I loved dancing with my father. I use to do it a lot when I was younger. My father use to dance with my mother all the time, but he always gave Grace and I a dance. Dancing with him now, I felt happy. It took me back to when I was a child and being different was okay because everyone assumed you would grow out of it. I didn't grow out of it, people's attitude towards me changed, but dancing with my father never changed. It was always a safe place.

"Do you know Grace has a new love interest?" I asked my father. I felt his hand tighten in mine and noticed his body stiffen.

"Who?" His serious face scared me.

"Prince Rafael, he is the youngest prince of Jauvon," I said.

My father's eyes widened in surprise. "A prince? They usually think they can get any girl and don't care about the consequences. I don't like it."

"She really likes him. I guess you can ask around, you know that creepy guy that knows everything, what was his name Quintin?"

"Quincey," my father corrected me. "Yes, he could tell me what I want to know. I think I will have a talk with this Prince Rafael, do a bit of recon myself."

I opened my mouth to speak but stopped upon realizing a guard that had come up to my father. He bowed respectively before speaking, "Captain, we seem to have a problem."

A look of alertness crossed my father's face. The guard continued. "Prince Mathew seemed to have disappeared."

"Did you check his chambers?" I scoffed. Leave it to Mathew to leave a party early with a woman.

Both the guard and my father turned red at the words that had come out my mouth. Oops?

"Y-yes," the guard said flustered. "He was not there. We do not want to create a panic but--"

"That is correct, do not create a panic. Let everyone assume everything is fine. I will search the perimeter with a few men," my father ordered.

Yes, some action! A little fun!

The guard and my father left immediately and I did my own recon. Walking up to a group of young women who had been watching Mathew the whole ball with googly eyes. They eyed my attire in curiosity and some in disgust. "Hello ladies."

"Hi?" one of them said in a form of a question.

"Do you happen to know where Ma- Prince Mathew is?" I asked. They already worshiped him, I wouldn't want to offend the possible witnesses by disrespecting his title.

"Why do you want to know?" asked another accusingly. Do not worry honey, I do not want to steal 'your' man.

I pointed at my guard's uniform. "It is my job. An official wants a meeting with him, I think he might be avoiding him."

"Why can't they just leave him alone, it's his birthday! He is allowed a break!" said one in a yellow dress. Okay president of the fan club, calm down.

"I know, it sucks but I know Mathew would rather this than deal with the wrath of his father. Mathew respects him too much and I don't want him to regret this," I said nonchalantly watching them all share worried looks with each other. "Well, since it is his birthday I guess I'll just let him get into trouble. As long as he has his break now and all."

I turned to leave with a smile threatening to cross my lips. In five... four... three... two...

"Wait!"

One.

I turned around trying to keep a straight face. "Yes?"

"I saw him go outside, we wanted to follow him but he didn't look too happy when he saw us so we came back inside," said the one in the purple dress. Outside? Great, did they know how big the castle's backyard was?

"Thank you, I'll let him know of your kindness," I nodded with a small smile. The five girls almost fainted in joy as they shared hopeful looks with each other. Poor poor girls. He is about to get married in about a week. You have all lost your chance.

I stepped outside in the direction the girls told me he had walked in. That's when I remembered something. I walked to the old oak tree in the back of the garden. It had been there for as long as I could remember. I looked up the tree to find a shadow on one of the branches.

"You know, you've got all the guards worried?" I called up to the prince trying to hide.

I heard Mathew swear, failing at staying silent. "How did you find me?"

I sighed before climbing up the tree to the level Mathew was seated on. I sat on the branch opposite to Mathew, it was a bit lower than his branch but we were still facing each other. I looked at my surroundings and took in a deep breath. I could see everything from up here despite the darkness of the night. They had every light in the castle turned on, giving me a good enough view. I could see why Mathew would come here. It was refreshing.

Snapping out of my state of awe, I turned my head to face the reason I was actually here.

"What's wrong Mathew?" I asked, the softer side of me appealing to him. "You only come here when something is bothering you."

He let out a humourless laugh. "How is it that you out of all people know this?"

"I am my father's daughter, I am pretty preceptive when I want to be," I said. When I saw he wasn't giving in, I continued. "Whenever you got into an argument or failed at something, you would run away here. You haven't grown out of it."

He has been coming here since he was a child. I have ran after him a few times as I child when I still had hope we could be friends, but I would cowardly stop scared he would hurt my feelings again.

"I thought no one knew, I guess I will have to change it now," he said but I could tell he wasn't all in it.

I rolled my eyes at him. "Don't worry, you can keep your spot. I was just checking if you were here and not kidnapped."

I was about to climb down when Mathew spoke. "I come here to just escape. Everyone expects me to be perfect all the time, the future king can not have any faults. The way I speak, dress, eat, move, all of it is being judged all the time. Some times I just want to be alone to just breathe and feel a little free. I don't know why I am telling you this, you wouldn't understand."

It sounded like he had been bottling this up for years and finally just blurted it.

I felt a pang in my chest. Truth was, I understood much more than he could imagine. "You know Mathew, I do understand what you are going through. If it makes you feel any better, I don't think you are perfect or expect you to be. I sort of hate you."

Mathew let out a full hearted laugh. Even in the dark I could see his perfect smile. "Yes, I think you might be the only one. I guess I could say thank you for listening."

I smiled back not expecting a thank you from Mathew. "You're welcome princeling. Let me go tell the rest you are not dead in some ditch to my dismay. And don't worry, I won't let anyone know about your spot."

Mathew chuckled as I began climbing down the tree. Once my feet hit the ground, Mathew called out. "Hey Clary, you want to get me something to eat? I'm starving."

"Hey Mathew, get yourself your own food," I called out. I know he was still my prince, but I wasn't going to let him boss me around.

I could hear him laughing from up there. "I did not expect you to. Oh and Clary?"

"Yes?"

"I sort of hate you too."

I smiled to myself upon hearing that. Somethings never change.

***

I spent the next two days planning for the mission. There wasn't much planning, just memorizing every map between our kingdom and the kingdom of Garain. That meant I had to spend a lot of time going back and forth from the library and the military room in an effort to avoid bumping into Mathew and his irksome ways like I was now.

I walked into the library towards the wall of scrolls filled with maps. Unlike yesterday, today Mathew was waiting for me near the scrolls.

A lazy grin crept on his face upon seeing me. "You are here yet again, I would think you might have fallen for me Clary."

"In your dream princeling," I rolled my eyes before putting the old maps back and picking up the new ones.

"Can you stop calling me princeling, it's emasculating," he pleaded from my side.

A smug grin crept on my face this time. "Don't give me too much credit, you do that all on your own princeling."

"Hey!" Mathew yelled as I tucked the maps under my arm and began to turn around. "I am much more a man than you are!"

I stopped in my place only to look over my shoulder with a smile. "Of course you are, I am a woman."

His face became a darker shade of angry red. "That is not what I meant."

"I sure hope not, you spend an awful lot of time educating yourself. I'd hate to think you were an idiot," I shrugged my shoulders trying to seem casual when on the inside I was dying to burst into laughter at Mathew's irritated expression.

He pointed his finger in my direction with a red face. "You are the most--" He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening his eyes once more. "Okay fine, I challenge you."

My ears perked up at the word challenge. My whole life was filled with overcoming challenges. I liked them and I liked the feeling of success once achieving them. "You are so on."

The redness of Mathew's face eased as a smile found its way to his lips. Suddenly, his idea face came on. "Let's set a bet."

I had an idea of the direction this was facing.

"If I win, you force a replacement for the mission tomorrow," he said.

Just as I expecting. He was very easy to read. I wanted this mission and I liked to win. Plus, the idea of having one on Mathew was amazing. "When I win, you will finally shut up about me being a woman in the guard and just let me do my job."

Mathew opened and closed his mouth at lost for words. "Fine. Let's take this outside."

I placed the maps on the table near the shelf and strut outside without another word to him. Once we were outside, Mathew ordered the guards to leave the field to give us privacy. I earned a curious look from the training soldiers but no one dared disobey the prince. I would have rather enjoyed the audience. Make a name for myself and embarrass the prince? It would have been great.

Once we were alone, I turned to face him once more. "I'll be nice and let you chose the challenge."

He furrowed his brows before crossing his arms in front of his chest. "Okay fine. Let's do three sets of challenges. The first being..." Mathew looked around the field for ideas. "Rock climbing. The second being... Archery. And the third... Oh! Hand to hand combat."

I threw my head back in laughter at his choices. I could make out his reasoning behind everything. I have been practicing these for fun for years now. He was so going down.

"I don't get what is so funny," Mathew frowned.

I stopped laughing managing to let out a few giggles. "Okay, okay. I'll stop laughing. So rock climbing? Let's get going."

We both perched ourselves at the base of the wall. I looked at Mathew with an amused grin while he was in the most serious state ever I had to hold back a laugh.

"On the count of three," he gritted through his teeth. "One... two... three!"

I began climbing as fast as I could, I knew every rock on this wall from years of experience. I knew the proper footing, where to grab and push myself. Mathew surprised me with his upper body strength since he was keeping up quite nicely. Maybe if he knew the wall like I did he could have beaten me. But I was currently reaching the top of the wall and using the rope on the other side to climb down. As I reached the ground I looked up to see Mathew scowling at me from up top the wall. I gave him a little wave in which he scoffed in response. I waited for Mathew to come down before revealing my thoughts.

"You thought just because you've mastered climbing your tree it meant you'd be a master at climbing a wall I've been climbing since I was a child?" I asked.

His eyes widened in shock at my ability to read him. "It doesn't matter, let us move on to archery."

I was already doing the victory dance in my head. My favorite pass time was target practice. I've perfected hitting the target with almost anything; daggers, arrows, even pebbles.

I picked up a bow and three arrows. "Most bullseyes win?"

Mathew narrowed his eyes at me excepting the challenge. "Yes."

I watched him stand a distance in front of the tree with a target painted on it. I saw him mutter something to himself. He kept changing his stance and pulling the bow string back then trying a new position.

I let out an exaggerated yawn. "Any day now would be nice."

Mathew shot me a dark look before going back to his attempt on getting the perfect stance. He finally stood firm and released his arrow. It actually hit the target but not the middle. It hit the edge.

"Two more tries," I said in a sing song voice.

"I know!" Mathew shot back quickly.

I held back a giggle seeing him struggle with aiming his arrow. He finally shot his second arrow coming close to the center. A smile creeped on his lips at his accomplishment.

One more to go.

Mathew aimed his bow and arrow with complete focus once more and let go. The arrow actually hit the bullseye. My jaw fell in astonishment. He actually did it. Good for him!

"Feeling scared now are we?" Mathew taunted. "It's okay you can forfeit if you want."

A let out a giggle not being able to hold it in any more. "You're funny. I just want to warn you that I never miss."

I stood in the proper position I have mastered so well. Pulling back on my bow I let go hitting the bullseye.

I took a peek at Mathew who was frowning. "That's just luck. You have two more tries."

Luck he says? Looking back at the target, I aimed and turned my head towards Mathew. "Try this for luck."

I shot and the arrow hit the bullseye once more. I didn't wait for his comment before taking out my last arrow and shooting it. It pierced right through one of the arrows, splitting it in half.

I now looked at Mathew who's jaw had been open in disbelief. "H-how?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "I told you, I never miss. Did you really think the fact you have actually read books on archery that it makes you more qualified than I am?"

"Y-yes! I did," he was still in a state of disbelief. I wanted to snap my fingers in front of his face to make sure he was still with me.

"Reading about and actually practicing every day from sunrise till sunset are two very distinct things. I thought you would have known that from when we were younger?" I asked. Mathew use to train with us when we were younger before he gave up and went on to burying himself in his books.

"It does not matter, science states that the average male is stronger than the average female. It is basic biology. I will beat you in hand to hand combat," he said with determination. Science huh?

I narrowed my eyes at him showing I meant business. "I have a few lessons to teach you myself."

His face set in determination.

"Bring it."

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