| |
What do hybrids need and how unfairly are they treated? From Sier to Thraves we collect more and more. It is a brave lycan hybrid who steps forward with the most brilliant of ideas. He suggests a central government I considered from the beginning. It’s time to consider it further and keeps my mind focused on something other than Ryel. I spend time studying each realm’s government. The more I learn, the clearer the picture. It won’t be like any of theirs, but something unique.
No one is calling for a change to realm governments, but we want to be represented. Navarin, realm of the fae, has a parliamentary monarchy where the parliament is a court of elected officials. Laws can’t be made by the ruling king or queen alone, but need the votes of the court. Thraves, Verboten, and Aradia are republics where officials are elected to represent each area of the realm and no one has all the power. Drakonia is a dictatorship without a shred of democracy. Sier and Canida are the most fascinating, as the people own everything and nothing. They have positions and jobs that benefit the whole and work as a collective. No one has more than anyone else in the pureblood world and everyone is taken care of. The governing bodies elected as a democracy that has little power. It is more for regulation.
I jot several notes on paper in the privacy of my inbetween and glance at the clear gel structure on my wrist, hoping it’ll light up and Ryel’s voice will speak in my head. It doesn’t and I can’t believe how hard I’ve fallen for her. The confident, powerful Cyrus who banished five hunters to parts unknown is a crumbling mess.
I attempt to push her to the back of my mind, even as my fingers still feel her soft flesh. It is in desperation and anguish I find my best ideas.
To be represented, we don’t need to be part of any realm government but will create a new one in the tiny realm of Provence with a council made of realm walkers, elected hybrids, and a select elected few from each realm to protect the interests of their realm. A government building will be erected in the center of Provence, and a shopping mall. Day traders will no longer need to pack and unpack daily. Each realm will have a store.
The elected officials, realm walkers, and hybrids will have their own realm. Provence. We can live there in peace and mediate real realm problems instead of mundane, conjured issues that can easily be solved on their own. It will truly be a realm for everyone. My dad nailed it when he said ‘purebloods are enshrined in their customs and expectations passed one generation to the next’. It is his faith in me that influences my vision. I will pull everyone together and we, the scourge of the realms, will unite the middle realms.
Their customs and traditions enshrined for posterity. It is time to put an end to it. The dawn of a new age. An era where everyone has equal rights and, given enough time as the realm leaders learn to work together through the bridge of the council, the veils and curtains can finally be dissolved. My concept is lofty, yet within reach.
My anger festers towards my mother and I rarely go home, communicating with my father almost daily. I hate her and Preston. Not because of what they did, but that my mother hates me because of her foolishness as if I was cursed not spelled. I see the irony, as I’ve always considered being a realm walker a curse.
The daggers and hate in her eyes and fiery speech concur that she thinks I am an abomination, hungry for power as a realm walker of two realms. A vile soul, an atrocity with a dark heart and malicious spirit. I can’t stand to be near her.
I am none of those things. In Lols I could have killed the hunters but I let them live and forbade them from harming again. I want peace and rights for all. I didn’t ask for more power than other realm walkers. In our cursed world, we know as the child realm walker grows their power increases and their parents’ power decreases. I have equal power of two, although I don’t truly hold more power than any young realm walker, I am simply more aware and in control. The others are improving their abilities, manipulating energy and matter with more precision through my guidance. They are tapping into the second heartbeat that thumps rhythmically alongside the heartbeat of every realm walker. I am a connection to something much larger and powerful than us.
In Verboten for the day, I’m bringing my idea to the lawyers. I take a seat on the soft green sofa, as Malcolm, a hybrid troll from Verboten, leafs through his notes in preparation for our meeting. He is Jine’s legal connection. Not only the friend of the family she led us to believe, but her father. Why can’t my mother be more like him?
Hybrid lawyers from every realm will be putting their minds together and sharing laws in their realm. It will be the first test of the tweaked comicays designed by a couple of young dragon hybrids.
If they work as they should, the devices won’t record the memory of the holocall or be traceable in any way. This has already been done successfully with regular two-way communication. It will be as if the conversation never happened. Our comicays light up on time and we depress them in unison. The holoscreen appears.
Are we good? I ask Tamre, the ice dragon hybrid. I hold up a finger for no one to speak until I have the all clear.
Is everyone present?
We are.
Then you are good to go. Nothing is showing up on the comover. I’ll stay with you until the call is over.
I put my finger down. “All is clear.”
Malcolm, Jine’s father, nearly melts as he releases the anxiety and clears his throat. “There are no laws governing a conglomeration of the realms. It is up to each individual realm to determine if something is a punishable crime. In Verboten, there are no laws against protesting and an obscure law protects it – freedom to speak one’s mind. Right to privacy is the law in Verboten that needs to be expanded to protect hybrids. The only law that might be broken in the protest is disturbance of the peace, but if the protest is done during daytime hours and no violence occurs then no law has been broken.”
“Our laws are similar but none safeguard, or have any regulations in order for, protesting. It’s something that’s never been done and therefore would break no laws,” a Thraves hybrid speaks. He appears more harvester than anything. I doubt his hybrid lineage is from a recent union, possibly a few generations past. Thraves isn’t home to many hybrids and the ones there hide in plain sight and mostly work at the CIU with so little blood connection to any other realm.
Their sentiments are concurred around the holocall as most realms have no laws for or against protesting or demonstrating. It simply is something that has never been done, or has a law somewhere in their history that protects it. In Navarin, of all realms, they have a specific law about the right to privacy in the home which broadly covers hybrids. They also, as most other realms, have a law against the birth of a hybrid. These laws conflict with each other.
Drakonia has the harshest laws, yet are the kindest to hybrids. They have no laws against hybrids since vampires are unable to carry and bear children. They do have laws about privacy and freedom of speech, laws that can be a problem if M’ra chooses them to be. As a dictatorship, Drakonians don’t really have any privacy protections except one; the right to privacy in their home, but there is a caveat. If a deed done under the roof of one’s home leads to the breaking of another law then it is punishable.
My head hurts with all the legalese, but we have to be sure we cover every base. Their next project, one we are already working on, is a declaration and design for the government we want in Provence.
Where are you? I need you in Thraves, the lieutenant’s voice rings into my head. I sigh, disappointed it’s him and not Ryel.
What do you need? My mind voice doesn’t attempt to cover my annoyance.
It doesn’t matter. We don’t question our superiors. Get over here now and figure it out! His grumpy mind words attest to his bad day. I haven’t been reporting in as I’ve been busy, jumping from realm to realm for meetings like the one in Verboten.
Rude! Tamre voices.
Precisely! I respond. I’d forgotten she was on the call.