Wish as she may with all her might, Trixxie's firm resolve to pull stings that ended with Zory not leaving at starcrest would soon prove to be her latest unanswered prayer. As starfall was beginning on less tainted horizons elsewhere, the promise of this event going well was feeling bleak too.
"I know you said you're excited and I am too…" Trixxie said as Zory grew harder to read than usual. "But is it the good kind of excited, like are you ready to meet them?"
The mostly makeshift family her parents had built around themselves were everything she thought that her and her older siblings ever needed before she met Zory. Not having to reveal anything about how they met was included in the deal of not having to tell anyone anything about the guest of honor until the grand reveal. As grand as it all seemed at first, the anxiety rolling of her favorite honorary aunt was almost enough to make Trixxie start to feel unsettled about this all over again.
Blaize's siren-fused smile was alluring to most but it certainly didn't work on empaths like Trixxie regardless of how many mood-altering substances were used to sell it.
"Are you ready to let me meet them?" Zory whispered as they began to cover the final stretch hand in hand.
Eluding to the fact that that Zory had already been willing and it was Trixxie that had never felt quite ready caught everyone else in the highest royal families off guard. They had figured being randomly presented before the Nine Crowns would be logical for just about anyone to be hesitant about. Her clearly unaffected and unafraid sort of composure created a mixture of both curious stares and critical glares.
Zory blinked rather innocently down at her young friend although her indifference to the amount of eyes and ears on them spoke to the fact she may be anything but. "They don't seem to be in a rush if you'd like to introduce me to anyone else first… Are you sure you're ready?"
"Mhm, come on!" Trixxie chirped brightly before freezing as she locked eyes with Blaize. "I just-?"
Zory gave a few playful swings of their arms as a gesture of warm encouragement that was enough to put a bit of pep back in her young charge's step. Trixxie had every right to be afraid to face this new final moment of truth given the fact that she had already made it clear she wasn't ever going to be ready to accept it. She had been throwing far too many eggs into the basket of introducing Zory to Nesterio from day one. It didn't matter who Trixxie introduced her to tonight, Zory simply had far bigger fish to fry elsewhere as soon as possible.
"Mari?" Trixxie beamed up proudly between them at long last as she brought Zory before the Nine Crowns. "This is my Uncle Nero… Aren't either of you going to say hello?"
The tension in the room surrounding the reigning champ of being the host with most not offering a greeting all yet had amused some and unsettled others. Where some saw distrust, others saw something that bred it anyways instead.
"Uncle Nero?" Trixxie fluttered her eyelashes up at him in an awkwardly deliberate sort of pointed fashion.
Nesterio Ezierzie was typically referred to as the crowning jewel of the Nova Alliance on multiple accounts. He was the effortlessly charming type. As the front runner for being voted as the most eligible bachelor left among Greater Zayin locals, he was even more of a household name than he had already been in most social circles for better or for worse. Many eager women found his light brown eyes more than the average level of swoon worthy, giggling to themselves about how they were the milk and honey of the promised lands. The reserved if not totally withdrawn and fully schooled expression Zory bore to convey a lack of similar levels of interest in him had caught him completely off guard from square one.
"H-Hello, L-Lady um?" He stuttered awkwardly. "Mari?"
"Now your turn, Mari." Trixxie whispered.
No one had ever seen him so blindly smitten before and no one seemed to have any idea why Zory was utterly immune to being easily Nesterio'd. His genuinely award-winning smile across multiple tabloids for multiple years in a row had not been returned in the slightest and he was clearly just a fish out of water regarding how coyly cold she was. Never had he ever stuttered like that in his life. Whatever sort of gravity there was in him knowing he was going to be stumbling all over himself regarding this woman perhaps forever, it was baffling.
"Not just a nod." Trixxie whispered again.
Zory was tempted to leave it at that and greet Blaize next.
"Mari?" Trixxie hinted softly.
Zory did dip her chin in greeting towards him slightly and silently as though the deeper nod she then offered down to Trixxie was not discouraging him further.
"As you wish, Your Highness." Zory relayed.
The small bubble of giggles that burst from her partner in crime at watching this otherwise surprising plot twist transpire was a dead giveaway for the fact they both counted on this happening. Blaize was at such a loss for why Vitale had known their guest would have such an obvious effect on Nesterio of all people, she wasn't even sure if cutting in immediately was what she needed to do.
"Hello, Nesterio." Zory greeted him with an elegant sort of reluctant politeness her next action didn't line up with.