Prince of Gulbrania

by Lauren M. Flauding

  “Ah, I see where this is going,” I said, recalling the plot lines to a dozen or more action movies. “If that stuff gets into the wrong hands, the whole world could end.”

  “Pretty much,” my mother replied.

  I raised my eyebrows, surprised that she had agreed with my facetious statement. This was getting serious.

  “Anyway, in order to get to the Gulbranak, the Jumerum had to go through our family, or more specifically, you and your father, as the access to the Gulbranak is passed down through the male line.”

  “Naturally,” I said, still having no clue what she was talking about.

  “After a couple of years in Indiana, your father was nearly killed by one of the Jumerum, and we realized the situation was far more severe than we had imagined. It became necessary to take more dramatic measures. Your father left and was concealed in Gulbrania, while you started taking the dissimulating capsules.”

  I stared at her. “You mean the pills?”

  “Yes. You don’t have liver disease.”

  I opened my mouth, but she cut me off before I could say anything.

  “The capsules masked your DNA. They disguised you to keep you safe from the Jumerum, but this...” she gestured at me, “is who you really are.”

  I got the feeling she was referring to more than just my recent transformation. “And who am I?”

  She smiled. “You’re the prince of Gulbrania.”

  Return to

  Gulbrania

  Prince of Gulbrania

  Book Two

  By Lauren M. Flauding

  © 2019 by Lauren M. Flauding

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the author.

  Chapter One

  Kayla

  They called him Frog. For years he had endured the most vicious pranks and bullying at the hands of his relentless classmates, even though he was kind, funny, and oddly intriguing. A month ago, Frog disappeared, and everyone forgot about him. Nobody cared that he was gone. Except me.

  “Hey Morrison! Look up!”

  The warning came a millisecond before the volleyball hit me in the face. Coach Hartwell blew her whistle and walked briskly up to me.

  “Morrison,” she said sternly, “why don’t you sit out for the rest of practice? Maybe if you watch long enough you’ll remember how to play the game.”

  I shrugged and walked over to the bleachers while another girl took my place. I felt strangely unconcerned by Coach Hartwell’s comments. I should have been offended, or at least motivated to pay attention, but I felt none of these things. I just sat there and watched the rest of my team go through various drills and plays, keeping my mind almost blank, which was a skill I had mastered over the past few weeks. There were really only two things that disturbed my apathy these days. A nauseous feeling whenever I saw Wyatt Brooks, and a subtle longing whenever I thought of Frog.

  It seemed like it had been ages since I had last seen him. I went over that day in my mind often, that evening when I had come to free him from the display case. It was impossible to forget the bizarre attraction I had felt for him and the overpowering emotions that ran through my body when I kissed him. When he didn’t show up for school the next few days, I thought he was sick. I called and texted him a dozen times, but he never responded. After about two weeks I gave up trying to contact him, but I still wondered what had happened to him. A small part of me thought it might have had something to do with me kissing him. It was a little ridiculous to imagine that I had that kind of power over him, and yet...

  “Okay, Morrison, what’s going on with you?”

  Coach Hartwell’s gravely voice interrupted my thoughts. She stood in front of me with her hands on her hips and an impatient expression on her face.

  “Maybe I’m getting sick,” I responded with little conviction.

  Coach Hartwell cocked an eyebrow. “Well, if that’s the case, you’ve been getting sick for the past three weeks. You’re usually our best player, but lately you’ve been a limp rag. You’ve lost all your focus, all your drive.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut. It was true. Lately I’d been slipping in all my activities. I had delegated a lot of my student government responsibilities to Sadie Garrett, my Junior class vice president, I was beginning to fail in my schoolwork, and I had quit the debate team. I told myself I had done it because my mom needed more help at the diner, but really I knew it was because I didn’t want to interact with Wyatt.

  “I’m sorry,” I said finally. “I’ll do better next week.”

  Coach Hartwell shook her head. “Morrison, if you don’t get it together soon, you’re off the team.”

  I watched her walk away, trying to find some spark of incentive, something that would spur me to action so I could counteract her threat, but I felt nothing.

  *****

  “You’ve all fallen behind in the past month, and we have a lot to cover, so be prepared to work hard.”

  I stared, glassy-eyed, at Mrs. Meekum, our new chemistry lab instructor. Mrs. Clements was still on suspension because of that fiasco where she nearly blew up the lab, and for the past few weeks we’d had a substitute that mostly showed us old chemistry videos. The lab was crowded since the two classes were still combined, but even with so many students in the room, there were two empty chairs. One was next to me where Miranda used to sit. She was now practically sitting on top of Wyatt, whispering in his ear while he looked smug. The other empty seat was in the back of the room, next to Milo Kowalski, where Frog used to sit.

  “I’m going to give you a series of take home assignments that I expect you all to finish by next Friday,” Mrs. Meekum continued, walking around the tables and handing thick packets to each of the students. I leafed through the stack of papers, noting that I would probably do none of the assignments. Just then, the vice principal, Mrs. Youngblood, came through the door.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, Mrs. Meekum, but could I borrow you for a second? I just need you to fill out some quick paperwork.”

  Mrs. Meekum gave us a stern glare and then followed Mrs. Youngblood into the hallway. As soon as she was gone, the classroom erupted into murmurs and groans about all of the homework Mrs. Meekum had given us. I pretended to study a poster on the wall, keenly aware that I had no one to talk to. Suddenly there was an outburst of giggles from the other side of the room. I turned just in time to see Wyatt tickling Miranda. As she tried to squirm out of his clutches, she lost hold of her pen and it rolled back near Milo’s table.

  “Oh, Milo, would you mind getting that for me?” She asked sweetly.

  Milo frowned for a moment, then shrugged and started to retrieve the pen. But as he leaned over, his chair came with him and he collapsed on the floor. Miranda and Wyatt burst into laughter, and more students joined in as Milo struggled to get upright with the chair stuck to his pants.

  “Oops, sorry Milo,” Miranda said with a mischievous smile, “I forgot that I spilled super glue on your chair earlier.” She held up the tube of glue, which caused everyone to laugh louder.

  I felt sick. I’d noticed in the past couple weeks that Milo had become a victim to the pranks that had usually fallen on Frog, and he wasn’t handling it well. He had turned bright red and was gripping the side of his table, as if trying to keep himself from losing control. Looking at him, I was filled with sudden indignation. For the first time in weeks, I was motivated to take action, to do something I’d never had the courage to do before. I stood up quickly and stomped over to Miranda and Wyatt.

  “Stop it,” I hissed, leveling a nasty glare straight at Wyatt.

  Most people stopped laughing, but Wyatt continued to smile at me. “Or what?” He asked. “You’ll make us all decorate for the next dance?”

  There w
ere some snickers around the room at his comment, but I ignored them.

  “No, but I might put you on display,” I said meaningfully.

  Wyatt stood up, his eyes roving over my entire body before he looked back up at my face. “I should have known you’d try defend him,” he said lazily. “Everyone knows you have a soft spot for losers.”

  “I guess that would explain why I dated you.”

  Some people gasped, but Wyatt just gave me a familiar smirk. The events of the homecoming dance rushed back into my mind, and I stepped back. His overt confidence made me lose some of mine. Thankfully, at that moment the bell rang, and the tension broke as everyone started heading out the door. Miranda shouldered me as she walked past, but it was Wyatt’s haunting sneer that affected me the most.

  I turned around and saw Milo ripping the chair off of his pants, losing one of his back pockets in the process. He looked at me and gave me a sad smile, and as our eyes met I thought I could guess what was going through his mind. I wasn’t the only one who missed Frog.

  Chapter Two

  Frog

  If anyone ever tells you that being a prince is cool, you should punch them in the throat. The past month had been one of the most rigorous, exhausting ordeals of my life, and there were a few nights that I sat awake in bed actually wishing I could be back in my high school gym class. I mean, sure, I’d suffered a lot of humiliation in there, but at least humiliation didn’t keep you up at all hours of the night and make every part of your body writhe in pain.

  The last month had been torture. Literally. My parents and their royal friends had decided it was necessary to put me through every kind of agony imaginable in order to build up my resistance to the Jumerum.

  “Someday they’re going to capture you,” my father had said in not so fatherly tones. “And they’re going to torture you until you give up the key to the Gulbranak.”

  So I had been held under freezing cold water, pummeled by the biggest guys Gulbrania had to offer, burned by hot coals, left alone in dark caves for days on end, and forced to watch every episode of The Brady Bunch. When I wasn’t being used as a human experiment in pain, I was training with Sir Almighty Pants. (Okay, his name was actually Sir Alm Hetapats, but my secret nickname for him was one of the few pleasures I had left in life.) He spent countless hours teaching me fencing, marksmanship, and martial arts. I had actually thought I was pretty proficient in martial arts, but the multiple bruises on my backside proved otherwise.

  To top it all off, I was being tutored by Zane, my 12-year-old former neighbor and bodyguard. It was really a blow to my self esteem to have to be instructed by a prepubescent kid who spent his free time making sculptures out of baked potatoes. Apparently he’d been a citizen of Gulbrania all along and was shipped over to the States a few years ago to keep an eye on me in Indiana. I spent my evenings being drilled on all the different aspects of Gulbrania: its history, its government and trade, its resources, and its enemies. Zane had smothered me with what seemed like a million diagrams detailing all the properties and applications of Gulbranak, the powerful mineral mined from the ocean floor that the Jumerum wanted to get their hands on so they could take over the world or something.

  The Jumerum. Just thinking about that stupid organization made my entire body tense up. They were evidently on a mission to ruin my life. They had killed my grandfather, and because they had almost killed my father he had left my mom and me in Indiana to hide out in Gulbrania. Meanwhile, my mom lied to me about everything, pretended I had a liver disease and made me take something called dissimulation capsules to disguise me from the Jumerum. Yeah, my life was pretty messed up.

  I rolled off of my ridiculously huge bed and rubbed my temples. It was four in the morning, but I was wide awake. I started pacing my room, which was housed in the castle’s tallest tower. It all seemed a little cliche, but nevertheless, I was starting to get used to this place as my new home. I had hardly left the castle since I had come to Gulbrania, and while I was a little disappointed by how archaic it all was (you had to flush the toilet with a bucket), there were some things that were actually pretty cool. Like the secret passages that tunneled between all the rooms, the awesome kitchen with every cooking device imaginable, and an observatory that was equipped with huge telescopes. My own room was big and circular, encased in big stones and rough wood, with large, arched windows facing the sea below. I glanced at the windows, caught sight of my reflection, and flinched.

  I didn’t know if I was ever going to get used to the way I looked, even though it was my natural appearance. I had spent ten years looking like a scrawny, spotted geek, so it was still a little shocking to pass by a mirror and see something akin to a male model. I peered past my reflection and out to the dark cliffs and ocean waves below. I hadn’t ventured far from the castle because I had been so busy with torture and training, but it didn’t really seem like there was much more to Gulbrania than the governmental buildings surrounding the castle and a few villages along the coast. I hadn’t seen a whole lot of inhabitants on the small island. The most activity I saw was people going out in boats that never seemed to come back.

  I don’t know how long I stood there staring out the windows, but I noticed the sun was starting to come up when someone knocked on my door.

  “Come in,” I called, still facing the windows.

  “Hey Freddy!”

  I tensed. It was too early to deal with Zane. I closed my eyes until I sensed that he was standing right next to me. With some effort I turned toward him. “What’s going on?” I asked, attempting to sound friendly and failing.

  Zane held out a duffel bag. “The concealment team was able to save some of your stuff before the Jumerum ransacked your old house,” he said. He set the bag on my bed and walked out of my room. I raised my eyebrows. That was the shortest conversation I had ever had with Zane. Maybe he wasn’t a morning person.

  “Oh! And one more thing.”

  I jumped as Zane’s head appeared through the door.

  “I put some googles in that bag for you. Be prepared for a Gulbranak demonstration tonight. It’s going to be awesome!” He smiled gleefully and then disappeared again.

  I sighed and crossed to my bed, dumping out the contents of the duffel bag. There was a high tech looking pair of googles, as well as a couple shirts that didn’t fit anymore, a few books and papers, and my cell phone. I swallowed hard as I picked up my phone, which seemed almost foreign now that I’d been without it for a month. I turned it on, surprised that it still had some battery life in it. I scrolled through some texts from Milo, feeling awful that I hadn’t been able to respond to him and that I had left him to fend for himself in that stupid high school, but what really got my emotions twisted up were all the texts and missed calls from Kayla.

  To say that I hadn’t thought about Kayla Morrison would be a lie. There had been a few nights when she filled my mind so completely that I could almost imagine she was there in front of me. The memory of her kiss still made me a little feverish. And yet, all of my experiences in Indiana seemed like they belonged to someone else, and on some level, they did. I was a different person now, with a different body and different responsibilities. I felt numb as I read through Kayla’s texts. There were several asking me if I was alright and where I was, and one where she told me that we had gotten an A on our world cultures project, even though I hadn’t been there to present with her. The last thing from her was a voicemail, and I pressed the button to listen to it.

  “Hey Frog, I, um... really hope you’re not dead, that would be awful.” There was a pause as she took an unsteady breath. “Look, I just want you to know that if I did anything to offend or hurt you, I’m really sorry. I’m going to stop bothering you with all my texts now, because you never respond, but if you ever get a chance, give me a call. I... I miss you.”

  My heart was pounding in my chest. Saying that she missed me was almost as good as her saying that she loved me. For a moment, I was tempted to call her back, to tell
her everything, but I hesitated. I could tell her all about what had happened to me and who I was and where I was, but then what? Would she even believe me? Would I be able to prove I was telling the truth? Plus, she was never going to come to Gulbrania, and I didn’t know if I would ever make it back to the States. I could call her, but what would be the point?

  I tossed my phone in the duffel bag and fell back on my bed, cursing the Jumerum for making my life so complicated. If I had stayed in Indiana, if I had stayed the way I was, I might have actually had a shot with Kayla Morrison. She might have fallen for that skinny, nerdy guy that I used to be. Now I looked like a movie star, and I didn’t stand a chance with her. Yep. My life was definitely messed up.

  Chapter Three

  Kayla

  “Hey Kayla, while you’re at it, could you make a grilled cheese for table four?”

  “Sure,” I replied, still staring at the hamburger patty sizzling on the grill. When I finally looked up, my mom had already gone to the front counter to greet more customers. I sighed as I assembled the hamburger and started buttering two slices of bread. I had come to the diner early that night because I didn’t want to be alone at my house. I told my mom I had already finished all my homework, which was a big lie. I hadn’t done my homework for weeks. So I had washed all the dishes that were waiting for me, and when I finished those, I had decided to make myself a hamburger. Frank, the fry cook, was on break, so I guess my mom had decided to utilize me at the grill while he was gone.

  I was about to flip the grilled cheese when I heard someone say my name.

  “Kayla?”

  I looked up and saw the school’s student body president, James Huckston, and his girlfriend on their way out of the diner.

  “Hey,” I replied softly.

  “Do you... work here?” He asked, raising his eyebrows.