Chapter Text
Caitlyn Kiramman was not having the kind of morning that inspired gratitude journals.
Her alarm had blared at six sharp, dragging her from the kind of sleep that promised to leave bruises under her eyes if she stayed a minute longer in bed. She’d silenced it with one irritated swipe, already half-planning her to-do list. Court filings. Depositions. A meeting with a client who enjoyed hearing herself talk. A lunch squeezed between arguments. Another long evening in her office with more contracts than oxygen. She’d planned everything, right down to the time it would take her to drive from her loft apartment to the firm downtown. Her navy blazer was pressed, her skirt matched the heels she rarely had time to admire, and her black coffee, scalding, unforgiving waited on the counter like a loyal soldier. Everything was in its place. Until her car coughed, shuddered, and gave up on life.
She sat in the driver’s seat with both hands gripping the steering wheel, as if sheer willpower could resurrect the engine. The dash lights flickered, blinked in pitiful surrender, then died. Caitlyn closed her eyes, counted to three, then tried again. Nothing.
“Perfect,” she muttered.
Her phone found no comfort for her either. Every ride-hailing app flashed the same apology: No drivers available. Rush hour. Everyone else in the city, it seemed, had beaten her to it. Caitlyn let her head fall back against the seat. A lawyer of her standing, managing partner before thirty, the Kiramman name printed across law journals, was not supposed to be stranded on a Tuesday morning like some college kid begging buses for mercy. She's Caitlyn Kiramman. Brilliant, polished, sexy, beautiful. And yet, here she was, in a pencil skirt, stuck in a quiet street with a car that had the audacity to quit.
Her neighbors were already heading out. A mother wrangling two children. A man walking his golden retriever. People with simpler mornings, problems contained within grocery lists or traffic updates. Caitlyn envied them in that moment, in the same way she sometimes envied anyone who didn’t feel the constant weight of legacy on their shoulders. The Kirammans were old money. Old expectations. She had grown up with rules carved into her like scripture: stand tall, speak sharply, win cleanly, never fail. Her father had been a judge, her mother a politician. Dinner conversations were rehearsals for cross-examinations. Success wasn’t optional; it was the air she breathed.
It had made her who she was: the woman partners in rival firms whispered about, the attorney clients begged for when things grew ugly. But it also left her with mornings like this one, where failure even a trivial, mechanical one, felt like betrayal. With no other choice, she locked the car, heels clicking angrily against the pavement as she started the walk toward downtown. It wasn’t too far, maybe twenty minutes if she ignored her aching feet. The city bustled around her, glass towers reflecting sunlight, taxis blaring horns, the usual current of bodies rushing past one another without ever meeting eyes. Caitlyn adjusted her blazer, phone in hand, checking emails as she wove through the crowd. She was already mentally drafting her apology to the client she’d be late for when it happened. She was about to hail a taxi when she slammed into someone.
The collision jolted her phone from her grip. She hissed under her breath, bending to snatch it before it could be claimed by the endless feet of strangers. Straightening, she prepared to give a clipped, polite apology, the kind that ended all conversation, when she saw the person in front of her. At first, she thought it was a joke. A street performer, maybe. A comic convention spillover. But no, the armor gleamed too realistically, battered and scarred, with leather straps crossing a broad chest. The woman standing before her was tall, towering even, hair shaved into an undercut dyed a shock of pink that caught the sunlight. Tattoos snaked across lean muscle, half-hidden by the chainmail pressed against her shirt. And the eyes... gray, sharp, startlingly alive locked onto her with such intensity that Caitlyn froze. The stranger’s lips parted. Relief softened her expression, followed by something heavier.
“Your Highness,” the woman breathed, her voice rough but certain. “Finally. I’ve found you.”
Caitlyn blinked. “I - excuse me?”
The woman took a half-step closer, ignoring the traffic and the stares of passing pedestrians. Her smile, crooked and warm, spread across her face like sunlight breaking through storm clouds.
“You’re safe,” she said, almost to herself. “Thank the gods. What are we doing in this strange place?”
Caitlyn’s pulse stuttered. Her lawyer brain tried to catalog possibilities: a cosplayer. A lunatic. Some viral prank. She opened her mouth to reply about something dismissive, something sharp, then snapped it shut when the stranger bowed, one hand over her chest, right there in the middle of the sidewalk. Caitlyn took a step back. This day, she thought grimly, was about to get worse. Caitlyn quickened her pace. She didn’t run. Running in heels would only make her look ridiculous, but she lengthened her stride, weaving through pedestrians with her eyes fixed firmly on the crosswalk ahead. The stranger could be anyone: an actress, an escapee, or someone dangerous enough to believe their own costume. Whatever the case, Caitlyn wanted none of it. Behind her, boots clanged against the pavement with alarming certainty.
“Your Highness, wait!”
Caitlyn glanced back once. Just once. Enough to see the woman barreling after her, chainmail catching in the sun, shoulders squared like she belonged in another century. Several people had already turned to stare. A businessman with a coffee muttered something about nutcases and hurried on. A group of teenagers pointed and laughed, phones raised to capture the spectacle. Caitlyn cursed under her breath and pressed forward.
“I’m not your, whatever that is,” she snapped over her shoulder. “Stop following me.”
The woman was tall, broad, radiating stubbornness, actually had the nerve to grin. “I cannot. Where you go, I go. It is my oath.”
Caitlyn nearly tripped over a curb. “Your what?”
“My oath,” the woman repeated, as though the word explained everything. She said it proudly, chest puffed, hands on her belt as if expecting applause. Caitlyn pinched the bridge of her nose. Her phone buzzed in her hand, three emails flagged urgent, one text from her secretary reminding her about court at ten. None of it mattered if she couldn’t shake this lunatic.
“Listen,” Caitlyn said tightly, forcing calm into her voice, “I don’t know you. We’ve never met. So, kindly—”
A honk cut her off. The light had changed, and a wall of traffic surged forward. Caitlyn stepped back onto the curb. The stranger, however, stepped boldly into the street, hand raised as if commanding an army.
“Halt!” she barked.
Two cars screeched to a stop, more from confusion than obedience. Drivers leaned on their horns, shouting curses out their windows, but the woman ignored them all, turning back to Caitlyn with a triumphant look.
“The road is clear, Your Highness.”
Caitlyn’s jaw nearly hit the pavement. “You can’t just—”
But the stranger was already striding back, taking Caitlyn lightly by the elbow as though shepherding her across a castle courtyard. Her grip was firm, her expression maddeningly earnest.
“This land is strange,” the woman muttered, scanning the glass towers around them. “The castles stretch to the clouds, yet no banners fly. And these…metal beasts.” She nodded toward the line of taxis. “Do they serve you?”
“They’re cars,” Caitlyn hissed, trying to twist free. “And no, they don’t serve me.”
The woman tilted her head, unconvinced. “Then why do they kneel at your command?”
“They—” Caitlyn stopped herself. Explaining traffic laws to someone wearing armor in broad daylight was not how she’d planned her day.
They reached the other side of the street. Caitlyn yanked her arm free, heart hammering. Every instinct told her to duck into the nearest coffee shop, call the police, do something logical. And yet, some small, inexplicable thread of curiosity pulled her back. The woman didn’t look high, or unhinged, or even rehearsed. She looked… utterly sincere. And worse, Caitlyn had never seen her before in her life. The thought unsettled her more than she wanted to admit. She knew people. She remembered faces. Especially ones like this, striking, absurd, impossible to forget. If she’d met this woman before, she would know. But she didn’t.
“I don’t know who you think I am,” Caitlyn said firmly, adjusting her blazer, “but I am not your princess. I am not your queen. I am not—”
“Princess,” the woman interrupted, unbothered. “Not queen. Not yet at least.”
Caitlyn blinked. “Excuse me?”
The woman only smiled, gray eyes crinkling with humor, as though she knew some private joke.
A man walking past muttered, “Nice cosplay,” and tossed a few coins at her boots. The woman stooped, scooped them up, then held them toward Caitlyn.
“Tribute,” she said. “Shall I place them in your treasury?”
Caitlyn’s cheeks burned. “Keep it,” she hissed, mortified.
The woman pocketed them cheerfully. Caitlyn tried again to escape, heels clicking faster now, but no matter how she turned, downside streets, through a crowd waiting for the bus, the woman was there, trailing just far enough to be polite, but close enough to catch her every glance. Every time Caitlyn thought she’d lost her, she’d hear that voice again.
“Your Highness, the enemy grows near.”
“Your Highness, beware that sorcerer’s box—”
“That’s a trash can!” Caitlyn snapped, earning stares from two passing college students.
The woman grinned, utterly unbothered. “Strange name for a trash.”
By the time the office towers of downtown loomed, Caitlyn’s patience was a thread stretched to breaking. She stopped dead on the sidewalk, spinning to face the woman once more.
“Listen to me,” Caitlyn said, low and fierce. “I do not know you. I have never seen you before in my life. And if you keep following me, I will call the police. Do you understand?”
The woman's expression didn’t falter. If anything, it softened.
“I swore an oath,” she said quietly, as though Caitlyn’s anger couldn’t touch her. “I vowed my life to protect you.”
For a moment, just a flicker, Caitlyn felt something tighten in her chest. No. Impossible. But when she met those gray eyes, steady, certain, impossibly old for someone who looked her age, she wasn’t so sure anymore. And that terrified her more than the following itself. By the time Caitlyn reached the glass doors of Kiramman & Associates, her nerves were frayed like a wire pulled too thin.
The firm’s logo gleamed in polished silver across the revolving doors, promising stability, order, and respectability all the things her morning had lacked. She strode toward it with a lawyer’s purpose, heels striking sharp against the marble, willing herself to ignore the sound of boots behind her.
“Your Highness—”
She pushed through the revolving door faster than dignity usually allowed. Once inside, she caught sight of the lobby security guards, two men in navy uniforms, one sipping coffee, the other scanning IDs. For the first time that morning, she almost smiled. Because when the stranger tried to follow, steel greaves clanking, the guards moved.
“Ma’am, you can’t enter here,” one said, stepping in front of her with professional calm.
The woman blinked at him, then looked past him to Caitlyn as though the interruption were some minor inconvenience. “She requires my protection. Step aside.”
The guard lifted a brow. “Not happening.”
The other reached for his radio. “You need to leave, now.”
Caitlyn didn’t wait to see how the rest unfolded. She slipped past the checkpoint with a tight nod at the receptionist and made for the elevators. As the doors slid closed behind her, muffling the rising argument outside, she let out a long breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. The woman’s face lingered in her mind anyway, pink hair catching the light, gray eyes fixed with unwavering certainty. Caitlyn rubbed her temples. Focus. You have a case at ten. Drafts by noon. Don’t let one street lunatic derail you. She repeated it to herself like a mantra. By the time she reached her office, she almost believed it.
The day crawled. She buried herself in case files, typed furiously through motions, endured a client who insisted on retelling every petty injustice of her divorce. Normally, Caitlyn could compartmentalize, wearing her courtroom armor as smoothly as her tailored suits. But today, stray thoughts pulled at her. The way the woman had bowed, in the middle of a crowded street. The ridiculous way she had commanded traffic like an officer of some phantom army. Caitlyn shook her head and stabbed her pen at the paper. Nonsense. She’d never seen her before. Never.
When the sky dimmed into violet outside her window, she allowed herself to pack up. Another twelve-hour day, conquered. She slipped her laptop into her bag, shrugged on her coat, and walked through the lobby with the satisfied weariness of a woman who had survived yet another storm. And froze the moment the doors opened to the night air. Because there she was. Leaning casually against the outer wall of the building, as if she had every right to be there, was the same armored woman. Boots crossed at the ankle, arms folded, that damnable crooked smile tugging at her lips. Caitlyn’s stomach dropped.
“You’ve been waiting here all day?” she demanded, scanning the sidewalk for witnesses.
The woman straightened, gray eyes brightening as if Caitlyn’s presence was sunlight itself. “A knight waits for her liege. I hoped your…affairs would be concluded by now.”
Caitlyn exhaled, sharp and tired. “I told you, I am not your liege. I am not your princess. I don’t even know your name.”
The smile faltered. For the first time, the woman looked uncertain. Her eyes searched Caitlyn’s face, lingering on the lines of her suit, the neat braid of her blue hair, the clipped, businesslike cadence of her speech.
“You are…different,” she admitted slowly, voice rough with hesitation. “The clothes, the way you hold yourself, even your words, they are not hers. Yet…”
She trailed off, confusion softening her roguish confidence. “You bear her face. Her eyes. You are the same, and not the same. I do not understand.”
Something in her tone pricked at Caitlyn more than all the babbling had before. It wasn’t just delusion, it was raw, honest bewilderment.
Caitlyn’s throat tightened. “Whoever you think I am, you’re mistaken. So, please…just leave me alone.”
The woman nodded once, though it looked as though the motion pained her. “If that is your command.”
And with that, she stepped back into the shadows, leaving Caitlyn standing alone in the hum of city lights and traffic. But as Caitlyn walked away, heels echoing against the sidewalk, she couldn’t shake the thought that those gray eyes would still be watching.
Caitlyn’s loft was silent, the kind of silence that usually soothed her after a long day of verbal sparring and courtroom theatrics. Tonight, it was oppressive. She slipped off her heels by the door, set her bag neatly on the entryway table, and shrugged out of her blazer. The motions were ritual, practiced, grounding. Normally, she’d pour herself a glass of wine, sink into her leather armchair, and scroll half-distracted through the news before burying herself in briefs again. But her thoughts wouldn’t line up.
The image of that woman, kept breaking through the day’s orderly file folders. The pink hair. The chainmail. The way she had spoken as though oaths were as real as concrete sidewalks. The way her confidence had cracked, just a little, when Caitlyn denied her. It should have been laughable. A story she’d share with a colleague over coffee tomorrow. You wouldn’t believe the lunatic who followed me this morning. But she hadn’t laughed once all evening.
Instead, she found herself curled on the couch, half a glass of red wine untouched on the coffee table, scrolling aimlessly through her phone. Anything to distract herself. Her thumb swiped past work emails, news alerts, an ad for shoes she’d only thought about buying. Then, without thinking, she tapped open TikTok. A live stream filled the screen. Some college kid in a hoodie, clearly bored, filming a city bench. His voice carried over the low hum of passing cars.
“Okay, you guys, I’ve been watching her for ten minutes now and she hasn’t moved. Like…not even a blink. This cosplay is next-level.”
Caitlyn’s wineglass wobbled as her hand froze. On the screen, sitting perfectly upright on the bench, was the woman.
The phone camera quality was shaky, but the details were unmistakable: the armor dulled by scratches, the tattoos curling beneath the edges, the undercut pink hair glinting under the lamplight. She sat with her back impossibly straight, hands resting on her knees, eyes distant. Not tired. Not casual. But as if she were holding vigil.
The comments streamed fast:
yo she’s committed fr
is this a promo??
where’s the con at??
she’s gorgeous ngl
The boy’s voice came again, chuckling nervously. “Excuse me—uh, what character are you supposed to be?”
The woman turned her head slowly toward him. Her expression was calm, but her voice carried, low and certain. “What is a…cosplay?”
The boy laughed, startled. “Okay, okay, she’s staying in character, damn.”
“No,” she said, frowning faintly. “I asked you plainly. What is it?”
The live chat exploded with omg method acting, Oscar worthy, she’s so real lmao.
Caitlyn’s stomach dropped. Her hand clenched around the phone so tightly her knuckles whitened. This wasn’t acting. The thought pulsed, undeniable, as her chest tightened with panic. That woman wasn’t playing. She wasn’t pretending to be someone else for fun or spectacle. She was lost. Unmoored. Sitting alone on a bench in armor while strangers pointed cameras and laughed. And Caitlyn, who prided herself on reading people, knew with sudden, terrible clarity: this was not performance.
She turned the volume up, desperate to hear more, but the live stream had already ended, cut off mid-laugh, the comments flickering to black. The screen jumped back to the endless scroll of trending videos, but Caitlyn couldn’t move. Her eyes drifted to the window. Down below, the city moved on without her, traffic lights changing, people crossing streets, laughter spilling from a nearby bar. The kind of ordinary rhythm she usually found comfort in. But now, it only made the image sharper: that woman, alone in her armor, lit by a streetlamp, waiting for something that would never come.
The guilt hit next. Slow and spreading. She had brushed the stranger off earlier with polite detachment, certain she was dealing with a delusional case or a prank. But what if she had been wrong? What if that woman had truly needed help? Caitlyn pressed her palms against her eyes, trying to steady her breathing. This was ridiculous. She didn’t know her. She wasn’t responsible for every lost soul wandering the streets. She told herself that once, twice, again. But the words rang hollow. Caitlyn paced.
Her loft was usually the picture of order: glass-topped coffee table, leather armchair angled toward the skyline, bookshelves lined with trial transcripts and novels she rarely had time to read. Tonight it looked smaller, suffocating, as her heels clicked back and forth across the rug. This is absurd, Caitlyn told herself. She’s a lunatic. A cosplayer who got too committed. A street performer. Someone in need of a hospital. Or dangerous. Yes, dangerous. Anyone wandering the city dressed like that, speaking like that, has to be.
And yet Caitlyn slowed, biting her lip, staring at the screen. The way the woman sat, shoulders back, spine aligned, breathing measured, didn’t speak of mania. It spoke of training. Discipline. Soldiers she’d seen in documentaries carried themselves like that. Officers in court when testifying under oath. Not street lunatics. And the eyes. Even through a grainy phone screen, those gray eyes weren’t wild or vacant. They were steady. Sharp. Watching the world with confusion, yes, but not with madness.
Caitlyn closed the app with a sharp flick of her thumb and pressed the phone against her forehead. “You’re insane,” she muttered to herself. “You’re actually insane.”
She could ignore it. She could go to bed, pour another glass of wine, and let the city chew up whoever this woman was. It wasn’t her responsibility. She had cases to win, clients to appease, a reputation to maintain. She didn’t bring strangers home. She didn’t rescue people from sidewalks.
And yet she found herself grabbing her coat, snatching her keys, and marching for the door before she could talk herself out of it. The city was colder than she’d expected when she stepped outside, the air sharp with the tang of rain. Her heels tapped against the pavement as she retraced her route downtown, nerves buzzing louder with every block. If she’s dangerous, you’ll regret this. If she’s not, then you’ll regret leaving her there. The bench came into view before she’d finished that thought. There she was. The woman sat as if no time had passed at all, posture rigid, hands folded, gaze turned skyward as though the skyscrapers were cathedral spires. A small crowd lingered, watching from a polite distance now that the novelty of recording her had worn off. Caitlyn’s pulse spiked. She didn’t think, didn’t hesitate. She strode forward, ignored the whispers around her, and grabbed the woman firmly by the wrist.
“Come with me,” she hissed.
The woman blinked, startled, then looked down at Caitlyn’s hand with quiet surprise. “You returned.”
“Don’t make a scene,” Caitlyn muttered, tugging her up from the bench.
The woman stood smoothly, towering over her as before, but instead of resisting, she followed. A few people laughed, mistaking the whole thing for some kind of improv skit, but Caitlyn ignored them, dragging the woman down the street and away from the lights of the crowd. They walked in tense silence all the way back to Caitlyn’s loft, the clank of armor against concrete echoing far too loudly in the night. By the time they reached her building, Caitlyn’s nerves were stretched thin as glass. She fumbled with her keys, shoved the door open, and gestured sharply inside.
“Get in,” she ordered.
The woman stepped over the threshold, her movements deliberate but her eyes wide with quiet wonder. She turned her head slowly, taking in every detail of the loft—the soft glow of the lamps, the neat rows of books, the tall windows spilling moonlight across polished floors. Caitlyn shut the door behind them, the click of the lock cutting through the stillness. She stayed there, back against the door, watching the woman’s awe soften into silence as she stood in the center of the room, turning once more as though she still couldn’t believe it was real. The loft felt different now. Smaller. Charged. The stranger’s presence filled it, all broad shoulders and quiet certainty, gray eyes scanning the space as though cataloguing threats.
Caitlyn crossed her arms, standing her ground. “All right,” she said, voice sharp. “Now you’re going to tell me who you are. And you’re going to tell me why the hell you keep calling me ‘Your Highness.’”
The woman turned her gaze back to her, steady as stone. And for the first time that night, Caitlyn realized she might actually get an answer.