Nora skipped dinner to catch the next bus from the palace back home. Even then, she ended up waiting at the bus stop, the chilled wind beating at her face for half an hour before the bus arrived.

She'd barely taken off her coat in the mudroom when Felicity appeared.

"Where have you been?"

Nora pulled off her scarf. "Does it matter?"

"I needed you here hours ago, and you weren't here. Is my career a joke to you?"

She tried to keep her voice flat as she responded, "I can assure you, "joke" is not what I consider your career."

"Then it better have been important," Felicity crossed her arms. "You weren't at Jostlin – their studios are closed over the weekend."

"The library's not," she pointed out in a way to cover herself.

Felicity snorted, "Only you would go to the library on the weekend. That's such a Scholar thing to do."

Briefly, she thought about pointing out that it was the studious thing to do and that people other than Scholars go to the library.

But she was tired, hungry, and really didn't feel like getting into it with her right now. "Let's just get this song together," Nora said. "I'll be down in the studio in five. Let me grab a bowl of cereal." She'd need something on her belly; otherwise, the recording would be crap and she'd be overly snappy.

"Whatever," Felicity said, then left.

Nora sighed and wished she was back at the palace with Eli, eating dinner with his family. Or listening to another song of his.

Having fun.

Although she loved music as much as she loved to breathe, it was these moments where it became a challenge – it was hard to enjoy something you were being told to do. Even harder to love something that you were being blackmailed into doing.

But as Nora went down to their home studio with her bowl of cereal and her laptop, she remembered her father, and the company, the legacy he left behind.

She would do anything for that legacy. She just wished sometimes it wasn't this difficult.

After almost three hours of rerecording and tweaking, Felicity's Daxton Cavenaugh contest entry was finally ready. Her laptop read 11:37pm when her phone buzzed.

Eli's name lit up on the screen, a goofy mug appearing with it. Her lip twitched when she saw it – he'd taken the playful picture when he'd saved his number on her phone.

Felicity glanced over the control board at the vibrating phone and did a double-take.

Nora quickly swiped the phone off the table surface and hit ignore.

But it was too late.

"Oh. My. Creator," Felicity was on her immediately, "Was that Eli Leonger?"

"No."

"Why?" Felicity's lip curled, "Why in Creator's kingdom would he be calling you?"

She shrugged and picked up her laptop, unplugging it from the studio system. "I don't know."

But as she moved to leave, Felicity stepped in her way. "You do know," she said, crossing her arms. "You've been hanging out with him, haven't you?" Before she could formulate a response, Felicity scoffed. "I didn't believe it." Her eyes swiped over Nora, assessing. And by the flair of her nostrils, she clearly didn't like what she saw.

Nora glanced down at herself. Was it her Kamree Philips t-shirt? The jeans? Her glasses? Her hair? The wind had done a number on her hair this afternoon. After swiping her fingers through it for the past hour and a half, she knew it was a mess.

"The girls at school told me you were hanging around with Eli Leonger, but I thought it was for that stupid chemistry project." Felicity shifted her weight from foot to foot, arms still crossed. "But, no one calls this late for a chemistry project."

"You don't know that," Nora said.

"You're right. I don't." Felicity got up into her space, her brown eyes narrowed down at her. "But if I ask you again where you were today, and you told me the truth, I would not like the answer."

Nora's body tensed. She stayed quiet, not incriminating herself, and began slowly wrapping her computer cord up to take with her upstairs.

Resentment churned like acid in her gut. The sane part of her knew it should not be like this. Other people did not have to justify who they hung out with and why. Just as others also didn't have to report to their stepsister on every little thing. She shouldn't have to feel guilty about who she hung out with and why. When her father was alive –

She stopped that thought cold.

"Why does it matter?" Nora asked.

Felicity's jaw tightened as Nora, now with all her things, turned to go. She left behind her empty bowl of cereal. She needed to get out of here.

"Because you're not the one who should be hanging out with Eli. I should. Do you know what that would do for my career?"

"I imagine that would do a lot of things," Nora said, her voice expressionless. Internally, all she could think about was Eli, and how he would feel if he'd heard this conversation right now. Was this what his life was like? With everyone only thinking about how he could further their own fame? Their successes?

She was already sick and tired of it. And she wasn't Eli.

Nora took a deep breath and counted to ten. "I'm not trying to steal anything from you, Felicity. I won't get in your way, I'm sure as hell not going to try and thwart any plans you have for Eli—" though she may very well try to warn him ahead of time. "If you want to hang out with him, if you want to collab with him, I will be the last person in your way." Nora stepped around her stepsister. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to bed so that tomorrow morning I can get up super early to work on your Winter Showcase piece."

Felicity let her leave.

❄︎❄︎❄︎

"You have to do something," Felicity said as she burst into her mother's study the next morning.

Mallory did not glance up from her computer as she asked, "why is that?"

"Because your stupid protege is going to ruin my career before it even gets off the ground."

Mallory clicked her tongue, her eyes scanning the screen as her fingers click-clacked over the keyboard. "She is Paul's protege, not mine. What has she done now?"

Felicity dropped into the white leather armchair across from her mother's dark oak desk and crossed her arms. "She's only just finished my Daxton Cavenaugh contest entry. Do you know how many people already entered? By the time the judges see my entry, they'll have already listened to a million other songs! How am I supposed to stand out if I'm last in their review?"

Mallory's fingers paused. She inhaled deeply and, as she exhaled, folded her hands together on her desk. Her deep red nails were striking against the off-white of her blazer. "I can get you a meeting with Daxton Cavenaugh," she said, "you can personally present your entry."

Her mother went back to her work.

Felicity worked her jaw. "That's well and good, but what's the use of even presenting it to him if Nora's going to overshadow me?"

"And how will she do that?" Mallory asked in a flat tone.

"She's hanging out with Eli Leonger. She's drawing attention to herself. It's only a matter of time before she tries to overshadow me."

At Felicity's words, Mallory stopped to give her daughter her full attention. "Eli Leonger?" Mallory's eyes narrowed. "How do you know they're hanging out?"

"They got paired up for a science project," Felicity scooted to the edge of her chair. "But mom, he called her yesterday. Voluntarily!"

Mallory eyebrows sunk together, her lips thinning - her planning face. That was when Felicity knew she had her.

"She hung out with him at the palace yesterday," Felicity said, driving another nail in.

"You know this for sure?"

"I have a friend who was outside the gates yesterday," Felicity dug around in her pocket and came out with her cell phone. She swiped along the screen and put the phone under Mallory's nose.

Her mother's knuckles whitened as she gripped the device. The semi-blurry photo of Nora getting onto a golf cart with Eli Leonger took over the screen. Blurry or not, one would have to be blind not to recognize Nora's stupid black glasses.

"We have to do something," Felicity said. "She can't just be out there running about. If my Musetunes number goes down because she's hanging out with Eli Leonger—"

"It won't," Mallory said.

"You don't—"

"It appears to me," Mallory interrupted, "that our Nora may be exactly where we need her to be."

Felicity frowned, "how could this possibly help us? She's messing around with him! Not working on my songs!"

"Eli Leonger knows a lot of beneficial people."

"We can't just ask him to get us places," Felicity said in a "duh" tone. "That's too...pushy."

Mallory's expression hardened. "Have you learned anything from me at all?" When Felicity opened her mouth to respond, Mallory pointed at her and said, "Don't answer that." After a deep breath, Mallory wiped invisible dirt off her pristine gold-cuffed blazer sleeve. "You can always get what you want, my dear. You just have to play your pawns right."

As Mallory explained their next steps, Felicity's smile grew.