Chapter 18: Chapter 18

“She’s fine. I already have doctors check on her. She’s just unconscious, Rose.”

“What would she be doing in those woods?” For some reason, I hear my sister’s voice. She sounds worried, which made me feel bad because I have a feeling that I might have cause them.

“Don’t look now, Rose, but your husband looks a little suspicious. Is that guilt that I am seeing?” A teasing voice says, which was then followed by a loud thud and a girlish screm. “Dude, are you trying to kill me or something?!”

“I don’t know what you mean by ‘or something’, but you got it right on the first guess.” Ace admits.

“Rose, are you seeing this!? You should file for a divorce!”

“Brother, not now. Can’t you see that Rose is worried about Stella?”

At that moment, I finally managed to gather enough consciousness to open my eyes. The bright light in my surroundings almost blinded me so that I had to squint and groan. “Geez, I am a winter fairy and not a vampire, but these fairy lights are killing my vision!” I start to aggressively rub my eyes before I start to open them once more.

The first ones that I saw were Rose and Custard, who were sitting by my side. On the other side is King Ren accompanied by his twin, and also advisor, Dan. As for my brother-in-law, I see him at the far side of the room along with Viex.

“Um…hey? This place doesn’t seem like we’re in Gija anymore.” I observed the difference between the placement of furniture and the room design.

King Ren, I assume that it is him since he is wearing a crown, chuckles. “We’re in Sanver, Stella. How are you feeling?”

Rose helps me up into a sitting position when she sees me struggling. I tried flexing my fingers and trying to remember my name before turning to Ren to answer. “I’m feeling fine. My body and mind are intact, and they don’t seem to hurt.”

“If your brain is feeling alright, do you mind telling us what you were doing in the woods before you passed out?” Ace demands. I have been living with him and my sister long enough to know that he probably got in trouble with my sister after she found out that he authorized my departure to Sanver. Come to think of it, didn’t we have an agreement that I wouldn’t get myself in trouble if I left?

Well, I guess now I know why he looks so extra mad at me. I best stick with my sister and hope that Viex is always nearby, so he won’t try to kill me - not that he would kill me, but just in case.

But now that he asked the question, I suddenly recalled the events that happened to me while I was in the woods.

Kellar. I finally met him. He is out there with Javi! They’re both alright! I was so thrilled about it that I almost blurted it out to the others until I decided to reconsider.

If Rose and the others never trusted me about some information regarding Kellar before, what makes me so certain that they won’t freak out about this? What gives me assurance that they won’t go after him and lock him up? After all, he is basically the center of the rogue splitting into two factions.

As much as I wanted to share this information, but I should keep it to myself until I am certain that Kellar will be safe.

I made my face look as blank and confused as possible. “Sorry. I am a little fuzzy on that part.” I pretended to wince and rub the side of my head. I am not a good actor like my sister, but I hope that I can manage to fool them with my mediocre acting.

“That’s strange,” As I thought, it was only Ace who was still suspicious of me. “Didn’t you just say that your brain was working perfectly?” Damn him. He was always so sharp. He’s clearly out to grill me for breaking my promise to him.

I was going to say something when Rose suddenly gasped, like she realized something. “Oh my goodness. You sound like you were enchanted to forget! Quick, Dan, get me a glass of water!” She hands something to Dan that I wasn’t able to see.

Dan starts to salute before rushing out of the door in a hurry. I don’t think that I have the time to be guessing why they needed water when I notice that Ace was starting to head over to stare at me suspiciously.

“Are you really enchanted, Stella? Or are you just pretending to forget to hide something?” How Ace was looking at me was making me nervous and I could not seem to move. I just kept my face blank and glanced pitifully at my sister.

Thank goodness that my sister never fails to be on my side because she quikly glares at him. “Ace, don’t you dare give my sister that look!” She pushes him by the face and goes to sit beside me. “I haven’t forgiven you for lying to me, you know. And now you have the audacity to glare at my sister. I’m sleeping in another room tonight!”

I covered my mouth with my hands to stifle my gasp. At the corner of my eyes, I can see that Ren is doing the same.

I was already expecting that they were going to fight, but I did not expect that it would come to this extent.

Oops, I think that I might have brought more of Ace’s anger on myself. Maybe I shouldn’t have thought of using my sister as leverage against Ace.

Ace looks a little taken aback at first, but after a few seconds, he just blinks before composing himself. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll follow you.”

“No, you won’t if you don’t want me to go back to the human realm for a week!”

If my sister’s first threat did not work on him, the second one definitely did. Ace hates the human world because of all of the noise and pollution, which is why he rarely goes there. If Rose stays in the human world, there’s no doubt that he's going to follow her, but he will have to suffer with the environment.

Ace starts to pout, and when he starts to turn to me, Rose points a finger at him. “Ah AH! What did I just say?”

Ace clenches his teeth and turns his back while crossing his arms over his chest. At that moment, Dan entered the room holding the chalice - wait, when and how did he manage to get his hands on!? - and running to get to Rose.

“I got it!” He rushes and hands the chalice to my sister.

“Great!” I started to feel nervous when I saw that Rose was looking my way after adding a drop of her blood to the chalice. “Hold still and don’t move, Stella.”

“Rose, what are you-”

“NACHOS!” I just started to open my mouth when Rose spilled the contents towards me, making me swallow and get blinded by the water.

I spat the water out before wiping my face. “Thanks. I needed to wash my face.”

“How is it? Did you remember something?” She asks hopefully.

“Huh? Oh…no. I still have nothing. I probably just spaced out and all.” I scratched the back of my head uncomfortably. I saw Ace giving me a side glance, and I could tell that he was still suspicious of me, but thanks to my sister’s threat, he didn’t say anything.

“You know,” Ren starts to say, as he looks at Rose with an assuring gaze. “We should probably just let her rest. Don’t worry too much because I will have someone nearby to monitor her and make sure that she is taken care of. Why don’t you two return to Gija and back to your kids?” He offers. “Stella can stay here, and I promise you that she will be escorted back when she feels better.”

Rose and Ace looked at each other for a few brief seconds before agreeing to Ren’s offer. “Yeah, you’re right. The kids are probably scared.”

“Rose, you go on ahead. You guys have parental duties. Besides, I am not a kid anymore.” I insisted.

Ace silently goes to my sister’s side and places a hand on her shoulder. Rose nods and starts to get up. “Alright, but I am going to leave Custard here. And this time, watch her carefully.”

Custard’s only reply is a cheerful yip.

Ace and Rose soon left, and they were soon followed by Dan, with the excuse that he had to get back with his wife and son. Now, I was left in the room with only Ren and Custard.

Ren waited until the door was shut before looking at me with his arms crossed over his chest and a knowing smile of amusement on his face. “So, what is it that you want to ask me?”

I looked at him all confused. “Huh? Ask you what?”

Ren laughs, “Wow. It seems like you are a little more lightheaded than you thought. Ace - sorry - KING Ace sent me a letter giving me a heads up that you wish to know about the divided rogue faction, right? Specifically, what we know about Kellar. You’re still looking for him, right?”

Oh, that. Ever since I found Kellar, my reason for looking for Ren just slipped out of my mind. In fact, I no longer cared about it because what I know is probably more than theirs, but for the sake of formality, I just nodded my head.

“Y-Yeah. Sorry, it has been a long day. If you still have time, can you tell me what you know?”

“Well, there’s really nothing much to tell.” Ren shifts on his feet and presses a hand to his chin. “I often call Kellar because he is someone that I can count on when disputing quarels involving the rogues. You see, they rarely listen to me even though I am their king.”

“But they listen to Kellar?”

Ren nods, “Since I found out that some of the rogues wish to make Kellar their new king, it now makes a lot of sense.”

“So this whole issue about the rogues has been going on for a long time?”

“Yes, it has. But your sister didn’t want you to get involved because you are already busy living your double life as it is. Kellar’s disappearance might have bought us some time before the rogues really made a move. I guess they thought that we must have figured out their plan and took Kellar as captive.”

“That’s insane. It’s like they see us as monsters for looking up one of our people.”

Ren blinks at me for a few seconds before patting my head. “It’s nice to hear that you have the same compassion for others as your sister. I think the fae realm would be pleased to have you as one of their future ruler.” Ren grins.

It took me a while to figure out what he meant. I immediately blushed and swatted his hand away. Ren drew his hand back with a laugh. “It’s not like that! We don’t have that kind of relationship!”

“That’s what Rose and Ace said to each other, and look at them now. Isn’t that right, Custard?” He coos while scratching the back of the spirit wolf’s ear. “Wow, you’ve really grown, boy. I can no longer carry you in my arms like before.” Custard continued to wag his tail and thrust his head in Ren's direction for the rubs.

“Chace is a friend!” I continued to defend myself.

“Yeah, for now.”

I could not help it. It was like Ren was asking to be hit. I threw a pillow at his face because he kept laughing at my red and embarrassed face. “King or not, I don’t care. I am tired and I want to sleep!”

“Sheesh, and we thought that you and Rose had nothing in common, but here you are, being bosy. Between the two of us, I am wearing the crown. You should wait until you become queen before you start ordering people around.” He chuckles.

I was so tired of his teasing that I just glared at him. “Custard, you know what to do.”

Even though they were acting pretty friendly earlier, Custard is still very loyal to Rose. And since she left him to take care of me, whatever I say has equal command with my sister. Which is why Custard did not hesitate when he started to bark at Ren and chased him out of the door.

“Woah, okay!” Ren, though he was being chased by a spirit wolf, still laughed as he went to the door and paused there. “Goodnight, Stella. You too, Custard.”

“Goodnight, King Renevier.” I greeted him back just before the door closed. As soon as he was gone, that’s when I lay down on my bed and breathed out a sigh of relief.

What a day. Keeping the fact that Kellar is alive is more difficult than I thought. I was just lucky because Rose was there with me when Ace was beginning to be suspicious.

It doesn’t matter. It is over.

Custard starts to turn off the light as we prepare ourselves to sleep. As the room was shrouded in darkness, I couldn’t help but smile to myself as I recalled the events that happened earlier.

Kellar. He’s alive. Now that I know where he is, there’s no way that I am not going to go after him again.

Well, that’s if I manage to finish my homework and pass our chemistry test in the next few days.