f-bomb… this is a spectacularly bad idea, Princess."). Unfortunately for him, though, his staunch opposition to hiring Soul only added fuel to the fires of Maka's scheming mind, only made her even more hell-bent on arriving home to Bellemorte in a couple of weeks with a surprise “fiancé” in tow.

If anything, Kid's reaction is all the proof she needs that this plan of hers is going to work exactly as she intends.

"Kid," Maka says calmly. She takes a page of the book in her lap and runs it between her thumb and forefinger to savor the texture of the paper a few times, before turning it over. "My answer remains unchanged since the last time you asked me about this, and it will remain unchanged the next time you ask as well." She gives him a sweet smile as she looks up at him. "Now, you can stand here and rattle off pointless questions at me, or you can make yourself useful and go check on the state of preparations in the kitchen. Only about three hours until dinner, now.”

Kid gives a bone-tired sigh, his shoulders slumping and the furrow between his brows deepening.

"Right away, Your Highness.”

If Kid had spent the past three days stalking sullenly about the beach house, every cell in his body wound up tight with stress and apprehension, the princess had exuded the very opposite energy. She had practically been floating throughout the corridors of the home, humming pleasantly to herself and smiling all the while, spending most of her waking hours daydreaming about what her Papa’s face will look like when she steps off the plane hand-in-hand with a strange American man and a huge rock on her ring finger. She’d been practically rehearsing what she’d say to him in her mind, running through different opening lines mentally, trying to deduce which one would get the biggest, most dramatic reaction out of her father.

Today, she's been quite partial to-

"Oh Papa, hello, almost didn't see you there. How very thoughtful of you to come all the way out to the airport to greet Soul and me, it was such a long flight…"

And then he'd take one look at their intertwined hands and Soul's leather jacket and all the piercings in his head, and his eyes would widen slightly and he'd press his lips into a tight, twisted smile, the kind that looks slightly maniacal despite all of his best efforts to the contrary, and he'd blink too many times and open and close his mouth uselessly like a fish, and while wringing his hands he'd say through gritted teeth-

"Who is Soul?"

And in response, Maka would say-

"Oh, Soul? You mean my fiancé? My future husband? The most important man in my life?"

And then to really seal the deal, she’d lean into him - Soul, that is - and she’d make a huge show of bringing her left hand up to touch his chest, or play with his hair, or whatever she'd need to do to make sure the light catches her engagement ring just right, and out of the corner of her eye she’d watch her father with smug satisfaction as he spontaneously combusts with rage, or despair, or some hilarious combination of the two, and then Maka would spend the entire limousine ride back to the palace laughing hysterically at his sheer, utter, and completely deserved anguish.

Just thinking about all the ways Spirit's face would scrunch up while he tried to hold it together, how his eye would twitch as he processes the surprise news of her "engagement" made her downright giddy with sheer, unbridled glee. It made her own face practically hurt from smiling, made her clap her hands together and kick her feet in the air with delight.

Maybe her father would be so utterly distraught over his little girl running off with some punk from the other side of the pond, he’d even cry, and wouldn’t that be thrilling!

Needless to say, these past few days were some of the happiest she’d been in months.

Kid takes his leave of the sunroom, muttering and mumbling miserably to himself all the while, and then Maka is once again left alone with her thoughts. She exhales a contented sigh as she closes her book, as she lets her head fall back against the cushioned wicker sofa she sits upon. Her gaze wanders, drifting slowly across the room and out the window.

She stares out at the ocean, letting her vision go blurry and unfocused as she loses herself in its impossibly blue allure.

She stares out at the ocean, and she thinks about her mother.

She wonders if, many, many years ago, her Mama had ever sat here in this very same spot, beholding the very same view of the ocean, magnificent and vast beneath the golden light of the afternoon sun, lazy and thick and stagnant in the way that only late summer sunlight seems to be. Whether her Mama ever sat here and pondered her fate, the unsettlingly certain future that lay ahead of her, as her daughter now does.

It’s become something of a habit these past several months - sitting here contemplating things which she cannot possibly ever know.

She's unsure how much time passes before she comes back to herself, but inevitably, eventually, she does.

The princess stretches, arching her back and lifting her arms above her head, before she deposits her book on the table beside her and finally rises from her seat.

She supposes she ought to get started on some preparations of her own before their guest of honor arrives in a few hours.

After all, it’s not every day you get to meet your betrothed for the very first time.

MALIBU, CALIFORNIA

Wednesday, August 24th, 20xx

About five-thirty in the evening

The princess's beach house is decidedly not what he'd pictured.

Though, if he's being completely honest, Soul isn't even sure what it is he'd been expecting, but he'd seen his fair share of mansions in his time. When he'd pictured what a royal vacation home tucked away among the seaside cliffs of Malibu would look like, his mind conjured up grand visions of a magnificent, sprawling palace with floor-to-ceiling windows, at least three stories, and pristinely manicured vegetation out front. A fountain or two, perhaps a massive, wrought iron gate for the purpose of keeping the prying eyes of the public away. Given his phone conversation with Damien a few nights ago, he almost expects to see security cameras and armed guards flanking the entrance to the premises.

He certainly doesn't expect the humble, two-storied brick building that stands before him now, almost cozy in its simplicity.

About as cozy as you can get in Malibu, anyway.

No gated entrance. Not a single uniformed security officer in sight.

Not even a fountain.

The only giveaway that any person of any significant importance lives here is the black limousine parked in the driveway, but even as far as limo standards go, it's rather on the small side.

Soul turns the key in the ignition, quieting the purr of his bike's engine, and pulls his phone out of his jacket pocket. He brings up the email from Sunday morning, which he had rescued from the clutches of his deleted items folder, and double checks the address.

Yeah, this is the place.

The place that Her Royal Highness, Maka Albarn, Crown Princess of Bellemorte, calls home while on vacation in the United States.

He had spent the better part of the past three days scouring the Internet for as much information about the country as possible - as well as its royal family - and reading every article he could find.

‘Planning a trip to Bellemorte? What to know about this dour little country before you go!'

‘Land of Beautiful Death: An Overview of the History & Customs of Bellemorte’

'42 Reasons to Visit Bellemorte - One of Europe’s Hidden Gems!

It had quickly become apparent to Soul that most folks who found their way to the small, quirky country nestled between France and Italy on the north coast of the Mediterranean did so either out of a desire to attend the world’s most prestigious mortuary school, or out of some bizarre fascination with the culture surrounding death, or the industry of it. He’d eventually gone away from the niche travel pieces about the country’s many pomegranate orchards and casket wood farms, and Pinterest articles linking to must-see sights in the capital city, in favor of Wikipedia articles about the royal family - and unfortunately, gossip columns about the very princess who had summoned him here today.

The Internet had quite a lot to say about her.

Crown Princess Maka Albarn had recently graduated summa cum laude from the University of Oxford with a double major in International Relations and Political Science, and beyond her formal education, she's also a polyglot, fluent in four languages, as well as proficient at reading Latin. She maintains and takes great care of a specialty royal collection of rare books, and personally oversees and operates her own animal welfare charity and rescue organization within her country.

Despite such a thoroughly impressive resume, the masses of the world wide web seemed all too eager to criticize. She is "quite the unconventional royal" in popular opinion, due to her fashion and style choices - pigtails over more polished hairstyles, Chuck Taylors beneath her billowy ballgowns instead of heels. Plenty of reporters had openly ridiculed her for being something of a recluse, keeping her appearances at royal events to a minimum, and having been caught with her nose in a book more than once at the events she does attend.

An alarming number of articles - like, more than he could count on one hand - credited her with having a wicked temper and an unfortunate penchant for violence as well, with plenty of paparazzi pictures to prove it.

He could find no information about her dating history, or any leads about potential romantic interests within European royal society, which struck him as a bit odd, but then again, he supposes that's the reason he's here in the first place.

Soul shoves his keys into his pants pocket and fiddles with the zipper on his leather jacket, sucks in a deep breath and squares his shoulders as he walks up the driveway of the house.

Nervous anticipation floods his senses, makes him fidgety. The fingers of his right hand itch to tap themselves against his left bicep, to dance out chords along the piano keys permanently inked onto his skin beneath the layers of fabric, but he resists; he knows that if he starts now, it's unlikely he'll be able to stop.

Instead, he elects to ease his nerves by mentally reciting everything he currently knows about Princess Maka.

She’s 5’ 2”, and her star sign is Taurus - not that he believes in any of that zodiac shit.

She’s twenty-one years old, and has green eyes.

She is the only child of King Spirit Albarn and late Queen Sumire Albarn, heir to the throne of an entire European country, and therefore probably the most high-profile client he’ll ever take on.

She had insisted on hiring him, only him, for reasons he can’t possibly fathom, and will be paying him the tidy sum of one-thousand dollars per day for the trouble of his company for four months.

Ergo, he better not fucking blow this first meeting.

He’s not nervous. He’s cool. Totally cool.

He reaches the front doorstep and rings the doorbell, and for a moment, the utter mundanity of the action underwhelms him. He could almost believe he's just stopping by an old friend's house to catch up, or that he's simply making a quick house call for an average client who wants nothing from him but a good time for a couple hours.

Until Damien answers the door.

Truly, nothing about this experience thus far has been anything like Soul had envisioned - he hasn’t even met this princess yet, and she’s already surprising him at every opportunity.

Damien Mortensen, Junior looks nothing like Soul had pictured - again, he isn’t sure what exactly it is he had been expecting the royal head of security to look like, but it certainly isn’t the image of the man standing before him in the doorway.

The bodyguard is maybe a few inches taller than he is, rather lean in build, and clad from head to toe in black. His most striking feature is the pair of amber, almost golden-yellow eyes set beneath thin black eyebrows, furrowed together in such a way that gives Soul the impression that the man has never smiled a day in his life. It’s hard to place how old he might be - his face is devoid of wrinkles save for the lines between his brows, skin pale and virtually blemish-free. If it weren’t for the white streaks at his temples, breaking up his otherwise jet-black hair with a dappled salt-and-pepper effect, Soul would almost place him only a few years his senior.

His whole demeanor comes off ageless, somehow, and deeply unsettling.

“Uh-” Soul starts, unsure what exactly his brain is directing him to say, after several uncomfortable seconds of Damien staring at him in completely unimpressed silence.

“Solomon Evans, I presume.”

Those words spoken in that order should be a question, but there is nothing questioning about Damien’s tone of voice.

The instinct to reply with a snarky, sarcastic “What do I look like, the fucking paper boy?” is so overwhelming that Soul has to force himself to cough to keep from saying it, and it's a fake, awful, strangled sounding noise, and instantly he regrets every life choice he’s ever made, starting from the very day he was born.

When he recovers, all he can manage to sputter out is a feeble “Yes” in reply.

Damien raises a single brow and appraises Soul from head to toe with narrowed, scrutinizing eyes, his lips pursing together into a thin line. There is another long, awkward silence, and for a moment, Soul honestly thinks that Damien might tell him to hit the road, to march right back to his motorcycle and never return.

Finally, the bodyguard sighs, an open-mouthed exhale, closing his eyes and stepping aside.

“You may enter,” he says, not without a touch of resentment in his voice, as he holds the door open wider. “But I’m certainly not happy about it.”

Soul steps across the threshold and into the entryway foyer. He makes it about three feet before he starts to ask if this is how Damien greets all of the princess’s guests, but he is interrupted.

“That’s far enough.” There’s a hand on his shoulder and then the bodyguard is standing in front of him once again, Soul’s eyebrows raising in surprise. “Your jacket, please.”

A reasonable enough request, Soul supposes. He shrugs out of the garment and hands it over.

“Very good,” Damien nods, then holds out a hand, palm facing up. “Now empty your pockets.”

Soul feels like a hapless, expertly trained dog as he reaches into his pockets, producing his keys, his wallet, and his Blackberry and passing them over, one-by-one, to Damien. He reaches around to his back pocket for the final two items, but hesitates. Damien doesn’t miss it, and he clears his throat impatiently.

“Um, okay, so,” Soul starts, an astoundingly eloquent preamble to pleading his case against surrendering the items in question. “I, uh, always bring a small notebook to every consultation with a potential client. For questions and notes and special requests, things like that,” he explains. “And a pencil, of course. For obvious reasons, I hope?”

Damien visibly stiffens, inhaling audibly through his nose. Soul can almost see the gears turning in his head behind his golden eyes.

“I suppose,” he clicks his tongue. “That’s fine. But before you leave today, I’ll take the liberty of reviewing everything you’ve written. Can’t have you walking around with incriminating information about a member of the royal family, now.”

“Right." Soul nods. “Of course.”

They stand in silence for another beat, before Damien starts to turn.

“Well, if that's everything, then… follow me.”

Once again, Soul does as he is told.

He follows Damien deeper into the house, through a small sitting area with plush, ivory-colored chairs and a coffee table with a basket of seashells in it, then into a slightly larger living room with bigger couches in a shade that exactly matches the sitting-room chairs. The colors - of the carpet, the wallpaper, the banisters, everything - remind him of beach sand and sunsets. The entire rear wall of the room is a huge pane of glass, allowing a breathtaking view of the ocean, and really driving home the seaside theme.

Beyond the living room is a small hallway lined with… what looks to be family portraits, but Damien’s pace is just a bit too quick for Soul to really stop and examine them all too closely. He catches a flash of a man with bright red hair, his arm around a shorter woman with honey-brown colored curtains of hair framing her face, and she’s holding an infant in her arms. In the next one, a young blonde girl in pigtails, smiling big and bright but with a few front teeth missing, and then that’s it, they’re out of the hallway and Damien has stopped in what appears to be another small sitting room with a steep staircase on the far side.

“Have a seat.” Damien gestures to one of the sand-colored armchairs. “The princess will come down to greet you when she’s ready.”

With that, Damien disappears through a door on the opposite wall, leaving Soul finally, blessedly alone. His body instantly relaxes, mind awash with ease now that the bodyguard has left him.

With nothing much else to do, he settles into one of the two chairs. They’re plush and velvety and high-backed, and as he sinks into the seat cushion, he’s thankful that at least this room is homey and comfortable, and he doesn’t feel like he’s sitting in a dentist's office waiting to be called in for a root canal or something.

Before he can wonder what on Earth he could possibly do to pass the time while waiting, his eyes fall upon another picture.

Next to the door that Damien had passed through and directly at his sight line, hangs a wide landscape shot of the beach, on a day when the ocean was relatively calm and the horizon was barely distinguishable from the water.

Standing in the surf is that same short, brown-haired woman from the earlier picture, bent at the waist and smiling at the camera while she holds the hands of a toddler - blonde little girl, pigtails - whose expression can only be described as one of wonder as she looks down at the water lapping at her bare toes.

“Mrrrrrow?”

A sound pulls his gaze from the photo, and he blinks a few times, shifts in his seat as he tries to locate the source.

On the floor just a few feet in front of him is… a cat.

“Um… hello there,” Soul offers, and the cat cocks its head to the side, amber eyes inquisitive and gleaming. If he didn’t know any better, he’d swear he sees a flash of almost… recognition in them, even though he’s never met this cat before in his life.

“Mrrrrrew!”

The cat meows again, louder and more enthusiastic this time, and springs into motion, dainty paws padding across the hardwood floor and advancing toward him. The little creature rubs its face against his right leg, purrs contentedly, and then jumps up into his lap.

Soul makes a noise of surprise, his body stiffening momentarily, but the cat hardly seems to notice, all too content to flop over in his lap and present its belly happily.

“Okay, I don’t know much about cats,” Soul muses, more to himself than the cat in question, “But I do know this is a trap.”

Even still, he finds himself reaching a hesitant hand out to stroke the feline’s soft fur. It’s black with an almost purple sheen to it, and when the cat doesn’t immediately sink its claws into the flesh of Soul’s fingers, the hesitance melts away and he rubs at its belly a bit more confidently. His reward is more purring, and okay, he’s not really a cat person, but this one is pretty damn cute.

“You’ll have to excuse Blair,” comes a new, feminine voice from the other side of the room. “She's quite the flirtatious little thing.”

His head snaps up and over in the direction of the voice, and lo and behold, there stands Princess Maka Albarn at the top of the stairs, regarding him with an aloof, if slightly amused, expression on her face.

He locks eyes with her, his lips parting in a silent gasp and his eyebrows going up in surprise. An odd feeling settles over him at the sight of her as she looks down at him, a feeling that ties his tongue to the bottom of his mouth and immobilizes him in his seat. For once in his life, he is completely thunderstruck, caught off guard, and utterly at a loss for words.

Be cool, his brain helpfully reminds him. Be cool, and don’t fuck this up. Don’t say anything stupid, or sarcastic, or…

He’s got nothing. He seems to have entirely forgotten how his vocal cords work.

The princess begins her descent down the stairs, and the cat - Blair, apparently - twists her body around beneath his fingers, leaping out of his lap and bounding toward her. They meet at about the halfway point of the stairwell, and the princess stops, both to let Blair curl her body around her legs in greeting, and to quirk a curious eyebrow at Soul.

“What’s the matter?” She says, the slightest hint of a smirk dancing on her lips. “Cat got your tongue?”

He blinks, realizes she’s reached the bottom of the stairs and he still hasn’t said anything, has done nothing but stare at her uselessly for at least an entire minute now. All at once reality hits him, and he stands up in a mild panic, clearing his throat and running his hands through his hair and adjusting his shirt and begging his mouth to say something, anything.

“P-princess,” he sputters. “Hello, hi. I, uh.” He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, hoping the act of moving his body will have the same effect on his words. “I-I got your email.”

She makes an intrigued little humming noise as she crosses the room to meet him where he stands, and Soul really takes in her features for the first time, now that he’s mostly returned to his senses.

None of the pictures he’d seen of her on the Internet had adequately prepared him for just how much shorter than him she is; she barely comes up to his collarbones, the pink bunny slippers on her feet doing no favors for her stature.

It strikes him, too, what she’s wearing - denim jeans and a well-loved t-shirt emblazoned with a cartoonish skull on the front, a stark contrast to the skirts and dresses and more formal attire that her online images had sported.

The pigtails and the green eyes, though - those are the same.

“Well, that much is obvious. Thanks for agreeing to meet with me on such short notice. I’m on a bit of a time crunch, so I really appreciate it.” She adjusts her stance, and Soul realizes she’s carrying something under one arm - a binder and a clipboard. She balances the weight of the items against a hip and offers him an outstretched hand. She then says, in a voice that manages to be both cheerful and bracingly matter-of-fact at once, “I have very much been looking forward to meeting you, Soul Evans.”

He swallows, feeling his heartbeat pick up the pace in his chest. Her smile is confident and self-assured, and there’s a determined glint in her sharp green eyes that sends a genuine thrill racing down his spine.

Several things occur to him, then, as he meets her unyielding gaze.

The fact that she called him Soul and not Solomon, even though her bodyguard has made it clear that they know his full name, and probably a whole lot of other things about him, and they aren’t afraid to lord it over him to ensure his compliance.

The fact that though he’s got over half a foot of height on her, something about her demeanor, the way she carries herself, makes him feel quite small, makes him feel like he’s pinned helplessly to the wall behind him - right where she wants him.

The fact that, despite all the clients he's worked with over the years, all the wealthy and distinguished people he's met, the women and men he's courted in his line of work, for maybe the first time in his life he thinks he’s actually… intimidated.

And even more shocking, he doesn't hate the feeling; in fact, he kind of likes it.

“Right back ‘atcha, Princess.” He finds himself smiling as he accepts her handshake. He’s not surprised by how strong and sure her grip is, and when their palms touch, the contact stirs something foreign and exhilarating deep in his bones.

“Please,” she says, the corners of her eyes crinkling and her nose scrunching up in a way that makes the rest of the room fall away, so that the center of his attention becomes her face and nothing else. “Call me Maka.”

MALIBU, CALIFORNIA

Wednesday, August 24th, 20xx

Dinnertime

Dinner is served at 6:00 pm sharp.

The dining room is inviting, if a little small for a royal beach house. Much like the living room, the rear wall has been repurposed as a floor-to-ceiling glass window to allow a magnificent view of the ocean, and Soul supposes there are worse ways to enjoy a meal.

Like, for example, if there were no such lovely ocean-view and it was just a regular wall, it'd be impossible to ignore the metaphorical daggers that Damien seems intent on glaring at him all throughout the first two courses of the meal.

The princess - Maka, he mentally corrects himself - is seated across the table from him, completely oblivious to her bodyguard’s scowling disapproval from where he sits, on the settee behind her - or perhaps she’s aware, she’s just had years of practice ignoring him.

He doesn’t ask why Damien isn’t eating with them. For all he knows, it's because he’s an eldritch being who sustains himself on the negative emotions of humans rather than the flesh and plant matter of carbon-based organisms.

“Now then,” Maka announces, breaking the awkward silence. She’s polished off the last of the second course - beef carpaccio - and has set her knife and fork down upon her plate. “Let’s talk about the reason you’re here. The…” she pauses, her head tilting to the side and her pigtails sweeping the tops of her shoulders as she does so. “Arrangement.”

As if on cue, two uniformed servers emerge from behind the half-wall next to Damien, descending upon the dinner table to clear plates.

“Lillian.” Maka reaches a hand out to touch the arm of the server next to her. “Would you mind telling the kitchen staff we’d like some privacy for about… twenty minutes? Hold the main course until then.”

“Of course, Your Highness.” The server responds, returning Maka’s bright smile with a curt nod. She exits the room, along with her companion who had retrieved Soul’s empty plate, just as quickly as she had appeared.

“Right,” Soul says, swiping his napkin against his mouth before setting it on the table. He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out his notebook and pencil. “The arrangement.”

He had read and re-read the initial email a few times since Sunday evening, but it hadn’t provided much more information than Damien had on the phone. The wording had seemed intentionally vague and weirdly formal, stating that the princess wished to have dinner with him to discuss potential companionship for a few months in Bellemorte. He was still largely in the dark about what it was, specifically, that she wanted from him.

“I’m sure you’ve got questions for me, but I was hoping we could actually talk about you first, Soul,” Maka starts, swiveling in her seat and leaning down to grab the clipboard from earlier, which she had stashed under her chair.

“Sure,” Soul agrees, setting his pencil down next to his notebook on the tabletop. “Fire away, I guess.”

Her smile turns conspiratorial, and for the first time, Soul gets the distinct feeling that he has no idea quite what he's getting himself into.

“Very good.” Maka flips a page up, lets her gaze fall from his face to the contents of her clipboard. She is silent while her eyes scan the page for a moment, as if deciding where to begin. Her voice is all business when she looks up and finally says, without preamble, “How many tattoos do you have?”

Soul blinks twice, wondering if he’s misheard her.

“You-your first question is how many tattoos I have?”

She is completely unfazed by his astonishment.

“Yes,” she replies matter-of-factly. “It’s mission-critical information. I counted at least three from your profile photos. Is that all, or do you have more?”

He stares at her another moment, slack-jawed and blinking like an idiot, before providing the answer.

“Six,” he states. “I have six tattoos.”

Maka nods, makes an approving little hum as she scribbles something on her clipboard.

“And piercings?” She looks up from her notes and quirks an eyebrow at him. “Any more than your eyebrow and ears?”

Soul allows a beat of silence before answering.

“Just one.” He reaches a hand to his face, tugs the corner of his mouth open with a finger and presents the metal barbel of his tongue ring, an action which feels quite strange given his audience. He doesn’t dare spare a glance at Damien.

Maka’s eyes widen and her smile turns downright devious.

“Oh, excellent,” she says, her pencil excitedly scrawling against the clipboard once more.

Okay then, Soul thinks to himself. This princess is into some freaky shit.

"Oh, yes, and your motorcycle," Maka continues, recovering impressively quickly from her apparent excitement over oral piercings. "I'll need the make and model information from you today, as well."

"Uh." Soul shifts in his seat, brows knitting together in confusion. "Sure, but I don't really see why that's… relevant?"

Maka doesn't even glance up from the page when she replies:

"So I can make arrangements to have it shipped to Bellemorte, of course."

Soul feels like he isn't even an active participant in this conversation - he feels like he's a caged animal in a pet store, listening to a child's parents go back and forth about whether he'd be a suitable first pet for their daughter, or something.

"Alright, hang on a second," he announces, leaning forward in his seat and resting his forearms on the table. "That's… uh, thoughtful of you, but I hardly think it's necessary– "

"Oh, it definitely is," Maka interrupts him with a flourish of her hand as she sets her pen down. "As far as I'm concerned, the motorcycle is absolutely crucial to the success of the arrangement."

"And just what," he balks, straining to keep his voice even, "is this arrangement, exactly?"

Maka blinks once at him, and then her expression changes noticeably, shifts as if something has suddenly dawned on her. She sets her clipboard down and folds her hands together on top of it.

"Right," she says. "I suppose you don't know. We kept the email intentionally vague to avoid a paper trail," she explains, as if that’s supposed to make all of this make sense. "I am hiring you to be my fiancé."

The beat of silence that follows is so quiet, so still, Soul thinks time must have stopped for a moment.

"My pretend fiancé," Maka clarifies after several seconds of Soul staring at her incredulously.

Behind her, Damien’s disgust is openly written all over his face, grimacing as though he's just discovered he's stepped in dogshit, and Soul can only imagine what his own face must look like.

After several more uncomfortable seconds, Maka clicks her tongue, unclasping her hands and fidgeting in her seat noticeably.

"Is there something about me that makes you forget how to speak basic English, Soul Evans?" Her brow is furrowed and her nose is scrunched up again, for the first time this evening her perfect, proper princess-facade faltering. "Because if so, I've got three other languages in my repertoire that we could try, plus sign language, if that would be any easier for you."

"Yeah, no, I'm just making sure I'm hearing you correctly," Soul quips back, voice taut with disbelief. "Let me get this straight: your 'arrangement' is to hire an escort to pose as your fiancé."

"Yes."

"And you wanted me - only me - for this job."

"Yes."

"You want to pay me one-thousand dollars a day for four months to be fake-engaged to you."

"Yes!" Maka slams her fists down on the table in exasperation, and Damien straightens behind her, poised at the ready in the event he'd need to intervene. "What about this is not making sense?!"

"Literally everything, Maka!" Soul snaps. "Why the fuck do you need a fake fiancé?!"

"LANGUAGE," Damien bellows, and from some far corner of the room, Blair scurries from wherever she'd been hiding, darting across the floor and nearly startling Soul out of his seat. "Reign in that vile tongue of yours, Mr. Evans, or I'll remove it from your mouth."

"Go ahead and try it, HP Lovecraft," Soul scoffs, and Damien starts to rise out of his seat before Maka holds a hand up in intervention.

"Enough." Her voice is final and authoritative in a way it wasn’t just a moment ago, and it really hits Soul all at once then that she is, in fact, a princess after all, and it's more than just a fancy title - it's a job, one that requires the ability to command respect and compliance at times. “Not another word out of line, from either of you.”

Damien squeezes his eyes shut slowly.

“My apologies, Your Highness.” He returns to his seat with an expression of utter resignation on his face. Soul takes a deep breath, makes a conscious effort to relax his shoulders and let the tension leave his body.

“Now let’s try this again, another way,” Maka continues, voice calmer but still every bit as assertive. She leans sideways in her chair for a moment, bending to reach beneath it, and a moment later she produces the binder from earlier. It hits the surface of the table with a dull thud, before she cracks it open and flips to a flagged page towards the middle of its contents.

“Bellemorte Royal Statute, Act Six, Chapter Ten, Article Seventeen; On the Conditions and Prerequisites for Royal Succession.” Her tone is detached, clinical almost, as she recites the words from the text. “At twenty-one years of age, the first successive heir of the royal family shall become eligible to ascend the throne. In the event the first successive heir is female, she must be entered into a union of holy matrimony legally recognized by the sovereign state of Bellemorte, by December 31st of the year of her twenty-first birthday, or else her right of succession is forfeit.”

Maka pauses, glancing up from the binder and meeting Soul’s shell shocked stare.

“Or, in layman’s terms - I have to get married by the end of this year, or else I can’t be queen.”

Soul blinks, taking the cue that he is allowed to speak now.

“Well, uh. That is… extremely fu-” he starts to say, then catches himself. “Messed up, I mean. That your country has such a law in place. No offense.” He swallows, eyes darting between Maka and Damien before proceeding. “But, respectfully - don’t you have… any other options?”

“My options,” Maka replies without missing a beat, her voice turning icy. Her hands ball up into fists. “Will be whatever suitors my father deems fit for me. And I’m not willing to be bartered away in an arranged marriage just to keep my birthright. Hence, the reason you are here.”

“O…kay, that’s fair,” Soul concedes. “But… why me?”

The corners of her lips quirk up and the sharp glint in her eyes returns.

“Because ultimately, this is an act of rebellion. Of revenge. This is me taking back control of the situation. And if I’m going to piss off my father anyway, I might as well go for gold. And you, Soul Evans, just so happen to check all the boxes for pretty much everything my father absolutely hates in men.”

The implications of her words slowly but surely sink in.

“Your father… the King of Bellemorte.”

Maka nods once.

“You want me to help you piss off an actively ruling monarch by pretending to be your fiancé for four months.”

“That.” She arches a brow. “Is exactly right.”

The tattoos, the piercings, the motorcycle. All of her questions suddenly make sense.

This is… completely insane.

She's completely insane.

She's also ballsy as fuck, and unquestionably ruthless in the pursuit of what she wants, he had to admit - but still insane, nonetheless.

It's a terrible idea, a recipe for disaster, and an international media circus waiting to happen. His face and his name would be all over the news. Word would certainly get back to his family, there'd be no way of hiding this from them.

He can't possibly agree to -

"...What all would I have to do?"

Did he say that out loud?

Her lips twitch into a grin at that, a beguiling smile that transforms her entire face and sends an intriguing glimmer dancing in her eyes.

“Easy,” she says. “Next week, you fly back to Bellemorte with me, where you'll live in the palace with me for the next several months. We’ll publicly announce the engagement upon our arrival, and you’ll appear with me at several key royal events until the end of the year. And, most importantly…” her smile falls, expression turning serious. “You pretend to be absolutely, completely, head-over-heels in love with me.”

Soul blinks, realizing his mouth has fallen open.

“In love with you,” he blurts, his voice robotic.

“Of course.” Maka nods. “We are going to be telling everyone we met over the summer and it was love at first sight. That we're so smitten, you’ve already proposed to me and agreed to leave your whole life here in California behind and move to Europe to be with me. So obviously, you’ve got to sell it. It’s got to be convincing.” She pauses, a thoughtful look in her eye. “Escorts are basically hired dates, are they not? I can’t imagine this is that much different from some of your other jobs?”

In a way, she isn’t wrong. He pretended to be Anya’s boyfriend publicly for two whole years.

“Point taken,” Soul concedes. He reaches for his abandoned pencil once again. “Alright, all that aside - if I’m going to agree to this I need to go through some questions of my own first.”

“Of course.” Her eyes fall briefly to the small notebook, a mini composition book with the title PRINCESS MAKA ALBARN scrawled in his neat, tidy hand across the cover. “Please go ahead.”

Soul flips through all the notes he'd jotted down about her in his Internet sleuthing, opens to the first blank page and sets the pencil to the paper.

“Okay, so…” He clicks his tongue, taps the eraser of the pencil against the page a few times. "Four months in Bellemorte. What are the exact dates of the job? Can you go over the timeline in a bit more detail?"

Maka inclines her head.

“We’ll leave for Bellemorte next Thursday, September 1st. You’ll stay with me for at least four months, until the new year, after which point my coronation will occur." She chews on her bottom lip, brows furrowing in concentration. "The first few weeks will consist of announcing our engagement, and really focusing on convincing everyone that it's legitimate. After all the excitement dies down, we'll start planning in earnest for the wedding, which will be in December."

Soul's hand freezes, pencil stopping mid-sentence. His eyes dart up to Maka's face.

"Wedding?"

"Well yes, of course," she nods. "I do actually have to be married by the end of the year in order to take the throne, not just engaged."

"So then." Soul blinks. "What you're saying is that this engagement isn't actually fake. You are paying me to marry you, not just pretend to marry you."

"Is that going to be a problem?"

"I mean," Soul says. "You do understand what marriage entails, right? Like, legally binding, till death do us part and all that?"

"Of course I know that!" Maka huffs, waving her hands dismissively. "But there's nothing in the marriage law that says I have to stay married to remain queen. So after the new year, once it's all said and done, you can go home to, I don't know, 'attend to some personal affairs' or whatever. Then after a few months we can quietly get the marriage annulled and go our separate ways. I'll say we just weren't a good fit, or you couldn't handle the pressures of being married to a royal, or something."

Soul sucks in a slow, deep breath.

Engaged, married, and ultimately divorced, all within the span of a few months.

One-thousand dollars a day, he reminds himself.

And really, it's not like being a divorcee before the age of twenty-five is a huge deal breaker for him - he never intended to get married for real, anyway. He'd been an escort long enough to know that when most people think they're in love, it's usually just lust - and even when it's not, he isn’t naive enough to think much of it.

Nothing lasts forever, and 'love' is no exception.

"Alright fine," he finally says, and Maka visibly relaxes into her seat, smiling and nodding to herself in some silent affirmation of victory. He pinches the bridge of his nose before continuing on. “So to summarize, then - all of the services you are requesting of me from now until the end of the year. I’ve got accompaniment at royal events, public affection, posing as your fiancé, actually marrying you, and, last but not least - I assume - physical intimacy.”

He pauses for a breath before launching into his elevator pitch about safety, the one he's given so many times that he doesn't even truly hear himself saying the words anymore.

“It goes without saying that I’ll need a clean bill of sexual health from you, and you’ll receive one from me as well. Any penetrative sexual acts performed will be done with protection, which I provide. Can you briefly describe to me what types of sexual services you’re interested in?”

When he glances up from the page to meet her eyes, he is taken aback by the complete change in her expression - her smile has disappeared and her cheeks have pinked, and her eyes are wide with… shock? Embarrassment? Horror?

“U-Um…” Maka stammers, averting her eyes from his gaze. Behind her, Damien's face has gone even paler, somehow. “S-Sexual…” she stumbles over the word, her voice scandalized. “Services?”

“Yeah,” Soul deadpans. “I’m an escort. That’s kind of… the main thing I do? For my clients.”

“O-Oh, um,” Maka laughs nervously, the sprinkle of rosy pink on her cheeks deepening. “No thank you.”

He blinks.

“No thank you?”

“I-I mean,” Maka stammers. “That… won’t be necessary.” She swallows. “I do not need any sexual services from you.”

Damien's posture visibly relaxes, his body sagging as though he'd just let out a breath he'd been holding in for a little too long.

"Are you… sure?"

Soul doesn't know why he has a hard time believing this - she certainly seems sure enough of her answer - but he's never had a potential client explicitly tell him they did not want any sexual intimacy whatsoever, so he's a little bewildered by this development.

"I am quite sure," the princess replies coolly, maintaining direct eye contact with him now. "And if you press the matter any further, I won't hesitate to invert your ribcage with my bare hands, dear fiancé."

A wicked temper and an unfortunate penchant for violence, the gossip articles had said. Paparazzi images of her bludgeoning a businessman on the street with his own umbrella flash in his mind's eye, of her sucker punching a young gentleman in the face at some royal ball.

"Okay, okay," he holds up both of his hands in an 'I'm innocent' gesture. "I hear you loud and clear - no sex. I just always ask that question as part of the client consultation process, that's all." Her face softens, seemingly satisfied, so he adds: "Please spare my ribs, oh beloved betrothed of mine. I quite like them just the way they are."

She rolls her eyes and barely suppresses an amused smile, and for some reason, he feels a small surge of pride in his chest at this reaction.

"They're safe. For now," she relents. "Is that all of your questions, then?"

"Just one last thing, though it's not a question so much as a personal policy," Soul says. "I don't kiss on the mouth."

Maka furrows her brows curiously.

"Ever?"

He shakes his head.

"Ever. I am willing to make one exception for the wedding day, but otherwise I'm not budging on this."

She makes that little humming noise again, and Soul doesn't know why he finds the sound so captivating.

"Why do you have such a rule in place?" There isn't a hint of judgment in her tone, only genuine curiosity.

"Helps me keep things professional," he replies. "Helps me not… get emotionally attached to my clients."

Maka crosses her arms across her chest.

"Might be pretty hard to convince people we're desperately in love if they never see us kiss until the wedding day, don't you think?"

Soul levels her with a look.

"Oh, I'll make it convincing," he declares, something deep in his psyche rising to the challenge. "There are still plenty of places I can kiss you, and countless other ways to be obnoxiously affectionate in public, trust me."

She smiles again, prompting Soul's heart to stir restlessly in his chest, for some reason.

"I give you my full permission to hold nothing back, then. Do anything and everything to make my father, the royal court, and the good people of Bellemorte believe you're disgustingly in love with me. Do that, show up on the wedding day and say your vows, and come the new year, you'll be one-hundred thousand dollars richer," she says. "Do we have a deal, Soul Evans?"

Normally, being addressed by his last name makes him bristle, but when she says it, somehow it doesn't sound all that bad. He grins, wide, and toothy and completely genuine.

"We have a deal, Princess."

"Excellent," she claps her hands together once, happily, before snapping her fingers and turning to address Damien. "Would you kindly let the kitchen know we are now ready for the main course, then?"

Damien manages to look entirely crestfallen, expression more dour than it has been all day, as he nods and rises from his seat.

Maka turns her attention back to Soul.

"You have about a week to pack your bags, get your affairs in order, and do whatever else you need to prepare." She smiles. "Our charade begins… in eight days."

For the second time that evening, several things occur to him as he meets her determined gaze.

The fact that Princess Maka Albarn has turned out to be nothing at all like he'd envisioned - in all his travels and in all his career exploits, he's never before met anyone quite like her.

The fact that she thoroughly intimidates him, terrifies him even, yet he doesn’t think he could turn down this ‘arrangement’ of hers if he tried.

And the fact that, for once, he isn't completely dreading this job.

He has no clue whether this elaborate deception of hers will work, or whether it will ultimately result in complete ruin; international scandal, public humiliation, irrevocable damage to both his and the princess's reputations.

Between her and Damien, he can’t even be sure he'll make it to the end of this year physically unscathed, considering they aren't even halfway through dinner and already they've both threatened him with permanent bodily harm.

He has no idea what these next four months will bring, how his life will change, for better or for worse.

But honestly, he can't wait to find out.

Chapter Text

LOS ANGELES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Thursday, September 1st, 20XX

Late in the evening

"Okay, so let's review."

For a Thursday, the Executive VIP wing of LAX is busier than usual, but not nearly as slammed as the rest of the airport; Maka had ended up having to resort to one of her grungy old sweatshirts, pulling the hood up and tightening the tie strings around her face to avoid being recognized and stopped on their way in.

She blames Labor Day weekend travel - a factor she's honestly more than a little bit irritated she didn't think to account for when planning the return trip to Bellemorte.

"Hit me," Soul nods confidently, bringing his drink to his lips and taking a quick pull from it.

The plane that will be ferrying them to the other side of the world is due to arrive in a little less than an hour, so in the interest of killing time, they had settled into a relatively quiet little coffee shop tucked away at the end of their gate. Soul sits across the table from her now, his backpack hanging off the back of his chair and his carry-on duffel bag at his feet, and when she and Kid had picked him up at his apartment earlier in the day, Maka had been absolutely thrilled to find that he had wholly complied with the wardrobe instructions she had laid out for him in their final phone call a day or two ago.

Leather jacket - check. Nails painted black - check. Hair pulled back in a headband to expose the piercings in his ears - check.

And the pièce de résistance?

Light-wash, acid-stained jeans, with holes ripped in the knees.

It's all coming together so perfectly.

"First question: where did we meet?"

He sets the paper cup down on the table with a satisfying plunk, an amused smirk on his face and a determined look in his eyes.

"At El Chupacabra's, the bar that I worked at this summer, on Latin Night. Damien wouldn't let you go, so you snuck out. I wasn't supposed to work that day, but a coworker called in sick and I agreed to cover. Thank God I did, too, because the second you walked up to the counter to order a drink, I knew I wanted to ask you out."

As part of preparing their backstory as a couple, they had mutually decided his fake job would be bartending, since the goal is to piss off her Papa as much as humanly possible, and bartender definitely ranks among the top five jobs universally guaranteed to win the disapproval of overbearing, controlling fathers.

And also, it's not technically a complete lie; Soul actually does have experience bar tending here and there as a supplement to his escort work - but this is just a bonus. She has absolutely no qualms about lying to her Papa.

"Very good," Maka smiles in approval. "Which of us made the first move?"

"You did," Soul responds. "I was too chicken to do it, but you thought I was cute too, so you kept ordering drinks until you were quite intoxicated. When you came up to the bar for your fourth or fifth drink, you drunkenly asked me if you could touch my eyebrow piercing."

"And even then, you were still too dense to take the hint, so I ended up writing my phone number on a bar napkin and passing it over to you before I left," Maka finishes the story for him. When he nods in agreement, she opens her mouth, her next question already on the tip of her tongue.

"My turn," Soul interrupts. "Where did I propose to you?"

Maka averts her eyes for the briefest moment, lets her fingers trace absently around the plastic lid of her drink cup.

“At the beach. My favorite beach in California,” she answers, her smile turning wistful. “At sunset.”

It’s all fake, of course, all crafted as part of their elaborate ruse, but she can’t help feeling a bit sentimental at the thought, at imagining it were real for just a moment.

There’s something so undeniably romantic about the ocean.

In another life, if she weren’t a princess and if she were getting married for love, her perfect wedding would take place on the beach, and it’d be small - just a handful of people, those nearest and dearest to her.

It's hard to get away with an intimate elopement on a secluded beach when you’re a crown princess with the eyes of the entire world watching you, though.

“Right on.” Soul smiles, and Maka internally scoffs, barely resisting the urge to click her tongue in annoyance - of course she got the question right, this little quiz game is for his benefit, not hers. “Any other questions? I’m feeling pretty confident about all of this backstory stuff.”

She smiles, then - time to shake things up.

"What's your favorite thing about me?"

This is not one of the questions they’d workshopped together- she’s throwing it at him completely unscripted.

She’s testing him.

Once they set foot in Bellemorte, anything goes. It’ll be a metaphorical shark tank, and he needs to be able to respond to anything and everything under pressure - whatever bizarre, off-base, or wildly invasive questions the media or the paparazzi or even members of her own royal court might throw at him regarding their ‘relationship’.

"Easy," he replies without missing a beat. "Your eyes."

She squints at him, her expression darkening in an instant.

“Are you serious?” Maka deadpans, brows furrowing in irritation. “My eyes? Tell me you're kidding.”

Soul visibly flinches, his jaw dropping and eyes blinking in confusion.

“What’s wrong with that answer? It’s a perfectly good answer!”

“No it’s not!” Maka leans forward in her seat, her hands slamming down onto the table in fists. “It’s the most generic, predictable, fake-sounding answer in the world!”

“Hey, I resent that– “

“Do you think the paparazzi is going to buy that?” Maka screeches. “Or my father, when he inevitably asks you why you want to marry me? You think he’s going to believe you popped the question within three months of meeting me because of my eyes?!”

“Um.” Souls blinks dumbly. “Maybe? I mean, by what you've described, he sounds pretty dense-”

“It's not a good enough answer!” Maka snaps, her fingers closing around the now-empty drink cup in her hands, and she relishes the feeling of how easily it crushes in her grip. “Pick a different favorite thing about me!”

“Okay, okay, geez,” Soul scoffs. “What would you prefer my answer be, Your Crankiness?”

“Is there nothing else you find appealing about me besides my eyes?!”

“Oh, sure, yeah, let me just count all the appealing things about your personality,” Soul spits, leaning forward over the table. “You're stubborn, you're quick to anger, you're probably the bossiest person I've ever met–”

She chucks the crumpled cup at him, sending it flying over the table and hitting him square in the forehead.

“Ow! What the hell was that for?!”

“For insulting me! And not having your head in the game! Think of literally anything else you like about me!”

“Oh, I've got it,” Soul sneers. “How about I tell your dear old dad that I'm a masochist, and that I just adore these angry outbursts and violent tendencies of yours! That having stuff thrown at my face turns me on!”

“Ugh, Soul! What am I even paying you for-”

“Will you two please quiet down already?!” A harsh whisper that is unmistakably the voice of Kid interjects. “You’re making a scene.”

Maka blinks, tearing her gaze from Soul’s face to the table behind him where her bodyguard sits. His hands are folded in front of him and he’s poised perfectly still, his posture impeccable, but the expression on his face is one of carefully contained fury. His golden eyes glare at her over the top of his shades and his mouth is pressed into a thin line. Without any further warning, he stands, pushing the chair out from the table and striding over to them. When he reaches their table he glowers down at the two of them for a moment, before bending to pick something up from the floor beside Soul.

“Honestly,” he seethes as he places Maka’s discarded paper cup back down in front of her. “At this rate, scandal will break before we even cross the Atlantic. Behave yourselves, or I will separate you, for the entire plane ride if I must.”

Maka swallows and nods weakly. She slides lower into her chair, feeling herself deflate a bit. Her eyes follow Kid as he turns abruptly on his heels and heads back to the coffeeshop counter. She watches sullenly as he places another order, as the barista quickly rings him up and nods along with all of his specifications - if she knows Kid, she knows he’s probably ordering an obscene amount of modifications to his drink, even going so far as to indicate the exact temperature he’d like it steamed to on the espresso machine and demanding that the hapless barista put precisely eight pumps of syrup flavoring into it-

“Your tenacity.”

Soul’s voice startles her eyes away from the scene unfolding at the counter. He’s looking at her intently, a serious expression on his face that she doesn’t quite know how to place.

“What?”

“My favorite thing about you,” he says simply, and the soft sincerity in his words surprises her. “Besides your eyes. I like how determined you are. You seem like the kind of person who stops at nothing to achieve your goals. When you want something, I don’t think any force in the universe, not your father, not even Damien, can stand in the way of you getting it.”

She stares at him in silence for a moment.

“You… you really think that?”

“Yeah.” Soul nods, shrugging his shoulders casually as he takes another pull from his drink. “I do.”

“You hardly know anything about me.”

“I know a strong will when I see one. The whole reason I’m sitting here with you is because you refused to take shit, even from the goddamn king.”

Maka rolls her eyes as a slow smile spreads across her face.

“Okay, when you say it like that, it sounds way more badass than it is. To me, he’s just my dad, not… the king of anything.”

“Still ballsier than I ever was with my parents,” Soul says, but as soon as the words leave his mouth, he seems to regret them. His eyes widen and his hand flexes, tightening around his drink.

“What do you–”

Before Maka can finish the question, Kid has returned, once again looming over their table with a serious expression on his face, his newly procured drink in one hand and the other held to the wireless audio device wedged into his left ear.

“I’ve received word from the Commander,” he announces without preamble. “The Sky Whale has arrived ahead of schedule.”

The Sky Whale - in addition to being absurdly named - is one of the biggest planes Soul has ever seen, which makes the fact that it is being used to transport three humans and one domestic cat halfway across the globe all the more maddening.

Royal families are all the same, he supposes, no matter the country, no matter the royal - even one who seems as self-aware and down-to-earth as Princess Maka does.

Er, Maka, he mentally corrects himself. He’s still wrapping his head around being on a first name basis with a princess. She’d programmed her cell number in his Blackberry as just ‘Maka’ and never misses an opportunity to correct him in conversation, of which they’d had several by phone in the eight days between their meeting at her beach house and today, to prepare for their multi-month-charade as smitten to-be-weds.

Crafting their backstory as a ‘couple’ mostly, as well as her supplying him with tips on what to pack, what to expect from life in Bellemorte, and in particular, life in the royal palace. Really, they were less ‘conversations’ and more two-hour sessions of Maka talking at him nonstop in that authoritative, bordering-on-bossy voice of hers, and Soul could hardly get a word in edgewise.

It had occurred to him, after the first two-hour phone lecture, that this was merely a glimpse of what his life would be like for the foreseeable future.

And now, that future has finally arrived, and he’s staring it directly in the face, proof that the past eight days hadn’t been some insane fever dream, and even though the humongous jet looming at the end of the tarmac feels larger than life, something about all of this still doesn’t quite feel real.

“Ready?”

Maka turns to him and addresses him with her chin held high and a glimmer in her green eyes.

“Ready as I’ll ever be.” Soul nods, adjusting the position of his backpack strap on his shoulder with one hand and hoisting his duffel bag up from the ground with the other. “Sayonara, California. See you in six months.”

“Technically, ‘au revoir’ would be more apt,” Maka corrects him, the hint of a smile playing on her lips. “Being that French is one of the official languages of Bellemorte, in addition to English.”

Soul rolls his eyes - one-thousand dollars a day, he reminds himself, which will hopefully prove enough to pretend to be in love with the world’s bossiest, most know-it-all princess - but all he says aloud is a very agreeable “Right, of course.”

They cross the tarmac and make their way to the enormous aircraft under the waning light of the setting sun. It's a fairly nondescript plane, aside from its size, painted a uniform gray with burgundy and black accents throughout and the flag of Bellemorte emblazoned on the tail, cartoonish skull and all.

Damien has gone ahead of them to do whatever it is that Damien does when he isn’t glaring daggers at Soul, and is now standing at the foot of the boarding ramp that connects the ground with the aircraft doors. He's still holding a coffee cup in one hand, and it makes him look slightly more human than usual.

“Your Highness.” The bodyguard inclines his head the slightest bit at their approach. “Allow me,” he says as he extends his hand to Maka.

“I’m good, Kid, thanks.” She shakes her head, and not a moment later, Soul feels her fingers lace between his, as she takes his hand instead. The contact makes him jump for some reason, at how easily she had reached for him, how normal she’d managed to make the action of holding hands for the first time feel, and he finds himself staring down at their clasped fingers as he obediently follows her up the steps.

“Showtime,” she leans back and whispers to him, and for a moment, he’s confused - is the king on the plane waiting for them? Is he already about to meet her father? - and that confusion must register on his face, because Maka quickly adds “The first person we have to convince of our ruse is Bellemorte's highest-ranking military commander, and she’s stone cold.”

Soul would have appreciated a bit more notice than approximately thirty seconds’ worth, but resists the urge to scowl nevertheless, instead schooling his expression into one of amicable neutrality. He grips Maka’s hand a little tighter as they near the top of the steps, and when she ducks inside the aircraft door, he isn’t far behind.

A Black woman in an impeccably tailored burgundy military uniform and locs pulled back into a bun awaits them inside, and at the sight of Maka, she lifts a hand to her forehead in salute, expression unchanging.

“Your Highness,” she says in a strong, unwavering voice, and Soul wonders briefly how many times per day Maka is addressed as such in her daily life back home.

“At ease, Commander Naigus.” Maka inclines her head. “It’s good to see you. Love the new uniform.”

The commander relaxes, her hand falling to her side once again and her posture softening the slightest bit.

“You're as observant as ever, Princess,” she replies, her voice unchanging from its stark monotone. When her piercing blue eyes leave Maka’s face and shift over to Soul, she blinks once before asking, “And who might this young man be?”

Maka gives his hand a squeeze, which Soul interprets as a cue to do something. In response, he steps in closer to her and starts to lift his arm, untangling his fingers from hers and intending to pull her in for a hug…

And fails at it spectacularly.

Maka moves at the same exact moment he does, and she must've been aiming for his face, or possibly his hair, or some other place above his shoulders, because when his arm accidentally bumps against her elbow, the force of the action sends her half-open fist knocking directly into the underside of his jaw and also somehow causes her to lose her footing. She stumbles into him with an awkward little grunt, and Soul very narrowly manages to avoid biting his tongue from the impact of her hand.

He catches her, but just barely. One hand grips her right above her elbow while the other one, having dropped his duffel, shoots out to steady her by her other arm.

“Whoa, Maka,” Soul chuckles, realizing his choice of words makes it sound like he's trying to wrangle a wild horse, so he changes his approach. “Feeling some pre-flight jitters, are we… sweetheart?”

In case his voice isn't cheerful enough, he leans forward and presses a gentle, hopefully reassuring kiss to her forehead.

“Y-yeah, I guess so,” Maka laughs, her smile wide and her cheeks flushed a rosy shade of pink. Her words are slightly too high-pitched when she adds: “Naigus, th-this is Soul. My… fiancé.”

The commander's expression is as stoic as ever, save for the way her lips are pressed together into a tight line - maybe a bit too tight, as though she's stifling her reaction. Her eyes move, appraising Soul from head to toe as she composes herself.

“Congratulations, Princess,” she says simply, her voice just as unaffected as it was before their little fumble. She takes a step back then, reaching for the door to the cockpit. “Enjoy your flight.”

They settle into their seats for the long overnight haul to Europe.

Technically, since this is one of the biggest planes in the royal fleet, there’s a master bedroom suite with a king-sized bed on board, but Maka chooses not to disclose this information - she’s enjoyed Soul’s company so far, but she isn’t looking to share a bed with him anytime soon. She contemplates claiming it for herself for about half a second before she realizes that the guilt at sleeping in a bed while he sleeps in his seat would keep her up all night.

So, side-by-side airplane seats for the next eleven or so hours it is.

When Kid appears through the curtained off entryway with a cat carrier and Blair’s preferred pillow in hand, it provides Maka an opportunity to get up and leave Soul be to get settled into his seat. Unfortunately, the moment Maka releases her from her confines, Blair proves to be a handful; all the fish treats Maka has on hand aren’t able to coax the royal feline from where she chooses to curl up for the night - Soul’s lap. If he is bothered at all by the prospect of being used as a pillow for the foreseeable future, however, he doesn’t show it - he simply shrugs, pulls his headphones over his ears, and leans back in his seat, closing his eyes without a word of complaint.

Taxi and takeoff are otherwise uneventful, and as they gain altitude, the long day of travel preparations quickly catches up with her. When her own eyelids start to droop shortly after they’re off the ground, Maka doesn’t fight them.

SOMEWHERE OVER THE NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN

Several hours after take-off

She awakens sometime later with her head on Soul’s shoulder.

It takes her a moment to register why, even after several blinks, her vision seems to be tilted sideways.

She realizes why with a start, nearly jumping in her seat when it dawns on her that the source of the warmth pressed to her cheek is Soul.

Luckily, it seems that he is still deep within the clutches of sleep, and so Maka takes a moment to observe the rest of her surroundings.

She blinks herself slowly back to full wakefulness, and shifts her head the slightest bit to peer out the window. By what she can see, wherever they currently are in the world, the sun is shining brightly against a backdrop of soothingly blue skies. She cranes her neck, scoots ever closer to the window, and when more of the earth comes into view, she is greeted by a glimpse of the equally blue ocean sparkling far below.

Maka sits up then, slowly so as not to awaken her slumbering seatmate, and then realizes that Blair is nowhere to be seen; she’d vacated Soul’s lap at some point in the past…

How long was she out?

Maka checks her watch and -

Nine hours?!

She sits bolt upright then, panic starting to rise in her chest.

Less than two hours until they arrive in Bellemorte!

She has so much to do before then!

As she unbuckles her seatbelt and rises from her seat, as she books it down the aisle for the master bedroom suite at the back of the plane, she doesn’t spare a second glance back at Soul, or a thought for where Kid could have gone - a million potential scenarios for what awaits them when they land are running through her mind, and she needs to be ready for any and all of them.

But before anything else, she needs a shower.

Another hour passes in what feels like the blink of an eye, and Maka finds little comfort in the reflection of herself staring back at her.

The bathroom is cozy, not cramped by any means, but she still feels like she’s going to suffocate if she stays in here a moment longer.

For probably the fiftieth time, she examines herself in the mirror - she's swapped out her grungy old hoodie and jeans for a petal pink sheath dress, her beloved pigtails for a straightened, relaxed style flowing around her shoulders. She'd added some simple, silver post earrings as well, and slipped nude-colored flats onto her feet to round out her arrival outfit.

There’s only one thing left.

Carefully, slowly, she reaches for the tiny box of black velvet on the bathroom counter and pries it open. She extracts the ring from within, and when she slides it onto her left-ring finger, she pauses a moment to examine it, the blackened gold of the band wrapped around her finger and the ruby-red jewel winking back at her. She finds herself contemplating everything that it is meant to represent for the next several months.

They’d met at El Chupacabra's, it was Latin Night. She’d snuck out, and Kid had been furious. She’d liked Soul's piercings and his tattoos and how he hadn’t recognized her, how he hadn’t known that she was an ultra-famous princess when they'd met. It had been love at first sight. He had proposed to her weeks later on her favorite beach at sunset.

She has the ring. She has the romantic backstory. She has Soul. In about an hour, there will be no turning back. In about an hour, they’ll have to sell their love story and convince her father - and the rest of the world - that what they have is the real deal.

Maka starts to pace back and forth in the bathroom, not entirely satisfied. Is it going to be enough? Is the ring, the story, Soul’s hand in hers, is all of that going to make them look like a real couple? Is that all it takes?

She racks her brain for ideas, for any potential last minute changes or additions that could make their charade more believable.

What do real couples do?

They kiss, for one, but Soul has boundaries that won’t allow that. They go on dates, they spend time together, they have inside jokes. They hug and hold hands, they…

Her eyes catch sight of her face in the mirror, and when they drop to her neck, that’s when it hits her.

She bursts through the bathroom door and sprints down the aisle of the plane as fast as the clingy fabric of her dress allows. When she finally makes it back to her seat, Kid is still nowhere to be found, and Soul is still fast asleep.

He’s slumped against the wall of the plane, headphones askew on his head and his mouth hanging open. Maka watches as a bead of drool starts to slip from the corner of his lips, and she wrinkles her nose as she sits down next to him.

“Soul.”

She reaches out, rests her hand on his arm, and gives him a gentle shake, which fails to rouse him.

“Soul,” she says again, a little louder.

Still no response.

“Soul!”

She shakes him with both hands this time, and a lot more force.

Finally, he startles awake, his head jerking up and shoulders jumping, and makes a sound halfway between a grunt and a yelp. He stares at her blankly for several moments, blinking at her with confusion in his sleep-addled eyes.

“Hm? Wha-“ He shakes himself, straightens his spine. “Are we there? Are we landing?”

Maka shakes her head, and Soul’s eyes narrow.

“Then… why–”

“Soul, it's almost go-time. Are you ready for your first official act as my fiancé?”

“Alright.” He stretches, cracks his neck twice before turning in his seat to face her. “What is it?”

Maka’s eyes slide shut and she takes a deep breath in through her nose, her fists balling up in her lap as she steels herself. When she opens her eyes, she doesn’t give herself time to mentally second guess her resolve before she says:

“I need you to give me a hickey.”

Soul’s mouth falls open and his eyes dart from her face, to her neck, and then back to her face. He regards her in stunned silence for a long moment.

“I- You-” he stammers. “You shook me awake like there was some kind of emergency happening, because you want me to give you a hickey?”

“It is an emergency!” Maka cries. “How is anyone going to believe we're a real couple unless I have a hickey to show for it?!”

“Okay, but… I hardly think now is the best time for–”

“It’s the only time!” Maka cuts him off. “We’ll be landing in a little less than an hour, so it has to be now.”

She watches Soul’s throat work as he swallows.

“And you’re sure that your dad is going to be at the airport to greet us? Isn't he like, a super busy king with lots of much more important things to do?”

“Yes,” Maka responds without missing a beat. “He’s only been calling me every day, about twenty times per day, since our big fight a couple weeks ago. Surely he’s been counting the minutes till my return. He’s probably been waiting at the airport for hours.”

When Soul fails to respond initially, letting several silent moments pass between them, Maka crosses her arms over her chest brusquely. She makes absolutely no effort to temper the indignation in her voice when she speaks.

“What, are you morally opposed to giving hickies or something? Are you refusing because I said I didn’t want any sexual services, because I hardly think a hickey can be considered-“

“Alright, alright,” Soul finally relents, raising his hands in defeat. “Christ, Maka, I’ll give you a hickey. It’s not a big deal, I just… this is kind of an odd place for it.”

“Odd place?” Maka quirks an eyebrow at him. “How?”

Soul tilts his head back, runs a hand through his hair in exasperation as he stares up at the ceiling for a moment, and for some reason, Maka’s eyes follow the motion. She watches his fingers disappear into the tangle of his pale hair and reappear a moment later with something not unlike fascination.

“I just mean… I mean like… Usually when I’m…” He swallows. “Being… intimate with a client, we’re like… in a bed or on a couch or something,” he mutters. “Not on an airplane.”

“Oh,” Maka says, her arms uncrossing and her face softening. “Well, how long does it take to…” She trails off. “To… make a hickey?”

“I mean… it depends how easily your skin bruises, but…” Soul pauses. “Maybe a minute or two?”

She nods in understanding.

“Well, if it’s a relatively quick process, then… would it help if I, um,” she fidgets with her fingers as they rest in her lap. “If we… laid down, at least? There’s a bedroom suite towards the back of the plane, we could–”

“N-no, no,” Soul interrupts, clearing his throat somewhat awkwardly. “No, here is fine. I can do it. It’ll be fine.”

“Okay, if you’re sure.” Maka blinks, and suddenly, she's hyper aware of the sound of her own heartbeat thrumming in her ears, of the warmth in her cheeks and the fluttery sensation swelling in her stomach.

She's instantly annoyed at her own nervous system for such a reaction.

This is a business transaction. It’s nothing more than Soul holding up his end of their bargain – doing a job that she's paying him to do. She's just a little nervous because it’s their first day working together, she’s certain of it.

It’s not because she finds his lopsided smile sort of charming. Or because she actually does kind of like his piercings and his tattoos, that bit isn't merely a line she made up for their story. Or because his hair looks really soft. Those facts are irrelevant.

“Well, if there’s nothing else, then…” Maka shifts, reaches her hands up to smooth her hair to one side of her neck. She leans in, tilting her head to present her throat. “Do it. G-go ahead, Soul.”

“Y-yeah, alright.” He moves then, rolls his shoulders and flexes his fingers a few times. He reaches for the armrest between them, pushes it up and out of the way. “One hickey, comin’ right up.”

Maka closes her eyes and inhales a deep breath. She hears him clear his throat a couple more times, feels the seat cushions shift as he scooches in a little closer. When she feels the heat of his body encroaching against her shoulder, when the scent of his cologne reaches her nostrils, her heartbeat quickens in her chest and she braces herself–

“Um, Maka,” he breathes. “Will you let me, uh, I mean, can I…” He trails off, his voice low and so soft, and now so very close to her ear she all but jumps in her seat at the sound of it. “Can I put my hands on you?”

“Yes,” she says, but it comes out sounding more like a squeak, too high and breathy and not what her voice normally sounds like at all.

“Okay.” He nods, and not a moment later she feels the warmth of his hands, his long fingers sliding behind her neck and resting on top of her forearm, and the heat of his breath against her skin as he leans in ever closer. His fingers curl around the base of her neck, and there’s slight pressure there as he pulls her in closer and then–

Maka gasps and her eyes fly open as his lips touch her skin, as the feeling of their warm roughness presses into the bend of her neck. He lingers there for the briefest of moments, before his lips open, parting to press a few soft, tentative kisses into her skin as his fingers massage gentle circles behind her neck, right at the base of her hairline. She shivers at how… nice it feels, at how warm and tender the contact is. She sighs, her body relaxing as she leans into him, and her eyes flutter shut once again.

Fleetingly, she thinks to herself that this isn’t so bad, that besides the hummingbird wing-beat sensation inside her ribs and how hot and sweaty she feels in… weird places, she could probably get used to–

She loses the train of thought at the feeling of something sharp, the quick sting of his teeth as he bites, as she feels them dig into her flesh, and then a wet, sort of sucking sensation as his mouth makes a seal against her skin. He applies more pressure and starts to suck, hard, and she feels rather than hears his voice when he groans softly. His lips and his teeth worry at her skin, and it kind of hurts but it also kind of feels really good, and she's lightheaded and dizzy and tingly in odd places, and she can’t quite remember how to breathe–

His lips part from her wetly after a final, light nip of his teeth against her skin.

“There you go,” he rumbles as he starts to pull away, and the gravelly texture of his voice makes her stomach churn. “A hickey for the princess, as requested.”

Maka fidgets in her seat, disappointment rising in her chest that it’s already over, and then confusion at why such a thing would disappoint her, and then–

“U-um, actually,” she swallows. “I think, maybe… you should… do a couple more?”

He blinks at her once, slowly, as though he doesn’t comprehend.

“More?”

“Yeah,” she shifts, nervously meeting his gaze. “You know, so that it looks… convincing. Like we're newly engaged and we make out all the time.”

His eyes fall to her neck, then, examining his handiwork. She can't quite read his expression - for the second time in the past twelve-ish hours - and it frustrates her to no end.

“Hmmm.” He licks his lips, the metal barbel of his tongue ring slipping into view for the briefest moment. “How many more would you like, princess?”

“J-just…” Maka fidgets again, her eyes darting up to focus on the ceiling now. “Just do that… that sucking thing a few more times. A-and do it a little harder. I'll tell you if I want you to stop.”

He smirks in response, and it's so smug that Maka has to fight the urge to shove him away.

“Yes, Your Highness.” He leans in, and before Maka can scoff or even click her tongue in disgust at his sarcastic tone, the heat of his mouth is on her neck once again.

This time, there’s no build-up, no soft, tentative kisses to ease her into it, no gentle caress of his fingers. She feels suction and the sting of his teeth right away as his lips start to pull at her skin, and her entire body shivers as her eyes flutter shut. She leans back into her seat, or maybe it’s more the force of Soul’s body as he presses further into her, as one hand slides from her arm to her hip and his other hand fists in her hair behind her head. She gasps, from the pinch of pressure on her scalp or the wet sucking noises his mouth is making against her neck, or possibly both. There’s a flash of searing, sharp pain, and then his lips smack wetly as they release, and when she feels his tongue trace a slow circle, soothing over the raw, bruised skin, Maka can’t help the soft moan that escapes her mouth at the sensation.

The respite is brief, and soon enough she feels Soul’s hand curling around the opposite side of her neck as he pulls her in for another taste. Maka’s mouth falls open and her toes curl inside her shoes, she gasps again as his other hand digs into her hip. Her fingers plunge into his hair and oh, it’s so soft, it’s every bit as soft as it looks, and she swears she hears him groan in response to her touch. His lips resume their ministrations, and as he hungrily sucks at the sensitive skin of her throat, she lets her head fall back as her body goes limp; her grip tightens in his hair when he bites down, and as his teeth sink into her flesh she lets another moan slip from her throat, and -

“Ahem.”

Maka's eyes snap open, and the sight of Kid standing not even six feet away saps any and all pleasant, hickey-induced sensations from her body entirely.

Soul freezes, his lips ceasing their movement on her neck instantly. Maka all but shoves him away, her fingers releasing their vice grip on his hair to instead find purchase against his shoulders, and as she parts from him, she pushes him so hard he hits the opposite wall with a grunt.

“Kid,” she gasps, voice breathless and her chest heaving, her hands instinctively going to her neck to cover up the… evidence. “I-it… it wasn't what it looked like, I just–”

“I don't particularly care what it was or wasn't supposed to look like,” the bodyguard says, his voice deadly calm. “Just do not ever let me see it again. Next time I walk in on you two… canoodling, I will not hesitate to put an end to this little charade of yours once and for all. Do I make myself clear?”

Maka nods sheepishly, unable to meet Kid's harsh golden gaze. Soul makes an affirmative sounding grunt.

“Good.” Kid straightens, smoothing a hand through his hair and loosening his collar. “Now, prepare for landing. We will be arriving in Bellemorte in just under twenty minutes.”

DEATH CITY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, BELLEMORTE

Friday, September 2nd, 20XX

About 4 o’ clock in the afternoon (local time)

When the dust settles and all the spit is wiped away, Maka is the proud bearer of three brand-new, deeply purple hickies, and her neck also kind of hurts.

The silence that persists between her and Soul as they wait to disembark the now grounded plane is tense and awkward, and she finds herself rubbing at her bruised skin absently, racking her brain for something to break the tension while Soul stares intently at the seat in front of him, very purposefully not looking at her.

“U-Um, Soul,” she tries, her voice gentle. “Are you alright?”

“Uh-huh,” he mumbles, and gives a curt nod of his head. Maka is not convinced, so she presses on.

“I’m… sorry for pushing you earlier,” she admits. “I just… you know, Kid was there, and I was really embarrassed–”

“It’s fine,” he says too quickly, his hands balling up into fists on top of his knees. “I’m not upset about it. I’m sorry for getting a little carried away.”

Maka blinks at him.

“Carried away?”

“Y-Yeah, uh, with the whole…” He coughs, clears his throat. “The whole hickey thing.”

Maka nudges her shoulder against his, a soft smile playing on her lips.

“You’re fine,” she says, feeling her cheeks heat up the slightest bit. “You did great.”

“Really?” He turns his head and finally looks at her, and Maka would swear that he's blushing if she didn't know any better. “I-it wasn’t… too much?”

“Nope,” she replies easily. His fists uncurl as his hands relax, and his fingers start to fiddle with the frayed edges of the holes in his jeans. The action makes Maka's own fingers itch for contact, and she doesn't resist the urge that overcomes her to lace them through his, whether out of a desire to reassure him, or to calm her own frazzled nerves, she isn’t entirely sure.

Either way, Soul’s fingers close around hers as he accepts her hand in his, and they stay like that for a long while as silence falls between them once more - though this time it’s comfortable, companionable, even.

When Kid reappears from behind the curtained entryway to announce that they may now disembark, they only separate for as long as it takes to stand up and collect their things. The bodyguard disappears almost as quickly as he'd appeared, and the cat carrier in his hand gives Maka the sneaking suspicion that he's off to find and wrangle Blair on her behalf.

She makes a mental note to thank Kid for all he does - not the least of which being how he's put up with all of her demands and schemes these past few weeks.

When she and Soul are standing in the aisle and heading for the exit, Maka is honestly unsure which of them reaches out to rejoin hands first.

Either way, when it comes time to step off the plane and onto the boarding ramp once again, Soul’s hand is warm, rough, and secure in hers, and it gives her renewed courage to face her father, and whoever else may be waiting for them at the bottom of the steps.

She steps out into the blinding light of the Mediterranean sun, and is greeted by the familiar sight of the Bellemortian airport runway.

Her heart swells with joy, and for a moment, the sheer magnitude of it overwhelms her, the feeling every bit as wonderful as it is disorienting.

How she's missed her country, her home, these past few months.

She slowly descends the makeshift steps, Soul's hand remaining in hers the entire time, and when she's almost to the bottom, a familiar voice reaches her ears.

“Your Highness!”

Maka glances up, and is greeted by the unmistakable, pantsuited form of her father's right hand woman, press secretary and chief of staff extraordinaire Liz Thompson.

“Princess!”

She hears another familiar voice, this one more high-pitched and childlike, as Patty, the younger Thompson sibling, trails behind her older sister happily.

By the time Maka reaches the bottom of the steps, Liz is waiting with a clipboard in hand, her sister right beside her. They both bow to her in greeting as she stops in front of them.

Maka aches so desperately to reach out and hug the two of them, but she's all too certain that there are already multiple cameras on her waiting to capture her every move, so she resists.

Instead, she lets herself shift into princess mode full force.

“Liz, Patty, it's so good to see you,” she proclaims, holding her head high and keeping her voice professional despite the smile creeping onto her face. “I very much appreciate you both being here to receive us.”

“Of course!” Patty chirps. “We missed you so much, Princess! Who's the scary-looking guy you brought home with you?”

“Patty…” Liz turns her face to her sister, but her eyes remain trained on Soul as he stands beside Maka. “Why don't you go find Kid and see if he needs any assistance inside the plane?”

If Patty had been eager for the answer to her question about Maka’s “scary-looking” companion, she moves past it easily with her sister's suggestion.

“Kay!” She replies, before pushing past Soul and Maka and zooming up the steps. Liz's eyes follow her, and as soon as she disappears inside the aircraft, they turn back to Soul and then finally to Maka, a thousand questions flashing in them.

“So,” Liz finally says, and her eyes flick from Maka’s face to her bruised neck, and Maka can tell she’s fighting down a suggestive smile as she speaks. “Who is your… companion?”

Maka squeezes Soul’s hand, flashes a brilliant smile, and says in the dreamiest, most lovey-dovey voice she can muster:

“This is my fiancé, Soul.”

His fingers slide out of hers and his arm finds her waist as he pulls her in for a hug, and it goes a hundred times smoother than it did with Naigus; Maka eagerly presses her body against his and relishes the way his hand rests firmly on her hip, and the feeling of his lips pressing to the top of her head. She leans further into him, nuzzling her head into his chest to really drive home the point that they are disgustingly in love.

“I’m the lucky punk who somehow managed to convince this brilliant, beautiful princess to give me a chance, and I’m still trying to figure out what she could possibly see in me,” Soul says, his voice silky smooth and positively oozing with affection. He drops his duffel and then extends his other hand out to Liz. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I hope there’s room for me in the palace?”

Liz’s eyebrows are halfway to her hairline, her lips parted slightly as she accepts Soul’s proffered hand.

“O-Of course.” Liz blinks. “It shouldn’t be a problem, although a couple days’ notice might’ve been nice.” She turns her eyes back to Maka. “Why didn’t any of Kid’s reports these past few weeks mention anything about you meeting someone in America?”

“Oh, I asked him to keep it under wraps until we got home,” Maka replies, hoping her tone of voice sounds as innocent and genuine as she’s trying for. “We just wanted the engagement to be a total surprise! If the paparazzi got wind of it before Papa did… well, you know how Papa is,” Maka continues, and her words remind her of her primary objective today. “Speaking of… where is my father? He is here, is he not?”

Liz’s face turns serious, apologetic almost, at the question.

“His Majesty sends his sincerest apologies, Princess,” she inclines her head. “He wanted to be here so terribly, but had some urgent business with the government of Spain to attend to. He’ll be back tomorrow evening, and has arranged for dinner with you as an apology.”

Maka exhales a breath, feeling her shoulders sag and her resolve deflate a little.

Of course something else came up. Of course. It always does.

“I would love to know what ‘business’ is more important than the homecoming of his only daughter,” Maka grits, her voice turning icy. “And anyway, missing my arrival isn’t the only thing he owes me an apology for, so he better be on time for dinner.”

Soul tightens his grip around her waist before sliding his hand around to the small of her back, where his fingers start to rub small, reassuring circles. It’s… a surprisingly sweet gesture, given that she’d told him very little about her tumultuous feelings regarding her father, and it manages to keep her from spiraling further into the bottomless pit of her anger.

“He will be, Your Highness, he will.” Liz straightens, and reaches to tuck an errant lock of her hair behind her ear. “But in the meantime… there’s someone else here that I think you will be very happy to see.”

Maka blinks, and Liz steps aside as she gestures to a nearby fuel truck on the runway. Her brows furrow together, thoroughly confused, until a figure steps out from behind the truck.

“Tsubaki?!”

Truly, of all the scenarios that Maka had played in her mind of how her arrival back in Bellemorte would go, this one hadn’t crossed her mind even once.

“Welcome home, Maka!”

The princess dashes forward, all cares and worries about the watchful eye of the paparazzi abandoned for the moment, and practically knocks Tsubaki off her feet with the force of her hug. For a moment, all she can do is squeeze her tight, her face hurting from how big she’s smiling, until Tsubaki lets go and pulls away to look at her.

“Me?!” Maka laughs. “What about you? Tsu, how are you here? Why are you here?”

“I flew in a few days ago.” Tsubaki smiles, serene and genuine. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, I wanted it to be a surprise. Unless you’ve already heard the news…?”

Maka shakes her head, and Tsubaki’s smile falters for the first time.

“Masamune abdicated,” she sighs. “Decided to join a monastery and study the art of swordsmithing. He wants no part in royal life anymore.”

Maka’s jaw drops.

“But… then… abdicated?!” She squeaks. “That means you…”

“The Crown passes to me, yes.” Tsubaki nods solemnly. “Hence… why I’m here. I just need a little time to clear my head. Figured I was overdue for a visit.” Her eyes suddenly grow wide. “Oh! I’m sorry! I’ve gone and made this all about me.” Her gaze travels from Maka’s face, to her neck, to the ring on her finger. “Clearly you’ve got some… news of your own to share?”

As if on cue, Maka feels Soul’s hand at her back once again, gentle and warm, as he steps up beside her.

“Sorry to cut in.” His hand reaches for hers and brings it to his lips to press a quick kiss to her fingers. “It was getting a bit awkward with… Liz, was it? She was grilling me about what hair products I use. Plus, I was starting to miss you, sweetheart.”

Maka resists the urge to roll her eyes at how cheesy he’s laying into their act already, electing instead to laugh, and let him lean forward to kiss her primly on the forehead.

“Sorry to ditch you with her like that. She only has two modes - work, and obsessing over the personal care habits of others.” Maka spares a glance back at Tsubaki. “Soul, this is my cousin, Tsubaki. She lives in Kyoto and I had no idea she was here visiting. I haven’t seen her since…”

“Christmas,” Tsubaki finishes for her. “Two years ago.”

Maka can’t believe it’s been that long.

“Tsu, this is Soul… My fiancé.”

Maka has known Tsubaki her entire life, and hasn’t kept a single secret from her since she was old enough to understand the concept of a secret. They’d spent every summer together until Maka graduated high school, alternating between Maka visiting her in Japan, and Tsubaki visiting Bellemorte. When life eventually got too hectic for annual visits with college and the demands of royal duties, Maka always made time in her schedule to voice or video chat with Tsubaki at least once per month.

When Maka's mother died, Tsubaki had been her lifeline, the one person who'd granted her permission to grieve, in whatever way her ten-year-old self needed.  Quite literally, she tells Tsubaki everything.

So lying to her cousin about her relationship with Soul, not disclosing the fact that it’s all a ruse to get back at her father, feels more than a little bit wrong, and the guilt is like a knife to the heart - sharp and immediate.

Maka does her best to smile through it.

“Oh my God, Maka, your fiancé?!” Tsubaki’s joy is palpable as her entire face lights up, and her hands cover her mouth for a moment. “Congratulations! When did you get engaged?!”

“Couple weeks ago,” Soul answers for her. “On the pier at Big Rocks Beach. I was so nervous I nearly dropped the ring into the ocean.”

“The ring! Oh, Maka, let me have a look at it!”

Maka nods, her cheeks burning and her mouth dry as she lifts her hand to let Tsubaki inspect the ring on her finger.

In their intricately fabricated lie, Soul had called in a favor from Kid a couple of weeks before proposing to help him get his hands on an authentic Bellemortian engagement ring, and Kid had been more than happy to do so.

In reality, Kid would never willingly do anything for Soul, and Maka had contacted the jeweler that services the royal family the night he’d agreed to be her fiancé, put a rush order on an engagement ring, and Kid had threatened the jeweler with life in prison for treason, or worse, if he dared speak of the exchange to anyone.

Either way, the glittering ruby now rests on her finger, flanked by a dozen tiny diamonds and set in a band of black gold, with twisting patterns of leaves and branches carved into the metal.

It’s a beautiful ring, truly fit for a royal Bellemortian engagement, and Maka almost wishes it didn’t represent an equally beautiful lie.

“It’s absolutely gorgeous, Maka,” Tsubaki croons. She lets go of Maka’s hand and looks up at her. “When is the wedding?”

“December,” Maka answers. “Do you think you can remain in Bellemorte until then? I would love your help with wedding planning.”

“Of course!” Tsubaki agrees, her voice brimming with sincere excitement. “Oh, Maka, you know I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

When Kid and Patty emerge from the plane, and Liz announces that the palace limousine is ready for departure, they part ways with another tight hug - Tsubaki had arrived with Liz and Patty, and is absolutely insistent on riding back with them in order to give Maka some privacy with her fiancé.

The ride from the airport to the palace is uneventful, and since Kid is driving, she fully expects Soul to break character, to pull out his phone and scroll through his notifications, but he doesn’t. He keeps his fingers laced through hers the entire time, their joined hands resting on her lap all the while and his thumb stroking soothingly along the back of her hand. He doesn't press her about anything - her father's absence, Tsubaki's surprise arrival, none of it, and seems instead content to sit with her in silent support.

It feels nice. Natural, somehow, and Maka finds she doesn’t want to let go.

So she doesn’t, not until she absolutely must.

Chapter Text

Royal Medical Clinic, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 3rd, 20XX

About ten o’ clock in the morning

There are a great many things on Maka’s to-do list for her first full day back in Bellemorte, and, in her ideal world, a trip to the doctor’s office is not one of those things.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t seem to have a choice in the matter.

The royal physician, Dr. Frank N. Stein, had all but cleared his schedule for her–not that she’d even asked him to in the first place–and Liz had handily shut down all of Maka’s attempts at protesting.

“He's a busy man these days,” she had said, her eyes only leaving her clipboard for a moment to spare Maka the briefest of glances. “Ever since you declared the palace clinic open to patients from the general public, he's been working insane hours. You know he even takes Saturday appointments now? Be grateful he freed up his calendar to see you right away for your annual physical exam.”

And that was that.

The princess would see the good doctor at nine a.m. sharp, according to the copy of the day’s itinerary that Liz had handed her, and there is no room for argument.

Which is how Maka had found herself frantically scrawling a note to Soul and handing it to one of her aides for delivery, instead of starting out her day the way she’d intended: breakfast with him in the courtyard to go over the day’s events–most notably, dinner with her father–and then a quick tour of the palace before her eleven a.m. meeting with representatives from her animal rescue organization.

She’d love to be enjoying tea and crepes in the garden. She’d love to have spent the morning properly welcoming Soul to her home.

Instead, she’s in the palace’s medical wing, shivering in a hospital gown and her bare thighs crinkling the exam table paper she sits upon, while she fidgets uncomfortably and awaits a diagnosis she already knows.

“Well, Your Highness,” the doctor begins, in his familiar monotone drawl. “It seems you’re in excellent health. For a twenty-one year old female fresh out of college, you take extraordinarily good care of yourself.”

She knows he means this as a compliment, but it feels backhanded, somehow, the way Dr. Stein says it.

“Thank you?”

The doctor smiles. From behind the wire frames of his glasses, his pale green eyes soften, and Maka can’t help but notice that the bags beneath them are a little more pronounced than they were when she’d last seen him. A pang of guilt hits her–between his long work hours, a wife, and a young daughter at home, he must be exhausted.

“I know you’ve got a busy day ahead of you preparing for your father’s return from Spain, so I won’t keep you too much longer.” He turns then, swivels around in his chair to grab something–a pad of paper–from his desk, before extracting a pen from the pocket of his lab coat and quickly scribbling upon it.

“Here, have one of your aides take this to the pharmacy,” he instructs, tearing the sheet he’d just written on from the pad and holding it out to her. “They should be able to fill it for you before the end of the day today if you act fast.”

Maka’s brows furrow in confusion as she takes the paper from the doctor’s hands.

“What’s this?”

“It’s a prescription for birth control.”

There’s a heavy beat of silence, then, in which all Maka can do is blink at Dr. Stein in disbelief, absolutely sure she’s misheard him.

“U-um, I don’t…” she starts, her mouth working robotically. “I don’t see why… I need this?”

The doctor’s face remains a mask of indifference, unchanging in expression as he clicks his pen once and deposits it back into his lab coat pocket.

“Because you arrived home from your extended holiday with a ring on your finger and a young man fawning over you with puppy-dog eyes, and we don't need any royal heirs in the picture until after the wedding.”

“O-oh, um,” Maka laughs, trying to sound nonchalant, but her cheeks burn as her face contorts itself into a forced smile. “I-I’m not, we’re not…” Her fingers tighten around the paper as she holds it away from her, at arm’s length as if she expects it to lash out and bite her at any moment. “We’re… waiting till marriage.”

It isn't technically a lie–she and Soul are indeed not having sex. The fact that wedding vows won't change that is irrelevant.

Dr. Stein stares at her with a completely blank look on his face for an uncomfortable number of seconds. His eyes fall to her neck for a brief moment, before flicking back up to her face.

“Uh-huh,” he deadpans. “With hickies like that, you expect me to believe you two are waiting until the wedding night. Cute.” He swivels back around in his chair, turns his attention to typing away at his computer. “Don’t worry - I’m not going to tell your father. It’ll be our little secret.”

Right, the hickies. The hickies she had decided in a fit of anxiety that she absolutely must have in order to prove the validity of their ‘relationship’, the hickies she had practically bullied Soul into giving her on the plane.

Those hickies.

How could she have forgotten?

She’s completely at a loss for words, so she says nothing, electing only to nod and place the birth control prescription in her lap and fold her hands gingerly over it. She mentally tables the decision of what to do with said prescription until… later.

“Now then.” Dr. Stein rises from his seat. “I’m late for my smoke break. Please give the king my regards tonight. Good to see you, as always, Princess.”

With that, he exits the exam room, leaving Maka alone, mortified, and with nothing further to do but dress herself and get on with her day.

Royal Family Dining Room, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 3rd, 20XX

About six o’ clock in the evening

Soul has been in Bellemorte for over twenty-four hours, and in that time he's hardly seen his ‘betrothed’ for more than a few minutes.

This morning, after probably the best night’s sleep of his life in the cushiest bed he’ll ever have the privilege of sleeping in, he’d woken up and noticed that a maroon envelope had been slipped through the crack underneath his bedroom door, and said envelope contained a sheet of silver-foil lined paper; on that sheet of paper, the princess had hand-lettered a set of instructions for him regarding the day’s events. Said instructions covered everything from what time he is to report to dinner with the king (precisely eighteen-hundred hours) to what he is permitted to do in the meantime while she sees to her royal business (stay in his room and don’t draw attention to himself, essentially) to how he should style his hair for the momentous occasion of meeting her father (slicked back, so as not to obstruct the view of his piercings).

She couldn’t be bothered to knock on his door and have a conversation with him, but she did have time to hand-letter a laundry list of demands on expensive stationery. She probably hadn’t even delivered it herself.

Royals.

Ugh.

So now, after a mind-numbingly boring day cooped up like a disobedient child in the guest bedroom suite that had been assigned to him, he’s finally arrived at the main event that he’d been anticipating ever since leaving California - meeting and purposefully inciting the ire of King Spirit Albarn.

For lack of anything better to do, he’d arrived early, and Liz had been gracious enough to show him to his seat despite the truly mind-boggling number of items on her to-do list for tonight's dinner.

This particular dining room is one of the smaller, more intimate dining rooms in the palace, with a table set for only eight people, but it still feels every bit as royal and extravagant as the rest of the palace. An enormous chandelier hangs from the center of the high ceiling overhead, shimmering with silver-and-black opulence and dripping with expensive-looking crystals. Everything else in the room–from the velvet curtains draped over the windows and fireplace, to the maroon painted walls, to the flickering red candles set atop silver candelabras to the cushy, upholstered chairs lining the table–exudes the kind of sophisticated luxury Soul had come to detest over the course of his own upbringing, but with a strikingly gothic twist, if all the skull iconography is anything to go by.

In the middle of the table sits a floral centerpiece overflowing with a spray of black, white, and maroon flowers, and pomegranates, of all things.

He's never seen so many goddamned pomegranates in one place in all his life.

They're everywhere. Scattered haphazardly over the surface of the table, sliced open so that their seeds burst from their innards like hundreds of tiny, glittering jewels. Hung upon the walls, their bulbous, fleshy likeness depicted artfully in impressionistic strokes of watercolor paint. Resting atop empty goblets on side tables, whole and unspoiled; even a massive bust of the ruby-red fruit on the mantle of the fireplace, its succulent flesh pierced through with the blade of a silver dagger.

You'd think these people practically worship the damn things.

He’s grown bored of the game he’d set himself to in order to kill time - counting the number of skulls and the number of pomegranates in the room to see which wins out (pomegranates, by far). He taps his fingers idly on the tabletop, reaches to loosen the collar of his dress shirt a few times, resists the urge to run his hands through his hair.

How he hates wearing it slicked back. How he hates sitting here with nothing to do, dressed up like some rich girl’s Ken doll. How he hates that spending the day hidden away in his room since the princess simply didn’t have time for him had made him feel… discarded, like an object.

How he hates being objectified.

He’d learned to tolerate the feeling over the years of working as an escort, but somehow, this time, he thought things would be… different, that despite her royal status, Maka would at least treat him like a person–

“Oh, Soul! You’re already here.”

The sound of Maka's voice halts his self-loathing thoughts and tears his gaze to the opposite side of the dining room.

She enters flanked by Damien and Patty, and as soon as she steps through the wide double doors she waves her hand, dismissing them to attend to… whatever else it is they need to attend to.

“I’m so glad to see you found your way.” She strides toward him, and the click of her kitten heels against the tile floor punctuates her words as she speaks. “I thought I’d have to send an aide to guide you.”

He rises from his seat at her approach, and he can’t take his eyes off her.

She looks so different from the last time he'd seen her, with her long blonde hair flowing around her shoulders in a half-updo, the top layers pulled elegantly back. There’s a light dusting of blush on her cheeks, a subtle coat of mascara on her eyelashes. Glittering, silver skull earrings dangling from her ears that frame her delicate face perfectly.

And her dress.

It's a floor-length evening gown the color of blood, a shade that exactly matches the maroon walls and the pomegranates scattered about the room, sleeveless, with a high-cut, halter neckline and a spray of ruffles at the neck. It looks tailor-made for her, the way it hugs the graceful curves of her body.

He realizes he’s staring when she giggles.

“You really aren't all that great with words, huh?”

Soul blinks once, before finding his feet striding forward.

“Maka,” he breathes, and he can’t help the air of wonder that creeps into his voice as he reaches for her. His brain finally catches up with his mouth, and though they’re seemingly alone right now, it swiftly reminds him that he’s got a job to do.

Act like a love-stricken fiancé.

“Y-you look…” he takes her fingers into his own, and his other hand finds her waist. “You look so… so p-pretty.”

Pretty?

How many times has he been a hired date? How many times has he complimented a woman, called her beautiful, ravishing, enchanting, et cetera? Any of those options would have been better than ‘pretty’.

And was that a stutter in his voice?

She giggles again and looks away, and he can’t tell if her cheeks are pinker than they were a moment ago, or if it's just the blush she’s wearing.

“Thank you.” She smoothes her free hand down the front of her dress. “You clean up rather nicely yourself.”

He brings her hand to his lips to kiss her fingers, and it isn’t until he’s lowering it and pulling her in for a hug with his other arm that he realizes his hands are shaking.

He’s… probably just nervous to meet the king. That’s gotta be it–there’s a lot riding on this dinner. A lot of pressure. His daily salary of one-thousand dollars and future prospects of wealth, that’s all.

When he leans in and presses another kiss to her cheek, the way he can feel her face stretching into a smile against his lips makes his heart stutter in a funny way.

“How was your day?” She says as he pulls away. “Not too boring I hope?”

“Oh yeah, so exciting,” Soul snorts. “The inside of my guest bedroom walls are absolutely fascinating. In fact, I laid in bed for a full three hours this morning, becoming very acquainted with the ceiling.”

At this, Maka’s face falls, and the action hits him like a gut punch. For the first time in his life, maybe ever, he actually regrets making a sarcastic comment.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and Soul is struck by how utterly genuine her voice sounds. “I hope I can make it up to you tomorrow. I’d had an entire itinerary planned for today but…” She averts her eyes. “Well, some… personal matters came up today that were… beyond my control.”

He’s hard-pressed to think of anything that could possibly be beyond a princess’s authority in her own palace, but the possibility that she may be lying doesn't even occur to him.

“No, no, it’s okay.” The words leave his mouth too quickly, and he’s suddenly hyper-aware of the fact that they’re both still standing awkwardly beside the table. He clears his throat and reaches to pull out the chair closest to Maka, gestures for her to sit down with his other hand. “Don’t sweat it. I needed some jet lag recovery time anyway.”

“Even still,” Maka insists. She moves to sit down, watches his every move as he steps away and seats himself in his own chair right beside her. “I’ll tell Liz to clear my schedule for tomorrow, no matter what’s on it. At the very least, I owe you a tour of the palace.”

Her gaze is soft as she regards him, but there's still something so disarming about the intensity of her stare. He's unsure what to make of it, so he defaults to what he knows best.

“Well, consider my curiosity piqued. Tell me,” Soul smirks. He folds his hands together dramatically atop the table. “Will this palace tour feature even more pomegranates? Cause this, honestly–” Soul gestures vaguely with one hand to the rest of the room. “-Is more pomegranates than I’ve ever seen before in my life. Like, in my entire twenty-two years that I’ve lived up till this point.”

Maka gives a dramatic roll of her eyes, but fails to hide her encroaching smile.

“Come on, it isn’t that many pomegranates.” She bites down on her lower lip.

“It is that many pomegranates. I don’t think even supermarket produce sections have this many pomegranates.”

“That’s because your only frame of reference is American supermarkets!” Maka huffs. She shifts in her seat, crosses her arms over her chest. “And anyway, these are–”

“You have pomegranates in your flowers,” Soul interjects.

“-As I was saying, these are Bellemortian pomegranates. We’re famous for them–they’re our number one agricultural export! We even have our own royal orchard here at the palace–”

“I am so looking forward to that part of the tour.”

“Soul!”

She’s grinning from ear to ear now, a fit of giggles bubbling up and escaping her lips despite her best efforts to keep it together.

“What? I’m being serious!” Soul can hardly keep the smile out of his own voice. “I’m very passionate about fruit, you see.”

“Oh my God, no you’re not,” Maka laughs. “Please stop.”

He resists the temptation to follow up with a snarky comment about how she’s only known him for about two weeks, which is not nearly enough time for her to definitively conclude what he is and isn't passionate about, and instead raises both of his hands in mock-surrender.

“Okay, okay,” he says. “You win.”

The smile he is rewarded with is second only to the victorious, satisfied little humming noise that she makes, and he tells himself that the only reason why his heartbeat speeds up ever so slightly in his chest is because he’s proud of his ability to make his clients laugh, and nothing more.

“Of course I win. Anyway…” Maka crosses one leg over the other and smooths her hair back behind her ear matter-of-factly. Her near-immediate shift in tone makes Soul sit up a little straighter in his own seat. “You understand the importance of this dinner, right? You remember everything we discussed in California?”

The look in her eyes is expectant as she leans forward. She’s using coded language, this much he knows, because though they’re seemingly alone in the dining room right now, the palace is never safe from listening ears.

“Yeah, of course,” he says without missing a beat, one side of his mouth quirking up in amusement. He scoots his chair ever so closer to hers and reaches for her hand. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head over it, Your Highness.”

His thumb swipes once across her knuckles as he lifts her hand up to his mouth. Rather than pressing another chaste kiss to her fingers, as he’d done earlier, he opts for something a little more intimate–he finds the pulse point of her wrist and presses his lips to it in an open-mouthed kiss. He holds her gaze all the while, and definitely doesn’t miss the slow breath she sucks in through her nose, how her eyes widen and her mouth presses into a thin line.

It’s a bit of a stroke to his ego, that he can charm even a princess in such a manner, but he’ll take every win he can get tonight.

After all, he’s got to make sure his head is fully in the game for this dinner.

Normally, he absolutely loathes meeting clients’ parents–loathes the polite, respectful facade that he’s repeatedly had to adopt, how much sucking up and ass-kissing he’s had to do to impress mothers and fathers, grandparents and aunts and uncles, wealthy, snobby guardians of all stripes. While he can’t deny that some small part of him feels a little apprehensive–who wouldn’t be nervous to meet a king?–mostly, he’s actually thrilled.

He’s meeting the King of Bellemorte, yes, but he doesn’t have to impress said king.

It’s the first time in his career as an escort that he is expected to do the complete opposite, and it’s oddly freeing. For once in his life, he doesn’t have to act like a perfect, polite gentleman; he isn’t here to be Mr. Right. If anything, Maka hired him for all of the qualities that make him Mr. Wrong, and he’s quite looking forward to living up to that reputation.

Starting… right now.

“U-Um, y-yeah, good, then I–”

“How long until dear old dad arrives anyway?” Soul muses, his voice turning just a touch devilish. He leans in closer to the princess, reaches with his free hand to take her long blonde hair between his fingers and brush it away from the side of her face. “I suppose…” His words are a low whisper as his mouth meets the shell of her ear. “...I should start getting into character, hm?” He lets his arm come up to rest on the back of her chair, circling it around her so that his other hand wraps protectively around her opposite shoulder. “Surely, nothing will put the king in a sour mood quite like walking in on some no-good American scoundrel with his mouth all over his precious daughter at the dinner table?”

He swears he hears Maka gulp as he traces the curve of her throat with the back of one of his fingers. When he presses a long, languid kiss to her ear and sucks her lobe between his teeth, he feels her lean into him, shifting in her seat slightly as a soft gasp escapes her mouth.

She had given him cart-blanche permission to do anything and everything to make their ruse believable, and this knowledge makes him feel uncharacteristically bold. He'd been sheepish yesterday after getting a little carried away with her hickey request, but now, that modesty is nothing more than a distant memory as he lets his tongue trace slowly, tantalizingly up her ear.

“S-Soul,” she breathes, and then her fingers are in his hair and she’s making that maddening little humming noise once more. “Soul, d-do that again, please–”

“I suppose I should probably get used to you constantly ordering me around,” he smirks into her hair. He indulges himself for a moment and inhales, breathing in the earthy scent of her shampoo and the floral scent of her perfume. “Given you’re a princess and all.”

She clicks her tongue in response, a huffy, frustrated little sound, but before she can properly sass him back, he obliges her with another long, slow lick of his tongue along her ear. He likes the way she sighs contentedly as he continues his ministrations, peppering luscious kisses down the column of her throat and along the ridge of her jaw. By the time he makes it to her chin, she’s practically gasping, her lips parted and her green eyes half-lidded in contentment. He kisses her primly on the tip of her nose and rests his forehead against hers.

“Anything else you’d like to demand of me, Your Highness?”

Her one hand is still tightly wound in his hair, the other still intertwined with his own. Soul trails his fingers down the side of her face before resting them gently upon her cheek.

“N-Nothing,” she murmurs, and she sounds surprisingly breathless. “Nothing… comes to mind right now.”

He lets his thumb brush absently across her skin. As his eyes fall to her mouth, he notices, for the first time, the perfect Cupid’s bow shape of her upper lip, and for about five whole seconds, he’s completely convinced that his no-kissing-on-the-mouth rule is the stupidest thing in the entire world.

The princess is his final client – really, truly, he'll be done with escorting for good after this job. Would it really be such a bad thing if he were to ki–

A muffled, sort of choked… sobbing sound interrupts his train of thought long enough for Soul to get a hold of himself, to snap him back to reality. He watches, almost in slow motion, as Maka turns her head toward the source of the noise, watches the dreamy smile slowly fade from her face as recognition dawns on her expression. Soul follows her gaze, and–

Standing there, in the very same double-door entrance that Maka had appeared through not fifteen minutes ago, is a tall, broad-shouldered man with a head of long, strikingly red hair, dressed in a heavily decorated military uniform of black-and-gold–a man that Soul needs absolutely no introduction to name.

King Spirit Albarn.

And he looks like he’s seen a ghost.

His face is frozen in an expression halfway between blind fury and abject horror, his mouth hanging open and all the color drained from his cheeks, and every few seconds, his right eye twitches manically.

Beside the king stands Damien, and murderous doesn’t even begin to describe the look on his face.

Soul wonders, almost casually as the two other men in the room stare at him and the princess, if any member of the Bellemortian royal family has ever actually murdered someone, or if there are reports of people ‘disappearing under mysterious circumstances’ after crossing them. He feels beyond stupid for not looking into this before accepting the job. With Maka's own tendency to resort to violence, he wouldn't be surprised if the proverbial apple–or rather, pomegranate–didn't fall far from the tree.

But, in any case, even if he’s a dead man by the end of these four months, at least he’ll be a rich dead man.

“Well, hey, Pops!” Soul shatters the silence of the room with an over-enthusiastic greeting and a too-casual wave of his hand. He makes a show of checking the non-existent watch on his wrist. “How nice of you to finally join us.”

He reaches for Maka and snakes his arm around her shoulders, plasters a shit-eating grin on his face as he pulls her in close. She goes completely rigid beside him for a split second, as if resistant to his touch, before recovering her composure and leaning into him eagerly. He presses a kiss to the part in her hair, lets his lips linger there long enough for it to be convincing. When he finally parts from her, he runs his hand affectionately along the soft skin of her arm.

“King Spirit Albarn himself, in the flesh,” Soul continues, his voice defiant. “You’re a little shorter in person.”

Across the way, King Spirit clamps his jaws shut and twists his face into what Soul thinks is an attempt at a close-lipped smile, but his eyes are wide and blinking furiously with disbelief.

“M-Maka, my sweet little blossom…” He stutters, and Soul bites his tongue, because the old man’s voice is higher and much more nasally than he’d expected of a king. He clears his throat and straightens his stance, raises his chin in what must be an attempt to assert some authority, some control over the situation. “W-Would you kindly explain who our… dinner guest is?”

Damien has cast his eyes up to the ceiling, as if he can’t bear to watch, as if he were pleading with some heavenly being on high for an end to his suffering.

“Oh, Papa!” Maka replies without missing a beat, in a voice that is blissfully happy and completely unaffected by her father’s mounting distress. With an ease so poised and graceful you’d think she’d rehearsed it, she reaches her left hand up to tangle in Soul’s hair, starts threading her fingers through it fondly. “You have no idea how much I’ve been looking forward to this moment…”

Soul can’t help how his smile widens at the double meaning in her words, and he has to bite back a full-fledged smirk as she turns her head to look up at his face. He meets her eyes, and finds it surprisingly easy to look deep into them; he holds eye contact, and Maka allows several beats of silence before she continues.

“This is my fiancé, Soul.”

It’s like the moment right after stepping off a cliff and into freefall, the agonizingly quiet, almost surreal seconds immediately following that proclamation, and Soul watches Damien’s eyes close in excruciatingly slow motion, watches them squeeze shut as if bracing for impact.

“F-Fahhh… fuhhhh…” King Spirit sputters. “Fee-fee-fee… fiancé?!”

He falters, swaying where he stands as his face goes utterly pale with shock, and when he sags sideways, Damien springs into action.

“Your Majesty!”

The bodyguard is at the king’s side in an instant, catching him by the shoulders as he loses his balance, bracing his body with his own to support his weight.

For a moment, Soul categorically does not believe that any of this is real, that it’s all some sort of fever dream. He had been bracing himself for a whole slew of potential scenarios, different possibilities for how this moment could play out, but this one honestly had not even once occurred to him. But, as he watches the king’s body go limp in Damien’s grip, watches as his curtains of long, ruby-red hair fan out dramatically around his face and his head lolls sideways over one shoulder, it hits Soul with stunning, sobering clarity.

His Royal Majesty King Spirit Albarn, sovereign ruler over the nation of Bellemorte, had fainted at the news of his daughter’s engagement.

It takes the efforts of three people–Damien and both Thompson sisters– ten minutes to rouse the king.

To the rest of the palace staff’s credit, dinner had proceeded without interruption during the whole ordeal.

Servers in deep burgundy, double-breasted uniforms had entered the room without so much as a second glance at their unconscious head of state, and deposited baskets of fresh, still-warm bread upon the table and filled all dinner patrons’ empty cups with water–including King Spirit’s, whilst he’d been passed out in his chair. By the time a palace maid bursts into the dining room with a bottle of smelling salts–Soul hadn’t even realized that those were a real thing, and not just something made up for those old movies in which people faint for dramatic effect–Maka is buttering her second roll of bread, and the servers have placed the meal’s first course down in front of them: chopped salad made with chickpeas, feta cheese, and kalamata olives.

His awakening had been met with an inordinate amount of fussing from Liz, mild amusement from Patty, and… complete indifference from Damien. The bodyguard had retreated to the sidelines of the room with an entirely unmussed expression on his face, content to let his Chief of Staff handle the aftermath of their king’s fainting spell. He shows no interest in partaking of the food, and Soul adds it to the mounting list of mental evidence that the Bellemortian Head of Security isn’t human. He imagines that the renewed vigor in Damien’s glowing, golden eyes had been drawn directly from the king’s life energy, and that’s why it had taken so long to awaken him.

In any case, King Spirit is upright and fully conscious once again, and has not once taken his steely blue eyes off Soul’s face since opening them.

The mood is incredibly stiff, the tension in the air palpable, and the only sounds that permeate the oppressive silence are the occasional metallic scrape of utensils against plate, or the distant clang of pots and pans in the kitchen beyond.

“Your Majesty,” Liz intones, for about the fifth time since the king had awakened. “Are you sure you’re all–”

“I’m fine, I’m fine.” Spirit dismisses her concern with a dramatic wave of his hand. He sits up straighter in his seat, takes a long inhale through his nose. Reaches to smooth his hair back and loosen his collar. “Perfectly fine.”

For a moment, Liz looks like she might protest further, before a beep of the pager at her waist draws her attention away from the king. She checks it, and then promptly turns on her heel and exits the room, towing her younger sister along with her.

“Yeah,” Maka snorts, speaking for the first time since her father had woken up. “Because fainting is a perfectly fine reaction to news of your daughter’s–”

“Now, now, my tender little pomegranate blossom,” the king interrupts. “Fainting is a completely rational response to hallucinating.”

“Hallucinating?!” Maka’s voice is shrill.

“I thought I heard you say you were engaged, and that’s simply preposterous.” The king steeples his hands in front of his chin as he rests his elbows upon the table. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly logical, sound explanation for why this…” His glare intensifies and his eyes narrow as he regards Soul. “...This ruffian is in my palace, sitting at my dining room table, that doesn’t involve him being your…” the king pauses, his face contorting into a grimace. “...fiancé.”

“Papa, don’t be rude to your future son-in-law!” Maka huffs. “What kind of a first impression is this?”

“It’s hopefully a last impression,” King Spirit glowers.

“Papa,” Maka seethes. “Stop it. Look at me when I’m speaking to you.”

Soul watches with bated breath as the king’s gaze slowly shifts from his own face to Maka’s, watches him truly acknowledge her presence for the first time since he’d arrived. King Spirit’s eyes appraise his daughter’s features one by one, from her swept-back hairstyle to her blush-painted cheeks, from the stern set of her brows to the skull earrings dangling from her earlobes to–

“Sweetheart,” the king says carefully, though the mounting hysteria in his voice is only just barely held at bay. “What is that… on your neck, my darling?”

Soul draws in a fortifying breath and braces himself.

“Oh, these?” Maka lifts her hand, lets her long, thin fingers trace lightly, almost fondly, over the bruises that dot her throat, the deep purple and red blooms of color stark against her pale skin. Her eyes drift from her father’s face to Soul’s, and her voice turns sickeningly sweet. “They’re love bites.”

More disarming than her honeyed words, however, is the way she reaches out and touches him–how easily her fingers find the topmost button of his shirt, how they linger near the hollow of his throat. She isn’t even truly touching him, not really–she’s touching the fabric of his shirt, not applying near enough pressure to reach his skin beneath.

It’s incredibly intimate, and it makes his heart race– the way she slowly undoes the button, the way her eyes don’t leave his even once as she does so. He swallows slowly, excruciatingly aware of the movement of his throat and the roar of his heartbeat in his ears, momentarily immobilized by the endless green of her eyes and the subtle heat emanating from her fingertips.

“Letting everyone know exactly where I’ve been,” he rasps, his voice coming out thicker than he’d intended. He leans in to rest his forehead against hers, keeping King Spirit solidly in the periphery of his vision. “Maybe tonight we’ll have to do the other side, eh? So that it's even?”

Maka giggles, and he wants to linger in the effervescent sound of her laugh for as long as he possibly can, however–

“Absolutely not–!” Spirit bellows. “My palace, my rules, I will permit nothing of the sort within these four walls, as I live and breathe and–”

“Your rules?” Maka spits. Her expression darkens as her gaze cuts to her father across the table. “I have every bit of the authority you have in this palace, and Soul is my fiancé anyway–”

“I will not have my little girl deflowered right under my nose–”

“I am not a CHILD! I can do whatever I please in my own home, and whether I’m deflowered or not is none of your–”

“That is ENOUGH!” Damien roars, his thunderous voice rising above the cacophony. “All three of you. Soul– hands off the princess. Arms-length apart while at the dinner table.” His shrewd golden eyes narrow on Soul, who relinquishes his hold on Maka with a dramatic roll of his eyes. He raises his hands to his ears in an exaggerated display of innocence.

“And Your Majesty, would you please,” the bodyguard turns his murderous gaze on the king. “Get a hold of yourself? I’m not sure when you last checked, but your daughter is twenty-one years old, and she spent an entire summer on her own in the States. You have got to come to terms with reality, already.”

“B-But– h-he– Just look at this scoundrel she’s brought home, look at his piercings, look at how he slouches–”

“I have looked at him plenty these past few months, I assure you,” Damien says coldly. “It unfortunately does not change how Maka feels about him.”

This statement stirs odd, conflicting feelings within Soul– on the one hand, Damien is reprimanding him once again, but on the other hand, he’s also going out of his way to vouch for the legitimacy of their engagement; he didn't have to say that last part. He stares at the bodyguard in equal parts fear and appreciation, and the fact that he is talking back to the literal king without even so much as flinching is not lost on him.

King Spirit closes his eyes and sighs through his nose, fists and unfists his hands on top of the table. For a moment, he almost looks like he’s going to drop the subject and allow dinner to carry on somewhat pleasantly.

Maka, however, is not so inclined.

“Oh, Papa,” she sniffs, making a show of crossing her arms over her chest dramatically. “And here I thought you would be happy for me.” She sticks her lower lip out in a much-too-convincing pout. “I’ve found someone I’m absolutely head over heels in love with and you… you hate him!”

The princess continues her charade, sniffing a few more times and rapidly blinking her eyes as if fighting back tears. Soul pushes down the surge of… something, some unidentified emotion that rises in his chest when she says she’s ‘head over heels in love’, schools his face into a concerned expression and turns his attention to his betrothed.

“No, no, don’t cry, honey.” The pet name tastes funny on his tongue, and he presses a kiss to her forehead in an effort to ignore it. He wraps his arms around her, rubs her back soothingly. “We’ll figure this out, my love, I promise.”

The king clears his throat awkwardly and Maka sniffles again, whimpers sadly as she rests her head against Soul’s shoulder.

“I-I, I am… happy for you, Petal.” The king practically stumbles over the words as he grits them out. His jaw is clenched and his right eyebrow still twitches occasionally despite his best efforts. “O-Or at least, I want to be, I just– I had no idea you’d even… met someone in America.”

“Oh, Papa, what does it matter to you?” Maka spits. Soul watches her face change, watches her eyes narrow and her brows furrow. “You were ready to marry me off to the highest bidder as soon as I arrived home.”

“M-Maka, sweetie, we talked about this, you know what the law says–”

“I have absolutely no desire to relive that conversation.” She straightens then, sits up in her seat and makes a show of composing herself. “I'll marry Soul in December and the conditions of that stupid, antiquated law will be fulfilled,” she announces, her voice haughty. “If anything, this means less work for you.”

The king seems to deflate little by little with every word out of his daughter’s mouth. He’s slumped forward in his seat, elbows on the table and face in his hands, fingers tugging at the thin skin underneath his eyes, and his mouth hangs slightly open in disbelief.

“B-But I’ve already notified all of the suitors!” Spirit wails. “P-Preparations have already begun for a gala to be held next week for you to meet them, to choose one of them!” His grip tightens, stretching his skin and warping the shape of his face in a way that makes Soul bite his tongue to stifle a laugh. “What am I to tell them now?!”

“You’re to tell them that I’ve already chosen my husband,” Maka leers. “And that they can look forward to meeting me at my coronation next year.”

“M-Maka, my perfect flower, just- just think about this rationally for a moment,” Spirit presses, his already bleak expression turning desperate. “Are you absolutely sure about this? About… him? You know I only have your best interests at heart, I just want–”

“A good father would trust his daughter with her own best interests,” Maka seethes, and the king flinches as if she’d reached clear across the table and struck him. “And a good king would do as I say and call off the gala–”

“Don’t call it off.”

The words are out of Soul’s mouth before he has a chance to truly consider them, and Maka’s head whips around to face him so fast it gives him a start. The glint in her fierce green eyes is sharper than usual, and having them trained on him with such fiery intensity proves to have an odd effect on him. His heart thuds a little harder in his chest.

“U-uh, I mean, If I may suggest…” Soul coughs into his fist, pressing on and steadfastly ignoring his elevated heart rate. “If there’s gonna be a grand ball anyway–”

“Gala,” Maka corrects.

“-Gala.” Soul nods, hoping the smile he plasters on his face looks more genuine than it feels. “If there’s going to be a gala anyway… why not use it as an opportunity to announce our engagement?” He runs a nervous hand through his hair. “A-And I could… like, meet everyone, or… whatever?”

“Or whatever?” The king repeats, through gritted teeth.

“Yeah, I don’t know, surely there’s a million people I gotta meet since I’m marrying a princess.”

“I hardly think this American rapscallion is in any position to advise us on how to manage our royal affairs–”

“This American rapscallion–” Maka interrupts her father, her mouth threading into a conspiratorial smile. “Is going to be my consort in just a few months’ time. I think he’s well within his right to advise on royal affairs.” She pushes her fingers affectionately through Soul's hair. “And I also think he'll do a fine job of it.”

She leans toward him, her eyes fluttering shut and her lips pursing, and as she presses a kiss to his cheek, Soul makes direct eye contact with King Spirit Albarn. He thinks only of the six-figure prize due to him at the end of all this as he raises a hand and, using just his middle finger, sweeps a lock of his own hair from his forehead with a shit-eating grin on his face.

He watches the king’s face turn as red as his hair in real time, and swears he can almost hear the steam hissing out of his ears. By the time Maka pulls away, blissfully ignorant to the silent declaration of war that her betrothed has just issued upon her father, the king’s bottom lip has split open from the force of his teeth digging into it. He nearly punches the hapless server who suddenly appears beside him with a plate of what looks to be… stuffed grape leaves, and he rounds on him with such ferocity that the poor sap actually drops the plate. The dark green appetizers fall to the table one by one, sending a spray of pomegranate seeds flying in their wake.

“Papa! Honestly!” Maka quips. “What has gotten into you?”

Soul expects King Spirit to leap across the table and strangle him. He expects fire and brimstone, expects that his face will soon become intimately acquainted with the king’s fists. He expects retribution in some form, expects retaliation in full force.

He does not expect the way the king turns his attention back to his daughter, the way he coerces his mouth into a pained smile as he addresses her.

“N-Nothing, nothing, my dearest little daffodil,” he says through his teeth. He reaches for his cup of water and brings it stiffly to his lips. “A-An engagement gala is… a great idea.” He sets the cup down and swallows hard. “Whatever makes you happy, my darling. I-If what you truly want is… is to proceed with this marriage, then… then we shall see it done. ”

The king looks like he may throw up at any moment. Soul isn’t fooled, and he suspects that Maka isn’t either. She nods diplomatically and turns her attention to meticulously cutting into her grape leaves.

The three of them settle into a peaceful, if a little tense, silence. King Spirit makes polite conversation, asking Maka about her time in the States, and begrudgingly listens with feigned interest as she somehow manages to turn every single one of his questions into a grand tale about her and Soul and their (fictitious) summer romance. If she notices the daggers that her father sends at Soul with his eyes at every opportunity he gets, she doesn’t call attention to it, and overall, Soul hasn’t shed any blood tonight, so he considers the whole affair a smashing success.

One-hundred-thousand dollars, here he comes. As a server sets what he assumes is the main course for the evening–a whole roasted fish, eyes and all– down in front of him, Soul wonders offhandedly what the conversion rate is nowadays between the American dollar and the euro; he resolves to Google it later, since it’s looking like he may indeed make it through this dinner unscathed.

Guest Bedroom Wing, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 3rd, 20XX

About nine o’ clock in the evening

Maka takes a deep breath.

She's been staring very intently at the polished wood of the door to Soul's guest bedroom for a full fifteen seconds now, and she can't quite seem to parse out why she's so nervous.

She could have asked one of her aides to do this. She could wait until morning, could slowly back away and retreat to the safe refuge of her own bedroom, could let merely another ten hours pass until she sees him again at breakfast.

Why is she doing this?

Her grip tightens on the object in her hands, and she swallows down the indecision.

Because it feels like she ought to, and that's that.

She runs a finger over the delicate, velvet texture of the item she carries before raising a fisted hand to rap against the door.

She taps her knuckles three times in quick succession, and thinks of three reasons.

Because she wants to give it to him now, before it should accidentally become misplaced, somehow.

Because part of her wants to check on him, see how he's doing, because another part of her feels like she's responsible for his well-being, since she dragged him halfway across the world for the most ridiculous ruse of her life, and the least she can do is thank him for getting through the ordeal that was dinner with her father.

Because she finds herself wanting to see him for some reason, and she can't fathom what that reason could be.

“Yeah?”

His muffled voice on the other side of the door snaps her to attention. Maka clears her throat, and then promptly feels silly for doing so.

“It's…” she hesitates, suddenly all too aware of the fact that there could be a maid or a palace servant anywhere within earshot. “Soul, it’s me. I just wanted to say goodnight…” She pauses, swallows nervously. “...Babe.”

Moments later, he responds, an undercurrent of mild amusement in his voice.

“Come on in, princess.”

Maka’s hands feel clammy around the doorknob as it turns in her grip. She eases the door open and slips into his room.

“You should respond in kind when I address you by a pet name,” she whispers harshly as she closes the door. It shuts with a satisfying click, and she turns to face her betrothed. “If palace staff hear you addressing me sarcastically by my title they’ll–”

Her mouth goes dry and she completely loses her train of thought when she sees him.

He's got his arms halfway into the sleeves of a plain gray t-shirt, and she turns just in time to watch those arms raise above his head and pull said t-shirt down his body.

It's only a glimpse–a flash of golden tan skin, a fleeting impression of lean abdominal muscles–but it was enough.

The long, jagged line of the patchwork scar she'd seen in the photo from his escort profile is seared into the center of her vision.

“Sure,” He chuckles. He tugs at the hem of the shirt briefly before sliding his hands into the pockets of his pajama pants. “Which do you like better, then? ‘Honey’? ‘Sweetheart’? Something else?”

She blinks owlishly at him, feeling like an animal caught in a trap of its own making–hadn’t she been the one to come down here and knock on his door unannounced? Why is she freezing up, her mind gone blank and her mouth utterly at a loss for words?

Too many silent seconds pass, and Soul raises a brow at her.

“U-um,” she stammers, her voice meek. She swallows, gives her entire body a subtle shake as she straightens her spine. “S-Soul, I– I hope I’m not intruding on your evening?”

He shrugs.

“What’s there to intrude on? I was just gearing up for another riveting night of staring at the ceiling while I wait for the sweet embrace of sleep to claim me.”

Maka suppresses the urge to roll her eyes, because… well, because she’s here for an important reason, after all.

“R-Right, um. Well,” she continues, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “I came here to… to give you something.” Her eyes fall on the settee on the other side of the room, and she finds herself gesturing to it. “Mind if we… have a seat?”

He shrugs again to indicate that he doesn’t, and as soon as they’re seated side by side on the plush gray cushions, she turns to face him.

“So, obviously… we’re engaged, s-so I’ve got an engagement ring. I-I’m not wearing it right now because I’ve changed into my sleep clothes, but…” she wiggles her naked left ring finger absently. “B-But I… well, here.” She shoves the small black jewelry box at him, gives a little huff of frustration. Normally she’s so much more eloquent than this. “Here’s yours.”

She watches his expression change, watches his brows knit together as he takes the box into his hands–and it's not confusion taking shape on his face, she slowly realizes, but rather surprise. He carefully pries the box open, revealing the dark metal ring nestled securely inside. He stares at it for a long moment, before lifting his gaze and meeting her eyes once again.

“This is… an engagement ring for me?”

Maka nods.

“I had Damien request it when he contacted our jeweler to place the order for my ring,” she explains, finding comfort in forcing her brain to recall facts. “We rush-ordered mine so I’d have it before we left California to go along with our proposal story. Yours was made after mine, but… I still requested a matching set.”

Slowly, carefully, Soul reaches into the box and plucks the ring gingerly from within it. He holds it in the palm of his other hand and admires it for a little while longer. He’s silent for so long, Maka worries she’s offended him, somehow.

“I-Is it okay if I ask you to wear it? Or is that something you’re not–”

“Y-yeah, yeah of course.” He sets the box down, closes his hand around the ring for a moment, before opening again. He traces the outline of the metal band with his other index finger, and then he looks up at her, directly into her eyes. “Of course I’ll wear it.”

Maka smiles despite herself, and she reaches for the ring.

“May I?”

Soul nods, and she takes it from his palm wordlessly. She reaches for his fingers, and her heart skips a beat at how intimate the act feels, at the weight and warmth of his hand in hers and the contrast of their skin tones– his golden tan against her porcelain pale.

At how he offers absolutely no resistance as she takes his fingers into her own.

She recalls how these very hands looked in another one of his escort profile photos, how elegant and refined they'd looked poised above the keys of a piano, and something impossibly warm unfurls deep within her at the thought of perhaps one day watching them dance across those keys firsthand.

“It’s not… it’s not a Bellemortian custom for men to wear engagement rings, or anything like that. Not really.” She eases the ring onto his fourth finger, taking care not to catch the skin around his knuckles as she does so. “I just think… that you and I should be equals in this.”

She takes a moment to admire it once it’s securely in place; the deep, dark gray of the titanium band looks nice against his tan skin. The thin stripe of red running through the middle of it–a complement to the ruby that serves as the centerpiece of her own engagement ring–catches the light and sparkles when he flexes his fingers.

When she finally tears her gaze from it, she realizes he’s staring at her with a strange expression and a soft smile on his face, and with this realization, heat floods her cheeks.

“Yeah. Equals,” He says, and his voice is just a touch lower in pitch than it was a moment ago. It makes her stomach churn. “I like the sound of that.”

Maka nods as she releases his hand.

“U-Um, and also, one other thing.” She averts her eyes, looks down at her fingers splayed awkwardly in her lap. “I– um. Thank you. For being such a good sport at dinner. W-With my father and… everything.”

Soul’s smile widens. His own hands move as he reaches to fidget with his brand new ring, and Maka watches him twist it slowly around his finger rather than meet his eyes.

“Hey, it was nothing. I’m still breathing, aren’t I?” he chuckles. “Although, I think I'd like to make a case to amend our agreement. If I incur any bodily harm in these next four months, I’ll expect interest on that one-hundred grand.”

Despite everything – the fizzy, butterfly-sensation of nerves in her stomach and the odd weight between them in this moment – Maka laughs.

“I’ll consider it,” she says.

His face changes, his expression softening and his eyes creasing at the corners.

“Good enough for me.”

“Right, well, if there's nothing else, then…” She rises from the settee, clears her throat awkwardly. “I-I'll take my leave. Let you get started on the whole… Staring at the ceiling thing.”

She crosses the room in a hurry after that; when she reaches the door, Soul speaks.

“You never answered my question.”

Maka pauses with her fingers curled around the doorknob. She peeks at him over her shoulder.

“Which question?”

Still seated on the settee on the other side of the room, he raises an amused eyebrow at her as a thoroughly infuriating expression flickers across his face.

“The question of what pet name you'd like me to call you. ‘Honey’, ‘sweetheart’, ‘fire of my loins’, queen above all queens’-”

“Angel.”

“What?”

Maka clears her throat, lifts her chin in an attempt to seem authoritative, though she's in her pajamas and feels anything but in the present moment.

“I'd prefer you call me ‘angel’.”

Soul nods, and her eyes snag on the corners of his lopsided smile.

“As you wish,” he smirks. “...angel.”

She nods curtly, trying and failing to will away the heat burning in her face.

“V-Very well then. Good night, Soul.”

She excuses herself in a hurry, not waiting for him to respond before she opens the door and steps out of the room. As soon as she's on the other side of the closed door, she scurries down the hallway and ascends the multiple stairwells to her chambers in a flurry of quiet, frenzied footsteps.

Try as she might, she can’t stop her mouth from stretching into a maddening smile. It doesn’t leave her face once, not even when she’s finally back in her own room with the lights turned off, and the covers pulled up securely over her head.

She smiles like a hapless idiot into the darkness, until sleep eventually claims her.

Chapter Text

Princess’s Bedroom, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 10, 20XX

A quarter past nine o’ clock in the morning

A pack of pills is mocking her.

More specifically, four packs of pills are mocking her.

They sit menacingly atop her dresser, tucked away and hidden from sight in the plain, nondescript white of the palace pharmacy bag that conceals them. There are four packs contained within said bag, this Maka knows, because she’d ripped it open as soon as she’d received it from her aide last week, and has since removed them from their confines for the express purpose of having a crisis over them no less than three times per day.

Four packs. Twenty-eight pills per pack. One pack per month. 

It is not lost on Maka that her wedding is in four months. 

Her fingernails dig into her palms as her hands ball into fists. She turns on her heels and stalks away, turns from the offending birth control pills and paces to the other end of her room with her brows furrowed and her shoulders hunched in frustration. 

She should just take the damn pills. 

What’s the harm in it? What’s the harm in taking a medication that was specifically prescribed for her? It’s not like taking a few pills laced with hormones is going to send her diving headfirst into bed with her fiancé. She doesn’t even have to tell her fiancé she’s taking them, not if she doesn’t want to. Besides, shouldn’t she take them anyway, just to be on the safe side? What if she changes her mind about the whole ‘no-sex’ thing–

No. Oh, no no no no no no no. 

See, this is why she shouldn’t take them, because just the thought of taking them has her thinking completely irrational thoughts, like thoughts of sleeping with–

She’s not going to change her mind. Not now, not in four months, not ever. 

“Your Highness?” 

There’s a knock at her door, accompanied by the attentive voice of one of her aides. 

“What is it?!” Maka spits. She can hear the irritation in the words as they leave her lips.

“I-I’m terribly sorry if this is a bad time, Princess, b-but may I come in?” 

“ No.” 

There’s a beat of silence, and then–

“Your Highness, is everything all right?” 

Maka takes a deep breath, because screaming at an innocent aide will do nothing to resolve her current dilemma. She unclenches her fists and straightens her spine, digs the heels of her hands into her eyes as she sucks in a deep breath. When she speaks once more, her tone of voice is not quite calm, but is at least several degrees closer to it than it had been moments ago.

“I’m fine, Brigitte,” she says. “What can I do for you?”

“Your father sent for you, Your Highness,” Brigitte replies without missing a beat. “He’s waiting out in the limousine for you. You were supposed to leave for Parliament twenty minutes ago.”

Parliament. Shit. 

Maka sprints across her room, clearing the twenty feet between her main bedroom and her closet in a flash–seriously, she may be royalty, but she’d do just fine with a bedroom half this size–and manages to trip over her own feet in the process.

“Princess, what was that–”

“Th-thank you, Brigitte!” Maka stumbles into her closet, one hand rubbing at her bruised knee and the other hand fumbling for a pair of shoes. “I-I was, um, I just– I lost track of time because I was, uh, alphabetizing my bookshelf.” She crosses to the other side of her closet and yanks an overcoat from a hanger. “Please tell my father I’ll be right down!” 

There is only a moment’s hesitation before Brigitte’s response. 

“Of course, Your Highness.”

Brigitte departs, and in another few minutes, Maka pauses, fully dressed, at her bedroom door, her fingers curled around the doorknob and her feet stopped in their tracks. Her mind returns once more to the pills on top of her dresser. 

She’s almost late for her very first session of Parliament–which she had so begged her father to let her sit in on, which he had finally conceded–and instead, all she can think about it is Soul, and the stupid ‘no sexual services’ clause of their agreement, and the stupid pills that have given her nothing but grief for the past week. 

Her forehead thunks lightly against the door. 

With a sigh of defeat, she turns around. 

It’s for the credibility of our relationship, she thinks to herself as she fishes a pack out of the bag. Because what if one of her maids comes across four unopened packs of birth control pills while cleaning her room, and what if word then gets out that the princess is not actually taking said birth control pills? Who knows what nonsense the rumor mill might generate.

They need to convince the world they’re madly in love, and part of that also means convincing the world they’re having sex–because unfortunately, the world seems to equate the two things. 

So, as she pokes a fingernail through shiny foil backing, as she reaches for the bottle of water on her nightstand and twists the cap off, as she places the pill on her tongue and takes a swig from the bottle, she tells herself this as many times as she needs to in order to believe it. 

She’ll take the birth control pills to ensure their ruse stays believable, and that’s that. 

Bellemortian countryside

Saturday, September 10, 20XX

About midday

He’ll never tire of this feeling. 

The sun warming his face and the wind whipping through his hair while the world rushes by in a blur of color around him, the exhilarating, addictive feeling of going fast –there's nothing else like it. Very few things in this life come anywhere close to topping how Soul feels when he's riding his motorcycle.

His beloved bike had taken an extra week to make it across the Atlantic, which, he now knows, is far too long to go without a ride, and with several hours to kill this morning, he can think of no better way to see the countryside of the land of ‘Beautiful Death’. 

Much like with its princess, the pictures he’d seen online of Bellemorte really hadn’t done the country justice.

Gently rolling hills to his left, the green and gold fields blanketed in the late summer splendor of pink and red blooms, and the sparkling jewel of the Mediterranean Sea to his right. A blue, virtually cloudless sky above, and the open road stretching out before him, miles upon miles of pavement twisting and turning as it hugs the curves of the cliff’s edge. Soul could almost trick his brain into thinking he hadn’t even left California, that he’s still back home enjoying a leisurely drive along the Pacific Coast Highway, if it weren’t for the fact that he’s driving on the left side of the road. 

He slows to a stop as he rounds the next corner, as he crests to the highest point of the cliffs and starts to feel the altitude plateau beneath him. His bike tires crunch against gravel as he pulls to the shoulder of the road, turning the key over in the ignition and quieting the low purr of the engine. Soul leans back in the seat of the motorcycle and breathes in deep, inhaling a lungful of salty sea air as he listens to the dull roar of the waves crashing below. He looks out at the horizon, where the ocean meets the sky, and sighs.

The cliffs here are not nearly as steep as they are in California. He’s never been one for homesickness, but somehow, the view is just reminiscent enough of the place he left behind, all the way on the other side of the world, it manages to tug at something deep in his chest and stir a restless, uneasy pang of emotion, something slightly bitter and almost nostalgic. 

It still hasn’t quite hit him that he’ll be here for four months.  

It still hasn’t quite hit him, the magnitude of all this, of the role he’s agreed to play. 

His first week in Bellemorte had been strangely quiet and rather uneventful–aside from the first night dining with the king, of course. Besides that, it had been relaxing , even. Maka had eased him into palace life, had left him largely to his own devices, and had not asked much of him these first seven days of his stay. He slept in a bed much bigger than the one he’d left behind, received three square meals per day–none of which he had to prepare for himself–and has had more free time to lounge about and explore the palace than he’d known what to do with. 

If anything, it’s felt almost like a vacation so far. 

But tonight, all of that changes. After tonight, there will be no going back. 

Soul lifts his left hand and holds it up in front of him almost absently, examining the dark metal band around his ring finger for probably the hundredth time this week, and hears Maka’s words in his head, as clearly as the night she'd said them.

I just think we should be equals in this. Partners.  

He’s been thinking about those words for days now, has turned them over and over in the theater of his mind more times than he’d ever openly admit, and he still can’t figure out why they stuck with him. Why he feels a swoop in his stomach and a swelling sensation in his chest when he recalls them. Why he can’t stop thinking about that conversation that night in his bedroom, the look on Maka’s face when she’d slipped the ring onto his finger. 

The blackened metal glints sharply in the full, early afternoon sun as he tilts his hand, turns his palm toward his face. He flexes his fingers, makes a fist, and then uncurls it just as quickly before running those fingers through his hair in exasperation.

He’s got to get his act together. He’s got to get his head in the game. 

He’s got to put all of these confusing feelings aside and focus.

Tonight is an important night–possibly the most important night of this entire job. His first public appearance as Crown Princess Maka Albarn’s husband-to-be. After tonight, the whole world will know his name. 

A terrifying thought, honestly, perhaps the most terrifying aspect of this entire ordeal. 

He checks his watch with a flick of his wrist and a shrug of his shoulders. With another heavy sigh, he realizes how much time has passed, and he casts one last, longing look out at the ocean before reaching for the key in the ignition once again.

He isn’t sure how far exactly he’s come out, but he does know it's about an hour’s ride back to the palace, and he dare not be late for his appointment with the princess this afternoon.

With a twist of the key and a push of his foot, Soul sets off in the direction he’d come from, with only his restless thoughts, the rush of the wind and the roar of the engine for company. 

Grand Ballroom, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 10, 20XX

A little past two o’ clock in the afternoon

He’s ten minutes late. 

Possibly more than ten minutes, if the look on Kid’s face as he checks his watch again is anything to go by. 

Maka’s eyes bounce nervously between the shrewd look on her bodyguard’s face and the points of her shoes, her hands idly worrying at the hem of her dress. Her heels clack against the tile of the ballroom floor when she shifts her weight from one foot to the other, fidgeting in place as she recalls her conversation with Soul this morning. Surely she’d told him the correct time? Surely, she hadn’t gotten it mixed up when she’d outlined the day's events for him over breakfast?

She tries to think back on the conversation, but the day had been so busy that it’s all blurring together. Breakfast, Parliament, debrief with her father after Parliament, a public appearance in town after that. She’d hardly had time for lunch, let alone checking in on her betrothed’s whereabouts.

“Should I–”

“No,” Kid says firmly. He sucks in a sharp breath and somehow, the furrow between his brows manages to deepen. “No, Your Highness. Let me handle it.” He clears his throat before lifting a finger to his ear, inclines his head before speaking once more. “Kilik, this is Reaper One. I need a status check on Loverboy...” A pause. “Yes, of course you should go check his bedroom,” Kid continues in a harsh whisper. “That’s the first place you should look!” Another pause, and Maka has to bite her lip to suppress a giggle–the vein in the center of Kid’s forehead is bulging under his skin comically, because of course Kid is getting worked up over something as trivial as Soul being late for dance practice.

“Copy that, and check back in when you–”

The wide double doors at the other end of the grand ballroom burst open with a thundering clang . Maka turns her head, her mouth falling open in surprise as she watches Soul stumble into the room. His hair looks mussed, windswept even, his mouth hanging open and his chest heaving with panting breaths as his fingers fiddle with the topmost buttons of the slate gray dress shirt he wears. He crosses the length of the ballroom in a flash, his dress shoes squeaking against the floor with every hurried step along the way.

“Solomon Evans!” Kid spits. “Do you realize what time it is?!”

Soul’s footsteps cease, screeching to a halt a few meters from where Maka stands in the center of the ballroom floor. The look on his face is cautious, apprehensive even, as he turns to meet Kid’s stern glare. 

“It’s, ah–” Soul stammers, swallowing and clearing his throat once. “It’s about a quarter past 2 last I checked–”

“And are you aware what time you were supposed to report?” 

“T-Two pm sharp–”

“Exactly,” Kid huffs. “I hope you have a very good excuse for making the princess wait almost fifteen minutes for you.”

Soul rolls his shoulders, lets his eyes flicker from Kid’s face to Maka’s face, and back to Kid again. 

“I was, uh, my motorcycle arrived today and I had some time to kill so I did a little… um, sightseeing, Damien, sir–”

“Sightseeing? Sightseeing?! Solomon Evans, we are not paying you to be a tourist! You wasted Her Highness’s valuable time because you were sightseeing–”

“ Kid, please.” Maka steps forward, gently placing a hand on Kid’s shoulder. He turns to her, expression thunderstruck, at the contact. “It’s Soul’s first week here. I don’t blame him for wanting to get out and see our beautiful country.” She offers a soft smile. “Let’s cut him some slack this time, alright?” 

There’s a beat of silence as Kid processes Maka’s directive. He blinks mutely in disbelief a few times, before nodding begrudgingly. 

“Very well, Princess.” The grimace on his face is almost pained as he straightens his posture. He cracks his neck once and sucks in a breath. “If that’s what you wish.” His harsh golden gaze cuts over to Soul. “But don’t let it happen again. You’re lucky the princess is patient with you. Now if you’ll excuse me.” He turns to leave. “I need to meet with His Majesty to discuss the security detail for this evening’s festivities.” 

They watch him leave in silence, and it isn’t until the sound of his footsteps recede and the massive doors close behind him that they exchange any words. 

“Is he–” Soul breaks the silence first. “Is he always so… uptight?”

“I think I can count the number of times I’ve seen him smile on one hand.”

“Damn,” Soul whistles. Maka watches his posture soften, his hands sliding into his pockets. “That’s honestly impressive. How long has he been the head of security?” 

“The last five years,” Maka says. “Since his father died.”

“So… he probably smiles about once per year, then, is what you’re saying?” 

Maka laughs as she turns and starts walking toward the side of the room. The clicking of her heels against the tile floor echoes throughout the empty ballroom. “Probably even less than that, now that you’re here.”

“Was that… was that a joke, Your Highness?” 

“I’ve been known to make jokes from time to time. I can be quite funny, actually,” Maka replies coolly. She stops walking, turns to look at Soul askance over her shoulder, and waves him along with a flourish of her hand. “Now come on, we’re already behind schedule since someone felt the need to go sightseeing today.” 

Soul rolls his eyes, but smirks even as he moves to follow her. She expects him to jab back, but he doesn’t; he obediently follows her in silence as she leads him to a small wooden table tucked away in a corner of the ballroom, atop which a stereo sits next to a spray of red and pink flowers. 

“Now, as I informed you this morning,” Maka begins. She reaches to turn the stereo on and fiddles with the controls. “Tonight, after our entrance and the formal announcement of our engagement, the gala will open with a royal dance. It’ll be a grand waltz, and you and I will go first. All eyes will be on us for at least two minutes before attendees will be permitted to join us on the dance floor.” She clicks the seek button until the track number on the stereo displays the correct one–Track 13 on the CD, the Grand Bellemortian Waltz. She hits play, and the familiar, orchestral notes of the song flood through the speakers. She turns to Soul, a satisfied, if somewhat nervous, smile on her face. “So, that is what we will be running through today.”

He’s standing merely a few paces away from her now, an almost thoughtful expression coloring his face as he takes his hands out of his pockets and steps toward her. He closes the remaining distance between them with a smirk, and it's downright infuriating, how charming that smile of his is, how it makes Maka’s heart flutter. The way one side of his mouth pulls up a little higher than the other, the way his eyes crinkle at the corners. The way those very eyes don't stray from her face even once as they assume the proper form and position, Maka clasping one of her hands in his and resting the other gently upon his shoulder.

 “So, dance practice.” Soul quirks an inquisitive brow as he looks down at Maka, and something about standing this close to him makes her hyper-aware of the height difference between the two of them–had she not noticed before since he's always slouching? Or is it simply because it's impossible to ignore the eight, nine, possibly ten inches he's got on her with one of his hands entwined in hers and the other resting heavily on her waist?

“Yes,” Maka says around a swallow, tilting her chin up in an attempt to feign confidence. “I-I wanted a practice run before the gala tonight. Without an audience.”

His smirk deepens, and something low in Maka’s stomach swoops.

“Alright then. I'll follow your lead.”

Heat rushes to her cheeks as she averts her eyes.

“U-um, a-actually, Soul… I was hoping you would… lead.”

“Me? You want me to lead?” Soul gapes. His brows pinch together curiously. “Why?” 

“B-Because–” Maka fidgets, shifting her weight from one foot to the other impatiently. She looks away, directs her gaze to some point on a faraway wall, her mind grasping for an excuse, any excuse, anything that sounds halfway plausible and isn’t horribly embarrassing, as to why she’d want Soul to take the lead. Her silence lingers between them a moment too long, hanging heavily in the stillness of the almost empty ballroom–it's just the two of them now, but in a mere matter of hours, this very room will be packed with questioning, curious eyes; her entire royal court, the rest of European royal society, the press–

“Maka?” Soul’s voice is careful, more gentle than it was a moment ago. “What’s wrong?” He squeezes her hand tighter, uses his grip on her waist to pull her ever so slightly closer. “What’s goin’ on inside that head of yours?” 

His tone is gentle, yet not without a hint of playfulness, and somehow–maybe it’s because they’re entirely alone, maybe it’s because she’s not used to the notion of someone else witnessing her in a vulnerable moment–it manages to break through her defenses. The walls she’s had in place so long, she can’t even remember why she’d put them there in the first place. 

“I’m not… much for dancing,” she admits, her voice barely louder than a whisper. She still doesn’t meet Soul’s eyes, keeps her gaze fixed elsewhere. “I never have been. I’ve always… kind of hated it. In fact, I’ve made a habit of avoiding it whenever I can. And so…” Maka swallows. “As a result, I’m unfortunately not very good at it.” 

She pauses, allows Soul the opportunity to interject if he’d like, but he says nothing. She can feel the weight of his stare as her gaze drops to his shoulder. She lets her other hand, the one not clasped in his, slide just a bit higher up on his shoulder, relishing in the crisp feeling of his dress shirt beneath her fingers. After a deep breath, she continues.

“Your escort profile said you had eight years of ballroom dance experience. It’s one of the reasons I chose you.” It’s nothing more than a simple fact, but for some reason, stating it out loud makes the burning in her cheeks intensify. “S-So, I would… really appreciate it… if you would lead.” She finally meets his eyes, and there’s a strange emotion in them–one not unlike the way he’d looked at her the night she’d given him his engagement ring. “Please?” 

She has no idea what sort of answer to expect, and she can hear her heartbeat roaring dully in her eardrums in anticipation of it.

“Alright, that’s fine,” he says after a moment, so simply, so easily, and Maka’s breath leaves her lips in an abrupt exhale. “I’ll lead, then. No problem.”

The relief she feels is a living thing, blooming outward from the center of her chest and spreading to every last inch of her body in waves. Her heart pounds against the inside of her ribcage and her breath comes to her in shallow gasps–they’ve not even begun to dance and already, she feels exhilarated, like she’s been spun around and around and around more times than she could count. 

“R-Really?” 

“Of course,” Soul says, and his smile is lopsided once again, his eyes lidded as he looks down at her. He raises their interlaced hands and adjusts his grip on her waist. “It’s fine. Just let me know when you’re ready.”

Maka closes her eyes and draws in a long breath. She clears her mind, pushes away the images crowding her subconscious of what this ballroom will look like when its packed full of people, pushes away the all-too-familiar feeling of countless eyes watching her every move, until there is just this–her and Soul, standing alone in the ballroom, listening to the soft, rhythmic sound of the music. 

She nods. “I’m ready.”

When she opens her eyes, Soul’s expression hasn’t changed. She keeps her eyes trained on his face as he begins to move–a gentle sway to the right, a step to the left, a step backward, which for her is a step forward, and then repeat. It occurs to her, for perhaps the first time, that, much like anything in life (especially royal life), that dancing is a performance, yes, but it’s also an exchange . An exchange of movement, an exchange of energy, an exchange of trust between two people. 

She stumbles, trips over her own feet, and what little confidence she’d  begun to muster falters as she tears her eyes from his face and looks down at the floor. She watches Soul’s feet, the scuff marks on his well-worn dress shoes, and tries to find her footing again. 

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Soul says as he stops moving. “We can start over, and we’ll go even slower. No biggie.” 

Maka swallows down the disappointment in herself, and gives a curt nod. 

And they begin again. 

Right, left, backward. Right, left, backward. And so on. Over and over again. 

At first, Maka stares intently at their feet as Soul guides them through the motions, while she gets used to the pattern of movement. She trips once or twice more, and each time is like the first–they stop, and start again. And each time, Maka trains her gaze downward, watches her own feet stumble to catch on to the rhythm set by Soul’s, until eventually, she no longer stumbles. 

Until eventually, they fall into a rhythm. 

There’s something sensory and meditative, almost intimate about this–about dancing together. The heat of Soul’s palm burning against hers as she grips his hand tightly, the comforting weight of his other hand on her waist. The hypnotic lull of the music and the gentle, rhythmic sway of their bodies as they move together. Gradually, Maka’s movements grow more confident, gradually, her grip on Soul’s hand and his shoulder eases up a bit. She finds herself almost smiling as her feet move through the motions, as it starts to feel less like she’s following him and more like she’s simply moving along with him. 

“So,” Soul says suddenly, his voice weaving like silk through the music. “Tell me, I’ve gotta know. Why else did you choose me?” 

“What?” Maka’s mouth drops open, and her rhythm falters the slightest bit, but she catches herself before she stumbles. 

Soul’s smile widens. “A moment ago. You said the ballroom dance experience was one of the reasons you chose me. What other reasons were there?”

“I-I, um–” Maka stammers. “I d-don’t see how that’s… relevant to anything.”

“It’s relevant to everything ,” Soul responds without missing a beat. “Certainly it’s relevant to this job, I’d say.”

“What?” Maka repeats. “How?” 

“I take pride in my work, you know,” he chuckles. “I wanna be a good fake fiancé. The best, even.” A surge of anxiety wells in Maka’s chest, that he’s speaking so freely of their arrangement while in the palace, until she remembers how utterly alone they are–and even if they weren’t, they have the cover of the music and their hushed voices due to proximity to hide behind. “So, it would help me to know what your other reasons for hiring me were.”

Maka narrows her eyes at him. 

“I don’t think–”

“Alright, I’m gonna spin you, are you ready?” 

“What? You’re going to what–?” Maka screeches. “Soul–”

“It’ll be fine, I’ll go slow.” His grip on her waist and her hand tightens. “Just keep following my lead, okay?” 

“I–”

He doesn’t give her time to respond, doesn’t let her get a word in before he starts to lift their joined hands. 

“Soul–”

“One…” he starts. “Two…”

“Soul, seriously–”

“And three–”

There’s gentle pressure against her waist where his other hand is, and then–

Maka’s field of vision tilts, slowly at first, as Soul spins her, using his hold on her hand to twirl her in place. A small ‘ eep’ sound leaves her lips as she picks up speed, as her feet turn in a circle despite herself, and the ballroom whirls around her faster and faster and faster until–

“There.”

Her momentum comes to an sudden halt. 

She’s standing with her back against Soul’s chest and his other hand resting comfortably on her waist once again. She’s stopped moving, stopped spinning, and is wrapped securely in his embrace. 

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” His breath tickles her ear and Maka is suddenly all too aware of just how close they are, how the warmth of his body simmers against hers where his chest touches her back, how her shoulder tucks perfectly under his raised arm. Slowly, she turns her head to look back and up at him, and finds his face mere inches from hers. 

For a moment, she’s spellbound. For a moment, their eyes meet, and it’s as though there’s nothing else in the world except this–the heat of his body and the intensity of his stare, the warmth of his breath and the rich, comforting russet brown of his eyes.

For a moment, she’s completely immobilized. She watches him, captivated, as he holds her gaze, as his eyes drop to her mouth and back up again. She swears he leans in even closer to her, almost close enough to rest his forehead against hers. 

“N-no…” she hears herself say, her mouth working almost robotically. “No, I guess… I guess it wasn’t so bad.”

There’s another heavy beat of stillness, and then–

Soul clears his throat and moves, pulls himself away and re-positions her in his hold, and the spell is broken. 

“Now then,” he says as he resumes the familiar, three-step pattern of dancing. “As we were discussing–the reasons you hired me.”

Maka rolls her eyes despite the smile pulling at her lips, the ephemeral wonder of the previous moment melting away nearly as quickly as it had come on. His persistence is mildly irritating, but she can't deny that there’s something maddeningly charming about it, too.

She can't deny that he's just maddeningly charming, in general.

“I already told you,” she says. Soul quirks an eyebrow and her smile deepens. “The night we met. You don't remember? I hired you because I knew my papa would hate you.”

It’s a vague answer, this she knows, but it’s about as much information as she wants to give him. The memory of sitting on her bed in her vacation home back in California flashes in her mind’s eye, the memory of scrolling through the pictures on his profile the night she’d dreamed up this whole fake engagement scheme. The image of him leaning against that motorcycle of his, clad in that stupid leather jacket with that stupid devilish smile on his face.

How much she’d liked that stupid leather jacket and that stupid devilish smile, which he definitely doesn’t need to know about.

“Oh, okay, so you have daddy issues?” Soul smirks, choosing that moment to slide his hand around the small of her back and press her closer. “You’re going through your whole ‘teen rebellion’ thing a few years late, and you need a partner in crime? A bad boy to really seal the deal?”

“D-daddy issues?!” Maka’s jaw drops. “I do not have–”

“Aaaaand another spin, here we go–”

“Soul! ” 

He spins her with enough momentum she nearly loses her footing, pushes her forward and turns her before she can get another word of protest out. The ballroom is a black, white, and red blur of motion as Maka whirls around, hardly getting her bearings about her before she stops and finds herself face-to-face and hand-in-hand with Soul once again. 

“So yeah–daddy issues,” Soul continues. “Daddy issues and ballroom dance lessons. I’ve gotta write this down later when I get back to my room so I know how to market myself in the future.”

Maka would smack him if she could, but seeing as maintaining their rhythm won’t allow it, she settles for a half-hearted nudge of her arm against his shoulder. She can’t help the giggle that escapes her lips–whether it's from the exhilaration of spinning or the teasing tone in Soul’s voice, or something else, she can’t say. There’s something so refreshing about it–about being able to laugh now, in this private moment with him. Something so refreshing about how freely he’s able to poke fun at her about this. 

When was the last time she’d honestly, truly laughed?

Soul says nothing more, electing only to watch her face with a soft smile of his own. He stays quiet, letting the ambient music fill the silence between them for several more moments. 

“I suppose maybe daddy issues is part of it,” Maka finally acknowledges, dropping her eyes from his face to his chest for a brief moment. “I’m… really quite mad at him, right now, actually. About the arranged marriage thing.” It’s nothing Soul probably hasn’t been able to piece together on his own, but still, there’s something very freeing about admitting her anger out loud to him. She expects him to press her for more details, but he simply nods and says nothing. Maka stares into his eyes for a long moment, genuinely unsure what more to say. 

“But… but also, I just… kinda had a feeling about you, when I found your profile,” she blurts. Soul raises his eyebrows as she continues. “You seemed… different, somehow, from the other escorts. More genuine, more authentic. Less full of yourself. I just got this feeling that you were my Mr. Right. Or… my Mr. Wrong , I guess would be more accurate.”

Heat floods her cheeks at the way Soul smiles, but before she can say anything else, he’s spinning her again, and this time, she’s more ready for it. 

“Mr. Wrong, eh?” he muses. Maka’s heels clack against the tile floor as she completes a full rotation, the skirt of her dress swishing around her legs as she returns to Soul’s embrace. “I like the sound of that. I’m glad you chose me. I’ll be your bad boy, your Mr. Wrong, for as long as you need.”

Her cheeks positively burn at that, at the way he says it so easily–how willingly he’ll be hers . It’s got about a thousand possible implications running through her head, absolutely none of which she has any desire to entertain–

“Gyouch–!” 

Her thoughts screech to a grinding halt as she realizes her foot has made contact with something that is definitively not the floor and their easy, swaying side-to-side movement has stopped.

“Oh! Th-that’s… that’s your foot, isn’t it?” 

Soul winces as Maka looks down and finds the heel of her left shoe embedded in the toe of his right foot.

“Y-yeah. Yupp. It sure is.”

“Sorry! I’m so sorry!” Maka stammers. She raises her leg and withdraws from him so quickly she nearly stumbles backward, if it weren’t for Soul’s hold on her waist. 

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” he says, stepping forward to steady her. His mouth curves into a smile, but she can tell it's forced. “Not the first time my foot’s been stepped on, and I’m sure it won’t be the last.” 

“This is why I said you should lead–”

“I was leading!”

“Exactly! Imagine how bad it'd be if I were the one leading!”

The music fades out, then, the lively, upbeat melody giving way to a new one–something slower and a bit more relaxed in tempo.

“U-um,” Maka says after a moment, voice sheepish. “Can we… try again? I'd like a chance to redeem myself.”

“Sure, but if you break my foot the medical bills are on you.”

At that, she laughs, and when they start to sway back and forth to the music once more, it's easier than ever to fall into a rhythm together once again–slow, unhurried, and achingly comfortable.  

When they finally wrap up for the afternoon several songs later, Soul leaves with both of his feet intact, and Maka leaves feeling lighter than she has in months.

Grand Ballroom Staircase, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 10, 20XX

Seven o’ clock in the evening

The next time Soul sees the princess, it's at the top of the grand ballroom staircase and with the cacophony of countless royal guests waiting below, just a few short minutes before his life irrevocably changes forever. A few short minutes before his name and his face is revealed to all of European royal society and, consequently, most of the Western world. A few short minutes before their ruse will truly be tested. 

It’s the point of no return, and it’s so surreal there’s something almost calming about it. 

Almost.

“Alright, look alive, scary American boy,” says the voice to his left, the voice that belongs to the younger Thompson sister–Patty, if his memory serves correctly. Starting tonight, Soul has been told, Patty will be acting as his personal bodyguard during all public appearances–because apparently, the palace staff has deemed such a thing necessary. Soul figures Damien must already be tired of his bullshit. “You’re on in two minutes.” 

He smooths a hand over his slicked back hair and reaches to adjust the knot of his tie–hand-picked to match Maka’s dress tonight, a deep burgundy shade cut from remnants of the fabric used to make her gown–as Patty gives him a final once-over. She nods to herself before pressing a finger to her earpiece. 

“Reaper One, this is Pistol Two, we are in position. Send her in.” 

At her words, another door opens halfway down the corridor–smaller and less elaborate than the double doors at the end of the hallway overlooking the ballroom–and, as if out of thin air, Maka appears. 

An odd feeling settles over him when she steps into view–a twisting sensation low in his gut, a pull in his lungs that makes it harder to breathe than it had been just a moment ago. He has to manually draw in a breath, remind himself of the steps required to do so–inhale, exhale, repeat. Has to clench and unclench his fists, feel the pinch of his nails into his palms to kickstart his stalled brain. 

She looks positively breathtaking tonight, but that’s not necessarily the reason for his strange reaction.

For the first time, she resembles the photos of her he’d seen on the Internet all those weeks ago–for the first time, she truly looks like a princess. Her flaxen hair is swept into a tightly wound updo, with two softly curled tendrils left free to frame her face. The tiara nestled atop her head looks to be made from the same blackened metal as the band of her engagement ring, and is beset with countless glittering rubies throughout its elegant, curling spires. A black choker adorns her neck, contrasting sharply against her skin, and dripping with crimson crystals that perfectly match the ones in her tiara. 

With the gown she’s wearing, she’s sure to turn heads tonight. 

It’s Bellemortian-pomegranate red, much like the dress she’d worn last week to the dinner with her father, with a sweeping, billowy skirt and off-the-shoulder sleeves, a plunging neckline that leaves her collarbones and much of her decolletage exposed. Affixed to the sleeves are countless silk flowers of various complementary shades, placed strategically along her neckline and at her hips. There's so many of them it's staggering. Some hapless royal aide probably spent hours painstakingly hand-sewing each one into place. 

It’s a gown made for royalty, and it suits her. 

Oh God. This… is really happening, isn’t it? 

In less than two minutes, he’s going to walk into that ballroom arm-in-arm with Crown Princess Maka Albarn and fool the world into thinking they’re hopelessly in love. 

For the first time, Soul genuinely starts to question whether he can truly do this. 

He’s nothing more than an escort. A paid companion, a guaranteed good time. He’s an American scoundrel, a high-society reject playing a part he’d never felt he could live up to, plucked randomly from a sea of faces on a webpage. He’s never been good enough for anyone, let alone a princess. 

She’d said it herself earlier tonight, hadn’t she? That she’d specifically chosen him for all the wrong reasons.

He’s hardly even worthy of standing in the same room as her, to say nothing of walking by her side as an equal. Of having her elegant gloved hands wrapped around his arm. Of breathing the same air that she breathes. And they’re supposed to make everyone think they’re in love? That he loves her, and she loves him? She would never love someone like him. 

“Soul?” At the sound of her voice, he snaps to attention, blinks furiously a few times to school his face into a neutral expression. “Are you alright?” 

He looks at her, really looks at her face, for the first time, and his heart clenches helplessly in his chest at her expression–genuine concern clouds her emerald eyes and furrows her brows, wrinkles the lovely, perfect skin of her forehead. 

Shit. 

He’s made her worry. He’s already messing up. She doesn’t need to worry about something as beneath her as his feelings.

“I’m fine.” He clears his throat and straightens his spine, squares his shoulders and gives himself a shake. “Just… just a little nervous, is all.”

He starts to reach for her–Patty is here with them now, so he might as well get into character–and has to fight the urge to smack his own hand away as it finds hers. How dare he touch her with these hands of his? Hands that are so unworthy of her it’s almost laughable. His unclean hands that have only ever been used for the purpose of delivering pleasure for a price, hands that fumble their way over piano keys in their pathetic attempts to create a sound worthy of being called music. 

“You…” His voice breaks, and he has to swallow the lump in his throat. He takes her hand in his and pushes down the internal screech of protest, lets his other hand find her waist to pull her in closer. He presses a gentle kiss to her gloved fingers. “You look… absolutely beautiful tonight, Maka.”

Her smile is effortless as he pulls away, as he drops her hand and releases her. 

“You’re not too shabby yourself,” she tells him with a wink. “And don’t be nervous. You’ll do great.” Her eyes leave his face and travel downward, and Soul has to fight the urge to shrink under her gaze. “Oh!” She snaps her fingers. “Almost forgot. Kid, the boutonniere, if you would please?” 

Before Soul can even register confusion, Damien steps out from somewhere behind the princess, as if he’d materialized from someplace deep in the shadows. He looks more solemn than usual as he holds up the item in question–a spray of flowers in a complementary palette of pinks and mauves, in colors that exactly match the silk flowers on Maka’s gown. 

“Your Highness,” the bodyguard says, his voice low and obedient. Maka takes it from him, and then he slips away, disappearing almost as quickly as he’d appeared.

Soul says nothing as Maka reaches to touch him, as her fingers grasp the lapel of his suit jacket and she carefully affixes the boutonniere to his chest. He stares down at her and watches her face as she works, watches the tiny little crease that forms between her brows as she concentrates. He stays very still and focuses his efforts on quieting the steady stream of self-loathing thoughts marching through the theater of his mind. 

“There,” Maka finally says. She gives a satisfied, triumphant little nod before turning her face up to look at him. “Now you’re all set.”

She traces her fingers along the edge of his lapel, runs her other hand smoothly up his tie before pausing a moment to fiddle with the knot. The action sends a shiver chasing down his spine and leaves him with a strange urge to reach for her and take her into his arms, and he almost does it, too, all previous thoughts of being unworthy of her be damned, until–

“And a kiss for good luck.” The words are a low murmur, her warm breath tickling his skin as Maka presses her lips to his cheek. She lingers there, draws the kiss out for several long moments, and the look on his face must convey the level of shock he feels, if the way Patty giggles into her hand is anything to go by. 

“Oooookay, lovebirds,” she says, her voice as cheerful and singsong as ever. “Ready whenever you are.”

Soul’s head spins and he has to take a moment to regain his balance as Maka pulls away. 

“We’re ready,” the princess says, voice confident and authoritative. She offers up her arm. “Aren’t we?” 

“As we’ll ever be,” Soul manages. It’s surprisingly easy to link his arm around hers, almost effortless the way she nestles into him–as if they’d practiced this. As if this is something they do all the time. “Let's do this.”

Maka gives Patty a definitive nod. Patty turns, whispers something into her earpiece that Soul doesn’t catch before melting into the sidelines. 

And then, the massive ballroom doors open.

Chapter Text

Grand Ballroom, Château de la Faucheuse, Bellemorte

Saturday, September 10, 20XX

Almost eight o’ clock in the evening

“How many more members of Parliament do I have to meet?”

Soul hopes the mild hysteria mounting in his voice is lost to the symphony of sounds in the ballroom— intermingled voices and clinking glass, shuffling footsteps and raucous laughter, all set to a backdrop of bright, vibrant orchestral accompaniment— but one quirk of the princess’s stern brow thoroughly dashes that hope. 

“Oh? Overwhelmed already?” She swirls her wineglass in one hand before lifting it to her lips and taking a quick sip. “And here I thought we’d at least make it through the first hour before you’d start whining at me.”

“It hasn’t even been an hour?” 

“Nope.” Maka takes another swig of her drink, and when she lowers her glass, her lips are curled into an almost gleeful smile, one that suggests she finds Soul’s misery endlessly entertaining. He watches her face wordlessly for a long moment, watches her eyes scan the crowd with ruthless scrutiny, and weighs his chances of successfully slinking away, having grown painfully aware of just how empty his own drink glass is; before he can make his great escape, however, Maka’s face lights up with the spark of recognition. 

"Come on," she says impatiently, excitement hedging in her voice as her gloved fingers close around Soul's wrist. "Only two more. I saved the best for last."

He lets himself be dragged— more out of resignation to his fate than anything else— and braces himself for the onslaught of pleasantries and small talk he knows is coming. He's lost count of how many members of the Bellemortian Parliament he's met in the past hour, not that he'd even been counting to begin with. 

You meet one stuffy, old white guy in a suit, you've met them all.

"Makaaa ," he groans. "Is there going to be a quiz on all this? I'm not sure how much more I can take— "

"If you keep up that attitude, yes," Maka says, tossing a glance over her shoulder to flash him a cool smile. "You underestimate my academic abilities. I could have a whole midterms' worth of study material written up on the Bellemortian royal court by tomorrow afternoon."

He doesn’t doubt it in the slightest. Soul rolls his eyes but bites his tongue, resists the urge to fire back at her with a snarky one-liner, because he’s not about to saddle himself with homework on top of all of his other fake fiancé responsibilities— although, the idea is already planted in the princess’s head, so it may be a lost cause.

“Prime Minister Barrett!” Maka calls, her voice carrying out over the cacophony of noise with an airy authoritativeness that surely only a person of royal status could muster. In response, a head in the crowd turns without missing a beat, and Soul straightens his spine at the knowledge that he’s about to meet the Prime Minister of Bellemorte. 

“Your Highness.”

The responding voice matches its owner— deep, resolute, formal. A tall Black man with a head full of neatly-arranged dreadlocks and a crisply pressed three-piece suit bows deeply in greeting at their approach. It occurs to Soul that he has no idea how to even greet a prime minister properly, because this is his first time meeting someone of such status. 

“Oh, Sid, stop it.” Maka rolls her eyes. She relinquishes Soul's wrist from her iron grasp. “You know that level of formality isn’t necessary. Come on now.”

“Even still,” the prime minister— Sid— says. “You know that’s just the kind of man I am.” The woman standing beside him, a blonde woman with an eyepatch, bites back a smile and hides her mouth behind her drink. Prime Minister Barrett turns his dark eyes to Soul. “And this must be that fiancé of yours I’ve heard so much about. The man of the hour.”

“Well, I don’t know about that,” Soul finds himself saying, despite the wooden smile plastered on his face. His cheeks are beginning to ache from the amount of smiling required of him this evening. “It’s hard to feel like the main event standing next to someone as radiant and beautiful as the princess, but I am indeed her fiancé, so I suppose I get to share some of the spotlight tonight.”

Soul offers his hand and watches the blonde woman’s eyebrows go up. The prime minister folds his hand into Soul’s and gives it a curt pump, his grip firm and unyielding. 

“I’m Soul,” he continues. “It's a pleasure to meet you, Prime Minister, sir.” He swallows down the urge to grimace, the nauseating feeling that such formal pleasantries gives him— it’s like all the parental meet and greets over the years as a hired date at weddings amplified by about a thousand, as well as the knowledge that there are quite literally hundreds of eyes on him at the present moment, the ever present reminder of all that is at stake on this job hanging over his head like a fucking guillotine. 

“Pleasure’s all mine. And please,” the prime minister says with a gruff smile. “Call me Sid.”

Soul releases Sid’s hand and barely has time to smile and nod before the blonde woman is leaning forward, bumping her shoulder into the prime minister’s arm in the process. She grabs Soul’s hand, and the strength of her grip takes him by surprise. 

“And I’m Marie Mjolnir!” she declares with perhaps a bit too much enthusiasm. She gives Soul’s hand a few vigorous shakes, nearly knocking him off balance in the process. A moment later, she clears her throat awkwardly and speaks again. “Senator Marie Mjolnir, that is. It’s wonderful to meet you, Soul.”

Soul nods, a genuine laugh escaping his throat at her excitement. 

“Y-Yeah,” he stammers. “Lovely to meet you as well, Senator.”

She holds onto his hand for several more seconds, finally releasing it just a moment after he starts to fidget uncomfortably. She straightens, and fixes Soul with a sincere smile. Her eyepatch is embroidered with an intricate design of gold rhinestones that exactly match the ones in her dress, right down to the lightning-bolt pattern, as if they’d been custom-made as a set. He wonders offhandedly if she has an eyepatch to go with each and every one of her outfits. 

“So,” she says brightly after a few moments. “How are you liking Bellemorte? Have you been easing into palace life fairly well? I can imagine all of this is quite a shock, coming from the States and being thrust into royal society like this.”

“It’s been a little overwhelming, yeah.” Soul swirls his drink once in his hand before bringing it to his lips and gulping down the last dregs of the whiskey in the glass. “I’ve been learning a lot this first week, for sure. And I’ve gotten lost in the palace once or twice already.” 

He hasn’t, of course— the last bit is a tiny little white lie, but it earns a laugh from Senator Mjolnir and Prime Minister Barrett all the same. If there's one thing he's learned in his time as an escort, it's the art of conversation— and more importantly, the art of being able to make people laugh. 

“He’s adjusted quite well, all things considered,” Maka chimes in, her voice clear and bright and beaming with pride. She reaches for his hand, and Soul laces their fingers together tightly. It's a nice little gesture of affection, one that he appreciates immensely, even if it is just for the sake of their betrothal-bliss act. “He even survived dinner with my father, so I’d say the worst is behind him.”

“Well, that’s no small feat,” Sid replies, an undercurrent of awe in his voice. “Everyone knows how hot-tempered His Majesty can be.”

“Oh dear, I’m sure!” Senator Mjolnir cuts in, her one visible eye widening and her mouth falling open into a gasp. “How did he take the news, Maka? Of the engagement?” 

The princess’s smile falters, but only the slightest bit, and only for a moment. If Soul didn’t know any better, he’d swear he’d seen her eye twitch. “It doesn’t matter how he took the news. Soul and I are marrying no matter what he thinks.”

“That bad, huh?” Sid takes a sip of his drink, but Soul doesn’t miss how the corners of his lips curl as he does so. “I can’t say I’m surprised. Would’ve loved to be a fly on the wall during that dinner.”

“Sid!” Senator Mjolnir elbows the Prime Minister in his side, but his stance doesn’t waver— the woman is tiny. Hardly a head taller than the princess. 

“What?” He shrugs. “Don’t you agree? The king can be quite a handful, but if anyone knows how to put him in his place, it’s his daughter. I’m just saying I would’ve loved to see it.”

Soul smirks, barely stifling a chuckle under his breath as he recalls that night. He can scarcely believe it's been a whole week since he’d dined with the king, since he’d purposely gone out of his way to make the absolute worst possible impression on one of the most powerful and influential men in all of Europe.

He spares a glance at Maka and finds her attention trained upon his face, a hint of amusement dancing behind her emerald eyes. He holds her gaze for a moment, his smile deepening with the knowledge of the private joke between them. 

“Yeah, I did my best to prove myself worthy of his daughter’s hand in marriage, but…” Soul says, biting back a vicious grin. “But let’s just say, I don’t think I’m his favorite person in the world.”

“Understatement of the year,” Maka snickers. Soul rather likes the hint of mischief woven into her words. 

“Anyway—” Senator Mjolnir levels Sid with a loaded look before turning a bright smile back to Maka and Soul. “Do you have a date set for the wedding yet?” 

“December thirty-first,” Maka replies without missing a beat. “And then my coronation one week after that.”

“New Year's Eve! How romantic!” Senator Mjolnir presses a hand to her chest. “But coronation, so soon after? You’ll hardly have time for a honeymoon!” 

Maka blinks, and one neat little wrinkle forms between her brows as she processes that statement. “Honey…moon?” 

“Of course!” The senator quips. “Certainly, you have a honeymoon planned, don’t you?” 

“Ummmmm—”

“We’re still working out those details,” Soul interjects, schooling his face into a nonchalant smile. He wraps an arm securely around Maka’s waist and pulls her in close. “Personally, I’d love to honeymoon in Santorini, but Maka’s gunning for Tuscany.”

“Ooooh ,” Senator Mjolnir nods thoughtfully. “Tough choice. Personally, though, I’d go for Santorini. Don’t you go to Italy all the time for diplomacy, Maka? Greece would be a nice change of pace.”

The furrow in Maka’s brow deepens, and Soul slides his hand up from her waist to rub her arm encouragingly. 

“That’s what I keep telling her!” He laughs, nodding along with Senator Mjolnir’s point. “Either way, we’ve got time to figure it out. Isn’t that right, angel?” He delivers a kiss to her forehead, her bangs tickling his lips and her floral scent flooding his nostrils for a delicious, fleeting moment. As he pulls away, Maka blinks at him with those shining green eyes of hers, and the gratitude in them is palpable. 

“Y-Yes,” she starts to say, her mouth opening and closing once or twice before she gets the words out. “I suppose that is a pretty good case for Santorini—”

“Champagne for the princess and her esteemed guest?” 

A butler cuts into their group, then, a platter of fluted champagne glasses balanced upon his white-gloved hand. Maka stares at it for a long moment, shell-shocked, as if it were a plate full of live scorpions rather than fizzy libations, and the butler lifts a puzzled eyebrow at her. 

“Sure, thanks,” Soul says as he deposits his long-empty whiskey glass onto the platter and swaps it out for a flute of bubbling champagne. His gaze flickers from the butler, to Maka, then back to the butler again before he makes an executive decision. “And Her Highness would love another one.” 

He plucks Maka’s barren wine glass from between her curled fingers and replaces it with a fresh one, before waving the butler on his way. She gives herself a shake, as if to jolt her body back into awareness, before taking a rather long gulp of champagne from her glass. 

“You alright, Maka?” the prime minister asks, voice gruff with concern. 

“Yes, I’m fine, Sid, thanks. It's just—” Her lips stretch into a smile, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “I just got lost in my own head there, for a second. Thinking about wedding planning, and everything we have to do in these next few months.”

“That’s understandable,” the prime minister nods. “But try to put it out of your mind for tonight. It's a celebration, after all.”

“Yes, of course.”

“You know, I’d love to hear the proposal story if you’d be willing to tell it.” His gaze turns to Soul once more. “How about it?”

This again. He’s sure he’ll tell this intricately crafted fiction he and Maka had schemed up approximately a thousand times in the coming weeks. At least this is something they’d rehearsed. 

“Sure, I don't mind—”

“Sid!” Senator Mjolnir interjects with a gasp, and Soul is grateful for it. She grips the prime minister by the shoulder with her free hand, nudging him eagerly. “Look, there’s Commander Naigus! Over there! She decided to make an appearance tonight after all!” 

The senator extends a hand, pointing urgently in the direction of the dance floor, and Soul's eyes follow it until they land upon the commander in question, dressed in a long, flowing, icy blue gown— completely different attire from when Soul had met her on the plane last week, but he recognizes the shape of her face and the decisive set of her shoulders.

“Hmm! S-so she has ,” Sid sputters. There's a slight tremor to his hands as he lifts his drink to his lips. He takes a long pull from it, nearly draining the glass entirely, but before all the dark liquid within disappears, he coughs violently, his body convulsing and sending the contents of his drink splattering all over his face and darkening the front of his suit. 

“Goodness! Oh dear!” Senator Mjolnir pulls a handkerchief from the clutch she carries with alarming speed and dexterity and starts dabbing at the stains despite Sid’s loud and insistent protests. Soul has known the prime minister for a grand total of maybe fifteen minutes, but there’s still something oddly disarming about seeing his composure completely disintegrate, at seeing him transform from a stoic, statuesque man to a flustered, babbling mess so quickly. The sight of Senator Mjolnir fussing over him, of him attempting to wrestle a handkerchief away from a woman half his size and utterly failing at it, is downright comical to witness, and Soul has to bite his tongue to stifle his laughter. 

“Honestly, Marie, I’m fine —” Sid finally gets one of his hands around Senator Mjolnir’s wrist, effectively halting her kerchief-based assault. “It’s fine, it’ll wash out. I’ll send it for dry cleaning first thing in the morn—”

“It is most certainly not fine! How can you ask Mira to dance with champagne all over your shirt?!”

“Ask her to da—” Sid guffaws, his voice deepening with alarm. “To d- dance ?! I am not going to—”

“Oh, yes you are!” Senator Mjolnir props a fisted hand upon her hip. “Every gala, every ball, every royal event , you spend at least a week talking yourself into it. A week asking me to back you up, to not let you chicken out of asking her for just one dance. And what have you done every single time? At every royal function for the past two years?!” 

“M-Marie, I just—”

“Chickened out! That's what!”

“Th-the commander is a very busy woman,” Sid babbles, fussing with the buttons on his suit jacket. “I-I’m sure she doesn’t have time in her life for something as trivial as romance—”

“No one is ever too busy for love!” Senator Mjolnir proclaims, loudly enough that Sid winces, shrinks away from her somewhat, and several nearby gala patrons turn their heads in response to the commotion. “Come on, Sid! Let’s go!” 

“M-Marie—! Seriously, I— This is not the kind of man I am—”

“It is now!” She hooks an arm around his elbow and starts dragging him away, deeper into the crowd and in the direction of the dance floor, with alarming ease, outmuscling a man more than double her size without breaking a sweat or spilling her glass of wine. After a few paces, she tosses a glance over her shoulder, a cheerful smile on her face despite the fully-grown man fighting her at every step. “Bye-bye Maka! It was lovely to meet you, Soul! I look forward to hearing all about your wedding plans over the next few months!” 

“Of course!” Maka waves. “Good seeing you, Marie!” 

It’s all Soul can do to muster a half-hearted wave and a bewildered smile of his own. They watch them go, Sid’s protests and attempts to wrestle away from his captor weakening the further they make it into the dance floor, and once they disappear from sight, Soul whistles. 

“That woman is terrifying.”

“That’s Marie, for you,” Maka chuckles. She turns to Soul, a satisfied smile on her face, and takes a sip of her champagne. “She’s always been like that. People have a tendency to underestimate her. But if you thought that was impressive, you should see her on the senate floor— she’s absolutely ruthless when it comes to debating policy.” 

“No kidding?” Soul smirks. “I’m sure she’d rip me a new one in a debate.”

“Well, in your defense, you’ve lived in Bellemorte for hardly a fortnight.” She arches an eyebrow. “Certainly you’re no expert in our politics yet.”

“Did you just use the word fortnight in a sentence?”

“Yes.” Maka raises her chin, squares her shoulders. “It means two weeks — ”

“Oh, I know what it means,” Soul interrupts. “I’ve just never heard anyone actually use it in a real-life conversation.”

“It’s a great word! More people should incorporate it into their everyday vernacular!”

“Look at you, throwing more big, fancy words at me,” he teases. He starts reaching for her, having half a mind to pinch one of her cheeks affectionately between his fingers, but thinks better of it when his hand is halfway to her face. He withdraws it awkwardly, instead sending his fingers running nervously through his slicked-back hair, but even the comforting, familiar old habit doesn’t quell the itch in his fingertips to touch her. 

It’s more than an itch, actually— it's an all-out urge. It’s nothing short of overwhelming, the way he aches to feel her skin against his fingertips. The way he has to physically restrain himself from reaching out and curling one of those wispy tendrils of ash blonde around one of his fingers. The way his brain suddenly scrambles to come up with some reason, any reason at all, to touch her.

She elbows him in the ribs, but it’s more of a playful gesture than an antagonistic one. “It’s not my fault if your vocabulary is lacking. Maybe you’ll learn a thing or two about your own native language while you’re here.”

He shakes his head, a fond smile growing on his face as he stares down at the princess. His hands still burn with the desire to reach for her, but he ends up settling for an affectionate nudge of his shoulder against hers instead— a gesture that mirrors her own but isn’t nearly as satisfying. “You are such a nerd.”

The smile on her face is undeniable even as she rolls her eyes. “Anyway.” She looks up at him, her emerald stare sparkling with… something. Gratitude? Fondness? Some deeply warm emotion, but Soul can’t place it. “Thanks for the save back there.”

“What?” His brow furrows in confusion. 

“The um. The honeymoon thing.” She lowers her voice, and instinctively, he leans in closer. Her eyelashes flutter and she looks away, her gaze falling to her toes for a brief moment, before she clears her throat and continues. “I, um. I hadn’t anticipated that question and it… threw me off guard. So thank you for the help.”

Soul smiles but tries to disguise it behind a shrug and a sip of his drink. “Eh, it was nothing. Don’t sweat it. As you said, we’re… we’re in this together, right?” 

He doesn’t miss how her eyes flicker to his left hand, to the fingers curled around his champagne glass and the glinting black metal band wrapped around one of them. Her throat works as she swallows. “Yes. Yes, we are.”

With one hand— her left hand— Maka reaches to adjust her tiara, to fiddle with her hair and coil a delicate strand of it around one finger, but her eyes don’t leave his all the while. 

God, her eyes. Something about those eyes of hers, about the way she looks at him— it cuts him right down to his very core. Makes him feel seen in a way he’s scarcely felt before, and its every bit as terrifying as it is exhilarating.

“N-now then,” she clears her throat again. “How about we—”

“Well. Well. Well. If it isn’t Princess All-Brains-No-Charm.” 

A high, nasally, distinctly British-sounding voice cuts through the crowd, thoroughly shattering the moment. Maka’s expression curdles instantly, nose wrinkling as if she’d whiffed the aroma of soured milk. Her eyes dart away from Soul’s gaze, fixating on a spot behind him, and when he turns to follow her line of sight, it doesn’t take long to identify the owner of the voice. 

A man— very clearly a prince, based on the royal blue military uniform he wears, complete with gold cord draped over one shoulder and multiple ribbons affixed to one of his lapels— looms behind him, a vicious smirk on his bespectacled face. Beyond the uniform and the glasses, his most striking feature is his hair, dark and cropped close to his scalp, except for the spectacularly dorky spikes that jut out from either side of his head like twin spires.

“Did you forget who’s gala you were attending, Ox?” Maka seethes, her green eyes flashing. “Or is that big, round head of yours full of nothing but hot air?”

His thin lips press together into a frown, and a flicker of irritation dances across his features. “That’s Prince Ox to you, All-Brains.”

The nickname is dripping with ire and soaked in venom, but for the life of him, Soul can’t fathom why a jab at Maka’s perceived intelligence would be an insult. This guy must have some seriously deep-seated insecurity issues or a hilariously fragile ego (or both), if that’s his play. 

Either that, or he’s a bitter ex. Soul can’t rule out the possibility, even though his research on Maka revealed absolutely nothing in the way of past flames or prior relationships. 

“I’ll address you properly when you offer me the same courtesy,” Maka says coolly. She makes a show of examining her nails, even though they’re thoroughly concealed beneath the thick burgundy satin of her gloves.

The prince’s harsh gaze swivels to Soul, ignoring Maka as if she hadn’t even spoken. His glasses catch the glare of the overhead light as he turns, and the way his eyes travel up and down Soul’s body, sizing him up and passing silent judgment, makes Soul’s skin crawl. Prince Ox grimaces as though he’s stepped in dogshit. “And don’t tell me. This must be… that riffraff of yours that you brought back with you from across the pond?”

“Oooooh, riffraff,” Soul scoffs, the sarcastic words escaping his lips before he can stop them. “Such a creative insult. About as clever as All-Brains. Hopefully you have someone else in your royal cabinet in charge of naming things?” 

The prince’s dark eyes narrow behind the frames of his glasses. “Do you even know who I am?” 

“Nope,” Soul shrugs, voice carefree and nonchalant, and entirely unfazed by the rising indignation in the prince’s voice. It's a lie, of course— he recognizes this guy for sure, from paparazzi pictures online.

This is the guy that Maka punched in the face last year, he’s almost certain of it.

“His Royal Highness Oxford Barnabus Bristol, Duke of Durham, Earl of Gloucestershire, Baron Carrickfergus and Lord of the Isles. Crown Prince of the United Kingdom and future King of England, that’s who.”

Soul stares at the prince for several long, drawn-out moments, his fingers on his chin and his brows scrunched together in a display of fake scrutiny, not acknowledging a word he’d said.

“Oh, I’ve got it—” Soul snaps his fingers, twists his expression into one of faux-epiphany. “You’re the guy Maka punched in the face at the Bellemortian state banquet last year.”

In his peripheral vision, Maka’s jaw drops. Soul has to suppress a chuckle at the expression on her face— if he didn’t know any better, he’d swear she looks embarrassed. Scandalized even. 

It’s actually kind of… adorable. 

The prince rolls his eyes. “Yes, just another example of her boorishness and utter lack of fitness for the throne of her sad, dour little country.” He glares at Maka, then, his gaze cutting away from Soul for a moment. “Damn near broke my nose with that hit, too.” 

It’s almost instantaneous, how Maka’s face transforms— how her lips twist into a sly smile and her eyes gleam with a wicked glint. 

“Is that so?” She snickers, the glee in her voice blatant and unfiltered. “I’ll have to work on my aim, then. Make sure that next time, it's a direct hit.” 

Prince Ox rounds on her then, crossing the space between them in a flash. His hands curl into fists and his chest puffs in a pitiful attempt at intimidation. Maka, to her credit, is undaunted; her smile doesn’t falter, and she doesn’t flinch, doesn’t shrink backward even one inch from his much taller form as he glowers down at her. 

It sends an irresistible thrill racing down Soul’s spine. Princess Maka, once again refusing to take shit from anyone — not her father, nor her eldritch being of a bodyguard, nor some idiot prince with an ego the size of his stuffy, tea-drinking kingdom. 

“Hmmph,” Prince Ox blows out a breath. He takes a step back from the princess with a minute shake of his head, and all the anger seems to deflate from his body with the action. He turns once again to Soul. “Never mind any of that . I don’t think I caught your name. Or shall I just call you… Yankee?”

Maka cuts in before Soul can fire back with a witty retort. 

“His name,” she says, her hand coming to rest purposefully upon his arm. It's a protective gesture, and though it’s a gentle touch, there’s something almost possessive about it— about the way her fingers wrap one-by-one around the swell of his bicep. The weight of her palm burns against his skin, despite the multiple layers of fabric that separate them. “Is Soul Evans, and he’s one of the guests of honor tonight. My fiancé.”

His stomach swoops at the authority in her voice as she says those words, at how she holds her chin up confidently while she says them. He knows— he knows— it’s all part of their charade, but it thrills him, anyway, the thought of someone claiming him as their own so proudly. He swallows roughly and wills his heart rate to slow down as his eyes gravitate back to Maka’s face. He doesn’t think he could tear them away from her if he tried, not with her touching him like this. 

For a moment, Soul almost forgets where he is. For a moment, there’s only this— the two of them, and the touch of Maka’s tiny hand tethering him to her like a lifeline. 

And then Prince Ox speaks again, and reality smashes its way through the moment and back into Soul’s awareness with the high, nasally intonation of his accented voice. 

“Hmm. Yes,” he sneers. “I’d hardly believed the news when I’d heard it, but I suppose it’s true. Though, why you’d want to marry a bloody Yank is beyond me.”

Soul smirks, chuckling under his breath at the insult. He’s been called way worse things than anything a guy named Oxford could come up with— though the way Maka’s grip tightens around his arm seems to indicate that she’s offended on his behalf. 

“I want to marry a bloody Yank,” she spits, her voice the razor-thin, sharpened edge of a blade. “Because we’re in love. ”

“Oh, please.” Prince Ox rolls his eyes. “Don't make me gag. No one in this life marries for love, Albarn.” He drops the ridiculous nickname, but somehow, the way he manages to say Maka’s last name is even worse— condescending and full of disdain. “Especially not someone of your status. You’re a Crown, for bollocks’ sake.”

Soul can’t fathom what it could possibly be, but something about this comment seems to get under Maka’s skin. She blinks robotically a few times and her grip on his arm loosens, her jaw clamping shut and her body sagging somewhat, as though she were deflating. 

“You know, California is almost six-thousand miles away by plane,” Soul says coolly. “That’s an awful long flight. And I didn’t come all this way to be lectured on whether or not my reasons for getting married are legitimate, by a guy who goes by the title of Baron Carrick-fuck-us.”

Prince Ox’s eye twitches as his gaze snaps back to Soul’s face. “It’s Carrick fergus.”

Soul’s smirk deepens. “Yeah, that’s what I said, Carrick- fuckus. ” 

The prince’s balls his hands into fists. His cheeks hollow and his lips purse, as though he were sucking his teeth, and his eyes flash behind his glasses. “I think I’ve had quite enough of this conversation. I have business to attend to with His Majesty, King Spirit anyway—”

"Better you than me." 

Prince Ox’s brow arches before he turns. “Later, Princess. I wish I could say it’s been a pleasure, but that would be a lie,” he says over his shoulder. “I look forward to seeing what becomes of this… marriage of yours. Congratulations, I guess.”

He strides purposefully and pompously away, back into the crowd, and as he fades into the colorful, shifting masses, Soul almost wishes he’d taken a page out of Maka’s book and punched the royal asshole— but unfortunately, Prince Oxford Barnabus Bristol isn’t the monarch he’d been hired to piss off on this job. As tempting as the thought is, he has a feeling that dealing bodily harm to the heir of the British royal family would result in way more trouble than it's worth. 

At the very least, it would incur Damien’s wrath, and at the very worst, the blame would surely come down on Maka.

“What a piece of work,” Soul mutters under his breath, careful to keep his voice low enough that only the princess can hear. “Please tell me you never dated that guy.”

“What?!” Maka turns to him, her expression aghast. “You think I— and he— you think Ox and I dated?!”

“Why else would he be such an insufferable prick to you?”

“No.” She looks like she may vomit at any moment. “Death, no. I would let my bloodline end, would sacrifice my birthright to the throne, before I’d enter any sort of relationship with that ignoramus.” She closes her eyes, draws in a breath. Reaches to adjust her tiara and smooth her free hand down the front of her dress. “We are not exes. Our rivalry is academic in nature,” she explains matter-of-factly. “I outperformed him during all of our years as classmates at university and outranked him at graduation. He could never make peace with the idea that a woman could be smarter than him.”

“Ah,” Soul says. “I’m sure the fact you punched him in the face adds insult to injury, then.”

Surprise colors her expression once again, her brow furrowing and her lips twisting into a grimace. “Y-yes. But how—” She clears her throat, tries to school her face into a neutral expression. “How do you know about that?”

“There's this wonderful little thing called the World Wide Web,” he smirks. “And pictures of your fist against Prince Ox's face happen to be all over it.” 

“You…” Maka blinks several times as her eyes widen. She grabs him by the collar with her free hand and yanks him forward to whisper in his ear; Soul’s gut clenches eagerly in response to being manhandled in such a way, and he decides he’d rather not examine that too closely. “You looked me up before all this?!”

“Should I… not have?”

Her grip eases on his shirt as she pulls away slightly to look at him, and he's oddly gratified by the pure, unbridled bewilderment in her eyes. “I…” She swallows. “I guess I didn't realize you were so… thorough.”

“Maka, Maka, Maka.” His voice lowers in pitch, and now it's his turn to close the space between them once again. He leans in close— so close, he can feel the warmth of her breath against his skin— and lets one of his hands reach up to trace reverently along the side of her face. To the rest of the room, it must look like they're having a private moment, as couples do sometimes, which he supposes they are, in a way. His fingers cup her chin and his thumb brushes her lips. “I told you before, I take pride in my work. I'm very thorough.” 

For a moment, she seems hypnotized by the action— by the touch of his thumb to her mouth. Her eyes widen and her lips part, whether in surprise or invitation Soul doesn't know, but his fingers move to trace the outline of her lips all the same— so small, so delicate. So soft, and so pillowy beneath his touch. His thumb brushes her upper lip first, dipping into the valley of that maddeningly perfect Cupid's bow of hers, before falling to press lightly against the plush curve of her lower lip. Despite the noise of the surrounding ballroom, he hears her gasp— a soft, bitten-off sound under her breath— and the noise does an odd thing to his psyche. It's a helpless, desperate little sound, and it makes him want to push his thumb into her mouth, between her teeth and onto her tongue, if only to feel the wet heat of her lips closing around it. It makes him want to take his other hand and pull her into him by her waist, press her hips to his, if only to feel the warmth of her body against his own. 

It makes him want in ways he’d thought he'd grown entirely numb to, after all this time. 

Maka's lashes flutter as she blinks, and then the enchantment shatters. Her fingers briefly clutch at his arm before the flat of her palm finds his chest, and for a moment, she looks as if she’s about to physically push him away. 

“I—I—” Maka coughs, clearing her throat. “I’m sure you are! V-Very thorough, I mean! I-I’ll—” she sputters, trips over her words, seeming to suddenly realize how loudly she’s speaking. “I’ll take your word for it.” She downs the rest of her drink, lifting it to her lips and inverting the thin glass in one fluid motion. When she’s done, she shoves the empty champagne flute into Soul’s chest, her face reddened— way beyond the rosy layer of blush she’d worn tonight— and her green eyes blinking wildly. “Oh, look at that– my drink is empty! W-Why don’t you be a gentleman and refresh it for me, since you're so very thorough?!” 

She practically pushes him away, and, as his legs start to move and he makes his way in the direction of the bar, Soul is too busy trying to suppress a vicious cackle to fight her on it. 

The free drinks are a nice perk of the fake-fiancé gig. 

Soul figures he should’ve expected it, at least for tonight as one of the gala’s guests of honor, but he places his order— a Whiskey 75 for himself, another glass of wine for the princess— and the bartender staunchly refuses payment. He shakes his head with furrowed brows and mutters something aggressively in French as he sets to work on the drinks, and Soul is all too happy to slide his credit card back into his wallet and lean against the bar counter while he waits. For the first time all evening, he allows himself to relax. To sit with his own thoughts for a brief moment.

The bar is situated at the far end of the grand ballroom, a vantage point from which he has a pretty damn good view of the whole gala as it carries on around him. 

The ballroom itself is unlike anything Soul has ever seen— much like the rest of the palace, it looks and feels like something straight out of a gothic fairy tale. Massive black pillars hold up the high vaulted ceilings, and multiple black, flickering wrought-iron chandeliers hang from above. Deep, ruby-red accents paint the walls, in stark contrast to the black-and-white pattern checkered upon the tile floor. Velvety, burgundy-colored flowers adorn every free surface in the ballroom, their petals dripping from heavy, drooping flower heads like crimson droplets of blood. 

And pomegranates, of course. The bulbous fruits are everywhere— bursting from within the scarlet flower bouquets and piled high upon platters of cheese for snacking, their likeness emblazoned upon napkins and proudly presiding over each guest table as a decorative centerpiece. Soul has to wonder if the people of Bellemorte ever tire of eating— or seeing— them.

Perhaps most unusually, though, is the great, black tree, its massive form situated between the two gently curving staircases at the head of the ballroom, its gnarled, obsidian limbs stretching up to the ceiling and dotted with twinkling red-and-white fairy lights. 

A gargantuan fixture in the space, and yet Soul had hardly noticed it on his descent down the staircase at the beginning of the evening— his heart had been in his throat and his eyes had been on Maka. 

He doesn’t know why he’d fixated on her so intently. Looking back on it, he hadn’t even realized he was doing it until afterward, when their descent was over; they’d reached the bottom of the steps and his gaze was still trained on Maka’s face, on the brilliant green of her eyes, rather than the eyes of the nameless masses surrounding them. 

It was the first time he’d ever felt at ease in front of a crowd, mostly because he'd entirely forgotten there was even a crowd to begin with.

He’d been fraught with nerves until the moment those gigantic doors had opened— nerves and self-doubt and all sorts of spiraling, self-loathing thoughts. This whole fake-fiancé-to–a-princess thing hadn’t really felt real up until that moment— until the point of no return. The point at which he knew there was no going back on what he’d agreed to. The point at which the entire world would know who he was, and it all suddenly seemed so terrifying, so much so he feared he’d freeze up deer-in-the-headlights style as soon as he set foot into the ballroom. 

But instead, he’d focused on Maka, and everything else had faded away. 

He’d hardly been aware of his surroundings or the motion of his feet as he'd walked down those winding steps, the symphony of noise all around him or the flashing of countless camera shutters documenting their grand entrance for all the world to see. 

He’d only been aware of Maka. The dazzling smile on her face and the genuine sparkle in her eyes as she’d looked down upon the gala attendees, the rosy flush on her cheeks and the wispy tendrils of blonde framing her delicate face. How utterly flawless and in her element she’d looked. 

And how utterly beautiful she'd looked. 

He’s aware of her even now, despite the distance between them— a distance that has him feeling weirdly prickly and nervous. With Anya, and most of his clients even before her, he’d all but jumped at any opportunity to get away. For space and a chance to clear his head, a chance to take a break from the facade he’s had to continually adopt during his time as an escort. He’d expected nothing less from this job— and if anything, he’d expected that need to be even greater with such a high-profile client. He’d expected the exhaustion of the part he’d have to play— the role of doting fiancé to a crown princess— to be amplified tenfold, thousand-fold, even, compared to his usual wedding-date gigs and romantic evening house-calls, and that he’d jump at any chance to be just a face in the crowd, even for a couple of short, sweet minutes. 

But instead, all he wants is to be near Maka. 

He wants this stuffy old French guy behind the bar to hurry up and finish pouring their drinks already. He wants to push through the masses of suits and gowns and paparazzi and get back to his princess, to take his rightful place by her side once more so he can do his damn job. He wants to listen to her yap on and on about Parliament and the members of her royal court and what projects which senators are working on, and he doesn’t want to dwell too much on why he wants these things so badly, because to want is such a foreign concept for him.

He doesn’t really let himself want. 

Working as an escort means constantly prioritizing the other person. The client’s wants and needs, their every whim and desire. The services they’re paying him for and expecting from him, whether that service is an evening of mind-blowing sex or an authentic boyfriend experience or an enthusiastic overseas travel companion— or some combination of the three.

Sex, desire, love— at the end of the day, it’s all just a business transaction, the means to which he makes his living and pays his bills, and that’s all it’s ever been for him, for a long, long time. 

He’s gotten so good at minimizing himself and silencing his own needs after all these years, the notion that he could actually want something fills him with a deep, primal fear, right down to the marrow of his very bones. 

He shakes his head and blinks himself back into awareness, shoves aside the encroaching dread and forces himself to focus on the here and now. The gala, the ballroom, the task at hand, his job. 

Because, despite all the pomp and circumstance and media attention, this is still just a job, like all the rest of the countless gigs that have defined his career in escorting thus far. 

His eyes scan the ballroom in the hopes of locating Maka once again— she isn’t where she’d been standing before his thought spiral. He finds her father first— King Spirit, himself— standing at the base of the great tree between the staircases, observing the celebration taking place all around him with a scowl on his face and a furrow in his brow. He’s dressed considerably differently than when Soul had last seen him, in a tail-coated black suit jacket and a burgundy sash draped from shoulder to hip, a staggering amount of pins and ribbons affixed to the lapel on his left. Soul doesn’t recognize the man standing to his right, whom he seems to be in the midst of an intense conversation with; a very tall man, with silvery-gray hair and round glasses. 

Conversation might be a bit of a generous word, actually— it's more like the king is talking at the taller man, who periodically raises his eyebrows or nods in mild interest to show that he’s at least somewhat listening, all with a conspiratorial smile on his face that Soul finds somewhat unsettling. He can’t really discern much more of the other man’s expression (the light reflecting off his glasses obscures his eyes), but the way he carries himself gives off a vibe that Soul would liken to a doctor or a mad scientist of some kind. It’s deeply unsettling.

King Spirit says something, then, and judging by the wild look in his eyes and the way he gesticulates passionately with both hands, Soul would guess it’s likely something about him, or about his dear daughter’s engagement. The tips of his ears start to turn pink and the furrow in his brow deepens, but then the silver-haired man places a hand upon the king’s shoulder, and the touch seems to have a placating effect. Spirit draws in a deep breath and then sighs, his posture relaxing visibly. The taller man speaks, then, and Spirit listens with rapt attention. 

Fascinating. 

Even more perplexing, the woman from earlier suddenly joins their group— Senator Mjolnir. She greets the king with a curt nod of her head and a firm handshake before embracing the taller man, going up on her tiptoes for a quick, chaste kiss, and Soul nearly does a double take at the revelation that they appear to be an item. Their conversation seems uneventful after that, and eventually, Soul loses interest and resumes his search for the princess.

He locates her once again, halfway across the ballroom and standing beside Tsubaki. He focuses on Maka instead of the maelstrom of tumultuous thoughts in his head, focuses on her radiant smile and her graceful movements instead of his own confusing emotions. The poise with which she carries herself, the way her nose wrinkles when she laughs at something Tsubaki says. The way the crimson gems in her tiara catch the light when she turns her head and the way her dress shimmers and sparkles with her every movement, how all the flowers pinned to her gown shiver when she moves as if they’re alive.

He tells himself, for the umpteenth time that evening, that the only reason he’s so transfixed by her tonight is because he’s never seen her like this. Because she’s actually in princess-mode for the first time since he’s met her, and he’s just not used to this side of her yet. The irrefutable charm and allure of beauty, to which Soul is certainly not immune. He’s had plenty of beautiful people on his arm in his escorting career— handsome men and pretty women in equal measure. Maka certainly isn’t the first. The magic will wear off, in time, he’s sure of it— just like it always has. 

His thoughts betray him once more when she bites down on her lower lip— when Tsubaki beckons her closer and whispers something in her ear, and Maka stifles a laugh at whatever she’d said. It’s a quick, fleeting action— teeth digging into the plush curve of her bottom lip— and in a flash the sight is gone, as Maka’s gloved hand lifts to cover her mouth, but it was enough. Enough to send Soul’s mind right back to the feeling of his thumb on that lip as he’d taunted her about how thorough he is. 

Fuck, he doesn't know what had possessed him to say that. What part of his brain had thought it was a good idea to pull such a line on her, what he could possibly hope to gain by teasing her. Maybe he enjoys making her flustered. Maybe he's subconsciously waging war against the ‘no sexual services’ clause in their agreement, trying to see how far he can push her until she breaks, because he’s so used to clients wanting nothing but his body that he can't possibly wrap his head around someone not wanting to sleep with him. Maybe he's just a pathetic asshole who hides his insecurities and inadequacies behind a mask of sarcasm, and secretly delights in tormenting everyone around him, maybe—

There's a man standing beside her now. 

Tall, dark hair, a stern expression on his clean-shaven face. Definitely royalty, if Soul had to guess, based on his attire, which is striking, even for a royal— he's wearing a completely white tuxedo with a forest green shirt underneath, and in addition to all the pins and ribbons and other bullshit meant to indicate his royal status, he's chosen to top it all off with an ascot. 

And a mother fucking pair of shades. 

“Sir? Your drinks, if you'd please.”

The sound of the bartender's watery, accented voice snaps Soul's attention away from the scene unfolding before him. He snatches the drinks in question out of the old man’s hands so fast, it’s a wonder that their liquidy innards don’t end up splattered all over the floor. By the time his eyes return to Maka, Prince Ascot is bowing before her, taking her gloved hand in his, and bringing it to his lips. 

Oh, hell no. 

He'd been gone what, ten, maybe fifteen minutes to refresh these goddamn drinks, and already the royal vultures have swept in? Not on Soul’s watch. 

His Royal Highness Prince of Sunglasses keeps his grip firm on Maka's hand and steps closer to her, and Soul downs his drink, inverting the glass at his lips and gulping the bittersweet Scotch-Champagne mixture within ten seconds flat, and when he's done, it's nothing short of miraculous, the fact that the empty glass doesn't shatter when he slams it down on the counter. His legs carry him away from the bar with hardly a conscious directive from his brain, full wineglass in hand and footsteps striding purposefully toward Maka.

His fiancé. His princess. 

He crosses the ballroom in a flash, and it's a wonder he doesn’t bowl anyone over in the process. By the time he reaches his destination, it's too late— Prince Shades has already whisked her away for a dance.

Soul genuinely… doesn’t know what to do in this situation. He stands at the edge of the dance floor dumbly, cradling Maka’s glass of wine in one hand and the other one hanging uselessly at his side as he watches his betrothed dance with someone else . His logical brain knows it means nothing— it’s just a stupid dance, and it doesn’t change the fact that he’s her fiancé, not the royal asshole who currently has his hands on Maka’s body where Soul’s should be. 

His logical brain knows this probably isn’t a big deal. 

However, logic doesn’t mean shit when every cell in his body is screaming at him to put an end to the scene playing out before him, to march his way across the dance floor and rip Maka out of this motherfucker’s embrace. It’s a primal, almost animalistic urge, the urge to claim what Soul sees as rightfully his, which is an absurd thought, really, because she isn’t his. 

She’s just paying him one-thousand dollars a day to act like it. He has no real claim to her, and yet—

In this moment, he wishes he did. 

He wishes he had any right to tell this mystery prince to fuck right off. He wishes he could do something about the hot, feverish itch beneath his skin, the thrashing of his heart inside his chest or the acid pooling in his gut. 

He watches as their movements slow, as Prince Ascot pulls Maka closer and leans forward to whisper something in her ear. As his hold on her waist tightens, as his fingers brush her cheek and reach to toy with a lock of her flaxen hair and—

Fuck it. 

He can’t sit here and watch anymore. 

He’ll make a scene. He’ll stake his claim on his fiancée even though he has no right to, he’ll piss off whichever European nation this jackass is the prince of, because Maka didn't hire him to be polite, after all. 

She hired him to be a bad boy, so a bad boy is exactly what she’s going to get. 

He’s tactical in his approach, angling it so that the prince won’t see him coming, but Maka will. She catches sight of him mere moments before he reaches them on the dance floor, her green eyes flickering to his face and her eyebrows going up as he places his hand— not gently— on the prince’s shoulder.

“Excuse me,” Soul says, voice dark and laced with smoke. “But I believe that’s my fiancée you’re dancing with, Shades.”

The prince turns, then, his dark eyes narrowing at Soul over the top of his tinted glasses. When he speaks, his voice is smooth and utterly unperturbed. “Shades?” 

Soul smirks, his mouth twitching into an impish grin. “You heard me.”

At that, the prince finally drops his hands, relinquishing his hold on Maka’s waist and fingers, and turns his full attention to Soul. “I’m sorry, who are you, exactly?” 

“Well, you’re a sharp one, aren’t you?” Soul sneers. “I said you’re dancing with my fiancée. Should make it pretty damn clear who I am. The better question is… who the fuck are you?”

The prince opens his mouth to reply, but Maka beats him to it. 

“Soul,” she says, her voice carefully neutral as she steps forward. She touches him, and this time, the weight of her hand on his arm is more of a warning than a comfort. “This is Prince Harvey Clairemont of Luxembourg, one of the evening’s esteemed royal guests.” The look she levels him with makes him feel less like her betrothed and more like a disobedient guard dog. “Harv, this is my fiancé, Soul—”

“Harv? You’re on a nickname basis with this guy?”

“Of course,” the prince— or should he say, Harv — replies coolly. “I’ve known Her Highness since we were children.” His chilly gaze crystallizes as he appraises Soul, his eyes moving slowly, calculatingly, behind the tinted frames of his glasses. “Leagues longer than you’ve known her.”

“Yeah? Childhood friends, eh?” Soul clicks his tongue. “How adorable. I’m still the one marrying her. So why don’t you and your ascot go find some other princess to dance with, hm? How’s that sound?” 

Maka’s mouth drops open, her eyes widening in shock. “Soul! Don’t speak to him like that—”

“It’s alright, princess.” Prince Harvey holds up a conciliatory hand. “It’s alright. I got my one dance. I’ll take my leave.” He inclines his head, eyes volleying from Maka’s face to her gloved hands and back again, as if contemplating a farewell kiss, but he elects to bow deeply instead. “It was lovely to see you, as always. It's a shame we didn’t have more time to catch up.” He turns to Soul with a curt nod, which Soul returns with a sarcastic wave of his hand. “Please accept my congratulations on your engagement.” He turns back to Maka. “You look absolutely ravishing in red, Your Highness.”

With that, he adjusts his glasses, pushes them up the bridge of his nose, and strides away, disappearing into the crowd. Soul hardly has time to grin in triumph before Maka rounds on him.

“Soul,” she practically spits, her green eyes blazing. “What was all that about? You can’t just speak to a royal like that!” 

Soul stares at her, slack-jawed and eyes unblinking. She’s seriously reprimanding him for mouthing off to someone of royal status? “Oh, what, and you verbally bitch-slapping Prince Oxford earlier was just fine?” 

“That’s different!” Her hands ball into fists and her brows furrow. Her eyes glance down at the glass of wine in Soul’s hand, seeming to notice it for the first time since he’d cut her little reunion with Prince Harvey short. She snatches it angrily from his grasp and takes an aggressive sip from it. “He and I are rivals. Prince Harvey is an old friend, and an absolute gentleman—”

“Oh, an old friend, sure,” Soul scoffs, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. “‘Cause the way he whispered in your ear and played with your hair seemed real friendly, Maka. And that last comment he made–" Soul’s voice takes on a mocking tone, mimicking Harv’s monotonous voice. “You-look-ravishing-in-red, Your-Highness.”

Her mouth hangs open, and she blinks at him in mute shock for several moments. “Is that what you’re so upset about? Soul, are you… are you jealous?!”

Jealous? No. No way. He's not jealous. He’s just acting jealous, because he is committed to this job, and the fat stack of cash due to him at the end of these four months. If he’s laying it on a little too thick, if his body is responding to this whole stupid situation with stupid, involuntary reactions beyond his control, it’s just because he’s been in character all damn day.

He's just playing a role.

It's all just an act. 

And besides, in the end, it might help sell the authenticity of their engagement— because nothing makes for a convincing relationship like a healthy dose of jealousy, right?

“So what if I am?” He scoffs, his tone trying for nonchalant and aloof but landing closer to defensive. He leans in, lowering his voice as his mouth closes in on Maka’s ear. “Isn’t that what you’re paying me for, anyway?” 

Without another word, he reaches for Maka’s barely-drunk glass of wine, the one he’d delivered to her so hurriedly, and gently, he extracts it from her grasp, taking care not to let the liquid within tip over the side. He deposits it on a nearby cocktail table, and once it's relinquished, he lets his now free hand find the valley of her waist. 

“Soul—” His name is a breathy gasp on her lips as her mouth falls open. “What are you—”

“Dance with me.” 

He laces his other hand through hers and is more than a little surprised at the utter lack of resistance, how she doesn’t protest even the slightest bit, given how earlier— much earlier in the day, so much earlier it feels like a whole lifetime ago, somehow— she’d confided in him her reservations about dancing. Her fingers grip his tightly and she follows him, with parted lips and flushed cheeks, as he leads her deeper into the dance floor. 

In his peripheral vision, several heads turn, and several paparazzi raise their cameras in interest. 

If they’re going to be on display, constantly in the spotlight and with the eyes of the world fixed upon them, Soul figures they might as well put on a good show. 

He stops in a relatively open part of the dance floor and pulls Maka into his embrace. His hand slides from her waist to the small of her back, pressing her so close to him their hips almost touch. Her fingers rest upon his right shoulder, and Soul keeps as little space between their faces as physically possible as he leads them into a simple, three-step rhythm. Maka doesn’t say anything, simply gazes up at him in wonder as she follows his lead. 

“I think we ought to establish a new rule,” he says with a smirk on his face, one that he hopes looks as devilish as it feels. He rests his forehead against hers, and somewhere on the sidelines, a camera flashes. “No dancing with people who aren’t your fiancé at these fancy shindigs, from now on. Which means, no dancing with people who aren’t me. Sound good?” 

Maka blinks at him, as though his words had snapped her out of a trance. “Soul,” she giggles, shaking her head and biting back a smile. “It's just how these things go, you know. Harvey wasn't trying to steal me away from you.” 

“What?” His voice is still gruff, low and protective despite his best efforts. “What do you mean?” 

“It's just basic etiquette. It's customary for royalty from visiting nations to ask the hosting crown for a dance when attending functions such as these.” 

“Well, when we're married, that's the first thing I'm changing. That rule has got to go.” He frowns. “No one gets to dance with my queen but me.” 

Maka pulls away, then, and the loss of contact with her forehead is a little disorienting. Soul finds his head falling forward and his step faltering for the briefest of moments. 

“I’m… flattered, Soul,” she laughs, her nose scrunching up in that utterly maddening way of hers. “But I think you need a few lessons on how our monarchy works after this.”

He narrows his eyes. “You're giving me more homework?” 

“I haven't given you any homework yet!” She giggles, and her laughter rings sweetly in his ears. “I was considering it! But now I think I will!” 

Internally, Soul smiles, an odd satisfaction settling in his chest. Externally, however, he rolls his eyes. “Fine, fine. What's my first lesson?” 

He moves his arms purposefully and intentionally, then, shifting his hold on her hand and her waist to send her in a slow, elegant spin. More cameras flash, and Soul finds he couldn't care less. 

The paparazzi can eat their hearts out. 

She returns to his embrace with a graceful swish of her billowing skirts, and then they seamlessly fall back into step once again. 

“Lesson number one,” she says with an infectious smile. “Bellemorte is a constitutional monarchy. The reigning monarch shares power with a constitutionally organized government, and the monarch's power is limited by the constitution set forth by said government. Parliament makes the rules, not the king or queen.” 

He'd never thought he'd find himself utterly enthralled by a civics lesson. “I see. So no queen-related dancing rules for me, then.” 

She shakes her head. “No. Although I suppose you could try to convince Sid to draft up some legislation, but even if it made it to the senate floor, it's difficult to challenge centuries of tradition.” 

“Well, yeah, of course.” Soul thinks back to the day he'd met Maka in Malibu, how she'd read the very statute, upheld by her own Parliament, that prevents her from even becoming queen unless she's wed by the end of the year. He lowers his voice to a whisper. “That's the whole reason I'm even here, isn't it?” 

Her face changes then, and he can't quite make sense of the way her brow knits itself together and the shape her lips make as she presses them into a line. “Yes… Yes, I suppose it is.” 

They dance in companionable silence then, save for the ambient orchestral music and layers of overlapping chatter permeating the ballroom. Soul studies her face for what feels like the hundredth time today, and—

He'd been so preoccupied earlier— during dance practice, and then their grand waltz at the beginning of the night — he hadn't even noticed. So preoccupied with leading– not slipping up even once on his footwork, with guiding Maka through the basic steps of a waltz, and, if he's being honest, impressing her with the spins— but now… 

“You have freckles.”

He blurts it out without even thinking about it.

Maka blinks. “Huh?”

“Freckles,” Soul repeats, bringing a hand up to rest delicately on her cheek. His thumb brushes her soft, delicate skin. Maka's eyes widen, but she doesn't shrink away from his touch. “On your face.”

How had he never noticed?

Before he can think better of it, he leans in and presses a gentle kiss to the bridge of her nose, right between her eyes— right where the freckles are darkest. He hears Maka's quick, sharp intake of breath when his lips make contact with her skin, feels the warmth of her hand as it comes to rest atop his. He lingers there for a long moment, and once he finally does pull away, there's a strange pang in his chest— something almost like disappointment.

“Now there’s a photo for the paparazzi, eh?” 

When he winks down at her, she flushes from the tips of her ears all the way to her collarbones, a deep, rosy shade of scarlet that rivals the hue of her dress. The memory of it lingers in Soul's mind long after she recovers— long after their dance ends, in fact, and long after his hands part from her waist, leaving only the phantom sensation of her body heat clinging to his fingertips.

As the gala festivities march on and the night approaches its end, Soul realizes he agrees with Prince Harvey on one thing— that Maka does look ravishing in red.

It's just a slightly different kind of red he finds himself fancying.

All things considered, the engagement gala has been a rousing success.

It's almost gone too well, Maka thinks, and the thought has her on edge as the hours tick by and the conclusion of the evening's festivities draws ever nearer. It's quite unnerving, actually, the idea that absolutely nothing has gone wrong tonight— she'd prepared herself for some sort of crisis, because if there's one thing she knows about living her life in the spotlight, it's that there's always a crisis to be had. 

Whether that crisis is small (a shortage of decorative napkins, a cellist who comes down with the flu the day of the event) or downright cataclysmic in scope (her fist bloodying the face of the crown prince of the United Kingdom), there's always something to sweep Damien and Liz into damage control mode, and more often than not, there's always some sort of reprimand awaiting her at the end, a stern talking-to to be had— by Damien or Liz or her father or all the above— in the aftermath.

But tonight has been about as close to perfect as it can possibly get. 

She hadn't slipped up on her footwork during the grand waltz. The press hadn't pestered her and Soul with any wildly inappropriate questions. Her father had maintained a safe distance all evening, had generously stayed at least a half a ballrooms’ length from her and had refrained from fainting or full-body tackling Soul at any point, or publicly renouncing his daughter's engagement in a fit of hysteria. 

She'd even held it together in front of Ox. Had reigned in her temper and managed to not break his nose, or any other part of him, a fact which fills her with an odd, unexpected sort of pride. 

If the worst thing that had happened tonight was Soul's bizarre outburst of jealousy when she'd danced briefly with Harv, Maka can live with it— she can arrange for a basket of the finest grade Bellemortian pomegranates and flowers to be delivered to the Royal Family of Luxembourg in the morning as an apology and overall consider the evening an otherwise successful affair. 

The memory of the incident, however, sends her heart all aflutter, and she doesn’t quite know why. The memory of Soul storming onto the dance floor, his expression dark and his tone of voice deadly, the brash, possessive way he’d spoken about being her fiancé. How thrilling it had been when he’d insisted on a dance afterward, the way her stomach had swooped and her heart had soared when he’d called her his queen. 

How plainly envious he’d been to learn that Harv was an old friend of hers, how he hadn’t even denied it or tried to hide it. 

It makes her feel all the more guilty that she hadn’t been completely honest with him. 

She and Harv are childhood friends— that much is indeed true. They’d grown up together, as closely as two young royals coming of age in neighboring European countries can, anyway. Their paths had crossed whenever Bellemorte would host a royal function— countless galas and banquets and garden parties over the years— and whenever her father would fly to Luxembourg for business. Maka had been a precocious young princess, eager to see the world and accompany her father on diplomacy talks even at the tender young age of ten, and her father was not great at saying no to his only daughter. Memories of playing hide and seek with Harv in his palace’s gardens, of shushing each other in the palace library as they tore through book after book, of following after him as he showed her around the capital city of his country, are among her fondest childhood memories. 

What she hadn’t told Soul was that Harv had been one of her father’s hand-picked suitors, and that, had her fake engagement scheme fallen through, he probably would have been the one she’d chosen. 

In another life— a life in which Maka accepts her fate with grace and agrees to an arranged marriage— she would have been betrothed, and eventually married, to Harv, because she is fond enough of him that it would have at least been an amicable union. Marrying a friend, someone she’s known for most of her life, would not have been the worst fate, Maka thinks, and she would not have been miserable. Harv would have made a good husband and a good king-consort. 

But fondness isn’t love, and even if what Ox had said earlier in the night was true— that no one in this life marries for love— Maka would rather stick to her principles. If she can’t have love, she’d rather carve out her own path, and so far, her attempt at doing just that has been going swimmingly.

So far, in fact, her entire fake fiancé plan has gone off without a hitch, without hitting any major snags.

So far, it seems everyone is truly convinced that her engagement is legitimate, and she's so thrilled about it, she doesn't even dread seeing what sort of drivel about her and Soul ends up in the papers. Come Monday when Liz sits her down for the weekly media report and debrief about whatever headlines the paparazzi had schemed up, whatever scandalous or embarrassing or completely out-of-context photographs end up in the tabloids, Maka can handle it. 

Her plan is working. Come the new year, she will be queen.  

The smile on her face is completely genuine, even blissful, as she rises from her seat to address the guests seated in neatly arranged tables all around the ballroom. With the final event on the gala's itinerary— a plated dinner— drawing to a close, all that remains of her responsibilities for the evening is a brief farewell. A parting message of gratitude for all who had come to commemorate the announcement of her impending nuptials and an invitation to look forward to more news about the royal wedding in the coming weeks.  

Easy. Effortless, even. A few short sentences and a toast, and then the gala will officially conclude. 

Maka clears her throat, fiddles with the lavalier microphone affixed to the neckline of her dress and glances down at Soul. He gives her an encouraging nod from where he sits beside her, a lopsided smile on his lips and his deep, mahogany eyes trained on her face, and something about the weight of his stare is almost… freeing. Empowering, even. The way he looks at her fills her with courage, gives her the confidence to speak a little clearer and stand a little taller.

“Ladies and gentlemen, esteemed guests of the gala,” she begins. “I hope you'll allow me a few moments to interrupt your meal for a word of thanks. It has been an honor to host you this evening, and to accept your warm wishes of congratulations.” She pauses a moment to survey the crowd and mentally run through the script she'd prepared for this brief speech. “On behalf of the royal family and the entire court of Bellemorte, I extend my deepest—”

Distantly, there's a noise. 

It's so out of place that Maka almost thinks she'd imagined it, that her nerves had conjured it to break up the silence in the ballroom— but then, she hears it again, louder this time. 

A shattering of glass, the unmistakable sound of something breaking, followed by a series of loud banging noises— a commotion on the other side of the lower-level ballroom doors.

A murmur rises from the crowd as gala patrons shift in their seats, as they turn in the direction of the noise. Maka's eyes flicker down to Soul, who looks as utterly confused and lost as she does, before darting wildly around the room in search of answers. 

“Your Highness—” Liz's voice in her ear snaps her attention to her side. “Your Highness, we have a situation.” 

“What sort of situation?” Maka says tightly, through gritted teeth and mounting panic rising in her chest. “What's happening?”

“There seems to be—” Liz takes a breath, quick and deep, through her nose. She reaches to adjust the lapels of her blazer with a nervous flutter of her manicured hand. “An intruder.”

“An intruder?” Maka spits. “What? How?! Where’s Damien?!”

The answer to her question is delivered in short order.

The doors to the ballroom swing open with a clatter, a massive, heavy-sounding thud that reverberates through the open space, and through the entryway steps the royal head of security himself, dragging another man in by the scruff of his neck. 

Literally. 

“Absolutely ridiculous— completely fucking bullshit— do you have any idea who I am?!”

The strange man wears a disheveled suit that looks worse for the wear, the tie at his neck loosened and jacket sliding precariously from his broad shoulders. Maka doesn't recognize him— she'd remember a man with electric blue hair, she's sure of it. She stands there, shocked and mildly horrified, as the man kicks and claws at Damien's hold, futilely trying to wrench himself free of the bodyguard's grasp, to no avail, and all the while being quite vocal about it. 

“I can't fucking believe this— I’m telling you there’s been a mistake!” He howls, his shrill voice echoing against the ballroom’s walls. “My name should have been on the guest list! I'm a friend of the groom! The best friend of the groom, actually—”

A chair screeches gratingly against the hardwood floor as Soul practically leaps out of his seat beside her.

“Ow!” Damien jostles the man roughly, and even from here, Maka can see the furious glow of his golden eyes ablaze with fiery wrath. 

“A mistake? Oh, I’m sure, ” Damien seethes, tightening his grip on the man’s collar and raising him even higher off the floor. “And I’m sure you scaling our perimeter walls and slipping in through a balcony window was also a mistake. ”

“It’s called parkour—" The blue-haired man screeches, his legs kicking uselessly in the air. “And I’m a goddamn professional! The only reason you caught the great Blake Starling is because I let you— yowch!” he yelps. “Watch the hair! Come on man! You know how much a plane ticket from LA costs?! I have a right to be here!!”

He swings his head wildly about the room, as if desperately searching for something, until his eyes sweep to the table Maka stands at.

“Soul, there you are!” He bellows at the sight of Maka's betrothed. “You fuckin' asshole! Did you really think you could just fuck off to Europe and get married? You forgot the most important thing—” he pauses, his smile stretching into a shit-eating grin. “Your best man!”