Part II

4. Emma

8 years old

It was almost three years after Mother came back that Nina got a little sister named Emma. Given that Abel had been assimilated into the castle with little commotion, Nina was surprised by the amount of fuss. Everybody, it seemed, loved Emma. Mother loved her for her pale hair the color of sky, and with no small amusement gave her the nickname Egg. Father loved her for the Mark that came out in the middle of her forehead, like that of the previous Exalt who was the girl's namesake. Lucina, growing with her own child, loved her for her reassuringly good behavior and willingness to be held. Morgan thought her mere existence was fascinating. Abel didn't care.

The children of those who had met and married during Ylisse's wars were different in this time. Nina knew enough by this point to understand that she was recognizable as a different version of her sister. But Abel was very different from Morgan, despite the physical resemblance that showed no sign of lessening as Abel grew. In a similar way was Nina's friend Cynthia, who went by her second name Marie and was known to be more levelheaded than her mythical sister. And then there was Iggy, who was born close enough to Inigo in the timeline, but had curlier hair and a different mouth and eyes farther apart enough to seem merely related to his precursor.

"Our alternate selves are married," he told Nina without preamble when he was over for Emma's first blessing.

"Go away, Iggy," said Nina. "You're gross."

It was after Iggy that her parents' friends generally stopped even considering using the same names for their new children. Nina's little cousin Imogen was a girl, even though she had been born, order-wise, when Owain should have been. Captain Frederick's son, Nathaniel, was a full two years younger than Laurent, relatively speaking, and so far didn't look like Laurent much. And now there was Emma, who hadn't existed in the original future at all.

Emma was in the throne room on Father's lap, where he and Mother were receiving petitions and well-wishers. Earlier had been the blessing, where Father and the priests brought her to the temple of Naga in the city and formally confirmed her Mark. Nina had been required to stand for that; but with her part in the ceremony over, she had changed out of her dress and now wanted to get away from Iggy so that she could play with her cousin and her friend.

The lawns surrounding the castle were a crowded mess. The public halls weren't much better, as seemingly everybody who was been invited to the feast later had decided to come inside now, even though the autumn weather was mild. And of course, there was a guard milling about for what seemed like each guest. Nina walked with as much purpose as she could muster around the priests and the Feroxi party. She failed to evade Lady Maribelle – May I have a moment, Princess? Congratulations to you and your family. If you see your aunt about, would you kindly tell her to find me? I will, Your Honor – but had ducked away before there could be some wandering comment on her posture or clothes or anything else. Having escaped that, she ran past the parlor, the captain, and a friend of Mother's from Plegia who had been gazing around the halls in astonishment before breaking free through the door that led outside to the courtyard, where Marie and Imogen were tossing a ball.

Marie saw her first, nodding almost in approval as Nina stopped and caught her breath. Her orange curls bounced. "Good. Now we can play monkey-in-the-middle."

"I want to be in the middle," said Imogen.

"All right," said Nina, "but you can't become angry with us if you have trouble catching it."

Putting Imogen in the middle kept her occupied while Nina and Marie talked, at least until Imogen got frustrated and Nina gave her an easy toss so she could switch out. For the time being, though, they spread out on the stones in front of the fountain, and Nina threw the ball to Marie in smooth arcs over her reaching cousin's head. "Did you come with your mother on her pegasus?"

Marie's mother owned a pegasus ranch just outside the capital. Marie talked all the time about how she helped out with the pegasi and how she was sometimes even allowed to fly on them. Nina wasn't sure how much a princess was supposed to like the idea of working at a ranch, but she secretly thought this was the coolest thing ever, next maybe to shapeshifting and the idea that certain parts of the castle (but only certain parts) had ghosts.

"No," said Marie, "one of the yearlings was sick this morning, so she had to stay behind. I came with my dad."

"Oh," said Nina. "Is the yearling all right?"

Marie's face was flat. "She didn't want to talk about it."

"Oh," said Nina again. She scrounged around for the words. "I'm...sorry." Her next toss was a bit weak and veered into the bushes. Imogen and Marie both ran for it. There was a bit of a scuffle along the way, but Marie let Imogen go because she was smaller and some adult would get upset if they saw Marie tussling with her.

Imogen crawled out of the bushes holding the ball triumphantly over her head. "I got it! Nina, you're in the middle now!"

Nina wandered to the middle of the fountain path, facing Marie. "Well, is your sister here?" she asked hopefully, since seemingly half of Ylisse had come to the capital today. "Maybe she could help, if your mother needs to...take a break or something."

Marie waited as Imogen got into place. "No. My sister's in the mountains, chasing chicken thieves or something stupid like that." She paused. "She's always off doing stupid things." She shrugged just in time to be hit in the shoulder by the ball.

"Both of you aren't playing," accused Imogen. "I thought you said you would play."

"Sorry, Imogen!" Nina chased the ball and threw it back. "We were just talking for a bit. But now we'll play with you, honest."

She turned to Imogen to make the point, but Marie continued her thought anyway: "It doesn't really matter. Pegasi, especially the young ones, get sick and die all the time. And besides, I told my mom I'll do chores tonight."

Marie was a good person like that. "You say your sister is off doing stupid things, but it doesn't sound much different than how my brother and Owain go off on journeys."

"But your family is royalty," said Marie. "So they can do whatever they want."

Nina didn't think that was true, because her parents, who were the most royal, spent almost all their time nowadays working or traveling or being exhausted. But she knew that to bring that up to somebody who wasn't royalty would be rude.

It was a while later, after they had spent some time actually playing with Imogen in order to satisfy her, that Lucina crossed the courtyard to greet them. "Why don't you ask Abel to play?" she said. "He looks lonely over there on his own."

She gestured to where Abel was sitting in the corner of the courtyard, drawing in the dirt with a stick. Nina had seen her brother there, but was used to not taking much notice of him. "He doesn't want to," she told Lucina. She raised her voice. "Abel, do you want to play with us over here?"

Abel looked up, shrugged, then looked right back down again.

"See?" said Nina.

Lucina shook her head a bit. "When I was younger, we all played together. Well, it was me having to keep those three" – she pointed at Marie, then Imogen, then Abel – "in line. Right, Morgan?" she called over her shoulder. "Didn't you all give me so much trouble?"

"What?" Morgan was under the awning, talking with great energy to Owain, who stood listening with his chin on his hand, nodding like some kind of scholar. "Probably, if you say so. Anyway, now Laurent's not talking to me anymore –"

"That's right, he wouldn't remember," said Lucina distantly. "Perhaps Owain – no, he also would have been very young..."

"Well, Imogen is a girl here, Your Grace." Marie spoke very politely. "So even if Abel did like to play, he might not want to play with all of us."

Lucina conceded this. "Ah, that's true."

Nina hadn't seen her sister for a few months. Lucina had been starting to show last time, but now she was definitely, visibly pregnant. It was strange to see Lucina like that: pregnant but still in her usual boots and trousers and coat cut for a man. Yet that was mostly what Mother wore as well, and there hadn't been anything so odd about her carrying a baby.

With a start, Nina realized that Lucina's child would be the same as if she had a baby with Inigo, or maybe even Iggy. And that was what she would look like if she ever became pregnant. For a moment, Nina had a strange sensation of not feeling at home in her body; of being somebody else who happened to be looking through the eyes of a blue-haired girl whose real name was Lucina.

She looked away. Imogen had caught Owain's eye, and they exchanged some weird, invented salute that existed between the two of them. Then Owain stuck out his fist and gave her a very dramatic thumbs-up. Imogen giggled, but didn't go running to him. She still looked a lot like her brother: blonde, with thin eyebrows and the gentle nose from Father's side of the family that Nina hadn't inherited. But her being a girl was a fairly fundamental difference between the two of them.

Nina didn't feel any better. "I'm going to go see if Father and Mother are done," she announced. "It's getting late, and I'm sure they mean to get everybody for the feast soon." And, since she was the princess who lived at the castle and was responsible for things like that, she turned and left before anybody could say they wanted to follow.

Towards the end of the feast, Nina excused herself to go to the bathroom. Since she wasn't old enough to sit at the main table, nobody really cared – in fact, she noticed as she stood up, her brother Abel was missing, and had probably floated off some time ago.

The silence of the halls still felt funny in her ears as she left the bathroom. When she'd left, she felt like she'd eaten enough to be comfortably full, but now she felt a bit sick. She was in the private part of the castle, and, as she stood in the hall deciding whether to go back or to seek solace in her room, she saw Maitelen the new nurse walking with Emma in her arms.

So all of them had gotten tired of the feast. Nina followed at a distance as Maitelen turned into the nursery.

"...the sweetest child I've ever held," she heard the nurse cooing. Against her better judgment, Nina peered through the open door. Maitelen stood with one arm full of Emma, undoing the front of her blouse. "And look how pretty you are. The spitting image of Exalt Emmeryn...none of those sharp Plegian features. You'll be a beauty, you will...there we are, yes." Emma fussed for about a second before accepting Maitelen's breast. She had already been changed out of her fancy baby-dress and swaddled. Nina watched as Maitelen rocked her, then hoisted her up and burped her, then set her in her crib.

Nina stepped back from the doorway as Maitelen fixed her laces, just so it wouldn't look like she had been sticking her nose in the entire time.

"Oh – Princess!" Maitelen exclaimed upon noticing her, then smiled. "Would you do something good for your sister, dear? I couldn't get one of the guards away from the feast as I was bringing her up. Would you stay here with her, until I get somebody to fill the time before the night guard? Then I can stay in with her and retire."

It was normal that she couldn't find a free guard when there were so many guests. Nina nodded.

As Maitelen was leaving, though, she asked, "Do I have Plegian features?"

Maitelen immediately turned. "Oh, Princess, forgive me –"

"Do I?"

Hand to her chest, Maitelen nervously stepped towards her. There was silence. Nina could tell she was thinking hard about what to say. "You resemble your mother as well as your father. Your little sister will be a beauty in her own way, but so will you. Why, just look at Lucina – her features complement themselves well. I couldn't tell she was Plegian by glancing at her."

"It's all right," said Nina. "I understand."

"Oh, thank you, Princess." She smiled again. "I mean it. Looks and everything else, you come from fine stock."

Maitelen bustled away. Nina crept into the nursery where her little sister slept. She looked down at Emma in the crib, at her pursed lips and stub of a nose and wispy pale hair.

And she whispered to her a question she would never, ever allow anybody else to hear. "Why do you get to be different?"

It was petty. It wasn't Emma's fault that she was the perfect baby, or that she had been born. That was what made it unfair.

Imagine how unfair it must be to Marie. She's not a princess. Imagine how unfair is must be to Iggy; he turned out ugly. Imagine how unfair it must be to Lailah; she has to grow up with a bunch of other children who aren't even her siblings besides...

Princesses weren't supposed to be petulant. But as Nina slumped down the wall to sit on her heels while she continued to watch her pretty sister sleeping in the crib that looked like it had once been hers, she decided she wanted to be petulant about it, just once.