Episode 3 The Twenty Dancing Princesses
“A royal pack must never reflect weakness. Your duty is to choose an omega who elevates the crown, not one who weighs it down.” My grandmother’s voice rings in my ears long after my conversation with her has ended. One final reminder of my duty to my family before we dive into this farce.
For most alphas, their duty is to their pack first and foremost, the family they form when they choose their bonds. That is not the case for me. It never has been, and never will.
As the prince of Bravonne, second in line for the throne, my duty is to the crown.
It always has been.
Which is why, when my grandmother told me my pack would go on international television and choose an omega in front of millions of viewers, I didn’t ask why, I just agreed. Now I’m wishing more than anything that I’d pushed back a bit.
That I’d questioned why she thought it was a good idea to put a royal pack through all this.
But even if I had, an answer wouldn’t have been forthcoming. She would have just told me to shut up and do it—though never in those words. She would have couched the order in a lot of flowery language that includes the word ‘duty’ at least three times.
“You ready?” Grieves, my pack mate and head of my security, asks from the doorway of the room that will be mine for the foreseeable future.
I turn to look at him, taking in his broad shoulders hugged in a charcoal grey suit. His shirt is white and his tie is the Ashbourne tartan. All of us will wear it somewhere on our person for this introduction to the omegas, to the world.
I smooth my hand over my vest of the same fabric and give a tight nod.
He frowns.
“You know we don’t have to do this.”
If only that were true. If only I could tell my grandmother I have no wish to find my omega currently. And even if I did, I wouldn’t want to go about it like this.
But I don’t have that luxury.
No. I am a prince, and my pack is already a disappointment to my grandmother.
She was none too pleased when I informed her that Grieves would be a member of my pack.
No matter that he attended Bellmont like the rest of us.
He was there on scholarship. And worse, that scholarship was earned with his fists.
Court has always been too wild, too impulsive. A reaction to the bounds his parental pack put on him growing up.
Thayer has the audacity to want to teach. Something my grandmother greatly disapproves of, even if it's only part-time and mostly as a guest lecturer. Even if his classes are the most sought after for the students at Bellmont.
It only got worse when we found Piers, our beta. She barely tolerates him as part of the pack, citing that a royal pack must be full of strong alphas and a perfect omega. In her mind Piers weakens us, but in truth he does the opposite.
He is our heart, hidden away and protected at all costs. Even if we can’t claim him as such.
I look back at the mirror, checking my suite one final time, before turning to Grieves, and following him out the door. “Let’s get this over with.”
The look he gives me can only be described as rueful.
“You know that's not what's going to happen, right? The introduction scene alone will take a while to film, and then there’s the party afterward.”
Hours is what he means. It's going to take hours to get just this one thing finished.
And even then there is no end in sight. Days and weeks of this.
Of being on display for the cameras, of being forced into conversations I would rather not have, of choosing a woman who is not the one for my pack, not our mate.
But that doesn’t matter.
If I want to keep Piers as my packmate, if I want to be able to publicly claim him as mine, I have to do as my grandmother says. I have to choose Isadora Aureline as our omega. Of course, none of my pack mates know this.
I didn’t tell them, and I don’t intend to.
Even if Piers were not a factor, I would still need to pretend.
That is what it means to be royal.
Duty, above all else.
The rest of our pack is lingering by the door of our suite, all dressed in suits, all color matched so we blend into one cohesive unit. A united front. The Royal pack.
The noose tightens. My grandmother's leash has never felt tighter.
I let my gaze sweep over my packmates, this small group of men I’ve chosen—men she would never have chosen for me.
If a pack’s primary focus wasn’t to keep alphas from going feral, I’m pretty sure my grandmother would have preferred for my sister and I to remain packless, take a single mate and ensure the Ashbourne bloodlines.
Courtland is buzzing with barely suppressed energy. He’s the most excited by this turn of events. A month in a luxury resort with the blessing of the queen to flirt with whomever he deems worthy of his time, so long as it doesn’t go beyond that. So long as we do what she demands of us at the end.
Grieves, steady as stone at my right, jaw tight, eyes scanning every visible path like he’s mapping exits in case we need them. Thayer, quiet and buttoned-up, smoothing his grey tweed lapel, glasses slipping down his nose as he mentally catalogues all the ways this production could go wrong.
And Piers…
Piers standing just behind them, straight-backed but carefully neutral, the way he’s trained himself to be in public—a shadow instead of our heart. He’s the only one of us not in grey, not wearing the family tartan. I hate it more than I can ever admit.
They are everything I choose.
Everything my grandmother condemns.
“Let’s go,” I say, because staying in this room will only make the dread worse.
We move as a unit down the hallway, into the elevator and to the entryway of the hotel. When we reach the staging area beside the set, the producers swarm immediately, checking mics, smoothing jackets, adjusting hair. Making sure we are camera ready.
A beta woman comes up and brushes a powder over my cheeks, glancing over her shoulder to where the director gives her a thumbs up and then she moves along to the rest of my pack. It’s all familiar, almost as natural to all of us as breathing.
This is the truth of always being in the public eye.
It becomes second nature to stand under hot lights, with fifteen people watching on as we pretend we aren’t sweating through the suppressants they’ve forced us to take.
“Alphas, you’ll stand here,” a producer with a clipboard in her hand chirps, tapping marks on the floor. “Yes, perfect. Hold that pose when the omegas enter. They’ll come to you. Greet each one and then they’ll precede you into the ballroom to wait while we finish out here.”
I almost snort at the audacity of calling the space a ballroom. It is, at best, a conference room, meant to host businessmen and self-help gurus. Nothing like the ornate ballroom of the Bravonnian Palace. But then, I suppose they’re working with what they have.
Cleo Hartwell saunters onto set, taking position to my right, flashing our pack a quick smile that I might have thought was flirty, if I wasn’t aware that she’s a happily packed up beta.
“Piers,” that same producer says to my beta, drawing my attention away from the woman.
“If you can just stand out of the view of the cameras.” My beta is already moving before she’s finished her direction.
This is well worn territory for him, for us.
Always shuffled out of the view of the camera.
Always leaning against a wall, waiting for us to finish.
It's worse today than it ever has been before.
A producer calls for quiet. Everyone rushes to obey.
“All omegas, to positions!” someone shouts outside my line of sight. “First entrance. Ready!”
My pack straightens.
This is it. The start.
Isadora is first. Of course she is. The woman doesn’t know how to be anything but.
Cleo announces her name as she drifts toward us in a red gown meant to shimmer under the spotlights, her smile polished to a jewel. She’s been preparing for this moment her entire life. Groomed for it by her family… and mine.
Her dark hair shines in the lights, a silky wave over her bare shoulders.
Her dress is far from demure, more daring than anything I’ve ever seen her in, bright red, strapless, low back with a slit up to her thigh.
It appears she’s taking advantage of the less formal setting, trying to fit into the expectations of reality television, rather than a noble born lady.
“Your Highness,” she purrs, dipping into a curtsy far deeper than necessary, giving us a view right down the front of her dress.
She straightens with a self-satisfied smirk, eyes flitting over the cameras to make sure they captured it.
“Looks like we finally get to show the world what we’ve all known since childhood. ”
Courtland mutters under his breath. Thayer stiffens. Grieves’s nostrils flare.
I school my face into neutrality.
Isadora steps a little closer, brushing imaginary lint from my sleeve in a move that reeks of familiarity.
“Grandmother must be thrilled,” she says lightly, but her eyes gleam with triumph as they slide toward the nearest camera, like she wants to be sure it caught her calling the queen ‘Grandmother.’ “This season is practically ours already.”
I force a polite smile, the one taught to me in etiquette halls before I could tie my own shoes. The one that adorns my face seventy-five percent of the time.
“Isadora,” I say. “Good evening.”
She beams, already convinced the crown and cameras and country belong to her.
If only I could relieve her of that notion.
But I can’t.
She moves down the line, playing up our closeness for the cameras, smugly showing off how well she knows us. And I can do nothing but stand there politely and wait for the next omega to enter the room.
I hear the click of her heels retreat and the tight knot of frustration I’d been feeling in her presence eases.