Jake ==> Think back.
Peace seemed something so distant, for you.
It’s something far from your pretty wide knowledge. Locked in your golden cage full of painted walls and precious fabrics, the young Prince was waiting along with the beloved father, sitting on a chair just next to his throne, a silver crown resting on his white haired head.
They were ambassadors, his father said. Coming from the rival country of Prospit. The pale prince asked if they were coming to ask the king to surrend, or something similar, but he never replied. Maybe he doesn’t know the answer, the Prince thought, still so naively. His orange eyes came back staring the curves of the closed curtains on his side, always closed when he’s in, because the sunlight seems to hurt his fragile, colorless skin when the days are cloudless.
The Prince’s father didn’t move when the ambassadors came in, barded with the colors of the sun. Their skin was so different from his, so tanned and… colored, if confronted to him. For a short, short moment, you selfishly hated them for being such a rainbow of beauty. But it was stupid. Why hating someone just because of his appearance? It was stupid.
He raises your head, looking again the three figures, and stopping right where a young guy dressed like a page was, lifting your hand up as a greeting.
You liked him.
Trying not to look around had, indeed, failed. The place was so different from his home, there was no reason not to stare. He could practically feel the disapproving eyes of the ambassadors on him, but he didn’t mind one bit.
His eyes explored the vast “room”, trailing along banners and beams and stones, eventually falling to the front again. They landed on the Prince just as he waved, and Jake’s eyes widened a bit. The Prince of Derse, waving at a lowly page boy? The notion was absurd. At least, to him.
Still, he couldn’t help but wave back, one corner of his lips pulled up into a smile. And if anything, his nervousness increased. The humdrum of the ambassadors talking to the king and, eventually, preparing to leave the room to a smaller one, faded into the background.
He wasn’t allowed to go with them, anyway, unless they needed a messenger boy. He doubted they would; his arrival could well have been a mere formality. Before long he and the Prince were alone in the hall, and Jake’s knees knocked together as he bowed as low as he could.
The Prince's father quickly moves to the meeting room, clearly letting him know that no, he cannot follow the mediation because he's too young and there were some things he couldn't understand because of his lack of knowledge. So he was left in the main hall with the prospitian page he greeted before and that greeted you back, surprising him since people, both servants and other nobles, tend to avoid his person.
He looked at him kneel, and he lightly bowed his head in reply, with a graceful but firm movement. He then moved his hand, aiming at the few stairs taking to the thrones.
"Please, get up. Your greeting has been accepted with kindness and joy. You may sit here, with my dearest apologies for not offering you a more respectful seat for you." His voice was mature and delicate, but somehow he held the authority of a legitimate sovereign. And, mostly, he was being kind.
