The Hidden Princess At All-Boys Alpha Academy

“Let me take this little rabbit," Maryam says, quite gentle and friendly, reaching for Marigold. Jackson tilts the little girl towards her friend and Marigold laughs, going happily and easily to Maryam, who takes her over to the window to look outside.

"I'm so sorry, Jackson," Hank says, coming close and looking up into my mate's eyes. “I...I should have put it together before."

"It's not your fault," Jackson says with an easy shrug, and down the bond I can tell that he truly holds nothing against this man who is clearly doing so much to help so many people. "As you say, Tasha was likely hiding her identity and going her best not to be found. It's not your job to see through that kind of subterfuge."

"Please," I say, stepping close to Jacks and clasping my hands around his arm, wanting him to feel my support. "Is there anything you can tell us, Hank? About Marigold's...history?"

Hank sighs and looks over to where his daughter is standing with Marigold, pointing out towards the park that abuts the palace, maybe chatting about some of the animals that live there. “What I know is brief and largely medical. Our little pop-up clinics served...hundreds, maybe thousands of people in need and still barely scratched the surface of what needs to be done up there." Hank hangs his head, pressing the bridge of his nose between his fingers. "But...that little girl and her mother made an impact. They were hard to forget."

Jackson tenses next to me and I look up at him, worried. But he simply clenches his jaw and steels himself, wanting to know.

"She wouldn't tell me much," Hank says, dropping his hand and lifting his head to again meet Jackson's eyes. "She was...very proud, wasn't she?"

"She was willful, yes," Jackson replies, his voice soft.

Hank nods, his eyes shifting to his daughter and Marigold. "But they were starving. She came for the food at first, not the medical treatment. She didn't trust us but she was willing to risk it for her daughter. But the second time they came we learned more. We learned that Asha - or, sorry, Tasha, as you call her - was determined to never go back to where she came from, that she'd never let them touch her child. I encouraged her to go South, even to the capital where she could get more aid, but...like so many from the North, her ideas of what happens here in the South were...skewed. She refused, thinking it too dangerous."

I look up at Jackson and he nods, looking down at me. "We were told that horrible things happen down here. That to go South would result in the worst kinds of death. It makes sense that she wouldn't want to go - she had no reason to trust that any sort of help would come."

My heart breaks at this because my mother has worked so hard to establish aid in our cities, to ensure that people get the help they need My stomach turns at the idea that the Community poisons the mind of their people so completely that they fear the places where they actually could actually get help.

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"She told me they lived in a cabin," Hank says on a sigh, clearly coming to the end of his knowledge. He shrugs. "It was likely a hut. I knew they were starving, I gave thema much food as I could. But...our aid program was mobile and had to move on to a new place. What help we gave was clearly not enough."

"We should have done more," I whisper, hanging my head.

Jackson hums his agreement, guilt rushing through him too. Because he got out, of course. But so, so many got left behind.

Including his daughter.

But even as he feels all of that, I pass support down our bond. Because even if we're too late to help Tasha - there has to be so much we can do now. So many more people who we can help.

Inwardly I set my heart to the task, determined to do it.