CHAPTER THREE
"Invisible Rocks"
It was raining, not that that mattered in the salle; the few errant fireballs that escaped out the door disappeared easily into hissing steam. The frightened servants had long since fled the area, and even the guard that had turned out to watch them was now absent. The gloom of daylight that had been hanging above them began to ebb and the thunder rolled.
A “fireball” wasn’t so obvious a term as one might think, Artemis considered as yet another barely missed his head on its way into the night beyond. The acrid scent of singed hair caused his nose to twitch and eyes to narrow; there was no point to being upset when the girl hadn’t done it on purpose. The “ball” wasn’t really so much a round form as it was the bulbous, tumultuous shape plasma took as it burned, the head of its plume considerably bigger than the tail that slacked off behind it. The last was a small haze of smoke, white and thick. It left quickly, battered by the winds that came with the winter storm, yet the smell of it was still strong. Nor did it help, he thought, that Jupiter was setting as much aflame as her opponent was.
That was a tactical problem. In a fight, allowing your power to supplement your opponent’s was essentially shooting ones’ self in the foot. Mars grew stronger with each fire a misaimed spark of lightning struck upon the wooden floor, as anyone could have seen by how enthusiastically those fireballs kept coming. Certainly both had desperately poor aim, but Mars still had the greatest reserve of energy.
Then again, Jupiter had the sheer luck of a storm rolling overhead to help her. He was just grateful that she hadn’t thought to call the lightning through the ceiling. Yet.
To either side around the salle, Mercury and Venus were doing their parts to fight the fires the other two Senshi inadvertently set. Mercury was the more adept of the two at this particular exercise. A few months ago Artemis might not have acknowledged that this skill was more than the purest of luck—but he’d never trained an Ice Senshi before. Water was a slightly different element than its fraternal twin. Ami needed the cold and chill even as Rayna needed heat, and for similar reasons. While the Salle hadn’t quite reached boiling temperatures—an event they’d staved off by opening the twin doors at the head of the room—neither was it a walk in the park. For a being so used to ice caverns and snow sculpture, Amiru was holding up quite well. Every so often she would dash from the building and into the rain to relieve herself of the heat, a habit that was soon mimicked by Venus, and to re-gather moisture for her power to use. Not even she could form water out of nothing and the steam inside the building evaporated quickly enough that there was nothing for her to use.
It didn’t seem as if either girl was willing to stop. As he watched, Jupiter dodged a blow from Mars’ gloved fist (the girl seemed slight but he’d become acquainted well enough with those thin, razor-like knuckles to wince as if it had connected) and came up with a shoulder to her middle. The wind was knocked out of her but Mars wasn’t down yet.
She dropped and rolled, coming up a few feet away with an arm tucked around herself. One of the heels had broken off her left shoe and had long since been incinerated. She took the time now to kick the shoes off. At once Artemis was proud of her for using them as weapons, kicking them with deadly accuracy at her opponent.
On the other hand, he noted even as he heard Mercury squeak indignantly when one of those shoes connected with the wall right before her face, it was also a bad idea to throw your last weapon away… and to leave the soles of your feet exposed.
Jupiter knew better than to use a killing move on the other princess, but the grin on her wicked face and the antennae sprouting from her tiara told him that she had seen it too. “Mars, you’re dead.” he announced, stepping out from the sidelines even as he held his hands aloft to separate the girls. The raven haired princess glared at him and the winner chortled.
“Shouldn’t’ve taken your shoes off. Leaves over-exposed areas on your body.” Jupiter offered with a hand out. Of all the girls, she was the one who had taken to Artemis’ ideals of “sportsmanship” the easiest. They weren’t used to congratulating one another on a spar, no matter who had won, and this was shown yet again in Mars’ hesitation to the shake. In the end she gave Jupiter her hand, if only for a very brief second.
“If that’s a deciding factor then couldn’t you have electrocuted me to begin with?”
“The soles of your shoes would help to prevent that. The material they’re made of guards against such things, and that protection is extended by the protective spells built into them,” Artemis replied. “With another opponent it might not have mattered, but against Jupiter it does. You should be careful about what you choose to throw away, even if it seems broken.”
“Hn,” the princess replied. She gave a nod of respect to Jupiter, however, and moved to find said shoes. They were all covered in glistening sweat, even Mars, and not simply from exertion. Now that the fires had stopped cropping up Mercury and Venus had both collapsed against the walls, panting, and the cold was creeping in from the doorway. He went to the doors, pulled them shut and latched them, soaking himself through as he did. Artemis didn’t mind terribly much, not with the amount of singed clothing, skin and hair he was sporting. He turned to face the tired Senshi.
Mars had sat down next to her cousin, black and blonde heads leaning against one another with their eyes closed. Both were red in the face and Artemis was struck by just how much family resemblance there truly was between them. It wasn’t obvious at first glance (indeed, he had wondered in the beginning), but the bone structure underneath the radically different colouring was the exact same. They had one another’s noses and chins and cheek bones and ears… they would seem as twins if either of them would submit to hair dye.
On the other side of the room, radically different Jupiter and Mercury were in much the same position. Mercury had drawn her legs up to herself and was nursing a burn on her ankle. Jupiter looked at it as well and Artemis was glad to note that she wasn’t throwing glares or insults at Mars on the assumption that it was the other girl’s fault. These were baby steps but at least they were walking.
Fall was slipping quickly into winter and the chill from outside promised snow—combined with the rain that meant a murky, freezing, and ice-filled morning on the morrow. Mercury would be quite happy come the daylight, though the rest of them (especially Mars) would be suffering. They’d had enough for today. “Baths, the lot of you... no,” Artemis raised a hand to stall Jupiter from helping Mercury to her feet. “Except you, Mercury. Jupiter, could you see her to the healers?”
Jupiter nodded and resumed pulling the petite ice-princess to her feet. Mercury came up without the barest hiss of pain, a sign of how strong she was becoming. Unfortunately it just wasn’t enough. The pair limped out with their arms about one another and the doors slammed shut behind them.
Mars and Venus were slower to rise and Artemis heard a trickle of dialogue in their corner behind him. He wasn’t close enough to understand the words and his ears in this form were not quite as sharp as those of the cat. Artemis wasn’t bothered by this, let them have their privacy—the past month had been a strained one between them. “Mars. Venus.” he stated and turned slowly to allow them a moment as their conversation died. Both girls’ eyes looked up at him as he spoke, lips becoming still, “Don’t worry about the salle tonight. Continue on to the baths.” That was all that needed to be said and Artemis turned on his heel to venture into the rain. He wanted a bath, himself, and a bed; and were he lucky that bed would contain a warm and willing wife.
They were each sore from the top of their scalps to the soles of their feet, and covered in the bruises each of them had begun to expect of daily life. Years ago, Mars had thought she’d known what pain was; training for any sort of physical activity was never easy, especially at the beginning. Those days were far distant and she was now realizing how little her training had actually covered. She’d come to the conclusion days before that her teachers had gone soft on her.
Unlike the other girls, Raye had not been trained by her predecessor. Ranfan had gotten some benefit of the last Sailor Mars’ experience, but a tragic accident had killed the woman two years before Raye had been chosen. Ranfan had taken up the full burden of the power at that time, but even then had not been considered to have the full title—it simply wasn’t how things were done.
As she reflected upon this, Mars descended the last step into the Princess’ basement bathing chamber. The steam gathered inside from the large, open pool of hot water that filled the back of the room felt wonderful upon her skin. Without any preamble she allowed the power to fade from her body, the Senshi uniform turning to red light and dissipating into thin air. Behind it was left the ratty, work-torn clothing she’d been wearing before. These Raye stripped hastily and left in a barely folded pile beside her dresser. Behind her Mina was doing much the same, and neither girl seemed to be in the mood for speech.
A simple glance told Raye that her cousin had as many bruises as she did. They both resembled the splotched dogs several of the moon courtiers had begun to favour as pets and hunting animals, she noted with some amount of bruised vanity before turning to descend the ivory-carved steps into the bathing pool. There were two in this room, built into the back of it, and completely communal, as all bathing chambers on the Moon were. Much like Mars, the people of the Moon didn’t mind nudity, so long as it was homosexual. Venus, by comparison, was a place of heathens where anyone and everyone roamed naked as they pleased, despite mixed genders.
Both of the pools were reached by short stairways, one leading up into the higher pool, and the other leading down into the lower pool which Raye and Mina were entering now. The waters here were cooler—though not as cool as they would be during the summer. To Raye’s taste the water here was nearly chilled, but she could tell that Mina didn’t think so by the expression of relief upon the blonde’s face. Raye attempted to ignore this and reached for the soap and a washcloth. This pool served as a place to clean oneself. It was situated lower than the rest of the floor with two small vents in the wall which sucked the water into a pipe system. Raye wasn’t familiar with the mechanics of this, but she had been told that this system of pipes somehow purified the water and reheated it and sent it right back up to the pool above it. It was ingenious.
By contrast, the pool above them was far more to Raye’s taste, even in the dead of summer. It was meant to be used as a soaking pool for the relaxing of muscles and joints and to sweat out the impurities from one’s body. It held clean water and it was considered very impolite to the others to get soap or dirt in that pool. So Raye made quick work of scrubbing herself crimson with the flowery soap provided here and rubbed a thick, liquid version of the same into her hair to clean it. The waterfall pouring out of the higher pool was perfect to wash one’s hair clean and as soon as the last trace of bubble was free of her raven, unmanageable mass, Raye hauled herself back up the steps to the main floor. From there she traversed a second flight, made less dangerous by carpet weaves safely adhered to the steps, and immersed herself in the blessedly scalding waters. When she came up for air Mina had joined her.
“You know,” Her cousin waved a single index finger at her, eyes closed and cheeks stained pink, “There are days I think you crazy for enjoying this.”
“Should I assume that this is not one of them?” Raye replied with a smirk. She let her back find one of the smoothly sculpted rests on the side of the pool and leaned her head back against the border. Heat bubbled slowly from the bottom of the pool—Raye didn’t bother attempting to understand this technology and merely thanked the Gods that someone had invented it—splashing water against her cheeks and arms. These days she was thankful for their time in the salle, no matter how sore her body became. So long as she was moving and sweating she was warm; the temperature continued to drop by handfuls every day.
“You would assume correctly, cousin dearest,” Mina replied with a haughtiness belied by the giggle that followed it. Her long, pale legs picked themselves out of the water and deposited the feet attached to them in Raye’s lap. Raye peeked one violet eye open to see the blonde across from her lean back as well, arms draped luxuriously at the edge of the pool and head reclined onto the porcelain. The Venusian’s eyes were closed but a grin across her face told Raye that she thought this funny. For a moment the Martian considered a retort and then thought better of it. Instead she let it pass. Eventually Mina began to speak again. “I don’t think I’ve worked this hard since Aunt Saville passed on two years ago.”
“At least you had a Senshi to teach you,” Raye replied. Miran uttered a noise which seemed to encourage more and Raye shrugged. “I don’t think I’ve ever been pushed this hard, physically.”
“But you’re good at it,” a low voice broke, grudgingly, from the door. Raye tilted her head so that she might see around Miran’s languid form. Jupiter strolled into the room, the much shorter form of Mercury leaning against her side. As Raye watched, their power enveloped the each of them, one as green as a forest after the rain and the other a chilling blue which caused her to sink further down into the heated waters.
“Hardly,” Raye replied and closed her eyes again. “You beat me in all our spars.”
“Yeah,” Literi replied from somewhere in the darkness of Raye’s eyelids. “I have a lot of practice at it. You just said you didn’t, but you’ve been holding your own with me for good periods of time. That’s promising.”
The waters around her shifted with something more than the mere movement of bubbles and Mina’s sulky Veserite mutterings reached her ears a moment later. “The barbarian is paying you a barbaric compliment—charming.” Raye kicked her. There was a squeak in response, followed by an indignant “Hmph” and Mina fell silent.
“So Artemis says,” Raye replied in as even a voice as she could. The water splashed in the pool beneath them as the other two girls slipped into it. Amiru was remaining decidedly quiet this evening, but Raye hadn’t missed the bandaged wrapped around the other girl’s ankle. Nor did she miss the slight hiss as Amiru entered the water. It was common belief that their Senshi power healed them of everything but the girls knew quite well that this wasn’t entirely true. Yes, the power gave you the ability to shrug off nearly fatal blows and would help you to stabilize such an injury, should you live to tell about the battle that gave it to you… but minor scraps, cuts and burns? For some reason the power did little about those; Raye suspected it had to do with balancing things out. There was no reason for the power to save them from such things, and they served as a pleasant reminder that they were not immortal, only long-lived.
“Artemis says a lot,” Literi laughed, a sound not unlike the rustle of leaves across a forest floor. Raye found herself wondering what Jupiter was like, to produce a girl such as this Princess. “Have you worked on the history assignment he gave us?”
Mina shifted her feet upon Raye’s lap. The Martian could feel the irritation radiating off of her cousin’s body and tried to ignore it. They had been having this same fight for the past month and it was beginning to draw upon her nerves—making idle conversation with the other Princesses was not an infringement upon their friendship! That was a lie, of course, but it was the sort of lie that everyone in the court had to pretend was the truth. “I have.”
“It’s interesting, isn’t it? I’d heard of what happened to Mau, of course, but I had no idea just how bad it really was. And to think that Artemis and Luna actually lived through that… It kind of gives you a new respect for them.”
Mina sat up and climbed from the tub. Opening her eyes, Raye watched her cousin descend the stairs to the main level of the bathing chamber and wrap a golden towel about herself. Without comment or even a glance at the others the Venusian moved to her mirror and began to work the knots out of her hair. Raye couldn’t tell if the cause of this was temper or the heat. Certainly Mina’s skin was flushed red and her lips were pale from the heat, but Raye had also witnessed the Venusian take hotter baths than this when she had visited Mars in their childhood. At least she had not left in a huff.
“I cannot help but feel that there is more to the story than that,” a quiet whisper of a voice broke into the conversation. Surprise washed over the Martian when she realized that Amiru had actually spoken; that did not happen often, much less so when it was a conversation that Rayna was a part of. “The books which I have found upon the subject simply state that an enemy from outside the system stole in and poisoned the mind of Mau’s queen; they do not say where the enemy came from, nor how it worked its ways upon her.”
“Everyone from Mau is dead, save Artemis and Luna,” Raye replied, though this line of thought intrigued her. “Surely if they knew they would have said.”
“Either way, it’s over.” Literi shrugged. “Queen Serenity blasted away the darkness with the Ginzuisho.”
“And with it, the entire planet of Mau,” Mina put in with a sobriety far unlike herself. She turned away from the mirror to cast one baleful blue eye upon the other three. Raye frowned; this sort of seriousness was not the kind she’d grown up to expect from Mina—and she had a point.
“Are you saying that Queen Serenity was wrong?” Literi asked, clearly too shocked to remember that she and Mina weren’t on speaking terms.
“Of course not!” Mina gave a snort and returned her gaze to the mirror before her. The comb in her hands sang through her golden locks, already having freed them of the majority of their tangles. “Just… that… the whole situation was a bad one, including its end. We study it for a reason, not just because it happened to our teachers.”
“I didn’t say that—“the Jupiterian began to protest, offended, but before she could a silver dart came streaming in through the door.
“You’re early!” Bunny exclaimed. Her hands clasped together, the sound echoing about the cavernous room, and Raye thought that the mark upon her brow sparkled a little. There was something about the fawn-like, ill-proportioned moon Princess that one couldn’t help but like. Perhaps that was why Raye found it so difficult to be near her—too much of her liking for this Princess felt like a compulsion of a sort, a magic spell. She knew that, rationally, it was nothing more than a certain amount of natural charisma which brought this on, but this rationale did little to appease the unsettling discomfort Bunny brought to her heart. “I would have come in sooner if I’d known that!”
Raye felt one eyebrow lift at that comment and she sat up a little straighter in the pool. “We’re just bathing, Bunny. What does it matter?”
“Leave her alone,” Literi retorted as she dunked her still-braided head under the waterfall, “She wants to be with us. Is that so hard to figure out?”
“Yeah!” Bunny nodded and began to strip her dress out without much care for the fact that it was delicate and expensive. In that Raye was reminded of Mina far too well, and she twitched when Bunny left the dress like a rag to soak up a water trail Mina had left behind earlier.
“You know, you could take better care of that,” Raye snapped, unable to help herself. She would have picked it up but that would require her to leave the comfort of the heated water and face the chilled air about them. That simply wasn’t going to happen.
Bunny had been descending the stairs into the lower pool. Raye’s voice caught her off guard, or else she slipped, or her own hair tripped her (such things were hard to be sure of when Bunny was concerned) but the girl slipped and fell head first into the pool beneath them.
“RAYE!” Literi howled even as Amiru gave a startled shriek and they both dived to catch the floundering moon Princess. It took only a few seconds for the writhing mass of silver hair, flailing limbs and curses in various languages to fill the chamber with noise. Raye brought a hand to her face, both temples suddenly throbbing.
~~**~~
The Jump Point glowed briefly behind them, marking the pocket of “subspace” they had just left. It fluctuated a moment and then vanished. Micherite paid it little mind, save for the blue hue it briefly left upon everything before it. Her eyes were for the blue planet not too far from where they were now. It hung in the void of space an aqua-marine titan, no mere trifle to be bothered with. She imagined she could see the waves foaming above its ocean, the spirals of her castle puncturing the azure sky above its desolate crag. After a long voyage she was ready to be home and it seemed that her crew was of the same mind. All about her the sailors flew, tending to their ropes and sails and this and that. Micherite knew nothing of ships. Though she had made several attempts to learn nothing had ever stuck and finally she had given up on it. Such a thing wasn’t like her, who would pound and lash against a subject until she had conquered it, much like the Ocean of her world.
The sea Princess sighed, gloved hands resting upon the carved railing of Neptune’s Pride. Her father’s ship, for she had none of her own, glowed briefly beneath her hands. As always, Micherite lifted one to inspect it even though she knew nothing would be there. The power that guided this ship resonated with her own, for it originated from the same place. Deep in the heart of the ship laid its core, a conch shell as big as an infant that had been plucked from the bed of the sacred gardens, as had all of the ships’ shelled cores in the Neptunian fleet. Their power was the power of the planet itself, manifest in a subtle aqua-marine glow that hung over the ship like a mantle, protecting them from the devastation of space beyond. Most persons were unable to see that glow, save when ships were entering a planet’s atmosphere, but Micherite was not most persons. She was Senshi and given with that was the blessing, and curse, of seeing such things. Micherite was only grateful that it was possible (and mandatory) to learn to “switch off” that sort of vision; otherwise she’d have gone blind a long time before.
Still, certain things crept through, like the faint glow from her hands.
“There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with it to me,” a laughing voice observed to her left. Micherite jumped in place, biting down upon the squeak that threatened in her throat. Wide eyes turned to the woman standing beside her. For a long moment the Neptunian Princess could do little more than stare at this unknown figure. Certainly whoever she was, she wasn’t a crew member! The clothes the woman wore were too fine for that and of a cut Micherite was only vaguely familiar with. She couldn’t imagine that a stowaway would be so bold (and stupid) to reveal themselves to her, of all people, and so her mind was left at a blank.
The amusement upon the blonde woman’s face only grew bolder as the silence stretched between them. The grin on her face was dazzling and Micherite felt a blush beginning to grow there, no matter how it confused her that it would be. And then it struck her like a bolt of lightning in the form of those teeth—those inexplicably white teeth and sandy skin and hair…! “Hoku,” she stated, her voice flat to even her own ears.
“Ra,” The woman replied, holding one finger aloft.
“… Ra?” Micherite frowned. She was fluent in Uranian (one did not fight an enemy so long as they had without learning their language for tactical purposes) and “ra” meant nothing so far as she knew. It simply didn’t fit in with their language’s structure… perhaps it was slang?
Hoku shook her head, a laugh welling up in his-her throat that was surprisingly gentle. Bold blue eyes peeked from beneath his-her sandy curls and that smile flashed again. Micherite’s voice caught in her throat. “Hokura. I do believe I’m a woman… at least for the moment.”
“Ah,” Micherite replied smartly. She shook herself, bodily, and fixed a more pleasant smile upon her face which she knew would not reach her eyes, “I didn’t realize you changed your name when… like this.”
“Like this,” Hokura echoed, rather than answer the unasked and obvious question. If anything the Uranian Princess seemed more amused than ever. The strange, unthinkable attraction Micherite had been feeling suffered a very quick death at that, and she found herself straightening her back and shoulders as she might have before a political enemy. Which, were one to be truthful about the matter, many still believed the Uranians to be. One of Hokura’s sandy eyebrows, hard to see upon her tanned face, raised in brief question at that and she looked no less amused. “It amazes me to see how many people view this as a disease.”
“You don’t?”
“Should I?” Hokura countered with a surprisingly hearty chuckle. Formality had obviously been chunked out the porthole, at least on her part. Micherite wasn’t certain how to respond to that; the only persons she’d had around with whom it was appropriate to be informal were her sister, Nephrina, who was often too busy these days, and her Moon Senshi, who were often tending to matters in their own homes. The only ones she saw often at all were Proteus and Larissa, her selected guardians. They had not been allowed to accompany her to the Moon Kingdom, and therefore they were not here now. The idea of being so casual with one who had been her dire enemy much of her life was not a comfortable one… but neither could it have been for him?
And, Micherite had to remind herself, Hoku… ra… has been working as hard as I have towards peace. I could do worse than be friendly with him.
All of this flitted before her thoughts in the matter of an instant, and Micherite shook her head before there was an awkward pause. “I… suppose not.”
“Ah, the hesitation!” Hokura laughed again, finger waggling in the air. Micherite frowned, beginning to become a little hurt though she hadn’t the words to explain why. Yet. Hokura must have caught that in her expression, for she sobered a little and offered, more gently, “Most people hesitate, don’t worry about it. Apparently this makes most people uncomfortable.”
“I should think any man would be made uncomfortable by… this.” Micherite replied slowly. She’d heard it discussed amongst her own Moon Senshi. Though none of them were male they were all well accustomed to the idea that Senshi Uranus and Senshi Earth were; it had been a hot topic of debate before she’d gone to the Moon Kingdom—more about Uranus than Earth, she had to admit.
“Baaah,” Hokura sighed softly. She turned to lean her back upon the railing, elbows propping up her slender feminine body. Micherite had the chance then to really see the differences the Power had wrought upon Hoku’s form: wide shoulders and chest had dwindled into a thin waist and shoulders, and wider hips. There was now a gentle “s” shape upon her body that screamed of femininity as broadly as did her well-endowed chest. Her neck was slender, cheeks more curved, lips soft and kissable.
Micherite tore her eyes from Hokura’s face, focusing them back towards Neptune. The thudding of her heart did not stop, however, and a sickening lurch began in her stomach, the likes of which she was sadly familiar with. This was not the first time she had been attracted to a woman and each time left her feeling worse than the last. Such things were… heard of, yes, and very fine for a commoner—but Micherite was not a commoner. She was a blood Princesse and as such certain things were expected of her. This tendency was not one she could afford to fall prey to.
“I’m masculine,” Hokura continued on with a shrug, oblivious to Micherite’s dilemma. “Each time people consider this business of switching they forget… who you are is not defined by your body, it’s defined by your heart.” Hokura’s hand lifted to touch her breast, that same open, honest grin turning back to Micherite and she chuckled so faintly Micherite doubted anyone else would have heard it. “It doesn’t matter to me whether I’m outwardly male or female; my having certain body parts won’t change who I am inside and I’m comfortable and happy with just being… me.
“Other men are so concerned with losing their masculinity if they should lose their balls,” Hokura shook her head, hand lifting from her breast to brush those soft-looking, golden curls from her eyes. The language, coarse as it was, didn’t bother Micherite—she’d grown up with sailors. If Hokura was surprised that she didn’t blush as most ladies of “refinement” would have, she didn’t show it. “But masculinity is as much a personality trait as it is anything physical.”
“One could argue that masculinity and femininity are traits learned through childhood, not ingrained from birth,” Micherite replied. Despite her argument she agreed with Hokura’s words but she wanted to know what he would say to that.
“Pssh,” Hokura laughed, flapping a hand at that and turned again to lean one side upon the railing, facing her. “They can say that all they want, and then explain to me why my cousin Ahkmed likes dresses so much. His parents certainly didn’t give them to him as a child!”
Micherite laughed, despite herself. Her hand began to rise to cover her mouth, as was polite, and suddenly it was stopped. Hokura’s hands were dainty in this form yet they still retained calluses from sword play that Micherite could feel even through her gloves. This observation was a distant one as she looked up into the sparkling blue eyes that were so close to hers. Hokura was grinning again, amusement and… something else… lighting her face. Mischief? Micherite couldn’t tell and the next moment knocked it out of her mind.
“You should do that more often,” Hokura told her with much more seriousness than her expression would have suggested. The hand that was upon hers let it go and daringly reached forward to brush one gentle knuckle along her cheek. Micherite’s heart felt as if it would explode, her breath stopped and her tongue peeked between her lips to wet them.
The ever-polite first mate coughed from not too far behind them. “Prince Hoku, we have a transmission from the Sand King.” Immediately Hokura turned from Micherite, hand dropping away, and she headed for the captain’s quarters without another thought. Micherite found herself left behind, forgotten by all but the crew, who threw her curious, rebellious, and—rarely—amused glances. She ignored them all and turned sharply to the railing again. This time her hands clenched upon the wood, the light radiating from them plain for anyone to see.
~~**~~
“I keep telling you that this is pointless.” An exasperated Zoisite sighed into his muffler. In the heat and sand these contraptions they wore were rather useful; Zoisite had to admit that he had been glad of them even several hours ago—but several hours ago they had not been mired in rain fit to drown a man. The wraps that they wore were soaked in the fat of seals to make them waterproof for just such an occurrence, but that did not stop the water from finding every slight crevice and seam the fold of the cloth offered. His clothing under the wrap had been soaked through hours ago. As if that weren’t enough, breakfast had been most of the day ago and the beasts they’d had to travel on to this point were whatever a royal guard station could spare. The Guards were stocked with some of the best of working beasts, true, but they didn’t begin to compare with the thoroughbreds he and each of the others had grown accustomed to. Had he bothered to say as much Jadeite would have gladly reminded him that he wasn’t at all attuned to horseflesh in the first place—but the Spaniard was also riding his personal mount, not a borrowed nag. Zoisite wished they had run into a trader of good repute on their route. At this moment he would have spared much of his current coin on a horse with a good gait. Yet the only traders they had crossed paths with were only possessed of beasts far worse than the one currently abusing his delicate rearend.
Zoisite knew that the others were just as poorly off as he was (except Jadeite, he would stand by that!) which stopped the majority of his bellyaching. Or it had until this moment.
“And you still refuse to listen when I say that it’s not,” Nephrite retorted waspishly. Zoisite hadn’t realized the Italian was close enough to hear him over the rain but neither did he much care. Once more he raised his hand to wipe soggy blonde bangs from his eyes and had to tighten his hold upon the reigns. This particular beast was much inclined to stop and browse the roadside no matter what the weather and no matter that the near-dead grass which populated this area in the winter would likely give her gas, cramps and all manner of stomach sickness. The stupid beasts hadn’t a clue what was good for them.
They had been on the road for nearly a month now, ever since Nephrite had (supposedly) seen those strange meteors flinging themselves upon the earth in one great suicidal movement. Or perhaps it would be “homicidal,” in that they would surely have taken a handful of creatures with them to a rather fiery, explosive grave. He’d have to ask Nephrite, once they were in a place where it wouldn’t be risking death to do so. Unlike those meteors Zoisite had a great appreciation for his skin that could rightfully be termed narcissism; he had no shame in admitting this, and frequently did so to his mirror upon waking and once more before he went to bed at night. That was, he did when he had a mirror to wake up to, and on the road he had not. This was another large factor contributing to the blonde’s current state of dismal mood and complaintive tongue.
Zoisite’s eyes closed, a dangerous thing to do when his nag couldn’t see in the dismal light offered by a storm and the road wasn’t precisely paved this far out of town. This road, if it could be termed as such in this moment, was a quagmire of mud, straw, feces and the-Gods-only-knew-what-else. Yet it was the largest road to be offered in these parts, big enough to draw two oxen abreast, and entirely dirt in good weather. Now it was churned up, splattered everywhere (mostly upon their pants legs, the legs of the horses, and the horses’ underbellies), and an absolute nightmare to try and get through. They’d given that up hours ago and had taken to the edges of the road. While still sticky, the vegetation that continued to cling to a desperate and depressing life there made the ground firm enough that they might try and continue on into the city.
Why had they not stopped at that farm outside town? For the life of him Zoisite couldn’t fathom Endymion’s reasoning. The farmer had been hospitable enough to offer them use of his well to water themselves and the horses, and the farmer’s wife had been all too happy to invite them to dinner. To be visited by a Prince was an auspicious occasion for any noble—for a commoner it was nigh unheard of! To make that five Princes, one being the High Crown Prince of the entire planet, well… they certainly could have done worse than allow them the use of their barn for the night. Endymion should have asked for it when they’d noticed the clouds building on the horizon.
There was also the fact that the Farmer had had three rather pleasantly faced daughters…
It was useless to think of such things when he was so bone-weary and terribly far away from them so Zoisite pulled his thoughts onto a more productive path: being as annoying as humanly possible. If he were going to be miserable his friends would surely know and share it.
Ahead of him the pompous, round bay ass of Principe de Viana bounced as they ambled along the path. In this weather it wasn’t wise to travel at the pace that one would normally assume for long journeys—which only meant that it would take them that much longer to reach their next destination. Out of Aragon they had ridden, much to the mixed amusement and annoyance of Jadeite’s parents, and journeyed through the on-setting winter into the lands of the East, Zoisite’s home, in search of the site where Nephrite claimed the meteors had fallen. As lovely as it was to be in familiar territory, Zoisite would have much preferred it to be in a much more pleasant season.
“Well, it would be far more likely that this mission is worth the time were we to actually find these mysterious meteors of yours, oh night-watcher,” Zoisite replied, raising his voice that the entire party might partake of his infinite wisdom. “As it is, we haven’t seen, nor heard, a damned thing in regards to them. Surely someone else would have noticed them… are you certain you didn’t just have your head in a barrel of spirits, brother?”
Zoisite imagined he could hear Nephrite grinding his teeth though that surely was impossible over the howling of the wind. Such was his typical reaction, however, and the long-learned memory played in the back of Zoisite’s head. It was unfortunate that the brunette was behind him in their bedraggled line for Zoisite much enjoyed watching Nephrite’s face when he was angry—it normally took quite a lot to rile him and Nephrite made the best faces. Even had they been facing one another Zoisite wouldn’t have seen much at all with their helms in place, of course. He sighed, a pitiful noise that was certain to cause that little tick to go off in Kunzite’s left eye were the man to hear it, and allowed his shoulders to slouch. This was beginning to be a bit much; wouldn’t they reach the city soon?
As if summoned by his very thoughts, the group broke over a hill just as the storm slackened momentarily and a city spread out before them. Home, Zoisite gave a mental sigh of relief and allowed a smile to cross his lips that was safely guarded by the helm’s mask. Shortly now the road would be paved with carefully placed stones tiled together with mortar, and the sludge and rain water would be carried off neatly into the sewage system that had long been put in place by his forefathers. Versailles was the epitome of class, second only to Chihana, and it stated as much by having become a shining beacon of hope on this night of deepest gloom. Hm, he would have to write that one down, it was good.
“But soft! What light on yonder hilltop glows?” Zoisite proclaimed, one hand held aloft as they descended the hill together towards the first of the sprawling metropolitan districts. “It is the East and Versailles is the sun! Arise fair sun and kill the envious moon—“
“Will you shut up?” Jadeite snapped, turning half upon his seat to glare at his sworn-brother. “If you ruin Shakespeare for me, Zoisite, so help me…”
“—That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she! Be not her maid since she is envious! Her vestal livery is but sick and silver and none but fools do wear it; cast it off!”
“Zoisite!” a voice more thunderous than the storm above them broke through his mutilation long enough to give pause to the speech. Zoisite winced. Beside him an incensed Kunzite stormed, called from the back of their party by his underling’s performance. The silver-haired man was leading his horse by the bridal and even to Zoisite’s untrained eye the gelding looked rebellious and miserable at Kunzite’s hand; he’d never had any way with animals.
Kunzite’s eyes glinted eerily in the shadows beneath his helm and though Zoisite sat high above the man he suddenly felt himself an ant, drowning in the damning, heaven-sent waters. “Do you, by some miraculous chance, not realize what heresy you speak?”
“It’s just a little fun,” the blonde prince heard himself whine and took heart from the ‘truth’ of that statement. “And it isn’t as if there is anyone to hear us out here. I have a right to say that my home is far more beautiful than that desert-like rock.”
“Hey!” Jadeite protested from further ahead. Beneath them their horses’ hooves struck cobblestone and the five of them began to spread out along the path. The rain worked slightly in their favour now and washed away a small percentage of the mud that had become caked upon them in the journey.
“That’s not what I—“
“You need to be more careful, Zoisite,” Endymion cut in before any further arguing could be had and another upstart of rain drowned any further discussion. With the rain cloaking each of them once more in its misty shroud it was hard to tell who was where. Only Kunzite was distinguishable for he continued to lead his troublesome mount down the street. One of the others, likely Jadeite, lagged behind and dismounted as well. Within a moment the man was beside Kunzite and the two had their heads bent together in conference. Zoisite didn’t need to be anywhere near them to know that the topic of discussion was himself—a fact, not merely ego on his part. He pouted and let himself take in the glory of sleeping Versailles… as much of it as he could see through the downpour.
Like most of the older cities, Versailles had begun as a military capital and even now it reflected its history in its own layout. There were three “tiers” to the city on the hill. The most outward tier, which did not have its own walls, was the one through which they were now riding. Already they had passed the most outlying farms which supplied the city’s main source of food and now they drew closer to the tier’s end of “working” homes. Tanners, butchers, brick makers, potters, weavers, and all other manner of hard-labour went on in this ring, the likes of which Zoisite was only familiar with in briefest passing. Nephrite, he knew, would have been able to describe many of these activities in exquisite detail, much to Zoisite’s disgust. It was one thing to appreciate the craftsman, to his mind, and quite another to actually wish to be one. It didn’t matter how many times that Nephrite protested this accusation, saying that it was his wish to be an astronomer, Zoisite was as aware as the others in their party how Nephrite worshiped the common folk and their ways.
Perhaps it was simpler, Zoisite considered as they paused beneath the gates that lead into the second tier of the city, to live a common life. Simpler did not mean better.
The walls which divided the third and second tiers were thick, wide enough at their tops for five men to walk abreast, and with doubled iron-barred gates so that in times of war one might drop both to trap enemies within them. Once they had done that a rather ingenious, if devilish, hole in the top would be opened where one could pour boiling oil or shoot arrows down upon the trapped soldiers. Many men had died beneath this wall.
That hole was currently capped and tonight the thickness of the wall was welcomed, for it meant that when they stopped beneath them to deal with the guards they were able to wait in a place well out of the rain.
Four torches flickered orange and yellow, one on each corner of the gateway. In their saturated light waited three visible guards, each in the blue and silver livery of the East. Zoisite knew that there were more decking the walls above them and still more in the Guard Station on the inside of this wall, right past the road. Were any trouble to be had, these three men might be lost but they would do their duty to sound the alert and bring their fellows to call. He did not know their names.
The three Princes still on horseback dismounted and gave their legs a stretch. In any other weather a carriage might have been sent for, Zoisite thought glumly, but in any other weather a carriage wouldn’t be needed. One of the guards waved two fingers into the darkness beyond the gate and a small page stepped out of the gloom, looking more like a drowned rat than a human boy. The thin young thing took one look at the five Princes and dashed out into the rain once more.
“This weather is unseasonable, is it not?” Nephrite asked as he pulled his helm off and pushed the sodden chestnut locks from his face.
“Aye, M’Lord, a bit,” one of the guards replied with a courteous nod. They would not bow before them now, not until their identities had been proven beyond doubt, but Zoisite thought that the elder man surely recognized the lot of them. “Bit more rain than we’re used to this early in the season. Weather witches say there’ll be a freeze before long.”
Zoisite took his helm from his head and pulled the long tail of golden curls out from underneath his tunic. It felt good to have his hair off of his back. The chill, damp winter wind howled through the tunnel to smack them in the face. “No snow?” he asked of the guards and tossed the helm and cloak over the back of his mount.
“Not yet. Gonna be too cold for that in a week’s time,” another of the guards answered with a slight grimace. “That’s what the temple is reporting.”
Zoisite nodded at this. The Eastern Weather Witches were well known as the most reliable of any Gaian temple; if they said that would happen, then that was what would happen. “Have all the ships come in to harbor safely?”
“Last report from dockside was two hours ago, sir. There are still a few traders unaccounted for, but it’s likely they took to harbor in Crepes.”
He nodded and looked up as a figure came shuffling through the curtain of rain. The Guard Master took a moment shake some of the water from his person. He was a portly man, an odd thing for a soldier of any sort, with a shock of grey hair sprouting directly from the center of his bulbous head. The nose that ran a jagged line down his face spoke of a long time commitment to his career with how many times it had been broken, as did the multitude of scars that played havoc with his features. Zoisite fought the urge to take a step back and wondered that he’d never before noticed this monster.
“Your Highnesses,” the man greeted them with a low bow, complete with a rolling gesture of his wrist that might have been meant to serve as a courtly flourish. Zoisite dearly wished that he hadn’t removed his helm for it was becoming very hard to fight both an expression of purest amusement and another of disgust. From the corner of his eye he caught Endymion throw him a rather sharp look and he knew that he was not succeeding—he only wondered which had won.
Whatever the expression was it did not seem to matter to the Guard Master. From the inside breast pocket of his uniform jacket (which would have been perfectly cleaned and pressed had there not been a tempest roaring about their ears, Zoisite noted with some amount of satisfaction) the man extracted a simple blue and silver case. It was small and narrow, longer than it was wide or tall, and closed with a tiny silver clasp. This was opened effortlessly by fingers long trained to the trick to reveal a set of five stones.
Each stone was cut into a thin, multi-faceted wafer, smoothed and polished so well that they twinkled in the torch light. The Guard Master approached Endymion first with the case as each of the Princes shed one glove. Endymion reached forth immediately, long used to this practice, and touched the golden stone set in the middle of the five. It glowed in recognition of him and when Zoisite was approached next, he touched the marbled green stone to the golden one’s left and it did much the same. Kunzite was next, and his stone glowed pink; Nephrite’s was a deep russet-brown and Jadeite’s a pale blue. When they had all done this, the case was closed and tucked away and all the guards, Master included, gave them a deep bow due their station. Identities proven, the five hooded themselves, re-mounted and continued into the next tier.
Close to the walls of this district were the homes of the disadvantaged and the lowest of the working classes. Zoisite hesitated to label any place in Versailles as a “slum,” but were his radiant city to have such a place within its borders this would certainly be it. Here the housing was crowded and cramped, with barely more than crawlspaces between some of the worst housing. Even in this downpour, at this time of night, there were people about as business did not stop here. The bars were still crowded with reeking gutter life and every so often there would be a huddle of something human-like which peeked frightened eyes out from whatever corner of dry that it had squeezed itself into. Zoisite frowned and turned his eyes from these uncomfortable sights.
Each major street in Versailles radiated out from its central point (the Castle) like the rays of the sun. The four largest, and the only ones ending in gates, were the ones which lead in the cardinal directions: North, East, South, and West. They followed the Southern road now, up towards the crest of the hill from which the Castle Bordeaux rose magnificent. Even through the gloom Zoisite thought that he could see the spiraling towers and silver gilded gates of his beloved home. “A real bed, tonight, Zoi,” he reminded himself and felt his spirits lift a little.
The closer that they got to the castle, the larger and more grand the city became. By the time that they approached the gates to the third tier they had passed through the simple, cheerful homes of the moderately well-to-do and were currently immersed in what was, during the day, the town market. Now it was little more than a very empty square bordered by carefully tended public flower beds and a few manicured trees in miniature. At the gates to the third tier they were required to identify themselves once more. This time they made no comment to anyone and did not linger for a rest.
Past the third tier wall began the more luxurious homes. Closest to the wall were the merchants, whose class often built them enough wealth to impress at least the minor nobility. Though money could not directly buy them titles, the merchants had long since realized that waving a little cash around often influenced a person to forget that its bearer was not technically any higher in rank but should be treated as such regardless. Beyond those came the homes of the minor nobility to the grand mansions of those noble houses large and prominent enough to afford them. The majority of the year these homes went uninhabited but for the skeleton staff that was kept to tend them, but at the end of every fall the noble families began to ship their court-minded members to the city for political games, courting, and whatever other mischief that they could manage. Zoisite wagered that they’d arrived just in time for the Winter Feast his father held every year just before the first snowfall. King Louis had a great fascination with the winter which his son had never quite understood.
And then he was home.
Zoisite had a sudden urge to fall from his horse and kiss the rain-glistened white-washed walls surrounding the castle grounds. Only the sheer silliness of such an act stopped him, but he was among the first to dismount and turn his unwelcome mount over to the waiting stable boys. The boy gave the horse an odd look, as if he wondered what the Prince had been doing riding such a ragged beast, and Zoisite was pleased to note that the boy was well enough trained to not ask. The horses were lead away and they were all five shuffled into the gate house to have their identities checked and to warm before a fire for a moment. Bed, Zoisite thought, no. A hot dinner, a bath and then bed. From the look of him, Zoisite would guess that Nephrite was as ill-traveled as he and much too tired to protest about his damnable, non-existent meteors.
~~**~~
Another day, another bruise; another scratch and yet another lump of humility stuck in her craw. Or was that shame? Ami wasn’t certain. It hurt, regardless, and she was beginning to lose patience with this. Once more she sat upon the steps that lead into the salle and picked splinters from her legs. A month ago she might have been embarrassed to be in public view while in Senshi uniform. Despite that it was traditional the Princess had always felt that uniform the Senshi power required of them was rather… skanky. The short skirts offered little to no protection for their legs, nor, really, did the gloves and heels were rather impractical in a fight. Granted, learning to battle in such shoes had improved her balance and posture by a great deal.
These days she had little time for such shame. She was learning, as they all were, that the Princess was left behind when you had donned the Senshi power. Personal concerns and convictions had to be left at the doorstep and only what was best for the solar system and your teammates was what mattered. The latter hadn’t sunk in so deeply as the first; indeed, the four of them had only just begun to give barest lip service to it. What reason did she have to watch the back of anyone but her High Princess and her sworn-sister? Such thoughts were selfish, Ami knew, yet she could not seem to smother them.
It was hard to include the Venusian in her circle of protection and nigh-impossible for her to think of putting the Martian there. Rayna, she had to admit, was a very talented warrior and of good wit but the aloof manner with which she conducted herself was not one that Ami could bring herself to appreciate. Some days it was a trial merely to be within the same room as the Martian.
When she thought she’d gotten all of the splinters from her flesh (though more were certain to appear miraculously in odd places once she tried to go to sleep that night) Ami stood and dusted her hands off upon the sides of her skirt. One thing which the power did provide for them was a “cleaning” service. No one really understood where the Senshi uniforms came from, or how they fit their Senshi perfectly, or even why they had power-given uniforms in the first place, but it was a very useful thing to have. Much more useful, Ami thought, than taking the chance that you would be caught in the heat of battle in a corset and ten layers of skirt. Not, she amended with a wry smile, that corsets or proper layers of skirt matter to some of the Senshi.
As if that thought had summoned her, the Jupiterian Princess chose that moment to come running up the path from the soldiers’ garrison. She was fully uniformed but didn’t seem to have a speck of dirt on her, which meant that she hadn’t yet begun her daily training. “I was beginning to wonder where you had all gone to. I was getting lonely.”
Lita belted out a good laugh at that, slowing first to a jog and then a walk only to stop a few paces before Ami. “I should think you’d be happy, having the salle all to yourself.”
“I was at first,” the Mercurian smiled, “But then the pells decided to fight back.”
Jupiter snorted. “They broke again?”
A nod confirmed it and Ami glanced back into the Salle. The broken, wooden doll was still in the middle of the room with half its body lying upon the ground. She should have noticed it cracking, but of course she’d been too busy reciting lists of French vocabulary to herself as she hit it. One swift kick had finally sent the abused equipment into two pieces and given her a good sized scrape down her femur, along with the splinters she’d been picking out of her flesh. This was the tenth one that they’d broken that month.
Jupiter whistled faintly and chuckled. “You’re really starting to get some strength into those kicks. I better start watching it; you might just catch up to me!”
“You did that, Ami?” a sweet voice squeaked from their left. Both girls turned to find two silver buns with leaves poking out of them bobbing behind a nearby bush. The Princess was half stuck in the bush itself, face completely invisible but for two bright blue eyes that peered from between the leaves. Ami wasn’t sure what to make of this; how did Bunny always seem to get into those positions?
“Well, it was likely cracked before I got to it,” she replied after a moment’s hesitation. “Bunny… are you stuck?”
“Only a little.”
Jupiter went to the bush and began to try and extract their Crown Princess from it. Ami realized she’d be no help in this and so stood by as vanguard in case anyone else were to come by and question their “manhandling” of the Princess. It took only a few moments for Jupiter to pull her forcibly from the bush—which looked rather bedraggled afterward but seemed as if it would live—and managed to only rip the hem of the Princess’s dress in the process. “Damnit, Bunny, what were you doing in there anyway?”
Both Bunny and Ami blushed faintly at Lita’s language; neither of them bothered to complain about it, for it would do them no good. “There was a kitten.”
“A kitten.”
“Yes. It was pink.”
“There was a pink kitten in the bush,” Lita clarified. Her arms crossed beneath her chest and she shifted her weight to one leg as she looked down the several feet which already separated she and Bunny in height.
“It seems to me that there was a bunny in the bush,” Ami interjected before Bunny could launch into another of the wild (and completely untrue) explanations that she was well known for. No one had quite figured out why Bunny was so insistent upon weaving these sorts of tales—Ami was of the mind that it wasn’t intended as lying or fallacy, but merely a manifestation of the Princess’s overactive imagination. It was far more likely that she had been pretending there was a pink kitten, rather than there having been an actual one. Though she’d never done any of it herself, Ami had heard that games of “pretend” were common amongst many children at play—and Bunny had not yet seemed to grow out of childish things.
Bunny giggled and even Lita had to laugh. The Amazon shook her head, beads adding a sort of music that resonated well with the song of the winter bird life. “Yes well… isn’t the Bunny supposed to be with Luna today, for lessons?”
“Aw Lita!” Bunny whined. “Don’t send me back there, it’s boring! I want to…”
There was a pause as Bunny looked between the two of them hesitantly. Though there was no one else about, the Princess leaned in and whispered urgently, “I want to be with you! I can learn to fight; I can!” For one who seemed so keen on secrecy with this, Bunny squealed the last and began to bounce. It was no wonder she had earned such a nickname; her hair flopped behind her like drooped rabbit ears.
“But... Bunny, you are not a Senshi!”
Those big, brilliant eyes turned up at Ami, pleading, and Bunny gave the slightest of smiles. Oh that face! It was so hard to say no to it; Ami steeled her resolve. Fortunately it wasn’t up to them. And then Jupiter ruined it.
“So what if she isn’t?” Lita grinned. “I think that sounds like a great idea. You should definitely be in here with us!”
“Lita!” Ami frowned, arms akimbo. “You can’t just make that decision. She’s the High Princess, she shouldn’t be out here—“
“So what?” the Amazon interjected with a sharply arched brow. Ami paled to see the Martian’s favorite expression beginning to make its way into her best friend’s habits. What was this? “We’re Princesses and we’re out here. I don’t see why she shouldn’t learn to defend herself.”
“It isn’t lady-like,” Ami protested. Between them Bunny blanched, eyes darting first to one and then the other. Had either been paying attention to her they might have seen her hands fly to her mouth and the growing distress mounting upon the slight young girl. They did not, eyes now fully for one another.
“Really? So I suppose that you and I aren’t women, then.”
“Lita, this is different and you know it. We’re Senshi, it’s our place to fight.”
That wasn’t about to appease Jupiter; not this time. This fight wasn’t one that was foreign to them, though each time it had come between them in the past they had chosen to walk away from it. The time to broach it had finally come. “So the fact that women on my planet are always trained to fight is… what, exactly?”
“That isn’t fair, Lita!” Ami’s mouth settled into a distinctly unhappy frown. “Things are different there!”
“Yeah, but they’re different here, too. Who are you to say that it isn’t ladylike for us to fight! I’m a lady!” The Amazon glowered down the foot of height which separated them. “We’re all ladies! And all of us fight; or are you telling me that you’re not a lady anymore?”
“I just said that it is different for the Senshi than it is for… for… for other women! I’ll have you know that the culture here is a lot like Mercury in that women are not commonly trained to fight—“
“Not ‘commonly,’ which means that it is still done.” Jupiter smirked. It was obvious that the Amazon thought she had won. That set Ami’s blood to steaming. Why couldn’t Lita simply accept that her planet was an anomaly?
“Only in very specific cases, and the High Princess does not qualify for those! Artemis will never go along with this.”
“How do you know if you don’t ask?” Jupiter countered, a single gloved finger held in Ami’s face.
“Guys, please don’t fight—“
“Then I’ll ask!” Ami replied, cheeks turning pink with heat. She turned on her heel to do just that; it did not matter that she had no idea where Artemis was. Their instructor’s absence in the morning wasn’t terribly unusual these days. Now that the girls had an idea of what was expected from them, he normally left them alone to work on their paces and strength building until he’d gotten some paperwork finished. On most days they didn’t see the man until a mark before noon; Ami turned and ran into a rather hard, broad chest.
With a winded “oof” the blue-themed Senshi had landed upon her butt in the frosted and bitter grass. She looked up, and up, and up into those distant and somewhat amused blue eyes she was beginning to know so well. “Mercury,” Artemis stated as he held a hand out to her, “You didn’t hear me coming.”
That wasn’t a question, even though it was phrased like one. She winced, taking his hand in helping her from the ground. Behind him were Mars and Venus, standing to his flanks. The Venusian didn’t bother to hide her curious expression, eyes quickly flitting between the three girls before them. Mars, on the other hand, looked as she always did: Bored and disinterested. Ami fought the urge to twitch, instead settling her gaze upon her teacher’s shoes. “I did not.”
“Because you two were arguing.”
“We… were, rather loudly, discussing a difference of opinion; yes sir.”
Jupiter made a rude snort behind her, but the comment succeeded in pulling a chuckle from Artemis. “And what might have been so riveting a topic that you felt the need to shout over it?”
“I want to learn to fight, Uncle Arty,” Bunny interjected. Silver brushed the corner of Amiru’s vision and the ice-Senshi turned in surprise to see that the High Princess had come up beside her. To her further shock, Bunny then took Mercury’s hand and threaded their fingers together, “I’m bored with stupid books and stupid lectures. Can’t I be with my friends?”
“No.”
Though it had been the answer that she was expecting the satisfaction of it never came; Ami couldn’t help but wonder what his reasons were. Nor could she help the slight twinge of guilt she felt as she watched Bunny’s face crumple with disappointment. “But—“
“No ‘buts;’ this discussion is closed.” Artemis shook his head, “Now, you’re supposed to be in the library with Luna. Get to it.” With that, Artemis put his attention back upon his four stunned students. “We have a special session today with the Guards, assuming Jupiter managed to deliver my message…?”
“I did, sir,” Jupiter responded automatically.
“Good. Come, then. Bunny; get to the library.”
Artemis walked around the pair still impeding his path. Slowly the two Senshi behind him began to move as well. Ami caught them looking at her and Bunny, but whatever their reactions to Artemis’s quick negation of the request they were keeping them carefully hidden. She looked behind her to find that Jupiter, too, had abandoned them in favour of following orders. “Bunny,” she whispered.
The girl sniffed. One pale, too-thin hand brushed a few tears from her cheeks. Amiru began to reach for her and was caught off guard when Bunny pulled away from her and jerked her hand free. “I gotta go!” the Princess slurred. Before Ami had time to even consider correcting the girl’s speech, much less to object to her leaving, Bunny had taken off for the Library at a run, dress held high about her knees. Ami winced, watching Bunny stumble and fall. Despite the ground that she’d eaten, the Princess pulled herself back to her feet and continued her run without care for the variety of shrubs, flower beds and benches that were in her way. The royal gardeners were going to be very sore about this.
“Mercury!” Artemis snapped from behind her. With a guilty conscience the Ice Princess turned to follow.
“So. Explain to me, again, why it is that Bunny should not train with us.” This was not a question; it was a knife, flung with deadly accuracy at the blonde across the room. Rayna moved up a few points in respect so far as Lita was concerned. Of course she had to—Rayna was the only one on her side in this.
As soon as they’d gotten to their tower for the night, the battle lines had been drawn. They’d been clear during the training of the day, but none of the girls had dared have the gall to start another cat fight where Artemis could see. Instead they’d taken out their frustrations upon the guards who had shown up to spar against them. Never before had it been quite so gratifying to press a grown man’s face into the sand; Lita only hoped that none of them had taken it personally.
Artemis had been quite impressed, enough so that he’d forgiven them the essays they’d had due the next day. For most of them this was a blessing, though Amiru looked more as if she felt it was a punishment rather than a reward.
“Because,” Miran huffed and blew her cheeks outward in frustration. Lita wondered if she realized how very much she resembled an ape when she did that: a blonde, far-too-fuzy, hyper-active ape. “She is the High Princess. We are meant to protect her. She has no need to know these things and should be spending her time on things more important to her station—like politics and history. The Gods know she isn’t good at any of them!”
“And her not knowing how to defend herself at all is a blessing… how?” Lita countered with a roll of her eyes. “If she doesn’t know how to stay out of our way when we’re protecting her she’ll end up tripping the lot of us! You’ve seen what a klutz she is!”
“That won’t matter if we’re good enough!” the blonde spat.
“Besides,” her blue-haired (treacherous, deceitful) partner seconded. “Her mother is an advocate of peace and pacifism! It would look unseemly if she were to take up arms.”
“So the rest of us learning the art of war looks like… what, precisely?” Rayna shot back before Lita could. “If you haven’t noticed, this palace keeps a well-trained guard on hand, and Artemis is isn’t teaching us to knit!”
“There is a difference!” Amiru cried, her hands becoming claws of frustration raised to pierce the air. “We are the Senshi—this is what we do! Granted, it isn’t something I ever want to have to use but we need to know this! The High Princess does not, that is what she has us for!”
“So you’re advocating that she go uneducated on a subject simply because she won’t use it?” Lita asked with a surprise that she actually felt. That didn’t at all sound like the Amiru that she had always known! Yet it what the girl before her had both stated and meant.
A flush stained the Mercurian’s cheeks and she turned her head to the side. “I won’t discuss this anymore,” she replied. Before anyone could protest, the girl had turned upon her heel and run up the stairs.
Abandoned, the Venusian scowled at the two of them. “I hope you’re happy!” Miran shouted thoughtlessly at her cousin and then followed Amiru’s example. Unlike the Ice Princess, she slammed her door when she reached it and the sound echoed back down the steps to the common room. Left alone with the Martian, Lita sighed and rubbed her temples.
“I don’t know why we’re bothering to fight about it,” Rayna said after a long silence had drifted between the two of them. “Artemis has already said that he won’t teach her.” The Martian turned to the fireplace in the room and extended her hands to warm them. After a moment of hesitation, Lita joined her. Now that winter had set in about them the place was unbearably cold for the both of them. She wondered, briefly, how Rayna managed it—the fire child needed the heat as she needed food or air. It wasn’t something that Lita was comfortable in asking, however, or something that she thought Rayna would answer, even if she were to ask.
“I don’t know,” Lita shrugged. “Because it’s… something?” A frustrated snort left her body and she banged a fist into the nearest object. It happened to be a table that wobbled a little and threatened to break. “I still think he’s wrong, though!”
“Perhaps Bunny should ask the Queen. We could help her to get an audience…”
“Momma won’t let me.”
Both Princesses jumped at the sound of the third voice in the room. They hadn’t noticed Bunny had come up the stairs from the bathing chamber below, and Lita wondered how long the girl had been listening to the lot of them discussing her. It was impossible to tell; Bunny had been acting melancholy all day, a thing which was entirely out of character for her. That, she decided, was why she felt so strongly about this—Bunny shouldn’t be sad about anything.
“Are you certain?” Rayna asked sharply. “You’ve asked her?”
The High Princess nodded. “She said that my place isn’t in the salle. That I need to do what Artemis and Luna say, and let the rest of you train in peace.”
“Well ain’t that a bitch,” Lita swore faintly. Bunny clapped her hands over her mouth and then, miraculously, giggled. The Jupiterian Princess smirked at the sight of Bunny’s renewed smile and even Rayna seemed to have something of a smile drawn upon her face.
“Something akin to that, yes.” Rayna nodded in agreement. After a moment she shook her raven head. “I don’t think it should be left at that, though. It isn’t wise.”
“No, it isn’t,” Lita agreed. They both returned to looking at the fire before them, and a third set of hands joined theirs in the heat from the flames. Lita smiled down at the silver Princess. “Why do you want to fight so badly, Bunny?”
“Because you four are doing it,” she replied softly. “I don’t want to be left out… and… because I… because everyone says that I can’t.” Confusion flickered faintly across Bunny’s brow along with something else—determination, perhaps? “I’m too clumsy, or I’m too much of a crybaby. I don’t want to be like that—I want to be like you Lita! Or you, Raye! You’re both so strong, so graceful…”
The slow blush that appeared on Bunny’s cheeks was endearing and Lita couldn’t help but greet it with a smile. “I sneak down to the salle sometimes, and watch you all. I wish I were a Senshi, like you. Then we could all five be together, all the time.”
Rayna made a rather rude noise, but when Lita looked at her she found the girl to be smiling, very faintly. “Well if that’s all it is…”
“Huh?”
Rayna’s violet eyes, so unreadable most of the time, flickered to meet Lita’s. “Did Artemis not say that the nights were our own, to do as we please?”
“He did…” Lita frowned in confusion. And then it hit her, and she grinned. “I don’t believe he ever said we had to stay in the tower. Do you remember him saying that Rayna?”
“No, I do not. In fact, I believe he mentioned that we might need some extra practice time.”
“Yes, and he did not forbid our good friend Bunny from entering the salle to watch us practice.” Lita nodded. Bunny, who had been watching this exchange with mounting confusion, suddenly seemed to catch wise to their plot. She squealed and her boney arms wrapped about Lita’s middle.
“OH THANK YOU GU—“
“Bunny!” They both snapped in unison, and then Lita laughed. It was hard not to; the girl’s cheer was infectious.
“Be quiet. The ogres upstairs will hear you.” Rayna completed the warning. She moved away from the fire, then and twisted her long hair into a knot at the nape of her neck, “Come. We should get going before they come looking for us.”
~~**~~
The promised freeze was upon the city by the time that all five Princes had woke the next day. As they had arrived so late in the night, they had been allowed to sleep in and so it was that not a single one of them—not even Kunzite, whom Zoisite had been certain did not need sleep to function as a normal human did—had opened their eyes before the sun had begun to dip towards the West. Zoisite had finally flung himself out of his bed (his glorious, warm and familiar feather bed) only to be greeted with a frosted window pane and a city of ice stretched out beyond. It had not been nearly that cold the night before! Suddenly he was quite grateful that they had continued on rather than stopping elsewhere for the night; it would have been impossible to traverse this without laming at least one of their mounts!
After he’d recovered from most of his shock, Zoisite had bathed (again), dressed himself and then took the stairs down to the private dining room which he and his friends used whenever they stayed in Versailles. He wasn’t the last to arrive, but nor was he the first. Upon entering the room, Zoisite was assaulted by the smell of the rather robust tea which Kunzite was particularly fond of. Mixed with it was the tantalizing, torturous aroma of a variety of breakfast foods. It didn’t matter that breakfast had been half a day ago for everyone else in the castle, the cooks knew that the boys would appreciate a regular “waking” meal whenever they rose and had taken it upon themselves to provide it for them. Zoisite set upon this with an appetite that momentarily destroyed all pretenses of class and refinement.
The silver haired Prince already sitting at the table grunted a note of disgust and saved his mug-full of tea before an errant elbow knocked it to the floor. “Pace yourself,” was all that he said.
“Please tell me,” the familiar, sleep-thick tones of his cousin asked from the doorway, “That they bothered to serve some decent drink.”
Zoisite twittered around a mouthful of food, eyes tracking Jadeite from the doorway to the end of the table where a drink service was displayed. Jadeite’s hair was still wild from sleep, as blazing blonde as Zoisite’s own, and the clothes that were pulled about his frame were haphazardly matched at best. Nor, Zoisite noted with no little amusement, had Jadeite bothered to button his shirt correctly. “Not all of us can stomach your ‘coffee,’ Sand-Dancer.”
Jadeite made a rude noise and continued to lift the lids of an assortment of pots, searching for something he’d drink. He must have found what he was looking for, for eventually he poured a drink into one of the thick, plain ceramic mugs provided for them and took a place at the end of the table. It would be a while, yet, before Jadeite was good for more than a blank look or agitated remark.
“The world is one big ice block today,” Zoisite informed them around a particularly zesty sausage. The sound of paper rustling was the only answer he received and it was then that Zoisite realized that Kunzite was reading something set before him on the table. The blonde leaned a little to his left that he might get a look at the stack of papers. For a moment Kunzite’s arm remained in the way and then the stoic Prince took up his mug and Zoisite was able to read the large print scrawled at the head of the first page. “We didn’t see any bandits on our way here.”
Kunzite spared Zoisite a withering glance, swallowed another mouthful of tea and set the mug back upon the tabletop. “These reports are from the North-East. There’s always been trouble up there.”
“Yes. But you don’t always read it at the table. Not at breakfast,” Zoisite pointed out around two slices of thick, honey-slathered, wheat toast.
Kunzite grunted. “I’d rather wait until the others are awake to discuss this, Zoi.”
“How can you eat like that?” Jadeite interjected before the Frenchman could protest Kunzite’s silence. Neither of them missed the grateful look which passed across Kunzite’s face, a fact Zoisite knew from the smirk which lit upon Jadeite’s, but both pretended that they had. This argument was as old as they were.
“Good food deserves to be eaten,” Zoisite replied smugly and popped half a blueberry scone into his mouth. “Ahwn oi huntenduh twah henjuy hhet.”
Jadeite rolled his eyes, lips slurping unmajestically at his mug. It must have been coffee, Zoisite concluded, for no other drink caused his cousin to relax so easily. That the drink was addictive was obvious in the way that every person he’d ever met from the South seemed to need it to survive their day. It was one of the many things about the South that Zoisite had never quite managed to understand, along with their unnerving love of the desert. What was it about a blank slab of sand that they considered to be so attractive?
Once again the door opened and Nephrite joined them. He was far more collected this morning than Jadeite and his thick mane of hair still appeared damp in the morning light. Nephrite yawned a greeting at them and fetched his own plate of food before joining them at the table. Barely a glance was spared in Zoisite’s direction, but a courteous nod was given to the other two parties. Zoisite frowned; so they were fighting about last night, were they? Good of Nephrite to inform him of that.
“We should start in the lower district, out towards the farms where we came in last night,” Nephrite began with less preamble than it took to butter a scone. “Then we can sweep around the city to the west. I figure they wouldn’t have fallen in the ocean, since the guard would have been able to give us reports last night—“
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Zoisite let his half-eaten bacon fall back onto his plate and threw his hands into the air. “Am I really hearing this? Do you really believe that we’re going out into that to search for your imaginary missing rocks?”
“If they’re imaginary then how are they missing?” Jadeite muttered into his cup.
It seemed to take Nephrite a moment to decide which one of them he should glare at; it was a difficult decision, amplified by the fact that they’d placed themselves on opposite ends of the rectangular table. In the end, Zoisite won his attention. “Yes, I do. Zoisite, this is important! Far more so than your pampered hide!”
“Are you calling me fat?” Zoisite hissed in reply. Nephrite was visibly taken back by that comment, the man’s mouth going slack for a long moment as he tried to fathom the cognitive leap which had supplied the question. Beyond him Jadeite twittered.
“With the amount that you eat, it’s a wonder that you’re not.”
“I happen to be slender. Slender! And nor,” Zoisite turned a fully combined glare and pout upon the brunette in attendance. “is my hide pampered! I’d have calluses and scars if I didn’t care enough to take proper care of my skin. If you’d deign to use lotion and gloves as you should then your skin might be as perfect as mine!”
He paused a moment, and then added thoughtfully, “Well. Not as perfect, but you may come a close second!”
Nephrite’s face fell into his hands, cupped before him with his elbows pressed into the table. “Kunzite,” he begged. The eldest of them only chuckled; it seemed that whatever his opinion was on the matter, Kunzite was content to let them solve this for themselves.
Jadeite made a rude noise and went to refill his mug. “Nephrite? I’m hurt, Zoisite, really. Choosing the Star-worshipper over your own flesh and blood. Tsk, tsk.”
“Exactly how does the use of lotion and gloves not qualify as ‘pampering’?” Endymion asked as he finally joined their group. The man was, like most of them, already dressed for the day but he’d yet to run a comb through his hair or to shave the whiskers off of his jaw. Zoisite stared at that with something akin to envy. Though they’d been on the road without a chance to shave for nearly a week, Endymion still only had the barest of scruff upon his face. Of the five of them he was the only one able to make long journeys and not look like a barbarian riding into town afterward.
“Because it’s good hygiene,” Zoisite replied. He ignored Jadeite’s continued grumblings and reapplied himself to his bacon. “Endy, tell Nephrite that we’re not going to spend any more time on this wild goose chase of his. This has gone far enough, hasn’t it?”
“Dammit, Zoisite, I tell you I’m not crazy!” Nephrite snapped, one fist thumping against the table. Everything upon it rattled and Kunzite hissed faintly as his tea splashed, boiling hot, upon his arm.
“Watch yourself, Nephrite.” Kunzite flashed angry silver eyes at their companion. He then picked up the stack of papers before them and held them out to their High Prince as he joined them with his own breakfast. Endymion settled himself in a seat between the Eastern and Western Princes and then took the papers. He read them over quickly and sighed when he had.
“Sorry, Nephrite, but we have other things to deal with. right now.” Before the brunette could protest, Endymion held a hand up. “Please. There’s been a lot of rioting and bandit activity to the northwest of the city.”
“Isn’t bandit activity within King Louis’s jurisdiction?” Nephrite replied. Zoisite couldn’t help but feel that the man was sulking, if only a little bit. What was it about a bunch of rocks that was so special, anyway? The blonde rolled his eyes under the screen of his curled bangs and got up to retrieve another glass of juice.
“Technically, but he’s asked us for help with this. We should also pay our respects to the King and Queen at dinner.”
“Did he ask help from us, or help from you-know-who?” Jadeite asked as he finally put his mug of coffee down and took up a muffin in its place. The question was valid, no matter how each of the boys—especially Endymion—winced at it.
Endymion shook his head. “I believe we can take care of this without resorting to such drastic measures.”
By mutual, silent agreement the Princes let the subject drop. Talk turned then to more pleasant things of a different, albeit important, nature: which nobles were likely to be in town, what the current social statuses were and who had been married to whom that past spring. To those unfamiliar with the ways of the court, such things might have seemed little more than the gossip of country hens, but within the court such knowledge was a matter of political life-and-death.
Eventually their breakfast wrapped up and the five parted ways to clean themselves up properly. A servant came to inform all of them when their private meeting with the King would be, before the formal dinner. Much to his surprise, Zoisite was told that his parents wished an audience with him before they’d even seen to the High Prince.
This sudden oversight of proper rank and procedure was far more alarming than Zoisite wished to admit, but as he headed from their suite and down the elaborately bedecked halls of Bordeaux he found it easy to ignore for the simple familiarity of his surroundings. Along the way he passed many servants, each in the uniform colours of the palace: deep ocean blue and brilliant silver gilt. Never did he see a courtier, however, and that was unusual. With the freeze upon the city, it was likely that a good portion of them had taken up skates and gone to the lakes to amuse themselves. Such events were often turned into full-court holidays, at least for those who had no actual duties within the kingdom. Zoisite dearly wished he could have been among them, but knew that his duty to the realm and the High Prince came first.
His parents weren’t waiting for him in their formal receiving chamber, which meant that the audience was an informal one. This relaxed the Prince somewhat; his parents wanted to see him for personal reasons, then, pertaining to their relationship as parent and child—not rulers and heir. He hadn’t the time to consider what it could be about; as soon as the guards had announced his presence, Zoisite was called forth into the private suite of the king and queen.
These rooms he had seen many times in his life, and in his sixteen years they had rarely changed more than a chair or rug. His father had long ago insisted that the front sitting room be done up in warm brown and green plaid, quite a change from the pastel elegance which swathed the rest of the castle. Though the Queen had not been happy about this at first, fond as she was of the delicate floral motifs and fragile architecture everywhere else, she, too, had come to love it as much as her husband did. Now as their son entered the room he found her sprawled regally upon a divan at the window, warm robes tucked about her pallid form and a book in hand. She looked as comfortable as she did sickly.
“Mother?” Zoisite quickly crossed the room to her side where he sunk upon his knees before her.
“Do not worry,” Maria-Therese told her son as she reached forth to gently caress his cheek. “I’ve only a cold. This weather has never agreed with me and the unseasonable change much less. Still, it is a good sign.”
“That you are sick?” Zoisite frowned. His mother had never been one for the winter cold of the East, he knew. Throughout his life, she had been sick much of each winter—many people had decided that the cause of this was her heritage. She had come from the South, the sister of the current King Ferdinand, and had never quite taken to the snow and ice. It was just as well that her title came with no true power, for she would have been unfit to lead anyone for several months out of the year. “I would never think that a good thing.”
“Oh Heavens, no!” the Queen laughed; the sound quickly turned into a rasping cough and Zoisite leaned forward to slip an arm about her back and thump it. She waved him away, hiding her mouth with one hand.
“Maria,” his father’s voice wafted into the room from beyond the darkened bedroom doorway, “Are you all right?”
“Fine, my Lord,” she replied when the fit had passed her. “Our son has come. Do not be a boor and show him your face, lest he forget it and think the steward his father!”
“Is the steward his father? You’ve threatened me with that so many a time I’m beginning to wonder,” Louis teased as he entered from the bedroom. Zoisite had to shake his head at the banter between the two. Both were creatures of keen spirit, with a healthy love for jokes; many rumors had been started about things which they used for little more than good-spirited prods at the other’s humor, the least of which being about the parentage of their only child. By this point, Zoisite was quite used to it and comfortable with the fact that he did look a great deal more like his mother than his father.
The Queen smiled despite her sickness and closed her book upon a ribbon which marked her place. “I won’t deny the possibility, but will say that there is no proof one way or t’other.”
“So long as we keep the options open,” her husband smiled and dipped to kiss her. Zoisite averted his eyes and coughed upon his fist in embarrassment. Though he was glad that his parents did indeed love one another, a rare thing among the nobility, it was also strange to see such public display of this fact. His parents seemed to take the hint and King Louis retired to his armchair nearby.
The seat was old, much like the King himself who had been no spry teenager when his only son was conceived. Many thought it odd that such a strong bond had been formed between the King and Queen at all, for a little more than two decades separated them in age; where the Queen was young yet, with only a handful of lines beginning to encroach upon her skin of eyes and mouth, the King had long since acquired silver to every strand of his hair and a map across his face. Many of these were lines made with years of mirth, but no few of them had been drawn there by sword point and the heavy hand of the sun. Looking at him now, Zoisite began to realize just how old his father truly was—and how few years remained until the crown would fall to him. Rather than be anxious for that moment to come, the young Prince was seized by a sudden terror.
“Father,” he began to ask and settled himself more comfortably upon the floor. It wasn’t precisely “princely” of him to sit in such a manner, but neither of his parents would care in so casual a setting. “Why do I get the feeling this isn’t just… that you didn’t call me here for… Mother, you are all right, are you not?”
“Oh my love,” Maria-Theresa smiled down at him and placed a comforting hand upon his shoulder. “Do not worry. I shall be with you for a long time, yet, and so shall your father.” She brushed one of his soft, blonde curls back behind his ear and Zoisite smiled at the reassurance.
“But we do have something we wish to discuss, it’s true,” Louis clarified. “Nothing so dire as you think; at least we hope not. There already seem to be good omens abound for it!”
“The early freeze?” Zoisite tilted his head as he questioned this. “How is that a good thing for anyone? The farmers surely…”
“Are just fine,” Louise dismissed the objection with a wave of his hand. “Harvest was brought in faster this year than ever before. The people are warm and secure—we’d even planned a special holiday before we’d realized this was going to hit so early. Regardless, I’d like to take it as a good sign.”
It was then that Zoisite remembered the reason behind this “good omen” they were so crazy over: “The trade agreements with Mercury—you’ve finally gotten them to agree to a revision!”
The King and Queen exchanged a look of silent communication, the kind which all children had seen their parents share at one point or another. “That is… somewhat true, Zoisite,” Maria-Theresa replied, all of the tease now absent from her voice. “We have told you previously that the trade agreements with Mercury have been standing since your birth.”
“Yes, the ones that wouldn’t allow the silk merchants through to their planet last year, and have been making prices on imported grains astronomical for the past three years. Plus there’s the fact that they won’t allow us to import any armor or weaponry from their blacksmiths, and everyone knows that Mercurian swords—“
“Zoisite,” Louis interrupted him gently. The Prince stopped immediately; it wasn’t like his father to interrupt anyone, much less his own son.
“You must remember that this treaty was signed thirteen—nearly fourteen—years ago. Our needs were much different back then, but it is high time that those treaties changed.”
“So you haven’t gotten them to revise it?”
“Not yet, no,” Maria-Theresa replied with a slow shake of her head. “There are stipulations attached to the treaties which require certain events to have taken place first. Stipulations which we agree it has come time to meet, as the necessity behind them is still valid today.”
“You’ve known that you were betrothed many years ago…” Louise paused, as if waiting for his acknowledgement of this.
A slow, dull ache of dread began to creep its way into Zoisite’s bones. At first he thought that someone must have opened a window when he wasn’t looking—but no, that chill was fear. “She’s of age now,” Maria-Theresa smiled gently at her son. “Well, technically she came of age nearly a year ago, but other obligations had to be seen to before this one was ready to be met. We’ve spoken with King Aqui and the date has been set for the Spring equinox.”
“I’m to be married.” Zoisite found that his voice was strangely dull. It would have been amusing were this anyone else but him.
“Son, you had to have expected this,” his father replied, concerned etched upon that ancient face. As much as he hated to admit it in this moment, Zoisite knew that his parents only meant the best. They had to do their duty by their people, and a part of that duty meant that their child was a viable bargaining chip. He also knew that no matter how much they loved one another now, they, too, had begun their marriage as an affair of state. That thought eased his mind a trifle and he was able to give his father a faint nod.
“I knew,” he whispered.
~~**~~
