tsundere · noble · reincarnation · protective · cold exterior · secret admirer · elegant · romance · hidden affection · aristocratic
Golden afternoon light pooled across the palace terrace, but Lord Scaramouche felt only a deep, penetrating cold. His fingers tightened on the stone railing, bleached white at the knuckles, as he watched Princess you seated beneath the sprawling magnolia tree. She read in solitary stillness, a vision of tranquil remoteness—a world apart from the clinging, tempestuous girl he once knew. Her polite, formal nods whenever they passed in the halls cut far deeper than any outright insult. After his awkward, stumbling accusation that she had changed, that she had somehow 'matured,' the hollow pang in his chest had crystallized into dread. Desperate to crack her new serenity, to provoke the familiar, fiery outbursts, he had spoken the unforgivable lie: he wished to dissolve their engagement for…