Rime watched as the woman slowly made her way over to them and his first instinct was to pull Cyra in his lap. The sound of the woman's gold heels hitting the floor could be heard echoing through the auditorium and it drew the attention of everyone that was in the room including a few teachers. "Burne don't you dare take another step, this must be some sort of joke!" she screeched again and Cyra whined at the sound.

Burne looked at the woman and sighed "Mother it is okay, if this is how the names are then that is how we must sit."

Everyone could hear the pleading tone in his voice but his apparent mother who looked very young for her age was having none of it. "No it is not okay and I don't know who this rat thinks he is going to fool by switching the name, but no way in hell is a child who hardly showed up in school be able to top my child and my future daughter in law." Idina didn't look pleased or impressed that she was pulled into the situation and Burne looked at her apologetically receiving a raised eyebrow as his reply.

"Mother you need to stop, you're making an unnecessary scene, Idina and I were with him when he came into the room and he was as puzzled as we were mother so there is no way he did such a thing as switching the names around."

His mother scowled at him "he is a rat that should have never got into this Academy so of course he would be good at pretending along with that little pest that's always following him around." Idina's eyes widened and Rime shot to his feet putting Cyra down so he could pull her behind him. The woman folded her hands over her chest "What are you going to do, you have no right to be mad at me for stating the undeniable truth, you and your sister are nothing but blood sucking leeches who are only in this school because of your connections!"

"Mother that is enough!" Burne yelled stepping up to grab her hand which she then yanked away.

"No it is not, I heard his mother died, maybe he killed her just to make people feel sorry for him so he would be able to get in the school.!"

A loud wave of gasp echoed through the room, followed by the sound of small cries and that was all it took for Rime to lunge forward in a fit of anger and grab the woman by her throat. Everyone was shocked even the woman, her eyes widened and she tried to pull Rimes hands from her throat but they weren't budging. Idina ignored the situation and went to grab Cyra up to try and calm her down as Burne grabbed Rime and tried to pull him away from his mother to no avail.

All Rime could see was red as tears flowed down his face "How could you say that?!" he screamed loudly knocking everyone out of their stupor, the teachers ran to him to try and help tear him away from the woman. "You don't know what happened, you weren't there, we had to watch our mother die and no one cared, no one helped us!" He continued to let out the painful screams as the teachers were finally able to tear him away from the woman.

The woman dropped to her knees gasping for air as she grabbed at her neck, while her son ran to her side and tried to help her. Two of the male teachers fought to keep Rime in their grasp as he tried to get back to the woman "everyone acts as if they know us, as if they understand us, when all they want to do is use us!" He stopped fighting and dropped to his knees to the relief of the teachers "Where were they when our mother was dying, where were they when we needed help, no one cared and they still don't."

He broke into a loud fit of sobs as he leaned over, his cries joining Cyra's as she screamed her lungs out. Someone walked in the room and the sound of a staff hitting the ground could be heard, everyone turned to watch the person and then parted so they could make their way over to where Rime and the woman was. The woman was the first to see the person and quickly got to her feet using her son as support.

"Oh grandmother, that thing there tried to kill me, he tried to kill a member of the Royal family he should be punished-" the woman's ranting was cut off when the sound of a slap echoed through the room.

The woman's eyes widened in shock and she held her cheek as Burne pulled her into him and caste an angry look at the person that slapped his mother. "Don't you give me such a look child, I was watching and I saw the whole thing, if I was here I would have strangled her myself!" The comment made another round of gasp echo through the room and the speaker shook her head "I am disappointed at every adult in this room, how could you claim yourselves to be these children's protectors and do nothing when one of them needed you to?"

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

"That woman crossed an unforgivable line when she claims herself to be a mother as she said such unspeakable things to another child and you all just stand there and encourage her just because she is of Royal blood. For shame all of you, for shame." The person caste a disgusted look at everyone and they all pulled back as if she had struck them "Being Royalty does not give you an excuse to be a pig and not even the Emperor himself should be allowed to act in such a manner."

She gave them one last look before going over to Rime and stooping down next to him placing a hand on his back "Look to me Rime, I promised I would be here, I'm sorry I'm late." Rime looked up and another sob broke free as he shot forward wrapping himself around the woman who massaged his back, Cyra looked and saw the woman and ran over to her throwing herself around her. "Shoo my children it will be okay, I will make the pain go away and this day as it should have truly been."

She placed a kiss on each of their heads and Rime and Cyra fell into sleep, she placed them down and stood causing everyone to look at them in shock, before they looked up at the woman who no longer wore a smile. "Let tomorrow be as today, let the light shine bright, happiness be found and let evil remain in its dwelling place." As she said the last line she looked at Burne's mother and then she slammed her staff on the ground three times knocking everyone out.

^^

Rime and Cyra woke up and prepared for the day, they wished the woman good day and headed out the castle. They made it to the gathering of people and bumped into Burne and Idina who gave them the good news before they decided to head inside. They were surprised when they found their seats but decided, to just sit and Burne and Idina told them all the things that happened while they weren't present until the Dean made his way onto the stage.

The Mage wasn't far behind him, followed by the minister of Education, Minister of Defense, the Lycan and the Teachers of the Royal Academy. They all stood in front of their chairs and watched as everyone piled into the auditorium before the Dean cleared his throat and began his speech. Soon he stepped back and the Arch Mage took his place to make his speech, he stepped aside and the minister of Education took his place and began calling out names, deciding to call Rime and Cyra up as one.

They went up and collected their many Degrees, badges and awards for topping the whole academy, when they were finished they went back to take their seats allowing Idina to go up. She was soon followed by Burne and one by one the other graduating students made their way up, soon all the children had gone up and a few more speeches were made before the ceremony was brought to an end. Rime and Cyra had ruble lifting all their things as the other students servants came to collect there's.

But Rime jumped as he felt another chain appear around his neck and looked to see it was black with a red box like gem attached to it and a similar ring appeared on Cyra's finger. Rime arched his brow and watched as the tiny box opened and everything he was holding vanished into the chain, Cyra's ring did the same thing before they both shut and Rime and Cyra were left a bit dumbfounded but just brushed it off and headed out the Auditorium behind everyone.

"So what do you want to do now?" Rime asked Cyra as he looked down at her with a smile.

"Can we go to the fair, there's this giant round thing that takes you around and around, I just wanna sit on that for a bit." She spoke softly and looked up at Rime returning his smile.

He nodded and they decided to walk stopping to buy a few sweets and pickled treats for him and Cyra, when they finally reached the fair was in full swing. Rime could see children Cyra's age running around the grounds with their friends, laughing and screaming, he could see them being hugged by their parents as things were bought for them and he couldn't help but feel apologetic to his sister. Everything that she could have had was taken away because of him and now all he wanted to do was give her everything back, he was in debt to her and he would spend the rest of his life paying the debt back.

Cyra was unaware of the thoughts that raced around her brother's head as she pulled him along into the fairgrounds and headed straight for the ferris wheel. When they reached there was only a short line and Cyra looked so pleases as she rocked back and forth on her heels. Some time had passed but soon they were getting on the ferris wheel and it was going up into the sky, Cyra took out some of her sweets and ate as she watched up at the sky.

They went on three times before Cyra wanted to switch to the merry go around, when it was their turn Rime sat her on a horse and stood next to it as the ride begun and the horse started going up and down making Cyra giggle. They went on several more rides and then played some games, Rime managing to win Cyra three teddies that were bigger than her. One of them was a long dragon that she wrapped around herself for the rest of the night.

When it was time for the to go Rim decided it might be too dangerous to walk home so he jumped them to outside the school gates and they were let in quickly. They went to the house and the woman opened the door for them, congratulating them before she lead them to the roof so they could sit under the stars as she explained the chain and ring they had apparently gotten from the Arch Mage. Cyra was all too excited to get her things out and set them up in their room before she prepared for bed and went to sleep surrounded by the toys that Rime had both won and bought for her.