"And you will be my dance partner!"
Anna stared at Crown Prince Ignis in a daze. She thought she heard it wrong, "Pardon me, Your Highness, are you trying to fool anyone here? Or did I heard it wrong?"
"What do you mean? You heard me right. You will be my dance partner for this banquet!"
"Your Highness, this humble maid has a lot of things to do… besides, there are plenty of women who are eager to be your dance partner," Anna said. She glanced at the noblewomen behind Prince Ignis. They stared at her as if they wanted to eat her alive.
Well, that was understandable. Anna knew her place, obviously. She was just a regular maid. She was not Cinderella, who could magically get a beautiful dress and became the star of the ball with her charming beauty.
Of course, these young noble misses who took hours to prepare themselves would get exasperated when a regular-looking maid stole the spotlight.
"They have no saying in whom I can take as my dance partner," Prince Ignis snickered, "Besides, what makes you so confident that I will pick you as my date? Dance partner and date is different, you humble maid."
"Yes, Your Highness, I know that well," Anna nodded, "That is why I do not understand your move right now. Aren't you a busy man? You are an amazing general and also a respectable Crown Prince. I believe you should be efficient in picking your desired partner, right?"
"Your Highness should consider efficiency and go straight with your desired one," Anna suggested.
Ignis: …
Everyone: …
All the noble guests saw the scene where the domineering Prince Ignis encircled his arm around a maid's waist and pulled her closer. He looked at her with at least a little bit of consideration and gentleness.
If this maid called Anna was a normal woman, she would squeal and die out heart attack after being embraced by Prince Ignis, or at least, her face would turn beet red and blush.
But she was nonchalant, not even a tint of pink on her cheek. She was still staring at the handsome Crown Prince with indifference as if she was calculating whether dealing with him would be worth her precious maid time of wiping glasses and delivering snacks.
Such indifference irritated Prince Ignis very much. He thought any girl would either get scared of him when he threatened them or would squeal when he embraced them.
Ignis was used to be the centre of attention wherever he went. Either fear or admiration, he took it all. But no one ever ignored him like this.
'And she is also immune to threat and teases…' Ignis had never found such a woman in his life, which made him wonder if he was not as good as what people made it to be. Or this girl was just specially… strange.
Knowing that somehow he couldn't win against this nonchalant girl, Ignis decided to just do it the primitive way.
"Your Highness, if I have no more use here, please release me. I need to clean some—EH!?" Ignis pulled Anna up and carried her on his shoulder, like carrying a bag of grains. Anna finally struggled, and her hands flailed around, "Y—Your Highness, this is improper of you!"
All guests were shocked by such disrespect, they thought Prince Ignis would carry this maid in bridal style, but instead, he carried her like a bag of grains.
However, Ignis didn't seem to mind the crowd gasps. He was actually quite excited when this nonchalant maid finally showed up some reaction, "Heh, so you do have some emotion in you."
Anna saw the shocked gaze of everyone around. Since Prince Ignis was probably almost 190 centimetres or 6.2 feet tall. And when such man carried her on his shoulder, it made her tower above everyone else.
Anna saw the bewildered gaze of Queen Seria, and she decided to lower his gaze to avoid meeting her eyes. If Anna was in Her Majesty Queen Seria's shoes, she must have been ashamed of her unreasonable son.
'Ah, it's over. My long-planned career as a palace maid is over. Queen Seria must've been angry at me for interrupting the banquet. Perhaps I should try and be a baker helper in the city instead,' Anna sighed in her heart. This was the medieval-esque era. Since she was not a princess nor born a noble, all she could do to earn a living was working just like the rest of the peasants.
Ignis stood in the middle of the space created as the dance floor for the banquet. He put Anna down gently and grinned mischievously when he saw the displeasure in Anna's face, "Oh, Miss Maid can also frown like a normal human. How surprising," Ignis teased.
'She really is not a schemer. So easy to read, yet so strange…'
Anna had lost all her perfunctory politeness. Since she was going to get fired anyway, she pointed her index at Prince Ignis and then at the crowd of noblewomen, "Your Highness, please don't make my life harder. Don't you see how these noble misses are waiting for you? I don't think—"
Prince Ignis grinned and engulfed Anna's palm with his. He intertwined their fingers together and leaned in to whisper at Anna, 'Just keep your mouth shut and enjoy this, insolent maid.'