*Paige's P.O.V.*

"Is something troubling you?"

Paige looks up from her book, brow furrowed, to see Sam on the other end of the couch, watching her with a curious, slightly fond smile. She blinks.

"What makes you ask that?"

Sam laughs. "You haven't turned a page in the past six minutes. Either you found one passage really engrossing, or you're not actually reading."

Paige blinks again, returning from her world of thought and nervousness. Perhaps this is a good conversation to be having—surely Sam of all people can offer some reassurance. "Oh," she says. "I guess I wasn't. I was thinking."

"About what?" Sam asks, tilting his head to one side inquisitively. It makes some of his hair fall forward over his eye, and Paige has an urge to lean over and tuck it aside, but that would probably be weird, so she doesn't. She still thinks about it, though.

"I'm just... a little nervous," she says instead.

Sam's reaction is immediate—he sits up straighter, eyes narrowed, and leans forward slightly. "Why? What happened? Did someone threaten you again?"

Well, now she just feels silly. Paige fidgets and squirms in her seat, blushing and shakes her head because no, that's not it at all. "No, no, nothing like that!" she says, swallowing hard. "You'll probably laugh at me."

"I will not," Sam disagrees as if he's affronted at the very idea. He relaxes again, though, sitting back against the armrest and folding his arms across his chest. "Why would I ever do that?"

"Because!" Paige buries her face in her hands to hide the persistent flush in her cheeks.

"That's not an answer," Sam prods.

"I'm having tea with your mother today and I'm nervous," Paige sighs into her palms. "She intimidates me."

There's a pause.

"See? You're laughing at me, I knew you would," she starts to say, but then fabric rustles and the couch cushions dip and then her hands are being pried away from her face, and Sam is grinning at her.

"I'm not laughing at you," he says, and it's only on a technicality that he's right. Suppressed laughter, however, surrounds him like a cloud of sunshine to Paige's empathic senses.

"You reek of amusement," Paige tells him, attempting to be jokingly cross but not succeeding because of the butterflies flitting to and fro in her stomach.

"I promise she doesn't want to grill you or anything," Sam says, not-so-subtly changing the subject. Paige chooses to interpret this as a concession that he was laughing. "She just wants to get to know you. And probably wants to talk to you about some stuff."

"Some stuff?" Paige repeats. "That's not particularly reassuring."

Sam gives up and laughs, squeezing Paige's hands. "Look," he says. "She likes you. Don't worry so much!"

Paige looks at him sceptically. "Why would she like me? She and I have barely had the chance to talk much at all, past the welcome banquet."

Sam waves a hand dismissively. "Oh, she just does! I guess it's because you're just a very likeable person, Paige."

"Hmm," Paige doesn't really respond, and they leave it at that.

***

Even the door to the Queen's personal apartments is imposing. It stands almost double Paige's height, surrounded by intricate, gilt designs and with two guards posted on either side. She glances at each of them once, smiles slightly and nods her greetings, before raising her hand to the golden doorknocker and rapping it against the door, twice.

After a heartbeat, the door slowly swings open. Paige steels herself (how bad can it be? Supposedly, the Queen likes her!) and walks forward, and the door closes behind her.

"Princess Mains," Queen Winchester greets calmly, sitting on one of the couches in front of the coffee table in her sitting room. There is a kettle full of presumably hot water, a selection of looseleaf teas, two cups, and a platter of assorted pastries on the table, and the knowing look in the Queen's eyes leaves Paige with the feeling that every move she could possibly make has already been planned for. "Good to see you. Please, have a seat."

Paige attempts to drown her nerves in around three to four tons of projected calmness and quiet confidence and sits down on the sofa across from the Queen's as gracefully as she can manage. "Thank you for the invitation, Your Majesty," she says politely. "It's an honour."

Queen Winchester considers her for a moment, scanning her with a critical eye, and Paige does her best to remain impassive, smiling politely. Did she already say something wrong? Oh, god, she probably heard about her meltdown last month but only now got the time to call her in for a lecture about how she needs to get her life together before she will consider her fit to continue residing at her court—

"Sam has told me quite a lot about you," she says suddenly, and Paige swallows carefully.

"Has he?" she asks. Be confident but not cocky, be demure when you must and most of all be polite, but don't show that you're nervous! And don't be awkward, it shows and it's painful. She considers what she knows about crafting small talk, considers their relative positions as Ruling Queen and Princess Consort-To-Be, and figures it's alright if she attempts a small crack at humour. "Mostly good things, I hope."

To her surprise, the Queen actually laughs, eyes twinkling merrily. "Yes," she says, "plenty of good things. Frankly, Princess Mains, my son is rather enamoured of you."

Enamoured? This conversation has rapidly moved into unfamiliar territory, and Paige feels rather off balance already. Not good!

"Is he," Paige says faintly. How often does Sam talk about her to the Queen? Is this why she supposedly likes her? Because Sam talks her up all the time? The thought is a little disconcerting. What if Paige doesn't live up to her expectations in reality?

"Quite," the Queen assures her. "Would you care for some tea? These pastries are simply delightful, I find."

Paige blinks and then numbly selects some of the pomegranate green tea offered, tipping a teaspoonful into an infuser and carefully settling it into her cup with practised fingers before she pours boiling water from the kettle over it. The Queen's piercing gaze continues to bore into her as she selects one of the chocolate-glazed eclairs from the platter on the table and places it in her saucer, then settles back without actually taking a bite of it.

"Your Majesty?" she asks, seriously starting to wonder what she did wrong. Queen Winchester continues to watch her for a moment. "If I may be so bold... something tells me you did not invite me here simply to discuss the merits of chocolate versus strawberry fillings."

"You would be correct," she says. "If you'd rather get down to it immediately, we can do that. I have a few things to discuss with you, Princess Mains. First, the subject of your magic."

Paige holds herself steady purely because of years of practice. Internally, she wants to flinch away, but doesn't, instead just reaching for her teacup and holding it so that its warmth seeps through her hands comfortingly. "What about my magic, exactly?"

"You have not explicitly told my court that you are an empath." It's not a question but a statement levelled over the brim of the Queen's teacup.

"My apologies, Your Majesty," Paige says immediately, fighting down a wave of horror so intense it feels like nausea. She must think her manipulative, untrustworthy, and rude! At home, she preferred not to disclose her magic outside the family, but she should have considered that her own preference for privacy could have been interpreted as—

"I want you to keep it that way," the Queen interrupts her thoughts, and her panicking, fretting brain stops abruptly. She blinks, the only outward sign of her surprise.

"Um... I beg your pardon?"

"You wisely keep your status as an empath from most people, correct?" the Queen asks in a way that means it isn't actually a question so much as an acknowledgement. Paige nods but doesn't speak, letting her continue. "I thought as much. Even dear Sam was unaware of your magic before he visited your family."

"I don't mean to keep secrets from you, Your Majesty," Paige says carefully. "However, if I may speak frankly, it's... a lot safer, for me and for those around me, if I keep knowledge of my empathy from becoming common. Only my family and closest friends know about it. People would like to use it, and me, to their own ends, if I was more open about it."

"Of course," Queen Winchester agrees. "Not to sound too cold to my future daughter-in-law, but I completely understand your concern about being used by people. After all, I am going to be one of those people." Her smile is sharp, her blue eyes cold like ice.

Paige's heart sinks like a stone. So, this is what she will be dealing with—being used as a tool. That's just one more layer of icing on the cake—being far from home, having mental breakdowns, having to marry someone purely for political gains, and now this. She's always known she's a pawn, in the grand game of things, but this is more direct than ever.

"If you could clarify, Your Majesty, I would appreciate that," she says, keeping her voice steady and calm despite the resignation and dread that are pooling in equal measure in her stomach. "What is it, exactly, that you want from me?"

"I'm sure you are aware of the arrival of the Harvelle twins, tomorrow," the Queen says. She takes another sip of her tea, and Paige nibbles at her éclair just to be polite. It is quite good, but anxiety kind of makes it taste like cardboard anyway.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"You are to continue to not disclose that you are an empath," she commands, setting the teacup into the saucer in her lap. "At all times when Sam meets with them, you are to be with him. Officially, this will reflect your status as a single unit in the making and will reinforce your image, which will be helpful when you are married later and he eventually takes the crown. This part, you already knew. However, I want you carefully monitoring their interactions. Should you sense anything off-putting from any member of Víteliú's delegation, you will report directly to either Jody Mills, to Sam, or to me. Nobody else. Is this clear?"

Paige hesitates. This sounds awfully like under-the-table spying... "I—yes, for the most part, Your Majesty, but, um... just to clarify, what do you mean by 'off-putting'?"

Queen Winchester narrows her eyes in thought, seeming to critically evaluate Paige all over again. "You know of the reign of my father, correct?"

"I know some," Paige admits, "but perhaps not enough for what you might need from me. I know that he instigated lots of reforms, not all of which were, ah, popular? And he—"

"I've spent the majority of my reign cleaning up his mess," the Queen interrupts her voice a little flat. "My father meant well in all that he did, but he was too idealistic for a throne and it showed. He tried to change too much too fast, and it bred resentment among many members of court. That resentment still festers today. I have been told you've already spoken with one of the heads of the dissenters in my court."

"Lord Alexei Ivanovich," Paige supposes. At the Queen's curt nod, she sighs slightly and mutters, "A charming fellow."

The Queen snorts. "Princess Mains, we may need to revisit your knowledge of the Ruritanian language before you can serve me properly if that's what you think the word charming means."

A joke. The Queen's jokes are very dry, apparently, and Paige lets herself chuckle, stuffing her nervousness aside. This is an important conversation, no matter how much she wants to get up and run away, back through those imposing doors and down that imposing hallway until she gets to the safety of her own suite of rooms.

"I apologize if this sounds like a pointless, stupid question with an obvious answer, Your Majesty, but I would rather just ask it to make certain I understand, so, ah... Do you think the dissenters in your court have something to do with Víteliú?" she asks carefully.

Historically, Ruritania has had strong ties to Víteliú. The two are still on good terms, even with the alliance, but the alliance is the reason the Harvelles are coming to Lawrence, because the economic details of Ruritania's new trade agreements with Pandora will have some effect on current trade agreements with Víteliú, so the Crown Prince and his sister are coming to negotiate some finer points thereof. It's a largely ceremonial visit because the negotiations could easily have been carried out via diplomatic proxy, but both the Harvelles and the Winchesters understandably want to highlight their continued solidarity.

"Our 'charming fellow' has significant economic interests in the older trade agreements with Víteliú," the Queen answers. "That is to say, the ones that were in place before we signed the alliance with Pandora. Additionally, he and many of the houses in my court have branches in Víteliú, due to historical closeness and other political arrangements like your and Sam's. I don't think the Harvelles themselves are likely to be involved in any potential plot, but I will not discredit the possibility and I certainly will not allow their delegation to bypass scrutiny."

She pauses, giving Paige a chance to speak, but she chooses to stay silent and let her continue, indicating such by raising her teacup to her lips politely.

"Having you here gives us an advantage, Princess Mains," she says, and the calculating look on her face is very similar to Sam's thoughtful one. "Empathy is not a commonly studied school of magic. It's notoriously difficult to master, as I'm sure you know exceedingly well. Having you fall into my lap like this is very fortunate. I think you should be able to read the Víteliens and tell me if they seem to be plotting something."

Well, that's definitely no pressure or anything. Paige shifts uncomfortably in her seat. "Your Majesty, I don't want to get your hopes up," she says stiffly. "As you just said, empathy is difficult to master. I've studied for years, yes, but I don't think you should rely solely on my perceptions to rule anything out. It's possible to shield thoughts from an empath, and even though you say I am a unique tool, I know several members of your court shield themselves anyway. Lord Ivanovich is one of these, in fact. It's—it's possible that someone maintaining a shield could think something suspicious and I wouldn't be able to pick up more than a vague sense of unease, easily dismissable as some kind of anxiety."

The Queen smiles that razor-sharp smile again, doing a grand total of nothing to reassure her. "Don't worry, child," she says. "I would never rely solely on you. However, you are a unique tool with which to supplement the intelligence I gather."

"I... see," Paige says softly.

"This isn't going to be a one-time thing," she warns her. "I want you at my Sam's side at all official functions. You are to be his right hand and support in all things. Come, sit next to me, Princess Mains; there is something I want to show you."

Hesitant, Paige stands and walks around the coffee table, sitting down next to her uncomfortably. The Queen sets aside her saucer, reaches for one of the drawers under the coffee table, and pulls out a photo album.

She lays it across her lap and opens it, sliding it over between the two of them. There's a small, almost wistful smile on her face, and Paige can feel that it's achingly genuine; on the page, there's a picture of the Queen herself, before she was coronated, holding a baby. It's Sam, Paige realizes, eyes widening.

The Queen turns the page, and Paige has to stifle a laugh at the sequence of photos she sees next—toddler Sam, staring with wide, awestruck eyes at a fluffy golden retriever that's bigger than he is, and then toddler Sam presumably seconds later, with his face buried in the dog's fur. The third photograph on the page is a little blurred and is also possibly the funniest of the three, because little Sam is on his back in the grass, laughing, while the golden retriever lies down on top of him. Is that Georgia? No, it couldn't be Paige surmises. Perhaps it was her mother.

She turns the page again, and it's more pictures of Sam, and so is the next page, and the next—from Sam in a tiny suit and tie, tall as his mother's hip, to Sam smiling brightly into the camera with birthday cake smeared all over his cheeks.

"Why are you showing me this?" Paige asks softly, fingertip brushing one of the pages almost reverently.

"I want you to have no doubt in your heart that I love my son," the Queen says, tempered steel in her voice. She looks up from the pages to pin Paige with a hard look, but she's less terrifying now that Paige has seen her with a toddler tying her hair into a moustache across her nose.

...Only a teensy, tiny bit less terrifying, though.

"I want you to have no doubt that I will do whatever I must do, for him," she continues. "He is my crowning joy, my greatest achievement, and my legacy. One day, I will be gone, and he will be king, and you are going to do what I will no longer be able to—you will take care of him."

"I..." What does one say to that? "Yes, Your Majesty."

Queen Winchester eyes her critically. "My son thinks quite highly of you," she says. "I'm glad for this. I would not want to force him into a life with someone he could not stand. What do you feel toward him?"

Paige feels a mild stab of relief. This is a question she actually feels almost comfortable answering, given how much time she's spent pondering it herself. "He has been very kind to me. I would call him a good friend," she says. "I care for him."

"That answer pleases me," the Queen says. Paige leans forward to take her teacup from the table, sipping carefully. "I hope you continue to care for him. Stay close to him, Princess Mains. He needs a good friend."

"I will do what I can to care for him and be there for him when he needs me," she pledges. "I hope that will be enough."

The Queen nods, satisfied and closes the album. "I suppose I can't ask you to do more than you can," she says dryly, "so I will take that answer as it is. Thank you, Princess Mains."

Paige offers a slight smile in response. "It is my duty and my honour, Your Majesty."

The éclair tastes much better now that the roiling mass of anxiety in her stomach has calmed down.

***

Sam finds her, later, when she's standing out on a balcony to watch the sunset. Paige greets him with a small smile, still turning those words over in her mind—'he needs a good friend.' It's funny; she assumed Sam was close to Lady Charlie and Prince Dean and Lord Kevin, and never thought too much of it, but now that she's tried thinking about it, going back and looking at their interactions, she's started to realize that might not be the whole story. Sam always seems like he's holding something back.

"Hello there, Paige," Sam greets, coming over to lean on the railing next to Paige, standing close enough that their shoulders brush. It doesn't really faze Paige at this point; she's starting to suspect she would be more surprised if Sam didn't greet her with some kind of physical touch. Which is another thing—Sam isn't this clingy with any of the others, is he?

"Hi," she says, continuing to look out into the beautiful rosy sky, streaked with orange and gold and fading into blues and purples that stretch as far as the eye can see. "It's nice out here."

"It is," Sam agrees. "How was tea?"

Paige sighs, thinking of the fact that the Queen wants Paige to be her "unique tool". She understands the reasoning, certainly, and it's not like she wasn't going to be attending the events with Sam anyway, but the fact that the Queen wants her to help with intelligence is... stressful. But then she remembers the other things they discussed and smiles.

"It wasn't as bad as I was afraid it would be," she admits, glancing over at Sam. Which is a mistake, because the golden light of the sinking sun is nothing short of striking on his hair, which in turn make it look metallic, and it paints his high cheekbones and sharp jawline in stark relief, and oh, boy, he definitely hasn't stopped being unfairly attractive in the few hours since Paige last saw him.

Oh, for crying out loud—and now he's smiling as if that's any help whatsoever—

"I knew it wouldn't be," Sam says smugly. "What did you talk about?"

Ah. He was unfairly attractive right up until he opened his mouth and 'I told you so fell out'. Paige rolls her eyes. She has a perfect retort to that.

"Lots of things," she says easily, smiling back. "She showed me your baby pictures."

"She did what?!" The look on Sam's face is nothing short of indignance and shock, and laughter bubbles up in Paige's throat, spilling out into giggles despite her best attempts to smother them. "No, you're joking, right? She didn't."

"She did," Paige confirms, still grinning. "I can't believe you tried to eat your birthday candles when you turned four."

"I was four!" Sam protests and the embarrassment that Paige feels radiating from him assures her that the rosy tint to Sam's face is not just a trick of the light. "They were colourful and I knew the frosting on the cake was colourful and tasted good, so why wouldn't the candles? Laugh all you want, but I remember this vividly and I maintain that for a four-year-old, my reasoning was sound. It wasn't my fault I didn't understand the difference between buttercream and wax!"

"You remember it vividly?" Paige asks, surprised. "I only remember bits and pieces from when I was that young."

"Oh, so do I," Sam assures her, and he's pouting, and it's kind of adorable because he's also trying not to smile at the same time. Idly, Paige wonders what the members of court would think, seeing the Ice Prince so open, so close to laughter. She doesn't like the idea. 'They would want to tear him apart,' she thinks, and that thought makes her want to shield Sam, to protect him from those vicious claws, even though he's perfectly capable of protecting himself. "It's just that..." He shudders, drawing Paige back to the present, and sighs. "You never forget the first time you take a bite of wax."

Paige glances at him, sidelong and amused. "The first time?"

Sam huffs. "No comment," he says. "Let's go back to just watching the sunset together. It's much more romantic and pleasant than discussing these things."

Paige looks up at him wryly. "I'll get the story out of you eventually," she promises. Honestly, she's kind of surprising herself with how easy it is to fall into friendly teasing and easy, light banter with Sam, but it feels kind of right to do it. And, if the Queen spoke truly when she said Sam needs a good friend, well... it probably feels right for both of them.

"Wow, aren't the clouds pretty this evening?" Sam asks pointedly. "I sure love talking about the sky! Look at that sun go, setting already. Wow! Incredible!"

Paige laughs. "It is beautiful," she agrees. They stand together in silence for a few minutes as the sun sinks toward the horizon, and Paige has to admit, this feels almost like contentment. There's just her, fresh air and the sunset, and Sam. All of her worries will fall back onto her shoulders when she goes back indoors, but for now, she can breathe easily.

Tentatively, she leans her head against Sam's shoulder, and after a moment, Sam leans his cheek against Paige's hair. They don't need to fill the silence with words; it's quiet and content, just like this, and nothing needs to be said. They don't move apart until the sun is no longer visible, and the first of the stars are glimmering overhead. Sam moves sometimes, but only slightly as to nuzzle his nose into Paige's hair.