After that day in the garden, something unspoken shifted between them. Aldric began to seek Kieran out—small requests, brief conversations, moments that seemed to last both too long and not long enough.

“Kieran, what do you think of this treaty revision?”

“Kieran, you’re from the southern district, aren’t you? Tell me about the harvest concerns there.”

“Kieran, stay a moment. I’d value your opinion.”

Each interaction fed the growing feelings Kieran desperately tried to suppress. His heart would race at the sound of his name. His hands would tremble when Aldric stood close enough for Kieran to feel his warmth. Every smile the prince directed at him felt like sunlight breaking through clouds.

It was agony. It was beautiful. It was completely, utterly wrong.

“You’re distracted lately,” said Chelsea, another servant who’d become something of a friend. They were folding linens in the laundry, the mundane task a brief respite from the chaos in Kieran’s mind.

“Just tired,” Kieran lied.

Chelsea gave him a knowing look. “You’re spending a lot of time with the prince. More than usual.”

“He needs additional assistance. The state visit preparations—”

“Kieran.” Chelsea’s voice was gentle but firm. “Be careful.”

He wanted to protest, to claim there was nothing to be careful about. But the words died in his throat.

“I know my place,” he said finally.

“Do you?” Chelsea set down the sheet she was folding. “Because from where I’m standing, you look like someone who’s forgotten the most important rule—don’t fall in love with what you can never have.”

The truth of it hit Kieran like a physical blow. He’d been so careful to deny it, to rationalize every feeling as mere admiration or dedicated service. But Chelsea had seen through him as easily as Prince Aldric had seen through the court’s false pleasantries.

“It doesn’t matter what I feel,” Kieran said quietly. “I made a vow. Loyalty to the crown above all else.”

“And what happens when loyalty and love pull in different directions?”

Kieran didn’t have an answer.

That night, unable to sleep, he stood in the servants’ quarters staring out at the moon. His mind churned with impossible thoughts. In another life, perhaps—one where he’d been born to nobility, where the gulf between them didn’t exist—things might have been different.

But this wasn’t another life. This was reality, with its rigid hierarchies and unbending rules.

He thought of Prince Aldric’s lonely grief, the way he carried his burdens alone because his position demanded it. Kieran wanted to ease that loneliness, to be the one person Aldric could be genuine with. But wanting that felt like betrayal of the very loyalty he’d pledged.

The heart and the mind, colliding endlessly.

To act or not to act. To speak or stay silent. To reach across that impossible distance or maintain the proper boundaries.

Three years of this feeling, growing stronger with each passing day. How much longer could he endure it?

But even as the question formed, Kieran knew the answer. He would endure it forever if necessary. Because the alternative—leaving Aldric’s service, distancing himself completely—was unthinkable.

Better to love in silence than not be near him at all.

Better to serve faithfully, even if his heart broke a little more each day.

It was the only choice a servant could make.