With your brown eyes bright and clear.
And your sweet voice, like a bird
Singing love to its lone mate
In the ivy bower disconsolate;
-
(warning: sexual content)
-

The months turned from February to March to April to May, and people all over England thanked whichever deity they worshipped, as the winter began to thaw to warmth.
Only slightly, though. It was still very dangerous to go out without wearing a thick coat or sweater- unless, of course, one wanted to die of hypothermia.

The final rugby game of the season happened in the third week of April, and Hendon House pulled a narrow win in the game, which meant that they were the season's winning team. There had been other games, too, in the months that passed, and they had won some, and lost others- but, overall, their victories outweighed their defeats.

Even the defeats did not diminish morale, though, as much as it used to.

The team had found quite a joyous method of therapy- making fun or staring in awe of Edmund's striking hickeys. They were usually found in twos or threes over his throat and neck and shoulder and collarbone, nearly every day- courtesy of Miss Sanya Rainsford.

Sanya, for her part, was sent to the Headmistress's office thirty-one more times- and, at the end of her last visit, Headmistress Graybow had congratulated her for 'finally starting to calm down'.
Previously, the thirty-one visits would've happened in just one month, as opposed to being spread out over four.

It wasn't that Sanya was 'starting to calm down', or because she had grown a newfound respect for the school- both those things were quite unlikely to ever happen.

It was just that she had finally let herself daydream.

In the past year and a half in England, she had been determinedly on her guard, as though this place was just an extension of the Forest of the Gods she had been lost in. She had tried to keep her feet planted on this earth, and not let her mind wander away to the skies of other worlds- she was constantly vigilant, because what if? What if something bad happened?

But now- more often than not, she would be lost in dreams, without being asleep- her leg would bounce under her desk, her eyes glazed over as she lightly tapped her hand over the love-bite Edmund had given just above her breast- and she would think rapturously of a milieu that made her heart glow.

Sometimes, she would think of being a mermaid, with gleaming scales and the Ocean a vast playground for her to explore.
Sometimes, she would think of flying up to the stars, like in Peter Pan, and gliding around the cosmos.
Sometimes, she would think of being transported back in time, and finding herself in some Austen novel, or Marlowe play, or the setting of a Van Gogh painting.

But, more often than not, she dreamed of her family.

Those dreams were of her old life, but of events that had never happened.

Building sandcastles with Sameer on the Cair Paravel beach- horse rides through the woods of Veersa Baagh with her parents- picnics with Jem and Selene and Seraphina, constantly up to no good, with Edmund chasing after the three while she lay on the picnic-blanket and laughed at them.
She dreamed of moving to Rihaaya with Edmund, and of him wandering around the gardens in Azraq, soaking in the warmth of the sun. She dreamed of making love with him every night, everywhere, because he was there and he was with her, and that meant they wanted to be as close to each other as possible, as much as was possible.

She slept badly most of the time- but even if she slept well, she had dreams, and those dreams were nightmares- they always were.
But her waking dreams- they were happy. Though they ended up making her feel sad- feel grief- the dreams, inherently, were happy.

"Rainsford!" Ms. Griffith, the geography teacher, spoke sharply, breaking Sanya out of her current reverie. "The exam started twenty minutes ago, and you haven't even written your name yet!"

She flushed ashamedly, and bent her head down, starting to scribble on the first of the mass of sheets that sat on her desk.

Exams had begun from the middle of May, and would continue till the middle or end of June- she wasn't sure of the dates. After that, school would run for two more weeks, as the teachers corrected the papers and then returned them back for the students to see how they'd done- and then the school year would come to an end, heralding the summer holidays, much-needed for both the student body and the faculty.

Geography was the second exam- the first had been physics, which she knew she would be failing. She had some hope for geography, because learning about this new world was rather interesting- but she doubted she would be getting anything even halfway close to flying colours.

Honestly, Sanya thought she would prefer her nightmares over the exams.

The third question stumped her.
"What is an ecosystem under stress?" She muttered under her breath, fighting the urge to look around to see if she could peek the answer from someone else. "I am under stress, but how can an ecosystem-" that was a certain section of a natural environment, right?, "be feeling the same?

She chewed her lip, and began to write an answer that bordered on being fiction.

Well, she thought, as she left the classroom two hours later, with ink-stained fingers and pencil shavings all over her shirt, that was the end of it. And it hadn't gone that bad.

And, anyway, she had passed the exams last year, she would do it this time as well.

Despite her nonchalance at the moment, she knew she would worry about it, even though it wasn't necessary. But the exams were over, and the worry was for later.

For now-

"You look like the Cheshire Cat." Bonnie said, falling into step with Sanya as they walked down the hallway that led to the staircase. "Exam went that well?"

"I'm not smiling because of the exam." She said, shaking her head. She hadn't even realised that she was smiling. "It didn't go well at all, actually. How was yours?"

"It was English, I think I'll manage a pass." She shrugged. "Say, I think I saw Wheeting-" the form-mistress for the lower sixth, "giving Susan Pevensie quite a scolding before the exam."

"Susan? Scolding?" Sanya blinked- those didn't go together at all. Her sister-in-law was supremely disinterested in academics, but she was the picture of discipline otherwise. "Doubtful. You probably saw someone else."

The other girl nodded, as they began down the stairs, "Perhaps, yeah."
But she knew it was Susan that she had seen. She'd made it a point to find out which of her classmates was Susan, after Sanya had mentioned her to her, all those months back. She had found her soon enough- and, though she had never talked to her and did not intend to, those silver-blue eyes had become as familiar to her as her own braids. They were unmistakable, even across a whole classroom.
"What are your plans for the day? Sleep?"

Sleep sounded so nice- it always did- but she shook her head.
"No, I'm going to meet Ed." She said, jumping from the second-last stair to the ground floor, landing clumsily but firmly. "Date. Sort of."

Was every time she met up with him a date? But weren't dates meant to be special and specifically significant? Every moment with him was near to her heart, but she doubted arguing for an hour about whether chess was more fun or checkers was (Sanya had played checkers, but never chess, and Edmund had played chess, but never checkers, which meant the argument would always be unresolved unless a third party who was familiar with both stepped in) constituted anything significant.

"You? Doctor's appointment again?"

She laughed, "No, not today. I'm going to go back to my dorm and doodle Wheeting and Mamzelle," Mamzelle being Mademoiselle Alláire, the French teacher, "brushing each other's hair with combs of iron nails. There will be blood."

"Good, gore is fun."
Drawing pictures that were likely to get her expelled was so much better than having to trot over to some bitchy doctor every week.

That was how often Bonnie visited the doctor. Every week.
Sanya had been concerned, though she had not admitted that out loud, but Bonnie had explained that she had a condition with her lungs, that sometimes would manifest on her external skin. That was why she had to go to the doctor weekly, to check on that manifestation and make sure it did not grow. It was all very complicated, and Sanya thought it was far too wrong that someone as nice as Bonnie was suffering from it. The only silver lining of the disease was that she was exempt from most sports, and from any mandatory events, athletic or otherwise, if she did not feel up to it.

"I'll see the drawing when I come back- oh, can you get these to my dorm?" She asked, just remembering the pencil-box and exam clipboard she was holding in her arms. "I would, but- I'm already late. A girl's bag split, and-"

"I'll do it." Bonnie smiled, taking the belongings from her. "Nothing private in the box, I hope? Love letters and the like?"

There was a teasing smile on her face, and Sanya blushed. She decided it was better to not answer- though, the answer was no, there was only stationery in the box- and she just waved instead, before briskly walking away.
-

"Yes, fuck, Ed-mund-" Sanya moaned, one of her hands gripping the bark of the tree she was pressed up against, while the other fisted itself firmly into Edmund's hair, pushing his head further between her thighs.

Edmund dug his fingers into her leg that was thrown over his shoulders, his tongue licking a path along her sex, and he felt a deep tightening in the pit of his stomach.
He reached up blindly- but he was so familiar with her body, that he found her bare breast at the first try, cupping it hard as he began to suck at her clit.

This was exactly- exactly- what she needed.
And it was truly astonishing how well he knew her body- so well that she just could not keep her mouth shut, "Fuck, ah-ah, yes-"
Needless to say, it took hardly a couple of minutes for Sanya to reach her zenith, her body relaxing as she came.

"No, no, no." She said, a moment after her breathing eased- Edmund was looking around for their long-discarded shirts, his suspenders (which she found extremely sexy, even though they were usually hidden under his school-vest), and her skirt.

Her husband looked at her inquiringly- good Heavens, he was licking his lips, she might orgasm just looking at that.

She pulled her knickers up and debated on putting on her bra- she was trying to wear them more often, despite how much she disliked them, because she'd heard a sixth-former whisper in the pool that wearing bras helped with back pain.

And she had a lot of back pain.

But she decided against it. A few more minutes wouldn't make her back hurt even more.
"Come a little closer?"

Edmund obeyed, but still looked blank.
"Why, though?" He asked, and was answered by Sanya kneeling, pulling his trousers down, and wrapping her mouth around him in one fluid moment. He started violently, quite staggered by the action, and drew a sharp gasp of a breath. "G-give a fellow some warning, darling."

"As though you didn't know-" She pulled away from his cock for just a moment to smile at him- going down on her had hardened him, which meant he was already close, "that I wouldn't let you go without returning the favour."

"I- forgot." His lashes fluttered, his breath coming in short bursts as she started to take him in her mouth again, her head bobbing up and down between his legs. "S- ach, Moonshine-" she sped up the work of her tongue- harder, faster- and he had to bite down on his lip to hold back a moan, "silly me."

Minutes later, they lay on the warm grass, holding hands- and they used their bunched-up shirts as pillows under their heads, as they caught their breaths after their orgasms and basked in the soothing silence of their forest.

Sanya began to hum, tunelessly, as she looked up at the patches of sky they could see through the canopy of the treetops.

"What are you singing?" Edmund asked softly, shifting his gaze from the multi-coloured blossoms growing with the grass to his wife.

"Um, 'Tropical Magic'." She reddened- she only ever hummed when she was alone, because her singing voice was practically caterwauling. "It's from some film- I don't know. It was playing on the radon in the common room."

"The radio, you mean." He corrected, giggling, and her blush spread to her bare torso. Even her scar, though it was faded, turned darker, almost to the shade of her nipples.

"Same thing."

"One's a radioactive metal, and the other lets you hear music and news from anywhere."

"Yeah, well-" She shifted, so that she was lying on her side- she could see the amusement in his dark brown eyes, "both start with 'rad'. And metal and music both start with 'm'."

He laughed louder, "You're an idiot."

"Your idiot." She said pointedly, tapping her fingertips against his naked chest.

"My idiot." He affirmed, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips. "My wife."

"I keep slipping up and calling you husband." She confessed, snorting at herself. "I did it a few days ago when Matron was after me because of my shoes-"

"How did I come up in a conversation about shoes?"

"They had mud on them. From the rugby field."

"Ohh." Edmund nodded intelligently, understanding. "Go on. How'd Matron react?"

"She was flabbergasted, and went on a rant about how child marriage happens in India. She forgot completely that you're not Indian-" neither was she, technically, "and said something about how she knows that I am Indian and might be married there, but since I live in England, I have to understand that things are different here." She rolled her eyes. "As though I didn't already know that. And child marriage may happen in India, but it's been outlawed for fifteen years. So, they at least know it's wrong, and thus made it illegal."

"Actually-" He cleared his throat, and she looked at him, her brows creased, "the age for marriage for girls in India is fourteen. So- Matron wasn't wrong. You could get married there."

"Oh." She blinked- she hadn't read that much about the subject, because it made her feel queasy.
So many poor children- and most of them girls- being forced to marry- and she doubted that any of their soon-to-be spouses were even slightly similar to Edmund, and that any of the brides had as much agency and power and parental support as she had.

If she was Queen- or, whatever was India's head of state- she'd raise the age. At least to sixteen- for all, regardless of gender- and even then, only with the child's consent and parental allowance. Perhaps eighteen would be better...

"We can go and get married there, then."

"For boys there, the age is eighteen. So- not for three more years." He was fifteen, yes? Then three more years- he disliked mathematics, especially algebra, but he was better at it than Sanya was. Still, sometimes the smallest sums slipped him up. "Anyway, we can get married here anytime. We'll just need the permission of our guardians."

"I have the permission of my dead parents. They were very vocal proponents of our union." Sanya said dryly. "Wouldn't that be enough?"

Edmund swallowed, and closed his eyes for a moment.

Sanya almost never spoke of everything that had happened after he'd disappeared- everything she had gone through. Sometimes, she would tell him happy stories about their children, but that was all. Even mentioning any incidents in passing- it was rarer than rare.

"I'm sorry about Shabana and Sadaf." He said quietly. He wasn't even sure how they had died- but he knew they had, and long before Sanya had gone into Neráida. "I don't think I've said it- but I'm sorry. Your parents were great lights in the lives of whoever knew them, and they raised you and Sameer, two of the best people I've ever known."

He opened his eyes and looked at her. She was looking at him, her expression impassive- yet something flickered in her bright brown eyes.

Perhaps it was grief.

"And I'm sorry about Sameer, too. He was so wonderful, and- I'm honoured to call him my brother by law."

Sanya was quiet for a long time. Quiet even when the birds started chirping again, a sound which she always either complained or rhapsodised over, depending on how awake she was.
When she spoke again, it was spoken curtly, making it clear she did not want this topic of conversation continued.
"I'm sorry, too. They deserved better." Sameer had deserved a sister that wouldn't abandon him. Her parents had deserved a daughter who could have protected them, saved them. "And thank you for saying that."

"Of course." He nodded, squeezing her hand. "And- I know I'm not the most emotionally- open person," was that even the right way to say it?, "but I'm here, Moonshine, if you ever need to talk. About anything."

For a split-second, Sanya was tempted.

She was tempted to tell him the dark insanity that lived in her mind, and the deep, ever-expanding hole in her heart. She was tempted to tell him that she'd left her baby brother, without even explaining herself or seeing him one last time or telling him goodbye. She was tempted to tell him how she had strangled that faerie, how she had murdered the Sphinx, how she had had sex with the Faerie Queen.
She was tempted to tell him that she saw their children's corpses almost every time that she closed her eyes. She was tempted to tell him that she was the reason their children were dead.

"Thank you." She said instead, a flimsy smile on her lips. Not today. "And the same for you, too, husband. I'm not exactly the best to console or empathise- but I love you, and I am here for you. Till death do us part."
Then she rolled her eyes- good to return to form, at least on the outside.
"Or," She said, burrowing even closer to him and resting her head on his chest, "most likely, exams."
She was terrible at mathematics, but she knew that exams equalled death.

He groaned, though his body and heart were both deeply pleased at the feel of her nearness.
"Don't even mention them. We had chemistry today, and alright, I'm smart, you know that," she nodded solemnly at that, and he smiled a little, in spite of his rant, "but that paper was unsolvable. I'm convinced it was set up to make sure each and every one of us failed."
Why were there so many compounds with CH₃? It was a never-ending list and beyond aggravating!

"The same for physics. The chapter on Light nearly killed me-" Sanya could not, for the life or death of her, remember the difference between reflection and refraction, "do you have any idea which one is concave lens and which is convex? I don't. And WHY do we need to know all those damned diagrams!?"

Edmund continued on a similar lament, as he absently traced patterns on her back, "Even the chaps who got full marks last term, were practically crying by the end of today's-"

"I swear, physics wants to break our minds and spirits-"
Would she take the Forest of the Gods over that hideous physics exam? She didn't know. But she did know that-
"I'll take maths over it, and that is not something I say lightly-"
-

"Stupid, stupid, stupid!" Sanya kept muttering to herself, feverishly- she'd just finished the exam for English Language (it was separate from Literature, for some reason) and she'd made a mistake in the direct speech exercises!
Those fucking past and future perfect tenses- they should die. She didn't care that they were not living, and thus could not logically die. They needed to die.

Apart from that, the exam had gone quite well. She'd spent too long in writing the essay- 'write a story ending with 'in the long-shut well' in 400 words'- and she had definitely exceeded the word limit- but it had been fun!

She'd used to write, back in Azraq. Silly, fanciful, adolescent imaginings. She'd stopped writing them a few months before she'd been told about the alliance of marriage- she didn't know why, she'd just put her writing-quill down one day, and never picked it up again.

She'd kept a separate journal for those novellas- as she'd called them. She remembered reading through those stories, when she had moved back to Rihaaya after the Pevensies' memorial, and the emotion in her heart had been so bittersweet. One of the stories had been of being a writer in a different world, where there was no magic and the main character was nothing royal.

"This could be that world." She said, almost walking into a wall, because she had missed the turn into the hallway, "though I am still royal. I could write."

But what would she write? About Edmund? Pen down her daydreams? Or perhaps her life?

"I should start keeping a diary again." She'd had a diary, too. She'd lost interest in it sometime after turning fifteen or sixteen, and the only entries after that had been 'sorry, Diary, promise I will write in you soon!'- though the 'soon' never came. "Even if I stop writing, I can throw the damn thing at-"

Then she stopped, suddenly, outside a door. It was a bathroom- probably of one of the first form dorms, since this hallway led to the dormitories of that form.
She turned, puzzled at herself, and pressed her ear to the door.
It was unmistakable, even for someone with poor hearing, as hers often was.

Someone was crying inside.

Sanya straightened up, and chewed at her lip. If this was the bathroom of fourth form, or higher, she would have walked away without the slightest urge to go in and check what was happening.
But- it was the first form. It was most likely some little girl in there- perhaps she was injured, or some terrible emotional upheaval had happened, and it was causing her to cry.

Sanya was not good with crying people, whether they were babies or children or adults- but she didn't want to just walk off.

"Hello?" She called out, pushing the door open and walking inside.

The door swung shut behind her with a loud snap, but she paid no attention to it.
Underneath one of the sinks, a small girl- definitely a first-former- was curled up in a fetal position, crying bitterly.

How could someone fit there? Sanya would've stopped being able to fit there when she was four.

But then, she had always been big.

"Hey." She said, crouching down on the floor, reaching out to tap her knee.

The girl was crying so hard, she didn't seem to be able to be shocked.
But, at Sanya's pat, she wiped at her tear-streaked face and took deep breaths, trying to calm herself.
"H-" hiccup, "hel-" sniff, "lo."

"Are you-" well, clearly, she was not alright, it would be so stupid to ask that!, "um- what happened?"

Her bottom lip wobbled as she looked up at the older girl with watery eyes.
"I'm dying!"

"Excuse me?" Sanya was appalled. "What? What do you mean? Did you just come from the Hospital Wing-"
In the anxiety of the moment, she forgot that in English boarding schools, the 'Hospital Wing' was usually called a sanatorium.

She shook her head wildly, beginning to cry again, "No! But I know it- it has to be- it hurts- and there's- there's-"
The rest of whatever she said, was lost in a new wave of wails.

"If you feel like you're dying, you should definitely go to the Hospital Wing." Sanya said, trying to pull her out from under the sink. "Come-"

"I can't!" She wept. "I'll drip buh-buh-blood all over the school, l-l-like I did in the bathroom, and it'll be cursed because it will be a dead girl's blood!"

"What-" But then she turned her head at that moment, to look around the bathroom-

On the grey tiles of the chamber, there were numerous drops of crimson liquid, which she had definitely not noticed as she'd walked in.

Immediately, Sanya understood what was going on.

"You're not dying, shona." She took special care to sound gentle, even though part of her wanted to laugh. "You just had your moon- um, I mean, your period."

There was confusion in her teary blue eyes.
"W-what?" She asked, her crying stopping on account of her confusion. "What's a period?"

"First, tell me- is the blood coming from your-" how to put it delicately?, "from your- uh- your-"

"My nanny calls it my swimsuit area." Then the child frowned. "And then it was wee-wee before that..."

"Alright, let's go with swimsuit area."
They could just teach little girls the actual word- vagina. It wasn't a dirty word, it was a clinical term, and it was better than coming up with the most nonsensical synonyms for the body part.

And it was definitely better to be taught the terminology by guardians instead of learning the word because you'd skipped etiquette lessons- on account of hating said lessons- and were flipping through the collection of dictionaries in the Library.

Not that Sanya had ever done that.

"Is the blood coming from there?"

The girl nodded, her lips downturned.
"But it hurts here." She said, patting her lower stomach- and then to the sides of her waist. "And here, too- and-"

"It hurts everywhere. I've had periods for-" well, she couldn't exactly say almost forty years, could she?, "I've had periods for years, and the pain just gets worse and worse every time."

"It happens again?" The girl looked horrified. "But why!? How long?"

"It'll happen every month, until you're in your forties."
At least, that was what her mother had told her, when her moonbloods had ended. Sanya had not yet reached that stage of her life, when she had gone to Neráida.
"I mean, sometimes it doesn't happen- perhaps your reproductive system is out of sorts, or you're truly very stressed- and if you're having a baby, too, it stops-"

"What's a reep-pro-reproductive system?" She asked, making a face. She appeared to be making a conscious effort to ignore the 'every month' part.

"The part of your body that deals with making babies." It wasn't as simple as or limited to that, but this was a child she was speaking to. "Boys have them, too."

"Boys have periods, too?" Her mouth fell open, and she looked down at her skirt. "Wow..."

"No- unfortunately. They don't have periods- though they should." Lucky bastards. "I just meant they have reproductive systems." Oh, she really hoped she wasn't asked why boys had one. She didn't think she could handle explaining sperm and fertilisation, or that she'd explain it right. "Does it hurt really badly?"

She nodded, her face crumpling again.
"Yes. And my undies are stained with blood- I don't know how to stop it-"

"You can use pads. Here, I have some in my bag, I always carry them-" She was suddenly grateful she had taken her satchel to that day's exam- usually she just carried her pencil-box and clipboard in her hand, "they won't stop the blood, but they'll soak it up, so it doesn't stain your clothes."
She brought out the packet, placing it before the girl.
"Some people use tampons-" in this world, "but I've always used pads, since the first period I had, so I favour them. Besides, a tampon is basically a tube that you stick inside your- your swimsuit area. To each their own, of course, but I just don't think that tubes belong inside there."

"Thanks." She said mutedly, picking up the packet and staring at it. "This is awful."

"I know, it is." The pains of being a woman. "But it's- you'll endure it- I know you will." She had no other choice. "What's your name?"

She sniffled, "Meghan."

"That's a really pretty name. I'm Sanya." She said, smiling faintly. "You'll get used to it, soon. And this 'time of the month' is one of the best excuses to get out of things you don't want to do."

"Even exams?" She looked suddenly hopeful. "I have history tomorrow- all the dates are topsy-turvy in my head-"

"You can try, but I doubt it." An all-girls boarding school ought to be more sympathetic to those suffering from the menstrual cycle, but it was far from. "Are you feeling better?"

She shrugged shakily, before continuing in a small voice, "I d-d-don't want this."

"No one does."

A muffled sob escaped her throat, "I don't even know what 'this' is- and it hurts- and everything- everything feels- it feels- I don't know!"

Sanya wished she could explain it, as well as she could, as she had explained to Selene and Seraphina- but it wasn't her duty. It really wasn't her place to.
"You should ask your mother."

She shook her head, "Mummy- Mummy doesn't like to talk much, about bodies. She says it's- it's low-class behaviour." She looked down. "She doesn't like to talk to me, either, nowadays- I think it's because I'm not a baby anymore."

Which meant she was no longer a doll for her to play with and show off to others.

Sanya's temper began to rise.
She'd heard only a couple of sentences about the mother, but she wanted to deck her already.

"I see." She said tersely, itching to curse. "Then I think you should talk to Matron- she's old, but she will have facts for you, and she'll be kind."
And I also think your mother deserves a punch in the head-

"You're kind, too."

Was she?

You are evil- you are horrible- cruel, so cruel- and I should have killed you- you deserve whatever pain you have felt in your life-

"Thanks, Meghan." She smiled tightly. "Where's your dorm?"

She blinked rapidly, "My- dorm, why?"

"You'll need clean underwear to put the pad on." Sanya replied, nodding at the packet she held in her hand. "I'll get it for you?"

"Er-" She sniffled, "y-yes. Thank you. It's Dorm 4- just beside our common room."

"Okay." She nodded, feeling the strange urge to hug the child and take her into her lap, still hugging her. Heavens. But she couldn't do that- she wasn't a mother anymore.
Or- was she? Her children were dead, and she had killed them- but they were still hers, she had loved and raised them. Wouldn't she always be a mother, just as she would always be a sister and a daughter, even if the other half of the relationship was dead?
She looked at Meghan, who had her head down, a couple of tears still leaking out of her eyes.
"Hey." She reached a hand out, and prodded her knee. "How old are you?"

"I t-turned twelve in April."

"I got my first period when I was eleven." Or maybe ten- she couldn't remember. "My cousin, she got it when she was nine."

Her mouth fell open, "That early?"

"Yes. We were all shocked- but see, you're lucky. You got a couple more years than us- and, anyway, nothing has to change." Apart from body-breaking pains every month and blood staining literally everything during that particular time. "You're still you, Meggie. And you're still a child, if you want to keep being one. It's all going to be okay, and I'm here if you need pads, or- anything, really. Just- you know, don't worry."

What had been that silly bit of wisdom she'd told Edmund that time on the quest?

Worrying never stops the outcome of an event- or something. She couldn't remember, she'd ask him later.

Meghan stared at her for a moment, and her bottom lip wobbled.
In another moment, she'd crawled out from under the sink and thrown her arms around Sanya, openly sobbing again.

Sanya went ramrod straight, her whole body stiffening. She was horrified. Yes, she'd wanted to comfort the girl- but she didn't actually think a hug would happen! She was deeply, deeply awkward with physical affection.

Going down on Edmund and vice-versa notwithstanding.

"Um." She cleared her throat, as Meghan continued to weep into her shoulder. She patted her back awkwardly, "There, there, Meggie."
The girl didn't stop crying.
Would rolling her eyes be wrong?

Despite her face still buried in Sanya's blazer, she managed a muffled mumble, "S-s-sorry for crying-"

"It's alright, my sweet girl, cry as you like."
She patted her some more.

But- well, she didn't want to roll her eyes. It was a child, one that needed her- and, even if she didn't need her specifically, she needed her comfort.

"Calm now, Meggie." Sanya's tone was dulcet and her pats on the back turned soothing- soon, she was stroking her hair. She gently combed her fingers through the knots in her hair- Seraphina had always had so many, just like she herself always had. She could pretend she was holding her daughter, that she was a mother again, that this was her old life. "It's alright- I'm here."

We're your children. However old we are, we will alwayth need you!

She swallowed, and kissed the top of Meghan's shaking head.
"I'll be here as long as you need me."

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-✧･: °*✧*°:･✧-
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Raffey Cassidy as Meghan Roslyn

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We know Sanya's parents' names now! Four books later, the High Queen and King of Rihaaya, Sanya and Sameer's parents, have been named- Shabana and Sadaf. About time, lmao.
Also, Sanya’s aunt- who appears in Ch13 of ‘Alliance’- her name is/was (since she is obviously dead now) Shefali. Just fyi.

Also, Edmund was so sweet, saying that. I don't think he knows quite how to handle Sanya's pain, partly because he doesn't know the extent of it. But he's trying. He is trying so hard.
But trying gets tiring, after a while.
At least sexual stuff with them doesn't get tiring 🤷‍♀️
Yk, I'm kind of a late bloomer, in a few ways, and very much a virgin, so I can't really relate to their passion for each other- but, hey, it's hot and they like doing it with each other, and that's all that matters. And they were away from each other for so long (from Sanya's pov, at least), so it makes sense that they want each other so badly, even though they're only fifteen.

Anyway.

Sanya's streak of adopting continues! Jem in 'Alliance', Laash in 'Moonshine', and now Meghan in 'Fairytale?'.
I tell you, if she didn't have all the work of being High Queen back then, she would adopt so many children she would have to buy a new palace for them to live in.
Plus, both Meghan and Jem have dark hair and light eyes, and were in peril when Sanya meets them, and she ends up saving them both- I don't think she realises the parallel. Even I didn't, until I was writing this author's note.
Petition for Sanya to actually adopt Meghan when she becomes of legal age. She may have abandoned her three children, but she's a better mother than Meghan's mum, for SURE.

Side note- I don't think the guilt of abandoning her children will ever go. Even if she comes to terms with it and makes peace- it's going to haunt her and be in her bones always.
Trauma doesn't just happen in youth.

Also, I'm pretty sure that the people who are still reading this book have no problems with the sexual content in it- but, just in case, I'm going to label the chapters which have sexual stuff in it with the warning below the poem, like in this chapter and the last.

To end: physics sucks. Chemistry sucks. Maths sucks. Every subject sucks. Exams suck. Only good part of school (and other educational institutions) is friends and other non-academic memories 👍

Next chapter will probably be out on Tuesday, but I'm publishing on a whim, so do nOT take me at my word 🤷‍♀️

And, as always- I humbly and unashamedly ask you to vote on the chapters, and perhaps comment, too :)