The Princess Anabella's thirtieth birthday celebrations begin today. Which you'd think would include fanfare, rather than rolling out of my bed and hitting my head on the sloped ceiling of my bedroom like I do every day.

I had assumed that the day I got to take my half-celebrity self right into the palace for the princess's birthday festivities would be met with at least a nice bird twittering away at the window or something.

I know these celebrations are a well-known meat market, meant to find the future monarch a suitable partner to marry and create more little monarchs with. But as someone with no title, no money, and no real connections outside social media 'influencing', I'm feeling pretty confident I won't be a part of that.

At least not in any way that matters.

Nonetheless, there will be a plethora of well-connected people there, including the king himself, so I'm not missing my chance to snag some prime opportunities to talk to people who can change things for the better.

If I even get near the princess, I know what I'll say. My sisters and I have been practicing all week and I'm as ready as I can be.

"Breakfast!" Mam shouts up the stairs. The whole brood, my sisters, myself, the boarder renting the back room, and both of my adopted brothers meet in the hallway, piling down the stairs and into the small chairs at the crowded breakfast table piled to the brim with Mam's famous pastries.

"It looks delicious, Mamma, as always," my eldest brother says, extreme suck up that he is.

I pick the glasses up off the counter and set them at each place at the table, extreme suck up that I am, and stick my tongue out at him when Mam has her back turned.

"I'll have none of that this morning," Mam says, waving her spatula without turning away from the stove.

"How did you know?" my sisters ask. "How does she always know?"

"Because," Mam says, bringing the last plate of food to the table. "I've been their mamma for coming on two decades of mischief. Perhaps more. You live with that long enough and you start to read minds."

The plate hits the table with a jingle and Mam puts her hands on her hips.

Tomasso and I quickly take our seats and bow our heads while Mam blesses the food and each and every one of us. Finally, she sits down and slips the gigantic spoon into the eggs.

Let the games begin.

I reach for the cornetto on the plate right in front of me and pass it to the left, only now noticing that my sisters are dressed as each other and sitting in each other's chairs. "Anabella, what are you—?"

"I'm Suzanna," she says, eyes narrowing and head tilting slightly away from the table. "Can't you tell?"

"Oh, of course. Sorry, Suzanna."

I pass her the cornettos and turn to load up the rest of my plate. I can think of at least three reasons my trickster sisters are dressed at each other and at least two of them are sitting at this table, so that doesn't narrow it down much.

"You looking forward to your week at the palace?" our boarder, Jacques, asks, digging into his small pile of food.

"I guess I am," I answer him, shoving a pile of food into my mouth.

"Enzo," Mam chastises my lack of manners.

"If he eats like that in front of the princess, I can guarantee he'll be coming home a single man."

"I'm going to be coming home a single man no matter what," I say with a shrug. "No princess is about to marry me."

"No woman in her right mind is about to marry you," Tomasso teases, reaching across the table to give Mattia a high five.

"You boys behave or I'll have you cleaning out Mr. Richardson's stalls across the street."

"You wouldn't," Tomasso gasps.

"Do you wanna try her?" Suzanna pretending to be Anabella says. "Because I wouldn't, if I was you."

She has the speech patterns down really well. It's uncanny. Maybe I am confusing the two of them.

"Enzo, you must remember you are representing the entire family and all the things that are important for our country," Mam says. "You mustn't get yourself thrown out before you can get a read on things."

"Yeah, like how likely are they to accept what we want? How easy would it be to—?"

"Not in front of our guest," Mam cuts him off. "We wouldn't want him to get the wrong idea."

And by wrong idea, she means things that are definitely not true because we are definitely not doing anything like that.

"I'll keep my head on straight," I say, breaking the tense silence. "Pay them no mind."

"Good," she says with a sigh. "Good. Now which of you ladies is helping me with the post this morning?"

"Mamma," probably-Anabella whines. "I went last week."

"And you'll go again if you keep that up."

She immediately sits straight in her chair and throws a wink across the table at probably-Suzanna. I was right. They're up to something.

And I'm not going to be here to see it. The clock above the mantle strikes eight and my phone alarm goes off upstairs.

"Text me later and tell me how whatever-this-is goes," I whisper to probably-Anabella.

"Whatever do you mean?" She flutters her eyelashes and laughs. "I'll let you know if anything happens here, brother, so long as you do the same. Send me lots of selfies from the palace."

"As is appropriate," my mamma cuts in. "Now go on your way before you're late. We can hardly afford a bad impression on your first day, can we?"

"Of course not." I race up the stairs and grab my small bag, my phone, and my sketchbook. In no time at all I've hugged everyone, including Jacques, at least once, and my mother no less than five times.

"I have to go," I grunt from under the weight of the whole family trying to hug me. "Or I'll be late and Mam will kill me."

"Too right," she says, shooing everyone away with her apron. "Back to breakfast with the rest of you. Clean up your mess when you finish."

Everyone bids me goodbye and heads back to the table like nothing is happening. Which it pretty much isn't.

"I'll only be gone a week."

"It's an important week for you. For us. For everyone."

"I know. But I'll be okay. Suzanna and Anabella have had me practicing all week."

"I know, but which one is trying to get a look at the new postman?" she asks under her breath. "I cannot tell who is pretending to be whom anymore with those two."

I should have known she knew. "Why don't you tell them you know?"

"It's far less fun."

Another alarm on my phone jolts me back into action and I make my way through the small wooden door onto the quaint porch. "See you all in a week," I call, shutting the door behind me with no more fanfare than a quiet click.

The ocean air greets me, blowing my hair back and poking gently at my cheeks. It's a beautiful day to take the short walk up to the palace.

~ * ~

I've seen the palace from the street probably a hundred times, and in textbooks several times a year for my entire childhood. But nothing could have prepared me for how absolutely massive it is.

I pull out my phone to grab a picture and send it back to Anabella. She'll love the sun popping up just over the top of the enormous stone structure, making the golden accents glitter.

I wander down the path to the main entrance for the public, but there's no one there except two stoic guardsmen who seem to perform a more ceremonial purpose.

"Is this where I'm supposed to be?" I ask, pulling the invitation out of my bag.

No one moves to answer me. So I wander up the stairs and move to open the door.

"No entry," the guard finally speaks.

"Where am I supposed to be, then?" I ask.

He doesn't answer, turning his head to the left and jerking it slightly as though telling me I should go around the corner.

But wandering around the corner does me no good. There's just another expanse of greenery and a massive stone wall. This can't possibly be where all the fancy royal gentlemen get out of their chartered helicopters and enter the palace. So, if not the public entrance, and not this wall devoid of almost any doors, where?

My search takes me around the back corner of yet another ornate wall and the world opens up in front of me. A massive lake sits behind a winding driveway surrounding a fountain. The grass extends farther than the eye can see, dotted here and there with clusters of trees, ornamentation, and flowers. The path I'm on splits in two and I take a guess, veering left toward the building.

Voices waft on the breeze and I'm sure I'm in the right place, even as I find myself a little lost in the middle of a grove of trees.

When I come out the other side of the obstacle, it's clear how I missed everyone: the driveway is much longer than I expected, and the castle is kind of a u shape, leaving almost a courtyard in the middle of the establishment where the cars and fancy guests are arriving. The sound I heard earlier is clearly the staff unloading the cars off to the side once their princes and dukes have entered the palace.

"Welcome," a bright young woman holding a tablet greets me at the gate. "May I have your name?"

"Alessandro Lorenzo Valentino," I answer, holding my invitation out for her to see.

"There's no need for your invitation, Mr. Valentino." She smiles and taps away at her tablet. "I have your name here. You're all set. Just head up those steps and in through the door and someone else will be there to greet you."

"Thanks," I say with a smile, lugging my bag up onto my shoulder. "Nice to meet you."

I wait for her to give her name but she doesn't. Unusual for me. Maybe I forgot to turn the charm on this morning or something.

She's turned to the next person arriving, speaking to the chauffeur through the open window.

I walk along the edge of the winding path until I reach the stairs the woman had indicated.

Of course, I arrive just as another car pulls up, carrying the Manarolan flag. A part of me wants to race inside before him, just to be first, but I'm here to make impressions and connections that will help me make a change. And someone like him isn't one I want on my bad side.

Waiting at the edge of the stairs, I watch as a man in a suit more expensive than mine steps out of the driver's seat and walks around the back of the vehicle, opening the door with a slight bow of his head.

"Thank you, Eros," a man says from inside the car.

The man's shoe exits the vehicle and I already know he's here to impress. Dressed to the nines to remind me he's the heir to his own throne. Manarola and Tilcara were whole, once. This alliance is favourable to everyone older than my mamma.

His sleek, tailored suit fits him perfectly and everyone in the vicinity stops and watches him float out of the car and button his jacket. The man standing near the door looks like he's drooling at the sight of him. Hell, I might be drooling at the sight of him.

Halfway up the stairs he stops, his hair still flowing out behind him like his own personal fan is blowing wherever he goes.

And then he turns to face me.

And I full-on panic, dropping into a little bow like some kind of comedian.

"No need for formalities, Man," he says clapping his hand on my back. The other is held out for me to shake, so I do. "Nice to meet you."

"Alessandro Lorenzo," I say quickly. "But everyone calls me Enzo."

"Hey, Enzo," he says, gesturing for me to walk up the steps with him. "I'm Prince Antonio Gabriele Emiliano Salvatore, but it's quite a mouthful. You can call me Tonio."

"Nice to meet you." I might as well be talking to him about the weather at this point.

"Let's get through today together, and then we'll have nothing but clear skies ahead of us until the ball."

"Is that how it works?" I ask, forcing a smile.

"It's not so bad," is all he says.

I certainly hope he's right.

We step through the open door and a bustle of household staff moving here and there catches my eye. They carry cases and guide young men up the beautiful white stone stairs.

Just as I'm looking up at the huge skylight dome on the top of the hall, I hear a small gasp. Turning to face the narrow staircase it came from, a small piece of bright purple fabric disappears around the corner.

In seconds, I reach the staircase and tip my head inside, but no one's there despite the fact that I can see clear up a flight of stairs at least. Where did she go?

"You coming Enzo?" Tonio calls, standing beside yet another woman with a tablet poised in her arms.

"Yes. I'm coming." But my mind is up those stairs to the mysterious staff member so affected by Prince Antonio that they gained superhuman speed to get up the stairs.

It's odd being in a group of men so generally affecting. I'm usually the one turning heads, but here I feel like a rock on the bottom of a shoe.