TheFallenHer0: I agree. I think they balance each other out really well. And I loved being able to include the Language of the Flowers thing. It seems like something Luca would have researched on his own, just for fun.

Chapter 10

Luca's POV

I was mentally patting myself on the back while I pulled out my sketchbook and notes. She had no clue what the flower meant. She's adorable. ;)

Authoress: So you finally decided to accept the fact that you're crushing on her? I mean, if the flirting that passed right over her head last chapter was any indication…

Yup. Pretty much. I've decided to let someone in. She's stubborn enough to do it with or without my input, so I decided it may as well be on my terms.

Authoress: I am so proud of you, Luca!

Thanks. Now, back to the story, shall we?

"Now, why do you think you're the illegitimate child of the Princess Aulelia?" Marelda sat cross-legged across from me. I noticed that she was in trousers. Heck, I think the only time she wore anything but was during classes, and not even during training (she changed after training before going to her next class). Focus, Luca. It doesn't matter that she'd covering those beautiful legs of hers, there's things of slight more importance to be thought about.

"My birthday is the same as the Princess Aulelia's death date, for starters." I avoided her eyes as I flipped through the sketchbook. I felt a flick (none to soft) against my forehead, making me look up, startled.

Marelda sat there glaring at me, "If you are her son, don't be blaming yourself for her death, idiot. If she wanted to live and let you die, she would have. Don't use someone's sacrifice for granted. That'd make me furious and then I'd have to give you more than just a bruised cheek."

I cracked a lopsided smile, "Thanks. I'll be counting on it." Unlike a lot of people, she had every right to say that. She's sure using the life her brother gave her with his death for something worth it. "Now, there are other reasons, coincidences."

"That you don't think are coincidences." She said.

I shook my head, "I don't believe coincidences are real, that everything happens for a reason."

"You're fiddling with your earring. Does it have something to do with your theories?"

I froze. I hadn't even realized I was doing it. I put my hand down. "Yeah, it does. Remember how I told you Schuyler—"

"Professor Schuyler, Luca. Professor."

"Yeah, yeah, remember how I told you about his past with the royal family?"

She nodded.

I continued, "I saw a match to this earring in his office a few weeks ago."

Her eyes widened, "Are you serious?"

"As a war." I replied, "I haven't seen it since, though I've purposely caused myself to make trouble in his class. I think he caught onto me."

"So now what?"

"I think I'm going to sneak into the school at night and break into his office. And find it."

She gave me an incredulous look. "You really are an idiot. Don't you know that the entire school goes on lockdown after hours, with patrols? And that Professor Schuyler is likely to put wards on his office, particularly if he suspects anything?"

"I know. I also know the patrol routes of the teachers and which nights they take them. And how the tracker chariots work. They'll lock onto one thing and chase it until they find it. Throw a stone in the opposite direction and you're set. I'm still debating on whether or not to do it, though." As bad as I felt about lying to her, it was necessary. I made up my mind a while ago to do this.

"Don't." she said, "You're just going to get in trouble, even to the point where you might be expelled."

"Ha! There's another thing. No matter what I do I won't get expelled unless I kill someone or something."

"What do you mean?"

"I've been held back three times, suspended five times, put in the detention chamber seven times, and given a stern warning almost two hundred times. Yes, I've kept count. Some of the things I've done would've gotten anyone else expelled. Like, for instance, last year, the last time I got suspended. Want to know what for? Going into the East Forest."

I remember it all too well, no matter how much I'd rather forget it. It's practically a living thing, one that swallows you whole and causes you to suffer by picking on your flaws and weaknesses and fears. Going in alone, no matter what my goal had been, admittedly, extremely stupid.

She choked in surprise, "You seriously tried to go in there?"

"Not try. I did. And almost got very injured and nearly lost a grip on my sanity." I laughed, "Yeah, don't go in there if you can't hear the song or aren't with someone who can."

"I don't think you really kept your sanity, from the looks of it." she muttered.

"Ouch, bella, that stung!" I joked. It was easier to do that now, joke and tease her. It was fun, interesting. Just as fun as making fun of Prince Elias.

She rolled her eyes, "Just promise that you won't try and do it. Please, if not for the fact that you'll get caught, then for the face that you'll put a blotch on my spotless record. Some stains will never really go away, no matter how much you scrub them."

"I promise, bella. I won't do anything stupid." I felt bad that I had my fingers crossed where she couldn't see them, but what I planned to do wasn't sheer stupidity. It was well-thought-out planning.

…. …. ….

Marelda's POV

I'm pretty sure he didn't mean his promise, not entirely. I saw that look in his eyes. He wasn't going to be so easily deterred.

We spent a good chunk of the afternoon discussing more possibilities. One, for instance, we'd need Selene herself for.

It was said that the Princess Aulelia kept in touch with her elder sister, but refused to tell anyone anything about it. There was a possibility that, indeed, if Selene's mother was Princess Aurora, she'd've kept a journal or letters from Princess Aulelia. Selene may know of some, or may know where to find them, or has a brother that could. Princess Aurora lived several years after her sister's death, so there might even be evidence of Princess Aulelia telling her sister of a love affair that left her with an illegitimate child.

Only problem was, we'd have to wait for Selene to return. And there was a problem with that.

Luca paled considerably when I told him what I'd overheard the other day from those two girls, Nile and Ravenswood.

"Do you think it may have to do with someone else possibly figuring out she's the child of Princess Aurora?" I asked him.

He shook his head, "I don't think so. I think it's a different reason. I mean, why kill a child of the princess just to take another? It doesn't make sense, particularly as Selene was the hardest to get to. This school is one of the most highly protected places in this world. Why not take an easier target, like one of her brothers, or even one of her nephews. I think it may have to do with something else."

"As in? Any theories?"

"Her father. The book doesn't say whether he's alive or dead because he's not listed. And another thing, I'm not so sure he was human. Selene may think he is, but I'm not so sure, mostly because of her magic. Magic is a pretty big indicator of heritage, especially if it's a unique and/or powerful form of it—of which Selene's is both."

"What's so unique about it?" I asked, "I've heard she's got some pretty strong talents in fire magic, but that's about it."

"That's exactly it. She can use fire far beyond any human on record. The current Fire Wizards are nowhere near that powerful. She can manipulate it to a crazy extent. But then there's the drawback. She can't use water or ice magics. At all. She attempted it a couple times in class and nearly passed out, or something else happened. Her first week here she tried to make it rain water in the class, and ended up getting everyone covered in glittery golden light droplets. She at some point figured out how to use something like ice, only she just removes the heat, controlling that instead of making it colder. She can't use earth-based magics, either, and her wind magicks are kind of wild and out of control. They're a lot better than they used to be, but still not well controlled like yours or mine. I think she might be fae-blood."

I blinked, taken aback. "You're serious? You think that her father may have been a faery? I thought that faeries couldn't live long in Terra because there's no natural magic to draw from."

"But a powerful faery with stored up reserves could live there for a while. As in, a year or more. From what Selene once told Elias, her father was gone before she was born. Less than a year. She thinks he died. I'm not so sure. Her father being a faery would explain the way her magic is. And maybe have something to do with why she was kidnapped. But there's nothing we can do." He sighed, looking up at the canopy of leaves above us. "Well, at least it's the Emperor that went after her. If anyone could do it, he could. Helps that he's madly in love with her. Men tend to go to extreme lengths for the woman they love."

"And how do you know that? Not that your sources are usually wrong, but still."

"Prince Elias told Yukiya in class one day, before Selene was there. Apparently the Emperor fell for her a while ago, and Prince Elias has been trying to push him to ask her out." Luca replied, still looking up.

Yukiya. That sounded familiar. Really, really familiar. "Wait, who? Is Yukiya the one with the black hair that kind of looks blue in the light? With the eyepatch?"

Luca looked over at me, "Why? Are you interested in him?" I raised and eyebrow and gave him a deadpan look. He chuckled, "Yeah, that's him. Yukiya Reizen. People say he's cursed, but it's a bunch of bull. He doesn't know I know this, but he's made a contract with that wolf familiar of his to gain his magic. The seal, I believe, in under his eyepatch. The 'cursed' rumors probably stem off the fact that contracts like that usually have some sort of really big drawback. He get's really sick once a month. In fact, I think that time is next week. Full moon is when it seems to happen. I think I'm really the only one who notices, other than the teachers and his roommate, Prince Elias. And Selene. Her too. Little gets by that girl, besides the fact that her buddy is hopelessly in love with her. She's oblivious when it comes to herself."

Yukiya Reizen. I knew him. Not well, but enough. "He used to live in my village, a little over two years ago. What surprises me most is that everyone thinks he's dead."

Luca's eyes widened slightly with interest. "You don't say."

I nodded, tensing as I thought about it, "He disappeared after a raider attack. I was at school at the time, and a larger group attacked our village. It the biggest attack on our village since the...the one that killed Parker. From what I heard, his father was away at a neighboring town when they attacked. He's the oldest of five, though there was another baby boy born about a year ago. Then, he had one younger brother, Nico, and three younger sisters. From what I got Nico to tell me—Nico's a friend of my younger twin sisters, see—Yukiya had them hide upstairs, while he stayed down there to protect them with the kitchen knives. Nico said they don't know what happened, other than there was a lot of screaming, and the roar of some sort of beast. Apparently, the raiders made it to their house and tried to get in, and that's when the beast—no one saw what it looked like and lived—appeared. Every single raider was killed by that beast, whatever it was. When Nico went down at the end of it the next morning, refusing to let his sisters down until things were cleaned up, there were a few dead raiders in their kitchen, slashed to bits, blood everywhere. Nico himself was never quite the same, and Yukiya was nowhere to be found. Literally. They never found a body."

"Huh. I don't think I know exactly what to make of that." Luca's voice was quiet, somber, "If anything, I feel bad for him."

"I do as well. From what you told me, that may of been the result of the contract, the beast. And I think Yukiya got frightened and ran off, thinking he was dangerous. Whatever happened, he ended up at this school and our entire village thinks he's dead."

"What are you going to do about it? Confront him?"

I shook my head, "No, I'm not. It's his problem. I'm not going to interfere. He's probably got his reasons. Besides, I don't even think he recognizes me. I've been at the village very rarely since I started attending the school, and even before then, I spent a lot of time hunting and training as well as I could, and from what I've heard, he spent a lot of time at home, helping his mother take care of his little siblings. The only reason he looked familiar enough to recognize is because Nico looks almost exactly like him, just a few years younger and with a different attitude."

Yukiya probably had his reasons, like I said. It's his choice. The only thing that's hard for me to understand is that for a boy who supposedly loved his siblings to much, why is staying away from them, letting them think he's dead? I hope, for his and his siblings sakes, that his reasons are very, very good.

I'm starting to run out of weapon ideas...so I'll just say that Marelda had something called a push dagger, and I recommend you look up a picture to get a better understanding. It's a coppery color, like many of her weapons, as copper is kind of her theme color.

(Also, if you guys feel like submitting weapon ideas...feel freeeee….)