Altair - Marian Tee Page 0,5

under house arrest.

The staff manning the estate had been with the royal family for over a decade. They were experienced and well-trained, and in their years of service, they had the opportunity (but not always the pleasure) to attend to A-list celebrities, dignitaries, billionaire tycoons, and - as this was par for the course - other members of royalty as well.

Upon Princess Safiya's arrival, the staff believed they knew everything there was to expect of the girl.

But they were wrong.

Two months had come to pass since then, and by now everyone was well used to the princess' charming...eccentricities. Whereas most other royals nitpicked on just about everything, the princess mostly nodded and quietly thanked all sixty-plus members of the staff...by name. Whereas most other royals demanded to be waited on hand and foot, there hadn't even been a day the princess had slept in; she was always up and about on her own early in the morning, and her bed properly made up by the time the attendants came in.

Everyone had been understandably suspicious at first, and no one more so than the special agent working undercover as the princess' personal maid. But eventually, she and the rest of the staff had come to realize the princess was truly what she seemed: a nice person plain and simple, and it was because of this Yara was now in a bind.

Yara would never have accepted this assignment if she hadn't owed Altair a favor. With a few rare exceptions, Yara saw royals as cruel and useless idiots. The princess, however, wasn't just nice. She was also different...in one of the saddest ways there was.

Yara had seen her fair share of abuse and injustice in the course of her work under the kingdom's defense department. And unfortunately, the more time Yara spent with the princess, the more it became obvious that the fairytale existence the world attributed to the girl was nothing but an illusion. Yara knew a victim when she saw one; there were certain signs one had to look out for...and the princess unfortunately exhibited all of them.

To be fair, the princess was rather good at hiding these signs, and the entire staff clearly didn't notice anything amiss. The other employees simply saw Sheikh of Farigha's daughter as well-mannered and surprisingly easy to please. Yara, however, had witnessed up close how evil lowlifes operated and how their victims turned out after surviving hell on earth. While the rest of the staff didn't see past the surface, Yara did, and what she saw...hurt.

There wasn't a single meal that didn't have the princess' eyes glowing like she had hit the jackpot, and the way she savored each bite made it seem as if she had only lived on stale bread and water before coming to Alfiraz. In the afternoons, Yara would sometimes catch the princess yawning, and the first time Yara had asked the girl if she wanted to rest, the princess had appeared stunned, almost as if she had grown up on the belief that an afternoon nap was a mortal sin.

There were only three kinds of people who made up their beds with the kind of precision Princess Safiya did: a five-star hotel housekeeper, a military recruit...or someone who had learned to do so while having a gun pointed at her head.

It was rare for Yara to feel overly protective about anyone, but once security informed her about the sheikh's impending visit...

ALTAIR WAS PRIVATELY surprised when Yara greeted him by the estate's front steps, all the while looking ready to bite his head off. Although Yara was a distant relation of the royal family, he and the other sheikhs had always considered her as their little sister. And so for her to act if he were the enemy, and it was the princess whom she owed loyalty to—-

"Is anything wrong?" he asked bluntly.

"La, alshaykh." No, sheikh.

Yara's tone was perfectly bland, and Altair frowned. Something was definitely up, but since he had more pressing matters at hand, Altair decided to set the issue aside. "I'm here to speak with the princess," he murmured. "Could you take me to where she is?"

He saw his cousin hesitate for a moment before nodding with visible reluctance. What the hell was wrong with her?

Yara led the sheikh past the courtyard until they were in front of a pair of ornately carved doors, and Altair stared at his cousin in disbelief. The estate's entertainment facilities rivaled that of a five-star hotel and theme park combined...and yet