Sasha belongs to moi. Everything else = nope.

Sasha POV

They were my family, the Cobrianas. They treated me exactly like Zane, Irene, and all the other siblings.

In my early years, I just figured I was a little different, you know, different colored hair and eyes and stuff.

I was all over the recessive gene thing. But then, when I was thirteen, I finally figured it out.

That I was really different.

I was thirteen and young, taught for years about the art of warfare, and I had been participating in it for about four.

I knew how to act in the battlefield; strike on the fallen, shoot deadly arrows to the flying, and shift in retreat.

And most importantly of all, to avoid the poisoned shots from the avians, we all called the enemy.

These arrows, I was told by my family over and over and over again, meant death the moment they wounded you.

So, I learned, you should do anything, anything, to avoid them whether that means diving into some thorn bushes or tripping into a ten-foot ditch.

Gradually, I improved my tactics from diving and tripping to sidestepping and jumping like the skilled warrior I was.

Okay, maybe Zane showed me too…

But, one day, my evasions failed when, pausing to shoot down a lone avian target, I got shot in the back from behind me.

A trap, perhaps one of the simplest ones: provide a decoy and attack from the opposite side.

I had to admit that I was impressed, since I thought the avians were lacking in the creativity department, and courage as well.

So as I fell to the ground, I marveled at my demise, and think about how I would die. Painful, and utterly slow?

No, most had died fast, so I should too.

Then a person, sprinting over to me, interrupted my thought process.

It was Zane, my brother.

He ran over to my side, and I could see tears were starting to form in his eyes.

"No," he whispered, wishing that he was seeing some illusion, something not real, "NOOO!!!"

He crouched down to my side and repeated the same thing over and over again, "No. No. No…"

I started to speak, then winced at the pain that was crawling down by back.

Finally, I gained enough strength to say, "Zany…(my nickname for him) I want you to tell Mom and Dad…"

I trailed off, utterly not knowing what the heck I would say.

He glared at me and practically yelled, "You're not going to die, Sash, you're not!! Don't you start making demands and …," his voice trailed off as mine had a minute ago as he contemplated what was inevitably going to happen.

He glanced at me and began again, "I'm taking you home."

I sighed, wishing to die faster, since drama was bound to happen.

So he carried me through the battlefield, dodging arrows as I once had minutes ago to not face the fate I was in.

We arrived at a bumbling, stumbling, upset, crazy madhouse that would be called a palace any other day.

In just a few seconds of getting there, I was snatched from my brother's arms and taken into the infirmary to where I presumed I would meet my end.

I waited impatiently as the serpiente doctors treated me as best they could.

When was it going to happen??

When would I meet my maker??

Would it hurt??

Was my family coming to say goodbye anytime soon??

I finally, after fifteen minutes, lost all of my patience and asked the doctor, "Well, when's my due date, doc???"

He stared at me with a loss for words.

And his lips started to turn upward into …a smile???

What? Am I dead already? Has everyone gone insane?

A few seconds later, my doctor was full-blown grinning at me, and, of course, not explaining anything to me.

I screamed at him, "Why the heck are you smiling, for Pete's sake?!?!?"

He blinked, once, and looked at me uncertainly and said, "My dear princess, this avian poison is only lethal to the serpiente; any other species it is harmless on. The only wound you suffer from is this arrow which, fortunately, hasn't gone as deep as it could."

I stared at him; I was serpiente, so it should kill me.

I guess he understood my confused gaze since he said, "My dear, you are not serpiente, no matter if you were raised your whole life in the Cobriana house and are an heir, which you are. A serpeinte is someone who shifts into a serpent, whereas you shift into a leopard. Don't you see? Surely, they explained that to you already…yes?"

I swallowed hard, not wanting to reveal my 'recessive gene' idea. I then focused my mind on one of the best things that I could do at the moment: lie.

"Of course," I laughed, "I was just playing a joke on you, doc. No need to worry, I was told this since practically I was born."

The doctor smiled weakly in response, glad he had not offended me. He said to me, "Your family can come in now. Shall I fetch them?" I nodded. I tensed myself to receive questioning stares from Zane and sympathetic glances from my parents. I was ready. I was different.

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