They call me the Black Wolf, a knight without a smile, sword without mercy. Let them. Their whispers don't matter. Only she does.

The princess.

Everything I'm not. Light to my shadow. Hope in a world where I only see duty. She talks too much, laughs too easily, and trusts too freely. It makes me angry. Not at her, at the world that will break her if I ever let down my guard.

I wasn't made to protect something so... soft. I was forged for war. For silence. For bleeding on battlefields and not flinching. But now I spend my days watching the way her hair catches the sun, and I feel more fear than I ever did with a sword pressed to my throat. Because kindness is something I was never taught, and she deserves it.

I remember the first time she got sick. A fever—nothing deadly, just enough to make her faint. She laughed when she woke, apologizing to the servants for "being dramatic." I didn't say a word. I just stood at her bedside, unmoving, until she finally asked: "Do you ever feel anything?"

I wanted to scream. To tell her I'd barely slept, watching her breathe. That I'd threatened the doctor behind closed doors if he failed. That I'd paced her chamber floor like a madman because I didn't know what to do with this strange ache in my chest.

But instead I just said, "Get well soon, Your Highness."

Cold. Stiff. Like always.

She thinks I don't care. But every time I brush her shoulder to move her behind me in danger, every time I stay up sharpening my blade after she's asleep. It's all I can do to show it. Quiet. Controlled. Invisible.

I don't know how to love like she does. But I would kill for her. Die for her.

And someday, when my duty is done... Maybe I'll learn how to live for her too.