Chapter 1

“Help me if you can, I’m feeling down.
And I do appreciate your being ‘round.
Help me get my feet back on the ground.
Won’t you please, please help me?”
-The Beatles, “Help!“

Hi, my name’s Susan Bailey. It’s been a while; how’ve you been? A number of things have changed for me since then.

I’m still the Permanent Third member of Troy and Julie Equals’ marriage, that hasn’t changed. Although, since we’ve been spending more time in San Finzione, lately, I’ve had to explain it a bit less. When we’re in Seattle, people don’t seem to grasp the idea of how and why our situation works. When we’re in San Finzione, people just say “Oh, they have a French arrangement,” and everyone gets it.

They’ve taught me the secret of mind-control, although Troy’s ethics lessons about it are a “for life” deal. They’re aware and supportive of the fact that, whether through a hyperactive imagination or borderline mental issues, there is a trio of women living in my head; two of whom are best described as aspects of my personality, and that the third makes me some kind of psychic. Yeah, I know psychics are bullshit, but two years ago, I’d have said the same thing about mind-control. I’m not out to make a believer of anyone; there’s this thing I can do, and I don’t have anything to sell you. Make up your own mind what it is, I’m calling it “psychic.” It’ll make more sense later.

Also, I’m no longer an employee of Inner Claire-ity Yoga Studios. After this thing that happened last year, I became what’s referred to as “independently wealthy.” It’s a common side-effect of being a loved one of Troy’s. I parted with the company on good terms. Claire accepted my oral resignation graciously, with a smile on her face. Then I got out from under her desk, finished out the day, and we concluded my exit interview in the showers after closing. She still comes by the house. Not as much lately, but that’s only because she’s been traveling back-and-forth to Mander Island a bit.

Troy and Julie aren’t here right now. (Oh, “here” is San Finzione, not our house in Federal Way like usual.) I’m sure you saw the news about Contessa Helena de San Finzione giving birth to twin boys about a month ago. Yeah, they’re great little guys; Vincenzo and Byroni, love ‘em. I’m sure you’ve seen them in the news with her lately. But have you noticed how it’s been all long shots or really short sound bites since then? Well, my unique position as a friend of La Familia Royale causes me to know a bit more about that than the average person.

Those are the Royal Twins, all right; but that isn’t Helen you’ve been seeing them with. That’s Rita Delvecchio, star of a sketch comedy show in San Finzione and the world’s only authorized Contessa Helena de San Finzione impersonator. (As far as we know, the world’s only UNauthorized Contessa Helena de San Finzione impersonator is a drag act in Berlin whose rendition of Reba McEntire’s version of “Fancy,” Helen says is “too damn moving” to send a Cease & Desist order.) Rita’s impression of Helen and her resemblance in the right makeup are so strong that Helen sometimes hires Rita to appear at events that she doesn’t want to go to but needs to show up at least. Since Helen has been missing since a couple days after they were born, Rita’s been filling in for her in public.

Well, not entirely “missing.” I’ve known where she is because of the aforementioned psychic thing. It’s this connection I have with her; one of the three women in my head that I mentioned is able to reach out to Helen. So far, just her, and mostly when one of us really needs it. So, I knew where she was and what she was doing there. The worst part about it was that I could have told our mutual loved ones who know about our connection when they came to me and asked. I could have told them “She’s living as a call girl in Paris, and here’s where she’s staying.” Two dozen of La Squadra de Ultimados, San Finzione’s elite Special Forces and Helen, Maria, and now the twins’ personal guard; would have descended on Helen’s location, probably snuck up and knocked her out before she could use her own ability to command them to go home and had her on a plane back to San Finzione within a couple hours.

Why I couldn’t is a bit complicated. Helen and I got off to a horrible start because, before I knew how to do it myself, she used mind control on me and it caused problems with us. So, in addition to the idea that using this thing between us to track her down when she wants to be alone would have felt like violating a trust, it also felt to me like a petty revenge for something we’ve moved past. (And I’m no one to comment on anyone else’s mental issues. Helen needed to get away, more than anything in the world. I absolutely understand that.)

As a result, this past month of hanging around a castle hasn’t been as much fun as you’d think. Even fewer people know about our connection than know about the fact that the four of us can control minds. The ones who know also know about my past with Helen and have tried to be understanding about my reasons why I couldn’t just tell them everything. But of course, there was some tension involved. Troy and Julie understood completely why I didn’t feel comfortable telling them any more than that she was alive and didn’t want to be found. He’s a smart guy, and eventually figured it out on his own. Maria and Ramirez wanted me to tell, and I’d heard that Capitan Ortega was ready to put me under the hot lights and sweat it out of me before Troy had a word with him. Things have relaxed now that he and Julie have found Helen and are bringing her home after the weekend.

That leaves me, as the only person remaining in San Finzione who can both control minds and speak Italian, to deal with La Familia de San Finzione. You see, Contessa Helena de San Finzione was born Helen Parker in Anchorage, Alaska. Her late husband, Count Vincenzo Ramon de San Finzione, forever does he reign in our hearts; (It’s customary to say that when you talk about him. Helen says he deserved it. Look him up some time, he was a great guy.) had been the patriarch of a once-proud royal family. He’d done so well for them and his country, in fact, that his children and grandchildren became idlers and fell prey to the excesses of the idle rich. Helen told me that something he said to her in private once was “Lamborghini and Cocaine have killed more San Finziones than the entire Renaissance.” It was so bad that by the time she met him, the royal line was down to the Count and his great-granddaughter, Lady Maria.

Oh, there are other members of La Familia de San Finzione, but Maria was the last of the royal line before the twins were born. Because Helen refuses to remarry unless she can somehow marry Troy, (Most of Helen’s rules have an “except for Troy” clause.) they’re still Vincenzo’s heirs, bear the San Finzione name, and go into the line of succession after Maria. This is good for everyone, because from what Helen told me, if she hadn’t happened to have the power to control minds to keep them in check after he died, the country would have been torn apart by La Familia’s petty political schemes and power plays.

They’re the kind of people that you hear so many bad things about that you can’t possibly believe them all, then you meet them and find out they hadn’t even scratched the surface. Someone cruel, who didn’t know that Helen was seriously trying to make amends for the things she’s done in her past, might say she fits right in. To Maria, though, they’re still her family. Maria is a dear friend as well. She’s as much of a warm, genuine, friendly person as she appears on TV. That makes her a great friend, but all La Familia see is a target or potential pawn. She’s not entirely; I mean, she’s had The Count and Helen’s guidance her whole life. She even filled in as Contessa-in-Reggenza last year after Helen was attacked, and then a couple times during her pregnancy. (They put a Transfer of Power ceremony together for The People the first time it happened. Now, it’s more like when wrestlers tag in and out of the ring.) But Maria’s someone who needs to be protected from her own family, and Helen knows all about that. The Parker family wasn’t a particularly nice one, either.

That’s why, when Suzy-Q came back from her last visit to Helen’s mind having promised that I’d look after Maria until she did whatever she needed to get through this, I was stuck. I don’t have control over Suzy-Q, however, she’s a part of me. She’d make the same choices that I would in any given situation, so if she makes a promise, that means I’m bound to keep it. I figured I owed her that for Suzy-Q not warning Helen that Troy and Julie were in Paris looking for her. I mean yeah, she doesn’t want to be found, but I want her to come home safe, too.

Maria’s no child, though, despite her media nickname of “Little Maria.” She was one of those TV Princesses growing up, when they gave her the name. Now that she’s 23, taller than some men I know, and always scores second only to Helen herself in “Most Bangable Royal Babes” online polls, (And that’s mostly because nude pictures and videos of Helen are out there to be found online, because she’s put them out there to deflect the media away from things before.) the name is used mainly by La Familia, internet creeps who had countdown clocks on their websites for the moment she turned eighteen, or people using it ironically. It’s been a bit hectic at the castle, having Maria secretly in charge while Rita plays Helen for the cameras. With the news that Troy talked Helen into coming back, things have relaxed, and I got to have an evening out last night with Colleen Sullivan, a friend we met through Helen on my first trip here.

Evenings out in San Finzione are too damn fun. By design. The country acquired a tech sector and a film industry within the past year, due to some events that we played a role in; however, their primary post-World War II industry has been tourism, because San Finzione’s unique geographical position gives them year-round beach weather. A close second is the wine industry because year-round beach weather also means year-round wine season. If you ever go to a market in San Finzione and they tell you they’re out of grapes, they REALLY don’t like you, because they have plenty and it’s a very friendly country by force of economic need, so you must be a real dick.

This means that if you go to the right places, which Colleen knows now that she’s a local, the drinks range from free to “we’ll pay you pretty ladies to stay and drink and dance longer.” We decided not to take the emerald-green iPads that would have identified us as “Special Friends of La Contessa” and gotten us the red-carpet treatment everywhere. The evening out became a blur that ended up a Colleen’s Place-colored blur, that became a roughly naked Colleen-shaped blur that became darkness, and then a pounding in my head. Once the darkness was replaced by too much light, I realized that the pounding wasn’t in my head, but on Colleen’s front door.

Carefully trying to keep any more light than absolutely needed from entering my eyes, I looked over at the naked top half of Colleen snoring next to me. Her bottom half was enclosed in some kind of mermaid’s tail costume that I don’t recall her getting into at any point. I registered that I wasn’t wearing anything as the pounding on the door made plain that it had no plan to stop on its own any time soon.

I whacked Colleen with a stuffed leprechaun I found amongst the pillows. That got me a muttered “feck off,” and I worked the math of my being able to wake her up to answer her door, her being able to either get out of the mermaid tail or get to the door in it and realized that the problem was now mine. I found my panties and nothing else. Holding the leprechaun to cover my breasts, I found my way to my feet and started navigating out of her bedroom and to the front door.

A guy in his late teens wearing a servant’s uniform had been the source of the knocking. In the hand he hadn’t been knocking with, he’d held some clothes that he’d found coming up the steps that I admitted were mine and took back from him.

“Lady Maria urgently requests your presence at the castle, Signorina Bailey. There is a car waiting.” He said before I could come up with a decent angry reply to the knocking. I’d seen him at the castle before. I think he was a page. Did they still have pages? Maria can’t send Jeanne to do everything. I muttered that I’d figure the clothes thing out and shut the door. I found something for my head in Colleen’s bathroom, did a brief clean-up, and put my clothes back on. There was no waking Colleen to say goodbye, and no time to leave a note, so I put the leprechaun next to her. She shifted, flopping her tail, and hugged it as I stepped out into the San Finzione daylight. Whatever Maria needed, it couldn’t have been as bad as that felt.

“It is horrible, Susan.” Lady Maria Louisa Francesca de San Finzione said to me when I got to the castle. The stuff from Colleen’s medicine cabinet had started working on the way here. Something from Jeanne’s beverage cart helped with the rest by the time Maria was free to see me.

Jeanne Carpentier was Helen’s personal maid; and when Helen was away and she was in charge, Maria’s. (There are special reasons that Helen picked Jeanne for the job, but I’ll let others tell that story.) The first time we met, we didn’t share a common language, so she was a complete mystery to me. Since then, we’ve both learned Italian, and I’ve gotten to know Jeanne a bit better. She seemed pretty stiff and robotic to me when we first met. I’ve learned since that this is a fetish of hers, which makes her a natural choice to work for a woman who’s attracted to other women and also able to take control her mind and fulfill that fantasy. (Hey, no judgment here. Last night, Colleen asked me to ravish her on the deck of a pirate ship. I don’t recall if the mermaid tail came before or after that.)