"All of this for a mere meal?"

Femio Ravenwing rolled his eyes as he hid behind a tree one gorgeous evening, spying on a girl from afar like normal human beings do. It was most certainly not what he'd had in mind for his Friday night, but what can you do when your only guardian is a giant aging demonic raven who eats a specific vital organ to maintain his beastly form? Oh, come on, he couldn't be the only one to have that problem!

Didn't they have surgery for that nowadays? And who was the first one to come up with this stupid heart eating crap, anyway? Some idiot ravens during a game of truth or dare? Either way, the whole idea was absurd! And disgusting!

"Why would you eat a heart?" Femio places a hand over his own as if appalled, "I mean, you don't even know where it's been."

His uncle had assigned him the task of finding the pure heart this time, and though his cousins liked to think of it as an honorable job, Femio couldn't stand it. It was all stupid and a waste of time. Why eat hearts when you could just have salad, or something? They served that back at the raven palace. Everyone loved it and the chef was really proud of himself.

Sure, after awhile, Uncle would begin to shrink from his mighty raven appearance and take on his human form of a regular guy who just so happened to have supernatural abilities, but what was so wrong with that? He had serious body issues, the guy.

Eugh, why did his uncle have to outlive all of his family members? Femio thought it would have been nice to live with his nice raven grandmother instead of the power hungry villain that was his uncle. Grandma would bake Femio something and send him on his way, not tell him to bring her back a human heart or "he'd be dead" to her. Who asks their nieces and nephews to do that for them, anyways?!

And his beastly cousins! They all decided they were too busy this week to do any of Uncle's dirty work and left Femio as the only one available for the job. One by one they'd all gone behind his back to tell Uncle how "excited Femio was to show off his powers and capture a pure heart for him."

What were those jerks trying to say, that he couldn't be busy, too?!

Why does everyone else get to be lazy except me? I had much better things planned — so many mirrors set up to admire myself as I walked through the house and danced. Is that not more worthy of my time?

This idiot girl he was watching was writing some kind of love letter as she settled on the bench, completely alone on the quiet campus. Except for after school activities, everyone had gone. She sat vulnerable in the presence of no one with Femio ready to attack her and steal her heart, given the chance.

Having watched her for a long time in hiding, Femio realized she was a member of the drama club that Mytho had joined. Femio would have joined, too, but the club had personally invited Mytho first before they had him. Call him petty, but Femio wasn't quite in the mood to share the spotlight this go around, so he decided to become the prince of the school's choir instead.

Hah! Take that, Mytho! He couldn't allow his own cousin to take over the school just like he did the last time they moved. What a disaster that had been. And don't even get him started on how Valentine's Day went. Femio's pile of gifts from girls didn't even hold a candle to what Mytho collected over the course of the day.

Which is another reason why Femio hated this particular job even more — this girl practically worshipped Mytho. She followed him everywhere and slipped letters into his locker every single day, though he got the sense they never actually spoke in person. Did they all have to be in love with him?!

Anyways, the wave of energy her heart was giving off got stronger each time she wrote a letter. Strong enough to match the same amount a pure heart would emit. Of course Femio had to go after her. But if he really succeeded for his Uncle this time, how humiliating would it be to take the heart of a girl who wasn't even in love with him? Did loving Mytho give everyone a pure heart? Femio was the epitome of beauty — falling in love with him should cleanse anyone!

"Whatever…" Femio snapped his fingers, specs of deep red light gathering about his face as a black leather eye mask appeared to cover his eyes and the bridge of his nose in a disguise. His uniform was soon replaced by a black suit with a long, feather like tail. Narrowing his deep magenta eyes, which were now dark and focused, he stepped out of the shadows of the tree and toward his victim.

"Let's just get this over with."

Mytho tried to hold back from smiling as he went through his lines with Duck the day after he'd dragged her to rehearsal. She was doing even better than he'd anticipated and had already memorized so much of her lines. She'd clearly been studying outside of school, too, which he was also taken aback by. She was a total dummy and didn't seem the type to study for anything.

But, can't judge a book by its cover!

It still amazed Mytho how he'd mistaken Duck to be the pure-hearted girl he had sensed the first day they met. He had almost been certain the light, intriguing perfume he'd smelled coming off of her indicated who she was, but it seemed to completely fade away by the end of the day. It made him wonder if she was very close with the actual swan.

But, nevermind that. Just like all of his cousins, Mytho had begun to invest his time in school and allowed that life to distract him from the heart snatching. Uzura had joined the school's marching band, Constantine joined the school orchestra, Rue had joined ballet, Femio had joined the choir, and Fakir and Autor had begun taking creative writing classes in both their schedules and spent most of their time writing at the library. And Mytho, of course, had joined the drama club and was having the time of his life working on this production with Duck.

They were currently trying to get through their lines without getting the giggles, but it proved difficult whenever they made eye contact and had to exchange cheesy romantic dialogue between each other.

"My prince, I wish to never leave your side. Won't you please dance with me, before my fairy godmothers come and discover our scandalous affair….*smicker!*"

"Dammit, Duck!" Mytho reaches up to press his hand against his forehead and completely breaks, bursting into a fit of giggles. Duck loses it, too, doubling over in laughter. Georgina the director couldn't be any less amused. She'd been trying to walk them through this scene for nearly half an hour now and they still couldn't get through it without laughing.

"Will you two please get it together and spit out those lines!"

"It's not my fault this nerd won't stop being a total goofball! Her line delivery is absolutely hilarious."

"Hey! Don't pin this on me, cotton ball, you're the one making those constipation faces 'cause you're trying not to laugh!"

And then, they just keep laughing. Georgina is ready to give up for the day and claps her hands to call the rehearsal. As the students begin to disperse, Duck and Mytho's laughter dies down a bit.

"Shall we walk to the fountain together to go over the dance?" Mytho lifts his hand to wipe a tear from his eye, trying everything in his power to calm down. Duck feels her heart jump with excitement in her chest as she remembers their plan would take action today. Her and Mytho — dancing together in the golden sunset next to the school's fountain — how romantic, right?

Is...is it romantic? Or just practice? I can't help thinking it seems romantic. But maybe I shouldn't get ahead of myself. Ah, but I'm really excited either way!

Duck smiles radiantly back at Mytho, not noticing the effect it had on him. He felt something move in his chest when he saw her pearly whites and her babydoll eyes light up.

"Yes, of course—-" she's starting to answer when something cuts her off. It's a feeling. A very strange, very unsettling feeling that makes the hairs on the back of her neck rise from the intensity.

Danger?

Without a second thought, Duck glances down at her ring and watches it flash.

"A heart is being taken. Someone needs your help, Princess Tutu." The familiar, soothing voice from the jewel rang out and echoed through Duck's mind. Looking up at Mytho with her heartbeat quickening, she cut her sentence short.

"I might be a bit late, I just..remembered I left something in the art room. Stay right here and I'll come back and get you when I'm ready to leave, okay?" She thinks on her feet and starts to run offstage.

Mytho folds his arms over his chest, "And what makes you think I'd want to wait on you?"

"Because I won't be long and there's a cupcake in my lunchbox. And I don't mind if it's gone when I get back. On time. Like I said I'd be."

And just like that, she leaves an annoyed looking Mytho standing on an empty stage by himself.