Stars Dancing [Dreams-To-Lovers Romance]

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Friends of Earth, do we have a treat for you today!

Didn't read volumes one or two of the Ayela Arcana? No matter. We bring you new characters and a new story so you can pick up the tale right here, right now.

Euri and Shah are a couple like nothing you've met before. Erotic comedy is the name of the game, and they do not disappoint. Tired of the slow burn? Then turn the page and dive into the spice.

We have telepathic twins who don't speak and a man who loves them both. Mysterious mirkas and a starliner called the Good Time.

Journey with us across Andromeda Galaxy and discover tales of hidden depths. For you seek answers about the present in the mysteries of the past. Wading in waters so deep can get you burned.

So prepare yourselves. This is a love story! Didn't you expect it to be complicated?

NOTE: Our audience is everyday readers, not academics, so numerical values (dates, units of measure, time) have been translated into common English to preserve the flow of the storytellers. To those who take issue with our decision to do so, you are entitled to your opinion. In other words, "Fuck off."

- Known Cosmos Earth Press, 2862

EURI

Portia and Larron Sloan were not normal.

Neither of them spoke a word. They were silent twins, but they had open, friendly eyes and soft minds. They felt good to be around, but they didn't talk in my mind. They were just there.

They ate pizza, but they pulled off all the toppings, including the sauce. So, basically, they ate pizza crust with cheese, but added extra crushed red peppers and salty, garlicky pizza herbs and then rolled it up and ate it like a taco. I tried it, and it was so sanding good that I decided to show them my tricks.

I handed them virtual reality masks and a little something extra I'd made: an external augment relay node, placed right on the top of the head, against the scalp directly. It was a modification of what cyberneticists used for augmentation surgery patients, so we could use them externally and not have them implanted in our brains. When we wore the scalp relays, all wireless tech was operable by the power of our thoughts.

Since the twins didn't talk, I took a vow of silence. They figured out the relay in half the time my brother Dwin had when I'd showed it to him. They controlled tech with their brains almost as well as I did. None of us were as good as my augmented dad, but we'd get there.

We got lost in a virtual world that the three of us made with our own brains. It wasn't like my Aunt Ryst's telepathic mind merge, but it was as close as you could get with tech, and even better because we could play in it all weekend and save everything. We could've kept going forever, probably.

Except for Dad. I felt the metal hand on my right ankle giving me the signal before I saw the text scrolling across my screen. Yeah, my ankle. P., L., and I were lying on the media room daybed in a row with our legs up the back of the bed, propped up on pillows. At least, that's where everyone had been last time I'd gotten up to pee, and I felt their minds nearby.

The Crieve-Madranos had Three Rules:

1) Be Tidy. This meant "Take a shower and brush your teeth everyday, Euri, you stink for sand's sakes." But I wasn't the only one who forgot to shower. There were three of us in the house with that problem, to the eternal frustration of Mets.

Who's Mets, you ask? My augmented dad with the metal hand. Yeah, he's an amputee with a cybernetic left hand. My brother Dwinlyn and I figured it was easier to call him "Mets" when he wasn't paying attention. We called him "Dad" to his face, though. Seemed less rude.

The "Be Tidy" rule also meant, "Pick up your shit, Dwinlyn, we're tired of you leaving crap all over the house." Fair enough. Not too bad as far rules went.

2) Eat three meals a day. Once again, there was only one man in the house who had no problems with this rule. There were three of us who forgot that food was a basic requirement of life. Poor Mets; he had a time looking after us all. Chef Amran was his life saver, and probably the rest of ours too.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

3) Sleep eight hours a night. There were four of us who found this rule problem. I had to unplug and try to sleep eight hours at night or Mets would threaten to ground me from tech. He was terrible at grounding, but I usually did what he wanted because that was better than him being in a bad mood.

Those were the Three Rules. Then there were the Three Principles:

1) Be kind.

2) Apologize when you screw up.

3) Listen.

Our dads didn't know it, but my brother Dwin and I had the Three Declarations:

1) Brotherly Solidarity. "Flee" is the code word. Here's what that was about: Flee to Nona and Poppop's the instant we picked up anything amorous from Muse's thoughts.

Who's Muse? Our musical Dad. He didn't know about the nickname. We called him "Dad" to his face. He was too easy to pick up thoughts from, and our dads were disgustingly amorous. They thought they sent us away for long weekends, but we fled to the grandparents on a regular basis.

2) Derailment. If our parents were being annoying, we pranked each other. We had a whole bank of pranks under lock and key, and we brought them out whenever we wanted to get the dads off our backs or get them to shut up about whatever they were on about. Or to just get them to stop being so freaking handsy at dinner. Pretend we were at each other's throats, and the parents stopped annoying us.

3) Leave each other the fuck alone. We figured that's being kind and listening all in one Declaration.

Yeah, Mets gave me the metal-hand-gripping-the-ankle-signal that I'd crossed the line and broken one of the Three Rules with Portia and Larron. We'd eaten, and we'd showered, but we weren't asleep, and it was 2:00AM. While I had the scalp relay on, I could text Dad back, no typing required.

Dad: Eight hours sleep break, Euri. You know the limits.

Euri: P. and L. can use the daybeds.

Dad: Their beds are in the guest suite.

I shrugged because I'd already handed Portia a set of sheets, and she was making up the beds while Larron pulled their toothbrushes out of their bags. Our VR masks were off, and I tucked the scalp relays in their protective cases for storage.

Dad shook his head and headed for the door, but then turned back. "I'm so proud of you, Euri. You were amazing tonight, and obviously, Auntie and Uncle thought so too."

Oh! I'd totally forgotten about the concert my brother and I'd put on. It seemed like forever ago. It'd been spectacular, sure, and my Uncle Nayth had showed up laughing. He nearly cracked Centre Stadium apart with his laughter from beyond the stars.

I realized Dad was probably really happy about Auntie's ephemeral presence arriving during the concert, so I grabbed him in a hug and half carried him down the hall.

"Thanks, old man." I held on too tight, just enough to be aggravating, and he shoved me off him.

"'Night, Euri. Love you."

"Love you too, pops. Give Dad a canoodle from me." He grunted as he walked away, and I collapsed into bed.

Once my mandatory eight hour break was up, P., L., and I went back to our private virtual reality where we spent the whole long weekend creating vista after vista of magical worlds just for the three of us. A special place, all our own.

We'd had no idea what our dads would one day do with it.

SHAH

I'm in love with Euridyne Crieve-Madrano. I don't care that people will say I'm only fifteen. I know what love is, and it has nothing to do with age. I know what love is because of my twin.

And that's partly why I'm in love with Euri. Because he's so nice to my brother Ronnie. Ronnie and I are a package deal. My twin is a part of me.

People think we're strange. And we are. Ronnie doesn't say much. He never has. He doesn't have to. I understand him, and that's all he needs. Mom and Dad mostly understand him, but what they don't get, I can fill in the blanks. Mostly, I don't need to. Mom and Dad are happy to let Ronnie be Ronnie and me be me.

There's a lot Mom and Dad don't know, though. Our whole lives they've told us about being Talented and that we might someday show signs like them. They don't know that Ronnie and I were always Talented, and we're never gonna tell them. We decided it as soon as we realized what they meant about the Talented. Me and Ronnie know we're telepathic, and no one else ever will.

Except maybe Euridyne Crieve-Madrano. He doesn't care that Ronnie and I don't talk to him. I could talk to him out loud, or I could talk to his mind. He's got it open. He closes it off sometimes, but mostly it's open to me and to Ronnie. He doesn't seem to care.

I'm not talking to him, though. He's happy to let me and Ronnie be quiet, so why would I talk out loud if I don't have to?

Euri doesn't hear my thoughts because my telepathy mind shield is too good for him. I never talk to anyone in their minds other than Ronnie. But I can feel Euri, and he feels really good. He's warm and comforting, and he likes Ronnie. He thinks our minds are soft and friendly.

He doesn't know that I want to lick his lips. I keep wondering what it would feel like to lick the pizza grease off Euri's lips. I think Euri would taste really good, like pizza cheese with extra garlicky herbs.

Ronnie thinks I should try kissing Euri's hand as a test, but I told him that's crazy, we're only here for a few days.

Exactly, Ronnie'd said in my mind. Kiss his hand and then leave to go home to the other side of the galaxy.

Maybe Ronnie was right.

I like our VR world. The one we made with Euridyne. We did a lot of different sketches. I had a really pretty ornate round building that Euri voted as his top pick, but then Ronnie made one that was sort of onion shaped, and we all picked it as the best. Of course, Ronnie always comes up with the loveliest designs because he's the best artist in the Known Cosmos, even if I'm the only person who knows it.

My brother made it snow in the VR world, and the snow melted right into his building and evaporated into mist. It looked so cool. Euri liked it because he'd never seen snow. So, we made our whole VR world snowy for Euri. He put blankets over all of us because he thought it got cold looking at all that snow. Like he forgot we were on the daybed in his house on his hot, desert sphere!

Euri was sweet like that— putting blankets over me and Ronnie because we might be cold. He also put up the Three Rules in text so we'd know what his parents expected. Ronnie and I took turns showering after Euri did, then we all just laid back down on the daybed to keep playing in our snowy world.

I didn't even notice when Mom and Dad came back from meeting with Euri's dads. Ronnie told me that they'd come in, seen us, and went to bed. Our parents don't have the three rules. We don't have any rules at all. "Just be yourself," was what they always said. Does that count as a rule?

Ronnie and I slept when Euri did. Then we ate pancakes for breakfast. Euri must've told their chef that we like things plain because the pancakes had no butter or syrup. But there was powdered sugar and cinnamon which we dumped all over the pancakes and rolled them up so we could eat them with our fingers.

Euri did what we did and grinned the whole time. I grinned back, and all three of us had white powder all over our faces. I really wanted to lick Euri then. I bet he'd taste really good with all that sugar and cinnamon all over his mouth.

When it was time to go back to our home world, I took Euri's right hand because that's how the Shurwinn bow to each other. But when I bowed, I put my lips on the back of Euri's hand. Then I dropped his hand and turned around and never looked at him again.

I could feel him, though, and he was warm, warm, warm all through his heart.

Ronnie took my arm as we walked away. Told you, he said in my mind.

It would be seven years before we'd see Euri again, and the next time, he'd find out just how tricky Ronnie and I really were.