The Hidden Princess At All-Boys Alpha Academy
Chapter 0412

At midnight, we all stand around while I light the fire with great ceremony, and there are a good number of Ooohs and Ahhhs that go around the room - mostly from the kids, but also Jesse - even though it is a small, unremarkable fire - especially after the bonfire I saw this evening. As soon as it's lit, though, people begin to turn in - hugging and kissing their loved ones before heading off to their respective rooms. Even Jesse's family will stay here tonight - there's no point in going home when we'll all be together again for breakfast. Jackson frowns at me a little, though, when I stay in place.

"What," he asks, giving me a nudge with his elbow. "No bed for you?"

"Nah," I say, smiling at him and tilting my head towards the fire. "Ceremonial duties, after all. Has to keep burning. I'll sleep here," I say, lifting my chin towards the hearth. "I do it every year. Quite cozy and warm." "None of us make her do this," my mom says, coming over and giving me a kiss on the cheek as she presses some pillows and blankets into my arms. "Her own insanity and superstition is all that keeps it going."

Jackson laughs but just nods, buying into it, letting me have my little tradition. But when the final door shuts, my last family member disappearing behind it, he's still here.

"What," I say, spreading my blankets out in front of the fire. "Your beds not calling you tonight?"

And I have to admit, I'm not really surprised when he grabs another pillow off the couch and comes to sit with me on the hard stone of the hearth. "Like I said, trouble," he murmurs, smirking at me in the firelight. "Where you sleep, I sleep. So if you're in front of the fire? So am I." I grin and lean forward to kiss my mate, tugging off his suit jacket and letting him lay me out in front of the flames.

I wake up a few hours later in the very early light of dawn, blinking and sniffing. Groggy, I turn my head towards the fire and scowl when I see that it's smoldering low-that it hasn't quite gone out, but it's well on its way to doing that.

Sighing, I start to press myself up from my very cozy spot sprawled out over Jackson's chest, frowning with dismay when I realize that I drooled a bit on the black t-shirt he changed into to sleep in, but I go very, very still when I notice something...quite strange. Jackson is sleeping flat on his back, as he always does, with one arm curved up over me. But his other arm, to my shock, is not flung out to the side as usual -

It is, instead, curled around a little tiny girl. I burst into a surprised and delighted grin when I realize that it's Seraphina - that she snuck in here and is now dead asleep, snuggled up to Jackson's side.

I mean, as one of the eldest cousins in a batch of ten kids, I'm no stranger to the kinds of sneaking from room to room that kids do at sleepover events. But this!? It's one for the books.

I go absolutely still as I look between the two of them, not wanting to wake either of them, because it's so cute - the gigantic terrifying Alpha next to the tiny little baby girl.

But Jackson, as he always does, senses somehow that I'm awake. His eyes flutter open.

"Jackson," I whisper, my voice almost shaking with glee, "did you know about this?"

"Hmm?" he says, frowning at me, and then he looks down to where his arm is curled protectively around Sera. "Oh, yeah," he says, laughing a little. "You mean our midnight wraith? She who creeps in and stares at me until I wake up, scaring the crap out of me in the middle of the night? Honestly, I don't know how you slept through it, Ari."