Phoebe

By ancient tradition, all Imperial League dragon riders received the privileges of aristocracy for their trip to the Emperor's First Seat. While select team personnel had guest rooms in the staff wing, and the remainder stayed at a swish modern building out near the orchards, each rider was assigned a Prince's Suite in the perpendicular galleries that separated the Four Seasons Courtyards.

The rooms were only modest in size by the standards of an Imperial Palace, refitted to the highest modern standards and then decorated over with a thin layer of antiquity. Under the silk top blankets embroidered with lily and lotus patterns were crisp modern duvets; the bed's four posts hid dimmable light fittings. Calligraphed paper screen panels along the walls slid back to reveal an enormous flatscreen TV mounted into the wall, connected to an exhaustive range of sources.

At any time, from any point in the bedroom, receiving room, and even bathroom, Phoebe could address a verbal request to the palace staff and hidden microphones would convey it. Requests that couldn't be granted in two minutes would result in a knock on the door from an apologetic page with an estimate of the wait even if it was only a few minutes longer.

Somehow it was even more oppressive and smothering than her memories of childhood and adolescence on the Hyperio family estate. Her windows opened onto the Autumn Courtyard, its trees and shrubs picked for the vibrancy of their seasonal colouring; under the day's crisp, chill sun, it was almost holographic, an endless wave of orange and yellow. Difficult to look at for long.

On the other hand, it was a place where only riders, their guests, and palace staff were allowed. There was a kind of privacy in that, with the benches nestled into the foliage to break up sight-lines and enough leaf around that there was a constant rustling white noise to mute quiet voices. So despite the cold it was the courtyard that she led Thessaly to when the mermaid had finished moving in to her own suite in the Royal Wing.

After the breathless terror of knocking on Thessaly’s door, the awkward, stiff moment of an uncertain greeting – hug? Kiss on the cheek? The aristocratic bow and kiss to the back of the fingers that matched the setting? Ultimately Phoebe had settled for none of the above – they hadn't said much as they walked the halls.

Old instincts had already picked out for Phoebe the corner of the courtyard that offered most shelter from her competitors' windows. The thickness of the autumn foliage gave the arbour the odd but welcome feeling of a blanket fort, muting the daylight and the breeze. Reflexively, Phoebe took Thessaly’s hand and gently moved her to sit first, then suppressed a rueful inward chuckle at that particular resurgence of her etiquette training.

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She had barely finished lowering herself onto the bench, neither too close nor too far from Thessaly – the correct distance for a suitor yet to obtain any formal consent is between two feet four inches and three feet depending on relative rank and which party, if either, owns the host estate – when the mermaid said, bluntly, "You look like shit."

For a moment Phoebe just stared at her. Then, as if someone had reached into the depths of her gut and flicked the switch on a long-sputtering engine, she burst into gales of cackling laughter. She bent double, fighting for balance on the edge of the bench, tears in her eyes. Thessaly tried to say something else and dissolved into bubbling giggles.

Phoebe turned to look up at her, half-raised a hand to wave away whatever worry she'd been trying to voice, and made a fraction of a second's eye contact. That wiped her out again. She managed to push her weight back on the seat, threw her head back and let out a noise that probably sounded more like a howl, maybe even a scream.

She came back wheezing, ribs sore, shoulders still shaking. Wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her indigo team-uniform shirt, the screen-printed sponsor logos slightly rough on her cheek, she faced Thessaly. "Thank you, I needed that." She nodded, slowly. "I needed you. That's not fair, is it?"

Thessaly broke eye contact, looked at the floor. "I don't mind."

With more force than she'd intended, Phoebe reached over and grabbed the mermaid's hand, holding it awkwardly with her palm over the back of Thessaly’s fingers. "No, I'm sorry. This all sucks. Hiding up in here and being afraid of what everyone thinks of me. I don't know what to do. All I know is how to race."

Thin, delicate fingers turned over under Phoebe’s, twined in between them. "It'll be different when the championship's over, right?"

"I don't know, Thessaly, I might be dead, they might just kill me. Or I might be in jail. Disowned. I've been trying not to think about it."

"Do you still love your parents?" Thessaly’s voice was so gentle Phoebe found she couldn't look at her. After Phoebe had been so selfish…

"I don't know that either." Phoebe screwed up her eyes. "I don't know why dad's doing this, I thought if I could just show him that I could really do it, that I deserved to be here, he'd back me again. He just hates me too much, I guess."

Thessaly switched hands, freeing her right to put on Phoebe’s shoulder, leaning closer. "I'm sorry, that really sucks."

Phoebe leaned over, pressing her head gently to the crown of Thessaly’s, feeling the angle tweak at her folded crownfeathers. "Yeah."

"I'll come and visit you," Thessaly said. "In prison, I mean."

"I don't want you to see me like that."

"Why not?" The mermaid's hand crept across Phoebe’s back, rippling electricity spreading from her fingertips. "I want to be with you. I don't care about that stuff."

"But your career, though…"

"Nah, it'll be fine. The gossip mags'll love it. There's no such thing as bad publicity, right?" Thessaly giggled, sliding up to press her body to Phoebe’s flank. "It's not like you actually did anything bad, right? Even if you broke some stupid rule."

Phoebe shifted, lifting her arm over the mermaid's head and then dropping it around her shoulders as she cuddled closer. "Maybe. If I can find a way to get the team out of this safely. It doesn't matter if they kill me, I guess, but Adelie and Petunia and the others- Ow!"

Thessaly had taken advantage of the embrace to jab her under the ribcage. Her voice held the same slightly playful sharpness. "I care if you die, idiot."