Without a warning, the Princess all but grabbed Eden by the hand before the Queen could say more as she brusquely slammed the door shut behind them. 
 
Eden thought her highness would have released her as soon as they stepped out of Her Majesty’s chambers but… but no, the Princess’ grip remained firm and true as she continued to drag Eden far and far away until they were all but running, now in the familiar, empty halls of the west wing, the sound of their footsteps the only noise, reminding Eden just how late it was right now.
 
“Did she hurt you?”
 
The handmaiden was alarmed when she realized that the younger girl’s hand was actually trembling, “Milady,” she called, eyes wide in concern, “Is… are you alright–?”
 
“Did she hurt you?”
 
“What…?”
 
“I asked if she hurt you. What did the Queen say?” the Princess demanded under her breath, as if afraid someone will hear even though Eden doesn’t see anyone lurking about, still not slowing down her pace and Eden briefly wondered what happened to her leg injury, “Why were you speaking with her? Did she ask for you? What did she even want?”
 
And Eden bit her lip, suddenly feeling very uneasy (for some reason, the idea of approaching the Queen suddenly felt like a very, very bad idea) as they finally arrived at the Princess’ study room.
 
“I… I was actually talking to her majesty about you.”
 
The Princess releases her hand, as if burned. Then, she unceremoniously pushes the door open while Eden quietly hovers by the doorway as she watches her highness take a couple of steps towards the center of the room, hands now moving to clasp in front of her.
 
“Why.”
 
 “I… I was just worried about you, your highness.”
 
The Princess doesn’t answer.
 
Eden straightens up, not sure whether she should say anything or not. Should she apologize? Should she wait for her highness to say something?
 
The silence in the room was so loud.
 
“Your highness, what is the matter?” Eden finally dares to ask, not wanting to bear another second of this kind of silence any longer.
 
The Princess turns to look at her.
 
She opened her mouth as if to speak.
 
No sound comes out.
 
Now that Eden was looking at her more closely, she sees the way her highness’ hands fidgeted with one another, as if anxious.
 
And…
 
She hesitates, the silence has gone longer.
 
“Milady…?”
 
Her mouth snaps shut again.
 
Her lips are shaking.
 
“N-nothing…” the words are mumbled, practically incoherent as the Princess sharply turns her head away, “You are dismissed, Miss Brighton.”
 
“Princess…”
 
“I apologize for dragging you. I was just–”
 
“Your highness, please talk to me,” Eden all but pleads, a twinge of desperation creeping in her tone while the Princess visibly grinded her teeth.
 
Normally, Eden would have been absolutely mortified at hearing herself speak like this towards her mistress but right now, she couldn’t find it in her to care, “You know you can tell me if there is something in your mind, yes?”
 
She’s just this close, now.
 
 
Whatever it was that had been causing her highness to act like this, she was so close to saying it, for her to figure it out.
 
Eden can feel it.
 
“Were you…” the handmaiden wets her suddenly dry lips as she slowly steps further into the room, closing the door gently behind her, “Just now, were you going to tell me what was bothering you?”
 
Her highness still doesn’t speak
 
Still doesn’t turn to look at her. 
 
“If you brought me here in this room right now, I believe it is because you feel that you wanted to tell me what the problem was,” nothing, just heavy silence, Eden swallows inaudibly and it was almost offensive, how loud it sounds in this space, “Your highness, if I may be so bold, if you just speak up–”
 
“I… I can’t.”
 
 “What?”
 
“…I can’t talk about it.”
 
The handmaiden’s heart practically thrummed in anticipation. It’s okay… it’s okay, just a little more… “Can you tell me why?”
 
 
“Which part of what I just said do you not understand?” the Princess suddenly crossed her arms (no, it was like she was hugging herself, as if she was cold, as if she was bracing herself because she was practically swaying on her feet–), whirling away to pace around the center of the room almost blindly, “You know what? I am far too weary for this kind of conversation. It’s late. Eden, you may leave.”
 
 
(…then why does it sound like you didn’t want me to?)
 
 
From this angle, Eden can see one of those ungloved hands were clenching into tight fists as the Princess gripped her forearms, fingers and nails digging deeply on the skin so bad that even from here, the handmaiden can see vicious marks of red half-moons forming so quickly, so stark on flashes of already bruised skin.
 
Wait… bruised?
 
From those skinny little wrists and up to her elbows, there were teeny-tiny splotches of green and purple marks. Like a child’s paint.
 
Eden has a strange feeling there were more.
 
The handmaiden could feel her stomach dropping, there was a voice in the back of her mind whispering to her, an idea was already forming even as her mind and pulsed raced, and it was one of the worst-case scenarios she had opted to ignore, hadn’t wanted to entertain but… come to think of it now…
 
Why is the Princess being so apprehensive around Queen Ysabel? Why, so suddenly, had she been reacting so terribly around the woman?
 
It was so… so obvious now that she looked more into it, the answer was there, all scattered and waiting for her to pick up the pieces until she sees the picture, Eden (was immediately tempted to slam her face on the nearest wall, god, she’s so stupid) and the King had been so focused on the Princess, had been hung up on the idea that it may have something to do with missing her friend who was too far away to actually help–no matter how temporarily–that they had failed to notice that the girl hadn’t been acting the same around one specific person ever since she started behaving like this.
 
Only one person stood out.
 
The Queen…
 
 
It had something to do with the Queen.
“Your highness, if you are too uncomfortable to talk, how about this,” Eden proposes, faintly surprised to hear her voice still coming out normally despite her growing suspicions, her ill-timed realizations, “…how about you shake your head ‘no’ if I am wrong then you just keep quiet if the answer is a yes when I ask questions?”
 
That got her attention, “What, like a guessing game?”
 
Eden nods, “Yes, milady,”
 
And the younger girl throws her head back and a hysterical, sobbing sort of sound instantly escapes her lips, “You really think I am in the mood for games right now?! Do I have to pay you in gold then? What should be the reward if you win. If I win?” 
 
Suddenly, as if realizing something, the Princess cuts herself off as she whirls around to look at her handmaiden in the eye and Eden very nearly took a step back at how cold, how dark the girl’s eyes are.
 
Here, in the darkness, those eyes don’t even look red.  
 
They were practically black at this point and… and her eyes… her pupils…. they were like thin, shaking pinpricks as the Princess stared almost unseeingly at her, mouth slightly agape.
 
While Eden merely stares back at her, not knowing what to say, if she should even say something, confused and frightened at the look on the younger one’s face. Because there it is... that terrified stare. This… this is how her highness appeared whenever she looks at her stepmother in the eye, as if the Princess was staring face-to-face at some sort of hideous, gaping monster intending to swallow her whole any moment now.
 
And the Princess is looking at her like that.
 
“I don’t think of this as a game, Princess,” Eden finally manages to remember to say, her voice a solemn whisper in the still silence, “…when it comes to your welfare, I consider it to be my highest priority.”
 
There is no response.
 
“Shall we begin?”
 
Still no response.
 
 
Nonetheless, Eden takes that as a yes, a sign to continue. So, she takes a deep breath, then another, “Does your behavior had something to do with Her Majesty?”
 
Automatically, the girl’s chest heaved.
 
There was a sharp intake of breath.
 
It wasn’t Eden.
 
And the Princess immediately screws her eyes shut, hands immediately crawling up to cup her ears, as if trying to block out the sound of her handmaiden’s voice, as if she didn’t want to hear the question or the next.
 
“Stop, please just stop,” her voice was practically a breathless whimper, “Don’t any of you understand? Do you really think just talking about it is going to erase everything–because it won’t. The memories are not going away on their own if I talk about it, it's only going to get worse from there because then, they’d be more real than ever when I put them all out in the open. They are still going to be stuck in there, with me, in me over and over again, I still won't forget it. I’m still going to see them over and over again, I can’t, I don’t want to relive it. I just can’t–!”
 
Again, just like earlier, she suddenly cuts herself off just as abruptly the words poured out of her mouth like a litany of pleas and prayers, eyes snapping open in horror, as if just realizing what she was saying.
 
Eden swallows, uneasily.
 
 
 
(Unbidden, Jin Sanscroft’s voice suddenly resounded in her mind: “Because for some reason, I have a bad feeling about this… I almost don’t want to leave.”)
 
 
 
Oh God…
 
He was right.
 
He was so right.
 
Something bad was going to happen, had happened to her highness and Jin wasn’t even here to watch over her, to protect her, and Eden was a terrible maid, a terrible guardian. She had absolutely no idea–
 
 
(“Can you please keep an eye on her while I’m away, Miss Brighton?”)
 
 
And Eden…
 
Eden was sorry. She was so sorry.
 
For a long moment, Eden can hear absolutely nothing but the sound of her stuttering heartbeat and her highness’ breathing heavily, head bowed down.
 
 
The Princess was still a child that was a good, few years away from being considered a young woman and despite what everyone says about her, she is beautiful, has always been beautiful but at the same time, she looks absolutely terrible right now. Her skin has a grayish, sickly tint that wasn’t there before, lips chapped and colorless, eyes blown wide, haunted, and looking almost unseeing as she continued to silently heave large mouthfuls of air, as if she was choking, as if she was drowning.
 
And Eden… she was afraid, she was so afraid of what could this possibly entail. Eden was suddenly hesitant to ask, to pry.
 
The handmaiden wanted nothing more but to get out of the room and call for the girl’s father there and then, but she realizes that if she turns away from the Princess–from this–right now, she might never have a chance to pick up the pieces, to salvage this.
 
So, she has to ask.
 
She has to know.
 
“What did the Queen do to you?”
 
The Princess froze, shoulders seizing.
 
Eden closes her eyes briefly at the sight and when she opens them again… she sees the Princess staring right up at her face and suddenly, Eden could feel herself growing cold from inside out, because her highness’ eyes are so, so wide, so glassy, they're steadily brimming with unshed tears and her lips are visibly shaking.
 
She was shaking like a leaf, looking so small, so afraid.
 
The Princess looks like a frightened, wounded animal.
 
And oh god, what is going on?
 
The second the Princess realizes the horror growing in Eden’s face, she immediately turns her head to the side as if not wanting her handmaiden to see, not wanting her handmaiden to look, look what they have done to me, her eyes staring straight to the wall, her gaze far away and there was something that vaguely resembles shame, fear and then guilt flashing all over such a terribly young face from one second to the next like a never-ending kaleidoscope.
 
She doesn't say anything.
 
Eden doesn’t say anything, couldn’t dare bring herself to speak… but she can still see them. She can still see the teardrops falling down from the girl’s trembling chin.
 
They all fall down to the floor.
 
They were like raindrops.
 
They were never-ending raindrops.
 
Eden has never seen her highness cry before.
 
And Eden can feel herself wanting to cry too.