Archive of Our Own

When the news that the Shroud family was holding their STYX Exposition Ball dropped, the announcement took the world by storm.

The speech where Director Shroud delivered the address with the date, time, and criteria for attendance, it was broadcast on every news station, posted on every news website, and blasted on social media. Cater couldn't have missed the announcement if he tried. And as soon as he saw it, he couldn't stop thinking about it.

The Prince of the Underworld was coming of age. The Shrouds weren't really royalty in an official capacity, but they might as well be. Without them, the Phantoms of the Underworld would run wild and no doubt destroy the world. For that reason, they were regarded as an authority by all of the governments of the world, and they certainly had the resources to back up their position.

The announcement had been made six months before the prince, Idia Shroud's, actual birthday, in order to give enough time for all potential attendees to prepare. The STYX Exposition Ball, or STYX Expo as it was more colloquially known, was a long-standing tradition of the Shroud family's. When the heir to the Underworld came of age, they were required to begin looking for a marriage partner. The Underworld would need a Watchman for as long as it existed, and thus the Shroud family bloodline must continue. Marriage was an obligation for the Prince of the Underworld, and the STYX Expo streamlined the process of finding a suitable mate.

The rules of the Expo were simple. Every eligible suitor who wanted a chance at earning the future Wachman's hand must submit a proposal for a technomantic project via an online portal. Each submission would be vetted by a team of researchers and security officers working for the STYX Institute, and if a suitor's submission was approved, they would be personally ferried to the STYX Convention Center along with their project and given space to demonstrate at the Expo. The future Watchman and their family would examine each entry presented at the Expo and then come to a decision about which attendee would best benefit the family.

Marrying into the Shroud family wasn't a choice that just anyone would make. It came with an impossible amount of responsibility, a burden to carry for the rest of your life, and a contract signing the lives of your children and grandchildren away to the Underworld forever. You would become one of the most powerful people in the entire world and have to lock yourself in some dark underground hellhole forever. It sounded more like becoming a prisoner than moving to the top of the world's social hierarchy, but… most of the time, Cater thought that anything would be better than living here.

Besides, the Prince of the Underworld was a major fucking hottie.

"D'you think Prince Idia would think I'm cute?" Cater asked, kicking his feet while lying on the couch in the living room and scrolling on his phone.

Didi snorted in response. "Doesn't matter whether or not he thinks you're cute If you're too dumb to get into the Expo."

Cater lowered his phone and shot her a glare. "And what exactly is that supposed to mean?"

AJ sighed. "C'mon, Cay-Cay, she didn't mean anything by it. She's just saying, only the smartest of the smart even get a chance to get near that guy," she said, then turned around from where she was sitting on the floor to pinch Cater's cheek. "So, sorry. Our cute baby brother doesn't stand a chance with Idia Shroud."

Cater growled in frustration. "You two seriously can't let me have anything, can you? So I've got a celebrity crush. Sue me. Can't a guy dream about marrying some tall dark and handsome prince and being whisked away from life as we know it?"

"Okay Y/N," Didi said, rolling her eyes. "Y'know I bet someone out there is writing some really good Idia Shroud RPF reader-inserts. That would make fantasizing a little easier, wouldn't it?"

"Oh, screw you, Dids," Cater snapped, sitting up on the couch. "Y'know, who says I couldn't come up with something to show off at the Expo? I am a smart guy! And unlike you two, I'm actually a mage!"

"Being a mage doesn't make you any less stupid, stupid!" Didi bit back.

"Ohhhh, I s2s if you two don't shut up right now I'm gonna bite you. This is so freaking stupid! It literally doesn't matter because none of it is real. Just let him have his little crush, Dids, seriously," AJ snapped at both of them.

Cater stood up from the couch and stormed towards the hallway that led to his room. "Y'know, maybe it's not just a crush. Maybe I really do wanna marry the Watchman and disappear forever, so I didn't have to deal with either of you ever again!"

"Aw, Cay-Cay, don't be like that," AJ said, but it didn't stop him from stomping down the hall and slamming his door shut, causing AJ and Didi both to flinch.

It was always like this. AJ and Didi both always thought they knew what was best for Cater, and what he was and wasn't capable of, and what was possible for him to achieve. Maybe going to the STYX Expo was a pipe dream, but Cater wasn't going to let that stop him. He was going to build something he could present at the expo and prove them both wrong. He already had a few ideas.

~*~

It took about three months for Cater to have enough of a project built to feel like he could submit the proposal to the STYX Institute. He'd been working nonstop, holing himself up in his room for days and weeks on end, pulling all-nighters and struggling to keep his eyes open during his college classes. It helped that he could use his Unique Magic to clone himself, giving himself ten times the brainpower and ten times the manpower to get things done. In fact, his Unique Magic was the inspiration for his project.

Cater was designing a technomantic device that could scan the DNA of the user and make magic copies of them. The technology of it was very rudimentary. Cater was a whiz with computers, but his sisters were right; he was no genius. So far he had only figured out how to produce technomantic holograms that were somewhat sentient, creating a sort of artificial intelligence from the brain, memory and feelings of the user. This was not going to be the most impressive display of technomantic invention at the Expo and it certainly wasn't going to be enough to turn the head of Idia Shroud, but with any luck, it would be enough to get Cater into the Expo, and that was all he really wanted.

Cater wasn't really going to win the attention—nor the hand—of Idia Shroud. He knew that. But simply presenting at the Expo would be enough to prove his sisters wrong. And, who knew? Maybe his invention would take him somewhere someday. Maybe he would find a new passion for technomantic research, maybe he could get a job or even just an internship with the STYX Institute even if he didn't marry the future Watchman. Maybe he would finally know what his purpose in life was.

It was days after he submitted his proposal before he got a response from STYX. His stomach was in knots the entire time, so anxious that he couldn't even think about working on his project any further until he got his answer. If they let him in, he was going to spend another three months isolating himself in his room to make the thing perfect. If they rejected him… he'd probably destroy the project and all evidence of it. He'd never want to think of it again.

Finally, though, he received both an email and a physical letter in the mail containing his acceptance to the Expo and a device with a holographic invitation programmed on it containing details on how he would be escorted when the time came. He had ripped the letter open at the mailbox, unable to wait even a single second longer to find out the answer. When he read it, he shrieked at the top of his lungs and ran into the house screaming and waving the letter around.

"I got in! I got in!" he shouted to his family. "I'm going to the STYX Expo!"

"Oh, Cater—! They did? You got your letter?" Cater's mother asked from where she was sitting at the dining room table.

"Look! It's right here! There's an official invite and everything—it has the Shroud family's seal!" Cater shouted, then slammed the letter and the invite down on the table in front of his mother and father.

"What!? There's no way," Didi said in disbelief, turning around and looking over the couch into the dining room.

"Well, I'll be damned…" Cater's father said incredulously as he examined the physical seal on the envelope as well as the digital insignia present on the holographic invitation. The invitation wouldn't show details for anyone who wasn't Cater.

AJ walked over to the table to examine the letter as well, eyes widened with surprise at her parents' reactions and needing to see the evidence up close. "Ho-lee Seven," she said after seeing the letter herself, "you actually did it. Way to go, li'l bro."

"You can't be serious," Didi said, now also coming over to the table to see this fabled invitation. "They actually let that grade-school science project into the STYX Expo!?"

Cater glared at her. "I told you I could do it. But you just can't be happy for me about anything, can you?"

"Hey, yeah, c'mon, Dids! This is amazing, I mean—our baby brother's going to present at the STYX Expo, he's gonna meet the Prince of the Underworld in person!! This is a once in a lifetime opportunity—holy Seven, we have to find him something to wear! Oh, Cay-Cay, we're gonna put together the cutest outfit for you, because you can totally be cute and smart, and now that you've got your foot in the door we have to make sure you catch his eye and—"

"Quit it, Aje, I don't want your help," Cater snapped. "I don't want help from either one of you, now or ever again. This is my project. I got into the Expo all on my own, and you two didn't believe I could do it. So I don't need your help deciding what to wear, and I don't care what you think about me going. I'm not gonna let you live vicariously through me this time. So save it, cuz I don't wanna hear it."

"Oh, quit being such a baby about it," Didi said. "You got in, so why does it matter if we thought you couldn't before? You proved us wrong. There. What else do you want?"

"I wanted my sisters to support me from the beginning. But you two only wanna help me when you get something out of it. Just leave me alone," Cater said, snatching the letter and the invite off the table and storming back off to his room, leaving his sisters distraught and his parents confused.

~*~

AJ knew that Cater had said he didn't want their help, but it was only because he was mad.

He had every right to be, of course. AJ and Didi shouldn't have teased him before, and they both should have been more supportive when he found out the news that he had been accepted. AJ wasn't above admitting her flaws. But she knew her baby brother better than anyone, and she knew when he was in desperate need of her help, even if he didn't want to ask for it.

The truth was, he probably didn't have anything that would be nice enough to wear to something as important as the STYX Expo. But AJ was a quick seamstress, and Didi had a better eye for accessories than anyone she knew. If the two of them worked together, they could make the perfect outfit for Cater. It would be so perfect that he wouldn't be able to refuse wearing it.

AJ got to work on designing and creating the outfit right away. Her vision was a white dress-like piece with a halter top featuring a wide split starting at the waist, revealing flowing black dress pants underneath. The top also had long off-the-shoulder sleeves. The perfect mix of fashion and class. Cater was going to love it.

It took her a few weeks to finish the project, spending all of her free time making sure that every stitch and seam was perfect while Cater continued to work tirelessly on his Expo piece. When it was done, all that was left to do was accessorize, but this was going to be the hard part. Didi had bought a few new pieces, but they couldn't go crazy spending money on the outfit. They knew that Cater had plenty of accessories that would go well with the outfit that AJ had designed, it was just a matter of sneaking into his room to put the outfit together with the accessories and leave it on his bed for him. This had been difficult, since AJ was taking college classes and Didi worked during most of the week.

Luckily, it just so happened that Cater was out late tonight to help with a group project in his class. It was honestly a miracle that he'd been keeping up with his schoolwork so well while working on his personal project for the Expo, but it gave AJ and Didi just the opening they needed. AJ brought the finished outfit with her and laid it out carefully on Cater's bed while Didi began rifling through Cater's drawers and closet to find accessories to go with it. His machine and all of the tools and parts he was using to work with were sitting on his desk.

"Okay, Dids, you find some jewelry for him to wear and I'll pick out the shoes," AJ commanded.

"I thought accessories were my job, since you went ahead and made the whole rest of the outfit yourself instead of even asking for my opinion," Didi huffed. She was very hurt that AJ hadn't included her in the process, but honestly, AJ was afraid that if she had told Didi she was making an outfit for Cater, she wouldn't be able to keep her mouth shut about it.

"You're actually lucky I'm asking you for help with any part of it, Didi," AJ retorted. "It's my project. I could do it all myself if I really wanted to. But you're better than accessorizing than I am, so I wanted to ask for your help. That doesn't mean I don't still get final say in how this looks."

"Ugh, Aje, you're so the worst!" Didi said, angrily rummaging through the compartments of Cater's jewelry box and pulling out various necklaces and pairs of earrings.

"You're free to leave if you feel that way," AJ said with a shrug as she walked to the closet.

"No way. I'm not gonna let you take all the credit for dressing our baby brother up. I'm not gonna be the only one missing out on this party," Didi protested.

"Suit yourself. It's my way or the highway, you know that," AJ called as she looked through Cater's collection of shoes to find something that would go well with the outfit she had made.

Didi did, in fact, know that. It had always been that way ever since she was born. AJ very rarely took no for an answer, and if Didi wanted any part of her schemes, she had to follow AJ's instructions to a T. It never stopped them from arguing about it, though.

Eventually, AJ had narrowed down her choices to three different pairs of shoes. One was a pair of stylish white platform boots that would give Cater some extra height but otherwise wouldn't be seen under the pant legs. Another pair were simple black dress shoes, comfortable and unobtrusive, taking nothing away from the main outfit. The last pair were black open-toed heels. They'd need to take Cater to get a pedicure if she ended up picking those, but honestly, she was probably going to take him to get a manipedi before the event anyway. After all, his nails were just as important as any other accessory they added.

Didi came back to the bed with a pile of different necklaces, bracelets, earrings, hair accessories, bags, and sashes. AJ watched as she began sorting them each into separate piles, clearly arranging them in different proposed looks. The problem was that AJ was unimpressed with all of them.

"Ugh, I thought asking you to help would make things easier, not a thousand times harder," she said, folding her arms as she stood behind Didi.

"What's that supposed to mean!?" Didi shrieked.

"It means these looks are so last year!" AJ said. "These are so boring, Dids, I mean, have you been keeping up with the latest trends at all?"

"I'm working with what I have!" Didi retorted. "It's not like you did me any favors! Your outfit is so ugly it would take me about a thousand marks and a miracle to clean up the mess you made."

AJ gasped indignantly. "My outfit is directly modeled off current haute couture trends! You clearly have no idea what you're talking about, I never should have asked you to do this! No wonder none of your accessories fit, you have no idea what I'm even trying to go for!"

"I don't care about haute couture, I care about making our baby brother so undeniably stunning it makes the Prince of the Underworld wanna gouge his eyes out because he doesn't deserve to look at something so beautiful!" Didi said.

"Well this would be a good place to start!" AJ said, taking a gold necklace with a moon pendant in the center and a line of star pendants on either side, dangly cuff earrings with stars at the end of each chain that lined the ear, a black sash with a gold galaxy pattern, a small black clutch, and several gold bangle bracelets and aligning them with the outfit she had made.

"You're insane! That's so gaudy, he'll be a laughing stock if he wears something like that!" Didi argued.

"It's not gaudy, it's fashion," AJ said. "He needs to stand out if he's gonna have any chance of catching the prince's attention! This is stylish! Not—whatever the hell you were putting together."

"Oh yeah? Well—what about these?" Didi asked, reaching down to grab the white boots that AJ had picked out. "I mean what, are we sending him to a rave? You really thought these would go with that outfit at all?"

AJ glared at her. "They match perfectly! They're powerful, they'll make him look intimidating, he's gonna need that if he's gonna fit in with the Shrouds!"

"You're delusional, he's gonna look like some gay teenager they dragged off the streets, not a serious contender for the hand of the prince. Honestly—just give me all of these and let me do the job you asked me to do!" Didi said, then reached for the other shoes that AJ had brought out.

AJ's eyes widened and she grabbed ahold of the boots in Didi's hands, trying to pull them away from her. "Nuh-uh, stop it!! Get your hands off those—!!"

"Oh, will you get a grip, Aje, you're acting like such a—"

"No, you're just mad because I know more about—"

"And you're just mad because I called you out on—!!"

"If you don't let this go—" AJ growled, pulling as hard as she could on the boot in Didi's hand.

She ripped it away with a force so strong that it left her own hand. As she yanked it from Didi's grasp, her arm flew backward and sent the boot flying with it. It hit the floating shelf above Cater's desk, knocking over several of the collectibles resting on the shelf and breaking one of the more delicate ones.

AJ and Didi both gasped when they heard the sound and turned to look at it. The boot and Cater's things fell off the shelf and onto the floor. "Oh no," AJ whispered, her eyes widening in fear.

Then, the shelf fell.

It hit the desk hard, crushing whatever was directly underneath it and sending several tools and parts flying. "Oh no. Nononononono," AJ gasped, tears forming in her eyes as the weight of the situation hit her like a truck.

"Seven, AJ, what the hell did you do!?" Didi yelled as AJ rushed over to the desk and lifted the shelf up.

"Nononono, oh, shit, this is so bad," AJ cried, seeing the remains of Cater's project cracked and broken on the desk. "Holy Seven, Didi we screwed up so, so bad, I—"

"What are you two doing in here!?" Cater's voice demanded from the doorway.

AJ sucked in a breath and turned around quickly, her face pale as she looked at Cater.

Cater saw where she was, the look on her face, the shelf she was lifting with her hands, and his heart dropped into his stomach.

"What did you do?"

"C-Cater, I didn't mean to I promise, it was an accident we were only trying to help," AJ said quickly, carefully leaning the shelf against the wall and rushing over to Cater.

Cater glared at her and pushed past her. "What did you—!?"

He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw the desk with his shattered project on it.

He dropped his backpack, nearly fainting as his entire body went numb from the shock. AJ noticed that he looked dizzy and quickly placed her hands on his back, trying to support him, but he pushed her away. "Get out!" he snapped at both of his sisters, immediately bursting into tears.

AJ cried with him, shaking her head. "Cater I promise we didn't mean to! I'm so sorry, I'm so so sorry, I'm sure we can fix it we can help you fix it I promise—"

"What part of get the hell out of my room do you not understand!?" Cater shrieked. "I already told you two I didn't want your help! All you ever do is ruin everything for me, you can never let me have anything for myself it always has to be about you! Just get out!"

He grabbed both of them by the arm and pulled them towards the door of his room. Didi had started apologizing by then, too, but Cater couldn't hear any of it. He didn't want to. The last five months of his life had been ruined. There was no way he could fix it in time for the Expo now. He shoved his sisters out of his room and slammed the door in their faces, then locked the door and stood with his back against it. He slid down to the floor, holding his head in his hands and crying his eyes out. This was something he didn't think he could ever forgive them for.

~*~

Cater tried his hardest to fix what had been broken. He wanted to go to the Expo with all his heart. He'd never wanted anything so badly in his life. He'd worked so hard to get in and now the opportunity was slipping through his fingertips, and it wasn't his fault, and there was nothing he could do about it. The project wasn't salvageable. It didn't matter how many clones he made of himself, even with all of their notes and documentation, there was no way they could repair five months' worth of work in just under a month. Cater still tried, but eventually he had to call it quits.

Applicants had a window of forty-eight hours before the Expo to rescind their proposals. Cater logged into the portal to rescind his at the very last minute, mostly because even thinking about touching his computer made him so anxious he felt like he was going to puke. As soon as he got the confirmation that his application had been deleted and his project removed from the Expo, he broke down and started crying again. He didn't have many tears left to cry, as he had been crying himself nearly to the point of dehydration every day since his sisters had destroyed his device.

He had been giving both of them the silent treatment for a month. Their parents had been quite furious. They demanded that the girls take on Cater's chores as reparations for what had happened and had expected them to repay Cater the marks he had spent on the project. None of that mattered to Cater. It didn't matter how much they were scolded or how much they apologized, nothing they did could make up for what had already been done.

He destroyed the outfit that AJ had made for him. Ripped it, cut it, shred it to pieces. The fabric itself probably wouldn't even be usable for another project.

It had been a beautiful outfit. Cater would have loved to wear it to the Expo. He was sure he would have gotten lots of compliments on it, and he would have begrudgingly hyped his sisters up because they really did always know how to make him look cuter, and…

It wasn't worth thinking about, because now it was never going to happen, and that was AJ's fault.

The night before the Expo, Cater didn't leave his room. He couldn't eat dinner, he was so upset. He couldn't decompress by doomscrolling, because every single post on his feed was about the Expo. All he could do was lay in his bed and cry, wishing that his life were different, wishing that he were at the Expo, wishing he could be anywhere but here.

As he cried, his face buried deep into his pillow, he didn't seem to notice that something magical was happening around him. Sprinkles of magic dust fell onto the bed around him like sand, slowly surrounding him before inching towards the headboard and beginning to build the shape of a person. Before Cater realized what was happening, there was suddenly a short old man with piercing hot-pink eyes, pointed ears, and short cropped black hair with pink streaks in it sitting on his bed. Cater's head was now in his lap, and the man was stroking Cater's hair affectionately.

"There now, chin up, lad. What could you be shedding all those tears for?" the man asked, startling Cater out of his fit.

He sat up quickly, then frantically backed away from the man, scooting all the way to the end of his bed before realizing that he was about to fall off. "Wh-who the hell are you!? How did you—how did you get in here—!?"

The man smiled kindly at him. "Why, I'm Lilia, dear child. Of course, you can refer to me as your Fairy Godfather," he introduced.

"Okay, that highkenuinely doesn't make me any less confused rn. WTF is a Fairy Godfather and why should I believe that you are one?" Cater asked, narrowing his eyes at Lilia.

Lilia chuckled softly at him. "Well, how else would I have gotten into your room? And how else would I have known to come find you? We Fairy Godparents—we can always tell when our godchildren are in trouble. And you seem to be in a great deal of it right now, my dear boy. So, why don't you tell me what's wrong, and I'll see what we can do to fix it."

Cater sniffled, wiping his eyes as he glared at Lilia uncertainly. "It doesn't matter. It's way too late to even try to fix anything now," he said.

Lilia smirked at him. "Why don't you try me, my boy?" he asked.

"…It's the STYX Expo," Cater said hesitantly. "I'd built a project that got accepted, but my sisters destroyed it. I had to drop out. The Expo's tomorrow—there's no way I can fix my project in time and believe me, I've tried."

"Oh dear, that is a predicament," Lilia said with a frown, holding a finger pensively to his chin.

"See? I toldya, there's nothing you can do about it. So just—get out of here, go… find someone else's problems to solve," Cater dismissed.

"Now, don't be such a Negative Nelly. You haven't even given me a proper chance yet," Lilia said.

He cleared his throat and stood up from the bed, reaching into the sleeve of his cloak and pulling out what looked like a magic wand. Then, he began singing some sort of incantation. It was full of nonsensical magic words that Cater couldn't make heads or tails of. But as Lilia waved his wand around the room and sang his song, strings of magic began to decorate his room. They pulled the pieces of his project from the trash, from his desk, from his closet, and before Cater's eyes they were pieced back together as if they had never been broken at all.

Other strings took the pile of fabric scraps that Cater had left on the floor of his room and redesigned them, changing them into a new outfit for Cater. This outfit was pure white with light blue feathered accents around the tops and bottoms of the sleeves. A form-fitting one-piece with a halter top, long off-the-shoulder sleeves, and long slim pants. There were arches cut into the sides at the hips, which would reveal a little bit of skin. The outfit had an open skirt with several layers of tulle and lace beneath the silk fabric on top. There was a veil to go with it, which would drape the back of Cater's head and down his neck. There were also two clear high-heeled slippers which appeared to be made out of glass.

Cater was speechless. He couldn't believe Lilia had put his project back together so easily. Cater had tried a thousand different ways to fix it with magic and nothing had worked. It certainly looked like it had been put back together, but… there was only one real way to find out.

Cater jumped off of the bed and ran over to his desk, carefully picking the device up and bringing it over to Lilia. "H-here—I—w-we need to test it!" he said. "Look—all you gotta do is channel your magic into this device while holding down this button in the center for thirty seconds—after it finishes scanning you, it'll start producing holographic copies of you."

Lilia did not seem at all phased by what Cater was asking him to do. He happily became a guinea pig for Cater's experiment, doing exactly as he was told. To Cater's utter disbelief, the thing actually worked. Magic holograms of Lilia began to pop up all around the room.

"Keehee. Believe me yet, my boy?" the copies said in unison.

"Ho-lee Seven," Cater said under his breath, but he realized he wasn't out of the woods just yet. "But—I already rescinded my application. It's too late to send in another one, the Charons won't come to pick me up and I won't have a spot at the Expo, either."

"Oh, silly me, how could I have forgotten?" Lilia asked, then snapped his fingers and another invitation just like the one Cater had received previously appeared in his hand.

"Is that… really gonna work?" Cater asked, blinking at the device that Lilia was holding.

"I've magically bypassed the STYX Institute's security systems and inserted a new, approved project form for you. The Charons will have you on their list. They will be here tomorrow to pick you up just as they would have been before," Lilia explained. "But, although this magic is powerful, there is a time limit to it. The spell will end at midnight tomorrow, at which point everything will go back to the way it was before. Your project will be broken, your outfit will turn back to rags, and the STYX security teams will have realized that your invitation was a forgery. It is imperative that you leave the convention center before then. To help with your escape, I will give you this."

Lilia snapped his fingers with his other hand, and in the palm of his hand appeared a necklace with a glass pendant shaped like a rounded carriage with ornate wheels. He held it out to Cater, who reached out and took it into his own hand. "What is this?" he asked.

"When you're ready to come home, simply throw this pendant on the ground and shatter it. It will take you home in an instant. As soon as the glass is broken, you will appear right here in your room again," Lilia explained. He handed the invitation to Cater as well, then smiled at him with something akin to adoration. "Now, my dear boy, is there anything else I can help you with?"

Cater shook his head, mouth hung open slightly in awe. "No, I… think that's it…" he said.

"Oh, dear me, I almost forgot," Lilia said, his eyes widening. He clicked his tongue, then snapped his fingers once more and handed an ornate silver pocket watch to Cater. "You'll need to leave your phone here. They'll be confiscating everyone's phones for security purposes, but you'll need to be able to keep track of the time. Keep this on your person, and be sure to check it frequently."

Cater nodded obediently. The thought of leaving his phone behind for that long filled him with anxiety, but he wasn't going to be able to make this work without a few sacrifices.

"That's a good lad," Lilia said, giving Cater a gentle pat on the head. "Well, then, I'll be on my way! Good luck, my friend! Have a wonderful time at the Expo!"

With that, Lilia vanished, and Cater was left alone wondering if this was all a dream.

In the morning, everything was as it had been the night before. Cater's project had been fixed, he had an invitation to the Expo, and he had a beautiful outfit to wear to it. But he couldn't let his sisters or his parents know. He wasn't going to lose this second chance. He came out of his room to eat breakfast in the morning and then returned, silently putting on his outfit and doing his hair and makeup while he waited for the Charon to arrive.

~*~

Idia hated this.

He hated all of it. He hated this stupid party. He hated the fact that it symbolized the loss of whatever little amount of freedom he had before this point. He hated that he was being forced to pick someone to marry, someone to spend the rest of his life with, out of these strangers at the Expo. All of these arrogant, power-hungry idiots who all thought they were smart enough to match Idia, who thought they knew anything about what it was like to be the Watchman of the Underworld. But even more than that, he hated that he was going to trap someone with him. It didn't matter how annoying they all were, no one on this earth deserved to be stuck with the Shroud Family's curse, and the future children that would come from Idia's union with this stranger would not deserve it either.

"Esteemed guests, at this, the tenth STYX Exposition Ball, we are very proud to introduce to you our son. Idia Shroud, your future Watchman of the Underworld."

The Expo attendees erupted with applause after Idia's father gave his introduction. He stood at a podium on the top floor of the convention center, his face broadcast to hundreds of cinema-sized screens all around the building. It was too loud here. Idia had already withstood more than he had the capacity to, and he hadn't even begun making his rounds. There was no. freaking. way. that he was going to make it through every single demo. Even if this had been a three-day convention, he still probably wouldn't have enough time to look at every single submission in detail. His parents, his grandmother, and Ortho would all be exploring the attendee's booths as well, but Idia wasn't interested in the opinions of any of them except maybe Ortho on who he should select as his marriage partner.

Idia held out for as long as he could, spending the first four hours of the Expo going from booth to booth, only really stopping by those that piqued his interest. In his opinion, the criteria for being allowed to present at the Expo needed to be far stricter than it was. That was the first thing he would change when he became Watchman. Or maybe he'd do away with the Expo altogether.

When Idia finally had enough, he stayed a little while longer at a booth while the rest of his family—including Ortho—moved along to the next demo. Then, he disappeared into the crowd. Idia was a genius, after all, so of course he had prepared an escape route for himself. The silver sash draped over his fitted black suit had a technomantic camouflage device built into the brooch that held it together at his waist. With a quick burst of magical energy from Idia, the device cast a magical hologram over him which completely changed his appearance, hiding his fiery blue hair, his blue lips, and the paleness of his skin. He became a completely ordinary-looking young man, with long black hair tied back in a low ponytail, wearing a simple black suit with his brooch disguised as a pocket watch. Then, he headed toward the convention center's exit, out into the artificial garden in the courtyard.

On his way out, he passed by a booth where a man with fiery orange hair and piercing emerald green eyes, wearing an outfit that made him look like a prince, was presenting a demo of a device that could make technomantic copies of the user. This, Idia actually thought might be vaguely useful. After all, if he could make copies of himself, then maybe he could have stayed in his room and sent a doppelgänger out to participate in this sham of a celebration. He made a mental note to come back to the booth and view it in more detail after he'd had some "fresh air."

Idia wandered the garden in silence for a few minutes before he ended up finding someone else in the garden. He held his breath, quickly calculating the optimal exit plan so that he wouldn't be seen even though he was in disguise right now. But just as he was about to turn and walk the other direction, he suddenly realized that the person standing in the garden was the same man he had seen giving a presentation just minutes earlier.

It wasn't that surprising, once Idia thought about it. The man had been giving a presentation on holographic cloning technology. The man giving the presentation inside was probably a holographic copy, and this was the real person, taking a break outside to escape all of the commotion inside. Wow, that was relatable. There was a melancholic look on the man's face that instantly resonated with Idia. He recognized it almost immediately.

Cater, was, in fact, trying to take a break from it all. He was outside because the world inside was getting to be much too loud for him. He'd come to the abysmal conclusion that his sisters had been right all along after only an hour of presenting his demo. Who was he kidding? No matter how hard he tried, he would never be able to network with these people. He had no idea what any of them were talking about. As hard as he tried, he couldn't hold a conversation with them. Every single person in that room was richer, smarter, and more powerful than he was. What was he even doing here?

He was startled out of his spiral of self-depreciating thoughts by a voice coming from behind him. "Hey, were you the guy in there doing the prez on cloning technology?"

Idia didn't know what had possessed him to speak to this man, and he realized as soon as the words left his mouth that he should probably have thought about speaking more properly and disguising his voice. His brooch was able to change his appearance, but it wouldn't change his personality or the way he sounded. Now, though, it was too late for him to try to undo this mistake. Changing his speaking mannerisms or anything else about his voice would just be even more suspicious. Idia had to hope that this person wasn't all that good at placing voices, especially when they were coming out of an unfamiliar face. It wasn't like he talked that much in public, anyway. Or, at all, really.

Cater thought he recognized the voice, and was somewhat shocked when he turned around and saw someone who was completely unfamiliar to him. He must have been imagining things, as the anxiety of being here became almost too much to bear. He had been seconds away from shattering the carriage pendant, fingers wrapped tightly around it as he contemplated yanking the chain from his neck. He slowly let it go as he gave a weak smile to the man standing behind him.

"Oh—uh, yeah! Were you—interested in it?" Cater asked. He knew he sounded foolish, but he didn't know if that was better or worse than being rude and ignoring the man completely. He had no idea how the social cues of this kind of crowd worked, and he knew he was missing all of them.

"I just saw you, like, two seconds ago," Idia replied. "The guy inside doing your demo right now is a hologram, isn't he? He looked completely real. That's… actually crazy sophisticated tech."

Cater shot him a playful smirk. "You wanna know a secret?"he asked.

Idia raised an eyebrow at that. "A secret…?"

Cater walked over to him. Idia took two steps back before Cater caught up to him. Idia swallowed nervously as Cater leaned in towards his ear and whispered, "He's not a hologram. My signature spell lets me create clones of myself."

In all honesty, Cater didn't know why he was telling this stranger about his Unique Magic, especially in a situation where it could potentially cheapen the impression of his Expo project. But this stranger was the only other person who was standing outside in this garden, and the only person of the night so far who hadn't spoken to him with absolute derision. The man seemed to be about Cater's age as well, and although Cater was sure that the man was still richer, smarter, and more powerful than him, on the surface he seemed like… someone completely ordinary.

Well, apart from the disguise that he was wearing. Cater had seen the momentary flickers in whatever technomantic energy he was using, barely visible, completely hidden to an untrained eye. He'd seen them plenty of times in his own work as he had learned to build his holographic clones. But there was still something physical underneath the projected exterior, although Cater hadn't seen it. Between that and the voice, though, Cater was starting to concoct theories in his mind. He already had his suspicion about who he was dealing with, and he… didn't know what to do with the information.

All he could do for now, he supposed, was carry on just like this was a completely normal conversation between two completely normal people.

Idia was taken aback by the red-headed man's confession. His mind quickly began racing through the data points, immediately identifying the connection between the man's demo project and its inspiration from his Unique Magic, but Idia wondered why someone would try to build a piece of technology that made their own signature spell available to other people. What was there to gain from dulling the uniqueness and integrity of their magic like that? Aside from, he supposed, trying to gain the approval of the Watchman of the Underworld.

Well, in fact, it had done the opposite—and now Idia was once again searching for ways to get out of this conversation.

When Idia didn't respond, Cater cringed at himself. How stupid could he have been? Of course laying all his cards on the table had been the wrong move to make. He couldn't seem to stop proving to himself that he wasn't meant to be here. But he could never leave well enough alone. It felt just as awkward to walk away from the conversation now as it would to continue it, so Cater decided to take a chance and see if there was any way he could salvage what was left of the single spark of a connection he had managed to make all evening.

"Sssssssso, uh… you… need'a get away from it all too, or what?" he asked, tucking his hands behind his back and turning toward the fountain at the center of the garden

Idia suddenly felt that his previous assumption was completely unfounded. The handsome—beautiful, even—read-headed man in front of him seemed… just as awkward and out of his depth as Idia felt. It was painfully obvious to Idia that the other man was putting on some sort of front. There probably was so much more to the project than Idia was giving it credit for and he probably would have to take another look at it once he finally decided to go back into the convention center.

"Uh… yeah," he answered, clearing his throat awkwardly as he followed Cater to the fountain. "It's… a little much in there, for me."

Admitting that felt like a weight off of his shoulders. Somehow this stranger was the only person he could speak his mind to without fear of repercussions. He was supposed to be Idia Shroud, future Watchman of the Underworld, tonight's quote-unquote guest of honor, the Maverick Genius who was meant to be choosing a partner who matched him in intelligence, diligence, and sacrifice. But right now in this garden with the beautiful stranger, he didn't have to be any of that. For once in his life he felt like he could just… be.

Cater grinned softly. Idia could just barely make the expression out from where Cater's face was turned slightly towards him. Eventually, when Cater made it to the fountain, he turned around and sat down at the edge of it. He patted the spot next to him, inviting Idia to sit down. Idia stood in front of Cater, his eyes awkwardly glancing at Cater's gesture, but he didn't sit down just yet.

"Well, what's your project all about?" Cater asked. "What are you presenting to the all-powerful Watchman of the Underworld?"

He spoke with such a sarcastic tone that now Idia definitely didn't think the stranger was here to try and win his attention. But wasn't that why all of the attendees were here…? If that wasn't what this stranger wanted, then what was he after?

"Oh, it's, uh… it's… er… c-consciousness transfer technology," Idia choked out. He'd needed to come up with a quick lie and had decided to dance around his own most classified project. No one outside of the Shroud family knew what Idia had done after his younger brother's untimely and horrific death. No one knew that that kind of technology existed. And it… wasn't like the stranger was actually going to be able to see his demonstration of this supposed project, so… talking about theoreticals probably wouldn't do any harm.

Cater furrowed his brow in confusion. "Consciousness transfer? Whaddya mean?"

"Y'know, like… uploading someone's consciousness to a digital technomantic program. All of their thoughts, feelings, memories, everything that makes them who they are. If something were to happen to their body, their consciousness could be saved and transferred to a technomantic body," Idia explained.

Cater blinked at him. "High key, that sounds genuinely insanely fucked up," he said after a minute, even though it wasn't really that dissimilar to his own project. "Buuuuuuuuuuuut pretty much exactly in the Shroud family's wheelhouse. Did the Prince come by your booth yet? Wouldn't be surprised if he proposes to ya on the spot with tech like that under your belt. Just imagine all the possibilities STYX could do with something like that…"

Idia had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. Idia hadn't let STYX near his research for Ortho, and he didn't plan on it. What he did should never, ever be done again. Idia was going to ensure it didn't happen, but… he couldn't fault the stranger for letting his mind wander to those possibilities. It did sound like something the Shroud family would do and, technically, it was something they had already done. Idia didn't regret his decision. He would do it all over again if he had to. But nobody else should ever have the power to be as selfish as he was.

"He didn't come by the booth when I was there. Idk if he'll come by while I'm gone, but tbh, it would be fine if he skipped my booth altogether. I never wanted to be here in the first place. My parents made me come," Idia said. It was just enough of a lie to keep his identity secret, but enough of the truth that he once again felt a little freer just by admitting it.

"What, you don't want a shot at marrying into the Shroud family?" Cater asked, raising an eyebrow. "I mean, c'mon, you're the perfect fit. Imagine what life would be like for you with all that power. All the resources in the world to take your project to levels you never even thought of before. That doesn't entice you just a little bit?"

"Not at all," Idia snapped. "Being married to the Watchman of the Underworld would be nothing but a curse. I wouldn't wish that fate even on my worst enemy. No one should have to live a life like that, trapped on some secret island in the middle of nowhere suffocating on the Blot of the phantoms day in and day out. Having to cut off everyone you've ever known and live your life alone. That sounds like the worst kind of hell."

Cater shrugged, then turned to look at his reflection in the water of the fountain. "Tbh, I'd gladly take a life like that over the one I have now," he said. "I know it's… never gonna happen. My tech is so… basic, compared to everyone else here. A-and idk how to talk like I have any kind of power, or—or explain myself, defend myself against these critics and researchers. Everyone here is smarter than I am. I really just wanted to come here so I could prove my sisters wrong about me. So I could show them that I'm in control of my own life, and I can do whatever I put my mind to, and I could marry the Prince if I tried hard enough. But… after tonight, everything's gonna go back to normal. I'm just gonna go right back to my life the way it was before, and I'll have nothing to show for every piece of work I put in to making it here tonight. It'll all disappear, like it was nothing but a dream."

Idia was silent for a long time, but he finally came and sat down next to Cater on the fountain. Idia had the terrible idea that if he really did have to pick someone to marry from the attendees of this Seven-damned party, this beautiful stranger would be the only person he could stand to be around in such close proximity for the rest of his life. But that meant that he definitely couldn't choose this person, because he could never subject this kind and horrifically relatable stranger to the life that he would have to live if he were to marry Idia. No matter how badly the stranger said he would prefer it to the life he was already living, he was wrong.

Idia was a selfish person at heart. He should end the conversation here, but for some reason, he didn't want to. He wanted to be selfish again, just for a little while.

"I guess we'll both just go back to our normal lives when this is all over," he said quietly, "but there's hours left 'til then. Hours I'd much rather spend with someone who gets it than any of the morons in there. So… whaddya say to ditching all of that 'n just… hanging?"

Cater stared at him in surprise, then let out a quiet, awkward laugh. "C'mon, after all the hard work we both put into this… you just wanna give up, just like that?"

"'S not giving up, the way I see it," Idia argued. "I don't want to marry the Prince of the Underworld, and you know that you don't stand a chance next to all these self-obsessed chuds. This is just the two of us cutting our losses and deciding to have fun instead of watching the clock and waiting for the night to end."

Cater paused in contemplation for a moment before closing his eyes and shrugging with a wry smile. "Lowkey, I can't argue with that," he said. He had pretty much already abandoned the idea of going back inside anyway, so… might as well spend a fun night with a new friend he'd never see again after this. That was how so many of his friendships ended, anyway. What was one more to add to the pile?

Idia stood up from the fountain and momentarily considered offering his hand to the stranger, but ultimately decided against it. His hands were cold and clammy and it was probably best to avoid physical contact if at all possible. It wasn't like Idia planned on keeping the stranger around, so there was no point in getting… attached.

"C'mon," he said, tilting his head in a gesture for Cater to get up and follow him. "There're some pretty interesting things in this garden, 'f ya know where to look."

Cater smiled and stood up, eagerly following the stranger. Idia let him all around the garden, showing him a variety of exotic and man-made plants, topiaries, and other garden fixtures. As the artificial nightfall of the Isle of Woe's dome began to set, many of the plants began to glow with bioluminescent light, and it was revealed that many of the fixtures had their own lighting displays as well. Cater was in awe of all of it. He didn't think he'd ever been anywhere more beautiful. Of course, it stuck in the back of his mind that this stranger who was wearing a disguise and had a voice that was so familiar—Oh, if only Cater could just put his finger on it—knew his way around the garden like it was the back of his hand. Idia hadn't put too much thought into the fact that he might need to pretend to get lost.

They talked for hours. It didn't seem to matter what about. The more they talked, the more they realized how similar they were. The more one tangent led to the next, and the next, and the next. The more Cater's heart ached when he thought about how he would have to go back home when the night was over. The more Idia's heart ached with a desire to be known and understood, to be able to give himself to someone he could learn how to love instead of someone who only wanted him for his power, and becoming more and more certain with each passing moment that that would never be a possibility for him.

It was getting close to midnight. Cater wasn't exactly sure how close. For once in his life, he hadn't felt the need to check his phone in hours—not that he could have, anyway. He kept glancing at the pocket watch hanging from the stranger's chest, but it was closed, just as his own had been closed for most of the night. He knew he needed to check, but it almost felt like a trap. It felt like if he never looked at the clock, he could stay in this beautiful dream forever, but as soon as he saw the time he would have to wake up.

Cater wanted to have one last fairytale moment before all of this disappeared.

"Hey, d'you… wanna dance?" he asked, turning to the stranger after they had been staring at a rather large topiary featuring the Solitary Beauty and her Hero who appeared to be doing just the same.

Idia thought it was a joke. He gave a soft chuckle and a wry smile as he continued to look up at the carefully landscaped faces of the figures. They had such adoring expressions. Idia felt a pang of jealousy hit him, suddenly.

Cater frowned. "Hey, I'm being slash-srs rn!!" he said. "This is a ball, isn't it? D'you think I got all dressed up like this for nothing? And nobody's even asked me yet, so I guess I have to be the one to take the initiative around here."

Idia couldn't help laughing at the stranger's boldness. It was a good thing his hair wasn't visible through his disguise. He felt a sudden warmth in his face and knew that both his hair and his cheeks were turning slightly pink. It would be a shame to let the stranger's prince-like outfit go to waste. He deserved to be swept off his feet by someone, even if Idia wasn't sure he had the rizz or the skill to do it—and even if it required letting the stranger hold his cold, clammy hands.

"Guess my parents forcing me to take waltzing as a feat wasn't a total waste," he said. "C'mon. I'll take you to the ballroom."

Cater smiled to himself, folding his hands behind his back as he walked behind the stranger, who once again seemed to know exactly where he was going. When they got to the ballroom, it was bustling with people. Many of them were simply chatting over champagne flutes, standing on the outskirts of the room, but quite a large number were dancing with each other in the center of the room while a live band played classical music on a stage at the front of the room.

Idia's hands were shaking slightly when he offered them to Cater—and they were definitely cold, and definitely clammy, and this was a horrible idea, why had Idia ever agreed to do it, and—

Cater's hand slipped easily into Idia's. Idia's hands were quite large. Cater's were small, but not too small. The curve of their palms fit together like two pieces of a puzzle. The stranger's skin felt warm to Idia. The stranger did not flinch or shy away from the unpleasantness that surely came with holding Idia's hand. Idia took a deep breath, then led Cater onto the dancefloor.

Cater could tell that the stranger was nervous. It wasn't just the unsteadiness of his hands or the light layer of sweat that coated his skin. It was in the way his hand hovered with uncertainty before settling lightly between Cater's shoulder blades. It was in the way he had to look down at his feet before remembering which one to start with as he began to lead Cater in a dance. It was in the way Cater could feel his pulse beating rapidly in his wrist. It was in the way he wouldn't look Cater in the eye, always glancing anxiously around the room or staring back down at their feet.

"Hey, you don't hafta be scared of lil ole me. I'm not gonna bite'cha, y'know," Cater whispered to him, laughing softly.

Idia winced. He knew he was a wreck, but he was hoping it wouldn't be so obvious. "'S not you I'm scared of. Not… really, anyway."

Cater smiled at him. "Aw, c'mon, you said it yourself—the rest of these people are just some self-obsessed chuds. They don't matter anyway, so just pretend they aren't here."

"Easier said than done," Idia said through gritted teeth.

Cater squeezed his shoulder reassuringly. "Just look at me. Don't look at anybody else. Keep your eyes on me and let everybody else just disappear."

Idia didn't know why the stranger's instructions calmed him so easily. He hated being this close to people he didn't know, he hated talking to people, he hated socializing, he hated making eye contact… but with the stranger, it was easy. And as Idia stared into those piercing green eyes, the rest of the world really did begin to fade away. Soon it was just the two of them, waltzing slowly together while some eerily dreamy music played from what sounded like another room entirely.

Then, all of a sudden, the dream was over—and it began to turn into a nightmare.

Cater hadn't meant to lose track of the time. The sound of his pocket watch's quiet alarm was drowned out by what sounded like the chiming of a clock tower playing over the convention center's intercom system. How long had they been dancing for? It didn't matter. Cater had to leave. He had to get out of here before he was arrested or tortured or mindwiped, or whatever the STYX Institute did to people who trespassed on their property and hacked into their insanely secure servers.

Cater let go of Idia's hand suddenly, stepping back as if he had been shocked or burned. Idia looked at him with a look of confusion mingled with hurt, though he didn't know exactly what had happened. "I-I have to go," Cater said, panic evident in his voice.

"Wh-whaddyou mean? The—er—the Expo isn't over for another hour," Idia stuttered out. The amount of urgency with which the stranger was showing in his voice and his movements had Idia scared.

"I-it is for me," Cater said, with as much conviction as he could, but his voice was shaking. "I-I'm sorry, I can't explain, just—I have to go."

Cater turned on his heel and attempted to run out of the ballroom, but for a reason that Idia couldn't explain, he reached out and grabbed the stranger by the wrist and tried to hold him in place. Cater turned back around to look at him, fear and doubt clear as day on his face. He didn't know how he was going to escape. In a last-ditch effort, Cater made a split-second decision to risk everything so that he might be able to get away.

Cater yanked his arm towards himself, pulling the stranger in close to him, and he leaned forward to kiss the stranger on the lips. Idia was so shocked that he immediately let go of the red-headed man's wrist, freezing with his eyes wide open as a soft shriek escaped his mouth. The feeling of the stranger's lips on his was electric. It made him feel like he had been jolted back to life.

"Come find me, my prince," Cater whispered against the stranger's lips before running away while Idia was still paralyzed. If he was right about his hunch, then maybe Idia Shroud would forgive him for his transgression and come save him from the mundane life he so desperately longed to leave behind. And if he was wrong, he'd just given that stranger a night to remember and some words to haunt him for the foreseeable future.

As Cater dashed back out into the garden, he could suddenly hear the blaring alarm and security announcements coming from the convention center. He heard the loud crash of a thick metal barricade slamming down in front of the door he had just run out of, keeping everyone else trapped inside the building. There was no way they hadn't caught him on camera, or had drones scanning his entire body, or some other crazy shit like that. But Cater wasn't just going to stay here and let them find him.

He ripped the chain from his neck and threw the pendant on the ground in front of the fountain where he and Idia had met. As the pendant shattered, Cater tripped on shreds of fabric from his outfit that was starting to fall apart. He could vaguely feel one of his glass heels slipping off his foot as he fell face-first towards the ground, putting his arms out in front of him to try and brace for the impact.

When his hands hit the floor, it wasn't on the cobblestone pathway in the artificial garden of the Isle of Woe, but on the soft carpet of his bedroom floor. His knees burned from sliding into the carpet at such high speed. When he pushed himself up to sit on his knees, he noticed he was surrounded by scraps of fabric all over the floor and was completely naked except for his underwear—and a lone glass slipper still clinging to his foot.

Its twin rested in a pile of scrap fabric and broken glass in front of the fountain in the garden on the Isle of Woe. It was all that was left of the beautiful stranger when Idia finally made it back out into the garden, accompanied by his brother, his parents, and several security personnel. Idia was warned not to go near the "hazard," but he pushed the security personnel away from him while Ortho followed him to the slipper.

"Preliminary environmental scans detect nothing malicious about or around the slipper," Ortho said as Idia approached the slipper.

That was all Idia needed to know. He carefully picked the slipper up and held it in his hands, examining the material and the craftsmanship. It was unlike anything he had ever seen before, like something straight out of a fairytale.

The man who had left this behind was surely the only person in the entire world who could match his genius. He had infiltrated the STYX Expo, bypassed every single security system the Isle of Woe had in place, hacked and forged his way into securing a spot to present at the Expo, duped and seduced Idia, and had made a clean escape without being discovered for what Idia had been told was twenty-four hours.

Idia had made up his mind. Everything he had thought about the stranger before now had been completely changed. The red-headed man was probably the only person alive more insane than he was, and if that was the case, maybe he could survive a life as the husband of the Watchman of the Underworld, after all. Maybe he was the only person who could.

"We need to find him," Idia said, turning to face his parents and the guards while cradling the slipper in his hands. "I'm going to marry him."

Idia didn't care what his family had to say about the matter. He didn't care if every employee of the STYX Institute rioted against it. Idia was going to fulfill the quest that the stranger had given him, and he was going to make the stranger his bride.

Of course, he should have expected it when his mother's helmet lit up, giving it the appearance of a wicked grin. "That's my boy. Let's go find your mystery date."

~*~

It should have been a piece of cake for Idia and the rest of the entire Seven-damned STYX security team to figure out this man's full government name and his exact address, but so far nobody could tell Idia what the hell had actually happened.

The stranger's demo project had been left behind but had been completely destroyed. In the chaos of everything that had happened, it was unclear if it had been purposefully destroyed or if it had been an unfortunate accident. Camera footage from the incident appeared to show the device self-destructing, but drone sweeps of the area immediately after seemed to indicate that the item had simply been magically unmade. The spell's energy was unable to be traced to any mage who was present at the Expo, even that of the stranger. Idia could have rebuilt the tech if he tried, but it would likely end up being a waste of time that wouldn't provide anything of value to the search efforts.

At midnight the night of the Expo, all data files containing information about the identity of the stranger and his project proposal started to permanently delete themselves from STYX's servers. The action hadn't been initiated by anyone on STYX's front end, which was what had triggered the security alarms in the first place. Even the unique ID number for the stranger's invitation had been completely erased. It was as if the invitation had never existed at all, despite the Charons receiving direct orders to retrieve this person from his home address and the invitation being verified. Of course, the GPS data from the Charon that had escorted him had been completely wiped, as well. With nothing else to go on, Idia had ordered STYX to use facial recognition technology to rake through a veritable galaxy of security footage and internet postings from around the world, and to also go through the mountains of Expo applications that had been rejected as well as the smaller handful of applications that had been accepted and rescinded.

This was how they found one Cater Diamond. Cater Diamond's initial project proposal was identical to the demo project that the stranger had shown off at the Expo, and it was only about a day before the STYX researchers found a perfect match between the facial data taken of the stranger during the Expo and the social media account of a man named Cater Diamond. Cater Diamond's original application contained his full address.

Game, set, match, Idia had thought to himself, a wicked grin to rival his mother's quickly spreading across his face.

Now all that was left to do was figure out how to approach this situation.

~*~

For the next week, the news was ablaze with stories about the emergency lockdown that had happened during the STYX Expo. Attendees had been required to turn in their phones and had been thoroughly searched at the door for any possible recording devices or other threats to security, but word had still managed to leave the island anyhow. The STYX Institute had made only vague comments about the incident. They had stated that there had been a security breach during the Expo, but that the situation had been swiftly taken care of and that the Expo's attendees had never been in any danger. In fact, the STYX Institute was steadfast in their assurance that the Expo had been a total success. Supposedly, the Prince of the Underworld had found a suitable partner among the attendees and wedding preparations were already underway.

Cater was sick of hearing about it. It had gotten to the point where even thinking about looking at his phone filled him with a horrific sense of dread, and if anyone in his family happened to be watching the news, he had to leave the room. None of them could know about the adventure that he'd had, and it was probably for the best if he forgot about it, too.

He hadn't heard from Lilia again since. He'd fashioned a makeshift safe to house his lone glass slipper in, somewhere the prying eyes of his sisters would never find it. Somewhere it couldn't get broken. But the longer Cater held onto it, the more it infected his mind like a plague. He couldn't stop thinking about it. Sometimes the thought of it seemed to paralyze him. He was at his wit's end, one breakdown away from taking the thing and shattering it along with all of his hopes and dreams.

It was a fateful ring of the doorbell that saved him from the spiral.

At first, Cater didn't think much of it. It was just that the sudden loud noise had startled him, bringing him back to the present for the moment. It was probably just someone trying to sell something. When the doorbell rang again, Cater thought to himself that he wasn't anywhere near the front door, and so it wasn't his problem. He wasn't expecting company. Someone else could deal with it, or they could all wait for the solicitor to go away.

The doorbell rang again third time. Cater didn't hear anything for a little while after that and assumed whoever had been ringing it had left. But then, there was a knock at his own bedroom door, and AJ's voice carrying softly from behind it.

"Cay-Cay? I—uh—there's a guy here to see you…? From school, I guess? He said his name was Prince?" She spoke the name with barely hidden disgust. Just from the way AJ spoke, Cater could tell she was still wallowing in remorse about what she had done and simultaneously jumping into protective big sister mode.

Honestly, Cater thought that he might need it. "Uhhh… what?" he said, confused.

"Doesn't ring a bell? Do you—y'know what, I'll just tell him to leave. I didn't let him in. I told him to wait outside. He said something about coming over to help you fix your Expo project and I didn't know—but—yeah, he's probably a creep, I'll—"

"Wait!" Cater called from behind his door, putting two and two together and genuinely driving himself into a panic. He hadn't told anyone at school about his project. The only people who would even know about it were the four people he lived with and…

"No, nono I know him, sorry just wasn't paying attention—!!" Cater shouted, throwing the door to his room open and practically pushing past AJ to get to the front door.

"Cater? What the hell are you—" Didi asked from the couch as she watched Cater run to the door.

Cater quickly unlocked the front door, and when he opened it, he came face-to-face with that dark-haired, dark-eyed man he had danced with at the Expo.

"Holy Seven, it's—you—!!"

The man gave an awkward wave. "Uhh—heyy, Cater."

Cater nearly fainted. He dragged a hand through his hair, laughing in disbelief, his heart dropping to his stomach when he heard the man say his name. "Holy Seven. How the hell did you know—" He stopped himself, realizing how insanely suspicious that would sound to his eavesdropping sisters. He grabbed the stranger's hands and stepped out onto the porch with him, then leaned in to whisper in the stranger's ear. "How the hell did you find me?"

The stranger, Idia, squeezed Cater's hands and smirked at him. "I think you know how."

"Ohhhhhhmy royal Queen of Hearts, oh, shit—shit—I—uhh—help—uhh—"

Idia let go of Cater's hands, then snapped his fingers and summoned what looked like an ornate shoebox shaped like a coffin. He held the box out to Cater with a wry smile. "I have something that belongs to you. But don't open it yet. Can we go somewhere and talk?"

"Uhhh—uhhh—yeah—hang—hang on, uhh—"

He stepped back into the house and slammed the door in Idia's face. He ran to his room to grab his house keys and throw on a pair of sandals, yelling to his sisters as he went. "Aje! Dids! I'm gonna be out for a while idk when I'll be home so don't worry 'bout me I'll see you later kay byyyye!"

Before Idia could register what had happened, Cater had appeared again. He shut the door behind him once more and locked it, then grabbed Idia's hand and began pulling him down the street. Idia didn't have any idea where they were going. They had been walking for a while before they found themselves in a walking trail in the woods around Cater's neighborhood. They walked a little while more before Cater finally stopped to turn and look at Idia.

"Okay—why are you here? Seriously—I—"

"You know why I'm here, Cater."

"Hooooooly Seven, I'm gonna die, I'm actually gonna explode and die, I'm actually gonna combust and explode and—"

As Cater's ramblings became more and more intense and nonsensical, Idia grasped his pocket watch and activated it. Before Cater's eyes, the disguise began to fade away, leaving in the dark-haired man's place Idia Shroud in flesh and blood. Long tendrils of fiery blue hair, skin as pale as death with lips blue to match, tall and mysterious and every bit as handsome as he was behind a screen. He was breathtaking. Cater felt like he was going to puke.

"You literally cannot be serious right now like please tell me this is a joke—actually, don't, that would be so much worse—holy shit—"

"Cater?" Idia asked, taking a step towards Cater after his true form had been fully revealed.

"Yeah, mmhm?" Cater asked, then covered his mouth with his hand to keep himself from laughing hysterically."

Idia held the box in one hand and took Cater's free hand with the other. "Did you mean what you said back there? That you could be happy being married to the Watchman of the Underworld?"

"Shit," Cater said under his breath, nearly choking on the soft sob that has very suddenly come from his mouth. He nodded vigorously. Was this really his fairytale ending?

Idia lowered himself to one knee in front of Cater and let go of his hand to place his own hand on the lid to the shoebox. "This isn't gonna be easy," Idia said. "And I want to give you time to adjust. Time to transition. This doesn't have to happen all at once. But if I have to spend my life with someone, it might as well be the only person I've ever met who doesn't make me miserable. And I promise, Cater, I'm gonna do whatever I can to give you a life worth living with me. I'm not gonna let you be miserable, either. I'm gonna make you happy."

Idia pulled open the box, and inside was the glass slipper that Cater had left behind. Cater leaned down and lifted the slipper gingerly from the box. It was then that he noticed the blue ribbon tied to the heel, threaded through a silver band ring inlaid with blue sapphires all around the band and a sculpt of the Shroud family's insignia in the center.

"Seven, Idia," Cater said, his voice barely audible as he stared at the gift he had been presented with.

"Allow me?" Idia asked, setting the box aside as he looked up at Cater.

Cater nodded again, quickly handing the slipper back to Idia. Idia pulled the ribbon free from the heel and held it between his fingers, keeping the ring attached to it. He lifted Cater's foot and removed the sandal he was wearing, then replaced it with the glass slipper. Once the slipper was in place, he took Cater's hand and slid the ring onto his finger.

Cater held Idia's hand tightly once the ring had been placed on his finger and pulled Idia up to stand with him. He wrapped his arms around Idia's neck, leaning into him and pressing his lips against Idia's in a dreamy kiss. This time, Idia got to kiss him back, and suddenly he had never been more sure of a decision he had made in his entire life.

~*~

When Cater and Idia returned to Cater's home, Cater's sisters were standing in the living room and gossiping about who this mystery visitor was and what his relationship with Cater was. Idia had returned to his disguise for the time being. As they both stepped into the living room together, AJ and Didi turned to look at them as if they had been caught doing something wrong.

Cater could hardly hide the devious excitement in his smile.

"So, uh, guys…? I got something to—uh, to tell you. It's a pretty big deal, so… you're probably gonna wanna sit down for this one."