The Aldean Chronicles: Hidden

It's Friday, the day before the big tournament. Blue rose meeting is canceled because the head is preparing his match. I haven't spoken to Kat since we got out of the car, I don't know if she's angry with me or just doesn't want to talk.

Yesterday's session with Max went well for combatants. I don't think he had anything planned so he just walked around as they trained. Sara and I are plodding back to our dorms after spending the afternoon in the library. Standing outside our hostel building are Jamie and Mika.

"Cass," Jamie says when he sees me. "Can we talk?"

Sara looks at me and nods slowly. "I should get inside, see you later." She enters the building. She docks her head out and screams without any noise coming out. She then docks her head back in and she's gone.

"Hey, what do you guys want to talk about?" My heart is pounding.

They share a look. "It's about Kat. She's been acting strange since she went for lunch with you and her dad," Jamie says.

"When I asked her about it, she got defensive and changed the subject," Mika adds.

"And yesterday during training, I asked Consort Maxon about Kat and he refused to answer," Jamie says. "You were the only other person there, so just... what happened?"

"She threatened him with fire," I say, and they look horrified. "No wait, she didn't, I mean she did but...I should not have started with that." I take a deep breath. "She was upset he was leaving and words were exchanged and then you came up and the situation with her parents. It was messy."

Jamie groans, finds the nearest stone and kicks it as hard as he can. I'm thrown back, this is the angriest I've ever seen him. "This is my fault, I never should have gotten back together with her." He agonizes.

Mika shakes her head. "Don't say that, she needed you. Even if you were going to give her some space, it wasn't the time."

Jamie doesn't look convinced. "Just tell us what exactly happened." And I do, I don't spare a single detail.

"And now Max is leaving on Sunday and they're not saying goodbye on good terms." I finish.

Mika's eyes widen slightly. "Okay, I know we're talking about Kat and it's really important but did you just call Consort Maxon Max?" She asks me.

"Kat didn't tell you?" Jamie asks. "I thought she did."

"Tell me what?" Mika asks. "What didn't she tell me?"

Jamie turns to me and raises his eyebrows like 'it's your secret to tell.'

"I'm Sebastian's daughter." I just realized this is the first time I'm saying that out loud, and Mika is the first person I'm telling my secret to.

"You're what? Are you joking? Is she joking?" She directs that last one at Jamie who shakes his head. "You're actually being serious."

I nod. "I am, I'm a Harrington," I say the last part blithely.

"That means you're a princess, and that Kat is your cousin and Greyson is your brother and Queen Freya is your aunt." She gasps and curses. "No wonder Kat is so interested in you. This also means." She pauses. "The pledge."

I raise my hands. "Relax, I'm not doing that. I'm not even planning on staying when school's over."

"Why not? If I was a princess I'll never leave Illyria," Mika exclaims.

"Shh, someone might hear you," I look around frantically.

She laughs. "Who cares if they know? Tell the whole world."

"Please, I'm serious, Mika. It's better if no one knows."

"Whatever you say, Princess Cassie." She teases.

"Can we please move back to Kat? I'm worried about her," Jamie says.

"Aren't you participating in the tournament tomorrow?" I ask him. "You should be practicing."

"Kat's in trouble, I need to focus on her right now." He insists.

Max was right, he is a fixer. Mika and I share a look. "You should go get ready for tomorrow, Cass and I will handle it." She tells him.

"It's not that easy, I can't concentrate." Jamie rubs his forehead.

"Jamie," I call him. "Kat is fine, she was taking care of herself before she met you and she'll continue to do so if you're not there. Go focus on your training, Mika and I can look after her."

"Kat is a very sensitive person, she's under an insane amount of pressure. Not a lot of people understand that." He persists.

"What, you think I'm not under an insane amount of pressure?" I ask, slightly offended. "Just because people don't know who I am doesn't mean I don't have my own problems." My voice softens. "I know you're worried and you love her but she'll want you to take care of yourself. Don't lose because of this, trust us, we'll check on her."

Jamie sighs deeply. "Fine, just call me if anything happens. Mika has my number."

I nod. "We will, now go. Tomorrow's a big day for you." I urge him to leave. He jogs away from us.

"That worked," Mika exhales. "Now, let's go check on Kat."

"Let me just drop off my books," I walk inside the building and go up to my room.

As soon as I walk in, I'm bombarded by Sara. "What just happened?" She's jumping up and down. "No more lies, today you're telling me all about your life."

"Yeah, sure." I lie. "Later though, I have to be somewhere now."

I put my phone, keys and wallet in a much smaller bag and leave the room. "Ready?" Mika asks when she sees me.

"Yeah." We walk to her building. The Hyacinth building separates hers from mine. "Anni krega," I say to myself. The name is displayed on a big plaque above the door.

"She was an air elemental who helped stop a Rypper uprising a century ago." Mika explains. "The building was named after her."

I nod. "Cool."

Rypper is the name given to the terrorist group hell-bent on raining carnage on Illyria. They've been operating for the past two centuries, since the end of the 100-year Illyrian war in 1801.

Mika leads me to her room on the second floor. I'm surprised by what I see, Kat is walking around without a care in the world. There are clothes displayed on her bed and she's holding a pair of shoes in her hand.

"What do you think of this?" She shows Mika the shoes. "With my white cashmere sweater and brown plaid dress." She sees me. "Oh Cassie, to what do I owe this pleasant surprise?"

"Hey Kat," I say slowly. "You seem... cheery."

She looks at me like I'm the odd person here. "Okay." She laughs. "Since you're here, maybe you can help me pick an outfit for tomorrow."

Mika breaks her silence. "I can see you opened the windows and cleaned a bit. That's good, I think."

She rolls her eyes. "Oh that, don't worry about it. Why is everybody being so overdramatic? Leave the past in the past."

I survey the clothes on her bed. "You really do own a lot of plaid."

She exhales. "My designer saw me in it once and became obsessed. She said it's my color, I thought why not. So I made it my style." She looks me up and down. "Maybe one of these days we'll go shopping, you have no idea the amount of restraint I've used to not comment on your fashion choices."

I feel the need to cover myself in shame. I take a seat on her desk chair and watch her closely. "I got it, the top and dress I was telling you about and this new black suede boots I got over summer."

"You're wearing heels," I ask. "To the tournament."

"I'm not competing in it." She barks. "And besides it's not pointy, it's bulky." She smiles to distract us from the fact that she just lost her cool on me.

Mika gets a call from someone. "Hey, you," she says. "Yeah, we're good. Stop calling, focus on your game tomorrow." She ends the call.

"Was that Jamie?" Kat asks.

"Yeah, just checking up on you." Mika drops her phone by her side.

"He's such a sweetheart." She has a far off, dreamy look on her face. "I don't know what I'd do without him." I agree, I really don't. I'm starting to see why her dad doesn't want them together.

"Kat, if somethings going on, you can tell me. You know that right." Mika looks concerned.

"I do and like I said, I'm fine," Kat says, looking at her dress. "Or maybe I should try a different color, what do you think?" She drops the dress and walks to her closet, it looks bigger than mine As she's searching, her phone goes off.

She looks at the screen before switching it off and tossing it back to her bed. "Was that Jamie?" Mika asks.

"No, it was my dad. He keeps trying to make me see this therapist," she says offhandedly.

"And what did your mom say?" I ask.

"What do you think she said?" She asks me. "No daughter of mine will be considered weak, physically or mentally." She brings out a piece from her wardrobe. "Dark blue, I don't mind."

"Do you want to see a therapist?" I ask her.

She shrugs. "Doesn't matter, she's just going to impose her will on him and he'll get tired and give up. That's what always happens."

I think she should talk to someone. But now isn't the time to convince her. "I should get going, it's almost time for dinner." I get up.

"You just got here," Kat complains. "At least tell us we'll be seeing you tomorrow. I've already invited Mika to watch the tournament with my dad and I. Do you want to sit with us?"

I shake my head. "I'm good." I refuse to be in the middle of another one of Kat and Max's confrontations. "But I'll say goodbye to your dad before he leaves."

She nods and goes back to her outfits "Good night, Cassie."

I turn to Mika and she looks exhausted. "Good luck." I mouth to her and she mouths back. "Thanks."

I leave their room and head back to mine. I see the vending machine on the first floor of my building. I don't have it in me to go for dinner so I decide to buy something from it. I use the card from Seb because I deserve a treat.

I get a call from Grey. "Hey," I say when I pick up. "How are you?"

"I should be asking you that. After Wednesday."

"How do you know about that?" I ask him.

"I know everything." He says mysteriously and laughs. "I'm joking, my dad found out what happened from aunt Freya and asked me to keep an eye on Kat."

"She's not doing well, I'm really worried about her."

"Me too, as hard as it is for you to believe. I care about my cousin. I also know how intense her mother is."

I suck in air through my teeth. "Right, I mean she won't even let her see a therapist."

"Aunt Freya is all about image, you can imagine how freaked out she was when she heard Kat burned down the art room and almost murdered the people inside."

I sigh. "Talking about that is depressing, let's talk about something else. How're the challenges going?"

"They're alright, everybody makes a big deal about this. This week all we had to do was piece some puzzles together, next week is the physical aspect. Unfortunately for the other pledges, that's where I shine."

I laugh. "Can I borrow some of your confidence, I feel like people expect me to get in but I don't think I can."

"Everybody feels like that, why do you think Kat didn't try out till second year?"

"I thought she wasn't interested."

"That was a cover, she didn't want to admit she wasn't strong enough. I could have passed it as a first-year but I actually wasn't interested."

I don't disagree with him, what's the point? "I wish you luck," I'm almost at my room. "Are you sitting with Kat and Uncle Max tomorrow?"

"Yeah," he replies. "Two of my friends are in the competition so I thought why not. And Ashton is dating Mira, we're not on the best of terms right now. Are you sitting with them?"

"No, for two reasons. One, too much attention to myself. Two, I cannot be in their middle again, Wednesday was probably worse than aunt Freya said."

"You're telling me this now," he says. "When it's too late to get out."

I laugh. "Yep, you're carrying over." I walk into my room and jump when I see all my friends there. "Hey, I'll have to call you back. Something just came up." I quickly end the call. "You guys scared me, what are you doing here?"

They're all frowning. "Cassandra, we have to talk," Sara says seriously.

"The full name." I joke. "Am I in trouble?"

"You might be if you don't tell us the truth." I hear Axel's voice. "Guys, I can't see what's going on, someone give me a better view." Michelle picks up a tablet and thrusts it in my direction. "Better."

"Hey, Axel." I wave at the screen. He's sitting at his desk and looking directly into the screen.

"It's answers time, Cass. Who are you and why do you know so many powerful people?" Paisley demands.

"What are you talking about?" I ask them. "How long have you been planing this ambush?"

"How do you know Princess Katya and Tristan?" Sara asks.

"Like I said, director Lilian asked Tristan to tutor me because I was basically failing all my classes. When we were training one morning, we ran into Katya. And she's really nice."

"So after one meeting, you're both best friends?" Axel asks.

"We're not best friends. And if you're wondering why Mika and Jamie cornered me it's because they wanted to know what was wrong with her."

"And how do you know that?" Sara asks.

"I didn't, I just went to go see her and she even seemed alright. If you don't believe me, watch her closely tomorrow. She's as good as ever."

"But why is she particularly interested in you?" Sara presses.

I blink. "I wasn't aware I was that boring," I'm getting angry. "I don't know what you were expecting to hear but I'm saying the truth. What even is there to lie about?"

"You tell us, is there something to hide?" Sara questions.

I get a notification on my phone and switch it off.

"And who is that?" Paisley questions.

I glance at my phone and feel relieved when it's Jason. "It's Jason," I say, rubbing my phone in their faces. "He's asking me if I'm coming to the tournament tomorrow." He was one of the four first-years who got selected. From what I gather, he's really strong. "And I am because I'm a good friend who doesn't go around making up accusations about my other friends."

"We're not making up accusations about you, why don't you just say the truth?" Sara's taking this personally.

"You know what fine, my mom is friends with the Infante." I quickly come up with a lie. "She and my dad were scared I won't be able to control my powers so she asked him to do her a favor. He got me into the school and paid my tuition, director Lilian really did take pity on me and arranged for me to have a tutor." I tell them part of the truth but leave out the most important bits. "That's it, he's just helping me out while I'm in Illyria."

"If that's it, why didn't you just say so?" Sara asks.

"Because the first thing you asked when we met is if I got into this school because I deserve to or because of someone I know. I was already the weird Earth girl, I didn't want anything else to make me stand out."

Michelle drops the tablet with Axel and stands up to hug me. "I'm so sorry, Cass. I told them not to do this."

"Well, all this would have been avoided if you told us the truth from the beginning." Sara is still defending herself.

I roll my eyes. "Whatever, you guys can go ahead to dinner. I'm going to bed early." I enter the bathroom. In there, I get a text from Grey asking if I'm okay. I reply yes, I just need better friends. He replies 'same' and that makes me smile.