Bravery Page 5

  “Traditional clothes, official prince-like clothes, anything to show off your status.” She looks at me, her eyes softening. “Or a suit works too.”

  I nod. I can make a suit work, since our ‘traditional/official’ clothes are too much like army uniforms to be comfortable in a situation like this, I would stand out too much, more than I already do. “I can work with that.” I get up, helping Litha up with me. “I guess we’ll see you two soon?”

  “You bet.” Litha stands up on tiptoes and gives me a quick kiss on my lips before she follows Phoenix out of the room, leaving us four princes alone.

  We all let out a groan at the same time. Maybe all for different reasons, but probably mostly the same reasons, we hate being shown off like this. And to do it for the werewolf king, the succubus queen, and lots of other people in important positions, feels very much like a show of power. I’m just not sure whose power we’re showing off... Whose pawns we’re portraying here, but I guess we’ll find out soon enough...

  8

  As soon as Litha and I reach our room, I start pulling towels and other things out of our closet for a quick shower. We can’t show up covered in grime from last night’s campfire or, in Litha’s case, smelling like sex. Just because I can’t smell it doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen, especially with that glow she has around her...

  Litha is dawdling at the end of the bed, leaning against it. “What do they expect us to do when they ask us to show up all dressed up? I’ve never done it before.”

  I sit down, pulling her against me, enjoying having her close, it calms my nerves. “We dress up in special clothes. And then they’ll probably make us stand somewhere so that we’re prominently on display. They’ll introduce us to whoever they’re trying to impress and we just wait around until we’re sent off again. They’ll probably include us in any official and ceremonial things, but that’s about it. There isn’t really anything we can prepare. We’re little more than dolls in these situations.”

  She lets out a little laugh, her arm snaking around my back. “You make it sound so boring.”

  “It is boring. We have to dress up in all sorts of ceremonial and official clothes, but other than that, we’re not really there because we add something to the conversation, we’re just there because we’re part of the prophecy. And they like showing the prophecy people off...”

  She stills the moment I use the word ‘prophecy’. “Will it always be like that? Forever?”

  “Being shown off for one reason or another? Yeah. But if you’re going to be queen, somewhere in the future, you’ll probably be showing yourself off to get an advantage too, in political situations.” I softly kiss her bare shoulder, the shirt she’s wearing has slid off her shoulder as it’s way too big on her. “Now, our mums will be here soon. You should go get a shower first.”

  She turns to me, smiling a little, her eyes sparkling. “Want to join me?” She plays with her fingers on my arm, ready to pull me along with her.

  I shake my head, smiling back, I take her arms in my hands, her skin warm under my touch, her fire-magic constantly there. “If I do that, I don’t think we’ll be on time for the meeting, and I don’t think we should chance that.” Then I lean closer, my lips close to her ear. “But maybe later, when we get back, and you have to get out of the uncomfortable contraptions they put us in. I’ll happily help you out of the horrid dress and then take a long soak in the bath with you.” I wink and Litha grins back.

  “I’ll hold you to that.”

  “I can’t wait.” I give her two towels. “Now, take a quick shower and make sure you clean yourself well. We don’t want to upset anyone by having dragon and incubus scent on you all day, may give the wrong impression.”

  “But I like smelling like that.” She pouts my way, but then turns around and walks into the bathroom.

  I smile at her back, before I take a deep breath. Yeah, while I don’t really care about her scent one way or another, I’m not the one with the strong sense of smell. But there will be werewolves all around today, and Litha smelling like a dragon, who can’t even have their royal family here, and an incubus, a royal family who is sitting right next to them, may make the werewolves decide that they don’t have to bother too much with playing nice. If they think Litha has already chosen someone from the princes, and it’s not their prince...

  Diplomacy sucks. Sucks, sucks.

  “Stop moving so much.” Mum is holding my shoulders as she tries to do the back of my dress up. The witches don’t really have ‘traditional’ or ‘ceremonial’ clothes, as we tend to do our ceremonies naked, but we do have special dresses for these kinds of situations. Being the daughter of the highest priestess means that I’m now wearing a dress just like my mum’s and it’s got all sorts of ribbons and stuff down the back. A maze of small hooks and bands connected to straps at the front, hiding at least some of my body... Not that it really matters much today, it’s only the fae who really care about clothing and ‘decency’ during meetings, and they won’t be there. Mum’s dress is a deep blue, like the colour of the sky after the sun has just dipped behind the horizon, and mine is a light purple, like when the sun is just setting.

  But no matter how much I like to complain about my dress, at least I’m not wearing Litha’s dress. She looks stunning, sure, but hers is even more intricate than mine. Not only is she descended from a royal witch line, who have mostly been staying out of the public eye in the last century, she’s also the prophesied Queen-who-brings-peace, so her dress is much more showy than mine is.

  Litha’s dress is red with orange and yellow elements, made out of alternating layers of see-through fabric and ribbons around her waist, all angled just right. The skirt alone is made out of at least six sections of fabric, all woven together to create the illusion of the sun being wrapped around her. Her bodice is little more than a couple of pieces of fabric and some ribbons wrapped around her chest, and then other ribbons connect the top to the ‘skirt. The ribbons over her belly are shaped like a triangle, leaving out a section that falls right over her lower belly, right in the middle between her hip bones. Like we need a reminder that, apart from becoming the queen of the four kingdoms, she will become mother to a new generation of royalty. The next blood-line to be in charge... The dress isn’t very subtle about its symbolism, is it?

  I look at Litha’s mum, who is trying to get the bottom of the triangle to hook up to the right eyelet on the skirt, doing everything she can to not look at the actual location of the triangle she’s working on. “Who designed it?” Because dresses like these take a long time to design and make, and this must have been very last-minute. I don’t think any of our parents knew about us having to show up more than a couple of hours ago, at most.

  Litha’s mum lets out a slight growl, as she stretches her neck and finally manages to get the hook through the eyelet. “It’s been ‘saved’ for her for years... Not really my choice either. But seeing how little time we had to come up with something new, we couldn’t really turn it down.” She looks back to the bed, where a dark red dress, seemingly a combination of what my mum wears and Litha’s dress, is waiting for her to put on. “Just like I can’t get around that one.”

  “What’s wrong with it? I like the colours, very ‘feisty’.” Litha grins and looks down. With the way the dress is made, she can’t really see much as the fluff around her boobs, like she needs any visual effects to enhance her size, is preventing her from seeing anything below it, apart from maybe the edges of her skirt, but the angle makes seeing the patterns of the ribbons around her belly very hard.

  I slide my hand into hers, rubbing my thumb over her knuckles. “Let’s just say...” I try to come up with a good way to explain it. “The dress is proclaiming you to be the future queen, but, most of all, it’s making it very obvious that you’re the future mother of other kings and queens...”

  “What?” She blinks, frowning. “How?”

  I look back at Mum, but she holds up her hands, having finally att
ached the final hooks of my dress. Since words won’t help in this case, I pull Litha along to the large mirror in the room.

  Standing there side by side, seeing us together, butterflies zoom through my stomach. We look... We look like we belong together, like a fairytale story, two princesses ready for a ball, or a wedding. Ignoring the symbolism of certain elements of our dresses, they’re definitely imposing and very impressive, worthy of our statuses.

  I watch Litha’s eyes go down her dress, until they fall on the triangle, her face falling. “You have to be kidding me... Are they seriously focusing on my...?” She stares at me and then at her mum, her eyes going wide, her mouth opening a couple of times as she’s trying to find the right words. “Really?” She’s out of breath, like she honestly can’t believe what she’s seeing.

  Litha’s mum comes over, standing behind us. “Yes, really.” She lets out a slow breath, frowning. “Remember what we talked about a couple of days ago? Certain people don’t believe that a witch queen can rule one kingdom, let alone multiple of them. So, at best, you’re your king’s queen, or, more likely, the mother of the future king or queen from one of the kingdoms... The symbolism is obvious, yes. Their interpretation of the prophecy too.”

  Litha’s excitement about wearing the pretty dress has definitely diminished and she’s now just looking frustrated, and more and more angry by the second. “Like this is going to do anyone any good...” Her eyes go around the room. “Take it off. Take everything off. I don’t want to wear this.”

  “You can’t. We don’t have a backup dress for you to wear.” Her mum is looking at her with large eyes.

  “Just the top and the skirt then. Take all the other crap off of it.” She starts walking towards some boxes.

  “Litha...” Her mum darts after her. “That’s... That dress is expensive, we can’t just cut it up.”

  “I don’t care.” Litha looks back at us, stubborn. “I’m not going to be paraded around like some baby-making-machine. I exist. I exist now. I’m not some background player to other people. I’m not a prop. I’m going to be queen, and I refuse to be reduced to this.” She pulls the bottom of the dress up and makes a beeline for another box, probably looking for scissors or something.

  “Litha, wait.” I rush after her, stopping her before she can topple the whole box all over herself. “Let me do it.” I push her back a few steps, away from the boxes, away from stuff that can dirty the dress. Then I dig through the box and pull out a pair of scissors. “I don’t want you to show up all covered in cuts, or whatever else is in that box. Give me a moment.”

  “Phoenix...” Mum’s not happy, but I just glare back at her.

  “You wouldn’t let them parade me around like that. You would call it dehumanising and severely sexist, and you’d do something about it. I agree with Litha, this is not okay, no matter the price of the dress.” I turn to Litha, holding up the scissors. “Now, stand really still and I’ll cut the ribbons off as neatly as possible. Make it look as if that was the way it was intended all along. In the ten minutes we have left...”

  Litha smiles at me, my heart fluttering again. “Thank you.”

  I smile. “You’re not a prop to be shown off. You’re a queen. You’re my queen. I’m not letting them turn you into anything else.” I wink and then unhook the bottom of the triangle, before unhooking the other ribbons. “Let’s get this off you.”

  Litha stands really still, trusting that I know what I’m doing, trusting that I won’t hurt her, or harm her. Her trust in me so honest that it almost scares me. But she’s right, we can’t turn her into someone else’s pawn. If she’s really going to unite all the kingdoms, then she needs to make her own moves, and this is a great first show of that.

  There is nothing that shows that they won’t be able to control her, that she’ll be making her own choices, that she refuses to be reduced to a side-character in her own prophecy, than standing up for herself right now, the very first time people are trying to use her for their own goals.

  She’s a queen, and she’ll look like one when she shows up to greet the werewolf king and the succubus queen.

  9

  The clothing-related issues didn’t stop after fixing my dress. While Mum was putting on her dress, we realised that it too was a no-go. If I was supposed to look like a future baby-maker then her dress was designed to make her look like she was waiting for death. Her femininity and body-shape taken away because she’d already given birth to me and was no longer ‘needed’ in the grand scheme of the prophecy. To fix it, we did something similar as we’d done to my dress, take off anything that hid who she was, anything that denied her the autonomy over her own destiny, anything that hid that she was still very much ‘in her prime’ as a witch. We spiced her dress up a little. Which was only fitting, as the fury in her eyes as she realised what they’d done would have shown anyone that she definitely wasn’t ‘past her prime’ and that she could turn them into a pile of ash with a single stare, just as easily as she’d been able to do at my age, maybe even better.

  Phoenix takes my hand as we leave our room, a blinding smile on her face. She’s almost radiant, but that could also be her magic as she’s definitely ready for more ass-kicking right now. We’re all ready for more ass-kicking.

  I lift my dress slightly as we make our way down the stairs, trying not to step on the fragile fabric of my skirt, but when I see the princes waiting for us at the bottom of the stairs, all decked out in sexy clothes, I still nearly trip over —quite literally— nothing.

  Wow. F-ing wow. They’re... If we didn’t have to leave, I’d drag them into the nearest bedroom and have my way with them.

  Finn is wearing a very well-fitted suit. His dark hair pulled back and he looks like a totally different person, while still exactly the same. It’s like he’s some mega-rich superhero version of himself. He’d looked sexy during the breakfast at the start of the year, but it’s like he’s dialled up the sexiness a hundred times this time.

  Next to him is Rune, wearing a very simple, but expensive-looking, shirt with pants that look like they’re made from some sort of leather, with hooks down the side of his legs, showing a little of how one leg is still wrapped in bandages and the blackness of the area around it. But if these are ceremonial dragon-shifter clothes, I guess they need to be easy to take off, as I suspect that shifting into a dragon is probably an important part of it. Right?

  Bane is standing next to Rune, not wearing a shirt at all, but wearing pants that look very, very, very good on him... They’re a soft green and look to be some sort of linen-like fabric. They have laces down the side, again, probably to make it easy to strip out of them to shift. He’s also wearing thick silver bands around his wrists, the only jewellery on him.

  Finally, almost standing in front of Rune, is Kit, looking a lot fancier than any of the others. His chest is covered in black swirls, though unlike his magical ones, these aren’t moving under his skin, simply static painted on swirls. He’s wearing something around his hips that looks like a kilt or something, in a fabric so black it almost looks like a dark purple, and he’s darkened his eyes too. He’s wearing a necklace with a simple hanger on it and a couple of rings on his fingers, but the thing that pulls my attention the most are the swirls on his skin. He looks... He looks kinda scary, intense, and really hot, making me heat up on the inside.

  Fucking hell. I have to sit next to them for the next hours? How am I going to manage not to sneak off with one or more of them? Especially when they look at me like that, their eyes smouldering, and like they’ve got the exact same idea as I have?

  Phoenix leans closer, her lips near my ear, so close I feel her hair tickle my shoulder. “Wait until you see Kit’s mother and her court. Kit is dressed very moderately in comparison.”

  “Moderately, how?” I glance her way, but she simply grins at me, winking, as we take the final steps at the bottom of the stairs. Now I’m going to be curious until we meet them, and also very very nervous...


  Meeting even more parents of the ones I love... Great... Like, no pressure. No pressure at all.

  Behind me, Mum claps her hands. “Oh my, you definitely all look the part today. Even I can believe in a prophecy when you’re all looking like that.” She walks around us. “Okay, let’s see. The ones whose parents are coming here, up front.”

  “Not my parents,” Bane grumbles, but still steps next to Kit in front of me, facing Mum.

  Mum smiles softly at him. “Your king then, your uncle, whatever works. The one in power who is related to you by blood, that one.” She looks over to Phoenix’ mum. “I suspect you’ll want to be there already, right? You’re not going to be part of the ‘prophecy group’?”

  “Yeah, I’ll be going ahead.” She steps next to mum, glancing over us. “You’re going to do great. Try to stay calm, whatever happens. You’re here as much to show off your place in the prophecy, as you’re here to protect Litha, while she’s being shown off for the first time. Good luck!” And she darts out the door.

  Mum lets out a slow breath, changing a little now Phoenix’ mum isn’t here anymore, her eyes harder. “I’ll be in the middle on one side, next to Litha, and Phoenix will be on her other side. Finn and Rune will make up the back. Does that sound okay?”

  I nod, looking around, and everyone is looking kind of grim, sensing the change in Mum.

  “I presume everyone has weapons with them? They may try to check, but just glare at them, they won’t do anything if you don’t give in. Like Isis said, you’re there to protect my daughter. You’re there to protect your future queen. You’re there on a single duty, protect her and make sure no harm comes to her.”

  “Mum...” She sounds so dramatic, but when I glance at the guys again, and at Phoenix, they’re taking her very, very seriously, which gives me a strange feeling in my stomach. This isn’t a happy thing we’re going to do, is it? Sure, they’re here about the attack, become part of the discussions on what to do next, but everyone is looking much grimmer than makes sense.