Ayra came out together with Cedric hastily. His evil laughter cracked inside her eardrums. She glared at him hardly and hissed letting go of his arms,

" STOP LAUGHING! Is it very fun to embarrass me in front of everyone always?"

Cedric hummed, wiggling his eyebrows playfully as his hand naturally reached out to snake around her shoulders. She elbowed his arms backwards, wanted to avoid his touch but he was too persistent in holding her tightly. Curling his lips up into a smile, he hummed showing his white milky teeth,

" Yes, your blushes are my new favorite."

She was momentarily speechless and soon another round of red blushes creepted through her cheeks. She hated the effect of his words. With a shy face, she muttured leaving the entrance together,

" You have a glib-tongue really."

Cedric laughed with humour without letting go of his arms from her body. He loved to keep her holding like pillow. Her body felt soft like cotton and he enjoyed the slight trembling of her body whenever he touched her.

Intending to take her inside the villages, Cedric was going to summon his favorite horse but a group of his border guards rushed in.

Ayra glanced at their way instinctively. Her lips parted open slightly in astonishment when she spotted a dead wolf in their arms. Two soldiers were carrying a dead wolf carefully and dropped the dead body in front of Cedric and Ayra.

Cedric let go of Ayra's shoulders slowly. His brows furrowed together tighteningly as he laid his eyes down on the brown furred wolf. A look of hurt flashed across his eyes. These wolves had been his greatest support throughout the ear of his reign. Their loyalty and sacrifices for the kingdom had always wavered his heart. Even Ayra was looking down at the animal sorrowfully.

She was the one who spoke first after looking up at the guards ahead,

" What happened to him?"

The guard stepped few steps back respectively. Keeping their head down, one of them replied with politeness,

" My Lady, he was patrolling near the border between DAVINA and Basarisk. He had been shot by a needle and was spot dead at once. When we demanded explaination from the Chitahs, they accused us back and threatened us telling that we were trying to frame them. Besides, why would they kill our wolf with a simple needle?"

Cedric questioned hiding the sorrow behind his dark eyes,

" Where is that needle? Has anybody seen them aiming at our guards?"

The other guard replied taking a note inside his mind deeply,

" No, Your Highness! Nobody has seen them aiming at the wolves. In a word, we really don't have any witness. We can only assume."

Cedric crunched down on his one knee and ran his long fingers across the wolf's furr soothingly. His caress was gentle as if he was trying not to wake him up even though he knew that he would never wake up. When the world had turned their back on him, these animals stayed by his side, devoted their lives in maintaining the wellbeing of Basarisk. Strangely, Cedric later understood that this animals were more trustworthy than some so called brilliant people around him. People called him heartless, murder or demon without emotion but deep down, he cared but never showed it on surface. Growing up alone and managing an entire kingdom was always difficult for him. He knew that the moment, he showed his weakness to this world, they would start using it against him.

Ayra stared at his back a little worryingly. He suddenly became silent and that worried her surprisingly.

Cedric's observant eyes ran across the waves of furr untill they stopped on a three inches needle that was stabbing inside the skin of wolf. His eyes narrowed a little as he reached out his fingers to pull out the needle from its body.

Bringing it up under his eyes, he deeply examined but found nothing suspicious. According to his judgment, the needle looked simple, made of iron possibly. But it wasn't enough to kill a grown up wolf unless the needle had any special ability.

Cedric pondered for a while but couldn't remember anything regarding this mysterious needle. They had poisonous arrows, guns but needles, he never heard of saw it anywhere.

Ayra followed his eyes and saw the tiny needle in his palm. She questioned out of curiosity,

" What is this weapon? I have never seen it before."

Cedric replied lifting his weight from the ground,

" Neither did I."

He was going to stab it inside his own palm to check the effect of it but suddenly a pair of hasty arms gripped him. Tilting his head aside, he met Ayra's anxious eyes and her tone of worry,

" Are you crazy? What if there is poison inside of it? Don't stab inside your skin. You may get hurt."

She spoke blatantly without caring about her voice that sounded worried for him evidently. Cedric's lips twitched in happiness as he spoke staring at her anxious face,

" So you are worried about me?"

Realization hit her sense as she quickly retreated her hand and muttered incoherently,

" I..I am worried about Basarisk."

Cedric smiled at her gleefully and compelled her words without any argument. He didn't stab the needle inside his skin but brought it up under his nostril to smell its aroma.

As soon as he brought it up to smell, his face crunched in disgust when a strong smell of rotten garbage engulfed his nostrils. He extended his arm away from his nostrils and scoffed angrily,

" What is this shit? It smells so freaking bad."

Ayra blinked her eyes curiously. Stepping near her, she suggested streching out her arm to take the needle from his hand,

" Let me look into it. I have researched many herbal stuffs. Maybe I can recognize."

Before Cedric could give his opinion, Ayra had already snatched the needle from his hand. Using the same process, she brought it under her nostrils to check her fragnance but surprisingly, she smelt different.

She frowned before mumbling stupifiedly,

" Why.. Why am I smelling different? It seems like scent of roses."