Dominique's POV -

"You shouldn't have to do this," I say to my father

He looks at me and my eyes soften, " It wasn't your fault, sweetheart"

My heart clenches at the small show of affection.

"Yes, It is. And you know it."

"I shouldn't have let your mother convince me to make Julian marry that girl."

"Mother... " I sigh and sit down in one of the chairs in front of my father's desk, "The marriage was a good idea. The North is powerful and could easily claim autonomy whenever they wanted so we've always been wary of them. Marriage between us would keep us safe."

"Did you want to marry her?" My Father asks bluntly

"W-what" I chuckle and start playing with my rings

"I wouldn't oppose. I thought that was why you were angry." I clear my throat

"No. She was just a friend. " I insist

"Oh, well, we should talk about your marriage before your mother gets involved. I don't want you to marry anyone you don't want to but Nik..."

"I know," I say and straighten up my back, " If I have to get married, I will."

"Your brother will be getting married soon. To the princess of the North or not. You should be careful," He stares at me

"My brother shouldn't feel cautious of me."

"Your brother loves you," I catch the meaning behind those words.

If there's anyone I should watch out for, It would be my mother. Her priority is and always will be Julian. Specifically, that Julian inherits the crown to Rodask.

I sigh and decide to change the topic, "Will you be sending them a letter to request a meeting?"

"No, I am preparing for war. This is something they chose. I will not 'beg' them to not attack us. If they want a war I'll give them one"

"You sound like a child. We're gonna take a huge loss even if we end up winning. I loved your little speech and all but If there's an option to stop the war then we should take it."

"They would invade us anyway, The engagement annulment was just their excuse."

"They will compromise. Send me and I'll convince them. You know just as well as I do that If we go to war, we will have a pile of dead bodies under us."

Under me.

Because of me.

"Fine, " He says shaking his head and taking out paper and pen. He writes a quick letter and rings the bell he has on his desk.

My father's assistant comes in and grabs the letter, bows to both of us, and scurries off.

"Julian, you, and Lucio will be coming with me. Wyatt will take care of things here while we are gone. I was also thinking of bringing Michel."

"Why would you want to bring the brat," I say, rolling my eyes.

"He wants to help. It'll be good for him."

"Alright, I guess so. I'll tell him." He nods

"I'll be leaving now," I say and stand up, a nod to my father, and leave the room.

I walk to Michel's room and he is training with a combat practice dummy I bought for him once.

"Hey Brat," I say and lay down on his bed, contemplating taking a nap.

"Get out," He says, catching his breath.

" I have good news for you, don't you wanna hear it?" He stops and grabs a towel to wipe off his sweat.

He walks over to sit on the bed but I stop him with my feet.

"What are you doing? You smell like nasty teenage boy sweat."

"It's my bed, Dominique, " He says scrunching up his face, " what. do. you. want."

"You're coming with us to meet with the North in seek of a compromise."

"Why? I say just kill them all."

"And you're gonna do that?" I ask, rolling my eyes at him.

"Yes, If dad let me."

"Well, he's not going to. If he did, you'd die you, idiot."

"Are you going to die?" He asks softly

"No, you brat, I'm way stronger than you."

"Okay." We sit in comfortable silence for a minute before he hits me with his sweaty towel

"What the fuck?"

"Leave. I have to train." He raises the towel and I jump off the bed quickly and laugh.

"Chill out, little brother" I leave his room, smiling but suddenly Guards are running down the hall and bumping me

"What the hell?" I grab him and pull him into Michel's room

"What the fuck is going on?" He bows deeply catching his breath, I gesture for him to raise his head.

"The castle is under attack, Your Highness." I run out of the room with the Guard and Michel behind me

"Then why didn't you say so! what the fuck are you doing wasting time on etiquette when we're under attack?" I open my father's office door but no one is in there.

"Where is my father?!"

"I-"

"Fuck!" I run down the hall where the guards were all gathered together and my father has an arrow on his shoulder and is sweating profusely.

"What the fuck are you all doing?! You two" I point to two guards, "Get him up. Carry him to the Infirmary"

"Someone went to get the medics, we're afraid it might make it worse if we move him," some random guard says

"Do I look like I give a fuck? It's poison if you don't get him to the infirmary right now, he'll die. Do you understand? By the time someone gets here, He'll be dead. There won't be any use to you waiting here." The two guards grab him and start running.

"Fuck, all of you are fired when this is over," I say opening the window and jumping out, landing on a balcony. I look around me for the culprit.

Michel follows behind me and I nod to him.

"Go check from the top, I'm going to check the woods." he nods and jumps from balcony to balcony to reach the castle roof.

I run to the woods and run jumping from tree to tree. I search every inch of the woods for the culprit but they were nowhere in sight.

"Nikki!!" I turn around, my heart beating through my chest, and jump to the top of the castle. I see Michel standing on a balcony. I rush over there and as I get closer I see the bloody body on the floor.

I approach Michel slowly and take the dirty knife away from him. It was small, tiny basically, he must've had it hidden on him for safety.

I wanted to tell him he did well but I don't think he has processed what he did yet for me to start praising him.

"Let's go inside," I say lightly pulling him inside and sitting him down on the bed,

"Are you hurt?" I said touching his face and looking for bruises or cuts

"Are you just gonna leave him there?" He says looking behind me. I stand up and close the balcony drapes.

"No, he'll be dealt with but you're more important. Wait here, hold on. I go to the bathroom and grab the first aid kit stashed in there.

I go over to him and wipe his face with a wetted towel from the bathroom. He gets startled and snaps his eyes at me, finally looking away from the balcony.

"Are you okay?" I ask cleaning a small cut he had on his cheek

"I'm fine, we should go check on dad." He tries to stand up but I gently push him back on the bed.

"We will soon. Let me finish first." I finish putting the bandage on his face and he gets up. I go over to the balcony for a second and grab the attacker's arrows and a vial of poison he had in his left pocket. Michel looks at it for a second before looking away.

"Come on, Let's go," We quietly rush over to the Infirmary.

"Is father okay?" I ask hastily.

He is laid down on the bed with his shirt ripped off and the arrow wound has been treated. My brothers are all in here except Lucas.

I give the vial of poison to the doctor and she looks for the right antidote for that kind of poison. He makes my father swallow it and turns to us.

"He's going to be fine." I nod towards her and we all come outside, leaving the doctor to treat my father in peace.

"Scott, take Michel inside and tell the doctor to treat him after she's done with father." He nods and takes Michel into the Infirmary.

"Did you catch the culprit?" Julian asks

"Michel killed one, I was worried about him so I stopped looking for the others. This was an assassination attempt, They were hired killers and knew how to make a clean escape."

"Michel would've been fine. You should have kept looking so we could capture one and interrogate them about who sent them," Julian said

"Well, you know what? I didn't fucking see you out there. Where the fuck were you? It was just me and Michel looking and our 15-year-old brother had just killed someone so I wasn't exactly worried about anything else at the moment,"

"Oh, also we know who sent them you idiot. How about the people that we're probably going to war with? I would think that's a rather good guess. Oh, and by the way, we need new fucking guards like immediately. Fire them all just- oh my fucking god." I say walking away from them.

"We're going to the meeting with the North tomorrow." Lucio states. I put my hands over my face and turn back around, "We got a confirmation letter less than 2 hours after we sent ours. We're meeting them tomorrow at 3 pm In the Capital's Great Hall." He elaborates. The Great hall was located less than 20 minutes away from The Academy In Etrus.

"Fuck." I clench my fist and leave them behind. I go into my room and take all of my rings off and walk over my practice dummy that was almost identical to Michel's but way bigger. I train for hours before being exhausted and take a shower before going to sleep.

Nette wakes me up and hands me a cup of coffee, "Thought you might need that,"

"Thanks, Nette," I get up and take a sip. She helps me get dressed while keeping me up to date.

"His Highness, Crown Prince Julian, Is meeting with Her Majesty at this very moment. She called him in as soon as the sun rose so it must've been urgent. Also, Prince Lucio is at the door with a questionable young man at his side." I nod as I put my suit jacket on and my hair up into a messy ponytail

(what Dominique is wearing. this is pretty accurate except she has longer and darker hair with green colored eyes )

"Let them in," Nette opens the door for them and leaves the room excusing herself.

"Your Highness, Princess Dominique" The stable boy bows deeply

"You can rise, What's your name?"

"My nice is Arlen, Your Highness," he says raising his head

"Well, you clean up nice, Arlen." I knew his hair was golden. It looked like brown from all the dirt last time I saw him.

He looked like a new person, he just needs his wounds to heal and cut his hair and he would be quite handsome.

"Your Highness, I'm here to beg for your help," He goes to get on his knees but I lift him off the floor

"I already agreed to help you, don't worry. Lucio here will be in charge of helping your sister and getting the two of you situated and working in the castle. How good are you at fighting?"

"I haven't had any training but I can take a punch or two," I nod, examining his face. yeah, I can see that.

"You can train to become a knight with Amir and his men. Lucio, after you get his sister bring her to me. I have to see what she would be good at. Take him to Amir after he gets his wounds properly checked at." He nods

"Julian says we leave at 1 and it's already noon so we should get going," He states

"Okay, I'm ready. You cleaned up very nice too, btw."

"Thank you, Sister."

We step out and leave Arlen in the Infirmary with Josette, our nurse. We would only be gone a day so he was going to stay with her until then.

Julian and Michel are already dressed and outside. Julian went all out on his outfit as always and Michel still looked a little taken back but he looked refreshed so I'm guessing Josette gave him something to help him sleep.

Julian

Michel

We get into our limo and our bags are packed into the trunk and we leave.

In order to get to any other country we have to go by boat since they're all separated by bodies of water. The boat ride to Etrus is only 30 minutes long so we get there quickly and from the boat we get into another limo and it takes us to the Central Grand Hall.

We walk in there and I put my hand on Michel's shoulder. He looks up at me and his shoulders relax as we go in.

"Welcome..."

*_*

the art in this is not mine! I found these off of Pinterest and they fit the characters really well. i put them in here to kind of help you guys picture them but if you want to picture them another way, go right ahead.

K <3