I grab a short dress from my closet, along with swim wear. I fold all the clothes I had already gotten out, and put them in my suitcase. I left the door connecting Xander's room to mine open as we talk to each other.
"What about this?"
I turn to look at the door were Xander stands with pants on his head and the same swim trunks on that he had already shown me.
"Very attractive Xan," I tease
He looks into his mirror, "Dame, I should be a model."
I pick up one of my night shirts and chuck it at him. He picks it up off the floor and throws it into his bag.
"Hey!" I call " I need that!"
"No, it's mine now," he says.
I run into the room trying to get it, he snatches it up and holds it above his head. I jump and try to take it.
"NO FAIR!!"
He laughs at me. I stand back and run to jump on him, I knock him down onto his bed. I sit on his chest, witch was bear, and take the shirt from him, and throw it back into my room. He turns us over so that he's over me.
"Why do you always take away my fun Ray," he whispers into my ear. He leans it and kisses me, then stands up leaving me laying on his bed in confusion. He zips up his suitcase and carries it ,as he does the same to mine.
"Are you coming Ray?"
"Uh. Yes," I snap back into reality.
"Come on," he says, "I'll take the bags."
I ran up to him and follow him into the carriage outside at the front of the castle. While I walk I hear the crunch of gravel as the rest follow us from behind. Xander, Erin, Leon, and myself get into the first carriage. Lillian, Colin, Grayson, and June get in the second. Before Jessie, Ashley, Linda, and Ace get in the third car my mother stops them.
"As director of events I'm in charge of eliminating couples, and I believe you four are ready. That carriage over there will bring you to your plane back home."
"Thank you for this opportunity your majesty," Linda says falling into a curtsy, and the others follow.
Collectively they all say, "your majesty," and with that they all leave in the direction of the carriage.
My mother gets into the third car, and we start moving. Xander wraps his arm around my shoulders and starts to talk.
"Are your guys ready to go swimming in some tropical water!"
"HELL YA!" Leon yells and Erin slaps him on the shoulder.
"If you stay this excited the whole trip your be paying for my hearing bills," she says to him.
"But you like me too much to make me sad," he says making a frown on his face.
"Do you what to test that theory?" She says back arms crossed.
I look at Xander and we both start to laugh uncontrollably.
"Hey, what's so funny!" Leon asks looking at Xander.
"It's just-" he starts laughing and tears form in his eye ,and he wipes them away, taking a deep breath, " The two of you are so cute."
"What?" They say in sink and look at each other, "Jinks!" They say.
"Anyways," Xander says looking over at me, " don't worry Ray I still think your the cutest."
I look away my face hot. Seriously is he playing the how many times can you embarrass Rayanna today challenge.
"You two are nice together," Erin comments.
My head shoots up from the floor to look at Erin with surprise on my face at her comment. When I see her looking at me I avert my eyes.
"Hmm," Xan hums, thinking something in his head then smiles.
"You really got a good catch," Leon says.
I put my face behind Xander to hide myself from them. I let out an annoyed moan loudly in protest. Great, I think, now they've all joined the embarrass Rayanna game.
"I don't think she agrees" Xan says.
"No shit sherlock!" I say removing my head from behind him to look at him, my face not as red.
We approach the gates and the huge stone doors open to the road, the noise was obviously unexpected because I heard someone yell from the carriage behind us, " WHAT WAS THAT?!"
They all continue the talk as we go down the mountains, as we descend I feel my ears pop. When we reach the bottom Erin says something to me and gets my attention, and I notice that she dictated to stand up instead of sit.
"Is the outside really more interesting than us?"
I blush and look away from the window and to Xander, who stopped his conversation at the question.
"Why are you standing?" I ask her back.
"Because we'll be sitting on that plane for a while, but you didn't answer my question Rayanna."
"Well," I start looking at Xander, and he nods.
"I-I rarely leave the castle, sometimes I sneak out but I don't go into the city, I've only really left out the gate three times."
They all look surprised.
"Thank my Dad for letting me out of the castle, if he didn't I wouldn't have ever left that maze of a house."
"If you were to be put on the street somewhere," Erin asks, " Would you be able to make your way back?"
I think about it for a minute and says, " I know some of the main streets like the square, but if it was night probably night."
"Why only at night?" Leon asks.
"You can see the castle from anywhere in the kingdom, but at night the castles lights are off so you can't see it," I say.
"Is this your-,"Erin says before we hit a rock that send our side of the carriage up.
I jump out of my seat, and Xan pulls me to him before I knock my head on the back wall. Erin wasn't so lucky, she ends up losing balance and landing on Leo, who grunts when she impacts. She is pretty much sitting on him now, she sits paralyzed with shock at what just happened.
"Are you falling for me now Erin?"
Erin comes back to reality at his pun, and gets off him and sits on our side of the carriage. Xander places me sideways so that I'm sitting on his legs, to make room for Erin to sit where I was before.
"No! I am not falling for you Leon Graysonova," she says face red.
" uh-huh," Leo says, " right.."
She mouths something at him that I can't see and he looks surprised, before I could elaborate on that thought, Xander started to break the silence.
" there should really be seatbelts in here, but it's not all bad I suppose," he says with a grin, and pulls me down with his arms to make me lean my head on him. I playfully slap his chest.
He gasps with jokingly sad voice and says, "why do you abuse me so Ray?"
I roll my eyes as I look at Erin who puts a hand in front of her mouth to hide her amusement.
We pull up to the plane around 15 yards away. A man in a reflective yellow shirt opens the door for us the leave. Before I could stand and make my way out, Xander stands picking me up and throws me over his shoulders like a sack of potatoes.
"Xander!" I yell hitting his back with my hands, " put me down!"
I struggle more, but it's no use he's strong. In the process of struggling the only thing I achieved was to turn around, so I could look behind him without straining my neck. I just hang my hair swaying to Xander's walking, I look at Erin who I can tell finds this all very funny.
"So Ray, how's your day?"
"You know," I answer crossing my arms, " I'm just hanging out."
Leon hears my joke, and starts laughing. Right as I think this couldn't get any worse I hear June start dying with laughter.
In between laughs she says to Lillian ,who is confused why she's laughing, "Look over there!" she says and points at us.
Not only does that get the attention of Lillian, but also my mother, greaaat. As we get to the top of the stairs, and almost into the door I wave at them expressionless.
We get into the plane, and Xander brings me to the boys side of the plane sitting down me straddled on him. I try to change the way I sit but he keeps me that way. Thank goodness that my mother doesn't sit back here, and has her own private quarters. The rest of the boys walk to the back of the plane, while he looks not fazed, I'm burying my burning face into his neck.
"If your going to force me to sit here can you at least move that," I point at his sword and he ties it to the hand rail.
"How was your trip?" Leon asks the boys.
"Well," Colin says " This one over here was getting a bit cheesy."
"At least I know if she's into me."
"Not now Grayson," he responds.
"Is there something your not telling us?" Xander asks.
"Oh, so you haven't told them huh," Grayson says.
I try to look at them, but Xan holds my face in his hands.
"What?" I whisper to him.
"I don't want you looking at other men." He purrs in my ear.
He pulls my head down and kisses me his breath minty, I blush hard red as I see the other girls look at us. I pull back.
"Do we have to do this now?" I ask him, " can you at least wait till we're alone?"
"I want them to know that your mine."
He leans in and kisses me again and I leaned into him, he's like some kind of wizard who can cast a spell to make me feel safe with him. He's spell may have made me feel like we were alone, but I know we weren't because I could hear the rest of them talking in his tones.
"Him and Lillian, they did a little thing on the camping trip," I hear Grayson say.
I then hear the ow of pain from Leon, like he'd been elbowed.
I then hear Colin add on, "she hasn't really talked to me much since then, I think she's busy with work."
"Pretty much," Grayson adds, " he's worried that he didn't," he stops and whispers something I can't hear.
I pull away from Xander and rest me head by his ear. He joins back into the conversation with the boys. I need to go talk to the girls, and it's clear he's not just going to let me go. I make my plan now to execute. I sink into his lap, I reach behind me, and take off my shoes. I slip my feet behind him. I make a noise that made his stiffen his posture, and move me with his hands to sit more on his right leg. I slip right back into my previous place, and rest my head in his neck. I kiss his neck softly, so it went unnoticed by everyone but him. I humm. I can feel him nervously sweat, Almost. I run my hands up into his hair and squeeze my legs.
"Excuse me boy," he stands up putting me on his chair, and heading towards the bathroom.
Bingo, I make my escape to my seat with all the girls around. I sit down and let out a breath. They all look at me.
"Oh, hey Ray," Erin greats.
"Did you really just do, what I thought you just did?" June asks shocked.
"I had to escape over here somehow," I defend.
"What happened?" Lillian asks, "I missed what happened I was talking to Erin."
That when I realize June was the only one they saw. I mentally sigh, I mean don't get me wrong it would have been better if none of them saw, but I can deal with only one. I glance over at June holding eye contact.
"It was nothing," I say.
"All she did was jump over a chair on her way over."
She lied to cover up. I place my hand beside my mouth to mouth at her, I would appreciate if this never happened. Forgotten she mouthed back and we continued to talk until we arrived at the airport. I stand up and run to the door and wait for it to open. I feel a hand on my hip and Xan leans down to my ear.
"Why did you do that to me Ray?"
"Pay back for carrying me like a bag of potatoes."
He laughs, the sound was like honey smooth and-. OMG Ray lisson to yourself calm down.
To be honest, my brain contains two versions of me, unfiltered one, and the opinionated one. Neither of which help a lot.
We walk down the stairs. I look down at each step as we distended until we hit the concrete. We have connections with the royal family of Cassadrus and they let us one of there beach side manors. It wasn't elaborate like our castle at home. It was more homely. While on our way maids made up the house while also making up three rooms, one at the front of the hose for mother, and two across from each other at the end of the house by the ocean. Each of the rooms had a balcony that overlooked the ocean, they all had a bath room with three sinks, two showers, and a stalled toilet. Each of the rooms had four beds maid up for all of us.
We got back to the new carriages waiting for us to arrive. This time my mother pulled me into her carriage, Xander protested to me telling me he wanted to stay with me. I took him with me.
"Why is he here?" My mother asks moshing to him.
"He's insisting on staying around me to keep me safe."
"This is something important for business in the family, that won't get an issue if he's planning to propose to you.
I stop for a second taken aback, after a moment I say, " I have theses ear plugs, that way he can see but not hear."
"Fine." She says before getting into her carriage.
I go and Xander follows, I hand him the ear plugs and he puts them in.
"I brought us on vacation for a reason," she expanse, " I'm planning to move troops away from the castle to assist."
"There under cover right?" I ask.
"Partly they have there pins on do that out allies can recognize them."
"Why are they going anyways?"
"To deliver weapons and resources."
"Couldn't we just send a truck,"
"They increased security it wouldn't make it through, it would look too suspicious."
"They are returning back to the castle when we do right?"
"Of course."
"If were going to continue I sujest we draft in new soldiers when we return."
"Good idea, that way we can have a home and traveling flet."
"Exactly."
"Now that you know let's talk about the price of supply runs."
After about an half hour of talking about advisors, price cuts, and the event, we make it to the manor. We pull up in the driveway and the maids come infront of the house. Two maids, each holding one dubble door, open the entrance. When we stop I fling the doors open and run out. Because of the shape of the building if you kept running straight, and push the doors on the other side of the house you were let out onto the sand. I run to the ocean and stand at the point my knees were wet, along with my dress. I lesson to the ocean, a wave hitting the one before it as it did so endlessly.
"Rayanna."
I turn and see Xander. He really needs to chill. I wave at him and he runs over.
"You act like I've never lived without you before."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"You need to calm down, it's not like I go anywhere dangerous. I can take care of myself Xan, I'm not a little girl. If you care this much promise me you'll look after yourself. If I need you to be my knight I'll ask."
He stays silent thinking over what I sayed, "..fine, I trust you, and I respect your wishes, but if I see someone hurts you I will not hesitate to step in. I know you don't what me to get hurt, but I'm not the only heir to my throne. You are however the only one to yours, I'm ready to give up my crown for you, for your life."
"I-" I start shocked at his clam, I rethink, "Your going to give up your crown?"
"Hey," I hear Graysons voice yell, "Xan come help with the bags."
"Ok!" He shouts back.
He looks at me, he don't say anything. He waits a second, then jogs back up to the house. I watch him as he goes, while I stay standing in the cool, clear, green and blue, ocean.