Ranelle waited for Tassette to return. She had sent her younger sibling to fetch Kellette, so that they could try to determine what had happened to them. But when half an hour passed with no sign of the redhead, Ranelle sighed and went to search for her. A guard pointed her in the right direction (after looking at her bountiful bust with not a hint of subtlety). Ranelle found Tassette walking around the gardens, arm in arm with her betrothed, Crown Prince Julio of Estrellia. The couple paused by the fountain to kiss. As minutes stretched on without the two breaking apart, Ranelle gave up. Clearly, even if Tassette still knew her true self, she was so enamored by her new one that she would be no help.
Ranelle walked through the Palace, mentally going through the list of her siblings. She had already come across Lysabel and Aria, who were both fooled into thinking they were truly women, as had Kellette. She could try to talk to Gia, but Gian had always been the dullest of the octuplets, and she had no reason to believe that becoming a woman would improve her sibling’s smarts. Liira was off doing who knows what in the woods, and was useless anyways. The only octuplet left was Jaspry, though she didn’t know his new female name.
“Oh, thank the gods!” a voice said. Ranelle looked up. A young woman stood before her. She had long red hair tied in a braid, bright blue eyes, and an incredibly comely face. “Ranulf?”
“Jaspry?” Ranelle whispered. Jaspry nodded.
“Though I am apparently now Jaspra,” she said, sounding disgruntled. She looked Ranelle up and down. “Dammit. Of course I am still the least comely of us eight, even as a woman.”
“What do you mean? I am sure Liira, I mean Liiran, is worse than you,” Ranelle said. Jaspra shook her head.
“No. She has a fine figure. Yes, I may be slender, but I lack the curves that it seems everyone else inherited from our concubine mother,” she whined. Ranelle silently noted it to be true. Jaspra’s bust was not small, but it was not large, either, and her rear was flat. Her body was not the perfect hourglass the others had. Jaspra shook her head. “Anyways, I am so glad to have found someone who knows who we truly used to be.”
“Tassette, or Tassian, is the same.” Ranelle scowled. “Though she seems to have been sidetracked by the arrival of her betrothed. Crown Prince Julio.”
“Ugh.” Jaspra rolled her eyes. “He is a fine match politically, but physically? No thank you.” Ranelle blinked in surprise. Crown Prince Julio was widely considered to be one of the most handsome men currently alive. Then again, it was a well-known secret that Jaspry was interested in men, and the main reason why he was excluded from even more things than Liiran. It would make sense for Jaspra to find women attractive, given that Ranelle now found men attractive. In fact, some of the guards in the Palace had been so handsome, Ranelle felt tempted to flirt with them.
“To each their own, I suppose,” Ranelle said diplomatically.
“What do we do?” Jaspra asked.
“Why do you ask me?”
“You are older than I. And you are a witch. I am not.”
“True.”
“So?” Jaspra prompted. “What do we do?”