I woke to the sound of Muriel quietly knocking on the main door to our bedroom, calling out to Jonah. Rubbing my eyes, I grabbed my dressing gown and wrapped it around my body, cracking the door open to her.

"Good morning your highness." she said with a raised eyebrow.

Her eyes darted to the stairs as if she was trying to tell me something.

"Sorry to disturb you so early in the morning but I must ask you to dress quickly, you have a visitor."

"Edmund?" I whispered rather freaked out.

She nodded with a very pained look on her face. I knew she was worrying how she was going to empty my entire wardrobe without Edmund seeing everything. It was impossible.

"Crap."

I rushed to the bed, Jonah sprawled out on his stomach still asleep. The top sheet was resting over his lower half hiding that very fine backside but gave a very delightful show of his back.

"Jonah!" I whispered as I shook him awake.

He grunted at me, almost sounding like he was telling me to go away.

"Your grandfather is here."

That woke him up. He rolled over to tell me something, his face dropping away as he looked past me. I turned, fearing the worst. Edmund stood there looking rather menacing, his face unamused.

"Explain yourself young man."

I ensured the dressing gown was covering everything it could as I sat on the edge of the bed. This was going to be interesting.

"Our house." he shrugged "She lives here because it's her house as much as it's mine."

"Jonah, the Waeston men do not live with their love interests before marriage. I am most appalled that you have conducted yourself in such a manner. Instruct your maid to pack Ivy's belongings and return her to her parents."

"No, this is her house. You can't come in here and tell us what to do."

"I am your king Jonah; we have morals to abide by. You are heir to the throne and as such you should behave like one."

"I am so far down the line it's ridiculous. I don't care for the throne; I don't want it."

"You would denounce your entitlements for this..."

"Don't you dare." he growled.

Jonah pulled the sheet from the bed wrapping it around his body as he stood.

"Don't you dare walk into this house uninvited and insult my fiancée."

I could see Edmunds eyes widen slightly, he had tried to hide his shock at the word but he failed. Clearly he thought I was beneath marrying into his family.

"I do not want to be king of Arque if it means that I cannot sleep beside Ivy before we are married. You are living in the past and maybe you need to wake up and realise that your standards are no longer acceptable. If you cannot accept the way that Ivy and I live then that is your loss, not mine."

"The Nicolai's are far too laid back Jonah." he snapped back "Her grandfather got her grandmother pregnant out of wedlock, as did her father and mother. Are you telling me you intend on doing the same?"

"I would love it if Ivy was pregnant and I couldn't care less if she was pregnant before marriage. If you loved me, you would be happy for me."

Jonah clutched the bed sheet around his waist, not the slightest bit worried that he was completely naked below it.

"Until you apologise to Ivy and her family you are not welcome in this house and I would suggest you hurry up and do it, otherwise you will miss out on a wedding invitation too. Harold!" his voice got louder.

"Yes, your highness?"

"Would you be so kind as to escort my grandfather to the rock face, ensuring he returns to mid jump without any issues."

"Of course your highness."

Jonah stood by the window watching out, clearly ensuring his grandfather left. Then he stalked into the walk in robe, I could hear doors being slammed shut, muttering and huffing. He returned a few seconds later fully dressed, stopping just before the doors. His gaze looked over to me, the anger in him melted away as I smiled at him. What else could I do? He had just told his grandfather that he would abdicate his position for the line of Arque. Not that it really mattered, Jonah was a phoenix, there was no other breed of being that was higher than them. With a stifled grin he walked over, kissing me as he pushed me back onto the bed.

"I will make him apologise for what he said."

His lips softly traced over mine as he whispered, his eyes staring into mine.

"No one has the right to talk to you like that, nor about your family. I like your grandparents and your parents."

He kissed me again, quick and sweet.

"I'm going to reset the gate code, you will need to tell your parents, grandparents and Nat."

I nodded as he stood.

"Jonah."

I tugged at his jacket standing to kiss him on the cheek.

"Thanks."

"I should have done it that night of the ball, then you..." He shrugged looking a little sad.

"Do you want to know what I think of that time in our life?"

I grinned as I wrapped my arms around his waist, looking up at him.

"You were my first, what happened that day was just a bad dream, it didn't happen."

"You were my first too." he pulled a loose strand of hair behind my ear "Now don't you venture too far woman; I will be back very soon."

Muriel delivered the new gate code a few minutes after Jonah had left. Whilst he was gone I rang my mother, both of my parents were over the moon that we were finally getting married and of course laughed at the thought of Edmund catching us in bed. I also told them about Jonah standing up to him after he insulted our family which my father was not impressed at but was grateful that Jonah defended us. Sure my family were laid back but it didn't mean we weren't worthy of being royalty. They would wait patiently for their apology but wouldn't hold their breath waiting. It could be a very long time before the very stubborn Edmund would see the error of his ways. As Jonah re-entered the bedroom, my mother and I agreed to meet for dress shopping, something she loved to do far more than I did. Jonah was on the phone to his father, clearly it was one rather heated conversation, the look on Jonah's face was distressing. I whispered down the phone for my mother to pass on the gate code to our immediate family, ending the call quickly. Patiently I waited as Jonah paced back and forth, much like his father does. He was going to wear a path into the floor. It was evident the conversation wasn't going well, he stopped pacing and rested one arm on the mantle, lowering his head in front of the fire place. The same things kept coming out of his mouth, no dad, that's not..., no. And then there were the huffs of frustration and defeat. He was going around in circles; he couldn't interrupt whatever it was that Terrance was saying. All it was doing was upsetting Jonah. I had to break this conversation up and end it once and for all. Casting my phone to the lamp table, I stood and cleared my throat. Jonah turned to me, the phone still to his ear. He watched completely stunned as I undid the knot of my dressing gown tie and let the satin slip from my shoulders. With a smug grin I sauntered over to the bed and laid my naked body onto it, waiting.

"Dad I have to go.... no sorry, Ivy's on the bed waiting for me..."

He huffed with a slight laugh.

"No, I'd rather love my fiancée than listen to you ramble on about shit."

Then he promptly pressed the button on his phone and put it on the mantle.

"Are you mad?" I laughed "Your grandfather and now your father?"

He shrugged and made his way over, peeling the clothes from his body.

"What can I say? I'm madly in love with you."

I grinned as I shook my head.

"You certainly know all the right things to say mister smooth."

"Hmm. I do, don't I?"

He got in under the bed cover, kissing up my neck as his fingers entwined into mine.

"How about, I would walk away from everything that I could ever possess just to have an eternity with you."

"That's pretty good."

"How about, I would become a Nicolai if you asked it of me."

"Really?"

He laughed as he laid back onto the bed.

"After this morning I might beg you to ask me."

I grinned back at him.

"I would never do that to your family Jonah, you might have just fought with your father but things will return to normal. It would hurt him for you to denounce your family completely."

His hand splayed out over my stomach as he let out another defeated sigh. Moving to my stomach, he frowned at it.

"When are you going to do as you are told? Get baby making in there!"

"You are mad." I said dryly as I shook my head "Talking to my stomach."

"But why? Why aren't you pregnant? I've checked you, everything is fine. I don't understand it."

"You've checked me? Eww."

"Ivy." he chastised "I wanted to know why you haven't gotten pregnant. We are a species that are supposed to breed easily."

"Why are you asking me? Why don't you go and talk to Godfrey? Maybe it's his way of saying he misses talking to you."

"Really?" he raised his eyebrows at me with one very sarcastic tone.

"How would I know Jonah? You asked why and I offered my advice, don't throw it back at me."

"Sorry." he sighed.

I laid onto his chest, wondering how the mornings events was going to alter our future. Terrance would be upset if his father didn't come to the wedding. I knew that Terrance and Edmund didn't always see eye to eye but he loved his father. What was worse was if Edmund didn't make things right, he would stop his wife from going. It was also likely that he would stop his other son and his family from going as well. It was a nightmare that was getting bigger by the second. One heated moment would wipe out the entire Waeston side of the family from attending our wedding, that is except Terrance. It was stressing Jonah out; I could feel how tense his body was. We just laid in bed, this wasn't Jonah, he would have been all over me but there was nothing except laying in each other's arms.

Jonah had laid in bed for about half an hour before he got up with one very big sigh, stating there was much to do in the compound. I of course was off for a day of shopping. When Jonah had left the house, I rang his mother and organised to meet up with her and my mother in mid jump. Miranda was going to have to step in and do something, otherwise nothing was going to happen. The Waeston men were a stubborn lot. My mother was flicking through the magazine in the dressmaker's shop, Miranda had one on her lap but had lost interest in it several pages ago.

"I agree with Jonah; Edmund has no right to turn up unannounced. I say good on him for defending you. He did what his father couldn't, stood up to Edmund. Personally, I think that has upset Terrance more than anything. The fact that his son did what he always wanted to, but never could." she shrugged.

The magazine was cast aside as Miranda got one very devilish smirk on her face.

"It's ok Ivy, I'll talk to Terrance when I get home. I will tell him he either tells his father to apologise to your family or I'll have Godfrey send a swarm of locusts to his prized vegetable patch."

"You can do that?" I gasped.

"Of course I can." she scoffed.

"Hey if you're talking to him, can you ask him why I'm not pregnant yet?"

I could hear the chair creak as my mother turned not saying a word.

"Jonah is getting quite agitated about it; he can't understand why."

"Ivy." she sighed "He doesn't know how a phoenix breeds differently to a dark being, I haven't enlightened him as to the exact details."

"But the card... the mural." I paled as I looked at her.

"Is accurate, you are going to have a lot of children together, I promise. Now I, as a created phoenix could birth a child from day one, there was no waiting. Josie was a little different. Because she was born to humans, she was designed to birth a child from the age of eighteen. A born phoenix, as in Jonah, the twins and his cousins are not considered an adult until fifty years of age. Why, I do not know, but that is how they have been made. Until that time he will not be able to conceive a child."

"So he's going to be shooting blanks for a few more years yet?"

"Yeah." she crinkled her face with a slight grin.

"You might want to tell him that because this morning he told me he had been checking my body to see why. That's just gross."

"Alright, I will drag his father to dinner tonight, how does that sound?"

"Good, maybe they might actually talk to each other."

She chuckled and resumed her casual flicking through the magazines. My mother snorted with laughter and then gasped.

"Oh Iv, look at this one."

My mother held up the image of a beautiful floor length dress. It was a backless dress that was figure hugging, thin lace straps sat at the edge of the shoulders.

"I like it but I don't want to look overdone. You know I'm not the dress up type of girl."

"Yes. I blame that on hanging around your brothers too much."

"And Jonah." Miranda adds with a wicked grin.

"I'd say that it was not enough Nat time."

I turned to the new voice, she was standing at the door with a beaming grin.

"Look at you!" she squealed "I can't wait!"

Natalie pulled up a chair and fawned over the ring. She was a screeching mess ever since I had called her this morning and asked her to be my bridesmaid.

"So.. when is it going to happen?"

"We were talking about the end of the month. Mostly just to get the invitations out."

"Nah, call them, tell them to be there or to go to hell."

"I like the sound of that." Miranda muttered.