"Father, she is my bride. I don't care about the Crown Prince position, but I do care about her. If I have to fight to win her hand, I will throw everything I have into that fight."
The Emperor sighed. He did not want to mention it, but the truth was that Dante was a top notch CEO. As far as making and growing wealth, he was the absolute best in the galaxy.
Unfortunately, that very same reason which made him such a good CEO also caused him to act like a dictator when he wielded the throne. He ran the empire like it was a business, and it just couldn't be run in that manner for so many reasons.
On the other hand, the son that Emperor Rex had thought would never be able to do much other than entertain people, his movie star son Lucas, had far more charisma than even Byron did.
Lucas could sway people's hearts and minds as easily as turning his beautiful face to the visual cameras and giving them that winsome smile of his.
He was actually the perfect choice to be the future Emperor IF he could have the full support of all his brothers.
"It will be a losing battle son. The entire galaxy is cheering on for Lucas as the new Crown Prince. He's a well-known star, someone they love and fully support."
"If you try to reclaim the Crown Prince title, the entire galaxy will think you've pulled something dirty and they will object."
The Emperor sighed.
"Think about all your successful enterprises and business conglomerations. Your wealth is staggering. Don't get dragged into something that will cause you to become an outcast and damage your business brands."
"But she is my wife!"
"You are the richest man alive. You can have any woman in the Galaxy! Take another wife. In fact, take a hundred wives! With my blessing even!"
"But I only love her, Father. Would you abandon my mother to take on a hundred other women?"
The Emperor sighed and shook his head.
Being Emperor meant he had to take on many political wives, but the woman who had taken his heart had always been the butterfly Anastasia. If he had the choice, he would be ecstatic with just the one woman who was Dante's mother.
"Understand, Son. You are not just a bat. You are also a butterfly. The Insectoids were rooting for you during the time you were Crown Prince, but the Avians began staging battles and takeovers across the Galaxy."
The Emperor rubbed his forehead as a pounding headache began to erupt. He needed to lay it out straight for Dante.
"They have this knee-jerk reaction against bugs of all sorts. To the birds, insects are the lowest of the lowest life forms and therefore are below their caste."
The Emperor pointed at Dante.
"To them, you are nothing more than a bug in a bat costume. To have a bug blatantly take over as Emperor of the galaxy is something so abhorrent to the Avians that they would rather destroy you by any means possible than to allow what should have been yours by rights of succession to happen."
He gave Dante a dour face.
"With you as Crown Prince, there will be endless wars, not because of anything you did but because of who you are. You will never know a moment of peace. Do you want your wife and children to be living in a state of constant war?"
Dante's eyes grew fierce. "We can't just let the Avians bully and push everyone around!"
"And that is why I've been sending Slate out to quell all the fires that have been flaring up here and there. But just because we have enough forces to maintain a semblance of peace doesn't mean they aren't going to keep trying to subjugate the bugs."
The Emperor turned to the twins. "Jason. Jared. The Avians even convinced your mother's people, the merfolk from Emporia, to join in with their schemes."
Jason scowled. "We know. It was our aunt who betrayed us at the Avgo Event."
The Emperor gasped. "Which of Mortimer Cordera's wives dared to do that?"
"Beatrice, Helene's mother." Jared responded. "She insisted on meeting us that morning of the Avgo Event saying that it was life or death, so Jason and I agreed to see her."
Jason shook his head.
"She took a small entourage of troops with her, which was strange, but we didn't say much. After all, she is our mother's sister-in-law."
"And they ambushed you two?" The Emperor's face began to darken.
Jared nodded. "She wanted one of us to choose Helene Cordera as a bride, because she is one of the Avgo contestants, and she knew that none of our other brothers would choose Helene."
"Hmmmph!!!" The Emperor harrumphed. "The nerve of that woman!"
He held up a finger. "First of all, that girl is your first cousin. It would be considered incest by the laws of Erenveil."
He held up a second finger. "Secondly, I have already told you all not to choose the fish girl. You can marry any female or mermaid you wish, just not Helene."
"Of course, we understood that, Father." Jared gritted his teeth. "We refused, and once we did, we were overwhelmed by her guards."
The Emperor nodded. Perhaps it was time to clean house on Emporia.
Dante leaned back against the seat. He had heard enough from all sides to know what had to be done.
"I am not going to allow the Avians to bully us any longer. I will be putting into place, the next phase of my plans."
The Emperor sighed.
That was exactly what Slate had said before he disconnected with his youngest son. Since his boys tended to collaborate on most things, he could only assume that the 'next phase of their plans' was one that they had worked on together.
Now that is oldest son was saying the same thing, all he could do was sit back and cheer them on.
=============
Within the hour, Dante had made the space hyper jump, taking them back into Erenveil space.
The other Princes and Candace had boarded the Raptor 600 warship and was waiting for them near the portal. Once Dante's transport pod arrived, the warship's hatch opened up to receive them.
"Wow. Your pod looks like it's ready to be junked." Slate joked as he looked at the visual of the ancient craft with the happy yellow face painted on the side as it flew into the hangar.
"I'm lucky I even got something to leave pirate space with." Dante responded with cheer. "Anything fancier would have been attacked and taken away with me and the twins still inside."
"Welcome back, Brothers." Slate said as he jumped off his command chair and made his way to the hangar to greet them personally.
Within minutes, Dante and the twins had joined the rest of the brothers and Candace up in the command deck.
Dante strode through and went straight for Candace, picking her up from her seat and crushing her into his arms.
'Oh my sweet Darling. I've missed you so much.' He spoke into her mind.
It had only been a little over twelve hours since they'd been apart, but it seemed like forever. And now that she would be someone else's bride, at least on paper, it seemed that he would lose her forever.
His heart ached so much. That old familiar rage was back full blast. He could feel his fangs begin itching to grow again
The unfairness and injustice of not being allowed to become the Crown Prince because he was part insectoid, the utter humiliation of fighting for and attaining the Crown Prince title only to have it revoked within a week's time.
It was almost more than he could bear.
But Candace was there, rubbing his back with her strong thin arms, making soft cooing sounds inside his mind.
'Sweetheart, you're doing an amazing job and I am very proud to be with you.' She continued to soothe his ragged weary heart.
'Everything is going to be alright. I am right here and not going anywhere. You have to trust that everything is going to work out, Dante, and that you're not alone. Just trust in me and your brothers. We won't let you down."
She was driving away his fears and rage, one demon at a time.
As Dante allowed her voice to sink into his soul, he began to let go of his anger and shame.
She didn't think he was less of a man even though everyone else in the galaxy thought he wasn't good enough to be Crown Prince. In her eyes, he was worthy enough to be with her.
That was all that mattered to Dante.