[ ah... merlin gets her. she frowns as she's hit, and she doesn't even flinch or react violently to it. ]

It's something I'm working on. [ she says gently, tapping the cake with the teeth of her fork. she doesn't look him in the eye when she says it, too. instead, she looks at the empty space next to merlin. she can't look him in the eye like this. not right now. ] I've just gotten used to doing things on my own, even when I was little. [ her mother died when she was eleven, after all. and it's not like there were a lot of kids in the cosmos space center that she was able to make a lot of friends. ]

Also, [ now she looks him in the eye, eyes soft. ] you shouldn't hit princesses.