Rue gently guided her horse through the gap in the trees and into the meadow, unable to stop herself from pausing shortly after, once she had nudged her horse out of the way to permit a trail of young noblewomen to file through behind her. She had stopped simply to look. The sun spilled crystalline light into the clearing, making each blade of grass shine in shades of emerald and turning flowers to ruby and quartz. There was, of course, a brook playing delightedly over its bed at the opposite end, before disappearing back into the trees. The trees themselves bore fine fruit, though the princess could not have said what kind, and felt no desire to sample them; it wouldn't do for a single thing to be taken from its place here. Her prince's kingdom was more beautiful than nature could have made any land, and so far be it from her to disturb it. There was, she noted with a mingling of annoyance and deeper unease, already something missing, something that made the day imperfect.

Her prince was not by her side today. For this outing, she had been left him at the palace; it was to be a social event for several of the young women who resided there, and however informal it was, a degree of ceremony remained. She was to play host to these others for the day, though she could have drily observed that the woods were hardly her home, and it was simply not a trip that the men were welcome on. In Goldcrown, Rue had seen girls take similar expeditions, but not into any forest. They voyaged among shops and cafes, their gossip no less lively than that of the grand ladies behind her had been. Had tactful grace not been such a reflex for her, she might not have known exactly when to smile, nod, and vaguely offer agreement, and that would have made the journey a much more difficult matter.

She was sure that Siegfried would not have minded any of it, and would have distracted her from it, as well. He had even offered to accompany them, if only for certain reports of unrest that had been circulating lately, but she had firmly denied him. And it was quite tricky to be firm when he was looking at her with such warmly innocent kindness, voicing a simple desire to join her for a ride through the woods with their peers, but she had done it. As much of a trifle as it might have been, it was also a particular royal duty that she had, and she intended to uphold it with the same diligence that he carried out his. So, she had told him, he could remain at the palace; she would see him in the evening. The worst she would suffer was idle chatter, and though she could do little more than tolerate it, she had experience doing that, if nothing else.

“Oh, this is a lovely place for a picnic.” A lady's cheerful giggle rose from the small gathering that had formed by the entrance.

Though Rue held herself a short distance from the rest, she gave her reply, “Yes, it certainly is. We may stay here a while...”

With her assent, the others busied themselves with the contents of the picnic basket, which of course had to be perfectly arranged. The princess had no need to concern herself over it, for if she tried, she would most likely be told that it wasn't suitable work for a princess. The ladies were all nobles, of course, just as much flowers of the prince's kingdom as any in the meadow, and yet she was something else to them. If they had known how different she was, what her origins were, they would have surely rejected her. She wondered if it would ever stop being so difficult for her to hold back the bitterness those thoughts brought, a cruelly conditioned reflex.

Turning away, she walked further into the meadow to keep the other women from seeing even the slightest hint of her frown. She could have been gliding, if one hadn't been able to catch her slippers just poking out beneath the hem of her dress, and she made her destination a particular patch of flowers at the other end of the meadow. Surely, that was a perfectly acceptable activity for a princess, looking at flowers; she did enjoy it, but perhaps not for the proper reasons. She had been given little time to appreciate beauty before, and she had been given even less beauty to appreciate. The silky petal she cradled between her fingers was able to draw a true smile to her face again, however small.