Fairy Tail and its characters belong to the amazing Hiro Mashima, but this plot is all mine!

My name is Lucy Heartfilia, and I am just your typical 19 year old girl, well other than the fact that I can use celestial magic and I'm the princess of Fiore. I am the daughter of King Jude Heartfilia and the late Queen Layla Heartfilia, we were always a happy family until my mother passed away 6 years ago. Since then, my father and I have not seen eye-to-eye, and I spend most of my time alone or undercover sneaking around the kingdom.

Dressing in disguise and exploring is one of my favorite pastimes and sometimes it makes me wish I could be like the mages in the country that get to go on adventures everyday. The mage guild I long to join the most is Fairy Tail, I hear they get into trouble every day and they always have fun adventures. Alas, that is not the life I was given so I must be happy as the princess that I was born to be. My best friend is my handmade Levy Mcgarden, she always tells me about the adventures she used to go on with her boyfriend Gajeel Redfox when they were in the Fairy Tail guild. But after a few years of not being able to pay the bills, they decided to take more steady pay by working for the royal family as a handmaid and a guard. And thanks to Gajeel for being our head guard, he often helps me escape the castle walls to go exploring.

Currently however, I was not up to anything fun or any exploring, I was getting ready for the ball we were going to have that evening. I used to always love going to the royal ball's when my mom was alive because we would get ready together, and eat the sweets at the buffet together all night long. However, after she passed, I spend most of the night at the royal ball's alone in a corner just trying to fake a smile and wave at our guests. I was not sure what this ball was for, all I knew is my father told me it was for an important alliance. Levy hummed a tune as she smoothed the wrinkles on my elegant ball gown.

"You're so lucky your highness, I wish Gajeel and I could go to balls like this" Levy said as she continued her work.

"Like I said before Levy, don't call me your Highness just call me Lucy. I don't care about formalities, I care about you being my friend, and trust me, it's not as fun as people think it is. During the entire event I have to stay prim and proper to not embarrass the country or my father. If I mess up even once, people in other royal families will never let it go, and neither will my dad for that matter."

"Oh, it can't be that bad Lucy, at least it gives you a reason to get all dressed up and pretty. But to be honest you're beautiful every day and you always get to dress up in some dress so I guess it must be typical for you"

"Awww thanks Levy, and thank you for helping me get ready. Things like this are what make me miss my mom."

"Of course Lu! Besides, it is my job after all. But I would still want to help even if it wasn't. Do you know what this ball is for tonight? I know I heard from other maids that it's going to be a very big day, and that King Jude is going to announce really big news that will change the country."

"I've heard those rumors too but to be honest he has been very vague about what's going to happen to me, I am just as curious as everybody else." I said as I looked out the window of my suite to see a line of Royal carriages coming up the castles driveway and dropping off people in all sorts of fancy suits and dresses. I then looked in the mirror and admired Levy's hard work.

My hair was pulled up in an elegant updo with a few loose strands framing my face, I also had my gold and ruby inlaid tiara on. I had some light makeup on that made my eyes pop, and I had an elegant red dress with gold details. The dress had a tight bodice with a sweetheart neckline, and the skirt flared out with a long train on the back. Wearing the outfit made me feel powerful, like the princess I was.

"So who chose this dress for you anyway?" Levy asked as she finished fixing the final bobby pins in my hair.

"My father said it was picked for me, but that is all he said. I'm curious where it came from but he refused to give any more details. But it is beautiful, I don't have any other dresses like this."

Once Levy finished giving me a final check, I started to head down to our Royal ballroom to be announced. The beginning of the ball was just like any other, there were a couple hours of people arriving and being announced and mingling amongst each other. Then finally at 6 my father came down and was announced and announced the start of dinner. After eating, my father stood up to give his proclamation that we all waited for.

"Thank you all for joining us at the castle for this monumental occasion. As you know, my daughter Lucy Heartfilia will be turning 20 years old next month, and as per tradition in Fiora she is to be married the day of her birthday."

…..Wait what?

"She has grown into a wonderful woman and I know she will someday rule this country better than even her mother and I have, but of course she cannot do that unless she has a strong man by her side to help her do it. That is why I decided to throw this royal ball to announce the man her mother and I chose to marry her when she was born."

At this point I sat in my chair in utter shock, I was shaking from so many overpowering emotions washing over me. How could my father never tell me about this or warn me about what this royal ball was going to be about. How could my mother not have told me? And who on Earthland could they have me paired with that they think would be able to handle being the king of Fiore? I was so angry, that I almost didn't hear the name my father was about to speak. I quickly remembered to listen just as he spoke the name.

"Lucy Heartfilia's chosen betrothed is Prince Natsu Dragneel from the Alvarez kingdom. With this marriage, we will bring together both kingdoms and finally end the wars that have plagued us since the formation of our kingdoms."

You've got to be kidding me! Prince Natsu Dragneel? As in one of the members of the Dragneel family that our family has cursed since I can remember?! I never have even met Natsu because they have never been invited to our balls due to our constant conflicts between our countries. How could they possibly think this will work? And he can't force me to do this, I may be a princess but I am my own person and I can't be forced into a marriage that I am completely against, right? He wouldn't possibly hate me that much that he would do this to me, would he? At that moment I suddenly felt the urge to cry and I couldn't hold it back.To keep my pride, I stood up and walked out of the room before I could cry in front of the hundreds of people in front of me.

A few minutes later I heard the door of the room I entered to hide in open and I looked to see my father approaching me.

"Lucy! What are you doing in here? You made a huge scene right in front of everybody. What do you think everyone will think when they saw you storm out right when I announced your betrothed? That is not the kind of thing we want people to see."

"How could you and Mom do this to me? The least you could have done is warn me. Why couldn't you have told me that I was betrothed and that I'm getting married NEXT MONTH. And to a Dragneel of all people." I said between sobs as I sat on the floor crumbled in the corner.

"Get ahold of yourself Lucy. You are the princess of the Fiore kingdom and you represent all of the people here. You should never act this way, and the reason I didn't tell you is because I didn't want you to try to get out of it because no matter what this has to happen. the reason your mother never said anything is because she wanted you to enjoy your life without having to worry about what would happen when you became an adult. But now you are an adult and you need to act like one, you are a princess so it is your duty to help mend foreign affairs and that sometimes means creating an alliance through marriage. Since you ran out you didn't hear me announce the last part, Natsu is here and he will be staying with us until your marriage so you can get to know each other a little. Once you are married you will be moving with him and running both kingdoms from the Alvarez palace."

"So I won't even be able to live here anymore? Not only are you making me marry someone I don't even know you're selling me to a different country just for an alliance?!"

"Lucy I know you don't understand this now but this is for the best, I wish you didn't have to move to that palace but their palace is much bigger than our Castle is. It is just more logical for you to run both countries stationed at the Alvarez palace. You still have another month here though so enjoy it. Now pull yourself together and come back to the party and apologize for what you did. It was very rude to our guests. Also, get off the floor, that dress was chosen by Natsu for you to wear because those are his favorite colors so you better not ruin it" with that, he left me in the room alone and I never felt more alone in my life than I did at that moment.

Eventually I went back to the party and tried to fake a smile and apologized to everyone, after that the party went by slowly. Now it was late in the evening and most of the guests had left, I still had not met Natsu yet, and to be honest I tried to avoid running into anybody I didn't know. Scared to know if it was him or not. but I knew I couldn't hide from him forever since he would be living with us for the next month. I also still couldn't believe he was the one that shows the dress I was wearing, it was beautiful but it almost made me mad that he clearly knew we would be married but nobody told me.

After the long night I had I decided I deserved a treat and headed over to the dessert bar. I looked over the variety of cakes, cookies, chocolates, and pastries and finally decided on a small slice of cheesecake, it happened to be the last one. As I reached for the cake my hand hit into somebody else's and I looked over to see a boy with pink hair and tan skin looking intensely back at me. His hair was messy, and he wore a nice suit but had a white scaly scarf over top of his dress coat which I thought was kind of weird. His face was handsome and I could tell underneath the suit that he had a well-built body and toned muscles. I had never seen this boy before but he looked to be about my age if not a year or two older than me.

"Um pardon me, I didn't see there is somebody else over here" I said, by the way he stared at me, I suddenly felt nervous.

"It's okay, you can have it. To be honest I've been stuffing myself with other food all night long and it wouldn't be fair for me to take the last one when you probably haven't had much tonight, Princess Heartfilia." So he knows me but I have no idea who he is, this is kind of weird.

"If you insist then thank you, and thank you for coming to the ball tonight. And I'm sorry to tell you that your name has slipped my mind, what was it again?" He then smirked at me before grabbing a cookie off of a different tray.

"You'll find out who I am soon enough, but for now have a good rest of your evening, Princess. Also, that dress looks lovely on you" after that he walked away leaving me standing there baffled that he wouldn't answer me. If he knew who I was then he would know he should always answer my questions since I am the Princess. I sighed and tried to shrug it off, the last thing I needed was more drama tonight. I brought my cheesecake over and sat at a table that was pretty much empty and relaxed for the first time during the evening.

The party finally came to an end about an hour later and the last of the guests had left the ballroom. I decided to head up to my room for the night to try and get some sleep after the long and stressful day I had just had. When I made it back, Levy was waiting for me with a sympathetic look on her face.

"I heard the news Lu, I'm so sorry…" like a titlewave the emotions flooded through me all over again and I started to cry as she came over and hugged me tightly. Times like these were when I missed my mom but then I had to remember that she was one of the people that decided this fate on me, I felt so betrayed I didn't know what to do. I felt anger towards my father, sad that I would be leaving my friends and my kingdom soon, and completely scared about the entire thing. I didn't even know the man that I would be marrying, he could be cruel and I would have no choice but to marry him.

"I don't know what to do Levy, my father is not giving me any choice. Apparently this has been decided since my birth but nobody has told me. I haven't even met the man I'm supposed to be marrying next month and he's going to be staying in our castle until then."

"I could have never expected this to happen, it was so sudden. I know that it is a tradition for the princess to get married on her 20th birthday but nobody has talked about it for you so I never thought it was going to happen. I did meet Prince Natsu's personal attendant, his name is Gray Fullbuster. He's very calm and collected, but he seemed to be irritated at the Prince for some reason. Other than that he was very friendly, and kind to the rest of the staff."

"That's good at least his staff so far seems nice. Is that the only staff that he brought with him?"

"That's the only staff he brought, but he did bring his pet cat. It's very peculiar, the cat is blue and his name is Happy. It can even talk, apparently it's breed is called Exceed, and they only have them in the Alvarez kingdom."

Why would he bring his pet with him? That's so strange…

"Well Levy, it's been a long day so I think I'm going to go to sleep. Thank you for talking with me though, I'll have to meet Natsu tomorrow morning."

"Okay Lu, if you need anything, don't hesitate to call for me. And once again, I'm sorry for everything, you will always have me here for you though." I smiled and hugged her, and then she helped me get out of my dress and get ready for bed. I laid in bed for a few hours before I could fall asleep with my mind racing about everything that would be coming soon, and how scared I was for all the change that was about to happen.

The next morning I woke up early with Levy lightly shaking me to wake up. It was a Monday morning and it was time for me to start my day at the crack of dawn. I started by taking a bath and getting into a nice elegant day dress, then Levy helped me put my hair into a nice braid and put on my typical silver with blue gems tiara on my head. The dress she chose for me was a light baby blue with some white lace on the bodice, it was one of my favorites. After I got ready I headed down to the dining hall for breakfast. Suddenly when I reached the heavy wooden door I was afraid to open it knowing that my betrothed was waiting at the table on the other side. My hand started shaking as I realized my future was on the other side of the door and all I had to do was open it and look, but I didn't want to.

As I stood there terrified, I heard someone clear their throat behind me and I jumped nearly a foot in the air before turning around to see none other than the pink haired boy I met at the party the night before.

"Are you going to go in or just stand outside the door all day?" He questioned with an amused look on his face. I felt my face heat up as I realized he must have watched me as I stood there shaking. Who was he anyway? I thought he was just a typical guest but now he's here even though the party ended last night. Then it dawned on me, and everything fell into place.

"A-are you Prince Natsu Dragneel by any chance?" As I spoke those words he smirked just like he did the night before.

"Finally caught on to that? Yeah I'm Natsu, it's nice to meet you again"

My knees suddenly felt weak as I realized the man before me was the one I was going to marry in only a short month. I felt so embarrassed that I didn't even know who he was the night before when the whole entire ball was meant for our engagement to be announced. How can I be so stupid?

"U-um yeah it's my pleasure, I'm sorry I didn't know who you were last night. To be honest, I didn't even know I was betrothed to anybody before my father's announcement."

He then let out a loud laugh,"nobody told you? I've known about our engagement since I was a child. But if I'm honest with you, I still don't want to get married even though I've been told it was going to happen whether I wanted to or not since I was a kid. I mean you're a Heartfilia, my family has talked about how stuck-up you guys are for generations."

How. Dare. He! How could he bad talk my family while he stood in my castle in my kingdom and was staying with us for the next month?! Not to mention he was going to marry a Heartfilia and he bad mouthed me to my face?

"Excuse me? How dare you say my family is stuck-up. When everyone knows the Dragneel family is a bunch of hard headed idiots who love going to war with all countries near them!"

"Like your kingdom doesn't go to war all the time! Didn't you just recently go to war with a small country near your border? You completely bullied that country until you guys were able to invade and conquer it."

"You say that like I'm the one that invaded and conquered the country, just so you know my father and the head of our country's defense were the people that made that decision not me. And we don't just invade and conquer countries for fun, we do it when it's for the benefit for us and that country"

"When would it ever be in the benefit of the country you are taking over? That makes no sense."

"if the country doesn't have the resources to survive and we have them we can help them thrive by taking over and bringing them into our kingdom. Since we took over that country, they have thrived. That's probably why King Igneel of your kingdom wants to have an alliance with us because he knows how strong of a country we are and if you guys don't have an alliance with us we will end up just taking you guys over"

We both were fuming with anger and Natsu was about to say something back when somebody clear their throat near us, we looked over to see a man with black hair that I had never seen before.

"Your highnesses, maybe right now isn't the best time to bicker. Besides, you just met give each other a chance, by the way Princess Lucy, my name is Gray Fullbuster and I am Prince Natsu's attendant.

Natsu let out a huff of irritation before walking around me and shoving the doors to the dining hall open and walking in leaving me standing outside with Gray.

"Sorry for his rudeness, he's never really liked the idea of having to be married. He likes to explore and have freedom and he feels when he becomes the king and is married with you all of that will go away. It's not your fault and he has no ill will towards you, sometimes he's just an idiot."

I laughed a little bit and told Gray it was alright and that I understood his feelings. But I just can't let what he said go about my family, he doesn't even know us! I let out a sigh and walked into the dining hall too and sat at my regular seat next to my father's. We waited a few more minutes before my father came in and breakfast was served, it was awkward and quiet sitting in the empty dining hall with only Natsu after our fight.

When my father entered the room he grumbled a greeting to both of us before sitting at his seat and eating his breakfast without another word. after my mother passed away, my father never said much during meal times or to me at all in general. It seemed even having Natsu around wouldn't be changing that.

After breakfast, my father went to his study to work on the latest affairs and to go to his typical meetings, and I went to my tutor for my regular lessons. My lessons went throughout the morning until noon when I had a small lunch and then went to my father to see if he had any meetings that he wanted me to go too. He had been having me shadow him the last few months to get ready to rule the kingdom on my own soon. But when I saw him he simply said he would rather me spend time getting to know Natsu for the time being. I let out a huff and instead of going to find Natsu, I went up to my room to read.

A few hours passed and I finally decided I wanted to get out of the castle. I headed down to the entrance of our Castle wearing a cloak, I then met Gajeel at the gate and asked for him to let me go on my usual excursion. He looked around to make sure nobody could see before nodding and opening the gate for me to sneak out to explore the marketplace.

I went to my favorite bake shop and then headed over to my favorite spot in the town park. I started heading over to the cherry blossom tree that was in full bloom before I noticed a hooded figure sitting at my typical bench facing away from me. I didn't know if I wanted to still sit over there or if I should find somewhere else, but I decided it was my usual spot so why should having somebody else there bother me?

I sat down on the bench and the other person just continue to look out at the small lake that was in front of us.

"It sure is pretty here isn't it? This is my favorite spot, I just bought these fresh cookies would you like one?" I offered with a friendly tone, whenever I was out in public I tried to talk with some of the citizens to see how everyday life was going.

He grumbled a "sure" before grabbing one out of the small bag that I had.

We sat in silence for a few minutes before a gust of wind blew throughout the park and flung The man's hood off of his head to reveal a familiar head of pink hair. I felt my face heat up again, why do I always get so flustered when I see him.

"Prince Natsu? Is that you? What are you doing out here?" I asked surprised to see him.

"Yes I am Prince Natsu but please don't say anything to anybody I'm not supposed to be out and about, actually how do you know who I am? I've never even been in this kingdom before." He said looking at me confused. Oh crap! How am I supposed to play that off? He doesn't know who I am yet and if he finds out he might tell my dad that I've been sneaking out. But to be honest, I don't think he would because he would be in trouble for sneaking out too if he tells on me.

I sighed and decided to show him who I am, I uncovered my face for a moment just to show him who I was before covering back up again.

"Princess Lucy? What are you doing out here? Isn't it against the rules for you to be sneaking around without guards with you?"

"Same goes for you, you know. You aren't supposed to be outside of the castle walls without a guard either. So what made you decide to come out?"

He sighed and scratched the back of his head, "to be honest I'm not used to staying in a confined area for too long at a time. At home I always would sneak out and explore the local towns. I've always wanted to explore the world but as a prince I'm stuck."

"You know, I've always been the same way. I've always wanted to join a magical guild and go on adventures every day." Suddenly Natsu's face lit up as he looked at me.

"Really? I've never heard of another Royal that wanted to do that. I've always thought the same thing. What kind of magic do you use? My family has used fire dragon magic for centuries."

"Oh, that's really cool. I use celestial magic just like my mother did. Celestial magic has went through my family for centuries too." He then smiled brighter than I had ever seen before saying "that's awesome Lucy!" I felt myself blush heavily but felt better knowing that he couldn't see with me wearing my hood. We then talked for a couple more hours about the adventures we always dreamed about going on, and the places we've always wanted to visit.

We started walking around the town as I showed him the village and the best places to get a bite to eat because that seemed to be his favorite thing to do. After a few hours of talking and walking around we finally made it back to the outside of the castle gates where Gajeel let us both in again. After that, Natsu walked me back to my room.

"By the way Lucy, I'm sorry about what I said earlier about your family being stuck up. To be honest, it's just been very hard coming here, and I didn't know what to expect, all I had to go on was what my family always told me. but from tonight I know that they were wrong, you definitely don't seem stuck up at all!"

"Thanks Natsu, I'm sorry too, I didn't mean what I said about your family. It's been hard for me too since nobody ever told me about this and it was all thrown at me last night in front of hundreds of people. But that's not your fault, you seem like a good person" we then smiled at each other before we awkwardly didn't know what to say anymore.

"Well I guess have a good night Lucy, I had fun walking around with you. And I look forward to seeing you tomorrow too." I felt myself blush again, I didn't understand how we went from hating each other to almost seeming like old friends in one day. Maybe it was because we both finally met somebody that felt the same way as we did. We never had anybody that understood what we were going through and now we finally did.

"Thanks Natsu I hope you have a good night as well, and I had fun too" after that Natsu gave me one last smile before turning around and walking towards his room. I then went into my room before shutting the door and sighing feeling happier than I have in a long time. I can't believe how nice he is, and that he wants to do the same things as I do. I still have so much more to learn about him, but suddenly I'm not dreading it as much as I did before.

Hey guys! it's been a little while since I've posted anything on here but my life just got pretty crazy for a few months but now it calmed down a bit. I still plan on finishing my other stories but this idea came to me and I couldn't help myself from writing it. I hope you liked the start, and I asked you to please follow and review, I always love some feedback! Anyway happy reading,

-Bookgeek102