Wish upon the Stars chapter 970

It took a week for the competition to officially come to a close. The succession war wound down in the background, and I didn’t do a single thing to participate. No alliance meeting, no trials, no recruiting. I had twenty five hundred people to free, and while most of them were D-rankers who would only cost a single point, we had a few hundred C-rankers and about a dozen B-rankers.

The only upside was that given our impressive showing saving the planet, a decent chunk of our people had decided to stay behind. Not Fade or his people, obviously, but some of the lower rankers, and not a small amount.

Regardless, that wasn’t my problem, I left it up to Crell, no, MY week was spent doing one thing and one thing only. Deciding where to take my honeymoon. And even a week on, it wasn’t going well. Even now, the night before the final announcement ceremony for the position of Wishmaster, I was engaged in a heated debate on the topic. Or at least, I was witnessing one.

“Look, this isn’t even an argument,” Benny snapped hotly at Abel. “Vertex has clouds made of ACTUAL candy, rivers of chocolate, and the fish can be eaten still swimming and are filled with caramel. It’s a PARADISE!”

“It’s a SUGAR coma,” Abel sneered. “Shane and Callie are WARRIORS. They should go to Svagan. The hunting there is the best in the universe. There are boars there that can SMELL your greatest fear! And their meat tastes like its been smoked in hickory freshly butchered. That’s so much better than some candy planet.”

Bethy slammed her hands down on the table menacingly, looking as enraged as I’d ever seen her. “No! They need to go to Gatosia! It’s a whole PLANET of cats! The cats can TALK! And they can sense your perfect kitty partner. Everyone leaves with an adorable kitten bound to them for life! It’s the best place ever! I’ve been trying to go for YEARS, but the Vitalstorm Matriarch hates daddy a whole bunch and refuses to let him send me! I want a magic kitten damn it!”

“Bethy, you’re supposed to at least PRETEND this is about Shane and Callie,” my sister chuckled. “This their honeymoon, remember?”

Jessie rolled her eyes. “You’re all wrong anyway. They should go to Rayvar. Every surface is so soft it feels like silk, and the air has naturally occurring relaxants blowing around on the breeze. It’s literally the most peaceful place in existence.”

“I say the Dorax Nebula,” Nat said firmly, cutting in from where she was sitting with Valk on the other side of the room. Since she’d gotten news that we were bringing Perit back, she’d been more and more her old self. “You can walk crystal bridges through the void of space, overlooking the cataclysmic star cauldron of Asteria Seven as it gives birth to stellar spirits. It’s supposed to be the most beautiful sight you’ve ever seen.”

I glanced at Callie, raising an eyebrow. She just smirked at me. I almost groaned. I knew that look. She’d picked our destination already then. I didn’t really care where we went as long as it was with her. She winked at me, and I rolled my eyes but said nothing. They WERE being kind of annoying, so I didn’t think a little prank was out of order.

“Are they always like this?” Derran asked from across the table. My cousin had been availing himself of our hospitality every since the battle with Wise’s forces, where his father Davis had been wounded. The A-ranker was on the road to recovery and wasn’t badly injured, but we didn’t have any healers who could affect someone at that level, so pretty much his only option was to wait and heal the regular way.

“Of course not,” I reassured him. “Sometimes they’re unreasonable.”

Nat snorted. “Ignore him. He likes to play himself off as wise and sardonic. He thinks pithy comments make him sound worldly.” She grinned teasingly at me. “At least he’s predictable. You can always count on Shane to be sarcastic and quippy.”

“Can you not NUTSHELL my personality to people who don’t know me!” I said waspishly. “You’re making me sound one dimensional. Don’t make me come fight you.” Despite the faux angry tone, I felt a surge of warmth in my gut. Nat hadn’t really be willing to tease me like that since Perit died. I’d missed my patronizing pain of a cousin something fierce, even if I would never admit it.

“Natalie, don't pigeonhole your cousin. Shane, don’t threaten to fight the D-rankers,” Callie said with a sigh. “It’s gauche.” She looked away to prevent us from seeing her grin, and I took the chance to stick my tongue out at her. I wasn’t wearing my mask, so when she jerked her head back to look at me I had to rearrange my face into an innocent expression, then returned her earlier wink. Before I could comment though, a loud voice cleared its throat on the other side of the room. I looked up to find Roland standing at the entrance, looking solemn.

I stood, walking over to shake his hand. “Hey, cousin,” I said warmly. “Good to see you. What brings you around these parts?”

“You haven't been attending the trials,” he said solemnly.

I shrugged. “Family time. But I think I did alright for myself during this whole thing. The succession war is over as of today though, right? Tomorrow is the ceremony to announce the winner. Unless you’re planning to rope me into some night before trial?”

“Not necessary,” he smiled. “I’ve been dispatched by the family to be the bearer of good news. Well, good for you. It’s pretty bad news for everyone else. They sent me because they were a little worried if they sent one of the A-rankers or another B-ranker they might attack you and get murdered by your guards.”

I froze. Because I knew what that meant. Why they would dispatch him to come see me. It had happened. I had won.

It wasn’t…a surprise, really. Like I had known I would probably win. But at the same time, I hadn’t KNOWN. This was the sum total of the result of all my efforts for the last two years, all bearing fruit. I had done it. I was going to be the Wishmaster. Knowing in the abstract didn’t compare to being told in no uncertain terms that it was coming.

“Wh-why would they need to do that?” I asked hoarsely. Everyone shut up with their bickering, turning to stare in rapt fascination. I ignored them, my eyes locked on Roland’s face, the edges of my eyesight darkening like I was getting tunnel vision.

I followed the shape of his lips as he spoke more than hearing him, given the rushing in my ears, but I still understood every word. “Shane Wyndham. By order of the Elder’s Council, under the authority of the current Wishmaster, Aiden Wyndham, and on your own recognizance as the officially selected heir to the Wish Curse Palace, your presence is requested at a ceremony tomorrow to announce your ascension to the position of Wishmaster, should you accept such a responsibility.”

I stared at him, brain blank, mouth open. It was…over? Or not over. But that had been it. What I’d been waiting for. Callie stepped up next to me, snagging my hand and bumping up against my side to jar me into rational thought. “He does agree, and we’ll see you tomorrow,” she said graciously. “Would you like to stay for dinner?”

“Thank you,” he said with a smile. “But no. I have my own celebration to attend. Those of us who chose to throw our lot in with Shane have benefitted greatly from this whole debacle.”

I raised a brow at that. “I mean…how? Because I didn’t pay you or anything.”

“The selection for Wishmaster is a complicated and many layered affair,” he chuckled. “While the actual position is, of course, the biggest prize, the WCP is fill of people determined to make a profit off any conceivable vector.”

I blinked at him in disbelief. “Did you…did you BET on me becoming the Wishmaster?”

“Nothing so overt,” he said with amusement. “But we positioned several of our interests in such a way as to benefit from your selection. Business interests changed hands, financial assets were traded, even a few planets had their leadership restructured. And that’s just us. Several of the branch heads benefited even more.”

“But they HATED me,” I protested. “They were actively trying to prevent me from taking power! How the hell were the in a position to benefit?”

He shrugged. “They’re old, and very sneaky. The majority of the upper seven members of the council almost always position themselves to benefit from either outcome of any given situation. There’s a reason they’ve still held onto so much power despite Aiden’s near total dominance. If you want a bit of advice from a loyal future subject, it’s this: politicians don’t worry about how to win. They worry about how not to lose.”

Grinning, he clapped me on the shoulder. “Take care of yourself, cousin. And good luck on the new position. I don’t envy you at all.”

I watched him leave, frowning in annoyance. “Godsdamned Wyndhams always needing to get the last word,” I grumbled as I turned to pull my wife back over to the table so we could drop into our chairs. Everyone was staring. I sighed. “Oh come on, I get why I’m freaking out, but you all knew this was coming. You don’t have to be weird about it.”

“I mean, it’s a big deal,” Benny pointed out. “I mean, you’re about to become one of the most powerful people in the universe.”

“No,” I said firmly. “I’m about to take up a mainly ceremonial position balanced by a whole council of S-rankers. Like, yes, I’m going to be VERY famous, but that doesn’t mean I’ll have any real say until I get stronger. Like yes, it’s a big deal, but I still have a LONG way to go.” I’d been reminding myself of that for a while so I didn’t feel so unmoored, but now that my ascension to Wishmaster was confirmed, all that comforting weight I’d been trying to pile on felt like it was crushing the life out of me. I wished my damned brain would make up its mind.

Changing the WCP, approaching the Vanished Gods about the alliance, negotiating some kind of peace, helping fight off the Void invasion, the list went on. And I KNEW the Void invasion would fall on me. Even without my new job and all the responsibility that came with it, my connection to Callie would suck me into this. I refused to leave her to fend for herself against the Void, which meant I was going to have to fight. They hated what she was too much to ignore her.

Oddly though, that thought settled me. Not her being in danger, that had me terrified, but the thought that we’d be in this together. All of it. Other Wishmasters might have been solo acts, but Callie and I were soulmates. She’d always be on my side, there to help me handle whatever came my way, no matter how big it was.

I squeezed her hand, smiling warmly at her, and then turned back to our friends. “Now, no need to keep gaping. I believe you were all suggesting possible honeymoon destinations? We still haven’t picked yet.” Almost immediately, they turned on each other, and I had to smother my smile as they argued endlessly over possible vacation spots. Callie was trying not to dissolve into giggles at the sight, and I winked at her like I had earlier. I had to wonder though, where had she picked for us to go? I kind of hoped it wasn’t the star bridges. That sounded like a chore. Oh well, I supposed I’d just have to trust her. It wouldn’t be hard.