Chapter Ninety-Seven

This time around, the inclement weather wasn't snow, but heavy rain and thunder. Even so, it would eventually give way to a rainbow overhead.



Anastasia attended her final fitting for her Tyler Wentworth-designed wedding gown. She had made her choice, and for once she was pleased with it.



After a week of questions about a set of pictures taken by an overzealous paparazzo at a private party, it was time for the speech everyone had been waiting for. Alexandra ended up addressing hundreds of cadets in the driving rain, with her grandfather Rudolph's stone statue standing forcefully ahead in the background. Whose idea was it again to have an outdoor ceremony?
"Each and every one of you is not here by accident," she began, her microphone-enhanced voice echoing through the air, with the slightest hint of her native Dutch accent. "You are here because you are the few and the proud!" Those opening lines drew thunderous applause, drowning out the rain falling from the sky.



Hoping that her voice would carry over the rain and thunder, she shouted in conclusion, after a fifteen-minute oration, "And so, cadets, future astronauts, it is our duty and our responsibility, to ensure the future of our realm, of other realms within our galaxy, and of galaxies yet to be discovered..."
Diplomat's daughters don't cry, but Alexandra, daughter of Hidden Springs' monarch and its highest-ranking diplomat, fought back a few tears after her speech.

Chapter One Hundred Twenty-One

To many people, Catarina Vanderburg WAS Hidden Springs. She'd been the monarch of the mountain municipality for as long as anyone cared or remembered.
When she became queen, she was a mere slip of a girl, the only child of King Rudolph and Queen Eloise Vanderburg - the former a respected scientist, the latter a great patron of the arts and learning. She lost both of them at an early age, one behind the other.
When she took the throne, no one knew she'd be there for sixty years. Or that under her leadership, Hidden Springs would grow from a backwards mountain village into a noted tourist getaway for celebrities and the rich.
To be sure, Queen Catarina had been a capable administrator who expected nothing short of perfection from her staff and her legislature. If she hadn't exactly been a beloved ruler, she was very much respected in Hidden Springs and the surrounding communities. The royal family's popularity was based upon mutual respect and admiration, and upon the Vanderburgs' good name.
However, over the years, events happening within the family began to erode at this popularity. First among them was Francisca's disappearance and the palace's subsequent reaction. Next was the new crown prince, Sebastian, and his playboy lifestyle. Finally came the behavior of the twins, which exploded and exposed the royal family's antics to a new generation of watchers.



Queen Catarina and her daughter, Princess Anastasia, hadn't seen or spoken to each other in almost a year. Anastasia had been known for giving the silent treatment to people she was upset with, but the year-long freeze with her mother had been the longest she'd given anyone.
Anastasia was a stunningly beautiful woman -- and she knew it. The princess of Hidden Springs, who had turned down a multi-year modeling contract, was looking as elegant as ever, wearing a stunning cocktail dress in her favorite color, white. Her jade-green eyes sparkled under expertly applied makeup and her jet-black hair was done in a stylish curly updo. She waited patiently for her mother in the formal dining room of the palace, where she'd spent so much time growing up. If she was nervous about seeing her mother for the first time in a year, she wasn't showing it.



"Well -- if it isn't my dahling Anastasia," began the queen, inspecting her daughter as she approached. The long-term monarch, her dirty-blond hair now fully silver, was sporting a new roller-set coif. "It's been a long time."
"Hello, mother." Anastasia brushed her dress and stood up straight.
"Marriage seems to have agreed with you, Anastasia," Queen Catarina grudgingly admitted while looking her over. "You've turned into quite the proper lady. I assume some things I've been teaching you over the years have finally begun to stick."



With Alexandra looking on, Queen Catarina reached for Anastasia and gave her a hug.
"When are you going to give me some grandchildren? And where is that husband of yours? I asked the two of you to meet me with them."
"He's teaching an art class over at Alpine."
"Ah, a cultured sort, isn't he?"



A few moments later, Queen Catarina also gave a hug to her other daughter, Alexandra. Over the past year Alexandra, unlike her sister, maintained relations with her mother, but they were strained, mostly over her sexuality. Ever since Alexandra publicly admitted to being bisexual, and numerous photographs were published in the tabloids of the princess with various women, Queen Catarina was conflicted over her own feelings about the matter. A bill was on her desk right now banning same-sex marriages in Hidden Springs. But she couldn't bring herself to sign it...



Now Queen Catarina was facing her daughters as women for the first time, these two women she birthed and raised -- and yes, they were indeed women now, with husbands and careers and lives. Different women though they were, they had arrived at the same place in their lives, the same place at this moment, facing their mother.
"I called the two of you here because I need to make an announcement. This announcement is sure to change both of your lives. You see, I'm an old woman, and my time here is nearing an end. I have cancer. I've been fighting it for awhile now. The treatments I've undergone at the hospital are not working. I've been a trooper as long as I could, given my subjects the appearance of strength. But I'm frail and weak. Just getting up in the morning has become quite a chore."
Just then Alexandra piped in. Barely able to contain herself, she asked, "Have you -- have you -- tried the water? From the spring? It's said to have mystical powers."



Queen Catarina let out a deep sigh. "Oh, Alexandra. You know, your sister went in search of that spring -- she never returned."
Anastasia replied, "You mean Francisca."
"She was sneaking out of the palace at night. I kept telling her it was nothing more than a fairy tale. Then after your father died and you set out on that mad quest to revive him --"
Alexandra was surprised. Her slate-gray eyes narrowing, she asked her mother, "What quest?"
"Alexandra Maria-Louisa. Do not feign ignorance with me! Do not think I've been living under a rock all this time! I know you disappeared at night looking for that spring. I know you spent hours in the basement with all those machines you have down there. Your father went behind my back and bought all that equipment -- even took the two of you to Comic Con one year. You don't think I know about your mad scientist baloney?"
"Mother --"
"Alexandra."
"I'm a full fledged astronaut now. Soon I'll be the first royal in space. Surely I could obtain spring water to help cure your illness."
"Alexandra, my illness has advanced past the point where a cure would help. It's a matter of time, love."

Chapter One Hundred Twenty-Two

The Vanderburg twins' next public appearance was at the SimsWorld TV launch party.  The girls' agent is in negotiations currently for their reality TV show to go into syndication. 

The twins had a blast at the party, hobnobbing with the Sims world's rich and famous.  Just about everyone who was anyone in the Sims world was there. 

It was also Anastasia's second public outing with her new bridegroom, Lucian.  Rumors of her pregnancy abounded as she showed up in a long, flowing ivory sheath. 

Chapter One Hundred Twenty

A weary Queen Catarina called for reinforcements. She summoned Crown Prince Sebastian to the palace.
"What's the matter now, mother? Another manufactured crisis?"
"Oh no," the Queen told him, "this one is not manufactured. It's all over the papers." She handed him the stack of magazines and newspapers and printouts of online articles.
The Prince laughed. That a sister of his was in the news for scandalous behavior was not news to him. Twenty years earlier, when Princess Francisca disappeared, the papers covered the story for three months straight.
Prince Sebastian's ex-playboy instincts kicked in. "So Alex banged a chick and the girl went to the press to brag about it. Big deal."
"Big deal?" shouted Queen Catarina. "Do you know how embarrassing this is?"



"Yes, embarrassing to you. Just like you were embarrassed when Francisca left."
"This is not about Francisca."
"Ah, but it is. The fact is, just like when Francisca left, this situation is making you look like you've lost control. And you have."



"Sebastian, your sisters -- I don't know what to say about them. They lie, they manipulate, they keep all kinds of secrets --"
"They learned from the best, mother. They learned from the best."
"Please, Sebastian. Talk to them. I can't get through to them. And you know their father, he worships the ground they walk on, so he won't discipline them even in ghost form. He never disciplined them when he was alive."
"Mother, respectfully, that ship has sailed. They're not children anymore."
Queen Catarina sighed with resignation. "I suppose you're right. I suppose the only hope I have is for them to grow up and mature like you did. Even if I'm not around when they do."



Tired of dealing with headline after headline, the palace hired Veronica Schofield, a leading crisis manager and public relations expert, to deal with the fallout from Alexandra's sexcapades. The longterm monarch broke down as she detailed event after event for Schofield. "I don't know where I went wrong with them," she confessed in reference to her twin daughters. "They're outrageous. Completely out of control. One of them, she's a skirt-chasing lesbian, and the other won't even talk to me."
"With Alexandra, how many girls do you think are there?"
"I can't really tell with her, honestly. She keeps so many secrets. Her and her sister both. They lie about everything. I don't know when they're telling the truth, half the time. I know of two for sure, the one at Anastasia's bachelorette party and this young lady from the article. The girl from the article even claims to have a video of them, you know, doing it. Neither she nor her sister have told me the name of the first girl. Anastasia won't even get me access to the guest list. I understand she's protecting her sister, but this is ridiculous. My contacts at the university have told me of a third girl, but that hasn't been confirmed and she hasn't come forward yet. And there was a young man at her father's funeral, but Alexandra won't name him either. We're not experienced with the twenty-four hour media cycle."
Reading through the headlines, Veronica said, "We need to get out in front of this, now. It's about damage control at this point. We need to know just how many other girls are out there, so we can keep them quiet."
"What are we going to do?"
"Well, I'm going to contact the young woman from the article. She's the one who says she has a video, right?"
Queen Catarina shrugged. "I guess."
"We have to get a judge to get some kind of order to stop her from releasing this stuff. Or at least pay her off."
"How much money are we talking about here?"
"Honestly, depends on her. The ball's pretty much in her court. All we have to do is respond. But we do have to get out in front of this. Alexandra has made a start with her statement that she hasn't had contact with her since leaving school. "





The next morning, Alexandra was in court trying to get an injunction against her ex-lover Tiffany Rich. She confidently strode up the steps of the Hidden Springs City Hall, almost certain that she would succeed in getting Ms. Rich not to release any more damaging media. Her new husband, Patrick, stepped right behind her, as well as Ms. Schofield, her agent, and her attorney.



While Alexandra was in court, Anastasia and her husband, Lucian, were enjoying a Simfest at a local coffeehouse. The pair were noted patrons of the arts in Hidden Springs, financing performers and sponsoring talent competitions such as this one. When one of the performers accidentally burned his hand, Anastasia herself poured cold water on it and herself tended to it while the next performer was going on stage.

Chapter Ninety-Six

About those pictures...Fort Starch Military Academy was the site of one of the most anticipated political speeches in recent memory. Adding to the anticipation was the scandal that ensued involving the leakage of photos featuring the keynote speaker dancing at her twin sister's bachelorette party with her arms wrapped around an unidentified woman. There were even more paparazzo and reporters around than usually follows political speeches.
For that reason, the timing of the photos' release could not have been worse.
In the days leading up to the speech, all anyone wanted to talk about was not the subject matter of the speech, but the pictures. The palace press corps did their royal best to try to quash the uproar caused by the photos, and they were helped by Anastasia's staunch refusal to release her bachelorette party guest list to the queen. "Her Majesty doesn't have to know who's at my parties! Unbelievable!" was her sharply worded denial of Queen Catarina's request.



However, no one had a bigger stake in the photos than Patrick, Alexandra's best friend of forever and current companion. And he had been conspicuously silent on the pictures -- until now.
"Who's that?" asked Patrick after the first wedding rehearsals.
"Who's what?"
"The woman in the pictures."
"I told you, that was Ana's friend, Valana. We shared a dance. I don't know why people are losing their heads over this."
"Because you're a princess and you're dancing with a woman. That's why."



"Well, they need to get a grip," Alexandra summed. "We only shared one slow dance, off of one song. We were making rounds, you remember that. They act like we're dating or something."
"You do like girls, don't you, Alex?"
"I thought I told you that, Patrick. I like guys and I like girls. I'm bisexual. I'm starting to feel comfortable with that now. There was a time not very long ago when that wasn't the case."



"Yeah, when you turned me into a boy." Patrick took a deep breath. "Alex, you're more romantically attracted to women than you are to men. Admit it. Those pictures confirm it. Those pictures don't lie."



As he spoke, he seemed to be on the verge of tears. "Alex, the way you looked into that woman's eyes as you danced, I've never seen you look like that before. At anyone. Not even me. Tell me, Alex, honestly. How do you feel about me? Do you love me?"
"Come on, Patrick, that's ridiculous, of course I love you."
"Like a brother, like a friend, or like someone you'd want to marry and spend the rest of your life with?"
"Oh, please, not this question again."
"It needs to be asked."
"Why? Patrick, we've been through the battles together. All the stuff with my mother, the kids at school, I mean, how could I have survived without you? We ran away on all those trips to the woods when you were still a stuffed doll..." Her voice trailed off. "When my father died, you were the only person I had to lean on."
"Alex, think about it. Ana and Lucian's wedding is just days from now. They're about to get married and move on with their lives."
"And I'm thrilled for them. Really, I am. But their situation is not ours. Ours is more complicated."
"Really? How so? They were only reunited fairly recently. And yet they're headed to the altar before we are. Tell me, what makes our situation so much different from theirs? Is it that you're having cold feet?"
"No, it's not that, it's just -- I'm just not ready. Marriage is a major step, a big commitment."



"Not that much different than what we are now, Alex, if you ask me. You committed yourself to basic training and flight school. You committed yourself to grueling college courses. So why, why can't you commit yourself to me? Come on, change me back to a girl if that's what you want and let's do this."

Chapter Ninety-Five

The Redwood Heights Luxury Lodge was a Hidden Springs landmark. It had been there, well, since Hidden Springs became a top destination for celebrities and the rich to kick back and relax. But lately the town had been losing ground to newer tourist locales such as Sunlit Tides, Monte Vista, Aurora Skies, and, lately, the new kid on the block, Isla Paradiso, which, ironically, was the rumored location of Princess Anastasia's honeymoon.

The city planning committee wanted to do something about that. They wanted to hire an architect to update and remodel the Lodge, to make it more attractive to tourists and locals alike. Who better to hire, then, than a native of Hidden Springs, with a deep understanding of its history and culture?



Princess Anastasia and her fiancé, Lucian, set foot inside the Lodge for the first time since being appointed to remodel it, and decided that indeed, a lot of work needed to be done to it to bring it up to date. Not impossible, she thought, but this place needs more work than I realized.



The views from one of the bedroom windows are spectacular.



Meanwhile, the palace press corps continued to try to lessen the fallout from leaked pictures of Alexandra dancing with a woman at Anastasia's bachelorette party.



The next morning, even Prince Renauld asked Anastasia about them. "Do you know the young lady in the photographs?" he asked her.



Anastasia's first and last instinct was to protect her sister -- at all costs. "No -- I -- I don't know who she is."



"Your mother is very upset about these pictures. She didn't sleep all night."
Anastasia laughed. "Well, she's the one with the problem. Besides, this is entirely ridiculous. I don't see why such a big deal is being made about pictures of someone dancing."

Chapter Ninety-Four

When the Vanderburg twins throw a party, it's an event, and it usually lands on the pages of the gossip magazines.



Anastasia's bachelorette bash was no exception.

Held at the twins' new estate in the Hidden Springs mountains, far away from the palace, the party had a guest list that read as a who's who in young Hidden Springs society, and even included a few of the princess' college friends.



Including one Samantha Grey, the rumored romantic interest of one Andrew Cheesman, Jr.



And designer Tyler Wentworth, rumored to be designing Princess Anastasia's wedding gown.



The first item everyone seemed to be buzzing about was Alexandra's new haircut. The soon-to-be maid of honor showed up with her blondish hair cropped very short, and wearing a slender black dress with a low-cut back.



After Alexandra's well-rehearsed toast to Anastasia and Lucian, the festivities really began.



First, the cake dancers entertained the guests with raucous numbers.





Then, after the dancers left, the guests entertained themselves with music and revelry.





Led by the bride- and groom-to-be themselves, the partying lasted well into the night.

Chapter Ninety-Three

Deep down, Anastasia was afraid. Frightened out of her wits.
She dare not confide her fears to the two closest people in her life, her fiancé and her sister.
With a week to go before her big day, she was afraid of everything going wrong. But even more so, she was afraid of being precisely the kind of mother her own mother had been to her.
Cold, distant, hypercritical. Too busy with matters of state to bother with her own children.
When Anastasia wrote letter after letter begging to come home from Smuggsworth after being mercilessly bullied, the silence was deafening. She received no response. She was forced to continue with her studies there, even though she hated it.
And, as she watched the snow continue to fall and the drifts pile high outside her window, she began to wonder if all she was doing was all worth it.
Was she getting cold feet? Was she even sure this was what she wanted?



As she picked up her new Persian, Duchess, a pre-wedding gift from Lucian, and stroked her, it was clear that she'd have to hold her nerve just a little while longer.



In the midst of her reverie the phone rang. It was the city planner's office.
Anastasia had had her run ins with the city planner, who like all the other government officials in Hidden Springs had been hand picked by her mother. "Hello?" she asked.
The city planner on the other end of the line waited patiently. "As you well know, Your Highness, tourism is the life blood of this town's economy, and the recent snowstorms have put quite a damper on that. We're hoping to revitalize the industry, and we've decided that a facelift on the old Redwood Heights Lodge would be just the thing to start with."
"What are you saying?"
"We've heard of your architectural abilities, Highness, and we'd like you to handle the job."
"Me?" she asked, with a mixture of glee and disbelief.
Gulp.
"If we can put a facelift on the lodge, we can bring the tourists back."
If Anastasia accepted the new job, would she have to postpone her wedding? And what would she tell Lucian? How would she even approach him?

Chapter Ninety-Two

When Alexandra arrived at the palace after work, her cell phone rang. She looked at her caller ID and was surprised. "AJ! I thought you disappeared off the face of the earth!" she laughed. "Maybe got abducted by aliens."
"Been busy."
Alexandra sighed. "Same here, actually. You know my sister's getting married in two weeks --"
"Who hasn't heard about that one?" He chuckled. "Been all over the news."
"Are you coming to the wedding?"
"Me? At a royal wedding?" AJ burst out laughing.
"Yes, you, at a royal wedding. Why not you at a royal wedding? I sent the invite, I surely hope you got it by now."
"Well, Samantha has to go cause she's one of the bridesmaids, but I told her --"
"Then you gotta come."
"I don't have to do anything but watch the whole darn thing unfold from my living room." AJ laughed again. "Best seat in the world. No screaming throngs, no traffic jams. Besides, weddings aren't my thing anyway. Particularly royal weddings."
"But funerals surely are," teased Alexandra.
"Hey -- I didn't know your dad's funeral was going on that night. I just, you know, happened to be in the area and I thought I'd stop by, I took a wrong turn --"
"Nope, it was the right turn," Alexandra grinned surreptitiously. "Listen, remember I told you that my mom made that ultimatum that my sister and I had to get married in 10 days or lose our inheritance?"
"Yeah, that was insane."
"I didn't get a chance to tell you what happened next. So, my sister and I, we came up with a plan to get mom off our back about marriage. We used this top secret formula, called imaginary friend metamorphium, this compound, which turned our imaginary friend dolls that we had since we were kids into real Sims."
"No way, that's impossible. Those things are plush, they can't be made real. My little sister and brother each have one of those."
"With this compound they can be made real. But there's a catch. In order for it to work you have to have built an excellent relationship with it."
"No way, not even." AJ whispered, "So, did it work?"
"Well, there's a wedding in two weeks -- you be the judge." Alexandra let out another chuckle.
"Does your mom know?"
"Of course not. We haven't told her. And I don't want you telling anyone else either."
"Hey, I'm pretty good with secrets."
Alexandra changed the subject. "I have a speech next week at Fort Starch."
"You -- speaking there?"
"Yeah, wild, huh? My brother asked me to address the cadet classes."
"Now that, I'd pay the price of admission to see."
Alexandra sighed. "It's going to be like every other address ever given at Fort Starch -- dry and dull."
"It doesn't have to be. Not with you giving it."
"I'm going to be halfway asleep at the podium, I'm serious. It's one of those state of the union type speeches. Ugh."
"Well, Alex, one thing you can do is, try to talk about something that catches your interest, that might also catch the ear of the cadets, too. Oh, and picture all the cadets in their underwear. That might loosen you up a bit."
Alexandra let loose a hearty, guttural laugh. AJ was good for that. "Oh my gosh, do you want me cracking up on the podium, too?"

Chapter Ninety-One

With Anastasia's wedding in two weeks, she hadn't done most of the usual preparations. And she was still without a gown. However, she'd narrowed her choices down to two.





Both elegant, strapless numbers, and both by one local Hidden Springs designer.



She hadn't nailed down a location, either, but she was looking at renting one grand ballroom for the day. (Author's note: This lot is on the exchange)



However, what she'd been doing plenty of is photo shoots, interviews, and media obligations.





For someone notoriously camera-shy, Anastasia seemed to take pretty well to the role of pinup girl and fashion plate. She turned down a modeling contract to go to architecture and design school, and while she usually preferred being behind the camera than in front of it, she was more than adequately photogenic.



With two weeks to go before the wedding, Anastasia summoned her psychic adviser, Valana Ayres. Miss Ayres had a colorful history. No one knew where she came from, but she opened up a psychic advisory practice in Moonlight Falls. One of her clients there was Sierra Cheesman, the teenage daughter of author-adventurer Savannah Plumb. Savannah found out that her daughter was seeing a psychic and had Valana run out of town.
However, Valana landed on her feet. She moved to Hidden Springs where she opened up a practice and was hired personally by Anastasia Vanderburg, Princess of Hidden Springs, after she correctly divined the location of her long lost imaginary-friend doll, "Lucky," who, of course, became her soon-to-be husband, Lucian.
Then, later, Valana hired Anastasia to redo the exterior of the house she was renting in the forests of Hidden Springs.
Somehow, incredibly, the pair became fast friends.
On this night, during a dinner party hosted by Anastasia, she confided to Valana that she was an absolute wreck preparing for the wedding.



"Being a wreck is perfectly normal for a first-time bride. Especially one who is as much of a perfectionist as you are. You can't ask your parents to help you?"
Anastasia shook her head. "My mother and I do not have a relationship to speak of."
Valana sighed. "I see. "Why is that?"
"The reasons are too numerous to go into here."
Nodding, Valana asked, "And your father?"
"He's dead," Anastasia replied sadly, "died last year."
"Oh, I'm really sorry to hear that, Anastasia."
"And whenever he was alive all he did was listen to whatever she said."
"Your mother is the Queen, if I'm not mistaken."
"And she wastes no time reminding my sister and me of that fact every day. Whatever my mother says, goes. She's the supreme law of this land, has been for sixty freaking years. My father tried, he really did. I don't fault him at all. He used to take me and Alex everywhere, and mom acted like she was ashamed of us."



"I have not met your fiancé, but from what you've told me, he seems like a terrific guy. I don't need to be a psychic to see that. If the two of you work at your relationship, I foresee a long and happy life for you."