Into Your Orbit: A Rune Galaxy Romance

“Hey, Talia, can you come in here for a second? There’s something I’d like to ask you.”

My boss, Princess Seraphine Rune, was the quiet head librarian of the Nevik subastral orbital spaceship. And while I was technically the assistant librarian, I was also her covert bodyguard and her go-to-gal for just about anything and everything. I was walking past her office on my way to lunch when she spoke up.

“Yeah, of course,” I said and sat down in a standard-issue sub-orb chair across from Seraphine. I wondered if this had anything to do with the surprise meeting she had with the queen and king yesterday? I pulled out my com and readied myself to take notes on whatever she needed.

“Could you shut the door?” she said in a hushed voice. Leaning over, I shut the door with a click and looked at her quizzically. Her office was small, cozy, and littered with paper documents and stacks of books that I’d have to re-shelve later. The quiet chatter of the rest of the library staff ceased, and the droning of the sub-orb’s synth-grav system was the only noise between us.

I had been her assistant for nearly four years and absolutely loved my job; she was a fair boss and we had a good working relationship. Sure, she had her quirks, and I had to be her bodyguard when she traveled off-orb, which was occasionally nerve-wracking, but our day-to-day was pretty—boring, actually. And I enjoyed boring. So when she folded her arms on her desk and buried her face, I knew something wasn’t right.

“What’s the matter? Did something happen?”

“This is obviously strictly confidential between you and me, but I can’t not tell you,” Seraphine mumbled from inside her arm cocoon. With a moan she unfolded herself and sat back in her chair; she looked awful, as if she was going to be physically ill.

“Do I need to get the medic in here?”

“No,” Seraphine moaned. “Not unless he can diagnose me with some terminal disease that’ll get me out of the marriage my mother has informed me will happen in a year.”

“No,” I gasped. “To whom?” I felt shocked and appalled. Seraphine wasn’t dating anyone; a marriage so soon could only mean...

“I have no clue. She just sent me this list of her top 100 marriage contenders, like it’s some sort of business deal and not the rest of my life she’s ruining, and now I have to choose one of them.”

“No,” was all I could say. My jaw was slack with surprise at every word Seraphine said.

“Yeah. Here, I’ll forward it to you.” Seraphine opened her com and clicked around on the screen; I heard my inbox ding, notifying me I had received a message. I opened it up and skimmed the 200-page document.

“This... This has basically every eligible royal bachelor and bachelorette in the galaxy listed.”

“I know. And each candidate has a bio full of the most obnoxiously trivial information.”

I looked down at eligible bachelor number 29. “I had no idea Earl Fruce Jimill had a kamelo named Fred.” Seraphine huffed a laugh, at least I could still make her smile a little. “So you’re supposed to choose someone to marry from this list? Why and why now?”

“My parents have decided that marrying me off is the most reliable means of forming a strong political alliance with another planet,” Seraphine said, a bit more stoic than before.

“But don’t we already have strong alliances? We have the strongest military in the galaxy?” I believed our dominance had waned for decades, but I had never heard the whispers verified by any member of the royal family.

Seraphine shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. All my parents said was we needed stronger alliances to keep the Galactic Assembly democratic—but I think we all have our theories about where Nevik stands.” She absentmindedly swiveled her chair back and forth, a tic I recognized as her thinking deeply.

“So there’s no getting out of this arranged marriage?”

“Not a chance. But I have an idea that may buy me a little time and reduce the pressure from my mother.”

Feeling intrigued, I said, “okay, what’s that?”

“I want to throw a party.”

That was the very last thing I expected Seraphine to say. She loathed parties and she especially despised forced small talk with other royals. I was so taken aback by this that I stared at her, jaw agape.

Seraphine focused on me, “you don’t think it’s a good idea?”

“No, it’s just that...” How could I say this politely? “You hate parties.”

“Exactly.” Seraphine started typing on her com and swiveled the screen so we could both see. She brought out her calendar and pointed to April 14th, her birthday. “We have three weeks to arrange the most magnificent and royal twenty-seventh birthday celebration the sub-orb has ever seen. I want to invite everyone on that stupid list and hopefully, hopefully, my mother will think that I’m taking this whole arranged marriage thing seriously and will leave me alone for a few months.”

I gaped. “You want to invite all 100 of the eligible royals to your birthday party? Here?”

“Yes. And everyone on the sub-orb. I mean, I know half of the royals won’t even have time to travel here unless they get special Fold Gate authorization, which, now that I think about it, wouldn’t be a bad idea. But if we manage a party of this scale, with this royal guest list, I think I may get a couple of months of peace before I’m bought and sold.”

“Don’t say that,” I said. “You’re not some trinket.”

“Aren’t I?” Seraphine let out a heavy breath and leaned back in her chair. I had never seen her look so resigned. She was always perfectly content with her work and books and life here on the sub-orb. But now? Everything had changed. “You know as well as I do that second daughters are bred and trained as bargaining chips. It’s always been my destiny; I just wasn’t expecting it to be thrust upon me so abruptly.”

“So you’ve accepted your fate?”

She slowly nodded in agreement. “What other options do I have? When the queen says bow, you bow.”

We sat in silence for a few moments. Seraphine’s words broke my heart. I couldn’t imagine what she was going through internally, but I tried to sympathize. I also had family duties I didn’t always like but reluctantly completed. That’s what second daughters always did—we were reliable for that, at least.

“So, this party?” I gathered my emotions and attempted professionalism. I was at work after all.

“Will be the biggest, grandest event the sub-orb has ever seen. And because of that, I need your help,” the princess looked into my eyes and a wide grin spread across her face. I could tell she was planning something more than just a party, but I didn’t know what yet.