Like petals protecting a flower pistil, all four siblings cover each flank as the sea of guests parts before them. It's a message to every single possible suitor, to every possible powerplayer, to every playboy: in order to even bear witness to the Silver Throne, you’ll need to face this Empire’s rifles, survive its crushing wealth, play the impregnable court, and win the love of her people.

To dare approach unprepared is tantamount to suicide, to even lock eyes with the Fourth Princess spells disaster—political, social, and perhaps even physical. She is the unseen force behind the Silver Throne, almost never outside the palace walls with only the rarest of appearances in court. She is the unknown quantity, the powerplay…and perhaps the true powerplayer.

Across distant nations in their rooms of intelligence agents and computational devices they had long theorized Princess Sophia Elise’s true purpose within the Ensolian Imperium was that of subterfuge. Where her siblings took charge at the forefronts of leadership in military, economics, court, and diplomacy; someone had to keep the proverbial house clean.

At home, inconvenient revolutionaries were quietly shot and buried in deep graves while abroad, entire families of scheming royals would mysteriously succumb to the dubbed “ricin flu” (ricin, as a potent neurotoxin, would give its victim a few days of extreme sickness before death, and was as much a calling card of antiquity Ensolia as rare silver). All nations had their dirty laundry, and the cleanliness of Ensolia’s current ruling family reeked with something far more dangerous than anyone could uncover.

Though for the rest of the siblings, in closest proximity to this esoteric figure, knew her true nature and as such, all share the same thought:

I really hope they had a chance to bathe her after dragging her out of bed this afternoon…

Sophia herself tries to ignore the immense discomfort at being the center of attention, the scowl on her face arising from both an immediately exhausted social reservoir and the pain from a (at least how she feels it) misfitted pair of slippers. And she really does hope that her kin, her impromptu squad of bruisers and social warriors, would somehow keep everyone away. That somehow tonight, at her own coming-of-age party, she could just slither behind the wall of siblings and never speak a single word to any suitor or political machinator.

Tonight, for my own twenty-first birthday, I shall eat a few pastries, down a glass or two of sweetened soda-water, and just go back to sleep in my comfortable bed within the next two hours.

That first goal wasn’t too far at all: a refreshments table had been set up at the far end of the hall within visible range. Piled high with fruits taken from the growers in the southern reaches of the Imperium as well as an electric fountain of constantly recirculating wine; Sophia catches a glance of something more.

Her pale blue eyes widen, her soul elevating as emotion surges from within her. A belated breath, a hungry face flushing with blood, she finds her most beloved there staring right back at her. The only lover she would ever need in her life, the only thing that made this cruel universe worth living in.

On the far end of the table is a pile stacked tall with donuts–circular rolls of sweetened dough with their centers cut out subsequently deep fried in oil, cooled and drenched in such varieties of flavored glazes and chocolates that she could barely count them all.

Donuts: the most pure and perfect of loves. Oh how that beautiful coating of sugary glaze would melt in mouths, the softness of the doughy flesh would give way at the slightest pull; she could, if left unattended, probably eat a dozen of them before etiquette would nag at her conscience.

Goddess, please give them to me… Sophia pleads to the watcher of all with this utterly mundane prayer.

She needed them, and she needed them now.

If she could only somehow steer this vehicle of politics just forty degrees to the relative left, their paths would intersect, just enough that she could fill her possession with one…no four of those beautiful pastries.

But she isn’t in charge of this ride; Naomi’s tactically oriented mind is already finding the most advantageous position within the Grand Ballroom and guiding them all towards it. A pair of pillars at the center of the room and against the northern wall provide coverage from the rear and allow for a more metered approach to any objective within. A natural chokepoint for the filtration of any incoming entries, and all they had to do was to get to it without harassment.

“Ambush.” Naomi hisses at the flash of the sunset orange coloration of the nation to their continent’s south east. “Amorian Republic incoming. Natan, Beatrice take care of those traitors.”

Those were the ones who sold themselves to the Axial Powers, a politically oriented thought process informs the consciousness committee, and neutered nobility powerless in practice, but dangerous as the Axial foothold to the Ensolian continent.

They are not to be trusted.

The two take the front, a counter-assault prepared as Natan cracks his neck while Beatrice pulls a seductive smile. Those foreign, barely ceremonial third and second princes are here together, working in both tandem and competition as they march towards the formation with intense glares.

Both have the charm to match Natan’s capabilities in the social circles. One of Sophia’s thought processes whispers to her. But with Beatrice alongside him this would be a quick kill.

Natan immediately throws a casual and cutting greeting to the second prince, enough of an offense that some of the nearby guests chuckle at their expense. Stammering, unable to recover, Beatrice adds more onto it with a story headline dredged from the gutter media.

Alice tugs the uniform of her older sister. “Naomi, the Kiralian delegation…”

That group of ten in their dark blue uniforms and dresses takes their chance, that cluster of politicians lacking any sort of eligible bachelors but still moving towards a political opportunity to sway an eligible heir to the Silver Throne.

Sophia left open, but not defenseless.

“I see them.” Naomi curses. “Watch over Sophia, Alice.”

“I will.” The youngest one waves away with an evil smile.

Sending herself on an intercept course, Naomi takes one last glare over at Sophia. A wordless exchange completely lost on her, but enough that Alice passes on the message. “She says don’t go anywhere, Sophia.”

Sophia Elise the Eighth sighs in frustration.

If only her childhood friend could come and rescue her from this awful fate. If only that handsome prince would come and take her hand now, declare that he always loved her since that fateful day underneath the peach grove. If only he could come and save her from this madness, like in so many of those wonderful romantic tales, that would be so utterly wonderful…

… if only we had anyone of that sort! Her brain sobs.

Unlike being sent to the military academies like Naomi, or boarding schools like Natan and Beatrice, this fourth princess instead received instruction from private tutors and brought-in lecturers, an education expansive but social circle miniscule.

Not even small… Sophia suddenly realizes in a wave of crippling anxiety. Completely non-existent!

Goddess we really have nobody.

No, no, no, we can find someone here. Tonight! Some thought in her head begins to compose a plan. Let’s hope they’re just our age and kinda cute and maybe even…

So, when someone approaches her from Alice’s blindspot she’s completely caught off guard.

Graying hair on the edges of his head, green eyes hidden behind a pair of spectacles and a wide body underneath his fitted suit.

Goddess damned it’s an axial. Not some traitor noble, but an actual, living person from an axial republic.

Three wars and twenty million Ensolian lives–all in their crusade over this continent for that awful republicanist government of theirs.

A thought process rolls its eyes, observing the pin upon that man’s suit lapel. And even worse it’s an Axial Congressional we recognize…

At least twenty years her senior, unmarried (or at least, forcibly divorced from the rumor mills), the middle aged man greets her with an overly flirtatious advance. “Hello my sweet. You look stunning this evening.”

Sophia coldly stares at him like a rabbit caught in the fast approaching headlights of a motor carriage, a flight or fight response defaulting to freeze.

Even if marrying some Axial might prevent another war, this man ain’t husband material. A thought process tries to ping the panic response. This random playboy is too old for his pants, but we can play this off easily! But use a subtle rejection, don’t go too far.

“I-I… I…” she barely stammers, an entire psyche completely losing cohesion as anxiety takes over first from the gut, then to the heart, lungs, and then her vision. A low drone begins to pound her eardrums in lockstep with an accelerating pulse, lips barely moving as air is forced out somehow.

It’s chaos in this girl’s brain, with this entire committee turning to the last item in the checklist of social weaponry. Deploy the glare!

A full fifteen seconds of awkwardness as Sophia’s response comes in the form of a dead, empty stare right into his soul; the crowd in a waiting, holy silence before the landmine Naomi left behind detonates.

“Hey, Mister Aapeli!” Alice marches forward, the girl half the middle aged man’s height, a challenge called as she places her hands on her hips. Her innocent voice is so soft and sweet that they all come to listen to what she has to say, waiting for these wholesome words that explode like a live grenade. “That’s not how you greet someone of true royalty! No wonder why your wife left you for that manwhore last year! She’s probably moaning as we speak!”

The crowd audibly gasps in horror at the mention of that rumor, this Axial Congressional completely slack jawed as the young princess proudly smiles at her handiwork. “Now chop chop, you have somewhere better to be, you hall-rat.”

She leaves this rotting corpse to hang across the proverbial bridge as a dire warning, an entire collateral section of the guest list left stunned, smoldering like the aftermath of an arson attack.

Well, maybe this evening could be salvaged—in its own way, part of Sophia thinks, then pauses on an alternative interpretation of that thought. Salvaged… in its own way?

Natan and Beatrice return from their campaign quickly, with Natan making his own observation of the youngest’s uncensored words. “Ok Alice, I’m telling Father to limit your news intake.”

She gives a cheeky, innocent smile as she holds her hands behind her back. “And why is that, brother?”

He cracks a rare grin at her: the so lauded and celebrated ‘People’s Heart’ of the Imperium. “You shouldn’t be given access to words of this sort, my dearest princess.”

Naomi interrupts, also returning with a quick jog. The seriousness in her cold eyes, like a general returning to a rubbled hometown. “Where the hells is Sophia?”

A quick scan of this space by each of them, a sudden realization of their failure.

Slipping away between just the smallest lapses of attention was, before this, just a small gimmick to get out of classes or court. But now, this worst habit of their sibling is suddenly more consequential than ever.

Goddess damn it! They all curse together.

Beatrice grinds her teeth, quoting the now missing sister. “‘I could never be an assassin’ my ass.”

“And I keep forgetting how quiet she is…” Natan adds.

“Stay focused.” Naomi consolidates their thought processes into a coherent strategy.

“I’ll ask around the guests,” Beatrice offers. “See if anyone’s seen or…tried socializing with her.”

Natan speaks up for him and the youngest. “Alice and I will try and intercept her before she gets to the donuts on the refreshment table.”

Little chance of that, Naomi thinks to herself, before adding onto it. “If she’s not there after three minutes, split up and search for her yourselves. I’ll grab a servant to make sure she hasn’t tried to…retire to her room. I’ll join you two afterward.”

They have a plan.

“We’ll have to find her quickly, before she ends up…”

Naomi and Alice settle on their own words: Embarrassing herself in front of the entire country?

While Beatrice and Natan take a much more dire consequence into consideration: Causing an international incident?

And stuck between a probable flashpoint of the Fourth Stygian War and Empress Annia Elise’s wrath, they honestly aren’t sure which is gonna be worse.