The Luna Choosing Game

As Nicholas asked out Lilliana, I stood in the back of the crowd of watching girls, my heart down on the

floor.

I had no right to be upset. I knew that. I had given up the right to be upset a long time ago.

Yet I couldn’t deny the feeling.

First, Nicholas had returned the handmade gift I made him, and now he was asking another girl on a solo

date.

According to the rules of the competition, solo dates were only supposed to be awarded after a girl performed well in one of the events.

Of course, from what I’d heard, the rules also stated that a prince could ask any girl out at any time, sol supposed such a thing wasn’t unheard of.

But for it to be Nicholas who asked for the first solo date felt like the hardest pill to swallow.

I understood that the candidates were invited here to the palace to date the princes. Soon, Nicholas would pick someone to marry.

that he would never be

be. We’d both moved on since then. It wasn’t my

there in the entryway to the dining room, holding Lilliana’s hand with only the barest

his faceless expression, the more he seemed like a shell

minute, I turned away from the spectacle and headed into the gardens for some fresh

was just beginning to set over the western tree line. The sky was painted

to see

hoped she

miss?” a male voice said,

and turned to

with not a hair out of place or a speck of dirt on his guard

had more stripes and fringe than the

because he was the head of the royal

I had met personally, but I had noticed him when some

pointed him out.

expression. I felt much like an

ask once more,” he said, voice gruff. “Are you lost? The banquet is