Love & Duty

Chapter 21

Rowen finally got to Ren's office. His pace was slow like never before. If he could, he would go to his room to process all that had just happened...

"How could she have a Fiancée...? Why would she hide that from me?" he thinks to himself before entering the office.

Deep down, he always knew that there would always be someone more worthy of her than himself. He just shut that idea off; he wanted to be the one for her.

But... she is a Princess, after all. Even if she doesn't care about her title, it doesn't change the fact that she is one and that only a Prince of the same rank is allowed to be with her.

"Not some random aide who doesn't even come from a noble family..." the thought couldn't help but come out.

He definitely didn't want to admit it, but he somehow felt betrayed... Not by Sophia but by himself. He was over the moon when their feelings were reciprocated; he didn't want to think of anything else.

He felt like a fool.

He takes a deep breath and knocks on the door. Once he is inside, he finds everyone there. He was hoping only Ren and Nikki to be there; maybe he could have tried speaking to them.

"Rowen? What's wrong?" Nikki asks when he walks in and still hasn't said a word. He only looked confused at her, wondering what she could mean. He was trying to hide his troubles.

"You look beat up. Weren't you with Sophia just now? Aren't you supposed to have a stupid grin on your face?" she tries to tease him, but she gets no reaction from him.

"Yeah. Oh, Ren, are you aware that Prince Julien is here?" he ignores Nikki and focuses on Ren.

"I was told he arrived, but he hasn't shown up yet. He might be looking around the castle." Ren answers, a little annoyed.

It was known that the first thing you do when entering a castle is pay your respect to its Royals. Yet Julien only does what he wants.

His jaw clenched again; if he had been told Julien was around, he wouldn't have taken his guard down with Sophia. Maybe they could have run away and avoided him. Avoided finding out about that stupid engagement.

He scolds himself for trying to ignore reality again. He would have found out about it eventually.

"Rowen, seriously. Did Julien say something to you?" Nikki hits the nail on the head when he flinches. "What did he tell you, Rowen?" she asks again.

He didn't have the energy to explain everything to them, especially since he didn't want to think about it at all. But the need to get answers was winning.

This time, he turns to Tyler; he knows he will never lie about something like this. "Is Princess Sophia..." he couldn't help but stop.

"Oh, still trying to hide how close you two have become? I still can't get that picture out of my head, you know!" he teases, but Rowen only looks at him with dreadful eyes.

"Is she engaged?" he finally asks.

Silence fell in the room; Ren was shocked to hear a question like that. Tyler and Valerie share a glance, and then he bursts out laughing.

"That girl? Engaged?" he holds his stomach from how hard he is laughing.

"Why would you think that, Rowen? How could she be engaged when you two-?" Valerie tries to ask.

"Maybe you were also kept in the dark." he interrupts.

Tyler did not like that. He gets up close to Rowen and glares at him. "There is nothing that I don't know about Soph."