She hesitated. “It is JingYi, Your Highness.”
To her surprise, the princess beamed. “Néi shi Xûen-rén, anh? Shà gan ruan xin jiàn nì,” she said warmly, fluently, in a voice threaded with sunlight.
The familiar syllables washed over her like a warm tide. She hadn’t heard her mother tongue spoken with kindness since she’d left Wu Ma and Feng. For a heartbeat, it wasn’t a princess sitting before her, but a piece of her childhood world.
She blinked, her smile softening from politeness into something genuine and wistful.
“The princess speaks Xûengua beautifully.” She touched her chest and dipped into a small curtsy. “Yes, I am Xûen. It is an honour to meet you, too, Your Highness.”
The prince reached for his wife’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Xûen people hold a special place in my wife’s heart. They showed her kindness when she needed it most.”
At that, the couple shared a look—warm, private, the kind forged by battles survived and loyalties earned, the kind that held the hush of something sacred.
Then, the door burst open.
“Reiya!”
A man swept in with the wind—not as tall as the first but just as striking, sun-kissed in every way. His unbuttoned navy riding coat flared behind him, and his pale gold hair was tousled from the sea breeze. He moved with confidence, as though the room had been built solely so thathecould occupy it.
JingYi flinched, instinct drawing her closer to the shadowed shelves. The air changed with him. Warmth. Charisma. An Alpha’s presence—undeniable, magnetic. Not threatening yet, but it singed, like standing too close to sunlight.
“Kaelen,” the princess said, both fond and exasperated. “You haven’t made a scene outside, have you?”
He crossed the room in three long strides, unbothered by the space, and took the princess’s hand with a flourish, pressing kisses to her knuckles.
“You vanished from the spot where I asked you to wait,” he said, voice low but edged with panic. His gaze dipped to herbelly. “Then the vendors said you’d collapsed. What exactly did you expect me to do?”
“Remain calm,” came the drier voice. The dark-haired prince, pouring more water into the princess’s cup, didn’t glance up. “If it had been a true emergency, panic wouldn’t help. And since it wasn’t, you’ve only succeeded in looking foolish.”
The blond prince shot him a glance. “Ah, but Iamfoolish. Especially where she’s concerned.”
The princess gave a small laugh, brushing her fingers over his. Her affection for him was obvious, but what caught JingYi off guard was the glances she shared withbothmen.
“Honestly,” Reiyana said with a sigh, “between the two of you, I hoped at least one would choose sanity over dramatics.”
“Dramatics? Me?” The golden prince placed a hand to his chest. “Never. You married me for my composure under pressure, and perhaps a few other virtues you’ve yet to admit aloud.”
The princess rolled her eyes, though laughter slipped past her lips regardless.
The three of them stood close, shoulder to shoulder, orbiting each other with ease. When one Alpha reached to steady the princess with a hand at the small of her back, the other didn’t bristle. When one kissed her temple, the other smiled, soft and unguarded, as if her comfort was the only concern, no matter whose hand offered it.
JingYi watched, unsure what she was witnessing. It certainly wasn’t a love triangle. There was no tension, no resentment. Only familiarity. Shared love.
The dark-haired prince straightened, turning to her, but addressing the other man.
“Brother,” he said, “meet the healer who helped our wife. Healer, meet the princess’s other husband.”
JingYi blinked. Brother?Otherhusband?
She opened her mouth. Closed it again. An astonished, unsteady curtsy was all she could manage. Her thoughts scattered. In Xûen, such a thing would be unthinkable. She would be facing exile or execution. The idea of two Alphas sharing an Omega—of doing so with tenderness, without rivalry—was so foreign it barely made sense.
Yet the proof lay before her.
And it didn’t feel wrong.
It felt . . .wholesome. Unusual, yes, but the strangeness didn’t alter the beauty of it. Besides, why shouldn’t the princess have two husbands, when her father had thirty-six wives?
She bowed to the princes. “Would Your Highnesses like me to show you how to ease the princess’s discomfort, should her symptoms return?”
