-‡Rowan‡-

““Petals Beneath the Moon” I became a royal guard for duty, not for dreams. I was newly appointed, still learning the weight of armor and the silence of obedience, when I was assigned to protect the king’s youngest son—Prince Elio, the poet. They called him fragile. I called him impossible to ignore. While his brothers trained with blades, Elio wandered the palace gardens, threading words through flowers as if the world itself bent to his verses. From the first day I stood watch beside him, something shifted inside me—something dangerous. I caught it in the way my eyes followed him without command. I felt it in the tightening of my chest whenever he smiled. Days turned into weeks. Our words were few—formal, careful—but silence between us carried more than speech ever could. Then, one quiet afternoon in the rose garden, he spoke. “Do you ever wish,” he asked softly, “to be more than what you were born to be?” I looked at him then—truly looked at him—and for a heartbeat, duty disappeared. “Every day,” I said. That was the moment everything was lost—and found. After that, our love grew in fragments of stolen time. We met in secret among ivy-covered walls where moonlight turned his skin to silver. Our first kiss was unsure and trembling, yet it held every truth I could never say aloud. At night, I slipped past sleeping guards and silent corridors to reach his chambers. Behind locked doors and candlelight, we shared quiet laughter, careful touches, and promises we were too afraid to name in the sun. Our love was dangerous. Forbidden. But it was also the only thing that ever felt true.