Once again, thanks to my amazing beta, SOPROL! By the way, the last little bit of this chapter was done by her. I was having a little Writer's Block when I wrote this, so I asked for her help.

Chapter Thirty:

Jonathan's Birthday

On the night before Prince Jonathan's birthday, Aly decided to go to sleep early. The parties to honor Jonathan's birthdays were always very big and very tiring, so Aly thought calling it a day early the night before would be a good idea.

Just before she walked into her bedroom, there was a frantic knock on the door. Curious, Aly went to open it. Alanna pushed inside and collapsed on the nearest couch.

Aly shut and bolted the door, and then put a magical barrier up. "Alanna, what is it?"

"He..." Both Alanna's voice and her body were shaking, "He kissed me."

"What?"

"He kissed me, I had my arms full, and he kissed me."

"What was in your arms? Who kissed you? Where did this happen?" Aly said, thoroughly confused at her daughter's round-about way of talking.

"The package is a birthday gift for Jon from a mutual friend of ours...I had the bundle in my arms, and he kissed me." Alanna buried her face into her hands.

"Who kissed you Alanna? You need to tell me details. Jon? Did Jon kiss you? Or was it this mutual friend that kissed you? Who is this friend? Is he your mysterious friend in the city?" Aly sat beside her daughter on the couch and put her arm around her shaking shoulders.

"I should have stabbed him." Alanna said. "I should have stabbed him, but he said he wouldn't let me stab him and ruin our friendship."

"Jon or the friend, Alanna?" Aly asked. "If it was Jon, might I remind you that will ruin the whole plan to be a knight because you will be killed for treason."

"George." Alanna murmured, looking up from her hands.

"Who is George? Is he your mutual friend?"

Alanna nodded.

"And is he the mysterious friend in the city?"

Alanna nodded again.

"Ok, so what happened?"

"Well...maybe I should explain everything from the beginning."

"That would be helpful. Start at the beginning of the night."

"No, I mean the very beginning. When I met George...but you have to promise me, no matter what I say, you'll be calm about this." Alanna begged.

"I don't like the sound of that." Aly said.

"It's nothing horrible."

Aly took a deep breath to steady her nerves. She wasn't going to be getting to bed anytime soon. "Go ahead."

When Alanna finished, Aly's jaw had dropped, and she jumped up from where she was sitting, looking at Alanna with a look of horror. "You are friends with the King of Thieves! Alanna, have you lost your mind? He or any one of his thieves could have killed you! And you told him your secret!"

"You promised to stay calm!" Alanna said.

"I wasn't expecting something like that!" Aly said "You spend time in the city-in the lower city, might I add-in the very building where thieves live and do business! Do you know how dangerous that is! And bringing Jonathan there? What if the traitor who sent the Sweating Sickness lived in the city and recognized Jon and killed him? What exactly were you thinking, Alanna!"

"George wouldn't have let anything happen to either me or Jon," Alanna protested. "And if you are going to act so irrational-"

"I am your mother, Alanna, I think I have a right to be just slightly irrational when I hear my only daughter is risking her life!" Aly said.

Alanna stood up. "You had been upset that I didn't come to you when my cycle started, so I thought I'd come to you for advice this time. I see it was a mistake. Good night, mother."

"No, Alanna, wait." Aly said. Alanna stopped, but kept her back to Aly. Aly took a deep breath. "I am sorry. I lost my head for a minute. Sit back down, please? I want to help you, really, I do."

Alanna looked at her mother for a minute, then nodded and sat back down.

The following night at the ball in honor of Jonathan's birthday, Gareth had persuaded Aly to join him on the dance floor, not that it had taken much persuasion. He was slowly spinning her around, when she saw Alanna and Garry talking. A minute later, he pulled Alanna up, and started dragging her off to a crowd of knights that Aly was positive Jon was in the middle of. She laughed.

"What?" Gareth asked, grinning.

"Alann-um, Alan looks like your son is dragging him off to his execution." Aly said, nodding her head over in the direction Garry was leading Alanna towards.

"Jonathan is behind this?"

"I am almost certain of it." Aly answered.

A few minutes later, Aly bit back a laugh when she saw Alanna dancing with one of the ladies who was fresh from the convent. She had heard a lot of young knights talking about the woman, and now all those same knights were glaring jealously at Alanna. Aly knew that Alanna would do anything to have the roles reversed.

After the ball, Aly and Alanna were in Aly's room.

"So, I saw you dancing with Delia of Eldorne." Aly smiled wickedly as Alanna glared at her mother.

"Shut up." Alanna grumbled.

"You had to know this would happen eventually," Aly said. "Very few boys never want to dance with a girl."

"I don't want to talk about it." Alanna said.

"You mean to say you didn't enjoy dancing with Delia? She was a lovely dancer, and I thought you two made a cute couple."

"Mother!" Alanna said.

Aly laughed harder, "I'm sorry, I couldn't resist."

Alanna growled, "Jonathan is getting something soft and squishy in his bed very, very soon...and green, it will almost certainly be green...possibly still alive and moving."

Aly grinned, "Am I hearing correctly? The prince's squire plotting against her knight master?"

"Yes, that is exactly what you are hearing." Alanna said.

"Jon was just having fun on his birthday." Aly defended.

"At my expense," Alanna said, "And he'll pay dearly for that."

The very next night, the entire palace heard an indignant roar coming from the prince's rooms, demanding for his squire.

"ALAN!!!!" Alanna rushed into her knight master's room, still dressed like a male. Upon seeing Jon's red-with-rage face, she knew her plan worked well.

"Yes, Jon. What do you want?" Alanna tried to not laugh at the sight of her knight master holding the hind leg of the frog she had put in his bed earlier that day.

"What is this?" Jon held out the frog, shaking it slightly in Alanna's direction.

"I do believe it is a frog, Jon, shouldn't you know that?" Alanna raised her eyebrow.

"Don't get smart with me, oh squire of mine! What is a frog doing in my bed?!?!?! The only people besides the cleaning staff who have access to my bed chamber are my parents and you. Now, I KNOW my parents wouldn't put something as immature as a frog in my bed, nor would the cleaning staff since they know they would get fired if they did, so that leaves one person. Care to indulge me on the details of why someone who is supposed to be serving under me as my squire would put a FROG in my bed?" Jon bellowed.

"It was your fault." Alanna crossed her arms across her bound chest.

"How?"

"You decided to make me dance with Delia of Eldorne! You know how awkward it is for me to be dancing with a girl! It would be like you dancing with Gary or Raoul, with you dressed as a girl, and them not knowing that you are male!" Alanna yelled back.

"I was helping your disguise! It seems suspicious if you don't dance with the girls at least once in awhile! I don't want you to be held on account of treason, which is what you are doing, parading as a male to get your shield!"

"Well, don't! I don't think anyone has any suspicion of what I really am!" Jon looked away.

"Fine, I won't, but make sure that when you are kissing guys, that you make sure that you aren't seen." Jon whispered.

"What? You saw George kissing me and you're jealous? That's really rich for someone who slept with Delia last night and another girl the night before."

"Are you jealous of me?"

"Are you kidding me? No, and I will never be! Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to bed!" And with that, Alanna turned and stormed into her room, slamming her door on the way.

Review Reply

Tishica: Technically, since Dain drew first blood, you are right, he did win. However, since he tried to kill Alanna after he won, and Alanna knocked his sword away, Alanna was named the winner since Dain had been unchiverlous. I might be wrong, though, I could have misread that in the book or confused it with something else I was reading at the time.

mistmagic: I am more a George/Alanna fan than Jon/Alanna, but there will be some more of them as I slowly begin to pull in George. Since you like Jon and Alanna, I hope you liked the little scene that my beta wrote between them.

Anjalit2624: Yeah, I've had that pointed out to me before, I am trying to work that out. Thank you for mentioning it, though.

Trisana Sarrasri: Yes, Aly knows about the Black City. She found out when she was told that Jon knew Alanna's secret, and you'll have to wait to see what I do with Gareth and Aly during the Tusaine War since Gareth was hurt.

Soraya the All Speaker: Glad you liked it.

DomLuver: Woops! Yes, it should say Alianne there...good eyes! Both my beta and I missed that. Thanks for pointing that out, I'll have to go back and fix that at some point.

ElfSquire90: Thanks.

SarcasticLoner: Glad you enjoyed it.

DamageReport: I don't like to talk about things to come that much, so as to both of your questions, all I will say is...you'll have to wait and see.

LittleMissGiggles'94': Glad you liked the chapter, and lucky you for getting to see Chicago. Rent will be near my house in October, but tickets are so expensive, I don't think I'll be able to go :-( really bummed out about that.

Susie Q.: I'm glad you liked the chapter.

spazzysassyangel: I'm glad you loved it!

xXthenextbookwormXx: I toyed with the idea of the duel from Aly's POV, but then I decided against it. I might put it in a flashback at some point.