Team Changes by Erin R Flynn

1

The dreams started the day I announced to the settlement in Texas we weren’t human. There had been non-humans in the group, and one had become the new snitch to run back to his old coven he had fled from to give information. It hadn’t worked well for the guy from Princess Safie of house Darbandi’s coven, but that was totally separate.

Because this guy had run from Princess Bahati’s coven.

I saw him get through the door by saying he had news on Cerdic. Aether showed me Bahati’s delight to learn I’d outed us to humans as there was some old rule against that. She thought it possible leverage, but also that situation would add a lot to my plate and keep me distracted.

She definitely wasn’t wrong there.

But the worst part of the dream was seeing her walk into a room that was clearly a war room and focus on a large map of North America that was marked up, my coven the focus. She went right up to Ceawlin—Cerdic’s evil twin that had crashed our wedding—and slapped him across the face.

While he was chained to the wall.

She chewed on him for not giving her the information but then “rewarded” him by drinking from him when he convinced her he hadn’t known that. It was true that the plan hadn’t been to out us to the humans… But the point was to show me Bahati could sense when people were lying.

Shit. That made her a tougher adversary, and clearly, we were going to be when I saw everything she had laid out with information on me. She ordered people where to spy and check things out.

Fuck.

I woke with the sense of dread, flinching when it was Cerdic lying next to me asking me if I was okay.

No, but there was no way I would tell him I was dreaming of his twin. It wasn’t like that, but he validly didn’t see rationally when it came to Ceawlin. Especially in relation to me.

So I told him it was a bad dream and that was all.

But the dreams kept coming.

The next night, I saw the original conversation Ceawlin had with Bahati once they reached her coven. I was floored by how much he kept from her. He skirted a bit too close and when she busted him, he fell back on sighing and saying he didn’t see the event and wasn’t sure he bought it. A lot of jealousy and confusion of extra people showing up clouded too much.

It was true, and she accepted it mostly. I didn’t know how it had gone from that to him being locked up after she’d made him swear she was more beautiful than I was and he did.

But it was a lie. She was furious at that, and I watched an abbreviated version of his severe beating.

She finally stopped when he told her it was because of how I treated my nobles and his jealousy of Cerdic. Part of that was a lie.

And she assumed it was the first part as no princess was so good to her nobles, and he was trying to trick her into treating him better. She loved games and approved of him being sneaky if it came from his greed.

It was written all over his face that she got it wrong, but she’d ignored him by then, focused on her plans to take over my coven.

And Cerdic when she killed me.

Double fuck.

Ceawlin bitched that she’d promised him she would never be with Cerdic and she only loved him. I honestly felt horrible for Ceawlin—no matter how much I hated him—when she simply replied she’d lied. She laughed in his face saying nobles couldn’t lie to their princesses, but they didn’t have such restraints. They always lied, and she had planned to have them both from the beginning.

That was the moment he started praying to Aether. I heard it as if he was speaking directly to me. He prayed for Cerdic never to fall into her hands because no matter his faults or flaws, he didn’t deserve to be Bahati’s plaything.

No one did.

The next night, I saw dozens of interactions between the twins but from Ceawlin’s perspective. I watched as Cerdic tripped Ceawlin in a competition. It seemed an accident, Ceawlin admitting as much to himself, but it was the reason Cerdic won, and while everyone praised him, he never even apologized for tripping Ceawlin. He simply soaked up the praise and victory.

And everyone ignored Ceawlin, not even checking if he was okay from the fall.

It sounded petty and not a big deal, but they couldn’t have even been ten years old. A lot could shape a person at that age. I sympathized with much of what I saw, but it still did not justify what Ceawlin had done. The punishment didn’t fit the crime and honestly, a lot of the problem was Cerdic’s easygoing nature, but also being too young to see or understand the ripples of what happened.

That was something that could have been overcome and handled better. I also saw his good heart, but from where Ceawlin sat, it seemed condescending at times. I could also see that. I had those doubts a lot too and that people were simply patting me on the head instead of loving me.

Another night of that and I knew I couldn’t forgive Ceawlin, but I could understand him. I would forever be on Cerdic’s side though.

I simply understood Ceawlin’s feelings more, I truly did.

The next dream made it clear I had a lot more to worry about besides his feelings though. He was vague on how the princess who had sent people after me had died. He was clearly trying to keep from her that I was Aether’s champion. He even prayed she wouldn’t find out because she would completely lose her mind.

And Ceawlin was smart in how he did it. Really smart.

Smart enough to figure out something big the rest of us hadn’t.

Bahati contacted one of her allies to find out what she knew, and I saw the conversation when they met up covertly. I recognized her as one of the bitches who had crashed our party. Sure enough, I heard it from her own lips that she did, lying that she’d had the dream the others had as an excuse to get accesss. She was careful in what she told Bahati too since she clearly planned to take me over as well.

So Bahati made a deal that she would take me over and remember the other princess in the spoils if she kept giving information. It was clear Bahati was more powerful and could take the other princess, which meant she was the best chance.

And she really wanted my nobles, so not to mess with that.

But Bahati was enraged by what she heard and that Ceawlin kept lots from her. She beat him until he was close to death.

Ceawlin only saved himself by being smart. He told Bahati it all sounded like bluster because if it was true—why hadn’t Safie gotten ill if she’d been plotting for weeks and weeks to have Vitor abduct me?

I woke from that dream in a panic for several reasons. Why hadn’t Safie gotten ill? Olivia had for pulling shit and trying to force me into being adopted. Safie had done the same.

So why hadn’t she gotten sick? Had she, and I couldn’t see it? I didn’t know what the signs were enough to tell if she’d been hiding it?

Is that why I’d won against her?

I got so lost in my head after that I couldn’t even hide from the others that something was going on. I tried. I brushed them off but then told them I was thinking of the situation with the princesses. That appeased them, but then they would tell me it was all fine, they would handle it.

But it seemed Aether wasn’t so sure of that if She was giving me these dreams. Hell, it got so bad that for a full week the whole time I slept, I basically saw recaps of all Bahati was plotting.

Until she reached such a low, I knew I had to act.

She wanted to get around being punished for sending people to kill me by riling up her whole coven to want to come after me themselves. The vampires who came after me weren’t killed… Only the princess. She’d believed Ceawlin’s bullshit theory that Aether was against princesses fighting given how many had died already and was punishing any that tried.

She fully believed it.

But she didn’t care. She wanted me gone and to take all that I had. At first, it was adopting me, but as she learned more and more of what I’d done, who supported me even, her jealousy burned so hot that she wanted to gut me so it was all hers.

She stopped caring that I was the way things had been fixed or turned back on.

Ceawlin was smart again and changed her mind that she wanted me to suffer before I died. That I could fix everything if I was locked up and they threatened Cerdic to force me do it, make him fall in love with Bahati again in front of my eyes.

He was buying us time if I did get caught. His prayers to Aether said so.

But the reason I knew I had to act was Bahati planned to send two young vampires to spy on us, saying it was training and they needed to learn. That the whole coven had been too cut off and others were thriving, so it was time the young of the coven learned what they needed to and for now, go spy on our allies for training.

And then she was going to kill them. She planned to kill two teenage vampires and blame it on us to incite her coven to come after me, bring me to her for justice and torture.

That was when I knew I had to act. I couldn’t let that happen or risk my coven.

I also couldn’t tell people I’d kept this from them and needed to fill them in because my husbands would be sure to go in first and take out the threat to me.

Except they would die. Aether was even sure of that, showing me visions of my being a shell of myself because my husbands were dead and I fell apart. It was how Bahati got me. I’d completely checked out, and she basically waltzed in and took over.

Which clearly was her backup plan if Aether gave me a dream of it.

So what the fuck was I to do? How did I handle this?

After debating a full day, I knew there was only one answer.

I had to sacrifice myself first.