press space to go to next backdrop. Enjoy! Chapter 3 April 14, 1578 Dear Diary, Today I accompanied Frau Martha into the village. Officially, she is my governess. Unofficially, she is the closest thing I have ever had to a co-conspirator. She has spent years teaching me history, mathematics, and the art of pretending not to hear insults from people with titles. The morning smelled of salt. Everything on Kleine Insel smells of salt eventually. The sea settles into clothing, into walls, into hair. Lately it seems determined to settle into the streets as well. As we walked through the market, I noticed that several shopkeepers had stacked their goods higher than before. Wooden crates sat atop tables. Flower pots balanced on windowsills. One merchant had moved nearly his entire stall onto a raised platform. "The water reached here last week," Frau martha explained quietly. I stared at the stone beneath my feet. A faint white line marked where the seawater had dried. It was much farther inland than I remembered. "Papa says the flooding is under control." Frau martha made a noise that was not quite a laugh. "Your father says many things." That was all. One advantage of growing old, I suspect, is learning how to criticize a king without technically doing so. Further down the road, we passed the harbor. A fisherman stood beside a damaged section of dock, staring miserably at several loose planks. The structure had partially collapsed into the water. Frau martha continued walking. I stopped. The fisherman looked surprised to find a princess standing beside him. "Is something wrong?" I asked. The question felt foolish immediately. The answer appeared to be floating in the harbor. "The supports rotted faster than expected," he replied. "Saltwater's getting farther in every year." I glanced beneath the dock. The lower beams were dark and cracked. During my engineering lessons—a subject Mia once declared was only useful if one planned to marry a bridge—I had learned that constant exposure to seawater weakened untreated wood. Not that I was an expert. Still, I pointed toward a cluster of stone blocks near the shoreline. "Could you reinforce the base with those?" The fisherman blinked. I immediately regretted speaking. Perhaps it was a ridiculous suggestion. Perhaps I had misunderstood entirely. Then his expression changed. "Actually..." He rubbed his chin. "That might work." For several moments we discussed possibilities. Mostly he talked and I listened. When he finally thanked me, it felt strangely undeserved. I had done almost nothing. Yet his gratitude seemed genuine. The fisherman excused himself a few moments later to fetch additional stone blocks from a nearby storage shed. "I shall return shortly, Your Highness," he said. As soon as he disappeared down the dock, I wandered closer to the water's edge. The tide was unusually high. Small waves lapped against the wooden supports, sending sprays of seawater through the gaps in the planks. That was when I heard laughter. Several children were playing nearby, racing along the docks despite repeated warnings from their parents. One little boy, perhaps six years old, balanced along a narrow beam with his arms stretched wide. "Look at me!" he shouted proudly. His older sister rolled her eyes. "You are going to fall." "I am not." He fell. One moment he was standing. The next, the wet wood slipped beneath his feet. I remember the sound more than anything. A sharp splash. Then screaming. The water beneath the dock was deeper than it appeared. The boy surfaced once, coughing and thrashing. Then a wave pushed him beneath the planks.People shouted. Someone yelled for help. Nobody moved. Or perhaps they did, but not quickly enough.
I did not think. I dropped my cloak and jumped. The water was freezing. It stole the breath from my lungs immediately. For one terrible second I could not tell which direction was up. Then I saw him.The boy's small hand disappeared beneath the surface. I lunged forward and grabbed his wrist. He was panicking, kicking wildly. The current pulled against us. Saltwater stung my eyes. I heard distant voices from the dock above. "Princess!" "Get a rope!" "Dear God—" The boy clung to me so tightly I could barely breathe. Together we drifted toward one of the support posts. I wrapped my free arm around it and held on. A rope splashed into the water beside us moments later. Several fishermen hauled us back onto the dock. The boy's mother burst through the crowd and nearly crushed him in her embrace. He cried. She cried. I mostly sat there dripping seawater onto the planks and wondering whether my shoes were still at the bottom of the harbor. The fisherman returned carrying stone blocks and nearly dropped all of them. "Your Highness!" "I am beginning to suspect," I said through chattering teeth, "that your dock may be attempting to murder people." To my surprise, he laughed. Frau Martha arrived moments later looking as though she intended to strangle me personally. "Have you completely lost your mind?" she demanded."Possibly." To my surprise, she laughed as well. Only for a second. Then she wrapped her coat around my shoulders. The boy's mother approached carefully. Her eyes were red from crying. She curtsied so quickly she nearly lost her balance. "Thank you, Your Highness." I did not know what to say. No one had ever thanked me for something that mattered before. So I simply nodded. The little boy peeked around his mother's skirts. "You jumped really far." Despite everything, I laughed. "Please do not make me do it again." He grinned. "I'll try." I suspected he was lying. As Frau Martha and I resumed our walk, she glanced sideways at me. "You know," she said, "most royals would have simply offered condolences." "I did not solve anything." "No," she agreed. "You paid attention." For some reason that compliment felt larger. Near the center of town we stopped at a bakery. While Frau Martha spoke with the owner, I wandered toward the back of the shop. That was when I overheard them. Three villagers sat around a small wooden table. They did not know I was nearby. "The king still refuses to listen," one man said. "What would you have him do?" another replied. "Anything." The first man gestured toward the harbor. "Half the eastern path is gone. Every year the water gets closer. Every year the palace says not to worry." The third villager sighed. "My brother had to move his family inland." "Inland?" the first scoffed. "There won't be any inland left soon." The others laughed. Not because it was funny. Because sometimes people laugh when the truth is unbearable. For a moment nobody spoke. Then one woman stirred her tea and said quietly, "At least one of the princesses seems to notice." I froze. The others nodded. "The younger one." "Emilia." "She's always walking through town." "Actually talks to people." "And she saved that boy today." "Unlike the rest of them." I stared very hard at a basket of bread. For several seconds I wondered whether they were discussing someone else entirely. People do not usually discuss me. When they do, it is normally in relation to Mia. Mia's sister. The other twin. The quieter one. I had never considered the possibility that people might know me simply as Emilia. The conversation drifted elsewhere, but I heard very little after that. On the walk home, I found myself looking at the kingdom differently. Not as a princess. Not as a daughter. But as someone who belonged to it. The fishermen repairing nets. The merchants sweeping seawater from their doorways. The children hopping over puddles that had not existed last year. It seemed backward somehow. I knew many of their names, yet I wondered whether they knew mine, and somehow I found comfort in that. I’m not the popular princess that everyone wants me to be. I’m not Mia's clone. As we approached the palace gates, someone called out behind me. "Princess Emilia!" I turned. An elderly woman stood outside a flower stall. She lifted a small white blossom from a basket and held it toward me. "For your kindness." I accepted it carefully. The flower could not have cost much. Yet I cannot remember ever receiving a gift that felt more valuable. "Thank you," I said. The woman smiled. Then she returned to her work. No bowing. No grand speech. Just kindness. As though I were simply another person. Tonight the flower sits beside this diary. I keep looking at it to make certain it is real. Perhaps it is foolish to care so much about such a small thing. But for the first time in a very long while, I feel seen. More tomorrow. — Emilia
