The Luna Choosing Game

Nicholas held Elva safe and secure in his arms as he stood to his full height. Elva buried her face into the corner of his neck and shoulder. He gently patted her back.

He glanced down at Elva, his gaze so tender that it made my heart clench.

“There, there,” he whispered. “You are safe now.”

“Oh my God,” said one of the other girls in the room, fanning herself. “Of course he’s good with children.”

“Someone pinch me,” said another. “I think I’m dreaming.”

Nicholas’s soft expression hardened as he glared out at the rest of the room. “Whose child is this? Why is she here?”

I started forward, but the girl in the pink dress spoke before I could reach him.

“An outsider sneaked in, unless she’s a maid.”

Some of the other girls snickered at my expense.

“She can’t be a participant,” another girl fake-whispered, loud enough for half-the room to hear. “I thought we had to be virgins, and she’s got a kid.”

I wanted to disappear into a corner. Whether virgin or not, I was nothing compared to the rest of these girls.

My clothes weren’t as nice as theirs, and my figure wasn’t like what it had been at the Academy. I’d lost much of my musculature. I was skinny from too many nights of skipped dinners.

Elva’s wellbeing had always come before my own.

Her sake was the only reason I continued forward rather than hide in embarrassment. I stopped only when I reached Nicholas.

He looked at me, and I looked at him.

I’d forgotten how gorgeous his eyes were, golden brown with flakes of green. When we’d dated, I had spent hours looking at them, trying to memorize that color, but it had seemed different each time.

Before, when I’d stared long enough, I could earn a bashful smile from him. Now, his face was totally devoid of emotion. He looked at me like I was a stranger.

Did he… not recognize me?

I had changed, sure, but not enough to become unrecognizable. Unless he truly had sealed me away in his past and moved on, never once looking back.

face. I could be a great embarrassment to him, showing up here,

Maybe he hated me.

is the outsider.” The girl

Nicholas said, and even his voice was monotone. Another moment of

led me to an adjoining room, separated by a

official-looking man in a suit hurried toward him. “Your Royal Highness, please remember that per the selection rules, you aren’t to be alone with

stopped to look at the man, who nervously backed up

is an exception,” Nicholas

Of course, sir.” The man bowed twice as he

room. I went inside after them. A servant stepped forward and closed the door behind us,

stomach churned. I thought I might be sick. I had never imagined I’d meet

see me as I was? To see

his chest. She must have cried herself to sleep, eyes closed and

toward Nicholas, and at once, his perfect façade cracked. He frowned. His golden

Elva, his arm looped more

you hide my child from

a stop. I blinked once, twice, but, no, I couldn’t make sense of

Eloquently, I said, “Huh?”

glanced at Elva, softly sleeping in his arms. She was three years old. That lined

We’d been so young then,

both finished in clumsy haste. I couldn’t remember where he was when he’d climaxed. But, hadn’t he been wearing a condom at

certainty that fueled it seemed to slide into bewilderment. His gaze

I said, hoping

children. He’d even said so on television. For me to hide a child from him would have been a cruelty. He would likely have struggled forever over the guilt for the years

her name.

eyes widened a moment, before the anger

say, he seemed to struggle

and Elva. “She

I wouldn’t tell that to Nicholas. Elva was mine in every way that

answer some unspoken question

What could cause

immediately cut off the deep rumbling

Elva down onto one of the plush couches in

mad at Mommy,” came Elva’s quiet