Miki sighs, "You fall so easily for cute girls," She gives Haruto a smirk, as the heart servant with perfect body shape strolls down the path back to her master. Her feminine walk brings out the best of her curvy body, an elegant feline - trained to attract men.
"Well you haven't found me a brother-in-law yet!" remarks Haruto to her sister with a sarcastic tone.
"At least I'll be checking out guys that aren't already taken. What are you doing flirting with the 10th Prince's heart servant?"
"How did you...?"
"You need to do a better job at flirting and," she lifts up her arm with something in her grasp, "hiding things." Haruto took a glimpse at her sister's hand which now held the black rose he had stolen... well took from Lira.
"Give it back, we don't know who knows about the heart servant academy or black rose," Haruto attempts to snatch it off of Miki's hand, but fails and receives a smug from her.
Miki stuffs in his hands a basket for one of the princess' laundry, "Left this specifically for you, and here you go," She hands him back the rose, "stop caring so much about this girl, she's the 10th Prince's heart servant. And besides what are people going to do knowing that she's directly in service of royalty. And is in a higher position than all of us." Miki pushes him in the direction of the 4th Princess' chamber, "and find me a sister-in-law that's actually not already taken." She laughs at his hilarious brother who sticks his tongue out at her, but forcefully turns his head away from her and faces towards the direction of the Princess' chamber. He continues down a stone path skipping to the beat of the song they just sang.
He clearly just wants to protect Lira from being ignored and sneered at by others from having different status, because - he knows that feeling, too well.
Miki giggles at her stupid brother, for doing something so kind for someone that he'll probably never get the chance to be in a relationship with. She picks up a basket that's for one of the royal members - the 8th Prince. And heads in the opposite direction of the way her brother went. She continues to laugh, but now at this hilarious world that's too funny to keep her cold laugh in.
Loving someone you can't, because their heart is already sealed. Sealed from loving someone else. Someone that's not her. Someone that'll probably never be her again.
--+--
Lira gets a little bored of just staring at the rose bushes on either side of the pathway she's been walking on for the past few minutes. They're all the same - all that bright pink colour rose. All just the same thing, staring at them even makes her feel a bit dizzy. She places the basket to her side and holds it against between her waist and arm. She continues walking along the seemingly endless gravel path. To distract herself, she stares continuously at her feet at each step she takes, until she reaches a stone path. The 10th Prince's chamber - Great.
She sighs in hope for the best. She tries to stare off at the front garden of the chamber that she fell in love at first sight, to distract herself for a little longer. Her eyes drifts off to look at the pond under the bridge she's so curious about. Whenever she passes it, there always seems to be water ripples. At the corner of her eye she sometimes sees green and orange colours jumping out or reflecting out of the pond. It wouldn't be a surprise that the 10th Prince would be raising goldfish in the pond.
Being so distracted she abruptly came to a halt at the wooden stairs, just before she was about to make a fool out of herself and trip over. It wasn't even that dark, the sky only showed minimal change in the colours of dusk. Tripping over these wooden stairs that couldn't stand out more than they already did, would've been the great embarrassment if anyone saw her. Don't overthink she repeated in her mind, but sometimes when you do overthink in advance, it may not happen. Anyways.
She continues on with her path. And climbs up the stairs with ease, from all her physical training she received at the Heart Servant Academy. One basket of sheets to her is nothing compared with the bags of rice she had to carry up a steep hill to deliver to their kitchen.
She reaches the top of the stairs and turns left to the front porch - engawa. The porch she had walked on this morning which led to the tatami room. She stops at the shoji and sees through the paper material that there's candle light inside the tatami room. The tatami room where he kind of did a floor kabedon to her earlier today. Besides that.
Lira kneels down on the wooden engawa, while placing the basket next to her. She raises her voice slightly and exclaims, "I'm back from the laundry department, 10th Prince. I've not come home empty-handed. I've brought back some dried laundry." The only response she gets is silence.
"10th Prince," she shouts a little louder, yet nothing responds to her. Lira's heart begins to race, her mind racing in sync with her heartbeat. She overthinks that the 10th Prince may have been... in her absence. She doesn't even want to think that, she quickly slides open the shoji to make sure.