Verena picked at her breakfast. Milisen and the others were glaring at her. Mislav noticed and cleared his throat. “Might I ask what is wrong this morning, Mili?”
“Verena should learn to keep her mouth shut.” Milisen gave her youngest sister a murderous look.
“They are angry with Ver because they think she caught them sneaking out last night.” Niklas fixed the oldest of his sisters with a dark look. “Mili, Ver was not the one who told father you were sneaking out. Astera and I were the ones who told him.”
“You what?” Milisen turned her glare on her older brother.
“That is true, Milisen.” Mislav regarded his older daughters with some heat. “Verena never spoke to me. Nik and I ordered the servants to lock the door and change the code to something I gave them so you could not leave the suite. I knew if you could not open the door, you would eventually go back to bed.”
“You cannot keep us locked in here like prisoners.” Milisen turned on her father angrily.
“I am not your mother, Milisen.” Mislav’s tone was severe. “I told you five years ago when I packed her off back to her family the nocturnal activities had to stop. You proceeded to ignore me and continued. I have had to resort to extreme measures to ensure I can find you husbands, which I am still having a hard time doing because of your reputations.”
“Men should be lining up to marry us because of how good we are in bed.” Ismat’s whining voice was petulant and unpleasant to listen to.
“Men want wives who have not slept with other men and who are not likely to cheat on them at the first opportunity,” Mislav pointed out. “You four do not fit those requirements.”
“I notice you do not include Verena in that.” Nefari glared accusingly at her father.
“That is because Verena is still a virgin, has never given me any concern, and when the time comes, I am certain I will have no problem finding her a husband.” Mislav looked coolly at Nefari, who squirmed a little under the look. “She is twenty one, so I have time. Milisen, you are thirty-seven. I am running out of time to find you a husband. I might as well send you back to Henebore and tell Egil and Julian to find something useful for you to do.”
“I am not too old to marry,” Milisen snapped.
“You are getting close to being too old to have children,” Mislav pointed out. “The rest of you are also in your thirties. A woman’s value lies in the number of children she can produce.”
“It is Verena’s fault we are not married. Everyone compares us to her.” Ismat continued with the petulance.
“I would say it is more your fault you are being compared to your younger sister than hers.” Mislav wasn’t going to let up, and Verena knew she was in for another bad day.
“You give Verena all the pretty clothes and the nice jewelry,” Nefari began.
“Verena has exactly two sets of jewelry, and they are the same sets of jewelry she has had since she was sixteen.” Mislav cut her off. “Verena gets the same gowns you do when fashion changes. It is not her fault you four do not know how to utilize the stylists and dressmakers properly. You are older than her. You have more experience with this than she does. You should be better than her at this.”
Verena sighed quietly. She was very glad she’d gotten better at escaping her sisters over the past five years. Otherwise, she’d be in for another beating that day. Her father was doing her no favors. Verena finished eating while her sisters glared at her and sullenly ate their breakfast.
“What is everyone doing this morning?” Mislav asked.
“We are going out to the gardens.” Nefari looked at the other three and they nodded.
“So am I.” Verena knew what would happen if they caught her, but she thought she could escape them easily enough.
“Milisen, Nefari, Ismat, Zdena, if Verena comes back injured, I will lock you in your rooms and you will not see the light of day until I put you on a ship for Henebore.” Mislav could already see what his older daughters were thinking.
“You always blame us for her injuries,” Milisen whined.
“Because you are the only ones who attack her.” Niklas glared at his sisters.
Verena pulled on a light jacket and headed out. It was spring, and things were warming up, but it was still slightly chilly this early in the morning. Verena wandered through the gardens, chatting with various acquaintances and enjoying the scents of early blooming flowers.
She found herself in the evergreen garden and decided to retrace her steps and go back to the suite. Before she could turn around, a blow to her back sent her staggering forward. She turned and saw her sisters. “I do not care what father says,” Milisen hissed. “You are the reason we are not married. If you were not here, we would have more nice clothes and fine jewelry. Your existence is a blight on our lives.” They surrounded her and attacked.
Verena ducked, twisted, and lunged out of the way. Nefari caught her across the cheek, clawing her and digging gouges into her pale skin. Milisen caught her across the mouth, leaving her spitting blood. Ismat nailed her in the left side, causing her to gasp for breath.
Verena needed to get away from them. She saw an opening and took it, dashing between Zdena and Milisen and running down the path. Her sisters pursued her, determined to leave her broken and battered in the garden as they had in the past. Verena frantically looked around for somewhere to escape. She saw a narrow opening in a tall hedge and ducked through.
“Hello.” A handsome young man regarded her with some surprise. “I do not usually see people brave the guards and force their way into our garden.” His eyes flicked to her cheek and his affable smile turned to concern. “Are you all right?”
Verena saw two men in power armor and noticed two more coming up behind her. She realized this was one of the private gardens and that she was in serious trouble. “I am so sorry,” Verena quickly started backing up. “I did not realize this was a private garden.” She glanced over her shoulder and saw her sisters prowling around outside the opening she’d come through. She bowed her head. She was going to get mauled if she went out there, but it was forbidden to enter the private gardens. “I – I will leave.”
“Please wait.” The young man put up his hand. “You look like you are in some kind of trouble, and even I can see the rather murderous looks on the four women’s faces out there. Who are they?”
Verena hesitated. She didn’t like talking about the private issues going on in her family with anyone. Yet her sisters’ attacks on her were public knowledge in the lower court. “They are my older sisters.” She spoke hesitantly, not sure how much to say. “I do not know if they will actually kill me this time, but they are going to try. They will definitely leave me battered and broken somewhere in the gardens.”
“Why?” The young man waved the men in power armor back.
“Because they blame me for everything going wrong in their lives, even though it is all their own fault.” Verena grimaced. “Our mother encouraged that line of thought, and even though father divorced her five years ago and sent her packing, my sisters were already adults by that point, and the damage was done.”
“I see. Drive them off, at gunpoint if you have to. I do not want them anywhere near this garden.” Verena realized he was speaking to the men in power armor. Two of the men bowed and marched out. Her sisters shrieked as they were driven off. The young man patted the bench he was sitting on. “What is your name? Who is your family?”
Verena sat down next to him. Her heart was racing, and she needed to catch her breath. “Verena Kelcrag. My father is Lord Mislav Kelcrag, representative of Henebore. We are lower court nobles, so you most likely would not have heard of us.”
“I am Ethian Valspur.” The smile had returned.
It took a moment for the name to register. “Ethian? Prince Ethian?” Verena was horrified all over again. She was in the Imperial family’s private garden. “Your Imperial Highness, please forgive me. I did not know I was invading the Imperial family’s private area.” She started to rise. She was going to be in such trouble if anyone found out she’d barged into the Imperial garden.
Ethian put a hand on her arm. “Verena, it is all right. Stay for a while until you have calmed down. You will do yourself harm if you run off in the state you are in. And you can call me Ethian. I do not mind.”
Verena sank back down on the bench. She was trying to catch her breath, and she knew she must be shaking. “Thank you, Ethian.” She smiled at him shyly.
“Do your sisters do this often?” Ethian asked.
“It has been a regular occurrence for the past eleven years.” Verena sighed. “It got worse after father divorced mother and he came down hard on them. They blame me for the divorce as well.”
“If they are older than you, they must be more than old enough to be married.” Ethian frowned. “Are their husbands not willing to step in and do something about them?”
“They do not have husbands. That is one of father’s main sticking points with them.” Verena knew she shouldn’t be talking about family matters with a stranger, but when the crown prince of the empire asked you a question, you didn’t prevaricate. You told him the truth.
“Is there something wrong with your sisters that they are not married?” Ethian asked.
“There is a lot wrong with my sisters.” Verena smiled wryly. “But to answer the question you were trying to ask, they are extremely promiscuous. They have been sleeping their way around the lower court since each of them turned eighteen. Mother never curtailed them, and it destroyed their reputation. They are not attractive, we are not that wealthy, and with that reputation, my father cannot find them husbands. Milisen is thirty seven and running out of time to be able to have a child. Father has said he will send them back to Henebore, but Uncle Egil and Uncle Julian keep finding reasons why they will not take them.”
“I take it your uncles are the only ones who can take them?” Ethian asked.
“My uncle is the Lord Governor of Henebore. He and his husband are the only members of the family who have no other children so they can afford my sisters. Everyone else has several children to tend to themselves,” Verena explained.
“That has to be hard on you.” Ethian gave her a concerned look.
“It is not easy living with those four.” Verena rubbed her arms to try to take away some of the chill she felt settling in with the adrenaline wearing off. “Niklas and Astera – that is my older brother and his wife – are easy to get along with, and their children are wonderful. I could stay in the suite in the morning to avoid my sisters, but that would just make me even more miserable. I love the gardens.” She looked around. “I wish I could find the sunfire roses in the regular gardens. They are one of my favorite flowers.”
“They are one of my mother’s favorite flowers too. That is why there are so many of them planted here.” Ethian smiled. “She used to sit by the sunfire rosebush in the courtesan garden for some privacy and father would sneak out to speak to her before they were married.”
“I did not know Her Imperial Majesty was a courtesan before she married His Imperial Majesty.” Verena shook her head. “I am certain my father knows. He just never told me.”
“How old are you, Verena?” Ethian asked.
“I am twenty one, Your Imperial Highness. I just turned twenty one a week ago.” Verena tucked a few strands of hair behind one ear.
“That would explain why you did not know. You were a young child when they got married.” Ethian nodded as if it made sense to him.
Verena tilted her head to one side. “They have been ruling the empire for a long time, have they not?”
“Father has been emperor for around thirty five years now. Mother has been empress for the last thirteen years.” Ethian paused for a moment. “At least I think that is right. I do not always keep the years straight.”
“She must have been very popular when he married her.” Verena smiled as she thought of the empress. “She is very beautiful and very wise.”
“The power brokers tried to assassinate her both before and after they were married.” Ethian looked angry. “All because of Lynet.”
“Who was Lynet?” Verena asked.
“His first wife. She was a courtesan his original council forced him to marry. Their goal was to get her pregnant so they could kill him and have a puppet emperor they could control because he was proving to be too problematic.” Ethian looked sober as he spoke. “Father subverted them by getting the rest of his courtesans pregnant, naming me his heir after all six of us were born, and eventually executing Lynet for treason after we all disappeared when she told the other courtesans of a murder plot against us.”
“Starflare, that is awful.” Verena stared at him, wide-eyed.
“Yes, but what is worse is she is the one who was planning on murdering us, not the council as she told our mothers. My parents told me the whole story a while ago, when I got a little too rebellious and made the mistake of asking why I had to be crown prince.” He chuckled. “Twenty-year-old males are not overly bright.”
“Neither are twenty-year-old females.” Verena laughed. “I think it has to do with the fact that we are just old enough to think we know everything and just young enough to get away with it.”
Ethian laughed. “That could be it,” he agreed. “My parents sat me and Fallon, one of my brothers, down and told us the whole story. Fallon and I knew some of the story, but not the whole of it.”
“Why is that?” Verena asked.
“Once Marin was found, she told Fallon what she knew of the story. Mother did the same with me.” Ethian shrugged. “No one thought to fill us in on the whole thing though, so father explained his side of it and the events that our mothers were not here to see.”
“Were not here to see? I thought Imperial courtesans never left their wing.” Verena was now very confused.
“Lynet, as empress, manufactured the escape of all six courtesans in order to convince my father to let her take us away from them.” Ethian looked thoughtful. “She wanted to prove they were unfit mothers and thought that them taking us and disappearing would be a good way to do it. She did not count on my father knowing our mothers better than she thought, and she did not expect to trip herself up and get executed for treason.”
“You have five brothers?” Verena asked.
“I have four brothers. Rhys died.”
From the expression on his face, Verena knew that was not a topic he wanted to discuss, so she changed the subject. “I have seen you and someone I would assume is Prince Fallon on our rare nights at court and at the high feasts. What do your other brothers do?”
“Meinard is the liaison between the specialist academies and the education districts. He is very good at it and has resolved so many issues over the past nine years that Runa would normally have to solve that she is ready to hug him next time she sees him.” Ethian grinned. “You have probably seen him and his wife with us during the winter festival.”
“Is Meinard the auburn-haired man with the pretty brunette for a wife?” Verena asked, thinking back to the high table at the last winter festival.
“That is them.” Ethian nodded. “Jair is liaison with the colonies. He does not make it home. He stays on Daaruta.”
“Are the colonies really that troublesome?” Verena asked.
“It is more that we used to get sporadic reports and often did not hear of issues until they were near catastrophic. Jair is on hand to deal with things when they happen, so problems do not get out of control.” The way Ethian explained it made sense to Verena. “My last brother, Hanzo, is who knows where. Officially he is assigned to Lord Durden here on the Throne World. Lord Durden has him traveling anywhere there is a conflict, dealing with things in person for him. We never see Hanzo anymore, even if he is on the Throne World.”
“Is it not dangerous to have an Imperial prince in combat zones?” Verena asked.
“It would be, if Hanzo was an ordinary Imperial prince.” Ethian lowered his voice. “We think, though neither Lord Durden nor Hanzo has confirmed this, that he is being trained to take Lord Durden’s place as Warmaster General.”
“What does Prince Fallon do? You mentioned him but did not say what his job is.” Verena thought to the red-haired man she saw sitting next to Ethian at the high table.
Ethian burst out laughing. “Fallon’s job is to keep me out of trouble. Right now, he is my gatekeeper and my aide. When I become emperor, he will take his place as my chief advisor on my council.”
“Your gatekeeper?” Verena asked.
“If you want to get in to see me, you have to get past Fallon first.” Ethian seemed very grateful for that. “He has cut down on the number of interruptions to my day that I have. He handles some things, sends some to our father, outright tells some people no, and then sends a few on to me.”
“Does he not resent his position?” Verena asked.
“Not at all. It was his idea to become my gatekeeper. He also says things I cannot, which makes my job so much easier.” Ethian’s smile was thoughtful. “I have to be diplomatic, compassionate, and kind. Or at the very least remain completely neutral. Fallon can be politely rude to people.”
“How can you be politely rude to someone?” Verena giggled.
“I am not certain how he does it, but he is very good at it.” Ethian also laughed again. “It has stopped some of the more opinionated lords from pestering us at meals, that is certain.”
“Thank you for letting me stay in the garden, Ethian.” Verena glanced around at the little oasis of peace she’d found, even if only for a few minutes. “I should probably go, though.”
“Will your sisters still be lurking?” Ethian asked.
“Most likely.” Verena sighed. “They will be there until we have to go in for lunch. Father is brutal if we are late for meals.”
“What time is it?” Ethian asked, looking over his shoulder at one of the guards. She realized she should have recognized the Imperial guards when she dashed past them.
“If they keep to the standard court schedule, it is another hour until lunch,” the guard told him, glancing at a readout in his armor.
“I do not want you getting hurt, Verena.” Ethian smiled. “I am certain we can find something to talk about for another hour.”
Verena smiled and looked around. “You say the sunfire roses are here because of the empress?” she asked.
“Yes. My mother loved the sunfire roses, and as we do not want to constantly be waylaid by my very touchy sister Kaelea and my exceedingly talkative younger sister Ismaeli, she does not go out to the courtesan garden anymore.” Ethian glanced around the garden. “Mother says Kaelea, who is eleven, is understandably touchy. Father says he remembers my brothers being sensitive at that age as well, but he always thought that was because they were about to be separated from their mothers.”
“Separated from their mothers?” Verena asked.
“Father found the other courtesans before he found my mother,” Ethian explained. “We were all in hiding, but mother hid me the longest. The rule of the courtesan wing was that no male twelve and older could be around the courtesans unless they were a eunuch.”
“I see why they might be resentful.” Verena could see where that might be a problem for the princes.
“Fallon said the only one who gave father issues was Rhys, but Rhys was a troublemaker his entire life.” Ethian grimaced and again there was that shadow that told Verena talking about Rhys was something Ethian didn’t like doing.
“How old were you when he found you?” Verena asked.
“I was fifteen, only a few months from my sixteenth birthday,” Ethian told her.
“Ethian, you say your mother hid you until you were fifteen. How did she do that?” Verena asked. “I have seen the empress. From a distance, mind you. I am in the lower court, and the great hall is huge, so I have never gotten a good look at her. But from what I have seen of her, she is strikingly beautiful. And you look almost exactly like the emperor. How in the name of all the stars did she hide you?”
“Let me tell you the story. That should take up most of the time we have left.” Ethian smiled. He told of his unconventional life on the colony world of Covus, and how he grew resentful and lonely because of how his mother raised him.
“In a way, I understand the loneliness.” Verena regarded him solemnly when he finished. “I have no friends either. My sisters would do whatever they could to destroy any relationship I had.”
“We are friends, are we not?” Ethian asked.
“Are we?” Verena was startled. “I think I would like that if we were.”
“Verena, I will clear this with my parents and let my brother know, because you are likely to run into Fallon out here as well as me.” Ethian took hold of one of her hands. “If you need to escape your sisters, run into the garden. I will make certain the guards do not stop you. You will be safe in here because your sisters will not be permitted inside.”
“Are you certain it will be all right?” Verena asked, desperate for safety but fearful of what it could mean if she accepted.
“I am very certain. I will speak to my parents this afternoon.” Ethian seemed so sure of himself that she found her doubt melting away.
“All right. If you are certain it will be allowed.” Verena smiled shyly at him, suddenly feeling overwhelmed again.
“I am.” Ethian gave her a reassuring smile.
“It is time to go in, Your Imperial Highness,” one of the guards said. “Most likely for your lovely young friend too.”
“If it is lunch time, then yes, I need to get back to our suite.” Verena rose to her feet. “Thank you, Ethian.”
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Verena.” The two parted company and Verena made her way back to the palace. She decided not to tell her father about her new friend. She didn’t want him trying to leverage it to his advantage, and she didn’t want her sisters to ruin it.
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