We talked about the curtains over lunch.

I understood. I was just as frightened as she to speak about matters of importance. I wasn't going to bring up our impending deaths or the babies or Queen Isabelle if Jade didn't.

We'd gotten another bowl of fresh fruit. This one held about a dozen plums, also accompanied by a note. Jade refused to read it to me. So we talked about the curtains.

When we ran out of things to say about what color they should be and how much fabric we had and who would do the job (Jade had formal sewing lessons while I only had my mother's teachings to refer to), we moved on to cleaning. Should we have a schedule? Assigned chores? How much water did we have, and how much was for bathing? For drinking?

There were logistics galore to be figured out. They made my head hurt. Jade wrote things down, making lists and charts and math equations. I felt dumb, but said nothing.

Finally, I sighed and said, "What did the note say?"

Jade flinched, finishing off the last of her canned chicken sandwich. "Nothing important," she said, swallowing.

"Sure, but I still want to know."

"Don't worry yourself, darling," Jade told me. She cleared her plate, tossing it onto the stand that held the water pump. After the chairs would come a counter, certainly. "My mother has no other purpose than to say nasty things and look formidable."

I didn't know how else to say this. So I stood up, grabbing her by the shoulders. Jade looked up, surprised. "Jade," I said firmly. "I need you to be honest with me, okay? If we're going to survive, we need to be open with each other."

She stared at me for a moment, emerald eyes darting back and forth between my murky ones. "I am being honest with you, Dear," she insisted. "It isn't important. You really shouldn't worry."

I withheld a growl, tightening my hold on Jade's shoulders. "This isn't just about the note," I told her. "It's the principle of the thing. If I want to know something, I don't want you to patronizing me."

Jade wrestled herself out of my grip, pumping water over her hands. "I'm not patronizing you," she insisted.

"Stop lying!" I shouted. I hadn't meant to yell, but it came out loud anyway. "You can't say something and expect me to blindly believe it, just because you're a princess! I know you're used to being on top, and getting whatever you want, but you're not going to get that from me. I'm not just one of your servants, Jade! You can't manipulate me!"

She looked at me, her face dead. I regretted everything that had just come out of my mouth, but her eyes told me I couldn't take any of it back. She flicked her hands through the towel on the water pump and breezed by me, out of the room.

I found myself alone with my bitterness.

I wanted to leave the kitchen and find my princess. I wanted to apologize, make things right. I didn't want to fight with the only person I could talk to anymore.

But at the same time, I didn't want to take it back. I meant what I said, and she needed to know that.

Jade had always been sensitive, though. I hoped I hadn't made her cry.

I'd made her cry before. The first time was the first time I went to the castle. She snuck me in, dressed as a maid. I wore the plain (but spotless) dress, the white bonnet and followed her up the stairs, my eyes wide with awe. I had never walked on carpets this plush or seen chandeliers with so many diamonds -- hell, I hadn't ever seen a diamond at all.

The castle buzzed with activity. Servants, maids, butlers and nobles rushed about, all with somewhere to be and no doubt in their step. Jade didn't look back as she ascended the staircase, leaving me to marvel in peace.

I remember arriving at her room. I gasped as she locked the door behind me, taking in her royal purple walls and queen sized bed. The canopy of cloth around her bedpost, the gold trimmed furniture and soft lavender carpet.

"Scarlett?" Jade said after a minute. "Are you okay?"

"Mhm." I stared at the ceiling, at Jade's personal chandelier. "I can't believe you live here."

Jade shrugged, taking my hand. She led me away from the door, sitting down on her bed. I hesitated, unsure if it would be proper to sit on her downy purple sheets. Jade pulled on my hand, tugging me down next to her. "I wish you could stay longer."

"Me too." She sat down, running her fingers over the silky blanket. "The palace is amazing."

Jade shrugged again. "I suppose it is."

"I wish I could live here."

That was when she cried. We had only been seeing each other for a month or so, and had not yet decided that we were in love. We considered each other good friends, each harboring private desires and attractions, each assuming the feelings weren't mutual. Until then, until she started crying and words flowed out of the cracks in her dam along with the tears.

"I'm a princess," she wept. "I am supposed to do certain things, Scarlett. I have obligations."

Obligations. The word felt big and heavy like a flag falling from the pole onto us. Fluttering down, suffocating. "Jade . . ."

"I am not allowed to love you," she sniffled, leaving me shocked. "I'm not allowed to be yours, but I desperately want to belong to you. I am not allowed to say this, Scarlett. I shouldn't be thinking these things, wanting these things about you, I should see you as a peasant, a farmer's daughter and nothing more. But you aren't. I'm not supposed to love you, but I do, Scarlett, and I don't know how to hide it anymore."

I left the kitchen, sighing to myself. If only I was born royal, or a boy. If only we were born in a world where we could be happy together.

I'd been right. I could hear Jade's distinctively quiet weeping from under our bedroom door.

I walked across the chilly living room, my bare feet protesting as I stepped off the carpet, back onto the stone. They wanted to go home.

I opened the door with a hesitant hand, pausing when it clicked open a crack.

I could see only her back, and a fan of loose hair decorating her mattress. Her shoulder shook with sobs, her side rising and falling as she breathed. She had curled herself into fetal position, arms folded around her body.

Sighing, I closed the door behind me. Although we were alone in the tower, a closed door seemed appropriate to the delicate intimacy of the situation. She flinched when the door scraped shut, but didn't otherwise respond.

"Jade?" I stood by the wall, my eyebrows knit together with distress. I hadn't meant to upset her so. For anyone else, I would have scoffed and justified my behavior by saying they needed to grow a thicker skin. But Jade, Jade was different. You don't mind keeping a beautiful rose in a glass cage, but a dandelion will have to fend for itself.

Jade didn't answer.

I stepped closer, sinking to my knees beside my mattress. "Don't be mad," I pleaded. "You know I didn't mean it like that, Jade." She gave a very un-Jade-like grunt. "I just meant--"

"You just meant that I think I'm better than everyone else," she cut me off, "Right? That I look down on you because I'm a princess?"

I blinked at her back, unsure of how to respond. That was what I'd said, wasn't it? I couldn't very well deny it. "Love, I don't want to fight. Can't we just put this behind us?"

Finally, Jade turned to face me. "Fine, then,"

I sighed. "Okay." She continued to stare at me, green eyes unblinking. I looked into them, trying to find some thread to follow through the complex maze of her mind, but found none. They offered me no entry, those eyes. They were sealed shut, but startlingly open.

I waited for her to blink. Finally, she did.

With tentative movements, I slid myself onto my mattress, lying down beside her. She watched me, her expression blank. I reached out a hand. She took it.

We would be okay.