Chosen Bride of the Seven Dark Princes

"Candace is your wife. You three boys figure it out between yourselves."

"No Father," Dante spoke up. "Candace is wife to all seven of us. She is the Primary Avgo Female and she has chosen all seven of us as her husbands."

The Emperor squinted. "Since when?"

Dante sighed and began explaining to his father the situation with the fragmented Avgo shards and how they flew into each of the brothers\' chests.

The Emperor gasped and turned almost purple when Dante explained to him how they had to deliver the Avgo back to Candace in order for the Avgo gemstone to be whole again and for an heir to be born.

He also explained that all seven brothers wanted her as their wife, and what was more amazing was that she had consented to all seven of them--at the same time.

The more the Emperor listened, the wider his eyes grew.

"This is unprecedented. I\'ve never heard of the Avgo doing something like this before."

"Father, like it or not, this is the Avgo we\'re talking about."

"I don\'t care. I\'m not going to have all seven of my boys married to the same woman. That\'s not going to happen so get it out of your heads." He snarled.

"I\'m going to get ready and make a quick trip to Avalia and pick up my wife and daughter. You boys make the marriage arrangements and keep me updated with the details. Get Leo in on the fun because he needs to get his ducks in a row too."

He turned away, about to disconnect from the call, but then he turned back with one other tiny bombshell.

"Oh. One other thing. Byron. Get ready to welcome Valeria Marakesh. I\'ve already spoken to her father. She will be joining you at your palace to be your Royal Consort."

"What? Father—" Byron sputtered.

"And you too." He looked over at Dante. "The bird girl Bethany Dresden is going to be your Royal Consort."

Seeing Dante\'s horrified look, the Emperor waved a careless hand.

"Don\'t worry. I\'ll put her up in your royal palace down here on Erenveil if you don\'t want her joining you on your moon. I\'m fully aware that Candace Farrah is staying there with you currently."

"Within the next two weeks, we will be announcing all of these new changes, so you boys get yourselves ready. You\'re about to get new wives. Which reminds me, I have to talk to Leo about Olivia."

Muttering to himself, the Emperor ended the call, leaving the six princes staring at each other with horrified eyes.

What in hell had just happened? In one fell swoop, he had mandated marriages for most of his sons without consulting them at all.

Slate rubbed his head. "Am I the only one who he hasn\'t forced someone on?"

Dante gave him a world-weary look. "Not yet, but don\'t get too giddy. He\'ll most likely come stomping down on top of your head soon."

"Poor Leo." Byron sighed. "He\'s not gonna know what hit him."

Jared shook with visible anger. "How do we stop Father from doing this to us?"

Byron shook his head. "We can\'t. He\'s still the Emperor and we are all still just doing his bidding."

Dante tapped his nose in thought. "We may not be able to outright oppose him, but we could throw a lot of monkey wrenches into his plans…"

Suddenly, all the princes began to huddle around each other, whispering and chattering in low voices.

"What about…"

"Hmmm, another idea is…"

"Oh, and also…"

"Hahaha! That\'s perfect, but don\'t forget…"

"We can also do this…"

"Hmmm. Yes yes. That\'s perfect. I\'ll go take care of this detail…"

"And I\'ll do that…"

"Who\'s going to talk to Leo?"

"Me. I don\'t have much to do right now anyway."

"Okay. Make sure to tell him he has to do this other thing…"

As the afternoon melted into early evening, each brother left the meeting with very clear ideas as to what they needed to do.

Protecting their wife was the number one criteria. Everything else was just scattered confetti.

Suddenly, the synergy and excitement began to flow through the brothers, energizing them and wiping away their previous exhaustion.

They all signed off with assurances they would touch base back to Dante to update him on all the monkey wrenches that would be released.

Once Jared and Jason were done with the call, they left the cocktail lounge with big smiles on their faces. If Father thought they were going to just roll over and accept his dictates, he would be sadly mistaken.

Jared tapped on Jason\'s shoulder. "You need to go check on Tiny Dancer. See if she\'s okay."

They both began heading in the direction of Candace\'s suite of rooms.

"But you\'re worried about her too." Jason responded.

"I know but this isn\'t my week."

Jason looked at Jared. "It\'s okay. You\'ll get her next week."

"Yes."

"Does that mean I won\'t get to see her for the entirety of next week?" Jason mumbled with sad eyes.

"Man, your week just barely started and you\'re already looking forward to being sad about next week?" Jared scowled.

"Well, you know I miss her. I miss her all the time now." Jason mewled.

"I know how you feel. One week out of seven is like a week in heaven and six weeks in hell." Jared sighed.

Jason huffed dramatically. "Aarrrghhh! The way she\'s got it set up, nobody gets too much heaven and everybody\'s got too much hell."

Jared\'s lips twitched. "You and I have back-to-back weeks. Maybe we can…"

Jason bit his lip as he pondered Jared\'s idea. "Do you think she\'ll let us combine the two weeks so we both get to spend two weeks with her, instead of one each?"

Jared scratched his head. "I don\'t know. Would both of us in the same week be overwhelming for her?"

"We\'re twins." Jason bared his teeth in a wicked grin. "We could maybe do that twin-switcharoo we sometimes do…"

They looked at each other for a moment. But then they shook their heads and kept walking down the hallway.

"That\'s not gonna work, Jay." Jared shook his head. "Our wife can tell the difference between us. We\'re like night and day to her."

"Yeah you\'re right. Even with the lights out, she can tell us apart." Jason muttered darkly. "How is she able to do that though? We\'re identical twins. We sound alike, look alike, we even have the same mannerisms."

"It\'s because she loves us individually, Brother." Jared sighed. "She doesn\'t just use the same love and spread it over the both of us at the same time."

"Yeah. I actually get that too. It\'s an equal but different love. It\'s not a one-size-fits-all kind of love."

"Maybe we smell differently?" Jared threw out.

"How? We both use the same J&J men\'s aftershave and cologne." Jason rolled his eyes.

"Then let\'s just approach her together. See if she\'ll accept us both."

"Oh, you mean like…" Jason made a hand gesture that looked suspiciously vague, but Jared understood all the same.

"Yeah."

Their conversation ended as they came to the door of Candace\'s suite.

"Well." Jason shrugged.. "Here goes."