Billionaire Quadruplet Alphas

Sunday 27th September, 2020.

Holly

“Mind catching me up to speed in the meanwhile? What the hell is going on here exactly. You seem to know a lot more than you’re letting on,” said Heath, his gaze and tone accusatory.

I nodded reluctantly, wondering how I was going to omit the very vital detail concerning his mate being alive somewhere.

“I…suspected something was amiss so I came here to try to catch the false Queen in the act,” I said simply.

“And you just…suspected this randomly?” Asked Heath, furrowing his brow.

“Well, not exactly,” I admitted.

“Well,” he said slowly. “Tell me exactly how you came to suspect that.”

I paused, deliberating for a few moments and then deciding that a bit of the truth was better than none of it.

“I…my grandfather was the doctor who bundled Princess Star up in a blanket, passing her off as the afterbirth, on Hesper’s instruction, so that she could be hidden somewhere until her eighteenth birthday,” I confessed.

Heath raised his eyebrows, widening his eyes. His eyes were exactly the same shade and shape as Harper’s, and heavily lined with thick long lashes, just like the Prince. I hoped he would wake to find me missing, find it strange and come searching for me.

“I found my grandfather’s journal,” I continued. “It documented his suspicions about the evolving situation at the Ice Moon Castle at that time. He did not believe that Hesper would kill herself knowing she had two living children out there even if she thought you were dead,” I said.

“Well, obviously, Holden pushed her and then made up that story,” snarled Heath. “When I get out of here, I will rip his head from his shoulders!” He roared.

He began pacing the cell. He was getting increasingly frustrated. He tried bending the silver bars again. I could hear the hiss of his flesh as it was singed by the silver. I grabbed both his wrists and yanked them away from the bars.

“Please, don’t!” I beseeched him.

“You have any other ideas,” he snapped.

I sighed.

Harper

Helena took me to the highest tower of the Ice Moon Castle. I noticed the window there had been flung open.

“Did Holly enter through here?” I asked.

Helena snorted, a shower of golden dust puffed into the air, indicating a yes. I entered the tower and looked around. There was no other sign of Holly save for the open window.

“Wait right here for me,” I said to Helena, who could barely fit her snout through the floor-length window but that hadn’t stopped her from trying.This content © Nôv/elDr(a)m/a.Org.

She nodded. I descended a staircase. This top floor was the Queen’s quarters. I had never actually visited her quarters before. Few came up here. I found myself in a long, wide hallway lined with paintings of dragons. I picked up a faint whiff of Holly’s scent near a table. I looked under it though her scent wasn’t nearly strong enough for her to still be there. Of course, no one was under the table now but her lingering scent troubled me. It meant she had had cause to hide her from someone or something. If she was hurt, I would kill everyone responsible. I walked down the hallway. There were double doors at its very end. This was the only place she could have gone. I found the double doors locked. f**k. I shook the door but it would not budge. I banged on the doors in frustration. I just knew she was in there somewhere. Perhaps, I did not need to open the door. I had been practising my Fae magic with cousin Asriel whenever I got some free time. I closed my eyes and focused on myself instead of the doors, imagining feeling light as air. I concentrated on just subliming into thin air, being shapeless, formless, free. I opened my eyes and stepped straight through the door as though I were a ghost haunting the castle. Once inside, I made myself solid again.

“Holly!” I called. “Holly!” I hissed.

“HOLLY!”

I tried to mind-link with her but I couldn’t. The Queen’s room looked just like I had imagined. It was opulently decorated in snow-white and ice-blue with gold and silver accents. The room looked like Winter personified. It was beautiful but it had this unmistakably unsettling atmosphere to it. I felt like an intruder though I probably had more claim to these chambers than the Queen herself. They were originally meant for the Ice Moon Alpha and his Luna. The Queen was nowhere to be found. I looked everywhere while my anxiety grew steadily. I looked under the bed, searching for a trap door of some kind. I checked all the books on the shelf in case removing one of them opened a secret doorway. I did the same thing with the ornaments on the mantle place in case that was a hidden door. I looked on every surface for a snow globe. I just knew Holly was nearby. I could feel her but I could not link with her telepathically. I searched the adjacent bath room. It was technically a bath house with stone steps leading down into a massive pool for bathing. There were many different faucets and each one emitted a different liquid. I turned each one in case one of them opened a hidden room. All I succeeded in doing was adding warm water, milk, honey, Fae dust and various emollients and cleansers to the water. I wanted to scream in frustration. I felt like an i***t checking every faucet and book, hoping for a secret entrance way that probably did not even exist.

I went to the only other set of doors in the Queen’s room besides the bathroom doors. and the exit. I tugged on them but they were locked. I stared at the doors. This should be a walk-in closet. All the royal rooms had a walk-in closet and private bathroom. Why would she lock her closet? I did my Fae spell again and walked through the door. I grinned triumphantly once inside. I found a couple dozen heavy gowns in showcases with crowns in shorter glass cases in front of them. It looked like a museum. I scrutinised everything but it was to no avail. I slid down the wall, slumping over on the door, feeling defeated.

Holly, where are you? I m****d to myself.

I covered my face with my hands.

Where could she be?

I took another look around. I did not have time to waste like this. Holly could be in grave danger. I noticed there were a few mannequins at the back of the large closet. They had obviously all been specially commissioned to look just like the Queen. The mannequins were all identical except for their gowns and one other thing. One of the Queens had her eyes closed and her arms down while all the others had their eye open and their arms raised as though welcoming someone with open arms. I went directly to that one and tugged on her arms. They moved in unison like a lever. The mannequin’s eyes snapped open and there was a low rumble like a stone sliding across concrete. I gasped. A hole had opened up in the floor before the awoken Queen. It seemed like a considerable way down. I was half werwolf too so I should be able to land on my feet. I took a deep breath and jumped down into the darkness.

Noah

The arena was just a simple dimly lit room with grey walls and grey tiles on the floor. There were snow globes everywhere. Were there actual snow globes or portals? A white splotch appeared on the wall. It began to take the form of words. I scrutinised the message. It said:

One snow globe will take you back to the other side of the door. The others will take you elsewhere. You have four tries. This is Prudence.

I started on one side of the room, examining the snow globes, working my way around anti-clockwise. The snow globes usually show the landscape of the place it led to but these had completely random objects in it. Each object was probably representative of where the respective portal led to. I had four tries and there were at least forty snow globes. Those were terrible odds. I had to choose the best option to demonstrate Prudence.

I decided to start by the process of elimination. I began putting the snow globes that were probably not the correct choices on one side of the room. I put the possibly correct ones on the other side. I kept adding to the not pile, interpreting the symbolic meaning behind the objects chosen. For example, I figured the snow globe containing a single red rose could be correct as roses signified romance. There was a small broken mirror in one of them. I put that one in the incorrect pile as cracked mirrors are associated with bad luck or misfortune. There was a fire burning in one of the snow globes. I could hear the magical fire crackling. Possibly yes. Fire represented destruction but also passion, a fiery romance. There was a diamond glittering magnificently. Yes. Engagement maybe? It could represent how precious Star was. There were toe shoes for a ballerina. That had to be wrong. It did not seem applicable to us. There was a crown. That could be right. Star was royalty. By the first sorting, I ended up with, twelve in the yes section and thirty-six in the no section. I was pleased with the first sorting but I still had eight to eliminate. The twelve yes symbols I had chosen were the red rose, the fire, the diamond, the crown, an infinity symbol, a puzzle piece, a beating heart, an umbrella, a balanced set of scales, an empty crib, a cocoon and off course a star.

I kept staring at the star as it twinkled but it seemed too obvious. Jonah’s task had been extremely difficult. They were supposed to get worse. Why would the answer be so obvious. I felt that the empty crib could be a bad omen so I eliminated it. The red rose was not that specific to our situation so I put that aside too. The umbrella seemed to represent shelter to me but I wasn’t so sure about it so I got rid of it too. The puzzle piece seemed like a cliche. The scales did not match that well either. I ended up with the fire, the crown, the infinity symbol, the beating heart and the star. I had one symbol too many but I could not delay choosing something any longer. I didn’t want Eli and Zaya to deal with a ravenous ghoul. I knew that thing was getting hungrier as I hypothesised.

We had gone through all of this so we could be with Star forever so I picked the infinity symbol first. I held the snow globe and flipped it over so I could read the inscription on the bottom. I felt my stomach lurch as I hurtled through a dense darkness. I found myself lying on a cold stone floor, the skin of my cheek sweaty and stuck to the floor despite its coolness. I struggled to my feet. A chill went through me. This was definitely the wrong choice.