by Lina Jubilee
But I knew both had seen and done as much on this world as anyone could.
Their semi-frequent absence during my childhood could often be attributed to the work they’d done saving this planet and all the Natches on it.
“You’re making me blush,” said Papa Zander out loud, his voice deep.
“Stop reading my mind,” I snapped, but my mood softened as Papa Zander pushed the tray he’d been carrying toward me.
Blueberry pancakes with a smiley face made of whipped cream. My favorite, long ago. I almost started bawling looking down at it.
“You’ve grown so much, pumpkin,” said Papa Zander as I picked up a fork and knife.
“Almost a queen,” added Daddy Alarik, his voice incongruously even lower than Papa Zander’s.
My stomach soured and I sighed, stabbing the fork into a piece of the stack but not picking it up.
Papa Zander nudged Daddy Alarik with his arm.
“Right,” said Daddy Alarik, clearing his throat. “Zander tells me you’re having reservations about the princes.”
“How could you just decide this for me without even asking me?” I said, not even bothering with pretext. My eyes pricked with tears, but I was determined not to let any fall just now.
“It, uh…” Daddy Alarik wasn’t usually at a loss for words. “It was just an idea I had. I’m worried about the next heir to the throne. With my sister uninterested in having children of her own—”
“And what if I don’t want to have them, either? You didn’t even ask.”
To spite my chaotic stomach, I shoved the bite of pancakes into my mouth, the tears streaming down my cheeks hot and salty as they hit my lips.
“Do you not want to have children?” Daddy Alarik asked.
“I don’t know,” I mumbled through bites of food. “I haven’t thought about it. I just don’t like everyone expecting things of me.” I kept eating, faster, making more angry stabs at the stack.
“Like?” asked Papa Zander quietly.
“Children, marriage, the throne—all of it!” I shoved the plate forward and crossed my arms, leaning back in my chair.
“You are destined to rule over Nelia,” began Daddy Alarik. “I know it may seem overwhelming—you don’t even realize what kind of vision I had for my people when I was the equivalent of your age.”
I glared at him. His vision had involved taking over the Earth by force in order to save its environment. I knew at least that much had happened before I’d been born. There was still a Nelian in a high-security Natch prison who had broken the Nelian-Earth ceasefire to wreak havoc at a Natch orphanage.
Of course, as a result, he’d busted up an abusive place that had stifled Natch abilities, which had led to the creation of Veras Academy. But that hadn’t been his plan at all.
Just as this era of peace and cooperation hadn’t been how the king of Nelia had seen his plan going before that.
If he hadn’t felt bonded with Mom, who knew if things would have turned out so well?
Papa Zander studied me and I tried to empty my mind, to keep my errant thoughts from him. When that didn’t seem to work, I purposely sent him an image of what I imagined the three princes looked like buck-naked and smiling seductively, and Papa Zander visibly jumped in his seat.
See? I said in my head. A daughter wants to keep some things secret from her parents.
Papa Zander flushed a little and looked down at the table. He and Dad Jayden shared a special bond in the pentagon of my parents’ relationship, so I knew it wasn’t the image of gorgeous, naked men that had sent him scurrying. Just the idea of his daughter with them.
“Daddy,” I said, addressing Alarik. “How can I marry anyone if I don’t feel the… pheromones? The Nelian sense where you just know?”
Daddy Alarik studied me. “You’re half-human,” he said after a moment. “You might not feel it at all. Do you think you…?” He shook his head. “If you felt it, you’d know. There’d be no denying it. No resisting it. Mother Nelia works in mysterious ways, but when she bonds her children together, it’s for a bigger reason.”
Like him bonding with Mom and taking a more peaceful approach to his goal of saving the Earth. Or Aunt Alanna bonding with her team of rebels who had vowed to take my parents down—turning them to our side, making it so there was less need for rebels to stand against us to begin with.
So if Mother Nelia had had plans for me to wed one of these princes for some grand, political purpose, surely, she’d make me feel the same type of things.
Grinning, I dug back into my pancakes.
“What is it?” asked Papa Zander, speaking aloud instead of poking around in my head. “You look happy.”
I shrugged. “I’ll go on these dates,” I said. “And if I don’t feel any special connection, well, it can’t be that important to the grand scheme of things that I wed any of them.”
Papa Zander and Daddy Alarik exchanged a look.
Then Daddy spoke. “Nelians find joy in each other’s bodies all the time. With or without the sense that you’re meant for one another.” He didn’t seem at all ashamed of speaking about this with his daughter, and in fact it was far from the first time I’d heard it. “But making love to someone you’re meant to be with… You’d know. You’d know if you had that innate Nelian sense, supernova.”
So if sleeping with the princes didn’t rock my socks off… I wasn’t meant for any of them.
My face flushed at the idea of sleeping with the princes so casually, and I had to think about ice cream, strawberries, fields of flowers, anything to make sure Papa Zander didn’t pick up on—nope, all of those things got corrupted, too. Licking off the same ice cream cone as Prince Trey. Prince Rio feeding me a strawberry, slowly, dangling it just out of reach and making me bite for it like a wild animal. Prince Zeke sauntering toward me in that field of flowers, a lily trailing down from his lips to his neck to his exposed chest.
Papa Zander cleared his throat.
I thought you wanted me to marry one of them, I thought spitefully.
He didn’t respond.
“I don’t want you to focus so much on the Nelian way of coupling,” said Daddy Alarik, oblivious to what had just gone on in my head. “It’s quite possible that, as a half-human, you don’t feel the Nelian sense at all. So go on these dates, try to consider the implications of refusing—”
Papa Zander nudged him and cut him off. “That’s all we’re asking of you, pumpkin.” He sent a roguish smile my way. “Go on some dates, like many girls your age would. And maybe you’ll have more fun than you expect anyway.” He sent an image of the three princes with roses in their mouths and winking at me via our telepathic bond, his squeamishness at the idea of me with any of them clearly tampered.
I sent an image of me sticking my tongue out at him in response.
Chapter Six
Food and a new sense of focus helped get me back to myself. I’d already felt like there was this cloud of impending doom that had hung over me as my days at Veras Academy ticked away, a clear line in the sand marked “Before Graduation” and “After,” where my life would break off into two. Though Nelians found their way to Earth somewhat regularly, the invitation the other way was extended to only the smallest number of Earthlings—diplomats, scientists, and very rarely, a celebrity figure. And the Veras students, of course.
The thing was, as beautiful as Nelia was, it was… Simple. Empty. A world where nature ruled and the few Nelians were simply the caretakers of their miniscule corner of a planet comprised entirely of lush, verdant plant life and small but plentiful bodies of water.
After a day or two of gazing at the stars, most humans would grow bored.
It was third period now, and the grounds were mostly empty, except for a class of elementary school Natches playing soccer for gym. Every few minutes, one kid or another would burst out with some power—vanishing, then reappearing to kick the ball or guiding the ball with some unseen force—and only the ones who got caught by the gym t
eacher got the whistle and a point taken off their team’s score.
The kids seemed to have a strategy for that. Get one kid caught while two more were manipulating the ball behind the gruff couch’s back. That was actually part of the game, though—training for how to use their powers in everyday situations without causing a scene.
“I thought you had class,” a familiar voice said from behind me. I’d been gazing out the floor-to-ceiling window in this hallway for longer than I’d realized.
“I’m taking off,” I said. “Princess business and all that.”
Sage ambled up beside me to take a look at what had caught my attention, but his gaze was drawn almost immediately behind him, so I followed his line of sight. Lacey walked out of an empty classroom, flipping off the lights and buttoning up the top of her ruffled blouse. Our eyes met and she waved in a short, jerky movement, looking immediately away. For a second, her fingers grew longer, inhumanly long, her head starting to loll forward and droop. But she straightened her back and got control over her power and its default state, snapping back into the pretty young teacher she was as she exited the building to watch her class finish its game.
“A quickie while her class is under another teacher’s watch?” I asked dryly.
As if I’d pointed out the fact that his T-shirt was inside out—it wasn’t—Sage did a quick onceover of his appearance for the telltale sign that had given it away. I nudged his arm with my elbow. “She’s beautiful. Kind. A bit old for you—”
“Jayden and Zander are seven years older than Mom,” he said, not bothering to give any of our fathers a title. It had grown cumbersome for him when we’d reached our teenage years. “And don’t get me started on Alarik—”
“Point taken,” I mumbled. “I just… I don’t know… I didn’t expect you to settle down so quickly.”
“So quickly?” He scratched his jaw, where a thin layer of stubble was protruding. “I tapped that almost as soon as I turned eighteen.”
“Ew, thanks for the image and the reminder, and that’s not what I meant.” Shuddering, I clutched both my elbows. “I just mean… You never even dated anyone before her.”
“Sure, I did,” he said, angling away somewhat. “I went to two dances with Pepper and one with Hazel—”
“Oh, god, don’t remind me.” It seemed as if Hazel somehow blamed me for my brother not being interested after that. Well, when she chose to bully her crush’s twin sister, I couldn’t say I knew what she’d expected to come from that. “I just mean… How do you know? How do you know she’s the one? You’re young yet.”
“I know.” Sage’s jaw clenched.
“That sounds… formal,” I said, struggling for the right word.
Sage turned to me. “Don’t tell anyone, but—”
“Papa Zander’s on campus,” I said, clearing my throat. Not that he needed to be that close to reach out to us.
Sage cocked his head, then shook it off. “Well, if he knows, he hasn’t said anything. I think anytime I’m with Lacey, he stays far, far away, no matter what kind of emotions he senses.”
“Right,” I said, not wanting that picture again.
Sage grabbed my hands in both of his. “Bry, I asked her to marry me.”
“What? When?”
“Just last weekend.”
“It’s been five days since last weekend,” I said, frowning. “Why wouldn’t you tell me?”
He chuckled. “Aren’t you going to ask what she said?”
I took my hands out of his and pointed to the classroom behind us. “Judging by that, I’d say she said yes.”
The tips of his ears turned red. “Well, yes, she said yes.”
“So why is this a big secret?”
“She wants to tell her brother first—we agreed that siblings would be the first to know.” He smiled slyly. “I would have told you earlier, but I’ve been busy celebrating, and then there was this whole mess with the princes visiting and—”
“Congratulations!” I said, shutting him up before he dwelled on all that for too much longer. I swept my little brother into my arms, some kind of strange sensation floating through me that it had been a long time since he’d been my “little” brother, even if I had protected him in the womb. In any case, the realization of what he’d just told me shot through me then like a bolt of lightning.
This “After” event was happening now, in the “Before Graduation” side of the line. My life was changing before I even expected it to. Though the tears that prickled the corners of my eyes were joyous ones, the silly grin on Sage’s face making my heart melt with happiness for him, I gave him one extra big hug, squeezing hard enough to make him pop, as one last, desperate sense of trying to hold on to things.
“Bry, glad you’re happy for me,” he choked out, “but I do need to breathe to make it down the aisle.”
“Right,” I said, letting go. “Sorry.” I wiped a tear away. “I’ll try my best to keep it from Mom and Dads, but Papa Zander has an annoying habit of popping up in my head when I least expect it.”
“Yeah.” Sage swallowed. “I think he’s been more worried about you, how you’re going to handle this whole prince thing, these days, so he hasn’t been around, but… If he’s prying in your head, he might stumble on it.” He shrugged one shoulder. “Lacey will understand if it couldn’t be helped.” He looked at me, his expression growing serious. “How are you handling this whole prince thing?”
Prince thing. As if it were just another item on my to-do list. Well, he wasn’t wrong.
I smoothed down imaginary wrinkles on the front of my jeans. “It’s… Well, I haven’t spoken to a single one of them. I saw them in a class, then bolted for my dorm room right after and…” I threw my hands up in frustration. “But I’ve got it handled.”
“You do?” Sage pursed his lips. “Do you need any help with this plan of yours?”
“Help like what?”
“Making sure some pompous royals with their heads up their asses don’t take advantage of my baby sister.”
“I was born first,” I pointed out. “Several minutes beforehand.”
Sage shrugged. “When I think of assholes taking advantage of a situation to hurt you in any way, you’re my baby sister.”
“I think I can handle myself.” I nudged him again. “Who’s protected whom since before birth?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Sage stared out the window, his gaze zeroing in on Lacey patting the head of a child who’d run over from the game to tell her something excitedly. I didn’t ask if they planned on having kids—if Lacey could even have them with her powers. Then again, maybe she could if she spent the whole nine months in Aunt Alanna’s ability-negating presence—but when my aunt slept, Lacey’s powers would return.
There was no way she and Sage were having kids that way. But I didn’t want to talk about it. That was his business—and just one more reminder that the world was ready to move on, dragging me with it kicking and screaming.
“Just be careful around them, okay?” said Sage. “I got a look at them last night in the dining hall and they seemed pretty full of themselves.”
“I’m with you there. I’ve never met a more arrogant collection of condescending assholes—”
“Princess,” said a man in a baritone, if somewhat amused, voice from behind me. “You’re a difficult one to pin down.”
Pivoting on my heel, I came face to face with Prince Trey, Princes Rio and Zeke a few steps behind him. Trey’s finely shaped lips were clamped tightly together, his blue irises sparkling with a glimmer of mischief.
Chapter Seven
“Your Highnesses,” I said, suddenly wobbly on my feet, “I didn’t see you there.” So much for my fleeting, if not entirely dismissed, idea of seducing the princes to see if I felt any Nelian pheromones drawing me to them.
But all in all, the end result would be the same. I doubted I’d fall in love with any of them to begin with. I just wanted to show my parents that I’d tried.
“
That much is obvious,” said Prince Zeke with a grunt. He smirked, though.
“Yes, well…” I smoothed more non-existent wrinkles on the thighs of my jeans. Zeke’s eyes in particular caught hold of the movement, his gaze lingering on my legs. I felt a flush hit me at my core. “I’ve been busy.”
“Skipping class and generally avoiding us?” ventured Rio. Of the three of them, he’d seemed the most aloof, the most disinterested. But his eyes sparkled now with some ounce of amusement.
Before I could respond, Trey spoke up. “Yes, well, if you had made a point of reaching out to us earlier, we could have saved you any undue anxiety.” He exchanged looks with Rio and Zeke, who both nodded. “We don’t relish the idea of an arranged marriage any more than you seem to.”
I wanted to retort—an inexplicable need to spit out that he didn’t know anything about me, let alone that—but he was right. There was no point in arguing about it.
“Oh,” I said simply, then decided to stop letting them lead me around by the nose. “Have you met my brother?”
“We’ve hardly met you,” said Zeke.
I ignored the comment and made the introduction. “Prince Sage Haddix, Princes Trey of the U.K., Rio of Japan, and Zeke of New Zealand.”
“Nice to meet you,” Sage said, offering each his right hand. I was sure he was breaking a dozen royal etiquette protocols, but prince and princess though we may be, we hadn’t exactly grown up learning all the Earth royal customs.
