The Heiress of Aragon

"Come on, Velitha, I don't want to be late!"

"It's still early!"

"It's not too early for someone whose time is limited! I want to make the most of this freedom, this anonymity. You have no idea what it will be like!" Said my depressed sister.

She's right; I have no idea what my life will be like in three months. That's a life my sister knows well. As I finish getting ready, I think about the life I'm leaving behind and the one that awaits me.

I am the only child of my parents, the only child from a completely different family. My mother is from another planet. It sounds like a joke when I say it out loud, and I wouldn't dare say it in front of other people, except for my own family.

When my mother was young, she came to Earth. Like most children from noble families in Aragon, she came to live anonymously on Earth after mandatory military service. The purpose was for them to learn to live without the privileges they had back home and to evolve as individuals. In most cases, it had a positive impact, teaching them to take responsibility for their actions and realizing that they were not the center of the universe.

Upon her arrival, my mother enrolled at a university where she met my father. They fell deeply in love, but like all passionate relationships, the flame eventually began to fade, and they broke up before my mother even realized she was pregnant.

Shortly after, my mother fell seriously ill, making it impossible for her to return to Aragon. Her brother, who is a doctor, along with another noble doctor named Haron, came to Earth to assess the situation. By the time they arrived, my mother had already discovered her pregnancy. Aragonese women typically have pregnancies that last about twelve months, but my mother was already halfway through and her weak body struggled to carry the pregnancy to term. Her grandfather wanted her to have an abortion, but she refused. Although my uncle was in favor of it, knowing the slim chances of my survival, he couldn't go against my mother's will.

Needless to say, the situation was extremely worrisome. Medical examinations were challenging with the limited resources available on Earth. Reports of pregnancies between different races hadn't presented as many complications. They decided to track down my father and conducted a comprehensive checkup to understand the nature of the fetus growing in my mother's womb and how it affected her health.

My mother believed that once I was born, she could return to Aragon with me. However, her grandfather strongly opposed this idea. Unmarried individuals, both male and female, were not allowed to have children in the place where my mother was born, especially considering she was the King's granddaughter. Haron proposed to my mother. As the ruling prince of one of Aragon's five principalities, marrying him would grant me legitimacy and a rightful place in the family. I know, you're probably wrinkling your nose at this point, and I don't blame you. They got married, and my mother managed to carry the pregnancy to ten months-earlier than ideal, but enough for me to be born healthy and for her to recover. Everything went according to plan until they realized that I was completely human. I could never live in Aragon, where everything was inhospitable for a human. So, I was left in the care of my father.

" Excellent! You look beautiful. Come on!"

My sister snapped me out of my daydreams, and there I was, ready for our friends' graduation party, determined to make the most of the time and freedom that being anonymous afforded me.

******

"It's no surprise how beautiful you are, but why is it that every time I see you, you look prettier?" This was Lucas, my current boyfriend. He was handsome, polite, and very smart - the kind of boyfriend every girl dreamed of having. He was in his second year of medical school. I confess that I liked him, but he expected more from me than I could offer.

"Lucas..." I started, feeling my sister fulminating me. Today would be the day I broke up with him. My sister had warned me to wait until the party was over and not to spoil everyone's fun. At that moment, she was looking at me with those black eyes, and I knew she was reinforcing this information. So, I smiled and asked him to dance. It would be difficult to break up with him; he really liked me and hoped we had a future together. But I knew since I started this relationship that my hours on Earth were numbered.

On the way home, while my sister was driving, I brooded over the breakup and questioned a thousand things I could have said differently to end it in a less painful way.

"Nothing you said would change the situation, Veh. Stop grieving about it," my sister blurted out suddenly. She knew exactly how I was feeling.

"Easy to say, Brindha, that wasn't you breaking up!"

"It wasn't me breaking his heart into a million pieces..."

"Arghhhh!"

"...but did you forget that I felt everything you and he were feeling? I mean, it's never easy for me either."

"You know, sometimes I think you're a sociopath and enjoy the suffering of others," I said.

"It seems that way, but let's be serious here. We're only nineteen; it's not like it's a love for life. Two weeks from now, he's over you." My sister was a staunch skeptic waiting for the arranged marriage she would have. She didn't care about love or romantic things.

"Glad we're here! This little talk of yours is making me nauseous."

We entered the house and found our father preparing one of his protein shakes in the blender.

"What time is it?" he asked.

"Half past five in the morning," my sister answered, sitting on the chair near the bench and throwing her shoes on the floor.

"Are my girls hungry?"

"No, but I want to eat something with a lot of calories," I said sullenly.

"What happened to her?" my father asked, looking at Brindha.

"She broke up with her boyfriend."

"Ahhhhhhhhh!" I groaned, banging my head on the counter.

"Are you all right, dear? I thought it wasn't that serious, you know..."

"That's not the point, Dad!" I interrupted him before he said out loud what he thought - that I knew I had little time when I started dating. I really didn't need to hear this right now; I already felt like crap.

"Do you know what it's like to feel everything the other person is feeling? As if it wasn't enough to deal with my turmoil of emotions, I still need to deal with his? That's not fair!"

"I'm sorry, honey. It really isn't. I'll make your favorite pancakes. Go upstairs, take a shower, and when you come down, breakfast will be ready."

I dragged myself upstairs, thinking about how much I would miss my father. He always tried to cheer me up. My sister hugged me as we walked up the stairs; she was the only one who knew exactly how I was feeling.