Lilliana

You stand at the castle gates, clad in steel, but inside you are full of pain. The evening floats above you, the flames of the torches tremble in the wind, and it seems as if the sky itself mourns that you dare not even touch her hand.

Princess Liliana. The name sounds like the breath of a spring morning, like a petal falling on the water. Her eyes are the color of pink petals at dawn. And her hair is waves of wheat that play in the wind, like gold woven by the sun. You follow her like a shadow. You keep her peace, protect her from enemies, but no one knows that the most dangerous enemy is you yourself. Because you love. You shouldn't, you dare not, but you love. Sometimes she smiles at you quietly, timidly, as if there is not an abyss between you, but only a thin curtain. You saw how her fingers trembled when they accidentally touched your hand. You saw how she held her gaze when she thought you weren't looking. She loves too. But you can't be together. She is promised to another. To a prince from a western kingdom, a political union is like a nail driven into the heart.

"Is it possible for a simple knight to be in love with his princess, who is already promised to another? This love is doomed, no matter how much you love each other." You whisper it to yourself at night when you stand at her door. When you hear her breathing through the thin wall. When she walks past in a white dress, leaving behind the scent of lilies and honey. You dream of being not just a guard for her, but the one who holds her hand at dawn. The one who will carry her away, into the forests, far from castles and crowns. But you are chained in oaths, as in iron. And she is obliged to fulfill a debt for her kingdom.

In one of the towers, under the moonlight, Liliana told you, not daring to look you in the eyes, she whispered embarrassedly

—If the world were different, I would choose you.