4. Xander
Xander groaned unhappily at his steadily beeping alarm. Usually, he would have shut it off for a few more minutes of sleep, but today was no day for lazing around. He had best-man duties to attend to, and perhaps most important of all was finding Niko and seeing how bad his hangover was.
He felt another flash of heaviness at the thought that his brother was getting married today — and at the memory of Niko’s cold feet last night. But he shook it off. Once today was over, Niko and Maisy would leave for their honeymoon, and Xander could return to his mostly carefree life. All he had to do was make sure that everything went off without a hitch today.
With that goal in mind, Xander got out of bed. A glance at the clock showed that he had enough time to hit the gym before meeting Niko at nine, so he grabbed his gym bag and changed into shorts and a T-shirt. Working out always helped clear his mind, and a clear mind was something Xander desperately needed today.
An hour later, he stepped into an icy shower. He was sweaty and tired from a hard session of weightlifting and a short jog on the treadmill — and his mind felt clearer. Now, all he had to do was make sure Niko was equally clearheaded.
Xander changed into his slacks and button-up, then draped his suit jacket over his arm. On his way to Niko’s room, where his brother was surely still sleeping, he stopped by the kitchen to pick up two cups of hot coffee and a stack of buttered toast. It was the twins’ classic hangover cure and worked wonders every time.
When Xander reached Niko’s suite at the top of the stairs, he knocked once. As expected, he didn’t get an answer. Niko slept the sleep of the dead after a night of drinking, and there was almost no chance he’d heard the knock.
“I’m coming in!” Xander called as he nudged the door open and stepped into his brother’s suite. The living room was as neatly organized as Niko himself was. Shelves of books lined the walls, mostly dry tomes on topics like international trade agreements and tax law. A desk in the corner was covered with papers in neat stacks, as well as Niko’s laptop, which was closed.
Xander set the coffees and toast on a small table in the corner of the room and continued on to Niko’s bedroom. There, he knocked again, more firmly this time.
“Wakey-wakey, big bro!” he called. “It’s your wedding day!”
There was no answer, so once again, Xander nudged the door open and stepped into Niko’s bedroom. To his surprise, the bed was neatly made, the blankets as smooth as the ocean on a still day and tucked firmly in at the corners. The pillow was fluffy with no sign of a head dent.
“Niko?”
Xander crossed the room to examine the bed more closely. Niko’s phone wasn’t there. The window shades were open, spilling warm morning light across the empty room.
“Interesting.” Xander’s voice sounded loud in the empty room. “Niko?”
But there was no reply. Perhaps Niko hadn’t gotten as drunk last night as Xander thought and was already up. Maybe he was settling his mind with exercise, just as Xander had. Yet a niggling feeling in Xander’s gut suggested that it might be something a little more worrisome than that.
He took a quick walk through the suite. He checked the bathroom, the living room (just in case Niko had been hiding in a closet or something), and the small kitchenette. Everything was spotlessly tidy and completely empty — there was no sign of Niko anywhere.
Xander took a deep breath. Then he got out his phone and sent his brother a text.
Where are you?
But as soon as he sent it, there was a tinkling sound. Niko’s phone was sitting on his desk under a folder, completely useless.
This felt like a bad sign, but Xander tried to stay calm. There was a good chance his brother was just exercising or in the kitchen eating breakfast. Maybe he’d even met up with some of the other groomsmen. Just in case, Xander sent a quick text to their group chat, but the answers rolled in quickly, and all of them confirmed that no one had seen him.
His worry growing, Xander hurried down to the gym, then the kitchen, then the library, then the football field, then the path along the ocean where Niko sometimes jogged. He wasn’t anywhere to be found. There was a chance he’d just wandered somewhere else, but Xander got the feeling that something was really wrong here. Niko was fastidious and punctual. His days were planned to a tee — they had to be, to fit in all of the duties that came with being the oldest prince in a country like Aenicea. Niko never disappeared without telling anyone where he was. Never.
Xander sank onto a bench beside the ocean path. He wasn’t sure what to do. There was still a chance that Niko was somewhere, sleeping off a hangover in an armchair in the corner of the library or with one of his friends. Or he might be up, somewhere in the palace that Xander hadn’t checked — and without his phone.
If Xander texted his parents, which he probably should, it would bring a lot of trouble crashing down on Niko’s head. Maybe it was better to wait, at least a little longer, to see if Niko turned up. And in the meantime, Xander could keep searching. He’d probably find his brother somewhere.
Wouldn’t he?
As Xander hurried back into the palace with a new list of places to search growing in his mind, he ran into the groomsmen. They had gathered for a late breakfast on a terrace overlooking the ocean.
“Xander!” one of their school friends, Jason, called. Xander crossed the terrace to join them. “Have you found Niko yet?”
Xander hesitated. More people looking for his brother would be a good thing, but any alarm would bring trouble for Niko, and he wasn’t sure all these men could keep the missing groom secret.
“Yes,” Xander lied. “But something’s come up. The, um, the wedding tie is missing.”
“Really?” Jason looked skeptical. “I didn’t know there was a specific tie.”
“Oh, yes,” Xander lied. “It’s traditional. All the men in our family marry wearing it. Niko is up in arms. Could you help us look?”
“Of course.” The groomsmen got to their feet, their breakfasts forgotten.
“If you see Niko, tell him to find me,” Xander continued. “He forgot his phone and went to find the tie in a hurry.”
“Will do. What does it look like?”
“Um. It’s blue. With silver stars.” Niko would never be caught dead in a tie like that, so Xander had to hope the groomsmen wouldn’t somehow find one before Xander could find his brother.
There. That was settled, at least. The groomsmen would be distracted by a search for a missing (fictional) tie and would keep their eyes out for Niko. And Xander could continue searching in peace.
Two hours later, though, Xander had to admit defeat. The wedding was starting in fifteen minutes and he hadn’t spotted Niko anywhere. He made a last desperate dash for the staging room — maybe, somehow, Niko was there, getting ready — but Niko was, once again, nowhere to be found.
Xander was going to have to tell his parents that the groom was missing. And worse, he’d have to tell Maisy that he’d lost her future husband. Xander’s chest tightened at the thought of poor Maisy, ready for her wedding day, only to be stood up by a probably drunk and incapacitated Niko.
Was it possible that Niko was skipping the wedding on purpose? Xander thought back to Niko’s waffling the night before, but his brother had seemed convinced in the end to do his duty. And even if Niko had decided not to marry Maisy, he surely would have been man enough to tell her himself instead of just not showing up.
No. Niko must have just fallen asleep somewhere, full of whiskey. When he woke and found that he’d missed his wedding, he would feel terrible. But at that point the damage, both to Niko’s reputation and to his relationship with Maisy, would already be done.
Then Xander saw it. In the corner of the room hung Niko’s wedding suit, freshly pressed and ready to be worn. Xander turned to look in the mirror. He looked just like Niko — so much so that even their parents struggled to tell them apart sometimes. It was only when one of them opened their mouths that their differences became apparent. It was a wild plan, and if Xander had had more time to think about it, he might not have gone through with it. But there were less than fifteen minutes until the wedding began and, if Niko was really just hungover somewhere, Xander wanted to save everyone from the consequences of his brother skipping the wedding.
So, he grabbed his brother’s wedding suit. As quickly as he could, he changed into the groom’s outfit, leaving his own clothes hung over a chair. If the best man didn’t come to the wedding, it wouldn’t raise too many eyebrows — after all, Xander was known for being a little flighty. No, Xander the best man wouldn’t be at the wedding. But Niko the groom would be.
When Xander caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, he hesitated. If he couldn’t pull this off and the crowd gathered in the wedding hall found out he was impersonating his brother, all hell would break loose. But as Xander took in the sight of the neatly trimmed suit and his own face, so close to his twin’s, above it, he couldn’t help thinking of what he’d told Niko yesterday about duty to his country and to the people he loved.
If Niko missed the wedding, he would be in deep trouble with the whole kingdom. Their parents would be furious and disappointed in both brothers. And poor Maisy, whose wedding day it was, would be humiliated in front of a huge crowd.
With that in mind, it felt like it was Xander’s duty to take his brother’s place. When Niko turned up, hopefully within a few hours and with a pounding headache, they could switch back. No one would have to know that the wrong brother had taken part in the ceremony.
So, Xander took a deep breath and exited the changing room.
One of the wedding coordinators was standing directly outside the door, her fist raised as if Xander had interrupted her in the middle of knocking.
“Oh, thank goodness. Niko, we need to get you into the hall right now. The wedding is about to start!”
And so it began. Xander let the coordinator lead him down the corridor, their steps hurried.
“Have you seen your brother?” she asked as they turned a corner and climbed a small flight of stairs.
“No.” Xander tried to modulate his voice to the even, regal tones of his brother. “You know Xander. He probably just wandered off.”
“Hmm.” The coordinator flipped her hair over her shoulder. “Well, the show will just have to go on without him.”
“It looks like it.”
She opened a door and gestured for Xander to enter. As soon as he stepped through, he realized that he was at the front of the wedding hall. Rows and rows of pews were filled with Aeniceans and Americans alike, all dressed in their finest, all ready to see a royal wedding. When Xander emerged, they began to cheer.
Xander raised his hand in his brother’s signature wave, and the cheering grew. In the front row, Xander’s parents and Maisy’s mother looked relieved to see him, and Xander raised his hand again. Then he took his place in front of a majestic arch woven with Aenicea’s national flower, the spring rose, along with American daisies to symbolize a “commoner” girl becoming a royal. The officiant, a tall man in a fitted suit, nodded to Xander.
“Welcome. Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
“Cold feet?” he asked with a wink.
“Not at all.” Xander smiled at him, trying to channel Niko’s quiet confidence and not his own worries that someone was going to figure out that he was impersonating his brother.
“Well, good. Maisy seems like a wonderful girl.”
“She really is.”
Just then, the string quartet began to play. In unison, Xander and the officiant turned their heads to the front of the room, where one of Maisy’s bridesmaids entered on the arm of Niko’s and Xander’s childhood friend Jason. They walked down the aisle in smooth, perfect steps, aligned exactly to the music. This was the part of the wedding that Xander had practiced several times. Maisy’s friend looked lovely in a yellow chiffon dress, and Jason saw Xander at the front but didn’t do a double take — it looked like his cover was solid.
The next pair came down the aisle, then another, then finally Niko’s chief advisor, Evros, followed with a bridesmaid on each arm. Maisy’s sister, Lily, was one of them. Xander felt a stab of guilt that the plans had been rearranged and he hadn’t been able to walk with Lily, but surely a small processional recalculation was better than the groom not showing up.
The music changed, and a little boy Xander recognized as Maisy’s cousin came down the aisle with a pair of shiny rings on a large, white pillow. The crowd aahed at the sight of the little boy, who really did cut a dashing picture in his tiny tux.
He was followed by Joya, Evros’s daughter, who toddled down the aisle tossing fistfuls of rose petals and daisies onto the ground. The aahs increased.
With each group that came down the aisle, Xander’s nerves spiked, then relaxed. No one seemed to notice anything out of the ordinary. They all simply took their places at the front of the room.
And then the music changed again and Xander’s heart stopped. Somehow, in his mad dash to take Niko’s place and his worries about being found out, he hadn’t really put together that Maisy would be walking down the aisle towards him. She was wearing a long, lacy white dress that accentuated her feminine figure and made her appear to almost float down the aisle. Her gorgeous brown curls framed her face, the features of which had been emphasized with makeup. A tiara glinted on top of her head.
Despite himself, Xander couldn’t stop staring at Maisy as she came towards him on her father’s arm. She kept her gaze bowed most of the way, but when she raised her gaze to Xander a flicker of confusion crossed those beautiful features. Xander’s breath caught. If anyone could figure out the ruse, it would be Niko’s bride. But then Maisy smiled. It was just a flash of a smile, the corners of her mouth lifting slightly, but it looked real. She stepped in front of Xander and held out her hands. After a moment he took her hands, and the ceremony began.
“Citizens of Aenicea,” the officiant said. “Visitors from afar. We have come together today to celebrate the eternal union of Mr. Galanis and Ms. Carpenter, hereafter referred to as Mr. and Mrs. Galanis — the crown prince and princess of Aenicea.”
There were a few cheers from the crowd at this. The officiant paused to let them die down, then continued. He spoke for a while about love and respect and duty and trust, but Xander was hardly listening. Instead, he was looking at Maisy, and she was looking at him.
Her green eyes sparkled with something Xander had never seen from her before. It must be love — the love she felt for his absent brother. Yet, even though Xander knew her affection wasn’t directed towards him, his heart warmed at the sight of her. Maisy really was gorgeous, and her hands fitted into his like puzzle pieces. Xander had never let himself look at his brother’s bride like this.
Yet now, standing here, their gazes locked, the rest of the world seemed to fall away. The officiant’s words faded into the background. The crowd blurred and disappeared. Xander’s thoughts of obligation and worries of being found out were washed away. The only thing that mattered was Maisy’s hands in his, her green eyes sparkling, the corners of her pink lips tilted up in a hopeful smile.
Perhaps it was the magic of the words being spoken and the romance of the packed wedding hall, but Xander felt a connection between himself and Maisy. Of course, for her, it was a connection with his brother, which dampened Xander’s enthusiasm.
“If you would each take a moment to sign the official wedding document…” The officiant produced a form, which had already been filled out, as well as a beautiful silver pen. Xander bit his lip and, when his turn came, quickly scribbled something that could be Niko’s name. Maisy signed after him, her signature much more refined.
“And now,” the officiant continued, “it’s time for the exchange of the traditional Aenicean wedding vows. Please repeat after me. Niko, you begin. ‘I swear to stand by you, in rough seas and in calm.’”
“I swear to stand by you, in rough seas and in calm.” Xander’s voice was steady.
“Now you, Maisy. ‘I swear to be your lighthouse, in dark nights and stormy weather.’”
“I swear to be your lighthouse, in dark nights and stormy weather,” Maisy repeated.
“Niko, ‘I swear to be your home, wherever we may wander.’”
“I swear to be your home, wherever we may wander.” Xander had heard these vows many times before, but speaking them felt different. With each vow they exchanged, he felt the bond between him and Maisy grow. It should have been Niko here, swearing himself to his bride. Yet strangely, Xander felt right saying these words to Maisy.
“Maisy, ‘I swear to be your refuge when you have none.’”
“I swear to be your refuge when you have none.”
“Niko, ‘I swear to be the wind in your sails and the stars on your horizon.’”
“I swear to be the wind in your sails and the stars on your horizon.”
“Maisy, ‘I swear to be true, in low tide and in high.’”
“I swear to be true, in low tide and in high.”
“Wonderful. And now, I understand you’ve both prepared an additional vow. Maisy, you may begin.”
“All right.” Maisy gave a shy smile. “Niko, I swear to grow with you as we go through life together, to always be ready to learn, to find the beauty in the everyday, and to love you a little more with each hour we spend together.”
“Niko?” the officiant prompted. Xander’s heart sank. He hadn’t thought this far ahead — he hadn’t even known that Niko and Maisy had prepared their own additional vows. He would have to just say something.
“Maisy,” Xander said, “I swear…” He blanked. He didn’t know what his brother would want to swear to Maisy. Niko would probably say something about doing his best to be a good and loyal husband and following his duty to Maisy and to the country or something equally bland. But the pause stretched, and Xander wasn’t sure what words to use. He would have to speak from his own heart instead. “Maisy, I swear to make you laugh every day that I can. I swear to hold your hand through every adventure and every trial that comes our way. I swear to dance with you until our feet ache and watch the stars with you until daybreak. And I swear to bring you your favorite desserts every day.”
As Xander spoke, he realized that he’d gone too personal — way too personal. Maisy’s eyes widened and her mouth dropped open. Xander saw the moment that she recognized him for who he really was.
“You—”
But the officiant continued before Maisy could finish her whispered interjection.
“I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss.”
Xander leaned forward until he could whisper in Maisy’s ear.
“Please, help me sell this. I’ll explain everything later.”
“I can’t believe you,” she hissed back, her tone full of venom. “Xander.”
But when Xander bent his head to hers, Maisy kissed him. It was not exactly a romantic kiss. Xander could feel Maisy’s anger and worry through the quick brush of their lips. Yet despite that, a tiny part of Xander’s mind noticed how nice it would be to kiss Maisy properly — if she weren’t furious with him.
They pulled apart and Xander turned to the crowd.
“Thank you, all.” Then he took Maisy’s hand and led her down the aisle towards the exit. As they walked, the crowd roared with enthusiasm, tossing rose petals over the couple’s heads. As soon as they stepped through the large double doors, Maisy’s grip on Xander’s hand tightened.
“I can’t believe you did this.” She propelled him into a staging room off the entryway and closed the door hard behind them. “What kind of horrible prank is this?” Her green eyes were glistening with tears.
“Maisy—”
She dropped her head into her hands and sank onto a chair.
“I can’t believe this. I can’t believe I married the wrong brother. How could you?”
“Maisy—” Xander tried again, but before he could explain himself, the door flew open. Their parents were standing on the doorstep, looking absolutely furious.