Diago welcomed his guest with a big hug.

“Thank you for coming, Istaìnn.”

The Prince Consort waved off the effusions of his friend with a gesture of his hand.

„Let’s talk about business. How is she?”

„Bad” sighted Diago. „She hasn’t left her room for three days since the fight, does not talk, and didn’t eat anything. We’re worried sick.”

„They’re like this at her age,” said Istaìnn condescendingly, with the unconsciousness of a parent who is incapable of imagining his own progeniture doing the wrong or stupid stuff other teenagers do.

They went to Vellantina’s room. Diago knocked but received no answer.

„You have a guest, Vella,” he said. No reply. He sighed, discouraged, but his friend knocked on the door in a specific pattern: toc, toctoc, toctoc.

After a few seconds, the same rhythm replied from the inside. But no key sound to indicate that Vella had opened the door. Istaìnn smiled and transported himself inside the room, using his ability to make wormholes.

„Pickaboo!” he said, like when she was little, and they played hide and seek.

„Ha, ha, ha!” she replied, not laughing, throwing herself on the bed, face-up, starring at the ceiling.

He approached the bed and sat on its margin, examining her. The girl had big bags under her eyes and dried tears marks all over the face. He waited and waited, but she didn't speak a word. At some point, he got up.

„I see all is going well, so I’d better go.”

„All’s going well?” she asked, surprised, raising her head. „What?”

He sniffed the stalled air of the room.

„It’s obvious you’re ok, just training to become an assassin. Your smell could kill a weaker man. If you’d go to a prom, now, the boys would fall before you. Literally.”

He got a small laugh as a reply.

“Seriously,” he continued, “can we go somewhere else and have a talk? I’m feeling sick.”

“Is it so bad?” she asked.

“Words cannot describe it. If someone had told me that a young lady could stink so badly, I would not have believed it. Come!”

He offered his hand, and in the next second, they were in another place. In the open air, on a porch. The warm light of the sun bathed the patio and behind them was an elven treehouse. They were atop a very tall tree, and all-around was only woods.

“How beautiful!” she exclaimed.

“Indeed, so! We’re in the Forest. My elf cousin and godfather, Faredhiel, built this, and I inherited this and all his woodland and farms around after… well, after the Second Moon events. Quite a prime location of elven real estate. But this is not what I wanted us to talk about.”

“I was wondering when you’d bring it on, uncle! Bring it. Hit me!”

She had put her hands on her hips, looking fierce.

“Do you mind not staying in the wind, please? We’ll talk after you take a shower. Meanwhile, I’ll bring something to eat. You’ll find clothes from the queens or Estella inside, just throw your clothes through the window, please. They’ll become one with nature, eventually. I just hope your nightgown will not become alive and start eating some poor soul below.”

While he tunneled himself away, she obeyed. Like most girls, she did not consider personal hygiene negligence something to be proud of. When she got out, dressed in a too wide t-shirt and a too-large pair of jeans, the table was set. Pancakes, hot coffee, tea, he had brought all from the city's royal residence in a blink of an eye.

“Delicious!”

She ate half a dozen of the pancakes.

“Well, they should be. They are made with a rhum based filling and burnt orange liquor on top. Our cook is one of the best. And the coffee is from my parents' plantation in the Grand Island of the Archipelago. The most honest coffee on the island, not too fancy, not too plain, a little acid. Just perfect.”

“Mmmm!”

Finally, she burped discreetly, not too loud to be rude, not too soft to be considered a girl, not a warrior.

“I’m a failure, Istaìnn. A fraud.” she attacked, knowing the discussion was inevitable.

„Well, you screwed the exam, that’s true. Barely passed it, I heard. Dora thinks you shouldn't continue on the second cycle; Diago thinks there is still hope for you.”

„What?” Her jaw had dropped. „Aren’t you supposed to say: you’re just a kid, you are supposed to make mistakes, you did the best you could? The way adults are supposed to talk!”

„I’m not an adult, Vella. I just pretend to be,” he joked. „Now, seriously, you didn’t perform well. You should have let your friend be once you saved her. At least, this is what Dora said. If she had killed the beauhemian in the safe zone, she would have still been disqualified, but you could have returned to your target. And maybe you would have saved Jorge from being injured. Restraining Shindariel after she went berserk was a good decision, but maybe it would have been better to let her have a go on the beauhemian and return to the main fight. We’ll never know.”

She started crying, and he offered his handkerchief.

„How is Jorge?”

The prince hesitated.

„Considering the circumstances, well. He lost his toes on the right foot; they were separated by the blade. The rest is there. Most doctors have magic powers nowadays; they stopped the bleeding on the spot and any possible infection. I’ve visited him, he does not harbor any bad feelings towards you. On the contrary, he’s proud he was the one to take down Donarl. And he said that in your place, he would have done the same. He decided to go on with the next cycle.”

„Did he? He was our second-best runner, that’s...”

„We don’t need only runners, Vella. Or fighters. We need logistics as well, communications, pilots, and who knows, maybe the dwarven prosthetics I paid for will let him run too. He still dares to go on; that’s the most important. Shindariel was disqualified, and three will not follow through with the next cycle. They got afraid, seeing the gore and Jorge hurt. It is not a job for the faint-hearted. For my part, I agree with Diago, not with Dora. Decisions have to be made on the spot, and you must live with them. As I did when I sent my cousin to his death, exploding that moon and the invader army with him. As I did when I broke Fits Patrifoy’s tunnel, breaking apart families.”

„But saving half of the Beauhemians.”

„Separating Ejlsa, our friend, from her daughter... If you think you had a bad day, yes, I agree, you had. You made mistakes. But you’ll learn to make better and faster decisions next time. And if you’ll go wrong again, you’ll have to accept the consequences, again. This is how the system works, Vella. All the pretend the Royals are perfect and all is under control is very, very subjective. But we try our best, yes, as you said.”

„Is it hard to live with it? I mean like for you, with the Beauhemians, and so on.”

„That’s easy, Vella. I didn't have many choices; it had to be done. I have performed much worse things in my life. If you want, I’ll tell you the worst thing I ever did.”

„But of course, uncle” she nodded very fast. „Knowing the worse about the Consort Prince would be a pleasure.”

He took a more comfortable position on the chair.

„It’s about your step-cousins, my children. Estella and Ulius. The twin-queens were due to deliver at about the same time, maybe a few days apart. That’s because the moons are making all women on the Realm have their...”

„Err... uncle... please spare me the details. I mean, we learned about the stuff at school, but it makes me uncomfortable imagining you and the aunts... you know. Gross!”

„Ok, ok. Sorry. Anyway, guess what brilliant idea, big quotes marks on brilliant, came to my mind.”

„What, what?” she asked eagerly.

„Darlings, I’ve said. Wouldn’t it be better that instead of calling the midwife, you let me do some magic on you? Fast delivery, painless, and all. I had all imagined in my head. And, poor them, they said yes. They trusted me, you know.”

„Oh, uncle... Don’t tell me it hurt!”

He sighted the most in-depth sight possible.

„The opposite. Didn’t hurt at all. In a minute, all was over. One of the queens pushes, the baby’s out, woaaa, woaaa, I take the baby, put it on a bed, cut the chord, heal her – in a second she was like new - then the second one goes as easy as the first, so I put the baby away and heal her too.”

„And what was the problem, then?” she asked, not understanding where the story was going.

„In the heat of the moment, I forgot to notice where I put each baby. Who was whose, what sex had the first and the second? We didn’t have any way to tell who was the mother, for both of them.”

„Oh, wow! Uncle, that makes me consider celibacy as a good option! If you’d done that to me, your skin would be now in place of this rug.”

„Yes, it was that bad, wasn’t it?”

„And did you found eventually, who and...”

„No. Never. I tried magic, but it didn’t work. The girls tried science, it didn’t work either. I can tell you how mad they were at me...”

Vellantina started laughing so hard she kicked a plate out of the table.

„ ...then we discussed it all, like adults, and agreed to raise them both as each queen would have been their mother. That’s why we call them pseudo-twins. So, you see that there can be even worse things than the one that you did, Vellantina.”

„I don’t know. I’ve hurt people... Do you really think I’m fit to continue?”

„Yes. And, what’s more important, Estella thinks so too. Her powers see you as a future brilliant warrior. Or a terrible army driver. Or a logistic wizard, the best army food provisioner in the East. Her powers are vague in the long term. But in short, she definitively thinks you should continue.”

As the girl sat quiet, thinking what was said over and over, he reached a paper-wrapped small pack.

„At least, consider it. The summer is long, there is plenty of time, and I have a proposition for you who might make your choice easier. If you’ll accept, it comes with a gift. Go on, unwrap it.”

Under the paper, a small leather box. In it a holster, and in the holster a small revolver. Next to it, a few cardboard packages with bullets.

„A gun!” she exclaimed. „Never seen one save in drawings. Is it safe?”

„As safe, it can be. Even Ulius, with his powers, couldn’t break it. I’ve imagined the system, and the girls helped build it. It has many gold, brass, and rubies arranged in intricated mechanisms and magic runes to dampen or enhance the Realm magic field to a constant level. It will not blow on you or fizzle, as guns usually do. It will go through any shield, magic or otherwise; its penetration power is immense. The gun costs not one, but two fortunes, and it is the first weapon of his kind built on the Realm.”

„And what’s the condition?” she asked.

„The condition is to be your step-cousins protector for the summer. Ulius and Estella’s guard. You’ll go with them to d’Ornia; we send them there because the summer is not so hot.”

Her face darkened.

“That’s where my half-brother and dad’s ex live.”

“Yes, and you’ll get the occasion to bond with your brother. Don’t tell me that a fierce warrior is afraid of meeting some family. So, what do you say?”

In a typical teenage fashion, she sat thinking for a few seconds, then asked sheepishly.

“Do I some money for the job too?”