Royal Affairs 3 (FT, Closed, attn Vipra)

[Alversia]

A groan escaped Nylia as she rolled over in her bed, stuck in the most frustrating position of being both too tired to fully waken yet far too alert to ever drop back to sleep. She lay there, paralysed in a state of exhaustion while she heard the birds sing and play, twitter and scrap with one another in the garden just beyond the window. Turning her head -even that felt like it took an extraordinary effort- she looked to see a clear blue sky so beautiful and perfect that it could not fail to lift the spirits. Or rather, it would have done, were it real. By now, the Alumina was far too used to the windows that showed nothing but what their occupants desired, painting the perfect picture of nature when in reality all she was looking at was a recess in the armour that surrounded this room, that surrounded the entire building. She had gotten used to it in the years that she had been living in the palace to the point that she barely remembered it was there. Only now, when she was low on sleep and low on energy that she recalled it and stared at the window, turning lethargically to give it her full attention. She watched it for a moment longer before it struck her that she was really doing it just to postpone the inevitable. She was now lying tangled in the blankets of the bed and she stretched, feeling that softness brush against her fur, claws extending from her fingers and footpads before once again rescinding, a feline whine escaping her throat before dying away to leave just the birds again.

With an effort, she lifted herself up and stretched again, arms pushed to the side and chest thrust out, eyes squeezed shut. She had been waiting for this day for months now, counting it down and having the days fly by until just a week before when the slightest bud of doubt had appeared in her mind. From there, it had grown more and more in her mind until the evening before. She had lain awake all week but last night she had tossed and turned more than ever until sleep had forcefully taken her. Now it was here and the emotions swilled around in her stomach, a mixture of pleasure and nervousness that brought her tail to life in a mad display of flickering. Today was an important day for her and she hoped that Thanalli felt the same about it as she did.

She had been this nervous before, so much so that she could barely sleep her breathing under control. The first had been when she was about go off to basic training for the first time, back on Alumi when she was little more than a kitten. The first time she had been away from her village and the first time she had been surrounded by strange and unfriendly faces. The second had been in this very palace, five and a half years ago when she had waited in a side room to meet with the Imperatrix of the Imperium for the first time. She had been about to take on the role of minder and guardian of Princess Javaelli. The third and most recent time she had been this anxious had been five years ago today. Or rather, it had been around this time when she had been waiting to make the biggest commitment of her life to the woman she loved.

Having cajoled herself up, the feline stretched again, hands reaching up towards the ceiling or as close as she could get. Given the ceilings had been designed for Atorans, there was plenty of room left when she finally stopped and fished out a robe. She threw it over her pearly-white frame and tied it at her wide hips before taking another deep breath. The bedroom was empty, Thanalli having risen before her as always. Normally she was not long in following her wife but today she had lain on and the Atoran never begrudged her a few minutes extra or, in this case, a lot of extra minutes. It was though, at last, time for her to make her appearance. She knew she looked a mess; her fur was all messy and her hair unkempt from the night before but then Thanalli often preferred the wild kitty look. She rummaged around in the pockets, searching for the item she had smuggled there the previous night before the Imperatrix had returned. All night, her mind had been fixated on it, fear and concern rolling over and over in her mind. She knew she had told Thanalli a few weeks ago about what would happen, an advanced warning, but she did not know if she remembered. The Atoran rarely forgot anything but given all that was happening, the pressures of her daily life. She tried to brace herself for a disappointment in case that was exactly what had happened.

She headed to the dining room, where she knew her wife would be finishing up her breakfast and gathering herself for another day of trying to control the gargantuan monster that was the Imperium. She herself would inevitably have a list of appearances, dedications and visits to make at various functions to spread the profile of the Imperial family. It was not a job she had particularly enjoyed when she had first married Thanalli but over the years, she had grown more comfortable. Well, it was more accurate to say she had grown better at hiding her discomfort at being the centre of attention in front of hundreds or potentially thousands of people. As she approached, her hips swayed with every step like a lioness on the prowl, footsteps silent on the tiled floor. Not that it made much of a difference. She may have been a trained commando but even she could not keep her presence from Thanalli under any but the most trying of circumstances.

Still, as she approached she made sure to come from the side, just so she would not startle her if she was deep in thought. People who startled Thanalli tended not to forget it in a hurry. Leaning in, she kissed her softly on the cheek and murmured into her ear, “Happy anniversary.”

Drinking in her form as she dipped her soft hand in her pocket, she pulled out a small string of beds. They were old and worn down, any shine they may have once possessed having long been robbed from them. To the casual eye, they were little more than pieces of junk but to Nylia they were amongst her most precious of possessions,
“I know we don’t normally exchange presents or anything silly like that,” she said with a nervous voice, tail flickering behind her. She was fully aware that she was echoing her conversation of a few weeks past, “but…well…this year is different. We’ve been married for five years.” The time had flown for her, to the point that it seemed not to have passed at all. Not once had she regretted her decision and every time she laid eyes upon the love of her life, she felt a bubble of happiness well up inside her and threaten to pop into giddy delirium, “and in my culture, five years is a milestone. We normally exchange personal gifts to affirm our commitment to one another. You probably haven’t bothered and that’s fine but…well…I wanted to give you this.”

She handed her the beads to Thanalli, so small and insignificant in her hands. Nylia felt a lurch in her stomach as she handed them over, as if she were handing over a part of herself, “they were Nemmi’s,” she gulped, pain welling up at the mere mention of her deceased sister, “when we were kittens, we were given beads to play with. I was such a careless girl that I lost mine within a day. I was devastated, because they were the first presents I’d been given. Nemmi…Nemmi gave me hers. She never asked for them back…she never asked for any payment…she never asked for them back…she just let me have the first thing she’d ever been given.” Nylia could feel the tears starting to build in her eyes as she recalled perfectly the moment she’d been given them and the smile on her muzzle as she’d made her sister happy, “I’ve held them ever since but…but I want you to have them now…a commitment…to show just how much you mean to me…” She felt the first drop run down her cheek, tail going limp but with a smile on her muzzle. It betrayed the myriad of feelings coursing through her from sorrow at what she had lost to joy at what she had gained.

[Vipra]

To most any Viprans this would have been a completely normal day, there was no significance religious nor was there any sort of state holiday. To Thanalli though it was an important occasion, and because of that she made especial care. The atoran woman rose before the break of dawn, blue eyes opening and her mind in motion at the same instant before carefully extricating herself from bed without waking her wife. It was easy enough; years of practice had given her an edge. A scraping followed, the typical routine of removing excess and dirty body slime a methodical one that left her blue-skinned body and the five headstalks that trailed down her back from her head impeccable. Careful not to make too much noise she slid on the black robes of state and tied it neatly with an ultramarine sash knotted against her left hip before placing two necklaces around her neck and putting on her half-mask. The golden upper-face matched her own but gave her an untouchable air when mixed with the consistently stern expression she preferred. With a final glance at the prone alumina spread across her bed, thoughts and memories rushing through her for that brief moment before she tore herself away, the Imperatrix left her bed chambers.

Instantly a flurry of bureaucrats fell upon her, well meaning as they reminded her of meetings with provincial leaders and the weekly convening with the admiralty board among so many other matters of state. Brushing off the cloying administrative fodder was as easy as a stern glare and they fled into the woodwork to lie in wait for when she was more affable to their intent. As they scattered through the vast halls of her palace, sandaled feet clacking against the mosaic floor, Thanalli found her way to the dining hall and entered the robust room. A single large table of a singular slab of carved wood, more chairs than were ever necessary lining it as well as tipping both ends, and two chandeliers of silvered serpents holding lights in their mouths hanging from the ceiling made it feel proper to the Imperatrix.

Taking a seat at the head of the table, the legs of the chair squeaking against the hardwood floor as she pulled it out and then scooched back in, waiters ushered out from the adjoining kitchen with trays covered in the various delights of her morning routine. A servant placed two cups of glossy grey china quarter-filled with ice shavings as well as a matching pot of steaming water and four small syrup jars, completing the set with two small spoons before she returned to the kitchens. She picked up the syrup jars one after the other she poured them into the cups, two of green and red colour into one while the other china glass received a blue and brown mix of thick liquid. Next she poured the water into each, an acrid scent rising from the first while the second was delicately sweet.

She considered how appropriate it was that one was off-putting, an intimidating drink that offered little more than stinging and trepidation by itself, only palatable when combined with its sugary and far more pleasant partner. With a little chuf of amusement she stirred the glasses with different spoons before setting aside the used utensils and picking up the caustic glass. The scent alone made her eyes water a little, and there was a moment of trepidation before she downed the entire cup in a shot, holding the tail end in her mouth where it burned like the strongest alcohol. Tingling in her tongue told her it was time to swallow, and she finished off the harsh drink before grabbing the next cup. Normally it would have been aromatic and earthy, a treat just to leave around and enjoy the presence of, but the taste in her mouth dominated her senses until she took a quick swig from the teacup and swirled it around in her mouth. It was smooth, a little thick, and sweet like a finely processed caramel as it clung to her palate, supplanting the bitter drink entirely by the time she placed the china back to the tray. The taste of the second half of the Farthii Tea would stay with her for hours.

Placing the cup down as she set aside her idle contemplations of the dualistic qualities within her tea, Thanalli considered what today meant to her. A wedding anniversary. She had not really considered it to be of any particular import; she knew that other cultures celebrated it but had never contemplated it for herself. It was such an oddity, marking importance to the date of a wedding. Why not apply it to the first time you met, or perhaps the first lovemaking? Both were ostensibly more important than the religious ceremony confirming what is already felt and making it known to the gods. The divinities could celebrate it if they felt like reducing themselves to mortal dramas, but for most all atoran, Imperials of the proper Farthii culture, and Juntists it was a silly gesture. Particularly due to polyamorous marriages that could become so large as to make anniversary celebrations untenable. They’d never get anything done for the flowers and gifts piled everywhere. Thanalli smirked at that thought as she smeared some meat paste across her toast with a thick knife.

As she slid cool metal across crunching crisped bread, crumbs falling to the plate below, the Imperatrix spotted movement in the reflection of the blade, a figure of white fur and wild blonde hair clad in a unadorned robe. Sparing her the game of coyful glances and faux subterfuge, Thanalli placed down her butterknife and bread, brushed her fingers against a cloth, and prepared to turn to her wife. Before she could, lips pressed against her cheek and Nylia whispered to her. The words spoken didn’t mean much, but the intent was what mattered. That was why Thanalli had taken two necklaces instead of one after all.

Turning to absorb the alumina’s form and bask in it, the leader of the Imperium watched as her wife reached into the pocket of her robe and retrieved a small string of beads. They looked old, worn, and battered by the years. A sign of either being tawdry junk casually left to ruin or that they had been well worn and much loved. Given the context, as Thanalli glanced from the trinket to Nylia’s face, she safely assumed the latter as her love began to speak with apprehension tinging her voice. As her wife spoke Thanalli felt guilty for the anxiety that was clearly suffusing her, listening to every word with exacting detail and recognizing it for a repeat of a conversation they’d had only a few days ago. Thanalli was glad for that, for if she hadn’t had the warning this truly would have been a surprise and the monarch would have felt like a proper ass. As it was she felt bad enough for not truly sharing in the significance, but she did her best to share in the feeling as Nylia held her hand out and gave her the beads.

Rolling the the small pierced spheres in her hand they became slick with shiny bodyslime as she listened to the story behind them. Staring down at them, insignificant and ordinary by every scientific rationale, each little bead gained significance as Nylia told her their origin. It was amazing how much emotion something so small could hold, and she listened in silence to her wife’s story of her sister. She knew about Nemmi, their daughter was named after her, and Thanalli knew all the stories. Yet she had never been told about the beads, perhaps only in passing. Heavier in her hand for the knowledge of what they meant to Nylia to give them to her, Thanalli stood up from her chair and embraced her partner. There had been the urge to thank her, or to apologize, but instead she embraced the love of her life and held her close, leaning on her shoulder.

When they pulled apart, Thanalli wordlessly corded the beads around her left wrist and tied them into a bracelet, spinning her arm to show how it looked before she reached up to take her mask off and placed it down on the table. Sadness for Nylia’s loss fresh in her heart lent a specter to her smile and she wrung a hand casually over the beads around her wrist as she spoke with more naked emotion than a decade’s supplicants would ever hear, “Nylia, I,” she said, emotion halting her as it robbed her of all coherent thought for seconds that felt to be minutes before her senses returned and words returned to her, “thank you. I will cherish them.” Reaching up she brushed the tear from Nylia’s cheek, leaving her hand there and enjoying the silent connection with her.

The weight of the second necklace hung both literally and proverbially around her neck though, and Thanalli drew back her hands to her shoulders to undo the latch and pull the metal necklace and the pendant into her right hand. She let it rest there, peering at it with a small smile, before presenting it to Nylia. A thin silver chain of immaculate links so tightly pressed that the necklaces to all appearances looked like a string of solid metal, and resting midway through the length a small pendant of cracked opal clasped in hooks of silver. It reminded Thanalli of many good times, and one really bad, but mostly good. Holding it out she let Nylia look it over before explaining, “You know I don’t talk about my family much, hated my mother and never got along with any of my sisters except for one and she left us prematurely,” bittersweet memories sprung forth, but she wrestled those away as she waited for Nylia to take the amulet, continuing only after she had, “this was from my father. I loved him, despite his weakness.”

“He was a Horusii and received a lot of shit for that over his life, didn’t help he was a pushover. But he loved us, more than anyone else in my noble house and definitely more than my mother ever did,” The memory of him sitting down and mending dolls was fixed in her mind, how he worked the string through the fabric until every hole was sealed and given it back to her. That doll had been lost at the same time she had lost pretty much everyone, the same time she lost him, “He gave me this pendant when I turned twenty one, he said it would allow the goddess Horut to watch over me and keep me safe. Normally I wouldn’t believe that, I believe in the gods and not supersitition, but,” Thanalli stared into the opal, voice quiet and grave, “it fell off my old necklace somehow, the links broke and it dropped. So I stopped to pick it up. And that was all the difference it took, the bomb went off and I was around the corner. If I had taken another step I would have been caught in shrapnel.”

“I’ve told you about the bombing before, but I never mentioned that it was this,” she tapped the pendant with a nail, scraping against the crack in the hard stone that the tumble to the ground had smacked into it, “that saved me. I like to think he was right and the gods looked out for me through that gem opal. This is my only treasure from my old home, from my father, and I want you to have it so it can keep you safe as it did for me.” It made her heart rise up in her throat to see it in someone else’s possession, to see it at all and remember clearly after she had kept it in a small lockbox for so long. She rubbed the beads around her wrist absentmindedly.

---

“I don’t know why you insist on these ‘experiments’ Javaelli, it is not as though you learn anything from them and I am not sure that is entirely safe, so maybe we should-”

The atoran servant spoke apprehensively beside the table in the sterile pale-blue student laboratory, the woman wearing a grey apron overtop a similarly coloured labcoat, goggles resting over her eyes and a cotton mask covering her mouth. Across from her younger charge, the imperial princess Javaelli, stood in the same clothing albeit smaller. What differed more immediately was that the royal was holding metal tongs clasping down upon a pellet of dull metal overtop a plastic tub filled with water that sat atop the table. With bright violet eyes gleaming with manic glee, she turned to her assistant for a moment, spoke in a spritely voice, saying, “No no, I know what I’m doing!” before opening the tongs and dropping the pellet into the tub.

A calamitous bang followed, the transparent jug rupturing and water gushing over the flat surface as a billowing cloud of white smoke filled the air. Javaelli laughed in triumph before two hands clasped on her shoulders and the servant inspected her critically, having closed with her through the obfuscating cloud before she could do little more. Pushing the hands on her away roughly, stepping back to keep her distance from the palace retinue and rolling her eyes before pulling down her mask and throwing her mask onto the table with a splash. As the explosive puff cleared the air she shoot a haughty smirk of victory to the older woman, “Told you I knew what I was doing,” she said, pride saturating every word as she pulled off her apron and tossed it atop a nearby counter, “although next time we need a sturdier tub. And a bigger pellet.”

The help sighed as Javaelli wrung her hands in barely contained anticipation of future explosive results, but did nothing more than pull rags out of a few drawers and begin mopping up the spilled water as Javaelli recited her ‘test results’ to herself and tromped from the room. Nobody looked at her twice, the staff as well as her own family well used to her antics and unsurprised at the sight of her clad in labcoats, smocks, or whatever other accruements her latest childish experiments in chemistry or rocketry necessitated. So she reached her rooms unbothered, humble servants and high ranking military commanders making room for her passage through the elaborately decorated halls, opening the wooden door and closing it behind her to leave her alone in her private section of the palace.

She strode through the expansive living room, stripping down and leaving her old garments strewn about before pulling on the comfortable clothes she had left upon the couch in advance of her morning wake-me-up experiment. Loose cargo pants and an even looser t-shirt of non-absorbent fibres, both a bright red, quickly made her decent and covered the majority of her pale blue skin as she cinched down her belt. It was a far more modest attire than either of her older sisters wore, she knew, but that worked just fine for her. She was a teenager, grown in body almost entirely if not considered an adult by her society and still evolving mentally, and she had taken to heart the advice of her eldest sister that she should play to her strength. Her body, with its thin limbs, modest chest, sharp face with scowling brow and straight nose, as well as a height of seven and a quarter feet meant that, apart from the promise of being properly tall after she hit her final growth spurt a few years from now, she would be winning no pageants and should focus on her intellectual pursuits. Not the talk she had been hoping for when she had gone to Anammi, the heir apparent, but it had been better than the time she’d gone to her other older sister, Tavanni, for advice.

Flopping down on the couch as she recalled that calamity, old leather soft and conforming to her familiar presence, Javaelli leaned back against the once-plush cushioning and stared up at the ceiling as she remembered how her seemingly ever-cruel sister had teased her. She loved her, but gods be damned Tavanni could be a proper bitch. Recalling back she reflected on how her sibling had told her that she might as well give up on being presentable, that the cherubine innocence of youth had fled her and she’d gotten only awkwardness in return so she might as well give up and become a recluse. Not exactly the most encouraging pep talk but it had given Javaelli a vital resource: spite.

All the energy and drive that had given her had actually allowed her to leverage her mother into giving her what she wanted. Her mother! Thanalli was not the doting or trusting sort, and when Javaelli had at first broached the subject of going to a school instead of being tutored the result had led to a predictable answer. Javaelli stretched as soon as she finished getting comfortable on the couch, bopping her heels against the floor while putting her arms under the headstalks that draped down her back and pushing upwards so that the thousands of gill filaments underlining them brushed against her skin. Yeah, she grimaced as she recalled the look of humourless judgement in her mother’s face. Asking her for anything was similar to being put on trial military judgement, after the tribunal had been told you’d called them all names whilst running over their pets.

Of course Javaelli had been expecting soul-stabbing silence after her question, and especially after the stare, but had instead been told she could have what she wanted. That had left her, as well as everyone else at the dinner table, stupefied. That had been four months ago, and just yesterday she had been told to prepare to leave for Volutiol and her new education within the next few days as well as a guest, probably a spy for her mother, that would be going along with her. Such was why the princess had been up in the lab before her mother had even woken, unable to sleep and instead nervously exploding things with the power of science. Detonating stuff with chemistry felt great.

Javaelli smiled, looking at the featureless ceiling a few minutes longer before turning her attention straight ahead to the television that sat in front of the couch. Deciding to placate the onsetting boredom she fumbled around for the remote, foundit lodged within the crevasses between the cushions, and jabbed at the buttons. Bright colours and loud voices came to life, a dramatic historical fiction playing out a bloody and brutal scene from a period of ancient insurrection against the holy warriors that had founded her people’s nation. The princess blinked a couple times as the warrior women on the screen battled, all heroics and bloodshed, and then flicked over to a channel with a show explaining how the latest three dimensional printers did their job. Now that was more interesting.

[Alversia]

Nylia watched as her wife stood before her, towering about her in a way that would not have been so apparent when she was sitting down. She looked into the mask of the Imperatrix, the mask by which the galaxy knew her by. She hated speaking to her when she was wearing it because in her mind it felt like she was speaking to the Imperatrix, the politician and leader, not the Atoran woman she had fallen in love with. It hid most of her face and kept her from truly reading her expressions like she was able to normally. The true depth of her feeling became abundantly clear though as they embraced, the Atoran reaching out with her arms and pulling Nylia in. She obeyed willingly, keen to feel those powerful limbs close around her and the soft chin of her wife on her shoulder. She linked her own arms around her back, able to feel powerful muscle as she held her and draw strength from her presence. Thanalli was always so unshakeable that it often made her feel weak and foolish by comparison. She reflected that although Thanalli wore a mask when she attended official duties and could remove it in private there was always a second mask beneath that one. She was a woman so used to keeping her true feelings bottled up that most of the time she came across as stoic and uncaring. Nylia knew from personal experience that it was an unfair description, that her wife was more than capable of amusement, sorrow, worry, nerves. She just kept it so well wrapped up that it could be hard to tell when exactly she was feeling them. Even she had fallen into this trap a few times of thinking that Thanalli was not interested in what she was telling her, only to realise immediately afterwards how unfair she was being.

There was no concerns this time about supposed apathy as the hug held her tightly while she trembled under the weight of her own memories and a period in her life she still wished with all her heart had not happened. It was a cruel twist that one of the happiest moments of her life was intrinsically tied in with the worst, two sides of the same coin. It had been the death of her sister and their combined failure to defeat the ring terrorising their family that had caused her to flee to the Imperium, as far away as she could get. It had been there she had been discovered and employed by Thanalli, who had kept her on even after learning of her past. It still haunted her, that failure, and it had hit hardest of all because they had trooped in with their eyes closed, trained and battle-hardened commandos who had been convinced that dismantling a criminal ring would be easy. That was before they had understood just how deeply the roots stretched, how much there was to take apart. It had only been the two of them and she was sure in that year she had grown up more than she had in the previous twenty.

When they finally parted, the Alumina took a moment to compose herself, breathing deeply to regain control. She watched as the mask came off, finally able to see the entirety of that beautiful visage. She watched the Atoran as she tied the beads around her wrist and turned them over and over to look at them. Compared to the rest of her finery, they looked rather pathetic, nothing more than worn beads of a simple and cheap wood. She almost felt embarrassed to see the Imperatrix wearing them which was combined with a tearing pain in her heart to see them go. She was sorely tempted just to ask for them back, to apologise for bringing up the whole silly tradition and to keep her memories close. She resisted, especially when she saw Thanalli’s hands go to the band of silver around her neck. It made her feel even more foolish then, to see how poor and simple her offering was compared to that of Thanalli. She was sure the band of silver would have cost more than the contents of her entire village, perhaps even her entire district, combined. She listened to the story, her ears perked as she allowed Thanalli to tie the necklace around her own delicate throat. Thanalli had never spoken much about her past and about her family in particular. She knew she had ill feelings towards her own mother, perhaps why she got on with Nylia’s own so well and indeed, very few members of her family ever seemed to come and visit. She had long gotten the hint that it was a time in her life Thanalli would prefer not to revisit whenever she could. She could feel tears build afresh though as she looked at the small token that hung between her breasts, trying to imagine that it was this that had saved her life from that terrible occasion, the time that had seen the whole of her family that had ever been close to her.

“Thank you,” she whispered as she took up her wife in a hold again, guiding her hands down until they were on her hips while the Alumina linked her own behind the Atoran’s neck, looking up into her eyes with a smile, “for everything.” She reached up, standing on tiptoes to kiss her on the lips.

---

Emaya Aria d'Tean stood in the shower and sighed, drawing in a deep breath and holding it for a moment before exhaling again, as calm and at ease as she had been in months. She closed her feline eyes as she felt the warm water run over her still developing curves and splashed at her feet. Her white fur was slicked down just to accentuate her body-shape further while her brown hair stuck to her back. It was hard to describe just how good a shower felt which is why she had started having them two or three times a day. Back in her village of Villarea hidden deep within the forests there had been a stream in which she had cleaned. She had done it for so many years that it had become normal for the eighteen year old but only now did she realise how uncomfortable it had been. It was a freshwater stream and when the villagers had wished to clean, as they had to frequently thanks to the muddy nature of their work, they had no choice but to go far downstream to avoid dirtying potential drinking water. No matter the time of year, the water was always cold, refreshing perhaps but definitely cold so washing was not so much social as it was a race to get the mud of the forest out of her fur and hair before her teeth started to chatter. There were also fish to be wary off as they didn’t seem to care what they took a nibble and even debris if it had rained or the water level had risen with the floods. There was none of that here. The water was clean and sparkling and there was warmth whenever she needed it, to as hot or as cold as she needed it. She was finding it very relaxing just to stand here and take stock of her life so far.

She had not seen Nylia in quite a while, her memories of her sporadic and short. They had been when she had been back on leave from the military for a very short time before being sent out again to keep them safe. That was what her mother had always told her, they were going to keep her safe. Even when the war ended, both she and Nemmi disappeared with a promise they would return once they were truly safe. That had never happened. Nemmi had never returned and she had been sent off to live with distant relatives in the thick and luscious forests of Kaprerra. There, she had grown up hunting and foraging, for the felines of Villarea did not believe in guests or visitors. Those who joined were expected to earn their own keep. Now, she had been invited to the Imperium by her sister, who had proposed she attend a school in her adopted nation. Their mother had agreed and, in spite of her own initial opposition, she had eventually been convinced. It would, they had said, be good for her to see some of the rest of the galaxy. So here she was.

Finally stepping out of the shower, the feline sighed. She could feel the water still running through her waterlogged fur and pooling at her feet. It would take a long time for her to dry herself properly so she decided not to bother. She could lie on one of the couches and let the warm air cool her instead. She opened the door and went to step out, only seeing at the last minute that her roommate was back. Abruptly, the door snapped shut again as Emaya fished out a towel. She had not thought Javaelli would be back from whatever she did so early because she usually wasn’t. She had also been informed tactfully by her sister on arrival that Javaelli was not the keenest on the…liberal Aluminan sense of dress. She grabbed a long towel from the rack and wrapped it around herself, covering from just below her shoulders to her knees. She slipped out and took up one of the other seats, lying on her belly so she could lift her feet into the air and cross them, her favourite way of sitting,
“You’re back early,” she said in a heavy Aluminan accent, “what is it you were doing?”

[Vipra]

Embracing Nylia and returning the kiss, their passion equally shared and both enjoying the closeness, Thanalli let the moment last. At least until a door to the dining hall opened and a rather sheepish looking atoran servant stood holding the hand of their daughter Nemmi, named after Nylia’s fallen sister, the hybrid princess in her baby-blue clothes so small beside the atoran, her fur a soft creme and hair bubblegum blue. The little girl, with a happy squee, broke up the touching moment as she bolted over to her parents and glomped onto Nylia’s leg before Thanalli could reach down and extricate the surprisingly strong the two year old from her surprisingly strong grip on Nylia’s gown. She wriggled and tried to shake free until being properly cradled in the Imperatrix’s arms, stopping then only to play with a head tendril that Thanalli had let lay down the front of her shoulder and chest.

Thanalli looked into the face of her child as she grabbed at and played with her headstalk, a sometimes painful game that the Imperatrix endured without so much as a twitch. She looked a lot like her, the young girl’s face having the same features and structure as opposed to Nylia’s feline muzzle except their daughter’s tall feline ears. She lacked head tendrils while her legs were in the typical alumina digitigrade fashion and there was of course the fur and hair, but again had blue skin underneath. Brushing a hand through Nemmi’s hair as she sat down again, her daughter making a purr at the contact, and the atoran monarch entertained the idea of talking to her scientific and medical advisors on the matter again. She had thought having a daughter would have required all sort of genetic tinkering, but apparently there were oddities at work that had baffled her when explained even in layman’s terms. After exasperating her endlessly, she had given up and just accepted it as the meddling of the gods and rolled with it. In the end all that it had taken was a few touches of modern science to overcome gender limitations and a few months later Nemmi had been born healthy as could be.

And so now Thanalli had to keep the small child distracted while rolling her eyes at Nylia to show that they weren’t going to have their moment now. Both knew they’d have later to make up for lost time though, when a grabby little girl wasn’t tugging on the Imperatrix’s tendrils. Servants came in as a matter of course, bringing in special food for the young one and a new tray of appetizers for Thanalli and a full meal for Nylia, the nanny sitting nearby and waiting. A bowl of spherical multicoloured fruit as small around as a pea, skinned and prepared for Nemmi, were what absorbed the atoran’s attention despite a tantalizing plate of morning desserts so close by. Ignoring that temptation she pulled Nemmi upright and gave her girl a spoon to let her have at the fruit, pushing the plate of treats away so as not to tempt her child.

While the kid devoured the fruit in messy clinks and clanks of silver against china, Thanalli spoke to Nylia over the noise, “Nemmi has perfect timing,” she joked, rubbing their little girl on the head as she looked up at her name before returning to her meal with vigour, “just needs to work on her dramatic entrance is all.” Fruit was flying positively everywhere, small children being what they were, and Thanalli didn’t have to look down to know she’d be having to change out of her current robe as she felt a spoonful of tangy fruit spill down her robe and heard a pitiful ‘sorry’ from Nemmi. With a parental laugh the atoran royal smiled at the little atoran-alumina to reassure her, and with a giggle the baby of the family was tucking back in. Keeping her reigned in from making as terrible a mess as before by holding Nemmi protectively with her arms, Thanalli focussed on Nylia again with what attention she could spare.

“How do you think Javaelli will do at school? I’d have kept her here, but you were right. Looking at how Anammi and Tavanni turned out a school environment and more interaction might help her. Still, given her predilection for eccentricity I am not entirely sold. Emaya too,” she said, not having forgotten about the young alumina, “I don’t know how she will cope what with having lived in rural Alumi for so long. Will certainly be a culture shock and I’m hoping staying with us for a little while will blunt it somewhat.”

---

As a door clunked closed Javaelli shot out of her seat, her instincts telling her to find something very anchor herself to; the legacy of Tavanni’s teenage years were still strong in the younger princess’ psyche. As the realization that it had come from the bathroom set in Javaelli caught her breath, the beat of her heart thumping in her head as she flopped back onto the couch and clutched her chest. When the door inevitably opened again and the sound of feet on floor approached the princess couldn’t even muster a glance over her shoulder, the tv screen a blur in her vision as she calmed and collected herself while Emaya approached. The alumina settled beside her on the couch on her stomach, legs crossed in the air behind her. When the prone girl spoke Javaelli just flopped against the couch seat and let her exasperation show.

“I was doing an experiment, seeing first hand the amount of energy released when water reactive compounds were introduced to, well, water.”

She knew that she might have sounded sciencey, but really all she had been doing was making things go boom and having fun with the explosions because chemistry is amazing. Her only regret of that morning was not using a larger pellet and a stronger tub. There was always tomorrow, she consoled herself, maybe she could ask for a transparent aluminium container and see just how absurd things could get before her mother found out and forbid her. To her that sounded great, plus it would mean she could have a proper explosive finale before she left. That felt right to her. Although she reasoned it would be so much better if she could put it all in a rocket and see it explode, but she didn’t want to make the captain of the guard angry again after the last time. Everything had gone perfectly right up until the end and two trees were set on fire. Science was awesome like that.

As her considerations of future detonations flagged, and reality returned, Javaelli fully took in the fact that Emaya was on the couch. Also that the alumina was positively soggy. With a tiny eye tic the only physical sign that anything was wrong, the atoran royal fought back the urge to make a snide comment or be an outright jerk. She also had to beat down the desire to indulge in juvenile humour, that was harder and she couldn’t hold back a snigger before sighing and speaking to her alumina roommate in a supplicating tone, “Could you please dry off some more?” she said as she spotted water dripping from wet fur to leather, “I’d rather not get mold in the couch or risk a wet ass, and there are more than enough towels. Maybe use a hairdryer? I’ve never used one but I think they supplied one for you.”

That she had to have this conversation at all irked Javaelli. It was her room damnit! She figured that because it was hers, why shouldn’t she be able to tell the new girl to just go and dry off properly rather than ask? Yet apparently her room was being split with Emaya as a ‘test run’ as her mother had called it, presumably in the assumption that she’d be bunking when she went to the school. That idea hadn’t struck her before asking, that she might have to share her space with someone else. So far she had mixed feeling about it. Looking at Emaya as the feline rocked her legs, Javaelli had to admit she did like the company of someone her age. On the other hand, her couch was going to be waterlogged and she had to share the bathroom with someone that showered three times a day and spent a good half-hour to hour in there each time. That and her spare room had been turned into a bedroom and all her knick knacks had been moved to storage, a true travesty. She consoled herself by consider that school couldn’t be much worse.

[Alversia]

The kiss went on for a blissful eternity for Nylia and she felt her leg rise as she held on to her wife tightly. She could feel the joy well up in her and her tail swished from side to side as she felt those hands on the back of her simple robe, pressing into her wiry back and making her swoon. Their time together was interrupted then as the door opened and in stepped an Atoran servant. At least, that was what she thought at first before she fixed her sharp, feline eyes on the female and saw that her hand was wrapped around one much smaller and furrier than her own. The two broke apart and Nylia fixed her vision on Nemmi as she was scooped up by Thanalli with gentle words of greeting. A smile rose to her muzzle and she shook her head at the look from the Imperatrix, knowing that they could have their time together to celebrate their anniversary later tonight. For now they had much more pressing matters on hand. She showed her teeth in an even broader smile that nearly went from corner to corner as the young Half-breed reached up to pull at one of her mother’s tendrils that she had let drape over her shoulder. Wrapping her small hands around the slick length, she tugged enough that it made Nylia wince, her tiny, thin tail swishing from side to side in an undisciplined and wild manner.

“Nemmi,” Nylia said in a soft but warning voice. The young girl turned to look at her, bright eyes with pupils wide fixing on her own as she stopped momentarily. She turned to her other mother after the rebuke and tugged again, this time softer. The girl loved to play with Thanalli’s headstalks, pulling and squeezing them whenever she could and the Imperatrix indulged her at every opportunity. Nylia watched the two play and shook her head in wonder. She had never been keen on having children, not for any desire not to have any but rather because she did not feel safe or comfortable bringing children into her life as it was. Even after marrying Thanalli, things had moved so quickly with her sudden responsibility and public exposure that the thought had never even entered her mind. Her wife had thought differently, even if she had given her the benefit of six months before she brought up the topic. Initially, she rebuffed the idea but the Atoran kept bringing it up at the opportune moments and used every ounce of her diplomatic charm to slowly make her case. Even her final defence, that it was not physically possible, was defeated by the scientists that Thanalli brought her to. At least, she thought it had been. She was not stupid by any means but the finer and even layman’s details were too much for her. They had said it was possible and, by the end, she had agreed to it. She carried private doubts with her even as she carried Nemmi, her stomach bulging out even as she continued to make her public appearances until it got too much. At that point, she had given birth to little Nemmi. There had only been one name in her mind for her child and, luckily, Thanalli had allowed her to choose it. That was how little Nemmi had come into their lives.

She looked a lot like Thanalli in the face, sharing the Atoran nose and cheek structure but she had a thick, creamy fur that Nylia distinctly remembered from her own youth. There was every chance she would keep the colour all the way into adulthood. She was set down and given her breakfast while Nylia was served with her typical favourites. She gave herself a generous helping of bacon and sausage, not forgetting the strict diet she had put on following the young kitten’s birth to regain her trim figure. Thanalli half-ate, half-supervised their daughter, who seemed as content to throw her food around the table as eat it. She rolled her eyes at her daughter’s mess but shared a smile with Thanalli. In spite of her private fears, the Imperatrix had been fantastic with both her and with Nemmi. She was showing the Atoran-Alumina attention and doted on her to the point that she was in danger of being spoiled. She was not the only one of course. Javaelli was good around her too, though Nylia rarely left the teenager with her unsupervised.

“She had plenty of time to work on her dramatic entrance. If she takes after her mother any more in that department, we may have to hire a travelling fireworks show to take full advantage.” She answered after swallowing a mouthful of delicious bacon. She took a moment to consider her other answer, shifting her weight on her rear with a slight wince, “Javaelli is eccentric but she needs to see more of the Imperium and more of this galaxy than just this palace and being surrounded by guards for the rest of her life. I think she’ll be okay. Emaya is the same. She needs to see more than just the forests and plains of Alumi. It will be a shock, but she’s young and she’s adaptable. I have confidence in both of them.” She smiled, “you need to stop worrying about them so much. They’ll have one another and I have no doubt they’ll keep one another out of trouble.” She took another mouthful as Nemmi hit the edge of the nearly empty bowl with her little fist. It jumped up into the air and a shudder went through her little body, shocked at the reaction.

“Tell me again about the school they are going to? I know you’ve explained it before but I’m afraid that I’ve had my mind on other things.” Of course, with her photographic memory, she remembered every word she had heard on the place but she wanted to hear it again, just to be sure she had not mistaken any details.

---

“Oh, okay,” Emaya answered to the girl’s rather shorty reply. She took the unspoken hint and went quiet. In the time she had been living with Javaelli, and they were up to a week at this point, she had found the girl to be temperamental, difficult to speak to and rather despondent on occasion. Indeed, on those occasions they would get into arguments that would have servants, guards and whoever else lived in this huge sprawling building running. She turned to watch the television only for her ears to perk up with Javaelli’s insistent voice. She looked down the length of her own long body to see that there was indeed water running down her legs and off her shoulders to pool on the leather beneath her.

“Okay,” She rose by kicking her legs around to make her towel deliberately flare up as she rose, now dripping water onto the tiled floor, “I’ll be back in a minute.” She headed to her room with soft and slow padding footsteps, tail swishing where it could under the thick and cotton-like material. Closing the door to her room, she made straight for the hairdryer, throwing off her towel as she did so. She picked up the device and began to blow warm air over her body, revelling in the heat as it cut through to her very skin, claws extending in delight as she felt the water being blown from her fur and hair. In a few short minutes, she was as dry enough that she judged she would not be dripping all over Javaelli’s precious sofa.

The Alumina went to rejoin her roommate only to remember as she closed her furry palm around the door-knob just who it was she was returning to. With an exhale, she turned to her wardrobe and threw on a pair of tight shorts and top to expose her long, athletic legs and her taunt belly. She wrapped a ribbon around her left ankle and her left wrist, tying them off in a neat little bows. She decided that standard Aluminan cultural norms hardly applied here and, with a broad smirk, tied a third ribbon to the base of her tail in a pretty, large bow.

Finally ready, she stepped out and stood in front of Javaelli, spreading her arms and doing a complete rotation in front of the Atoran,
“Does this meet your approval, milady?” She asked in Aluminan.

[Vipra]

Thanalli laughed, running a hand through Nemmi’s hair as she flung the bowl through the air and sent little sticky fruit flying across the table, chuckling at the way the girl was shocked at her own action, “I’ll be sure to have a full band follow her, would at least give us more warning.” The Imperatrix ruffled her child’s hair with one hand, keeping her distracted and happy while grabbing a pastry and devouring the fructose-covered treat in two bites before grabbing another. She nodded and murmured confirmations as her wife talked about Javaelli and Emaya, listening while she enjoyed the interplay of sweet flavours from the Farthii tea’s lasting effects and the soft baked goods. As Nemmi figured out there was nothing left in the bowl she’d turfed over the young hybrid began to whine, and Thanalli paused in her conversational murmurs to break off of a piece of sweet bread for her child to chew.

“I’m sorry, you know I have a hard time not worrying over Javaelli and the rest; it is in my nature to consider every possibility, and what could go wrong with all of them, after all,” she held the calmed Nemmi in her lap while talking, one arm wrapped around her and the other picking aimlessly at pastry crumbs, “I’d be remiss if I didn’t.”

Nylia asking about the school saw a smile flit across the Imperatrix’s face and stick there as she cast a glance at her alumina wife, “Must’ve been very distracted that you can’t use your perfect memory to recall. Either that or you just want to hear me say it again,” she laughed coyly, “Damabrus school is a senior school, Javaelli’s private tutoring has put her ahead by a fair margin and so she is being bumped ahead while Emaya did well enough on her exams that she should adjust to the curriculum just fine. It is a pleasant compound, one of the few schools built with true Farthii architecture on Volutiol before the hybrid aesthetics took over there. That is just style though, as far as everything else goes it is a public school, but the area is home to the nobility so it is de-facto held to higher standards due to the pressure that the rich can exert over municipal authorities. Has an excellent academic track record, I took the liberty of having some of my favourite helpers look into its background,” she spoke so fondly of her intelligence agencies, “they couldn’t find any hints of misconduct, and it is of course girls only.”

Snuggling Nemmi close, the child relaxing against her and resting on her meal, Thanalli considered the school itself. The pictures showed an almost sterile structure, the outer walls kept clean of the creeping vines that came kit and parcel with building on that jungle world, and the grounds maintained just as strictly with the thick bark maintained and burnished. It was built atop the solid canopy of Volutiol’s continents, the solid layer of wood sturdy enough to support the structure’s concrete walls and the sloping flat-topped pyramids fortresses that served as the school buildings. There was a natural pond within the school grounds, a large dip in the canopy supporting what was probably a few hundred square meters of water while strategically encouraged tree trunks growing from the main mass reached into the air and supplied shade with broad leafs. She’d been there once as well, to compare and contrast with the website’s description for herself, and had found it to be as promised. The headmistress had been a bother though, fawning over her as though her schmoozing would sway her at all. Ultimately Thanalli had chosen it because of the location, it was close to the palace on Volutiol and so they could easily spend their weekends at home if they pleased. That, and her own security forces could easily hover nearby and tame any of her worries. A small comfort, but one that had tipped the scales.

---

Pleased to see Emaya trudge off to tend her coat of fur, Javaelli glanced over at the seat the alumina had taken up. It was a soggy mess, a veritable puddle that would lead to mold and heavens knew what growing in the cracks. Huffing, the princess rose from the couch as the sound of the hairdryer carried from the bathroom and shuffled over to the kitchen set off to the side of her living room. Walking behind the bar counter she grabbed a drying towel, pausing as she spotted a bottle of juice left on the counter and mumbling frustratedly to herself before replacing the lukewarm container in the fridge and trudging back to her couch. Throwing the towel down, she mopped up what might as well have been a lake in her mind, squeeging between the cushions and moaning in annoyance as the tea towel came back with soggy lint and yuck attached. By the time she was done the couch was only mildly damp, and the cloth was close to dripping. Bundling it in a ball she eyed the kitchen sink, closed one eye and then the other before hauling her arm back, and flung the set towel. It splatted like a slab of meat on the floor three feet short of the counter and the sink. With a quick glance to the bathroom door to make sure Emaya hadn’t seen, Javaelli sighed with relief as she stalked over to retrieve the towel where it had slapped against the tile floor and then throw it grumpily into the sink.

Walking back from that thankfully private embarrassment, the door to the bathroom she now shared opened and Emaya stepped out like a model on a runway in front of Javaelli. Stopping stock still, Javaelli did the courtesy of paying attention. She wasn’t like Tavanni after all, and wouldn’t blow everyone off with bluster. So she stood there with as critical an eye she could manage without knowing anything about fashion. What caught her eye of course was the fact that Emaya was wearing so little, but that was easily forgiven; fur covered a multitude of problems. But the ribbons, those stuck out. Javaelli knew their significance, Nylia’s influence leading to her interest and subsequent investigation. The pair wrapped around her wrist and neck were one thing, but the one at the base of her tail?

With a blush, lips sucked in and eyes wide, Javaelli stood stock still as her alumina roommate finished her spin and asked for comments in Aluminan. Javaelli understood perfectly, but remained quiet nonetheless, mind running a mile a minute. What if someone came in and saw her? What would they think? It would be scandalous! Even if she left the room, a servant could spot her and they know they are roommates and they might think there is something going on. Or one of sisters might spot her- No, oh no no. She had to stop this before someone saw, or else she might never be allowed to forget it and the teasing would be unbearable. With a nervous smile, the best she could fake given all the terrible things happening in her imagination, Javaelli pointed in the general direction of the ribbon wrapped around Emaya’s tail and managed to speak in Aluminan, albeit with a thick Vipran accent, “Yes but, uh, the things is, the uh, thing- Ribbon! The ribbon! Do you have to wear that? I mean, isn’t it a bit...” she let that part hang, not wanting to say anything offensive and wringing her hands as she glanced over her shoulder to make sure that nobody had opened the door to her quarters without making a sound in the last few seconds.

[Alversia]

“Well,” Nylia smiled at the gentle teasing of her wife, “maybe I just like to hear you talk about it.” That part was definitely true as the Atoran was not telling her anything she did not already know herself from countless discussions on the subject. Though she had argued passionately against the subject, when it had come down to research Thanalli had really been second to none. Indeed, in the rare times when she had not been working on matters of state or spending time with her children –the latter being something that Nylia had insisted upon since their marriage- she had been pouring over thick and heavy-bound documents that flooded in from every corner of the Imperium. Nylia had read some of them herself, dry and boring pages filled with tables and charts of performance in everything from exams and truancy levels to funding and staff backgrounds. There was a lot of it to take in to the point that Nylia had ceased to read any other than those recommended to her by Thanalli. She trusted that her wife wanted what was best for her daughter and was grateful that she was being given input into the decision. Of course, there had been the doubt all along that perhaps the Imperatrix was overthinking it, that none of the schools would match the impossibly high standards she had set for herself and for her daughter.

That was before this school had popped up on the scene. One of the many reports in the pile, Thanalli had shown it to her almost as soon as she was finished in a burst of nervous excitement she had rarely seen from the restrained woman. As she read the report, an activity which had taken a week to finish thanks to her own tasks and the size/complexity of the document, she had to agree that it seemed to be perfect. The results looked to be amongst the best in the whole nation and every single page seemed to point to it being the perfect school. It looked like it was everything they had been hoping for not just for Javaelli but also for Emaya, the perfect place for the two girls to get the best education possible. Of course, since then they had received a lot more information on the place, none of it seeming to turn them away from their initial opinion but rather enhancing it. It had been enough for both girls to be registered for the new term there and then, both parents in agreement. There had been plenty of regret since then, second doubts and guesses of their wisdom and judgement. She knew it was just nerves on her part, the worry that she had perhaps made the wrong decision or made it too quickly. Speaking to Thanalli helped as the Atoran had such an unshakeable confidence in her decision and her thought processes that she always calmed her feline wife. Whenever Thanalli was confident, it was always enough to bring all those positive thoughts and self-assurances back to the forefront of her mind. She knew that she had done the right thing. She hoped as much anyway.

“It sounds perfect,” She smiled warmly, “it sounds like the sort of place I would have liked to go, given the chance. I know Emaya is going to love it. So is Javaelli.”

At that point, she was distracted by a happy burble from little Nemmi as the little kitten happily munched on the little morsel of food handed to her by her mother. In her hands, it looked like a full sized treat. It was gone in seconds as she guzzled it down, quicker than her Atoran mother could finish her own mouthful. She began to squirm, unhappy without some sort of food within convenient arm’s reach. She was fighting Thanalli’s iron grip until Nylia reached over, dangling a stringy piece of fish that had been sitting on a plate. Nemmi’s eyes shot to it immediately, wide and full of emotion as she watched it wave from side to side. She reached out with her little hands to try and grab it, claws extending as she strained for her next mouthful. With a happy purr, the older Feline brought it within range, only to watch it be snatched and quickly vanish between the lips of her first daughter. The little piece of protein seemed to have been the final straw for the hybrid settled back against Thanalli’s form, eyes drooping as she slowly drifted off.

“You are going to see Javaelli off aren’t you, my love?” Nylia turned her attention back to her wife, “it will be the last time you see her in quite a number of months.”

---

Emaya put a hand on one hip, shifting her weight to one foot as she watched Javaelli stutter and stumble in that strangely accented Aluminan she spoke. She extended the claws on one footpad to clink gently against the floor, tail swishing. She looked back at her own tail for a moment as if in confusion, ears perked as the long and flexible limb swished from side to side,
“There’s a problem with my ribbons,” She looked down at her wrists for a moment at the colourful bands there as if those were what she was referring to. Finding nothing massively offensive there, she looked down at her ankles, turning them this way and that to search for the problem. She looked up puzzled again at her in-law, tail swishing again to expose the offending ribbon.

“Wha-Ohh…” She looked as though it just dawned on her and the feline turned and bent over slightly, raising her tail in what was clearly a very provocative pose, looking coyly over her shoulder, “you mean this ribbon right?” She swished the raised tail again, “do you mean you think it’s a bit…what was the sort?” She grinned teasingly at her, “slutty perhaps? Or maybe a bit much?”

Turning to face her roommate again, Emaya reached around and with one hand untied the ribbon. She threw the strip of cloth to the Atoran, “there you go. You can keep it. You never know when it’s going to come in handy.”

With both her hands on her hips, the Alumina cocked her head slightly, “you need to lighten up, Javaelli. I don’t think anyone else in the palace would know what it means and even if they did,” she shrugged, “I don’t really mind. What’s the worst they can do?” she licked her muzzle.

[Vipra]

“You are going to see Javaelli off aren’t you, my love?” Nylia turned her attention back to her wife, “it will be the last time you see her in quite a number of months.”
Smiling at the praise of her decision, Thanalli held the suddenly struggling child tight as she tried to squirm and worm her way off of the atoran monarch’s lap and onto the table, “That would be because it is the best option,” she was thoroughly nonplussed by the flailing atoralumina in her arms as she spoke evenly, “I went through way more than enough dossiers to ensure that. Pretty sure if I hadn’t found it when I did, there would have been significant kindling added to the nearest fireplace,” she smiled and rubbed Nemmi’s hair, her daughter still struggling, “and I doubt they’ll like it there, at first. change is always jarring and Javaelli has been educated by tutors. Emaya as well has had a rather rural education up to this point. Both will have some shock, likely a bit of nerves, and take some time to adjust. After that I could see them having a good time.”

She stopped talking as Nylia reached over with a strip of fish, a piece of her meal held in her fingers. The young atoran-alumina hybrid went stock still, watching the swaying piece of food with what seemed an instinct to pounce. Pounce she did, in her own way. Small arms reached out like youthful lightning, trying to snag the parcel of meat and failing despite her claws extending, finding only air between her fingers until her mother brought it closer. At that point her efforts were reward, snagging the tidbit and cramming it messily into her mouth where she chewed loudly before swallowing. Grinning and licking her licks she looked up at her parents before, with a small burp, she leaned back against Thanalli to start dozing off. Above her the Imperatrix smiled and stroked her young daughter’s hair as she began to snooze.

Nodding towards Nylia, pulling her attention away from Nemmi only once the little girl was snoozing, she spoke softly so as not to wake the sleeping child, “Of course I'll see her off, and Emaya as well. I imagine she is still fooling around in that lab I had set up for her so there should be some time yet.”

---

The sheer provocation that Emaya managed to draw from Javaelli was grand in scale. Hands shaking in the air, fingers crooked and stiff, she clenched her jaw on the right and felt a rush of anxiety while a familiar form blustering panic blitzed through her brain as her roommate made a show of bending about like a stripper in a club. Tearing her gaze away and staring at a wall as she was mocked, crossing her arms sternly even as heat burned in her cheeks. She only caught Emaya untying the ribbon out of the corner of her eye, and stumbled back a little as the piece of fabric flitted through the air, hand snapping out reflexively to grab it. Holding the length in her hand as the alumina told her it might come in handy, it then struck Javaelli where it had been tied and her hand quivered in abhorrence before dropping it to the counter and glaring at the ribbon accusingly.

When told to lighten up, followed up by Emaya blatantly tempting fate to do its worst, Javaelli grabbed the sides of her head as though the world was falling around her, “Don’t think they know?! Of course they know! Everyone knows!” she said while nearly hyperventilating, “They teach themselves stuff about alumina culture so they don’t accidentally peeve Nylia, to avoid the wrath of my mums. If they didn’t, whoa boy would they regret it. So everyone, everyone would know. Instantly!”

She placed her hands over her face, pulling down and dragging her features in nervous exasperation before shaking her arms in the air, “And the worst they could do is know! And then they would let my sisters know! And then they’d never let me forget it! You have no idea what they are like,” Javaelli stared bleakly at Emaya, her colour draining even as she calmed into a deep dread as she unwittingly forced herself to contemplate what her elder two sisters would do with that sort of gossip, a shiver flowing up her spine as her slumped, “you have no idea.”

[Alversia]

“That’s all I ask, my dear. They will have a difficult few weeks to acclimatise to their new world so any contact they have with us will be important.” Nylia watched as Nemmi began to settle in the arms of her mother, resting her head and bringing her little arms together in a bid to get comfortable. The Alumina lifted herself from her seat, feeling quite full and ready to start the day. She reached out her own arms to Thanalli, eyes dropping to their daughter as she indicated what it was she wanted. The Imperatrix may have been the most powerful woman in this arm of the galaxy but even she knew when it was wise to follow the wishes of her wife. Soon Nemmi was in Nylia’s arms and she held the little kitten close. Her fur was wonderfully soft and her little body beneath it pliant and warm. She could feel the girl’s tail twitching as she looked up with slowly blinking eyes, wondering where the sudden movement had come from and a little whine escaping her lips as she was moved from the comforting embrace of one mother and into the arms of another. The tight, soft arms of her mother and her soft and soothing voice singing to her in Aluminan was enough for her to settle back down again, snuggling in close to her mother’s bosom. The Feline smiled warmly at her, leaning down to kiss the top of her head and whisper a few more words in her own tongue. It was important for her that Nemmi grow up being able to speak both languages, not that she needed to do much to convince the Aluminan maids who looked after the young Princess to speak their native tongue with her and one another.

Speaking of which…

“Reni,” Nylia called. Immediately, the door swung open and a young Alumina slipped in through a side door. The young feline was wearing a traditional Atoran sari and bowed deeply to both her mistresses, eyes bright and tail swishing from side to side. She was a little fuller than when she had arrived from Alumi, five years ago, growing into her height so that now she was a curvaceous and charming young woman. She looked from one to the other, waiting for instructions,

“Reni, can you please take Nemmi and put her to bed? She looks like she needs a nap.” Nylia asked.

“Of course, Mistress,” Reni chirped as the girl came around, her blue hair shimmering in the light. She gently accepted the young Princess as she was handed over, holding her with a practised ease. She bowed again to the pair and slipped out of the room, the half-dozing young kitten leaving with her.

Now alone, Nylia slithered up to her wife, resting her chin on the Atoran’s shoulder and all but purring, “do you…have time to celebrate our anniversary?” She licked her lips.

---

Emaya stood with her hands still folded over her generous chest with something of a bemused expression. By now she was very used to Javaelli’s panic attacks, when the girl was confronted by something she considered to be the end of the world. It was fairly safe to say that the girl was a worrier, a person who seemed to see and fear for the worst in every situation even if there was no such fear necessary. Having said that, she couldn’t help but snigger at how the Atoran held the ribbon, thrown to her and caught without a second thought but dropped as if the teenager had just blown her nose on it. She held the expression of laughter though to avoid antagonising her roommate any further though her ears did perk up at something the Atoran Princess did say,

“They all know what it means, you say?” She grinned as she reached out a hand towards the ribbon lying on a surface. It shot to her palm as if held on elastic and she caught it with ease, slipping it into a back pocket in her short shorts, “I think I’ll keep a hold of it then, maybe I’ll find someone who knows what it means.” She patted her rear where the ribbon now made its home. She settled into one of the couches, rolling her eyes at the still-agitated woman.

“And I do have some idea of what big sisters can be like. Well…not my actual big sisters but you know…older girls around the village. They loved teasing us, loved making us seem so small and humble in front of them. I had my fair share of adventures with them, not that I’d tell you about them with your nerves as they are…” There was another panicked pause.

“Oh come on, Javaelli. Your sisters can’t be that bad. It’s not a matter of life and death is it? Can’t you make some sort of drug to make them not be such jerks? Is that even possible?” She shrugged her shoulders, splaying herself across the couch and rolling over the leather like a pet trying to get itself comfortable, “You live in a palace with an army of servants and your own laboratory. You think you’d be a bit more…cheerful…” she looked at the woman upside down, long legs rubbing against one another.

[Vipra]

Holding her daughter close, rubbing her cheek softly and humming to her softly, Thanalli nodded to her wife while cradling their child. Nemmi was on the border of sleep, eyes half closed and breath slow as she nuzzled against the Imperatrix’s robes and cozied up against her. She felt more than warmth as she held her child, staring down into her face until she heard the scrape of chair legs against the floor. Looking up as Nylia approached and reached towards her, staring at Nemmi. Knowing well what her wife wanted, although she was somewhat loath to end the cuddle now that Nemmi had gotten comfortable, Thanalli obliged and lifted their daughter gently into Nylia’s waiting arms after kissing her daughter on the forehead. Watching Nylia hold their child, the Imperatrix smiled as her wife nuzzled and cuddled their daughter. It was adorable watching Nemmi twitch her tail and snuggle close to her mother.

When Nylia called out the name of their closest alumina maid, Thanalli assumed what would follow. The blue-haired woman was young and tended to Nemmi the most often, mostly because she had the most energy when the child decided that it was time to be hyper. As she assumed the younger alumina was tasked with taking Nemmi to bed, bowing before leaving with the atoralumina child. Thanalli nodded her head to Reni as she left, and turned to Nylia as slinked up to her and pressed against her so that purrs vibrated into the Imperatrix as she made her suggestion. She had to admit, celebrations were something she would very much enjoy. Kissing Nylia on the cheek coyly, “I am certain I have a cabinet meeting to attend to,” she spoke while giving her alumina wife a lecherous leer, “although I doubt they will argue when I reschedule them.”

Rising to her feet Thanalli stayed close to Nylia and kissed her again, passionate as she wrapped her arms around her alumina lover, pulling back only once breath demanded it, “Perhaps the bedroom is better than the dining table,” she smiled lasciviously, flicking her eyes towards the door, “To the boudoir!” She swept Nylia off her feet, holding the alumina in her arms and taking her away to their bedroom. There were only a few glances along the way, only the uninitiated giving a care to notice. Everyone knew it would be a while before either emerged again, and no doubt some ministers would be politely irate over being delayed.

---

As the ribbon flew through the air to furred hands, Javaelli surmising that a telekinetic pull was the mechanism Emaya used. She had known more than enough alumina to understand their psionics, having first hand experience when she had been caught mid-fall off of a tree by Nylia. So there was no mystique to what Emaya did, only eye twitching annoyance as she made yet more comments that could very well bring downfall to all the stability Javaelli enjoyed. This alumina had no clue what it was like, despite what she said. Her adoptive siblings were alumina, not atoran, she had no idea what an atoran household was like when you were the youngest daughter! And adventures, hah! She’d probably just... Wait what was she implying with what she said? That sank in quickly and Javaelli gave the alumina girl across from her a straight-lipped stare until she broke the silence again.

“It very well could be a matter of life and death, for if they get ideas I may regret existence in the first place and wish upon myself the swiftest demise so that I might escape their attentions,” she had used that phrase often enough that she liked to spice it up, but followed up with far more common wording as Emaya sprawled across the couch like a, well, a cat, “I think the better term would be ‘trapped in a palace’. I can’t escape them. If you wanted to get away from someone you could just walk in any direction far enough and have some peace. Here it is just my room for a safe haven, and even then they enjoy storming in unannounced. Unlike pretty much every other atoran family in existence there are big age gaps in mine and I am the unlucky youngest. Or was. Nemmi will have it a lot easier though, I’m nice and both Anammi and Tavanni are gonna be too mature to pick on her.”

Javaelli was so caught up in herself that, thankfully, she missed all the splaying and leg rubbing that Emaya was doing, instead leaning over the kitchen counter with her elbows and staring into the reflective surface in introspection as she spoke, “At least at a school I can have friends who aren’t also my retainers. Handmaidens and guards leagues older than me don’t count,” she buried her head in her hands, “Plus if I made a chemical to scare them away I think I’d get my lab rights revoked and that’d suck.”

[Alversia]

The thin-lipped and heavy stare from her niece-in-law made Emaya grin cheekily as she did so love to tease these expressions from the stiff and reserved Royal Princess. She brought a hand around to pat her rump where she had stored the ribbon in her pocket, tail swishing before she rolled over and lay on her back, legs up and together as her toes pointed and her claws extended. She had to admit that the couch she had nearly ruined was fantastically comfortable. It was especially good compared to what she had used for most of her life, namely a set of blankets that were rolled up and laid out on a cold wooden floor. It was never comfortable really; more warm and soft. She had often slept on those blankets if there were guests in the village and her bedding was taken up. It was never ideal though and she frequently woke the next morning with aching back or sore limbs, cramped up and her tail aching. Not that it was ever acceptable as an excuse to say that, or to try and use that. She tried it once, when she first arrived and petulantly suggested that she was too stiff and sore to go on the morning hunt. Her Hunt Leader had not been impressed. She suggested a therapy to help. So they threw her in the river. There was never a problem with stiffness after that.

She rolled her eyes at the rather overdramatic statement from Javaelli about ‘life and death’ though, sighing as her marital niece. “Surely your sisters have better things to be doing these days than teasing you about me? If you want, I can go and tease them endlessly so you can get them back.” She grinned to show her sharp little teeth, “that way, the equilibrium is returned and you can stop being so worried about it.”

Thinking on her new niece, Emaya nodded, “she’s so cute that no one would go near her anyway. And if they did then my sister would be on them like an Alumina in heat. Besides, you’re right. You are nice and you’ll be able to look after her. Or you would if you weren’t going off to school. Besides, now you can get away from them because you’ve got me,” She was still grinning, “and I only tease you for fun. If you want me to stop, then I’ll stop.” She finished her rolling and spinning, ending up her shoulders draped over the couch and her head nearly touching the ground. She was watching the Atoran upside down, “I’m looking forward to it too, especially if it’s like this. Lots of soft beds, warm rooms and food I didn’t have to spend all morning catching myself. Plus more Atorans, I like Atorans,” She giggled, “and I hear they’ll like me.”

There was a second pause as she considered her options, thinking over something with a cute expression and her ears flicking, “have you tried making the chemical? Don’t need to use it…maybe just the threat…” she licked her lips, “deterrence.”

[Vipra]

Javaelli blinked in stunned silence at Emaya as she suggested teasing and tormenting her older sisters back. She didn’t get it! There was not victory down that path, only ruin. They had years of experience, one was shameless and the other ruthless, and they both would treat it as a game with higher stakes and go all in. When the escalation inevitably occurred Javaelli would have no peace and would suffer under the determined wroth of Tavanni even if Anammi was too busy enjoying herself to bring her torment. Emaya might have meant well but she had no idea how horrifically it would backfire and the terrible curse she would unleash. It was dreadful even thinking about it, Tavanni no longer picking on her out of random whim but rather spite. A terrible thought to be sure.

“If I thought you teasing them would have any positive effect, I would have personally built a trebuchet and launched you at them already,” she said under her breath before refocusing on the upside-down alumina and squinting at her as she talked about school. Javaelli was looking forward to it too, but the way Emaya talked it was like she was assuming it was a lounge and not an institute of learning. Plus there was her comment about liking atoran, and them liking her. Under other circumstances the princess might have been self conscious about that, but she was drained after unleashing all her worry and stress and so only considered that, yes, she would be popular. Assumedly they’d take notice of her immediately and begin vying for her. The atoran royal pinched the bridge of her nose and grimaced, it was going to be awful being around that, and she just knew that some people were going to try and get close to the exotic alumina through her.

Releasing her pinch and sighing, she stared at Emaya, “It does seem that most atoran do, yes. Of course most haven’t had a soggy one drench their couch or hog the shower all day, so there’s that,” she worked in the teasing jab with a flash of a smirk, “I’m sure as soon as you flop onto their textiles all wet and drippy they’ll change their tune.”

Her slight teasing ended as she contemplated what Emaya had said about making a chemical though, or more aptly considered her response to the alumina, “If mom heard I’d be so grounded it isn’t even funny and I’d probably have all my television rights revoked forever. Just trust me on this, if I could have done something like that and not been a pariah for it I would have,” she spoke the truth, having dwelled on many options, “So instead I just avoid them as much as I can. I used to get along with Tavanni until she hit puberty, we’d play a lot, then she changed and started being a cow to me and we haven’t got along since. As for Anammi, she’s always been odd. Anyways, it is most prudent just to stay out of their way and keep my head down. Once we’re at school I can act without worrying that Tavanni might be around the corner or just bored.”

[Alversia]

Almost any other person who had seen the look Javaelli gave her in response to the idea of retaliation would have shuffled off to a corner with muttered apologies and sworn promises never to bring it up again. Emaya was not one of those people. She just raised her eyebrows and perked her ears as she waited for the upside down hovering Atoran to deliver her verdict. It was hard to tell what she was thinking behind those mischievous feline eyes but it probably wasn’t good, it rarely was. The way the corners of her mouth tugged up at either end did not inspire much confidence either in the validity of her thoughts. In spite of her niece-in-law’s protestations, it was almost possible to see the machinations firing up between her ears.

Rolling back over so she was on her front again, the Alumina frowned. It was a cute expression, one eye-brow going up in curiosity and her tail curling in on itself, “What’s a tray-boo-shay?” She asked, now watching Javaelli while crossing and uncrossing her ankles, “do you have one? Is it fun? It sounds like an artillery piece or something. Not sure I’d want to be fired out of one of those. The soot would stick in my fur for aaaages.” She rolled over onto her back and kicked with her long and powerful legs so that her upper-half swung up and she was in a sitting position. She looked for a moment like she might actually get up before whatever fancy had taken her departed and she flopped back onto the sofa again, resuming her previous position. Again, she went back to watching the pacing Atoran who was now pinching her nose and praying or doing some other weird thing that Atorans did. She watched the movement of her tendrils as she moved, the way they shimmied and shied from side to side. The movement was almost hypnotic and the girl nearly went into a sort of entranced daze.

At least, that was until Javaelli mentioned her wet and dripping onto the floor of some Atoran’s bathroom. Her first reaction was a snort, a high-pitched squeak as she brought her hand up to her mouth in an attempt to stifle what was following. She was giggling childishly then, a short series of chortles as she tried to bring herself back under control. She finally managed it with a deep breath as she looked back to the Princess, tears slowly gathering at the corners of her eyes,
“Oh gods, sorry,” she wiped them away with the hem of her top, already too short, it revealed rather more than Javaelli might have been expecting if she was looking, “that was funny. You have no idea how many Atorans want me all wet and drippy over their tiles.” She clenched her mouth shut as if the sentence had somehow regained its amusement. A few further deep breaths and she was finally back under control.

Now that the sound of laughter had died away, the Alumina went back to her rolling and squirming on the seat. She tried a few positions, ears always perked towards Javaelli as she explained how her relationship with her older sister had soured. When she finished, Emaya was back in the same position she had been before, resting her chin in her palms and propping herself up on her elbows, ankles crossing and uncrossing lazily, claws unsheathing and retracting slowly. There were a few moments of quiet,
“She sounds like a bitch,” Emaya delivered her verdict in Aluminan, “I’d have told her to fuck off, or made sure she did. Where I’m from, bitches and bullies like that aren’t tolerated. You need to stand on your own two feet. If she escalates it then you escalate right back. I’ve had my fair share of pricks who thought they could take me, just because I was the little ‘pure-fur’. Hard to believe right? I’m actually small for my age. They thought they had some gods-given right to pick on me, because that's how these people think unless you rearrange a few things. Whatever they had when I was finished, the gods sure as hell couldn't claim,” the Feline shook her head at the unpleasant memories, ”I’ve not met her much, her or the older one, the party one. Then again, you have so many halls and corridors I’m surprised I’ve seen anyone at all. So big…” she sighed, gazing into the middle-distance as if her mind had settled on other things before snapping back to Javaelli, “why can’t I read your mind?” she asked, this time in common, “I can’t read anyone’s mind but Nylia and the other Alumina. It feels weird. It’s like walking around with a plug up my nose or ear-muffs on.”

[Vipra]

Emaya was rolling around and Javaelli felt like she had a very large pet for a moment, the shedded fur and potential for ruined furniture backing her on this, but the instant turnabout of her words against her made Javaelli know that was not the case. A pet would have listened to her problems and not made her blush again with implication and euphemisms. There was not winning against the alumina! She laughed at her expense and Javaelli gave her a completely unamused straight lipped stare until she stopped. Of course then her alumina roommate began rolling and wriggling again until she was back in her silly position again. Albeit she’d decided to move on from making the princess embarrassed and instead decided to give advice.

Cupping her face in her hands as Emaya talked in Aluminan, Javaelli grumbled and grunted through the lecture. Sure, in the backwoods of Alumi they could resolve their problems with violence. Here though? Not so much. If that could have resolved it a younger Javaelli might have bitten her older sister and driven her back that way, but that would have only seen her punished more and Tavanni suddenly the aggrieved party. That would in no way have ended well in any way. So while Emaya’s advice might have worked well for her people and culture, and possibly for siblings in other families, but in the imperial palace it would not help. It would make her the crazy one, the mocking would increase, and she’d either have to commit to that image and its dreadful implications or back down and deal with the suffering that would follow. Being known as the crazy one or the violent one would not help her either way, regardless.

Releasing her face from her hands and leaning them against the counter, she listened to Emaya as she spoke Vipran. The question about reading minds had Javaelli pulling out of her deep thoughts and thankful that they were kept to herself. Gods knew what her life would be like if her mind wasn’t sacred and secret, still she could understand, somewhat, what it might be like to lose a sensation like that due to a lack of stimuli. Shrugging and speaking, she felt comfortable about this topic, “It’s because of implants that make us psychically neutral and unreadable. I don’t know the mechanisms behind it but that is the end result, as readable as,” she glanced about, noticed the counter, and tapped it with her knuckles, “a stone counter. Can still be effected by telekinetics, but those of us with the implants are dead zones. Almost everyone gets it too, at a young age.”

“Well,” she considered, “Not everyone. Almost every atoran does but among the other races it isn’t as ubiquitous. I remember reading the reason for it being atoran psychics being all crazy and manipulative or dangerous, but I can’t remember hearing about any recent psychics. In my peoples literature they are referred to as demons, and before my time there were knightly orders devoted to hunting them down and killing them. I can’t say anything about it though, as I said I can’t recall any, but it obviously left a big imprint. Nowadays it is paranoia and worry over security leaks,” she tapped the counter with her nail rhythmically, “the idea of somebody ‘taking over’ terrifies a lot of people I think. It’s mandatory for most everyone working in the palace of course, alumina excepting.”

“Probably not so worrying for your people because you are born with psionics, all of you,” Javaelli smiled at Emaya, a drastic shift from the mixed revulsion and dread she’d been wearing for so long, “sometimes I envy that. It must be unique, communicating with your mind.”

[Alversia]

The straight-faced and serious look that Javaelli had given her seemed to make it all the funnier for Emaya so when she finally stopped, the silence was rather startling. She could tell immediately of course that her advice had not sunken in. She was surely too worried about what others thought of her, as that was the general protest she had heard whenever she brought up retaliation; my mums would not be happy, my sister would not be happy, they would think I was the bad one, I’d get grounded for the rest of my life and so on. Really, Emaya did not understand any of it. Surely being poorly thought of was better than being known as a root over which all others walked? Javaelli was a nice girl, when she wasn’t stressing out or being as serious as a matron in a lesson, but she needed to grow a spine by Emaya’s reckoning. Next time they saw Tavanni, she predicted, it was going to be interesting. After all, she couldn’t kill her right? What else could she do?

The seriousness in Javaelli disappeared whenever she asked about the science of the implants though. She had known about them before coming, her sister had warned her before ever bringing up the idea of her attending an Atoran school. She had brushed it off then, thinking that it couldn’t be as weird as Nylia was suggesting. Turned out, it was every bit as weird as she had suggested. She did not fully grasp that until she stepped into the Imperial Palace and suddenly she was surrounded by walls everywhere. Not the physical sort, though they were intimidating too for a girl used to lots of forest to run around in, but the mental kind. It felt like she was being hemmed into a tiny box or that she had stuffed her head into a black bag, unable to breathe, to see or smell. It had taken a long time for the girl to get used to the idea of not reading people’s minds as casually as she saw their clothes. Now, for instance, she would have loved to know what Javaelli was thinking; about her, about school, about her sister, about anything. No one told anyone anything on this planet. Everyone was so damned careful about their secrets. She missed the days when, within an hour, she knew who fancied who, who was sleeping with who, who had fallen out with who. Almost nothing was kept quiet in an Aluminan village. She was comfortable with it now but she still yearned for those good old days. It was still taking some time to adapt to everything.

“Demons?” Emaya blinked, “so…you think we’re demons then?” Quite frankly, there was not a creature on this planet or the next who looked less like a demon in that moment than the Feline did, with her perking ears, swishing tail and big, bright, curious eyes, “sounds like a lot of superstitious nonsense that cave-cats would have come up with.” She shook her head in mirth, “you’d think that Atorans would be scared of us then but they’re…really, really not. I guess having a great ass goes a long way to dispelling paranoia,” she wriggled her derriere to make the point, “besides, we can’t take over people. I wish we could! That would be amazing, all the things I would do,” she made a point of looking at Javaelli with a knowing eye but then broke it off again with a light giggle, rolling back onto her back.

“Yeah, it’s not very nice coming here and not being able to speak to people without everyone else hearing it. And conversations are so…cluttered…so many people talking at once. How do you make out all the voices? It’s easy to sort people’s minds when they’re talking but with their mouths?” she shook her head so her hair swished and her ears flapped, “lots of blah blah blah blah. Lots of it wrong too. People like lying with their mouths,” she sighed, crossing her ankles together, extending bright pink claws, “you like to be a psychic then? Can’t all your medicines and machinery give you something like that? Gave me a niece after all,” she smiled, “and are you going to tell me what a tray-boo-shay is? Is it some sort of cat catapult? It doesn’t sound very fun.”

[Vipra]

“Nah, you’re not demons obviously. Atoran psychics, those were the ones considered demons,” Javaelli responded immediately, kicking her foot against the floor, “and I don’t know about it being superstition or not. Suppose they were pretty bad considering the knightly orders and all.” At the mention of being afraid of alumina, Javaelli rolled her eyes and chuffed at the notion that it was their physical assets that made them disarming. Well, she supposed it was true actually. So many atoran did seem to adore the alumina for their bodies and not forego any concerns to seek their affections or dole affection upon them. Javaelli didn’t understand it herself, and the look she got from Emaya as she alluded to what she would do with mind control made the atoran avert her eyes and mumble indecipherably about being glad Emaya couldn’t.

As the conversation shifted back to the far more comfortable matter of psionics not involving remote control Javaelli met her alumina roommate’s gaze again. She could understand the points Emaya made, for someone that was used to psionic communication verbal conversation must be dramatically jarring. Talking psychically must have been liberating in a way, no lies as she said, but in other ways it would be disconcerting. No lies meant no secrets, and everyone had secrets they wanted to keep. The gods knew that the princess had more than a few that she wouldn’t want everyone knowing. Yeah, not a very pleasant thought. But communicating her thoughts without obstruction or technology? That would be amazing. Not that she could ever really experience that in a pure form, and phones filled the void. She would never know what it felt like though, and that was a disappointment.

“We don’t have anything to imbue people with psionic capability, as far as I know. We have the cyberbrain and all that which can allow something similar, sort of. Constant connection and the ability to talk wirelessly through the comm-network. I’ve been told none of us are allowed to get those augments though, mother’s orders due to worries over the technology involved and security risks. Most things come down to that it seems,” Javaelli spoke plainly, her stress seeming to dissipate more and more over time as she smiled back at Emaya, “and yeah, Nemmi was a surprise,” her half-sister really had been a shock, a pleasant one though, “A trebuchet is a siege engine that uses torsion or a counterweight to throw its payload, typically a stone or a barrel of flaming pitch. It was popular in ancient wars before the advent of cannons. And they may not sound fun, but a miniature one armed with a payload of fruit is satisfying,” she remembered mastering her own mini-trebuchet, tossing pulpy fruit across the garden and pegging the target with practiced accuracy, and grinned, “very satisfying, great stress relief.”

Javaelli knew she was going to regret this, but she wanted to ask just in case Emaya surprised her, “So,” she stared at the alumina, still leaning against the counter while Emaya was lounging on the couch, “what do you do for stress relief?”

[Alversia]

“Is that why they don’t exist anymore?” Emaya asked knowingly, looking to her roommate as she chuffed and snorted to herself, “Atoran psychics, I mean. I’ve never seen any in all the time that I’ve been here anyway. Not that I’ve been here long. Do they exist anymore or did your knights and other heroes manage to kill every single one of them?” the teenage Alumina was not so sure she liked the sound of these roaming bands of thugs whose only purpose seemed to be to kill those who had psychic abilities. It was a strange concept to her and she had difficulty understanding why they would do it. After all, who would want to kill people who could share information with their minds, check if people were lying and move heavy items that would have otherwise taken dozens of people with just a strong thought? It didn’t make much sense to her. She shook her head at the very illogical idea of it all the foolishness. In fact, she was thinking so much on it that she failed to spot the mumblings and muttering reply to her own suggestion of what she would do if she could minds and indeed the rather eye-rolling look she got for her bottom wiggle. She could go quite deeply into her thoughts at times, Emaya. They had told her off for it more than once given how dangerous it could be when out hunting.

“Well, I guess that you can’t have cyberbrains then? That sucks. What security problems could you possibly have with a cybernetic brain if it was well secured? It would surely be worth it to be able to communicate and talk right? Is no one in the palace allowed these brains or just you?” She seemed genuinely curious now and she watched with an interest expression, “I’ve never met anyone who had a cyberbrain before. It sounds like a cool idea and useful too! Do they scoop your old brain out then? Replace it with robotics and stuff? I don’t know the actual technique personally.”

As the concept of the trebuchet was explained to her, Emaya nodded a few times keenly and grinned even wider, “you built one of the things to fire fruit? That sounds really cool! Could we go and build one now? I’d love to shoot fruit at a wall and stuff. Especially if it fires them really far or really hard. We could even have a competition to see who can do it best.” The Feline positively giggled at the thought. In truth, she was finding living in the palace to be kind of oppressive. It was not the fault of the people who lived here, not really, but instead she had to say that she did not like how serious everyone was, how little time there seemed to be for just winding down and relaxing. No groups of people gathered in the halls, no sharing of secrets and laughter. At least, there was none of that around where she was. She would have loved to have some fun, some innocent and consequence free fun. She was still a teenager at all and she wanted to enjoy it while she could.

She was jolted out of excited thoughts of flung fruit by the question posed by her Niece in Law. She blinked, surprised by it, “you mean besides the obvious?” she grinned mischievously, “I like to meditate. It sounds silly but just sometimes sitting with your eyes closed and breathing deeply does wonders. Especially if you can hear and smell nature all around you while you’re doing it. Not so helpful in here.” She shook her head and sighed sadly, “you do anything besides fire fruit?”

[Vipra]

Javaelli blinked, considering her responses to the questions posed to her. Scratching at a headstalk, she decided to deal with them in order, even if she wanted to talk about the trebuchets the most, “The knights tried, but apparently there isn’t any rhyme or reason to who can be born a psychic. So they never stopped popping up. From what I read the psychics were very dangerous though, causing mass hallucinations, reading thoughts to advance themselves, or some even having the ability to make things explode with their mind. I’ve never seen any of this though. As for a cyberbrain, they kinda do scoop it out,” she winced, recalling a how-it-works television special she saw on it, all the graphic details swamping her mind’s eye, “they remove parts and replace them with cybernetic equivalents before putting it all in a new casing. The problem is that they are advancing really really fast, the technology that is, and what is secure now probably won’t be as secure in a few years. People in the military have them, but they get regular upgrades. Honestly I think they’re safe and secure enough, but my mother isn’t going to let us get them sooo...” she let that hang, her mother’s paranoia speaking for itself at that point.

“As for trebuchets!” her voice raised in pitch, excitement returning, “I built one that could fire more than fruit, but it was disassembled after I nearly launched myself across the gardens. Thankfully the pond broke my fall,” Javaelli looked oddly proud talking about the time she catapulted herself, “was my first trebuchet but after that they banned me from making them any bigger than a certain size. And we don’t have to build one, I have a few made already. I can just ask and they’ll be set up for us,” she was becoming genuinely excited, it had been a while since someone had asked to see her trebuchets and actually use them, “I wasn’t kidding when I said the fruit explodes. Especially pulpy gourds, they end up everywhere.” Fond memories of fruit pulverizing against walls and ground filled her mind. She honestly enjoyed seeing her calculations and work coming to explosive fruition, each smashing fruit a testament to her success and brilliance. As were her fireworks and experiments in chemistry, all of it made her warm and fuzzy on the inside

She was so absorbed in dwelling on her success in engineering that she almost forgot the last question, and only pulled herself from introspection upon glancing at Emaya. Smiling at her, the obvious comment flying over her head or at least appearing to do so, Javaelli pushed her palms against the countertop, raising herself up so she could sit on the edge, “I wouldn’t have taken you for a meditating type, and you can hear nature in here. Sort of,” Javaelli leaned her head back and shouted up at the roof, “Computer! Nature ambience!” As she fell quiet after the loud shout, the sound of birds, amphibian croaks, and rustling leaves seemed to enter the room through the faux windows, the scent of tropical forest filtering into the room from somewhere.

Speaking conversationally again, Javaelli grinned at her roommate, “See? Just have to shout at the computer and you can set the ambience to a good degree, I set it that way so I don’t accidentally give it a command,” the princess kicked her legs back and forth, heels tapping against the counter side, “And I do my chemistry, watch television shows, and have my game consoles. I’ll also trawl the internet sometimes. I also do martial arts with a couple instructors.”

[Alversia]

“Oooh, mass hallucinations?” Emaya perked up, “that sounds like fun. Maybe I can meet one of these Atoran psychics somewhere then. Maybe at school? Think of everything I can learn. And making heads explode? What a bonus!” She giggled childishly at the expression on Javaelli’s face, “I’m only joking, but it would be a cool thing to know how to do, purely for the theory rather than anything else. I am trying to learn everything I can though. Not so sure how you can scoop someone’s brain out and keep them alive at the same time but then I’m not a doctor so what do I know about it?” She was watching Javaelli as the girl moved over to the counter, seemingly more at ease now that the conversation had moved from less, Aluminan topics, “but I guess I can understand what your mother is saying. I mean…I don’t think I’d want my daughter’s head opened up and the brain taken out. What do they do with it in the end then? Do they feed it to the dogs?” That time she seemed sincerely honest and waited for the answer to that before she moved on. Not that the excited explanation was lost on her.

“You made a trebuchet that could fire yourself into a pond?” She blinked a few times, tail swishing slowly from side to side, “that sounds so cool! Can you put that one up to? Think of the fun we could have! You can swim right?” she paused her own train of thought for a confirmation before moving on, “we could see who can get furthest into the pond! It’ll be an experiment in aerodynamics. Or something.” The teenager waved off the half-assed excuse, really only thinking of being flung through the air and plunging into cool and refreshing water. Even thinking about firing the fruit sounded like fun, “Can we go now and do it? Can we? Please, please please?” She sat up on her knees and stared right at the Princess, her eyes wide and pupils dilated, tail raised and swishing rapidly from side to side.

The young Alumina did seem rather put out at the surprise though, “What? You don’t think I can be quiet and meditating?” She asked, ears flattening for a moment before she perked up again, “and it’s not the same in here though. We don’t get the smells or the sounds, not really.” She indicated up to the ceiling, “there’s so many millions of little things about true nature that a computer just can’t pick up and even if it could,” she shook her head, “there’ll always be something in the back of the mind that makes it different,” She leapt up from the chair, stretching out with a loud whine, whipping her tail around and flattening her ears against her skull, “come on!” She said keenly, “let’s go throw fruit at walls and kitties into lakes!”

[Vipra]

She would have liked to get a word in edgewise but Emaya was simply too active and excited, talking about feeding brains to dogs in one moment and the next begging to be launched from a catapult before becoming seemingly despondent at the implication she did not seem the type to meditate. Javaelli had to collect herself as the alumina sprung up from couch and her mood swung back to eager playfulness. The princess wasn’t used to someone being so enthusiastic to see her creations, and it took a moment to click before she slipped off the counter and glanced over her shoulder at the door to her room as though someone might be standing there and waiting to pounce. The closed door assured her there was no threat, and Javaelli brushed the creases from her shirt as she chewed over the idea of bringing out one of her old trebuchets, the big one, but that wouldn’t work. She’d be caught before getting twelve feet and the princess doubted she could drag it that far in the first place. No, that was a bad idea. She’d stick to her normal design

“Come on,” she said simply, walking over to the door and opening it. Checking to make sure her alumina roommate was following, Javaelli led the way out of her rooms and into the hall. From there it was a winding path out, passing by the myriad servants and military sorts that bloated the palace as the princess did her best to reach the gardens. Delays occurred of course, having to stop and prod an atoran servant until she agreed to drag out one of Javaelli’s constructs from its locker and to the yard, and Javaelli routing their path through the kitchen so she could grab a heavy cloth bag and fill it with fruits large and small. After all that though, laden with two heavy satchels each, the pair exited the palace proper by a side door Javaelli used frequently and walked down a marble-paved path to where she did her experiments.

After another couple minutes of walking under warm sunlight, tepid air heavy with humidity pleasantly brushing over Javaelli’s slick skin but cloying to Emaya’s fur until the Imperial royal stopp under the shade of a tall broad-leafed tree and hucked the bags she had been carrying against thick roots. Nearby the pond glimmered with sunlight, small fish and swimming amphibians rippling the surface as they snacked upon small insects that flew too close to the surface, and Javaelli grinned as she stared at its almost glassy surface. It was deep enough to be safe, she knew from experience, so long as you didn’t smack into the edge and she was confident it was large enough that that wasn’t a problem. The view she’d had from above that one time had at least shown her that, albeit at the time she’d be scared out of her wits, but her calculations had been right and she’d slapped right into the middle.

Waiting for the servant to arrive with her catapult, Javaelli scanned the large pond and the distant wall behind it before turning to Emaya and grinning, “I agree, nature is nice,” she said while a singing lizard chirped in the branches above, pausing to enjoy the ambience and the scent of grass, pond lichen, and dozens of pollens from the flower gardens before speaking again, “and they don’t throw the brain out silly,” she brought up the topic of the cybernetics again, not having forgotten, “They plop it in a vat of chemicals, replace a few parts, and then put it in a metallic casing. Goes back to where it was or into a synthetic body, either way it doesn’t get fed to anything.” Javaelli chuckled as she finished her explanation, but stopped partway as she spotted a familiar servant pushing up her treasured creation.

Formed from lengths of steel and titanium as well as metamaterial metals, with a hyperdense sphere for a counterweight that would have torn a wooden frame apart from the pressure and an electric motor attached to make priming feasible, the supposedly primitive device looked rather modern. Even the bowl for the payload was made from composite materials, a dull white while the body of the siege engine was painted a pale blue. This design didn’t have a sling, sadly, her design that touted such being suspended indefinitely after she had used it to catapult herself into the pond. A sad fate for a brilliant design, but it had served her well for she was fully confident in her designs now. Albeit she also feared death a little more. Just a little.

The servant pushed the wheeled contraption to the spot Javaelli always set them up in, kicked down supports that dug into the dirt, and brushed her hands off before bidding the princess a good day and leaving the pair to their games. Javaelli thanked the much taller, and broader, woman meekly, waiting for her to disappear out of sight before grabbing a large gourd fruit and loading it into the trebuchet. It looked tiny in the bowl, and she knew from experience she could fit a dozen or so in, but right now she needed to calibrate. Checking the motor with her tongue pressed between her lips in concentration, tip showing as she brought up the PSI with an almost silent whirr with a two-second button press that winched down the arm a touch and rotated the launching arm with another tap, Javaelli felt like she had it set right and looked at Emaya with a grin before pressing a large orange button.

The counterweight slammed down like it had been shot out of a cannon and the fruit flung into the air in a blink. The pink gourd flew in a lazy arc before colliding with the white wall. It was an instant mess, the wet crack of the mushy insides smearing against the hard surface taking its time to reach the girls. Javaelli looked triumphant, fists on her hips as she beamed at Emaya, “See? It works!” she stepped back and pointed at the simple controls, only five buttons and readouts for orientation and pressure present, “Go on, press the down arrow and it will winch the arm down so you can load in something. Big orange button releases. Just, uh, be absolutely sure you don’t have anything in the way of the arm. I nearly dislocated my shoulder and elbow at the same time once, and I had to wear a bandage on my forearm for a long time.”

[Alversia]

Emaya cocked her head to the side as she saw how jumpy Javaelli was in looking around. It was almost as if she was expecting there to be someone in the room with her, just hovering over her shoulder like a ghost. The Alumina knew that was silly because surely no one would have been able to sneak up on them without one of them spotting it right? She shook her head at the notion and instead bounded eagerly after her roommate, stopping only to swipe the ribbon from a pocket in her hip-hugging shorts and tie it again around the base of her tail. She made sure the entire time that Javaelli was not watching for the sudden excitement and talkativeness was a welcome change to the grumpy and silence Atoran she had been rooming with for the past couple of weeks. Each time the Princess turned around, the Feline made sure to keep her tail positioned in such a way that it was impossible to really see its base and she kept the same broad grin and bright eyes. She was genuinely looking forward to seeing a tray-boo-shay for the first time and seeing what it could do. She had a mental image in her mind of an artillery piece made of wood with a weight on one end. How such a contraption would work, she had no idea but she assumed Javaelli had sorted out the science behind the device prior to use. It would be a short trip otherwise.

Once they were through the dizzying maze of corridors –only some of which Emaya professed to have explored and gotten genuinely lost in- they arrived out in the garden. The Teenager stretched with a loud whine escaping her gaping muzzle, delighting in the simple luxury of being out of the palace and in actual natural surroundings. It was a lot quieter than she was used to and everything from the bushes to the grass a lot more preened but nature was nature and she would take what she could get at this point. Out of the corner of her eye though she was looking for good hiding spots; trees to climb up or bushes that could be hidden behind. It was habit and nothing more for she was as safe in this garden as she would have been at the heart of an army. Because she was. She took a moment just to enjoy the sounds and smells of outside and the feeling of the grass on her bare footpads, even if the heat was sitting on her like a thoroughly unpleasant blanket and making her yearn even more for the cooling waters of the pond.

“Hmm?” She turned to Javaelli, having allowed the girl to get behind her, “they put it in a jar?” she blinked for a moment, tail swishing, “then…what happens to the body? Does it just sit there and wait for its brain to come back? Does the brain know it’s being lifted around? Are there memories? What happens to the bits they replace then? Do they get fed to the dogs?” She asked in rapid succession, the answers from a cheery Javaelli only serving to confuse the young Alumina even more. Cyberbrains did sound really rather fascinating. Perhaps she would look them up tonight on the network and learn all she could.

Finally, the tray-boo-shay was brought out by a long-suffering servant and Emaya finally got to cast her eye of the contraption she had heard so much about. The most immediate thought she had was that it looked like one of the dipping bird toys that Nylia had sitting on her desk that bobbed its head to take a drink and that made her giggle. Her second thought was that it was really a marvellous piece of engineering. She walked around it a few times, bending over to peer in past the supporting frames and into the joints. She spent a long in particular on the weight at the end, trying to work out how a young Princess not even out of her teens had gotten her hands on such a valuable and intricate material. It was not quite her cannon but only because it was better than anything she could have imagined in her head. Even for all the mechanisms and minor sounds of stress she picked up from certain joints, it looked simple to operate too.

She was pleased to have been correct in as this as Javaelli took a piece of fruit and demonstrated the device from start to finish. She watched keenly, unblinking, tail barely moving and ears swivelled forward as she took in every step. She knew she would take a turn –there was no other alternate- and she recounted the steps over and over in her head. There was no need for her to do it for she could recall everything with perfect accuracy but even so, it was soothing to reassure herself of everything. She was waiting for the moment when it was fired but when it did, it was not in the manner she had expected. She was not sure what she had been anticipating but the weight hit the ground as if making an atmospheric re-entry and the whole frame responding with screams and groans of stressed metal had not been it. She leapt back a step, eyes wide, ears flat and tail suddenly puffing up like a squirrel’s. It took her a few seconds to calm down, purposefully running her long limb through her hands to flatten the fur as she looked at the exploded mess that had once been a fruit.

“That was…unexpected,” She stepped forward with a characteristically mischievous grin spreading across her muzzle, “let me try!”

With the warning ringing in her ears, winced back the arm into place, pressing the button down until it was in exactly the same position as Javaelli had put it. She picked up two pieces of fruit and weighted them carefully, holding her tongue between her teeth before shrugging and putting both on the tray at the end of the arm. Looking back over her shoulder to her friend, the Feline smiled and pinned her tail against her back with one arm while using the other to press the fire button. It sprung into the air as loudly and dramatically as before, again causing the Feline to spring back as sharply as the arm itself. She watched her fruit as it split in two directions to land some ways apart and nowhere near Javaelli’s own marker.

“Ooooh,” she clapped her hands together enthusiastically, “that’s amazing! So much noise and the splatter at the end! Sqoosh!” She made a noise akin to fruit being squealed, all but bouncing on her toes, “can we fire more? Pleeeeease?”

[Vipra]

The princess was incapable of holding in her laughter as Emaya jumped back and her tail went super-poofy. It was adorable and Javaelli was somewhat disappointed as the alumina stroked her tail fur back down to its normal flatness. Oh well, the moment of weakness passed and her roommate was back to her perky, impish, self. Javaelli would have to find another way to make her poof up some other time, for now she stepped back and held her hands behind her back as her alumina peer took over the miniature siege engine. Watching as Emaya winchied the arm back with the buttons and placed fruit in the bowl, Javaelli stood further back as her alumina companion pinned her tail against her back and hit the button. The trebuchet again slammed and groaned, flinging fruit far afield, but Javaelli only had eyes for the strip of coloured ribbon tied around a certain alumina’s tail.

With a grumpy frown she was about to tap Emaya on the shoulder and complain about her wearing the ribbon even after having told her that it would not be good, but as Emaya spun about and clapped happily Javaelli’s expression shifted into a smile before the alumina could spot her mood. It was hard to make herself serious again and tell off her alumina friend as said friend hopped on her toes and begged to fire more. Well, Javaelli supposed she could tell her after they’d lobbed a few more gourds and citrus fruit. What harm could come of it? “Sure,” Javaelli said with a grin, winching down the arm and up the counterweight with a click of a button, “grab some more and load it up.”

Javaelli watched Emaya walk to the sacks of fruit, focused in thought on what she might select to launch next, and was surprised as a hand slapped down on her shoulder and a familiar voice rang out beside her, “Hey sis? What’re you up to, fucking around with fruit again?” Javaelli groaned as Tavanni spoke, her older sister having walked up beside her unnoticed, “Shouldn’t you be doing something productive instead?”

Staring up at her sister, Tavanni a half head taller than her, broader in the shoulder, and definitely fuller in figure with her inherent atoran athleticism shown off by sportswear, Javaelli looked into her older sibling’s dark red eyes and shrunk against her touch, “We’re just having some fun and I was showing Emaya-”

“Hitting on the alumina your rooming with eh?”

“No! I-”

“Come on,” Tavanni laughed, removing her hand from her younger sister’s shoulder to slap her on the back while nodding at Emaya, “she’s got the ribbon around her tail and everything so don’t try and be coy. No way you’d let her wear that unless you had a thing for her.”

“What?! We’re not-”

“Suuure you’re not,” she drawled out the word maliciously, “Toss fruit around for a bit longer, but when you’re done with your date Anammi and I want to have a chat with you. And you Emaya,” Tavanni raised her voice so it carried clearly to the alumina and winked at her, “try not to tucker her out too much. I’d stick around to make sure you don’t cause a scandal, but I’ve got places to be.” With that, and not allowing a word edgewise, Tavanni slapped Javaelli on the shoulder again before laughing and striding back to the palace.

Glaring after Tavanni as she disappeared back into the palace, Javaelli gritted her teeth and sighed out her frustration before looking at Emaya, “Well, at least she was in a good mood. Wanna load the fruit in and fire it?” she paused a moment before looking down to the swaying tip of her alumina roommates tail, “and did you really have to put on the ribbon?”

[Alversia]

Emaya stood a little off from Tavanni and Javaelli with a large piece of fresh fruit in her hands. Her eyes narrowed and the tip of her tail curled into a hook as she watched Tavanni with what could only be called a very unpleasant expression. Everything she said from the initial opening statement to the very unnecessary teasing regarding the ribbon around Emaya’s tail made the girl clench her pointy little teeth to avoid saying something back that might not end well for any of them. So this was the infamous Tavanni was it? Even if she had not been warned beforehand, Emaya knew that she and the Princess were not going to get on. She had an effortless sort of arrogance and cockiness around her, a smugness that came from position and stature rather than any degree of competence or talent. She could feel her claws extending into the fruit she was holding, passing easily through the flesh to bring bright-coloured juice dribbling into the fur of her fingertips. Javaelli did not seem to know how to respond to the accusation of the ribbon and Emaya glanced back briefly at the ribbon there. Regret flashed up for a moment before she dispelled it with a simple assurance to herself. She should not be afraid to wear a little band around her tail for fear of a bullying bitch.

As the Princess strode off with all the cockiness that she would have expected, the teenager looked down at the fruit in her hand and pushed her finger tips into it a little further, mind racing with all sorts of possibilities. The elder of the two Atoran had made her way across the gardens now, passing around trees and across from the lake. The Feline looked up towards the tips of the trees to measure the wind direction. She pondered it a little longer as Tavanni got further and further away. It would be so easy to do, she thought as she let go of the fruit. It did not drop to the ground but instead hovered in place, bobbing up and down a little as she effortlessly held it in place. She lined up the shot with the back of Tavanni’s head. The fruit was not hard, it wouldn’t do any serious damage she estimated. All she had to do was put it right between those long head-stalks and make sure that it exploded appropriately. Lots of juice all over her face. It made her giddy to think about it. Just as she gathered herself to hurtle the first shot of war across the garden she stopped herself. It was only a glance towards Javaelli that stayed her, for the girl looked so forlorn that the Alumina changed her formerly concrete decision. She did not want to ruin the mood of her roommate any further than it had already been ruined so she put her hands on the fruit again as Javaelli turned to her.

“Sure,” she put the fruit in the newly reloaded catapult and fired it towards the others but there was none of the enthusiasm as before. Nonetheless, the sound did make the Feline jump once more and her tail puffed up as before. This time, Emaya looked back at her own limb, affronted by her own fright as she worked to pat it down again.

Turning to Javaelli now that their firing had finished, she rolled her barely covered shoulders, “it’s a pretty ribbon. I like wearing it,” she said in as casual voice as she could but while forcefully keeping eye contact with the Atoran, “shall we go and see what your surprise is? Will I bring some squishy fruit just in case?” She offered a small, sheepish smile, "your sister's a bitch."

[Vipra]

The way Emaya had been floating that fruit had had the princess very worried that her roommate was about to do something that would land them both in a galaxy of suck. Naturally she was very much relieved as the alumina took the fruit in hand again and loaded it into the catapult. It was obvious to Javaelli as Emaya fired the trebuchet that it had lost some of its magic upon the alumina, and shewas disappointed. It wasn’t enough that her sister made her uncomfortable, she also ruined the moment. Watching after the fruit forlornly as it flew through the air and splattered against the hard surface of the wall, the princess looking at the mess they left behind for a moment before turning back to Emaya and again finding her poofy tail cute but not enjoying it as she had before. Emaya’s answer to her question about the ribbon and the feline’s steady stare had her keeping eye contact as she explained why she was wearing such a... symbolic ribbon.

Then she directed Javaelli’s attention back to the matter her sister had brought up and the fact that said sister was not of the highest social caliber. While some people might have felt they had to defend their family members automatically, she did not have such a degree of filial piety and responded taciturnly, “Yeah, she can be. A lot. I suppose we should go and see what she and Anammi want though, and leave the fruit.” Pressing a few buttons, the stabilizers for the trebuchet retracted from the soil and Javaelli left it there, fruit remaining in their sacks leaning against the tree for servants to dispose of as they would. She stalked off in a sulking stride, expecting the worst given Tavanni had been the one demanding her presence, and departed from the clear skies of the garden and back into the palace depths.

It was obvious where they would be waiting, her sisters favouring Tavanni’s livingroom for some reason, and the youthful princess knew the way there by heart. It was quickly then that she found herself outside the door, Emaya beside her, and stated openly to her roommate what she expected wait for her within, “I bet this is going to be something humiliating.” Dourly shaking her head, she opened the door and stepped past the threshold.

Inside were Tavanni and Anammi, the two eldest daughters of the Imperatrix, Tavanni looking unchanged from minutes before and Anammi as slim and flirty as ever in a soft pink sari that accented her bright scarlet eyes. The sister that was ever the cause of Javaelli’s torment sat upon a stool, leaning back against a counter in a room whose floorplan was a carbon copy to Javaeilli’s while the eldest sister sat in a wide four-seater couch and had her arm resting over the back. All the accoutrements of the room, such as the television and two computers, or the various athletic gear piled in a corner, did not interest the youngest atoran present so much as the genuine smiles of her sisters. Approaching cautiously, glancing over her shoulder to make sure Emaya was close behind, she entered the room and made her way to Anammi, sitting beside her oldest sister.

“You wanted to see me?”

“Well of course!” Anammi said in her flitting, cheerful voice, “Tavanni and I have gifts for you. You’re going away for a long time and we wanted you to have reminders of us.”

“I- Really?” she was honestly rather shocked, having expected them to goad her into a game or some other social activity and leaving her in a shameful last place once more, so her confusion was honest, “Uh, what is it then?”

Anammi stood up, taking Javaelli by the arm so she had to rise as well, and let go before walking over to Tavanni’s bedroom, “I’ve prepared my gift, come on then and I’ll tell you all about it and show you how to get the most out of it.”

Looking to Emaya again for a split second before following behind her sister, Javaelli disappeared into the bedroom and Anammi closed the door behind them. This left Tavanni and Emaya together, alone, and the atoran wasted little time in striking up conversation, “So,” she said with joviality, “how fares the feline of the forest in the lap of luxury? Hah, had to say that one. Seriously though, my sister isn’t being a bother right? She is more than a tad excitable and nervous, very anxious about everything and takes jokes far too seriously, needs to shrug it off and toughen up,” the middling princess looked at Emaya with a stony expression despite the smile tugging at the corner of her lips and the steely edge that suddenly tinged her words, “Take care of her out there, and don’t you dare push her around.”

[Alversia]

Emaya was as upset as Javaelli that the immediate entertainment of the trebuchets had been ruined and she watched as the girl set up the device ready to be moved in their absence. The Alumina shook her head, tail swishing from side to side, “Can you leave it where it is please? We can have some fun with it later right?” She asked with a hopeful edge to her voice. There was no answer to her explanation of why she had put the ribbon back on and that surprised her. She had been expecting some sort of challenge to her rather half-explained reasoning. Luckily, Javaelli seemed to be much more distracted by the looming threat of meeting with her elder sisters and so the conversation moved rather quickly away from her choice of attire and back to the matter at hand, namely the bitchiness of her sisters.

Here again she was not sure what to expect from Javaelli as none of the talk so far had seemed to paint the elder Atoran princesses in any sort of positive light. She had not spent much time with either of them, just a typically brief greeting when she had first arrived just so she would remember the names and faces. The young Feline glanced around at the fruit and contemplated bringing one of the larger and squishier pieces that was left. She did not even know what she was going to do with it in the end really, just to have something at her side. Javaelli clearly saw the glance though and with her word, the thought was abandoned in Emaya’s mind. It would just be the two of them then with only their wits and no fruit to protect them. It was an unhappy duo that made their way back across the gardens then, though Emaya had mixed feelings about that. She kept looking back longingly at the siege engine they had left behind but at the same time, her fur was prickly and uncomfortable in the heat. What she really needed was a bath, or a dip in the lake, or another shower. A shower would be nice. Her thoughts strayed back to the shower in Javaelli’s bathroom, nice and cool. Maybe she would slip out at some point later in the day and cool herself down.

Javaelli clearly knew where they would be waiting for she was able to find her sisters without Tavanni giving her as much as a single direction. They were waiting in a room that looked identical to Javaelli’s, to the point that Emaya was momentarily disorientated as the turns they had taken did not match her mental map of the palace. There was Tavanni and the elder sister as well. She had met Anammi even less frequently than Tavanni, the heir to the Imperium was usually off with her Balu wife or partying, at least, if what the other Alumina had told her was true. She looked it too, beautiful by any standard, she was wearing a playful grin and quickly whisked away Javaelli despite her stuttering protests and look of surprise. She was not the only one and the teenage Feline’s perked ears betrayed how things had not gone how she was expecting either. It did however, leave only her and Tavanni in the room together.

She would have been content just to sit there in silence but Tavanni had other ideas it seemed. The Alumina turned to look up at the bigger Atoran and shrugged her shoulders, “its okay,” she admitted then decided not to elaborate any further than that. She was not really interested in a full conversation with the girl, even though she had to admit that what she said about her roommate was true. Javaelli had most definitely a flair for the dramatic and she seemed to have misplaced her sense of humour somewhere and her sense of fun somewhere else, “Javaelli’s been fine. She’s just a little…serious is all,” She looked to the Atoran, unblinking and with her expression entirely serious, “don’t worry about that. Javaelli’s my friend and I will protect her from anyone trying to hurt her. Anyone.” She left her lingering look for a second longer before changing tack, “so what have you got her as a present?”