Kathyln breathed in deeply before exhaling in front of the full length mirror in her bedroom, as soft music played from an artifact. She was wearing a simple black dress that hugged her body a bit more than she normally wore, and stopped right above her knees. The dress was something that she knew her mother would disapprove of, and would no doubt lecture her about why she had no business wearing a dress like that, but she didn't care. Kathyln had a vision for tonight, and there was no room for her mother's opinions in it.

She turned around and looked at a properly set table in the middle of the room. It was a round table with a pristine white tablecloth on top, two plates of food with silver dome covers that reflected the light from the two candles in the middle, and two glasses of white wine. The table was roughly the size of the one in her room at the wall, so a cart was beside it with an ice bucket holding the bottle of wine, along with dessert which was also under another domed lid.

Everything was set, all that was missing was Lunaris. Kathyln's maid had already returned and left, so she knew he had received her invitation. The anticipation of waiting only made her more nervous, but it would be difficult for anyone to tell just by looking at her. She looked back in the mirror, her makeup was perfect. Her lips were a light red, just a light blush on her cheeks, and eyeliner and mascara that made her eyes pop.

Knock knock knock

Kathyln took one more deep breath and smiled, it was time. She walked over to the door and opened it to see Lunaris standing tall in his uniform, looking more handsome and dashing than usual.

"I hope I didn't keep you waiting too long. I wanted to see my father off since it's been so long that I've seen him," Lunaris said with a nervous expression.

"Not at all, I'm happy you were able to see him," Kathyln replied as she stepped aside and gestured for him to enter.

Lunaris entered and immediately saw the table. "Wow, what's the occasion? I know it's not our anniversary yet."

"Hester is more at ease here, and is busy catching up with some old friends. So I thought it would be nice to have some time alone together, since she won't be coming by to check on me," Kathyln replied with a small smile.

"I'm that case," Lunaris said, as he leaned in and gave Kathyln a light peck on the lips. "Why don't we enjoy our meal?"

Kathyln nodded and the two approached the table, with Lunaris pulling out Kathyln's seat for her. Once seated Lunaris joined her, and the two removed the silver domes concealing their dinner. Both plates held a sizable piece of fish on a bed of rice, surrounded by roasted mixed vegetables, and a roll to the side.

Before either could start eating, Kathyln raised her glass. "A toast?"

Lunaris smiled and raised his glass. "To a romantic evening together."

"And to us. May we have a long and happy relationship together," Kathyln added.

They both blushed a bit from the insinuated meaning of Kathyln's words as they clinked glasses and took a sip before beginning their meal.

They both enjoyed their meals with light conversation, mostly driven by Lunaris, as Kathyln was more accustomed to a quiet dinner. Lunaris tried to slow down his eating since Kathyln took smaller bites, but he still finished a bit before her.

"Are you ready for dessert?" Kathyln asked as she finally finished her meal.

"It's been so long since I've had dessert, it honestly feels like a foreign concept to me," Lunaris replied with an amused tone.

Kathyln smiled as she pulled another plate from the cart with a silver domed lid. She removed the dome to reveal the most delicious smelling and looking slice of chocolate cake Lunaris had ever seen. The cake itself was chocolate, as was the icing, while the filling was a raspberry jelly. Lunaris' mouth watered as the thought of eating his favorite dessert stood prominently in his mind, before he noticed something wrong. He leaned over and checked the cart, which only had the ice bucket and wine.

"I think someone forgot to put another slice on the cart," Lunaris commented.

"No, this is correct. I read something in one of my books that I wanted to do."

Kathyln picked up her chair and moved it closer to Lunaris, picked up her dessert fork, scooped some cake onto it, and brought it up to Lunaris' lips. He then opened his mouth and the cake bite went in. Knowing now what Kathyln was wanting to do, he took his own fork and did the same for her.

The two began feeding each other bites of the cake as a noticeable smile formed on Kathyln's face. Kathyln's plan was so far working just like it did in her book, and if it were to have ended with this she would have been happy with her heart feeling full, however this wasn't the extent of her plan.

About halfway through the slice of cake she put the next stage of her plan into effect. As she fed Lunaris his next bite she made sure her aim was slightly off, so that just a bit of icing got on his lip.

"Oops, let me get that for you," Kathyln said in a soft voice, that for some reason sent an excited chill up Lunaris's spine.

Kathyln reached out her right hand, and with her index finger wiped the icing from his lip. In her books usually one of two things happened here, either the man stopped the woman's hand and put her finger in his mouth to lick off the icing, or the woman licked it off herself and the man was noticeably aroused. In this case it was the second scenario. Kathyln brought her finger into her mouth, then slowly and gently sucked licked the icing off. Lunaris' eyes were now a little wider and completely focused on Kathyln's lips.

She took notice, but saw he wasn't doing anything else. This came as no surprise, as she knew that Lunaris had an amazing level of self control, and always moved carefully with their relationship. This was a commendable trait when trying to gain her parents approval, but not now. Thankfully for Kathyln, she had a few ideas on how to weaken his self control.

She stood up from her seat and leaned forward, placing both of her hands on his thighs for support, as she leaned in and gently pressed her lips against his. If not for her long hair Lunaris would have clearly seen her ears burning bright red from her embarrassment. These actions were completely out of character for Kathyln, but she knew they were needed if she were to fulfil her desires.

Kathyln could see into Lunaris' eyes and could tell he was currently in a state of shock, meaning his control was also waning. She took it a step further and sat on his lap as she gently began to make out with him. Lunaris' control was now confirmed to be faltering, as he wrapped his arms around his Princess and returned the kisses. Deciding to make one last push to break his control, Kathyln ran her tongue along his lips, asking for permission to enter. Lunaris opened his mouth slightly, and Kathyln pushed her tongue in. Their tongues moved passionately inside his mouth as they both got more so into their making out.

Without thinking Kathyln's hands made their way to Lunaris' coat and quickly undid the buttons, and then moved on to his shirt. His mind became a blur as he began acting without a single thought, his self control already pushed aside and replaced with a primal desire for the woman he loved. He tightened his hold on Kathyln and stood up before carrying her to her bed as they continued to make out.

Lunaris sat Kathyln down in the bed, and as his hold on her loosened she moved to remove his coat, letting it fall to the floor. Lunaris' hands moved back to Kathyln and slid the straps of her dress off her shoulder. She then started to pull up her dress and spread her legs as Lunaris held her sides while fiercely moving his tongue round inside her mouth.

Kathyln ripped his shirt open, showing his well defined muscles, before moving her hands to his belt. She undid the buckle, just as her bedroom door started to open.

"Kathyln dear, why don't we..." Priscilla Glayder started as she entered her daughters room, only to see her and Lunaris in a less than desired position.

The two teens froze with their eyes wide as the Queen of Sapin stared at them in complete shock. Her eyes suddenly narrowed on Lunaris as she released the pressure from her core. Lunaris quickly backed away from Kathyln and grabbed his coat, before rushing out the door as fast as he could.

It wasn't her pressure that frightened Lunaris, as his core was at a much higher level, it was that the Queen of Sapin looked like she wanted to kill him.

"That conniving little bastard!" Priscilla said through her teeth.

"Mother," Kathyln said urgently, before getting cut off.

"Don't worry Kathyln, I'll see to it that he's thrown into the deepest darkest dungeon on the continent." Her anger was clear, and a rare sight. Normally she was more so the type to be smiling even when enraged, so for her to actually look as she felt truly showed her level of rage.

Priscilla then turned to leave, but stopped as she felt the pressure from Kathyln's core, which wasn't far from her own.

"Mother stop," Kathyln said sternly, almost as though she was speaking to a child.

"Kathyln dear, I need to protect you. For you to be in this position he clearly manipulated you somehow, and should be severely punished."

"I created this situation, not Lunaris."

Priscilla gave a sympathetic smile and walked over to Kathyln and gave her a hug.

"No, my little girl couldn't ever put herself in this situation. He must have tricked you."

Kathyln shoved her mother back.

"No! I am responsible for all of this! I picked out this dress myself, invited Lunaris for dinner, and I seduced him! If I didn't do anything all we would have had was a romantic dinner together, but I wanted more, and you ruined it!" Kathyln explained, showing more emotion than anyone had ever seen before.

"Hester, this is all her fault! She clearly failed her duty to take care of you!"

"The only person who's failed here is you! Hester did her job to protect me, but it's not her job to raise me!"

"Where is all this coming from? I may not have been perfect, but I did a good job raising you."

"You raised a Princess, not a daughter," Kathyln began, as her dam filled with years of pent up frustration towards her parents began to overflow. "You provided me all the best teachers, gave me any 'thing' I could ever want, but you only ever corrected what you call, "behavior unfitting of a princess", and never once behaved like a mother."

"Fine," guilt was starting to show in Priscilla's expression. "But that doesn't change the fact that you are far too young to even be having a physical relationship like that."

"Tell me, how old were you when you married father?"

Priscilla looked away, as Kathyln had her. Among nobles, it was very normal to be married by the age of sixteen, which was when she and Blaine were married. Priscilla wanted to try and make a point about the possibility of having children too young, but suspected Kathyln already knew that Curtis was born before she was even seventeen, which was Kathyln's current age.

Kathyln took a deep breath to recompose herself. "If not for you and father deciding not to arrange my marriage we both know I would have been married by now, most likely to someone that I did not care for at all. So thank you. Because of you and father, I was able to get closer to Lunaris and fall in love with him. You may not approve of us having a physical relationship, but I know the potential outcome and accept it, because that child would be born from the love Lunaris and I share."

Priscilla remained silent as her daughter's words sank in, and she realized how much smarter and wiser Kathyln was now compared to herself at the same age.

"Despite never being a good mother, I always wanted what was best for you. I don't think having a child now would be wise, and I will not be ok with you having sex before you're married," she took a deep breath then smiled at Kathyln. "But I can see that you really do love Lunaris, so I won't do anything to impeded your relationship with him."

—————————————————————

It has been two weeks since Lunaris ran for his life from the castle, and there has not been a word since. Lunaris' biggest fear was that the queen would have ordered Bairon to come kill him, since despite her loyalty, Varay would be highly against assassinating him for such a petty reason.

Lunaris toiled away on writing supply order requests, as Pasta did the only paperwork he was ever seen doing, folding paper birds. He had completed another and used wind magic to send it flying around the tent.

"So, still no word from the castle?" Lunaris asked nervously.

"Nope," Pasta replied casually. "Well," Pasta grinned mischievously. "I did get an order from the Queen to send your head and manhood to her on a silver platter, but I told her to send her little bitch boy to do that, if she felt he could get past me."

Lunaris just gave him a deadpan expression. "I'm happy that my situation is so amusing to you."

"Haha, what's amusing is that you still think you're a dead man. It's not like you put it in, she's still pure so don't worry."

"Easy for you to say, you're a white core mage who never had the queen looking like she was ready to kill you."

"No, but I did have Blaine's father look at me like that. Word of advice, doing the queen to get back at the piece of shit king isn't as satisfying as you would think."

"How are you even still alive?" Lunaris asked as he looked at his master with both curiosity and disgust.

"Simple, Varay is the only Lance Sapin has had that was strong enough to take me on and win, and I doubt Blaine even knows how close he was to having a half sibling." Pasta laughed hysterically at the thought. "It also helped that the queen enjoyed it."

Lunaris let his head fall and hit the table as Pasta continued to crack himself up over his past. The ring of a communication scroll got Lunaris' attention, causing him to open it. The color drained from his face as he read the message.

"What's wrong?" Pasta asked as he started to recompose himself. Lunaris didn't reply, so Pasta just snatched the scroll to look for himself. "Well fuck." Pasta said, clearly looking nervous.

The scroll was in fact an invitation for Lunaris to return to the castle tomorrow evening for a small banquet to celebrate Arthur completing his training.

"Ok ummm, we can tell them we didn't see the message," Pasta suggested, finally taking Lunaris' worry seriously.

"There's an acknowledgment spell attached, so they know I read it," Lunaris replied as he was looking scared.

"No, they know someone read it, not necessarily you. I'll say I read it while you were leading a team through the dungeon and I forgot to give it to you. Or we can say you were wounded and the medics wouldn't let you go," Pasta suggested, trying to find a way to protect his disciple.

"No," Lunaris said, recomposed and sounding more dignified. "I can't run from this. I need to go up there and face my consequences."

"That's both brave and stupid all at once!"

"I know, but I can't live in fear of this. My mother once told me that Queen Glayder takes her revenge like chess, that sometimes everything looks fine before she goes for the kill. If I don't go then it's only a matter of time before she gets me."

"Fine," Pasta said, relenting to Lunaris. "Just know that if you don't come back, I'll go up there looking for you."

—————————————————————

Lunaris exited the teleportation gate upon the floating castle and was immediately greeted by the knights standing guard. With the clang of metal, the six armored guards stood at attention.

"Welcome Captain Aldwynn," the lead guard greeted.

This in itself should have left him nervous, but his nerves were long since shot from spending the last day and a half worrying.

"Well, if I'm going to die, at least I'll be well dressed," he thought to himself, as he was wearing his white uniform, complete with a cape.

Two of the guards then lead Lunaris to the banquet hall, where he saw several servants setting up, a young woman wearing glasses talking with a young girl, and Arthur sitting in a chair up against a wall. Seeing as he knew Arthur would never be involved in whatever he believed Priscilla could be planning, Lunaris grabbed a drink from a waiter and walked over to Arthur.

"Hey, I didn't know you were coming," Arthur commented to his friend as he stood up.

"Yeah, I got an invitation yesterday," he replied as he looked around nervously.

"Don't worry, I don't think anyone is going to kill you," Arthur stated as he put a hand on Lunaris' shoulder.

"Wait, what?"

"I heard rumors about what happened when you were here last. I'm sure some of it was exaggerated, but I'm sure enough was true for me to understand why you seem so nervous."

"I see. Well, I don't know how much you think is real, but we didn't...."

"I didn't think you did. Although the rumors were that you two were caught in the act."

"Oh gods," Lunaris replied as he rubbed his temple.

"Well here's the positive for you. If anyone try's anything, I've got your back."

"Thanks," Lunaris replied with a sincere smile. "It makes me feel better knowing the strongest Lance is looking out for me.

"One of the strongest," Arthur corrected. "I was able to spar with Varay a few days ago, and without my beast will we were evenly matched power wised."

"I see, congratulations," Lunaris replied, raising his glass. He understood why Arthur didn't take his beast will into consideration, as he also saw it as borrowed power that he wouldn't want to use to gauge his strength.

Their glasses clinked, just as Kathyln and Hester entered the room. The Princess quickly saw Lunaris, her eyes lighting up as she quickly walked over. Hester's eyes also responded, but to Arthur, and didn't light up, but instead twitched as she saw how casually he was dressed.

"I can't believe you're here," Kathyln commented as she arrived.

Lunaris smiled as he took her hand. "Well I received an invitation, and I couldn't turn down the opportunity to see you." He raised her hand and kissed its back.

"But I didn't invite you," Kathyln replied, not knowing she could have invited him.

"I didn't think you did either." Lunaris replied, his nerves getting the better of him. Kathyln must have realized, as she held his hand and gave it a squeeze.

"Ah, Captain Aldwynn," Blaine Glayder said with a smile, as he entered the hall with his wife's arm hooked on his.

"Your majesties," Lunaris greeted with a bow.

"Nice to see my daughter has such a good man by her side," Blaine commented as he patted his shoulder with his free hand.

"Indeed, that's why I felt the need to invite him," Priscilla said, then looked distressed. "I felt so bad that you had to rush back to the glades so suddenly that I felt I needed to give you two another chance to spend some time together."

"Thank you, your majesty, your generosity and consideration seem to know no limits," Lunaris replied, trying to suck up just a little in hopes of his life being spared.

"Yes, thank you mother," Kathyln added as she moved closer to Lunaris, hooking her arm with his.

"Could the rest of you give us a moment? I'd like to have a word with these two," Priscilla asked with a kind smile, which only made Lunaris even more nervous.

"Of course. Hester, why don't you join me. It's been too long since we've been able to talk," Blaine said, gesturing for her to come with him.

As if on cue, Tess entered the room wearing a single strapped sparkling blue dress that ended at her ankles. Her and Arthur's eyes locked and the two smiled lovingly as Tess brushed a lock of her hair behind her left ear.

"Yeah, I'll talk to you two later," Arthur said with a smile, and walked off. His heart was overjoyed to see her after a little over two months, and thankful that Virion was able to come through like he promised.

"There now, let us have a little talk shall we?" Priscilla said as she gestured for them to follow her.

The three walked over to the far end of the room away from any prying ears. Lunaris' heart was racing as his mind ran through possibilities for what she could have planned. Kathyln held tightly on his arm, trying to bring some comfort that he wasn't alone.

"So Lunaris, after you left my daughter and I had a nice long talk about things. Now if you think I owe you an apology, you can forget that right now. Regardless of what was actually happening, it doesn't change what I saw."

"I understand, and I never for one moment felt that you owed me anything."

"Good." Priscilla sighed with a little frustration. She wanted to banish Lunaris far away from Kathyln, at least when she or Blaine couldn't be present, but her talk showed that would not be a good idea. After years of not acting like a mother, to suddenly be so overly protective would only end in disaster. "You love my daughter correct?"

"With all my heart."

"And you do realize that you could have gotten Kathyln pregnant if I didn't show up?"

"I do," Lunaris replied, standing a little taller as Kathyln leaned closer to him.

"And that doesn't scare you?"

"It terrifies me." Both Kathyln and Priscilla were both taken back by his answer, but he continued. "Honestly I can't see how anyone couldn't be. The thought of being responsible for such a fragile life probably scares everyone at least little, but that doesn't change the fact that if Kathyln were to be carrying my child, there is nothing I wouldn't do to take care of them both."

Lunaris looked to the side to see Kathyln looking up at him with wide eyes. Even though the rest of her face was surprised, her eyes held a dreamy look in them. He then leaned down and kissed her forehead.

"Alright, I won't do anything to stop you two from being together. However I do have two conditions."

Kathyln and Lunaris both looked at her with anticipation.

"First, you will not have sex until after you two are married." Lunaris nodded in acceptance of this. "Second, when you feel you are ready to ask for Kathyln's hand, you will ask both Blaine and myself together."

"I accept your conditions."