"Ria! Ria! You need to wake up," Malcolm shook the sleeping, tired girl who looked at him, bewildered.

Something must've happened again.

Ria's mind raced to all the bad things that have happened to them in just a short period of time. Her heart beating loudly in her chest, she wondered if Malcolm could hear them. She glanced at the bed beside her to find it empty. No sleeping princess. No girl staring blatantly in nowhere, void of any emotions in her eyes. No Catherine.

Ria looked at Malcolm, wide-eyed and mouth slightly open as if she was about to say something but closed it again. She needed to think. She knew Catherine most all her life but she also just lost her whole family. Who knows what a broken and grief eaten person could do.

"Maybe she just went to get some fresh air?" Malcolm suggested which Ria answered with a glare.

"Fresh air?" She asked with gritted teeth. How could one be so stupidly deplorable? Ria pulled her brown boots and immediately worn them when the door burst open and it revealed Catherine with a basket full of bread and some flowers.

"Oh, you're awake?" Catherine asked as she strode to the other side of the room and placed the flowers in the vase as if it was her own home. Ria watched her with scrutinizing eyes. "What? I just went to get some fresh air."

Malcolm snickered at her side, making Ria glared at him for the second time since she woke up.

"What do you mean 'you went to get some fresh air'" Ria questioned, rising from her bed and making her way to Catherine. "Your Highness?"

"It is as I said, Ria. Now get ready we are going back to the palace today," Catherine said in her authoritative voice that sent shivers down Malcolm's spine. Yes, she has commanded him before, but the way she spoke to him today was different. Malcolm knew something was up when Catherine showed up at the door looking all cheery and freshen up. Not that Malcolm minded she was getting better, something just felt off and it tickled in his gut to find out what it was.

After gathering the necessary things that they need and some of the things that Catherine saved in her now ruined kingdom, they boarded the carriage and headed straight to the castle, leaving the small run-down inn that housed the trio for a couple of days. Throughout the ride, Ria kept glancing at Catherine wondering what has happened to her. She was itching to ask Catherine what changed but she knew that there was the right time for that and the ride back to the castle certainly was not that time. Malcolm may know about their kind but Ria was still reluctant in trusting him. He may have made a vow to never tell anyone about their kind but his loyalties are still on the table for questions and she wouldn't risk her and Catherine's life in the hands of a man that served another kingdom, especially with the group of his own kind roaming free, in where they don't know about, wiping their kind.

When they arrived at the palace, Ria knitted her eyebrows at the many, many servants running around the palace with the many guests that she recognized, some from the gatherings and parties they attended, and some she saw for the first time. She looked at Catherine who did not seem even confused about what was happening in the palace.

"Your Highness, please come with me," the head maid instructed quickly when she spotted their group. Catherine nodded at her in acknowledgment and followed the middle-aged woman while Ria and Malcolm followed closely behind her, still wondering what was happening on the palace grounds.

The head maid stopped in an enormous door, with crystal plated knobs and silver linings. Again, Ria questioned the amount they spend on the interior design in the palace. The guard standing in the door opened the door for them and it showed the room that would leave anyone's mouth open. The room was twice as large as the room Catherine stayed before with five doors, she guessed as the bathroom, a walk-in closet, balcony, her bedroom, and the other she would open later. The group was in the receiving part of the room complete with two peach-colored armchair and two cream-colored loveseats with a mini table in the middle.

"This is the queen's suite," Malcolm whispered to himself but Ria heard it and walked towards him.

"What?" She raised her eyebrow at him asking for an explanation which he obliged. "This is the queen's suite but it was renovated. The last time I came here, it was not as big as this."

"But wh-"

"Lady Ria please come here!" The two shared a look before proceeding to the room where they heard the voice of the head maid. When they entered the room, it was like being struck with a blinding light. Catherine stood in the glass window with the sunlight penetrating the entire room, wearing a white lace gown that hugged the right curves in her body before flowing rigorously to the floor. Two servants that she recognized as Maria and Catalina who she did not see after the attack on the kingdom and Elle who was nowhere in sight. Ria knew she will question her, but that will come on later on. She focused her attention on Catherine who was wearing a wedding dress.

"Come, come the wedding will start in a few minutes," With what the servant said, Ria raised her eyebrow at Catherine who gave her a look of 'please not now', she sighed and moved closer to Catherine who whispered a small thanks and proceeded to help her get ready. When all the things necessary were done they walked to the garden in the east palace where Catherine tended to the plants and flowers. It was decorated beautifully and Ria knew that it cost another thousand to build the place. Unlike Kirin and her sister's wedding which was plainly simple yet radiated elegance, Catherine and Lucas' wedding was nothing simple. From the small details to the biggest factor, it shouted money and royalty. More guests came in settled down in their respective places, with all the other main houses in the kingdom.

The trumpet sounded and everyone stayed silent, the only thing that they could hear was the melody of the violin dancing with the harmony of the piano. It was beautiful and sounded right to everyone's ears. When the music changed its rhythm, two figures came into view, linked with each other's arms, they walk gracefully but with power. The cold face of the king matched the warm smiling face of the princess. Anyone could tell that they were made right for each other but Ria knew. This wedding would not have happened if the king knew that Catherine's family was gone. They did not have to proceed with the oral agreement that their grandfathers have. The two people who were about to be bound for life were free. Unless something happened that forced the two of them to continue with the wedding.

It was a short ceremony that nobody expected. The king was busy with the internal affairs happening in his kingdom and the newly crowned queen will be grieving for her family but no one knew that. No one in the kingdom knew what was really happening to their rulers. They were kept in the dark and it was for the best.

"The wedding happened! It happened already!" The man in a black cloak shouted in the cold walls in the manor. The group sitting at the long round table flinch but no one in the room tried to make any excuses.

"It was not supposed to happen and yet it happened," He laughed that echoed in the whole cold manor. Everyone was silent, terrified that if they made a sound they would be killed in an instant. The example their master showed the last couple of days was enough to keep them all in line. The man continued laughing and one brave middle-aged man decided to join in the fun. When the cloaked man heard his forced laughter he stopped and look at the man in the eyes.

"You think this is funny, do you?" The middle-aged man gulped and the cloaked man walked towards him. Before he could touch the man, the brave one got on his knees, trembling, "M-my L-lord I-I-"

Sticky crimson substance splattered across the floor, staining the woman's white shoes. She kept a straight face on, not looking at the lifeless body of the brave man.

"Look at him!" Their master shouted and everyone's head turned in the direction of the man who laughed with their master. Half of the people sitting at the table looked sick at the sight of the rotting body while the other half looked excited and amused.

"This is my new creation," the cloaked man announced and laughed while examining the rotting body below him. The mouth half-open from his begging for his life and his pale skin was turning black, disintegrating slowly into ash. The death was quick but a horrible sight. "Normally, blood does not need to be spilled just a touch will make the body rotting like a corpse, it's just that I need to be motivated so I needed to see red."

And he laughed. The kind of laugh where it was void of happiness but full of madness. The one that would send chills down your spines and it did, to the people at the table.

When he stopped laughing, he glanced at the woman beside the rotting body. He pulled her chin forcefully, making the woman wince but she did not complain. She was smart enough to know when to act or not, so she waited. They were now eye to eye and she could smell death from his breath.

"Hmm. You pretty little thing," she looked down, lips quivering a little but she trapped them with her teeth to stop.

Show no weakness. Bear with it and it will be over.

She repeated this mantra again and again in her mind until their master let her chin go.

"Continue doing what you were doing and report back in two moons. You're all dismissed." He finished and one by one the people at the table disappeared with a crack, leaving the master and a white-haired man.

"Can we really trust the girl, My Lord?"

"Are you questioning my decisions, Abel?"

"No, My Lord. Forgive my disrespect." Abel bowed low and waited for a response from his master.

"Now, now, Abel, you must not forget the reason you are still alive to this day when you should have died the same day you place that bastard in power. Now that the two people I despised are joined together for life, I believe that it is your time to take the plans into action." The cloaked man sneered, playing with the black signet ring on his finger.

"And it will be done, My Lord."