"It's amazing what you can do when your best friend is the Moroi Queen," Rose sighed, collapsing into a plush brown suede sofa.
"It's amazing what you can do when your girlfriend is the Moroi Queen," Christian echoed.
"Well, she's my sister," Jill laughed.
"And I'm his guardian," Eddie added, thumbing back toward the door where Adrian and Sydney were just walking in. He pulled Jill onto the sofa next to Rose, their hands interlocked. They were already much friendlier with each other than they were when the group had left the Moroi Court early that morning.
"And we're just along for the ride," Adrian chimed, too chipper for his own good. Sydney, in the doorway behind him, laughed, Declan in her arms.
Dimitri just shook his head, smiling as he slipped in carrying half a dozen bags—most of which probably belonged to Rose. His fiancée could pack up and leave with nothing more than the shirt on her back and the silver stake in her belt loop…but she preferred to travel heavy, especially on vacation.
Which was effectively what this was. Even as queen, Lissa had to pull a lot of strings to work this out. It helped that she, Lissa, Christian, Rose, and Dimitri were living legends, war heroes, and some of the most badass dhampirs and fighting Moroi alive. The five of them only had to look at something like they wanted it and it was theirs. So, when Lisa had asked for a month-long, minimally supervised retreat for herself and her closest friends, the Court had to give in. Was it the most practical venture? No. But when Lissa walked into the stately cabin mansion in the secluded hills of the Vermont woods, she knew that all the effort was worth it.
"Finally!" she cried, playfully falling into Christian and wrapping her arms around him. "The Court has been boring me to tears lately! I needed this."
"I think we all did," agreed Sydney. She was sitting on the floor with Declan, unpacking his travel bag and handing him a toy car. She continued rummaging around the bag until she pulled out a sheet of paper. "Not to be the fun sucking human and mother here," she continued, stifling a yawn, "but can we go over the sleeping arrangements? I made a diagram."
Everyone rolled their eyes, but no one was surprised. If Lissa was the mastermind behind this trip, Sydney is the engineer who assured it went smoothly. From suggesting the month—June, when she and Adrian would be off from college—to arranging food deliveries and, apparently, sleeping arrangements, Sydney Ivashkov was the master planner who made sure everything went pleasantly for everyone.
"Let's hear it, Syd," Rose said, rolling over so that her elbows were propped on the arm of the couch and her chin sat neatly in her palms. "As long as you don't have me sharing a wall with Queenie and Hot Head over here." She gestured toward Lissa and Christian who were standing behind the couch and paying very little attention to anything else. "It's bad enough that I've seen what they do through the bond. I don't need the audio, too."
"If you think they're bad, don't even get me started on what the Mr. and Mrs. get up to," Jill teased, miming a gagging motion. "We're talking really kinky stuff: leather and ropes and—"
"Say the girls having sexy time with dhampirs!" Adrian cut her off. He personally didn't care if his bedroom preferences were shared in detail with his friends, but he could practically feel Sydney blushing behind him. "Talk about stamina! I mean, Belikov is the physical incarnation of the Russian war god, and if Castile is half as creative in other areas as he is in his cooking, then I don't think either of you have any room to kink-shame."
A wild grin spread across Adrian's face when he saw how uncomfortable both Jill and Eddie were. Rose, on the other hand, just shrugged as if to say that Adrian had a point, and Dimitri, stoic as usual, only twitched the ends of his mouth up in a nearly imperceptible smile.
"I don't want to know about that!" Lissa shuddered. She turned to Sydney, "But I would love to hear what you've worked out for bedrooms. Please."
"Oh, uh, sure," Sydney stammered, unsure as to whether or not the bedroom banter was going to start back up again. There was no denying that all four couples were looking to have some alone time that night. "So, there are three rooms on the floor above us and three on the floor below us. This is the main floor with the kitchen and living room and other common areas," she said. "The pool is out back, and there are bathrooms connected to each bedroom. That being said, I figured that we'd put a nursery together for Declan downstairs, and Adrian and I would take the room next to it. And then next to us we'd put Jill and Eddie—to keep Eddie as close to Adrian as possible, you know? Then, upstairs, that leaves Lissa, Christian, Rose, and Dimitri. You can even put a room between you to soundproof."
Sydney winked, and Christian almost looked like he wanted to bite her head off, but she knew that was mostly just the way Christian looked. They were all close enough friends to accept that completely consensual, adult sex would be happening on this trip, and any strange noises were par for the course. Not that they wouldn't do everything in their power to eliminate as much of that awkwardness as possible, though.
"Works for me," Rose said, swinging her feet off the couch and grabbing one of her many bags from Dimitri. "I'm going upstairs to—" she wiggled her eyebrows "—freshen up."
"I'll bring the rest of our things up, Roza," Dimitri smiled. His dark eyes were fixated on Rose as she disappeared up the steps.
"Have fun, Comrade," Adrian winked, "but remember that us respectable people are going to be awake and socializing for a while. Try to keep it down."
Dimitri only smirked in response.
"Do we actually have to be respectable people and socialize?" Jill asked once Dimitri was out of earshot.
"No, I just wanted to make them feel bad for giving in to their primal urges instead of spending time with their dearest friends," Adrian said. He seated himself in a massive arm chair and rested his feet on the coffee table.
Sydney rolled her eyes. "Well, I'm going to go put this one to bed," she announced. "A day of travel has him a little fussy."
"Vamos, querido. Es la hora de dormir," she added to Declan.
"Hurry, so we can gossip about Rose and Dimitri!" Lissa called after her.
When Sydney returned, Lissa, Christian, Jill, and Eddie were lying on the couch, limbs and bodies intertwined. Lissa nursed a mug of tea as she nestled into Christian's shoulder. Jill had her long, slender legs draped over Eddie's, and his fingers were drifting absentmindedly over her stomach.
There wasn't an inch of space left on the couch.
"Your seat's over here," Adrian's voice came from behind her, dripping with suggestion. Sydney turned around to see her husband sitting in the arm chair patting his knee. Sydney rolled her eyes. Ordinarily, she would have told him off, chastised him for being so puckish in front of other people, but something about the cabin and the surrounding mountain air and the weight of everything that had happened in the last few years made her go and sit on Adrian's lap without question.
If Adrian was surprised by her boldness, he didn't show it. He only ran his hand down her spine, resting it at the small of her back before turning back to Lissa: "So what's this gossip about Rose and Dimitri?"
Lissa sat up a little and set her tea down. "Wedding gossip," she said. "She's been engaged for seven months, and she hasn't told her mother; she hasn't set a date, and she hasn't asked me to be her maid of honor. What's going on? Is she getting cold feet? Is Dimitri getting cold feet?"
"Liss, if anyone would know that, you would," Jill pointed out. "You're her best friend."
"I know, but I'm always with Christian, so that means Dimitri is always around, and she's not going to talk about that with him there. And if I'm not with Christian, we're surrounded by other Royals or Court officials. We don't exactly have much time for 'girl talk.'"
As soon as Lissa finished speaking, the unmistakable sound of rhythmic thumping could be heard from upstairs.
"I don't think she's getting cold feet," Adrian chuckled after a pause. "She's crazy about him. But I do think the idea of getting married scares the hell out her. And I can't say I blame her. I mean, how many healthy marriages do we know of?"
"Sonya and Mikhail," Lissa said.
"You and Sydney," Jill smiled.
"And…" Eddie started, but faltered. "Yeah, that's really about it. I guess Rose and Dimitri don't really have many great role models. You don't really hear about dhampirs getting married, and their situation is—unique, to say the least."
"But you guys did it," Jill said. "And a Moroi/Alchemist relationship is definitely more taboo than two dhampirs."
"Eh, it took a little work to get here," Adrian grinned, burying his face in Sydney's hair, "but I think it worked out."
Sydney relaxed into the feel of Adrian's lips on her neck but kept her cool long enough to respond.
"She'll come around," she agreed. "It's stupid that no one can stay together anymore. They're just getting married to reproduce and keep their family line. No one's had the chance to love whom they want to. It's all been written out and dictated for so long that it's almost breaking from tradition to be in a marriage you legitimately want to be in. But they could start turning the tide." Sydney looked around the room at Jill and Eddie—a Royal and a dhampir—and Lissa and Christian—the Moroi Queen and a social outcast. "And I really think they're just the beginning."
Christian, unnoticed by anyone else, pulled Lissa marginally closer to him, his hand slipping from her shoulder to her waist. Eddie's fidgeting fingers stilled on Jill's knee.
"And we can always give Rose a little friendly push if we need to," Sydney added.
"We might have to," Christian said, his voice half smirk and half sincerity. "I don't know how much more of Liss' 'Babe, what colors do you think she'll choose? I really don't look good in yellow. Babe, do you think she'll wear white? Babe, they won't get married at the Academy, will they?' I can take."
Lissa swatted his arm. "Oh, hush! I'm just practicing for our wedding."
"And when will that be, dearest sister?" Jill asked, unable to hide the prodding curiosity from her voice—not that she tried to.
"'Teen Queen marries Outcast'," Adrian teased as if quoting a newspaper headline. "Won't that be the talk of the town?"
This time Sydney hit him…much less kindly than Lissa had hit Christian.
"Very cute, Ivashkov," Christian replied. This time, his voice was entirely smirk and sarcasm. "I've never heard anyone make fun of the differences in mine and Lissa's social statuses before. That's really clever of you."
"If you got married, you'd have the same social status," Jill pointed out. "Queen and King."
When Christian didn't reply, Lissa came to his defense. "Adrian, I'm twenty-one, so your 'teen queen' headlines don't work anymore. And, guys, you know we've discussed this. We'll get married one day. I think we're both in agreement on that. But, to put it mildly, there's been a lot going on recently, and we're in no rush. Right now, it should all be about Rose and Dimitri and their wedding."
Jill pressed on. "But how wonderful would it be to be engaged at the same time as your best friend? Sydney went and got married without us, so this might be your last chance!"
"What about you?" Lissa quipped, raising a blonde eyebrow at her sister. "What if we were engaged at the same time? A double Royal wedding."
Jill flushed. "You're just avoiding the question."
"I think it'd be nice." Lissa shot a quick glance in both Christian and Eddie's direction. Eddie was too overtly uncomfortable to notice, but Christian caught her eye and sighed.
"Maybe we should go to bed before we make Eddie wet himself," he suggested.
"I'm not even tired anymore," argued Lissa. "All this wedding talk has me too excited to sleep."
Christian carefully untangled himself from the couch and picked up their bags from the floor where Dimitri had left them earlier. "Did I say we had to sleep?" he asked nonchalantly.
Lissa relented and followed him upstairs, a shameless smile spreading from ear-to-ear.
"Well, that's our cue to go downstairs and put another sound barrier between us and them," Adrian announced. He tapped Sydney's sides as he urged her to stand up, and she obliged, rolling her eyes as she did so. He took her hand and began to lead her downstairs, calling over his shoulder as he did, "Hey, Jailbait, how's it feel to know that you and your sister will be getting some in the same house at the same time? That's got to be, like, a sisterly right of passage or something, am I right?"
The last thing Jill and Eddie heard was the sound of skin hitting skin and the faint echo of Adrian's cry of, "Ow!"
Eddie looked down at Jill, who had relocated so that her head was now in his lap. He twirled his fingers through her long blonde hair.
"So, uh, about what Lissa was saying, about a double Royal wedding…what exactly does she expect…do you think?"
"Damn," he thought. "You're a Guardian, and you sound like a total idiot talking to your own girlfriend. Get over yourself, Castile!"
Jill sat up, taking his heavy, scarred hands in her own soft, strong ones. "Edison Castile," she smiled. "I love you. I think you're the bravest, kindest, funniest, smartest, and most selfless person I have ever met. But I just turned seventeen. I don't need an engagement ring or a big wedding anytime soon. I just need you. For as long as I can have you."
Eddie smile and released the breath he had been unconsciously holding. "You really are too good for me," he whispered, his lips inches from hers.
"Don't let Lissa get to you," Jill smiled, moving minutely closer. "She's just been itching for Christian to propose, and then Dimitri went and beat him to it, and now with Rose dragging their engagement out, I think she's got a lot of pent up frustration."
"That, and, you know, being queen," Eddie whispered, now just centimeters from Jill.
"Yeah, and that," she breathed, closing the gap between their lips.