Serim runs her hand over the cover of the leather-bound book, smearing dust on her palm as this is the first time she's picked it up since she stopped using it around a year ago. The princess is currently busy with the princes from the other realms, seemingly having a discussion in which she's not allowed to join in. She is free from any direct obligations so she's spending time in her modest room, trying to lift her mind off of things even though they seem endless.

She unwinds the rope around the book, the pages expanded and edges frayed from the constant use back then, but she no longer found time to even open it due to the constant demands from the princess. She sifts through the pages; her feelings flowing among the pieces. The carbon scratches take shape as something she enjoys doing in her free time, though she barely has any as the years go by. The pages have started to turn yellow, but the markings remain.

'Beautiful markings', as what Seonghwa once told her.

She opens the book, her hand itching to pick up a wooden pencil again; the material she needs to let her feelings out on the initially-white paper. The lines and curves take shape as the scenery around the palace, or what she sees as she goes to town alongside the princess. She captures what she experiences perfectly through her drawings; the only talent she feels proud of. She never drew portraits, except for one person.

She stares at the portraits of the single person scattered among the pages, feeling like the person is now a mere stranger, just like how they used to be.

---

3 years ago

The princess had went on a trip to another realm with the king and queen, and Serim was left behind at the palace; the princess said that she'd only be a burden to bring around. Serim is 19 at that time, and despite already having a few years of experience as Narae's lady-in-waiting, she still feels like she needs a lot to learn.

Though she knows it's wrong for her to be moving around the palace, it's the first time she's able to roam freely without having to rush to the princess whenever she calls for her. It's like she's seeing the interior of the palace in a new light; as if it's the first time she knows how many halls the palace has, how the hallways twist and turn, making someone unfamiliar with it to become lost.

With the sketchbook in her hand and pencil in another, she walks around the palace like she's having a self-guided tour. She takes in everything, appreciates every single detail while capturing them in her sketchbook. As soon as she arrives at the library, she hides herself among the shelves when Prince Seonghwa suddenly comes in, under his arms a stack of books he is looking to put back on the shelves.

She doesn't want him to notice her presence, and it would be awkward for her to suddenly appear in front of him while scurrying to exit the library. So she stays quietly among the towering books that can conceal her, all through praying that he would leave quick. Her wish doesn't happen to come true though, as it seems that the prince is someone who loves to spend hours in the library. To make things worse, he's currently seated at the desk nearest to the door, making it impossible for her to escape without being noticed.

Her legs are starting to become numb from standing so she sits down, repeats it a lot of times but still the prince is concentrating on the book in front of him, body as still as a statue. Then she does what she never did before - she takes out her pencil, opens her sketchbook, looks at him to capture his details before putting down her work. As much time as it takes for her to draw him, she finds herself drawn to him more and more.

She notices his details she's not able to lay her eyes upon before. How his perfectly proportionate body is rigid as he delves into the book, his sparkling eyes under his reading glasses flicking back and forth in a hurried pace to capture the words on the pages and his lips occasionally pushed to form a pout, or bitten as he concentrates fully.

Yes, she's fully aware that the prince is a highly sought-after bachelor, and she understands why they call him the 'perfect prince', but she never wanted to be one of them as much as that moment. Before this she only described him as someone she's not allowed to look at for more than a fraction of a second, so her head was always hung low whenever the prince passed by. They never had any business with each other so they never talked; she is strictly to be dealing with the princess. The size of the palace made it easier for them to not even be running into each other despite living under the same roof for years.

Somehow seeing the prince alone, doing an activity that he enjoys while completely letting himself get absorbed without having to be so tense like he always is; makes her feel that maybe, having feelings for him is supposed to be completely normal. As much as she knows that she doesn't have the rights for the feelings to be there, she changes her wish instead. For the moment to last forever, for her to be able to look at him as long as she would like, even though he currently has no idea that she's camouflaging herself among the book covers.

"Ah, no!" Seonghwa shouts before his hand shoots up shoulder-level, curled into a fist. He thumps the surface of the table in mild frustration before he goes completely silent again.

It startles Serim to a great degree that she loses her grip on the sketchbook, but she manages to catch it in time before it lands on the floor to give her position away. After heaving a sigh of relief, she thought that she's safe from anymore interruptions, but her heart completely melts at what he did next.

The prince closes the book slowly, buries his face in his hands before a tear drops, only one at first then followed by a cascading set of fresh tears. She gets stunned by the prince's sudden change of attitude, her mouth hanging open slightly before she regains back her motion and puts the sketchbook on top of several arranged books. She feels awkward and a little bit amused- but mostly thinking on how much punishment she would get for one, hiding her presence from the prince and two, watching quietly as the prince lets himself get consumed with his feelings.

Everything feels so wrong, but she doesn't know what to do. She doesn't even know why the prince is currently sobbing like a baby, although his sobs are muted.

She does find out the reason after, though.

"Why?" Seonghwa wails. "Why did he have to die?" If not for his next words, Serim would've thought that someone actually died in real life. "I thought they're going to get a happy ending but the author had to kill off the man? For what? To make me suffer? To make the plot move forward? I hate this!" He pushes the book away with his elbow, like a kid throwing a tantrum for not getting what he wants. "But," he sniffs, "I need to know what happens in the end." Pouting, he takes back the book, opens the page to where he left it and continues reading. He wipes off his tears with the heel of his hands and composes himself. "Right, Park Seonghwa, it's just a character in a book." He hits his palms against his cheeks.

Mistake one, Serim couldn't help but giggle when she sees this. Already too late, she slaps a hand over her mouth and widens her eyes before she crouches to the ground, hoping that she can somewhat elude the prince. Mistake two, when she crumbles down so fast she tumbles backwards, an automatic yelp coming next as she lands on her butt.

A pair of feet comes into her vision and she's already fixing her stance; her automatic reaction is to kneel on the floor, head hung low while her palms are attached to each other. She doesn't even risk a glance at the prince, because she's scared of the consequences and she doesn't need to see the distasteful expression the prince must have on right about now.

"You are?" Seonghwa's voice comes in, but she fails to perceive his current emotion from the tone alone.

She lifts her chin slightly so that her face is partially in view to the prince, but takes no advantage of looking at him directly.

"Jo Serim, Your Highness. Princess Narae's lady-in-waiting," still with her head down. When it takes longer than half a minute for him to cook up a response, she profusely apologizes. "My deepest apologies for being here, Your Highness." She fumbles over her words, "I had no intention of keeping my presence a secret-" she stops when she realizes how much lies she's been spewing, "-but I thought that it would be disrespectful of me to suddenly appear and make you startled. I thought it was best for me to keep quiet until you leave. It wasn't my intention to snoop around-"

"How long have you been here and how much did you see?" Again, she can't guess what he's feeling right now; not that she'll risk herself getting punished much worse if she were to lift her head up.

"From- from the moment- you went inside the library and sat down to read. My apologies-"

"Stand up, or you're going to make me look heartless. And stop apologizing, you did nothing wrong," the prince mentions before a hand appears in her limited view, startling her to an even higher degree.

The prince can't possibly be...?

Seonghwa splays out his fingers, waiting for her to hold his hand for her to be able to stand up, completely oblivious to the hesitation Serim has as she fists her hands and bunches her dress with them.

"Your Highness, I must not- you must not have any contact with a dirty-"

"Park Seonghwa," he interrupts. "That's my name, no need for any formalities here."

Despite feeling scared and hesitant all rolled into one, she finally risks a glance to the prince, preparing herself to gaze upon an expression from the royal that tells her that her time is up. Instead, her breath gets stuck in her throat as she takes a good look at his face.

The prince is smiling. Not a sinister nor a mocking one, but a pure and sincere one that makes her heart beat like she just went on multiple laps around the palace.

Seonghwa brings his hand out further, trying to signal to her that it's okay for her to be grasping it. After much hesitation she does, although she's only clumsily grasping on it, trying to make as little contact as possible before releasing it at the speed of light as soon as she's on her own feet.

"My apologies for-"

"So what have you been doing here?" the prince cuts her off, as if he's trying hard to not hear another word of apology coming out of her mouth. "You enjoy reading too?"

"Not quite, Your Highness." She presses both of her lips together, feeling that Seonghwa's stare is making herself evaporate bit by bit. "I- uh, I was-" Automatically she slaps a palm on her lips, as if it could help her talk smoothly. "Since I was having a bit of free time without the princess here, I thought I would take a walk around the palace. Not that I," she quickly adds, "am trespassing into anywhere forbidden. Just the common places around here, and I somehow found myself in the library. I much prefer to enjoy myself by drawing instead."

She doesn't know what made her say the last part, but it's as if she's itching to have the prince know that she, although only a lady-in-waiting, possesses some talents too. Even though she has no opportunity to show it off.

"Ah, you draw?" The prince's face lights up at the mention of this. "I've never heard about this from my sister, surely it's a talent to be celebrated."

"Your Highness, it's just a mere hobby of mine. Nothing special to be looked upon," she corrects him. "Something to pass my time."

"Are you sure you're not being too humble yourself?" the prince tuts. "You can't say that if you don't let anyone else look at them." His eyes go wide as he blinks slowly, his lips pursed.

Truly, she has never seen the prince like this. So close without any protocols, any barriers separating them despite the existing difference in their positions.

"Would you mind showing them to me?"

Although she could somehow predict that was what was going to come out of his mouth, it still took her by surprise that she takes a step back while softly shaking her head. If not for the fact that on the most recent page is the prince's face, she would have considered the request. But right now, as she subtly eyes her sketchbook placed on top of the arranged books near the prince's head, she hopes that the prince has yet to notice the spine of the notebook hanging precariously on the edge.

"Thinking about it, I misplaced my original sketchbook some time ago, so I don't have one with me now. The new one is currently empty," she lies through her teeth.

She mentally cringes, just how many lies she had let out to the prince without even batting an eye. The only word that's repeating in her mind is punishment, punishment, punishment...

"Really?" He pushes his lower lip forward. "That's a pity though."

She feels guilty for lying straight to the prince, who currently doesn't know more than what she had told him.

"Wonder what's this though," his demeanour changes as a cheeky smile makes its way to his face. She widens her eyes in late regret as he holds up the sketchbook with the tip of his fingers. "Pretty sure this wasn't here before."

"Your Highness," she squeaks, the flashes of her getting the worst kind of punishment playing in her mind on repeat. "That's, uh-" Realizing that she's too deep in hot water, spewing out another lie to Prince Seonghwa is not the most lucrative option to cover her previous lies.

"I guess you're not ready to show them to the world," he decides before giving the sketchbook back to her. "If you make up your mind one day to show them to others, I hope that I can be the first. Since you must've seen me crying over a book," he chuckles, "it's only fair if I be the first person to see them, right?"

She swallows back hard, slowly covering her reddening cheeks with her sketchbook as Seonghwa moves away from her. He does something akin to a wave, puts back the books he brought with him on the shelves; all the while Serim remains frozen on the spot, unable to give a proper reaction. The prince leaves not long after.

Over the course of the next few weeks, Seonghwa never left her mind, although she knows how difficult it is for her to catch him alone inside the palace. The prince is always busy with his training, classes and duties, giving no chance for them to be left alone like they were in the library. Especially not when she's expected to follow Princess Narae around, ultimately pulling her further away from the prince.

She's starting to accept the reality that the incident is the library is only a one-time thing and the prince must have forgotten about their conversation. She also finds less and less time she's able to spend drawing, so the sketchbook is tucked deep in her wardrobe. The last drawing she has is of the prince; the meeting that seemed to be a dream.

Only thing is, maybe it isn't.

She has heard of a festival downtown, where the best artists gather to show off their skills and performance. She wants to catch a glimpse of the festival but knows that she's not allowed to unless the princess wants to, but Narae is not the type to enjoy a large crowd that much so it's highly unlikely for her to be get the chance.

That is, until Prince Seonghwa pulls her to the side, serving an invitation for her to go the festival with him.

An invitation that she wishes she did not accept.