Chapter Text
The ball flies near Lonnie’s face, making a loud whoosh as it speeds by. Maybe a bit too close to her, considering three things: it's 5 pounds of solid stone, Lonnie is standing about 12 meters away from the goal, and the prince has a self-proclaimed perfect aim.
“Something you would like to say to me, Your Highness?” she asks.
Yes, her tone is hard. She just nearly got brained. If the prince thinks this is disrespectful, that’s fine. It’s been a couple weeks since they’ve gotten into a physical brawl.
“Perhaps you should be wearing your face shield,” the prince suggests lightly. Lonnie can hear the fucking smirk in the tone.
So that near-miss was definitely intentional.
“Shields are for wimps,” Lonnie responds. “I’m a behind-the-scenes person. Unlike you, all of my talent isn't in my pretty little face.”
The shield comes off, thrown in Lonnie’s direction. It doesn’t catch much air though, landing several meters short of her.
Usually that sign of aggression would lead to an exchange of blows. They’ve literally been scrapping since they were 6. But. When she glances at the prince’s face, she sees fidgeting ears and downcast eyes.
“Are you trying to pick fights for fun or is something actually wrong?” Lonnie finally asks.
The prince sighs and flops down onto the floor of the private gym. Nearby royal attendees look like they might rush over and provide aid until Lonnie waves them all off.
“She’s just being dramatic,” she explains, sounding bored.
“I am not!” Catra screams. “Last night was a disaster on par with a global crisis.”
So dramatic.
“The game’s over then?” Lonnie asks.
“You’re not listening to me!”
“Then, talk , Cat.”
Crown Prince Catra of Halfmoon, the second in line to the throne, straightens all of her limbs, starfishing on the floor and making a fart sound with her mouth.
“I had really high hopes for this one,” she says. “Decent family, good schooling, strong personality.”
“Gorgeous,” Lonnie adds. “I once saw her reduced to drooling when you entered the room. What was unacceptable about her?”
“She was so boring ,” Catra whines. “She’d actually been able to escape this dull land and somehow was still as vapid and insipid as all the other suitors.”
“You’re setting the bar too high. You can’t possibly think you’ll find a mate that’s every single thing that you’re looking for. Especially from the pampered pool of Halfmoon elite that you insist on choosing from.”
“How in Saz’s name am I supposed to meet other women?” Catra asks. It’s rhetorical, Lonnie knows, since they’ve had this circular conversation a dozen times now. “These are the only people in my social station. I can’t exactly just wander the streets and hope to meet a suitable woman. There’s criminals and thieves and con artists.”
“I think the same can be said for Halfmoon’s upper-class,” Lonnie mutters. “That’s your mother talking, by the way. The world’s not the big scary place she likes to pretend it is.”
Catra grunts. “Yeah? You try telling her that after generations of keeping us shut off from the rest of society.”
Lonnie has never envied the wanderlust in Catra’s blood. She’s perfectly content — there’s nothing that they want for inside the protection of the kingdom. Her liege, on the other hand, has never been able to look at the fortress surrounding them, witness the indifference towards her pleas to open access to and from outside lands, without feeling trapped.
One day, some poor soul will discover all of the weaknesses that Catra dug into Halfmoon’s barriers, its mountains and cloaking magic, while plotting her escape as a youth. Lonnie knows she'll get blamed. Queen C’yra always holds her responsible for Catra's worst behavior, since the prince is avoidant of any and all personal accountability.
“Perhaps we should bring in more help?” Lonnie suggests. “Professional matchmakers? Romantic rivals? Nosey aunties?”
“Cloudfoot thinks she's all of those rolled into one and she's already up my ass about this. I don't need more feckless dipshits crowding me.”
A throat clears nearby. One of the servants points out, just a minute too late, the older, distinguished long-haired midnight black Magicat next to her. In her gold doublet and matching tights, comically overdressed for the training gym, Cloudfoot looks even more ridiculous than usual. No small feat.
“Good afternoon, Minister,” Lonnie greets, straightening up out of habit. Catra pretends to salute from the floor.
Cloudfoot’s emerald green eyes narrow but she says nothing. Instead, she turns stiffly to Lonnie.
“Her Majesty requests your presence in her study,” she says, deep voice unnecessarily formal. “ Both of you.”
She turns sharply on the heel of her foot and leaves quickly.
“Well, congrats,” Lonnie drawls. “You've now ensured a marriage to the homeliest, dullest, most ill-fitting match that Cloudfoot can find.”
Catra nods sadly. “Like someone who whistles constantly.”
“That heiress with the awful laugh. Sounds like a wolf choking.”
“Cloudfoot's daughter who always proudly tells you the exact day that she last bathed.”
“ Cloudfoot .”
A throat clears again. Lonnie doesn't even bother glancing over. They're already screwed anyway.
Lonnie wants to change quickly into more formal clothes to meet with the queen. Catra knows this is a waste of time. It's an ambush in the middle of the day; getting dressed would just delay the inevitable.
So C’yra opens by slowly assessing them both with her eyes and frowning lightly at the very casual all-white sportswear.
“Royal Advisor D’Londra, is this how you let her roam the castle? No wonder she's still without a mate.”
The queen herself is dressed in a short black tunic covered by a blood red linen surcoat with gold clasps and a brown leather belt.
The queen’s study is a massive room of books and scrolls and documents. Somehow, her presence always rises to fill whatever space she currently inhabits, leaving little room for anyone else. Especially Catra.
She would be the spitting image of her mother – tan fur, lean body, voluminous curly brown hair – if it weren't for her eyes and her much smaller stature. The elders say Catra's blessed to carry one gold eye from the late King and one cobalt eye from her mother.
Catra's pretty sure this is just one more curse. Like how she's destined to die alone, unloved and bored to death in Halfmoon.
Across the room, Lonnie's trying to silently get Catra to say something in her defense. No sense in wasting more time than necessary here.
“What do you want, Big C?” she asks instead.
Seated at her desk, the queen digs her claws into the arms of her chair. Her face never changes though, a talent that Catra’s tried to mimic her entire life.
Minister Cloudfoot looks for a second like she might launch into a familiar lecture about respect and bullshit but both Catra and C’yra shoot her hard look until she wilts back into her corner.
“Fine,” the queen pushes out through gritted teeth, “let's cut right to the heart of the matter. You're marrying Neko.”
Horrible choice. Neko never trims her claws, for one, and the sound makes Catra so irritable that she once abandoned the girl in the middle of a clandestine trip to the town market just to be free of it.
“Why are you so unreasonable?” she asks her mother.
C’yra’s tail jumps to life and her blue eyes widen. “ I’m un- ”
She catches Catra's smirk and quiets immediately.
“No,” C’yra says firmly, pointing a claw at her daughter. “No more avoiding. No more absurd excuses. I gave you plenty of time to find a mate and you failed. You'll be 25 in less than 6 weeks. You're marrying Neko and that's final.”
Catra crosses her arms behind her back, idly shifting from hip to hip. She's the very picture of unconcern when she says, “Your traditions are arcane and idiotic. Only a fool would continue to blindly follow them without question.”
Lonnie winces. Catra imagines that she's already trying to think of new jobs that she could apply for.
Cloudfoot might faint. That would be pretty funny.
C’yra, however, is unmoved.
“Our traditions have provided for us for a thousand years,” she replies coolly.
“When I'm King, I'm changing all of that,” Catra tells her.
“Remember, my sweet young prince,” the queen returns, “fail to find a mate by your 25th year and you'll never be King.”
“This is so stupid,” Catra whines. “Her connection to the runestone is strong enough. She could just go into my mind and puppet me through all of this marriage bullshit.”
The two nude handmaidens bathing her pretend to murmur in sympathy.
“I pointed that out already,” Lonnie responds, standing fully dressed at the edge of the bathing pool. “She told me that she too was once a 24 year old asshole and she's not looking to relive it.”
“Lonnie, you're my oldest friend and closest ally. Tell me the truth – am I being insufferable and overly picky?”
“Yes,” she agrees immediately.
Catra sighs. “You're not making any sense.” She turns to the handmaidens. “No one understands how hard this is for me.”
One begins to massage her neck and shoulders, drawing a low purr out of Catra.
“If you don't get out of that bath and get dressed in the next five minutes, Your Highness, I'm pulling you out by your scruff. We have to meet your fiancée.”
Catra exits six minutes later, just to prove a point. Lonnie has to watch people clothe her and give compliments on the hideous robes and jewelry that are placed on top of her suit.
They're wearing similar dark brown tuxedos, a shade of the runestone, with jackets that crop high near their waists in the front and flow with long tails in the back, framing Catra's actual appendage. But tradition calls for Catra to be additionally adorned in gold and red robes in reverence to the Tiger’s Eye.
“I look like everyone emptied their dresser onto me,” Catra frowns. She moves stiffly, like she’s about 15 pounds heavier with all the extra material.
“I'll add it to the list of future decrees,” Lonnie tells her.
Catra formed this list when they were children. Lonnie suspects that she'll be deeply shocked when she realizes that her advisor has never once written a single thing down when ordered.
C'yra has gathered at least 200 of the kingdom’s richest, most connected, most influential citizens in the ornate, yet mostly sensibly decorated throne room. That's never stopped Catra from creating a scene before and Lonnie predicts it won't today either.
She's mostly excited about the party afterwards. Lots of single people will be devastated that Prince Catra is taken. Lonnie intends to mend several hearts tonight.
C'yra sits on her throne, much more successfully pulling off the formal look. Catra, seated next to her mother and mumbling with displeasure, has tripped on her robes twice already. Though her throne is much smaller, it’s still ill-fitting and her feet dangle, much as they did when she was a child. Lonnie’s fairly certain that she already forgot the decree on all future thrones to be built.
Neko’s family is introduced, two prominent businessmen, one orange with white spots and the other pure gray. They have kind smiles but Lonnie's aware that that hides lots of sins in Halfmoon's court. Catra barely acknowledges either of them but that could be a bad sign or the prince just continuing to be difficult.
Neko is the last to be announced. She wears a long-sleeved tight-fitting blood red gown that covers most of her light gray body and trails behind her on the floor. Only her head is actually visible.
Lonnie tries to think of counter-arguments to whatever absurd critiques Catra will come up. Neko's head shape is... charming? She does have lovely jet black hair and she’s always had a sweet face, ever since they were younger. If Catra complains about Neko’s white and orange spots, Lonnie's prepared to just call her insensitive and see how that lands.
Neko’s quite capable and will make a lovely future consort and that’s really all that should matter.
When they were teens, the prince dated indiscriminately. Now that they're talking about marriage, Catra suddenly has standards . Unsurprisingly, all of those standards seem to conflict and run counter-intuitive to each other. Cloudfoot pretended to take them seriously for about a minute until it became very clear that Catra wasn't even bothering to remember the list of traits that she's supposedly looking for in a mate.
Neko stops at the foot of the stairs leading to the throne. She bows appropriately, prepared to hold it until the prince greets her.
For a long moment though, Catra simply looks at her betrothed blankly. Neko doesn't do well under pressure apparently cause she just bows lower and lower the longer Catra observes her, until her nose is practically touching the floor.
Lonnie practices saying ‘At least she's flexible’ with a smile. Maybe Catra will be distracted and fall for that.
With a sigh loud enough to be heard throughout the entire room, the prince stands and carefully walks over to Neko. She bends only slightly at the waist, still not motioning for the poor girl to straighten up.
“I’d very much like to speak with you privately,” she whispers.
“She was thoroughly unacceptable,” Catra explains to C'yra and Lonnie. Her voice comes out oddly calm, all things considered. “Too... obedient . I've dismissed her.”
“You can't dismiss your fiancée,” her mother says. She's starting to dig her claws into her own scalp.
It had been a scramble to find Catra. After Neko’s sobs could be heard throughout the east wing of the castle, Catra simply disappeared.
At Queen C’yra’s insistence, General Tao, the beefy brown-haired hazel-eyed lug, led guards on a thorough search of the palace from top to bottom. Lonnie avoided the dozens of tan-clad dummies running in circles and merely tried to think like Catra. She wasn’t as fast or good at climbing obviously, being the only human in Halfmoon, but she was clever; instead of going to any place where Catra would find comfort, she went where the prince expected no one to seek her out.
Lonnie sent Catra’s personal guards on a search of rooms that the prince would never be caught dead in. The library. Her own study. The ballroom.
She herself headed to her own quarters, hoping that she’d find her friend there. It was her favorite hiding place as a cub. And Catra probably figured that her advisor was searching the towers for her, instead of giving up and taking a nap, which is really what Lonnie deserved to do after 20 years of putting up with this nonsense.
She was shocked to find the queen there as well, staring at a brown tail peeking out from underneath Lonnie’s armoire. Catra wasn’t quite as small as she used to be.
Lonnie was less shocked to hear Neko wouldn’t be a princess.
“This can’t continue, Catra,” C’yra says. “You don’t have the power to dismiss subjects, especially ones that I have invited to court. And, by the whiskers of Saz, come out from under there right now !”
Lonnie nearly flinches as the queen roars. She rarely yells, a sign that Catra has finally broken through her facade of royal calm. Catra should be scrambling to fix this. She is...not.
“She’s stuck,” Lonnie guesses, smirking.
C’yra growls, catching Lonnie’s eyes and motioning with her head towards the armoire. The queen is stronger and almost a foot taller than her – not to mention, made of magic – but an order is an order.
“I can hold a perfectly reasonable conversation from down here,” Catra protests. But when Lonnie’s only a step or two away, she hears scrambling from under the dresser, Catra’s tail whipping wildly in anticipation.
“I’ve blocked the door,” C’yra announces, just as Lonnie pushes against the side of the armoire, lifting the heavy object just high enough for Catra to escape. She makes for the window, sees her mother lowering to pounce, and settles for calmly dusting her clothes off with a feigned air of disinterest.
“Well,” Catra begins, as if none of that just happened, “I hope you’re both done being silly.”
Lonnie is stopped from throttling the prince by C’yra. They’ve long established that she has dibs when Catra finally pushes them both too far.
Catra must sense this. “I will fix this. Obviously, you two and Cloudfoot were going about this the wrong way, just grabbing random gays and hoping that they’d like me.”
“It’s our fault that you’re behaving like a spoiled terror?” Lonnie asks incredulously.
Though, in a way, they probably shouldn’t have indulged her so much, especially C’yra. C’yra, who was watching Lonnie closely like she could see that thought on her face.
“Yes,” Catra immediately answers. “I appreciate you admitting that. Anyway, I’ve decided to take control. The problem is Halfmoon – I'm familiar with the dating pool here and there's nothing for me. I don't want them, they don't want me. They have terrible taste.”
C’yra turns to Lonnie. “Light Paws would make a decent King with some training. I know he's only a second cousin but I'm pretty sure-”
“I'm leaving Halfmoon,” Catra interrupts, with great indignation. “I'm leaving and finding a suitable mate.”
C’yra’s tail twitches as she stares her daughter down. Lonnie watches her unsheathe and then sheathe her claws reflexively. Catra doesn't budge.
“No,” is all C’yra finally says.
“Uh, yeah ,” Catra returns. “There must be somewhere out the-”
“Absolutely not ,” the queen adds.
The prince continues, undeterred, “-re where I can meet a decent person with good intentions who won't bore me to dea-”
“I forbid it.”
“-th with incessant prattle about nothing! Some-”
“Am I just talking to myself now?”
“-place interesting and-and new where no one knows me and I'll find someone to be a-”
“I will disown you.”
“Princess!”
Lonnie looks between the two of them, both out of breath.
“We are only safe here because we are hidden,” C’yra points out, slowly and with near-deadly calm. “No one knows where we are. Hells, most of Etheria doesn’t even know Magicats still exist . Do you really want to risk your people’s safety just to traipse around outside?”
“The war has been over for decades,” Catra replies. “No one cares about us anymore. Lonnie says it’s not even that dangerous out there. You just made it up.”
One day, Lonnie thinks, she will have her revenge.
Today though, the queen turns to her, ready to attack.
“Your Majesty, I would never say such a thing. Consider the source! This plan is a complete surprise to me as well.”
C’yra narrows her eyes for a moment, letting this sink in. When she turns her attention back to her daughter, Catra has already quietly wandered over to the other side of the room where Lonnie keeps her reading and work materials. Catra unfoils an ancient map of Etheria, the most recent version that they have available, since they have little to no contact with the outside world , a fact that Catra seems intent to ignore.
“Now,” she mumbles to herself, “How to pick a destination? There must be someplace out there. Something bigger and brighter than Halfmoon.”
Lonnie snorts at the absurdity of this. Catra’s “plan” doesn’t even have a location yet. How typical. This is probably the first time in her life that she’s actually bothered to look at a map of their planet; she certainly never did in school, more interested in fantastical tales than honest depictions of history and the world.
Prince Catra gives a sudden trill. “ Bright Moon! What a dumb name. I love it.”
C’yra’s eyes burn through Lonnie. So she does the only reasonable thing she can think to do. She rushes from the room, calling for Minister Cloudfoot.
After Catra “details” her “plan”, Cloudfoot is silent for several seconds. In all fairness, she was coming up with all of this on the spot but it was rather inspired in her humble opinion.
She gets to avoid more of this marriage bullshit. She gets to leave Halfmoon. Her mother couldn’t yet kill her for rejecting Neko.
Now, if she could just get Lonnie to cooperate, everything would be fine. But Lonnie was refusing to speak to her, instead sticking close to Cloudfoot, of all people. Everyone was deferring to the old fool like she had the final say on anything.
Catra tries to rack her brain on all the things she could use against Cloudfoot. The minister is boring and deeply moral. The only concerns she truly has are propriety and decency and–
“I’ll have to be gone from Halfmoon for a month,” Catra announces.
From her seat near the queen’s desk, Cloudfoot’s black ears perk up. She crosses her arms and legs in an attempt to retain her composure.
“Obviously during that time,” Catra continues, “without Lonnie and I, Cloudfoot will be in charge of coordinating the wedding ceremony. And picking a suitable mate as a backup.”
Lonnie’s face is frozen in horror. “I’m coming too?”
“Of course.” Catra ignores C’yra’s low growl. “We’ll have to go undercover. I’ll need a human so that I attract as little attention as possible.”
She moves closer to Cloudfoot, surprising even herself with her ability to keep a straight face.
“It’s important that this trip is a success. Otherwise, I’ll have to marry someone from here...like your youngest daughter. Kittrina is single, right? I’m sure you’ll love having me as part of your family.”
“Your Majesty,” Cloudfoot says suddenly, steepling her hands as if she’s deep in thought. “I do believe that Prince Catra has exhausted all possibilities that Halfmoon has to offer. With adequate planning and precautions, this is likely the most viable option.”
She’ll have to bring Cloudfoot back a nice souvenir for making such a wise choice to side with her. Besides, a couple named Kittrina and Catra would be awful . They’d be divorced before the year was over.
Catra tries to make sure her smile is only medium-smug when she turns to C’yra.
“So it’s settled then, Your Majesty.”
“Far from it,” her mother replies. “I’ve offered women of station who know exactly what kind of arrangement they’re getting themselves into. You’re proposing that you’ll find a woman and get her to...fall in love with you? Agree to a marriage based on said love? In a month? In a world where you know nothing and no one? Impossible .”
Catra makes an undignified stinkface.
“Why the hells not? I’m charming and lovable!”
Cloudfoot has the decency to at least look away. C’yra raises a disbelieving eyebrow. Lonnie just looks sad for some reason.
“I am!” Catra screams, resisting the urge to sweep all of the items off of C’yra’s desk and prove their point for them. “Whatever. I’m also rich.”
“Unfortunately, to remain undercover, you’ll have to take very little money as to not alert anyone to your true identity,” Cloudfoot tells her. The older cat clearly takes some pleasure in this.
“Fine,” the prince says with a tight smile. Money’s not that hard to come by, right? They’ll just find some in Bright Moon and everything will be fine. She’ll leave Lonnie in charge of that.
Cloudfoot is apparently just full of ideas now. “I’ll assemble the Magicats who have been allowed to leave previously and have the prince and her royal advisor trained in Etherian customs.”
Oh, Gods. A group of scientists and life-long soldiers droning on about Etheria’s weapons and technology, like that matters to her at all.
“Sounds lovely,” she manages to mumble.
A little over a week, and several planes and vehicles to disguise their arrival, later, Crown Prince Catra of Halfmoon and her Royal Advisor Lonnie are left in Bright Moon’s most populous neighborhood with fake identity documents and only one suitcase each.
A sign overhead says “The Fright Zone”.
Everything smells like gasoline and industrial fumes. It’s all gray and overcrowded. The buildings are boxy and unimaginative, stretching far up towards the sky.
But! Snow is falling. It never snows in Halfmoon. Catra feels like a child in a novel and indulges herself in catching a snowflake on her tongue.
It tastes like ash. She rushes to spit it out. Her first instinct is to ask Lonnie to fetch a servant to bring her some champagne to rinse the taste out with.
There are no servants. Cloudfoot didn’t let her pack champagne. And Lonnie hasn’t really spoken to her in the past 5 days.
Nevertheless, Catra’s sure that amazing adventures await.
In the span of less than a minute, she watches an old woman throw dirty water from her 5th story window, hitting someone sleeping on the sidewalk below. A man punches another guy for seemingly no reason. A giant rodent steals a piece of candy from a baby.
Finally, Catra thinks, real life.