*Sam's P.O.V.*

It looks like this is going to be another sleepless night.

Sam stifles a frustrated groan, rolling over in bed again as carefully as he can, not wanting to disturb Georgia. These nights aren't common, thankfully, but every single time they happen, they're terrible. He probably won't get to sleep until just before dawn, if even then. He supposes it's lucky that he managed to avoid having one of these nights until the Víteliens left two weeks ago; even the thought of running on less than three hours of sleep while conducting international business sounds terrible.

He's wide awake. It's three in the morning and he feels like it's noon, and it's painfully still in his room. His phone screen is too bright even on the lowest setting, but doing nothing just leads to staring at the ceiling and letting his thoughts swirl and fester, and that... never ends well.

Three in the morning, he thinks to himself, might just be the loneliest part of a day.

He scrolls through his private account's Instagram feed, absentmindedly liking all the posts with cute dogs in them, and blows out a quiet sigh. There's an ache in his chest, the kind of slow melancholy that rises over time like a slowly gathering flood until he drowns without ever having realized he was sinking.

This happens sometimes.

He doesn't have to like it, but he's used to it. Right?

Tomorrow, he'll just be drained and tired and dead on his feet, but he'll put the mask back on as normal and pretend that his own emotional exhaustion isn't slowly overwhelming him, seeping in like water through all the cracks, damaging the very foundations of everything he stands upon. It'll be fine. He's been pretending nothing is wrong for years now.

...It'll be fine, he's been pretending for years now, this happens sometimes, and he's used to it, so why exactly is he swinging his feet out of bed, stuffing his phone in his pocket, and walking to the door?

He takes a brief moment to make sure Georgia is still snoozing away, content in her doggy dreams, and then slips outside, locking his rooms behind him. He'll be back soon anyway, no doubt—a quick walk to clear his head is probably a good idea. And if that doesn't end up working out, he can go outside and run or practice his magic against the summer's warmth until he's too exhausted to stay awake, and no matter what, all he has to do is make sure he comes back by morning to get Georgia.

Yes, this sounds like a foolproof plan to ignore the loneliness in the pit of his stomach, even though the sad, pathetic ache is the actual reason he can't sleep. He's just... sad. For no real reason, except that maybe in recent years he's come to realize that being a Crown Prince seems to mean being alone and that he doesn't like it, not at all. That is—he loves helping his country, he loves being good at it, but...

The fact that he never had a choice in the matter, the fact that he still has no choice, effectively, and the fact that he seems to have to do it all alone when so many other people have friends and lovers and more people to rely on... those facts feel unfair. He doesn't blame his mother—of course, he doesn't, not when she's doing her best too!—but he's still just so bone-achingly tired of living with the weight of it all.

Can it really be called living, if it's so mindless, day to day repetitions of the same routines until he feels like some kind of royal puppet, a mimicry of himself?

Most days, he's okay with it. He can outrun his thoughts and hide from his fears, and he's fine with life as he knows it. It's only on the days—or more often, the nights—when they all catch up to him that he realizes that maybe, just maybe, something is wrong.

And so it is that his feet, either brilliant or treacherous in their ability to walk places without his mind telling them to, bring him to Paige's door, and his hand, on autopilot more than anything else, rises and raps against the wood, three times.

What is he doing?

He more than half-expects the knock to go ignored, assumes Paige probably is asleep by now, as most sane people are at quarter past three in the morning. Honestly, he ought to have stayed in his rooms; he's dealt with sleepless nights like this before. He should turn and go, really—there's nothing wrong with sitting alone and staring at the ceiling and watching Georgia sleep while loneliness gnaws at him, slowly devouring him from the inside out until there's nothing left but a high-functioning husk of who he's supposed to be.

But then the door opens.

Paige stands there, and though she's in her sleepwear (frankly, the most distracting set of satin pink, shorts and tank-top pyjamas that Sam has ever seen), she doesn't look like she just got out of bed—she seems far too alert for that, even if she isn't wearing her glasses. It's a stark contrast, seeing her like this. She looks more human and more vulnerable than any of them do during the daytime, all covered in rich clothing and seemingly impenetrable masks of poise and decorum. Then again, Sam supposes, he looks much the same—human, vulnerable, and woefully far from the elegant standard of perfection that everyone seems to hold him to. Most days, he reaches those expectations. Most nights, he doesn't think about it. But... tonight isn't most nights.

"Hi," he greets lamely.

"Sam?" Paige asks, surprised. "What are you doing up right now?"

"I could ask you the same thing," Sam says, but he can't quite manage to project his usual levity into the words, and honestly, it doesn't matter, because he knows Paige would've been able to see right past it anyway. "...May I come in?"

Paige wordlessly stands back, allowing Sam into her sitting room, and Sam slumps onto the couch with a dreary sigh.

"Are... you okay?" Paige asks hesitantly, closing and locking the door once again. She takes a careful perch at the other end of the couch, painfully close and yet not in reach, and regards Sam as one might a wounded animal, not sure whether to approach or give space.

Sam blows out a breath. "I suppose I just couldn't sleep," he says after a moment. "Why are you awake? Is it—should I be asking about the Mignon index?"

"Oh, no, nothing like that!" Paige says quickly, offering a smile warm enough to thaw even the icy numbness residing in the pit of Sam's stomach. "I was just talking to my parents. It's fine, though—you had pretty good timing, they were about to have to leave when you knocked, anyway."

"I see," Sam says, and silence falls, thick and awkward like it's just begging to be punctured. He looks at Paige, traces the curve of her jaw and nose up to the wavy fall of rumpled hair near her eyes, at her demure, uncertain posture, and aches to reach over and grab her hand. To curl up into something small and to be reassured, to be comforted, to be told 'it's okay, you're going to be okay.'

He hangs back, though.

"...Why couldn't you sleep?" Paige asks, breaking the silence. "Is something wrong?"

Sam shrugs moodily. "Yes, and no."

Paige looks at him carefully. Then, to his surprise, she shifts, pulling her feet up onto the couch and turning so that her back is to the armrest, and holds out her arms.

"Come here?" she asks quietly, and Sam wordlessly crawls closer, until his nose bumps into Paige's shoulder and Paige folds her arms around him, drawing him into a loose, gentle hug. Paige is quiet, just holding him, until the tension starts to drain out of his shoulders and he relaxes, lying there against her chest. Finally, Paige speaks up again. "You, um... you feel lonely, right now," she says, still quiet and soft. "And sad."

"Funny," Sam mutters, closing his eyes. He can feel Paige's heartbeat, lying together like this, and it's so much better than lying alone in his room, maybe crying silently into his pillow and desperately hoping he doesn't wake Georgia. "Because I am lonely right now. And sad."

Paige curls an arm around his head, fingers hesitantly petting his hair. "Why?"

Sam shrugs again. Then he sighs. "Do I need a particular reason?"

"No," Paige replies immediately, firm and sure. "No, you don't. I was just wondering. Do you want to talk about what's on your mind?"

Sam doesn't answer that for a long moment, considering Paige instead. Paige, Paige... normally, he thinks she would be regaling his thoughts with 'my dear' and 'beautiful,' 'talented,' and 'brilliant,' but... right now, he's too tired. Emotionally tired, that is. He's spent so much time alone that it's really felt—it's felt so different, having Paige here. Having a partner. But sometimes even the ever-confident Sam Winchester stumbles, doubts himself, and, well...

This is one of those times. He's so lost, he doesn't care about how inmasculine it is to be the little spoon.

Most days, he's happy enough with his life. Sure, it's felt like he's just going through the motions every day, over and over, for years, but he never really had anything to complain about. The feeling of emptiness just became natural. It was only normal that he trusted nobody save his mother and that he expected people to betray him, to hate him, and to scheme as to how to outsmart him, at all times.

But god, he's tired.

His mother didn't have the perfect storybook marriage. She and her husband are estranged—they have for most of Sam's life; he didn't grow up with two parents. His mother's husband, for lack of a better name for him, lives far out in the countryside and prefers to avoid court, though they're officially still married. He has no claim to the throne, coming from a noble house, and has mostly fallen out of the picture.

But all his life... Sam has just craved companionship. He knows his mother knows that too—he's not blind, he's not stupid, he knows that her gifting him Georgia for his eighteenth birthday was her attempt at giving him the closest thing to that she could offer. And he loves Georgia dearly, of course, he does! But Georgia isn't...

Paige is the first person other than his mother that Sam has allowed himself to trust fully in a long, long time.

He trusts Dean, of course, but one can't really use their little sixteen-year-old cousin as a confidant. Deanie is someone he trusts and will care for and look after, but Deanie can't provide the kind of mutual companionship that Sam wants. Charlie and Kevin, well—they're closer to him in age, particularly Kevin, but he's never been able to interact with them without remembering interhouse politics and loyalties. It's always felt like being Crown Prince has isolated him from the rest of the court, has put him on a pedestal from which he cannot ever fall.

The pedestal is so lonely.

"Do you ever wish you weren't born into a royal house?"

The words drop into the silence with the weight of a stone. Sam's breath catches in his throat as Paige's hand stills in his hair.

"How do you mean?" Paige asks.

Sam sighs. "I mean—if you didn't have to worry about your duty to your country all the time. If you could just be yourself and do what you love with no restraint. If you could let yourself trust people because they wouldn't have a reason to want to stab you in the back the moment you give them the chance. Something like that."

Paige hums thoughtfully, her chest rising and falling as she breathes. "I... yes. I've thought about that. I—I would never want to have a different family, but... sometimes I wish someone else could rule. In that way, I'm glad I wasn't firstborn, actually. It's lonely enough being the Second Princess."

"Being heir is..." Sam sighs. "I guess I don't have to tell you how having so many expectations on you feels. Things you have to live up to, things you have to be, always, no matter what. I... I haven't even told my mother this, Paige, but you know, sometimes I think that somewhere along the way to becoming the perfect prince, I lost myself. Who I actually am. I just—I don't know. Is there anything that makes me actually me?" He laughs softly, humorlessly. "The day we met when you took me into the garden maze. You remember that, right?"

"Of course," Paige murmurs.

"You told me—you sat there and you told me you wanted me to be myself, just like that," Sam laughs again, breathy and mirthless. "It made me happy, at the moment, it really did. But later that night, I sat back and thought about it and I realized I wasn't sure if I even knew who I was. If I'm not moulding myself into someone else's idea of what they want from me, well... what am I?"

"You're Sam," Paige says, just like that, as if it's that simple. It almost makes him laugh.

"What does that mean?" he presses, shaking his head.

Paige gently scrunches her fingers through Sam's hair. "Let me finish," she says, "and hopefully, I can tell you. Or at least, I can tell you what I think. I don't know if it'll be helpful."

"Okay," Sam acknowledges when it becomes clear Paige is waiting for him to say something.

Paige lets out a breath. "First of all, I'm honoured you're trusting me with this," she says. "Thank you. I... I hope I can do something to help. Anyway, though... to me, you're not just a list of traits in a box or something. You're not just a prince or just this or just that. You're... so much more than any of that. Ugh, I just know I'm doing a terrible job of explaining this! Let me start over.

"Whether you're a prince or not, engaged or not, whatever, there are still things that make you, you, Sam. You love dogs, you're persistent, and you're very caring, though you have to hide it deep down. You, I think, are still a dreamer at heart, and you want to be happy, and you want the people you care about to be happy. You crave knowledge.

"You're very loving, too, I think! I mean—you're always looking out for me and trying to take care of me, and you always want to hold my hands when we walk together, and I think that's very sweet of you. And when I see you, you always feel so warm. I guess that's the worst word I really could use, considering that you're an ice mage and everything, but..." Paige shrugs. "That's the best way to describe what I feel from you when we're together. It's warm and comforting. Emotions are confusing and messy, and it's kind of hard to pin a label on them, but... I don't know. You make me feel safe, and you make me feel like I make you feel safe, too."

Warmth, comfort, and safety. So that's what Paige thinks of the way Sam has slowly but surely been falling in love with her ever since they met?

That's kind of funny, actually. Because warmth, comfort, and safety are the three major things Sam thinks he's feeling, after hearing all that. Perhaps it's no wonder Paige is just taking these emotions as they come. Feeling like this is heady enough that Sam doesn't want to think about it too hard, in case it makes him stop feeling quite as safe, comforted, and warm—no wonder Paige hasn't thought hard enough about it to realize that it is, in fact, something close to love.

"Thank you," he says after a moment, and if his voice is a little rough, neither of them comment on it.

"Of course, Sam," Paige answers. and although from here, Sam can't see her face, he can hear the gentle smile in her voice as her fingers start to tentatively stroke through Sam's hair again.

He shakes his head slightly, cheek against the warmth radiating through Paige's thin shirt. "Call me Sammy."

Paige's hand stills again, and her heart beats a bit harder in her chest. Sam doesn't move, not yet, and when Paige hesitantly tries, "Sammy?", it feels like being wrapped in a soft, warm blanket.

"Yes," he answers, unable to keep the small smile from his face. "You said it right." he jokes.

"Sammy," Paige repeats, smiling again. She rests her cheek against Sam's hair and lets out a soft, contented sigh, and for a few minutes, the two of them lie there in silence, punctuated only by heartbeats and breaths. Sam could fall asleep here, head pillowed on Paige's shoulder like this. He's in no rush to go anywhere and he feels, in Paige's words, 'warm, comfortable, and safe.'

He lets his thoughts wander again. Maybe he even drifts into a light doze, he's not that sure. At some point, Paige shifts, though, and it draws him back to the present.

"Sorry," Paige mumbles. "My shoulder was getting stiff."

Sam hums and shifts, tucking his head into the crook of Paige's neck on the other side, and Paige lets out a relieved little sigh. "Better?"

"Much," Paige says. "Do you, um... do you want to stay here tonight? Or are you going back? I mean—I'm not trying to kick you out or anything, I was just wondering because it's pretty late and all and you just dozed off and if you're tired—"

"Paige," Sam interrupts before the panicked, tired rambling can go too far. "Paige. I, ah... I would love to stay here if you wouldn't mind."

"I don't mind!" Paige says quickly. "Um... should we move to the bed, though? Or—I can take the couch if you—"

Wryly, Sam glances up at her and notes the red cheeks. Interesting. He'll have to think about why the thought of sharing a bed makes Paige blush later when he's not feeling so raw and vulnerable. "Paige," he says drily, "the reason I wanted to stay was to continue doing exactly what we are doing now, except in a bed, ideally, though if you'd prefer to sleep on the couch, I suppose I'd stay here, despite how awful it would be for my back."

Paige blinks, once, twice, and blushes a little harder. "Okay," she manages and then chuckles self-consciously. "Sorry. I just... I didn't want to assume! We can move to the bed, though, that's absolutely fine. Yes. Should we do that? Now, I mean?"

"Now seems like as good a time as any, I think," Sam agrees, finally pulling away and sitting up again. The loss of warmth and physical contact makes itself felt immediately, but he can't just pitch over and lie back down when they just said they were moving to the bed, so instead he just reaches for Paige's hand as they both get up.

Paige leads him into the bedroom and switches off the lights in the sitting room, turning on a lamp and plugging her phone into its charger at her bedside. Sam sets his on the nightstand next to it—he'll have to worry about its battery tomorrow, he supposes—and flops down on the bed with a deep sigh.

Paige lies down too, more gently than Sam did, and pulls the blanket up over both of them. Then she pauses, glancing uncertainly at Sam. "Um... did you want to come over here, or...?"

Wordlessly, Sam scoots closer, until their sides are pressed together and he has physical reassurance that really, he isn't alone. The thought hits him that in a few months, after their wedding, convention will dictate that they sleep in the same bed every night, though of course, they don't have to. Still, he thinks he could get used to this.

Paige rolls onto her side, looking up at him even as she tentatively twines their legs together. Sam looks back down at her, questioning before a wave of exhaustion passes over him and he lets his eyes close.

"I like your eyelashes," Paige says suddenly, and Sam is startled enough that he blinks and squints down at her, nonplussed.

"You... like my eyelashes?" he repeats.

Paige blushes, ducking her head, and rolls away to turn off the lamp. She's back almost immediately, settling her arm carefully over Sam's chest slowly enough to send a very clear question ("Is this okay?"), to which Sam replies by snuggling closer to her and wrapping his own arm around her waist ("Yes, more than just okay.").

"Yes," she says. "They're very pretty. Normally you have mascara on, but just the brown is nice, too. I like them like this. It's like a side of you that nobody else gets to see."

That's...

That's such a silly little thing to notice, and yet it's sweet enough that Sam finds himself seriously contemplating replying with 'I love you.'

He doesn't, of course.

But the words sit there, on the tip of his tongue, and he tries them out silently, the darkness giving him courage. I love you, he doesn't say, but he thinks one day he could. It would come out so easily. I don't know who I am yet, but you're helping me find myself and I love you. It would fit.

"Good night, Sammy," Paige adds, settling cosily into the pillows, and Sam finally closes his eyes.

"Good night, Sweet Pea," he answers. There's a loose ball of warmth sitting in the base of his stomach, coiled like a purring cat in the sunshine, and it only gets warmer when he thinks of the way Paige says his name—Sammy, Sammy, good night, Sammy—or of the words she hasn't quite said yet.

I love you, he doesn't say, over and over again, until finally, sleep finds him.

***

*Paige's P.O.V.*

"So how have you been lately?" Donna chirps cheerfully over her tea, something that's become a weekly tradition for the two of them after volunteering together at the orphanage. Paige is glad for it. Donna's presence is a constant comfort, a little piece of home—it means more to her than she'd ever really thought it would, having someone who she can speak Pandorian with.

Paige groans. "There's so much that goes into planning a wedding," she says, taking off her glasses to rub them on her shirt. "We don't even have to do most of it ourselves, we're just overseeing things and approving final decisions and contemplating list after list after list, but oh my god."

Donna laughs sympathetically. "All that on top of worrying about court life, huh?" She hums, idly tapping her fingers on the sides of her teacup. "You must be so tired!"

"Always," Paige agrees, deadpan. "I don't think that's really changed, though. I feel like I've been tired forever."

Donna laughs again. Paige gives her a wry look, then chuckles herself; she has to admit, court life is exhausting. It seems frivolous, on some level—they party, they have banquets, they sit around and talk politics and network with each other, but having to maintain so many façades, having to be ever-conscious of saying just the right thing, having to constantly evaluate what could possibly motivating different people to do even small, seemingly inconsequential things... it does get tiring.

And that's not even mentioning her near-constant use of empathy. Juggling her perceptions of an entire roomful of people is a skill she's not bad at if she's completely honest, but she's definitely not great at it. She's definitely gotten better since coming to Ruritania—court here is a good deal larger than that of Pandora—but it's painfully obvious to her that she needs more practice.

Well... at least she's got time to do that.

"It's strange," she muses, half to herself, half to Donna.

"What is?" Donna asks, her head tilting to one side in curiosity. It's like she's a confused kitten, Paige thinks—Georgia does the same thing when Sam pretends he's about to toss a ball but then doesn't. It's pretty cute.

But the thought of court sobers her quickly, and she sighs. "I don't really know how to quantify it, honestly. But, ah... you know I practice empathy, right?"

Donna nods. "Your mother pulled me aside to mention it when I went back to Pandora most recently," she says. "That's so cool of you, Paige!"

Paige laughs self-consciously and rubs the back of her neck, looking down into her tea. "Well, um, thanks, Donna. Yes, I thought she would have told you. Um... but yeah, what I meant, it's just... I don't know if it's just because I'm not used to having to keep track of so many different people for so long, but..."

She hesitates. She hasn't told anyone this, not even Sam, not even the Queen. She doubts her own perceptions too much for that, and she knows that what she's about to say sounds silly. It's too vague and could easily be dismissed as paranoia, especially by non-empaths. What she really wants to do is to talk to Marya about it, but the chance to do that hasn't come up yet.

Perhaps she should call her tonight. Or even sooner than tonight, really—she doesn't want to be in the palace when she talks to her about it. Maybe she could call from Donna's apartment. It's private enough, surely.

"But what?" Donna prods gently. "If you don't want to tell me, you don't have to, but if you're just wondering if I'll listen, I promise I will!"

Paige sighs again, pressing her lips together, and hesitates for just a moment longer. "I don't—it's just a very vague feeling," she says slowly. "And it's more intense around certain people, I think, but I've had a hard time narrowing down which people, and I don't really know what that means. But I just... I can't shake the feeling that there's something big going on right under our noses. It feels like there is something festering, stuck in the heart of the court, and nobody sees it. I—I know that's a really vague and unhelpful metaphor, that's why I haven't really told anyone about it, but you know, sometimes with empathy—usually, with empathy, it's just... vagueness and feelings. That's what it is. It's a feeling."

Concern writes itself across Donna's face and radiates from her aura. Concern, worry, mild apprehension, and a touch of bewilderment. These are feelings Paige is familiar with, feelings she knows how to recognize and handle. She clings to the certainty they provide.

"What kind of something?" Donna asks. "What should we do?"

"I don't know," Paige says helplessly. "That's what I mean—it's vague and just a feeling and I... I don't know."

They finish their tea in silence. It feels like the calm before a storm.