A/N: Hey, chapter 25 guys! Halfway to fifty! Also, this is going to be a fairly short chapter. Hope you don't mind.

That being said, we might have some new readers here. As said in chapter one, here is where you should have skipped to if you wanted gloss over the early years. So here's a quick recap.

Dorian Havilliard, Crown Prince of Adarlan, met his best—and only—friend when he was just eight and Chaol was eleven. The two bonded immediately, but, like all friendships, they had difficulties. After just a few years of being friends, Chaol was forced to move back to his homeland of Aneille. This, of course, drove a rift between the friends, though they were still able to see each other occasionally, and write to one another.

Dorian and Chaol both wished to escape their birthrights, but only Chaol could possibly do that. After many years spent unhappy, he finally made the decision to abdicate his title and become a member of the royal guard, with the help of a few members on Dorian's detail.

That meant that they were able to see each other once more, which should have meant that they'd grow closer again, right? Wrong.

Chaol got a girlfriend, and suddenly all of his time was occupied by her and his training, and so Dorian began to drift from his old friend. In this drifting, however, he met a girl about his age named Lisa, and the two became friends. He also became friends with a group of court boys, who were all girl crazy. At which point he began to feel different, because he wasn't.

Now, wondering why that might be—and trying to feel less alone and more like maybe he has a family—Dorian is turning to Lisa for her advice on his increasing unease with his feelings. Since he doesn't have Chaol anymore, he tells Lisa everything. But there's one thing that he'd never tell her—or Chaol, for that matter: Dorian is able to do magic, and he's known since he was thirteen—so for over a year.

Chapter Twenty-Five: The Questioning Begins

This mystery continued to plague Dorian for quite a bit of time, causing him more than a little bit of concern. His father was always stressing to Dorian how important it was to find a good, strong woman that could carry the weight of the crown and, preferably, who he loved.

So what would the king think about a son who didn't love women the way he was supposed to?

That thought was the most worrying for Dorian. He couldn't bear to think about his father being that upset with him just because he was different. His father hated anything and anyone that was different.

Different.

Dorian didn't like that word. Or the idea that he was so profoundly different. He liked standing out, and didn't mind that none of the other boys his age liked books and philosophy, but for some reason, this did bother him. Like they were all judging him…or something like that. This just felt like he was taking it one step too far, somehow.

He thought about all of this so much that he even brought it up to Lisa, who had basically become his new counselor-in-chief.

"Lisa?" he asked her, after much deliberation as to whether or not he should actually talk to her about it. He was worried she'd just make fun of him for worrying about what other people thought. And for worrying about crushes.

Lisa rolled her eyes at Dorian. "I know that tone. You've got something on your mind. Come on, don't be shy. Spill," she commanded.

Dorian pursed his lips, second guessing himself. What would she say? Would she just laugh at him?

"Well," he finally got out, "I've just… you know, I'm not in that same place as the other boys my age."

Lisa smirked at him. "And what place would that be? The whole 'crushes on girls' thing?"

This had been a bad idea. "Yeah," Dorian forced through his lips nervously.

"Dorian, that's nothing to worry about. It just means you'll get there later!"

"I know, I know," he said, feeling a little embarrassed. "I shouldn't have said anything."

"No," Lisa said, her face softening. "No, Dorian, you should always say something! I'm going to be here for you no matter what, and you can talk to me about anything! I just want you to know that you shouldn't be worried about this."

"Really?" Dorian asked. "I mean, I just can't help but feel like I should be. Everything seems to be saying I should—my voice has deepened; I'm growing up. What if I never reach that point? Seriously—what if I don't? I know we talk all the time about how we like being different, but I don't think I like this kind of different. I want to fall in love, to find someone to spend the rest of my life with!"

Lisa looked him dead in the eyes. "Dorian. You'll get there. And even if you don't, that's totally fine! Falling in love isn't the most important thing in the world—loving in general is! You can find people to spend the rest of your life with, but you don't have to love them in a romantic way! You should just relax: You won't solve anything by worrying about liking girls, and it's certainly not going to happen any sooner because of the worrying. Besides, you're going to have to marry whether or not you want to, and you'll have to marry a woman of adequate blood status. You know that. Whether you fall in love with a woman or not, it's unlikely you'll love the one that you marry."

He nodded along. "Yes, but just say that I don't end up feeling that way—"

"Dorian! It's not a big deal!" Dorian looked away. Lisa groaned. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Love is a big deal; I'm just trying to say that it's not something you should be worrying about right now. There are plenty of people who don't start feeling that way until much later, so maybe you're one of those people! Or maybe you're one of the ones that needs to find the right person before they start to feel that way! You're perfectly normal in that sense, Dorian, and you need to let it go."

Dorian looked at her, and nodded again. "I guess you're right," he murmured. "I'll forget about it." It wasn't the entire truth, but he did feel better having talked to her about it, and he decided that perhaps he shouldn't be so worried.

"Thank you. You need to stop listening to those boys and their teasing, I'm telling you. They just make you feel bad!"

Lisa was right about that too, Dorian realized. They did make him feel upset. But they also made him feel like he belonged to something for once.

But maybe that's not what matters. Maybe I don't have to belong to something to be whole. After all, I've got Lisa, haven't I?

He dismissed this idea, however, deciding that it was a problem to deal with at a later date. Right now, he was just content to read beside his best friend.

Chapter Release Date: March 3, 2018