Dark Love

Book 2: Part 2.1

"Trade up! Swap your birthday for a birthweek! Sign the petition now!"

The pixie fluttered over to them tossing out flyers as they made their way past the motley crowd of late night shoppers.

Saera glanced up overhead momentarily distracted by the sparkles left in the pixie's wake. She snatched at the leaflet that fluttered down towards her feeling her heavy heart lighten as she read it. Chuckles left her lips, and then she was passing the leaflet on into her aunt's outreaching hand. Massey's chuckles joined her own. Magical petitions were common enough in these days of hard times. With the walls between worlds rumoured to be falling faster than the panties of a succubus in heat,   panic petitions were a dime a dozen. From the plain ridiculous to the absurdly ridiculous, there were no petitions to shy to be penned.

Her mood lightened, Saera turned back to offer the large black wolf a disarming grin. A grin that suddenly wavered then fell away altogether with remembered hurt. She turned back shifting the weight of her empty pack uneasily. "Do you need anything, mum?"

Her true aunt and adopted mum, Massey, merely shook her head. Her attitude even more subdued then her own which in a case in itself was alarming. Saera was the one walking with a battered heart. Trampled on by not one, not two, but all four of her mates. If looks could kill, she should be the one sporting it. And if hearts could break, she ought to be the one wearing the heartaches on her sleeve. But instead she became the recipient of the death stares and they were the ones walking around with heartbreak wrenched features. How was that even fair?

Another flyer shot loose through the air by a reckless pixie now floated down to rest onto her upturned hand. She peered at it beneath the street lamps.

"The Quest Is On!"

Saera read the heading out loud for her mother's benefit. Massey hurrumped absently beside her and so she continued on.

"To find a bride fit for a prince."

Her heart stuttered.

"Not one bride but two. Not one prince but two. Two balls will be held in two courts. The darkling royalty seeking a princess for their prince and the pallid royalty seeking a princess for their prince.  At the same time on the same night. The night the blood moon rises.  In a blessings to the royal pair."

Saera's hand scrunched over the flyer crushing it in her fists. The week long respite was clearly over. The royal tantrums were clearly short lived. Or perhaps, her worst fears really was true. Perhaps, her princes really cared two shits about her and she was a lost cause pinning for win. But there was no winning hearts of stone. No winning either of her prince.