...*....*.....*
The Royal Palace was reeling. If the birth of three children in a single lunar cycle wasn't enough to strain the sanity of the staff, the sheer atmospheric pressure of having the "Serpent" and the "Tiger" in a state of sleep deprived domesticity was enough to make the sturdiest guards tremble.
The morning began with a deceptive, heavy stillness. The sun had barely crested the eastern spires, casting long, golden shadows across the nursery. Dr. Haelen, the Imperial Physician, looked like a ghost of himself. He had spent forty eight hours straight navigating the complexities of superfetation and dual births. He was pale, his hands were shaking, and he was suffering from a rhythmic, hacking cough that suggested a severe case of palace flu.
In his haste to finalize the birth certificates and return to his quarters to collapse, he had performed a final, perfunctory check on the newborns.
"Princess myra is healthy," he had wheezed, marking the parchment with a trembling quill. "A bit smaller than her brother, jun, but steady. Now, if you'll excuse me, I must... sanitize."
He had vanished before Arion or Kyon could ask a single follow up question.
*
*
*
An hour later, the room was a hive of quiet activity. Kyon was in the parlor, desperately trying to finalize a trade agreement with the Western lords while rocking a fussy Celine. Arion was draped across a chaise lounge, his eyes closed, finally catching a moment of rest.
Aiden, however, was on a mission.
At five years old, Aiden took his role as "Big Brother" with the intensity of a high ranking general. He had watched the nurses change the swaddling clothes, and he was curious. He approached the double crib where "jun" and "Myra " lay.
"Lorcan, come look," Aiden whispered, beckoning the Southern Prince over.
Lorcan, who was now seven and currently trying to find a way to make his Southern robes look "royal but relaxed," walked over. "Aiden, the babies are sleeping. Don't touch them or the King will use his 'stern voice.'"
"I just want to see if Myra is as pretty as you said," Aiden murmured. He carefully peeled back the edge of the silk swaddling on the smaller twin.
He stared. He blinked. He looked at jun, then back at Myra.
"Lorcan," Aiden said, his voice rising in confusion. "Myra….myra doesn't look like Celine."
"She's a baby, Aiden. They all look like wrinkled potatoes," Lorcan sighed, leaning over to see. He froze. He looked closer, his emerald eyes widening. "Wait. That's... that's not a Princess."
Aiden didn't wait for another second. He scrambled off the rug and sprinted into the parlor, nearly tripping over a stray wooden toy.
"PAPA! THE SERPENT KING! STOP!"
Arion bolted upright, his hand instinctively reaching for a sword that wasn't there. Kyon nearly dropped his pen, Celine letting out a startled squeak in his arms.
"Aiden? What's wrong?" Arion asked, his heart hammering. "Is it the guards? An assassin?"
"No!" Aiden shouted, pointing frantically back at the nursery. "The doctor is a dummy! Myra isn't a girl! He's a boy! He's just like me andJun !"
*
*
*
The chaos that ensued was immediate. Arion and Kyon hurried into the nursery, where Lorcan was standing over the crib with a look of immense scholarly interest.
A quick check confirmed the truth. The exhausted, flu-ridden Dr. Haelen had completely misidentified the second twin in his haste.
"A boy," Kyon whispered, a mixture of disbelief and hysterical laughter bubbling in his chest. "Another Alpha... Arion, we have three sons and one daughter. The lineage is...well, it's certainly stable."
Arion looked at the twins. "Jun " and "Myra ." The names no longer fit the reality of the nursery. He looked at the larger twin, who was already trying to kick his way out of his blankets, and then at the smaller, surprisingly quiet boy who had been mistaken for a princess.
"We're changing the names," Arion decided, his Northern authority returning. "I'm not calling him Myra for the rest of his life."
Kyon nodded, wiping a tear of laughter from his eye. "Agreed. What do you suggest, my Tiger?"
Arion picked up the larger twin. "This one... he's got the strength of the East and the fire of the North. We'll call him Kenzo. It means 'strong and healthy.' It suits a boy who tried to hide his brother from the doctors."
He then looked at the smaller boy, the one with the amber gold eyes that seemed to be watching the room with a calm, observant wisdom.
"And this one," Arion murmured. "He's handsome, and he's a survivor. We'll name him Calix. It's an old name from the mountain peaks. It means 'most beautiful.'"
"Kenzo and Calix," Kyon repeated, the names tasting right on his tongue. "And Princess Celine. The triad of the late pulse."
*
*
The domestic peace was shattered by a piercing, shrill scream from the hallway.
A maid had been delivering a fresh tray of medicinal tonics to Dr. Haelen's office. She had found the Imperial Physician not in his bed, but face-down in a bowl of cold soup, his skin a terrifying shade of grey.
"HELP! THE DOCTOR! HE'S DEAD!" she wailed, her voice echoing through the stone corridors.
Guards scrambled. Nurses panicked. Kyon had to hand Celine to Arion and rush out to manage the hysteria. It turned out Haelen wasn't dead, but he had fainted from a combination of the flu, exhaustion, and the sheer terror of realizing he had misgendered a Royal Heir. When he was finally revived by his assistants, he began to sob hysterically, babbling about "Serpents with too many heads" and begging for early retirement.
The rest of the day was a blur of correcting official documents, calming the maid, and trying to explain to the Southern Delegation why their "Princess" was now a "Prince."
*
*
*
As the sun began to set on the most chaotic day in palace history, Arion found Lorcan standing on the balcony, looking out toward the southern horizon. The young Omega prince looked unusually somber.
"Lorcan?" Arion approached, placing a hand on the boy's shoulder. "You've been a great help today. Aiden would have been lost without you."
Lorcan looked up, his strawberry scent tinged with a hint of bittersweet saltiness. "My father sent a message this morning, Lord Arion. The Southern Isles are calling the delegation back. The trade treaties are signed. I have to go home."
Arion felt a pang of genuine loss. Lorcan wasn't Aiden's brother by blood, but he had become the emotional glue of the nursery. "When?"
"Tomorrow at dawn," Lorcan whispered. "I don't want to tell Aiden. He's finally happy about the babies. If I leave, he'll think the shadows are coming back and that I'm abandoning him."
"Aiden is stronger than you think," Arion said. "And the Southern Isles aren't that far. We'll make sure you visit. Often."
Lorcan turned and threw his arms around Arion's waist, a rare display of unpolished emotion. "Thank you for letting me be a 'First Shield, Arion. I'll come back for them. I'll come back for all of them."
Arion held the young prince, looking back into the room where Kyon was attempting to soothe Kenzo and Calix while Aiden "supervised" the process. The day had been a whirlwind of mistakes, screams, and renaming, but as the night fell, the bond between the North, the East, and the South felt more tangible than ever.
The time was passing. The babies would grow, the King would heal, and the Consort would find his peace. But for tonight, they were just a family, exhausted and imperfect, in a palace that had finally found its heart…
Without knowing who was the one ,who had sent kyon the emplacement of Arion back then…. Unknown is still to come.