Denise Soleil’s POV
My eyes can’t keep away from the tiny red gem sitting in my hand. The tiny thorns surrounding every coil in its frizzled structure didn’t change, still serrated and jagged that the longer it stayed in my hands out of its sphere chamber, the deeper it penetrates my palm.
“I think we lost them,” sounded a panting voice that emanated from behind me.
I simply veered a glance at her and replied a nod before tossing her a pair of clothes. A shirt and cargo pants I got from the human world. A day after I came back from that world, the clothes I bought from the humans seemed to be easier to slide in.
Thus, I ordered Lachlan to scatter bags containing these fabrics across the territory for the warriors and even us to have something covering our bodies after we shift rather than walking around naked.
“Then what do we gonna do next? It’s not like we can easily return to the pack mansion and carry on with the inauguration, right?” Sydney blurted as soon as she slipped into those clothes.
I dropped my hand and closed the white wolf’s emblem back to its chamber before gliding it back to a hiding spot inside a simple ring wrapped around my left hand. “They have comrades inside and outside the mansion. And maybe they’ve already taken over the entire place by now.”
Hearing that, I saw Sydney’s eyes close tightly followed by her deep sigh. “I guess we’ll be hiding again.”
My head nodded. There’s no other choice. I acted impulsively conducting inauguration that I didn’t think about exposing my presence back all over Claveria Haltera. That it means again attracting Laxon’s fiery eyes. Aisshh, stupid Denise!
“But where?” she asked.
“In what place would no one suspect we’ll be hiding?” I answered, causing her brows to furrow.
“Where?”
I raised my head towards the path afore the cliff we’re standing. The way leads to a cursed palace where none of whom entered managed to get out.
“No… No way I would be sneaking inside! I never have dreamt of spending even a single minute there!” she screamed and quickly turned her back on me.
“Then start dreaming about it.”
Gradually, the normal sly smile crept up my face. I turned to my friend and shove the mess-up strands of my hair covering my face. “Are you up?” I tilted my head, “Or not?”
Her jaw gnashed and a corner of her lip twitched. And as expected, she marched back with her loud footsteps past me. “If not because you’re keeping that mutt away from me, I would never ever follow you, Denise!”
“Oh, really?” I reacted, matching with my little bit widened eyes as my legs strode along the rocky path leading to the cursed palace.
Tales of this place have been passed from generations and even outside Claveria Haltera… even to the human world, this cursed palace was known. That here once settled a woman, she’s a human bestowed by humans for peace alliance in the ancient days. When Claveria was still open to human’s naked eyes.
That woman married the highest vampire prince who was bound to rule the entire vampire territory. But unlike good fairy tales, their story was never a happy ever after. They may be married afore the people they rule, but they both know deep in their hearts that there was not even a single chance for love to grow between them.
However, in a sudden blow of fate. That human develops roses towards the prince, her husband. And as time goes by, the roses’ roots drive deeper and deeper until she could stop it no more. Waking up one day and saw she had already fallen in love with the man he never liked from the day she stepped into this world.
Rowing to the other side, this so-called prince then became the king. And to his sight, being married to the woman born from an enemy’s land was absurd. What more if he started loving her? So, for the past five years of marriage, all he did was travel across the lands and do what a king should do.
Leaving his wife almost all year round that his stay in the palace was only counted by fingers.
Yet, what he thought was a ridiculous idea became the plot twist in his life. Aside from the queen, he met another human girl whom he was captivated madly. And he loved her more, and then the new girl loved him even more.
Basically, her husband cheated on her with also a woman of her kind. Pathetically, the king did never love her just because she’s a mere human but because the queen was not the woman he was looking for. And that they were not on the same page, and I guess they will never be.
Knowing the truth, she did nothing to stop them. Why would she? Right? Nothing will change even if she comes up with the idea of splitting them apart. Because even if they separate, she knew her husband still won’t love her the way he loved the other woman.
So she locked up herself in that palace, wrapping herself in pain and remorse. Until a curse was born out of mental torment and distress that cloaked the entire palace the second she, herself, took the life out of her.
“What do you think we’ll see inside that palace?” Sydney asked when we stepped past a brick structure that looks like the under of the balcony with a series of vines and green creepers attached and dangling on it. “Could we be seeing a human corpse?” she giggled.
My fore creased and darted a glare at her. “Are you sure she’s a human, Sydney?”
To that, her left brow raised attentively when she turned her head to me. “Why? Is she not?”
“She’s the white wolf. That human queen was no other than the white wolf,” I frankly replied which she overly reacted with both of her hands shaking my shoulder back and forth.
“How dare you make up stories in front of this cursed place! Do you wish for death? Because for me, I do not! If something happened to us, I swear I’ll blame you until I become a vengeful ghost!”
“Why would I care if you become a ghost? It’ll be just like you without the physical body, there’s no difference!”
Sydney raised her hand and pulled my hair like she’s an asylum patient on the loose, “Ah? Ahhh!!! This is why Laxon did never regard you as a student because you are so arrogant like you own everything!”
Causing me to grunt and grab her arm, and was about to flip her over when a bright light across the dark surrounding shut the both of us. “Do you think I would lie about this? There was no such thing as the human-vampire political alliance echeche!”
She released my now-crazy-messed-up hair and so as my hand on her arm. The light was from the creaking door of the palace. And it was not just a simple light, it was so bright like it contained the sun inside.
“When did you—”
“That night, when I stole the white wolf’s emblem from Laxon.” I shook my head recalling that crime I did years ago.
I was simply taking back what’s mine. Wasn’t it a fair thing that I got their most precious emblem in exchange for not letting me join their graduation ceremony and worst, they even attempted to assassinate me before I could even step out of my room?
“And then what?”
My shoulders shrugged and paced in the direction of the palace’s door. “Then it just flashed in my head like a memory.” It was something like a tiny light and then it entered my head like a bubble. “The story flows the same as what we’re told. But it misses the most significant part. Maybe because… they don’t want what really happened. The tale of the white wolf and the tale of this cursed palace… they’re connected.”
It feels like I have been here before that every step I take as I enter was so familiar. Like I have known every inch of the place. Light from the flaming torches and the lighted hanging chandelier above created shadows as we step in.
“And you mean?”
“The white wolf was the one who is betrothed to the vampire prince for peace. Her hair was silver and her eyes were gold, she’s the eldest daughter of the highest Alpha across the entire werewolf pack. Her beauty was irresistible. Thus, the perfect candidate for a marriage alliance with the vampires.”
The pieces of furniture and paintings were still intact to where they were supposed to be. The only thing messing up was the vines and green creepers that had gone berserk that invaded almost every corner of the palace.
“It is true that she fell for her husband and her husband didn’t. Also, fact was when the prince became the king, he traveled across Claveria. Not because he’s avoiding his wife but because he was afraid that the longer he stayed, the deeper his wife’s feeling for him would grow.”
“So he looked for someone who can fit his taste and that someone who can shove his wife away, right?” Sydney blurted in a mocking manner.
“For someone who did not know what the real situation is, it’s easy to point out which one is at fault and which is the victim,” I answered that shut her up and look away. “The other woman was there first, whom he first love even before the marriage alliance was discussed. And the queen knows that… because the other woman was her sister.”
I shifted my eyes at the painting hung on the wall, ruined and wasn’t that clear. Not until I closed my eyes and again, the place I am standing change into a summer garden blossomed with flowers and ivies.
I am again traveling back in the past. A thing they described as an ability, a gift since I was born. I can cross over time and years that had passed in a place or a person whenever I want to. Sadly, only history is what I can jump back to and not the future.
“Have you seen him?” asks a woman in a purple dress embroidered with rhinestones and bits of sparkling crystals.“Who? The vampire prince?” replied her sister with long pearl-colored hair. Both have a book of the same cover in their arms, sitting on a wooden seat swing under an enormous mango tree.“Magnus,” blurted the lady in a lilac dress wearing the most expensive smile on her face. She looks so happily confident mentioning that Guy’s name. “His name is Magnus. He talked to me, Afana! I-I still can’t believe he talked to me!” Her cheeks turned tomato and still the smile on her face retained and grew wider. Her expression was undoubtedl
“What do you want? Why don’t you just step down from your place and let her take over? You’re not pushing me away just because of your concern for your sister but of something else.”“I want to stop the war, Magnus. I need you and this place beside you to fulfill that mission. Let me be your queen and that is all I’m asking from you.”“What about loving you?”“What about loving you?”“What about loving you?”“Putang— arrgghhh!” I irritatedly pulled my hair in frustration hearing those words repeat and echo inside of my head. For three hours. For freaking three hours! And what’s more terr
“Assemble the array! All aim at the Carus’!” shouts a man in a battle suit. His hair was pitch black and his metal headgear was off, making that defined carved-like jaw visible.From this perspective, it looks like they both won the battle against the anti-peace battalions of vampires in the south. My eyes roamed around, this is not the white wolf’s castle. Where could it be?Pinned and hung on the walls were eleven flags embroidered with the eleven territories of Claveria Haltera. Also, in front of this gigantic hall were two thrones both at the same level.Flocking the whole place were vampires and werewolves, on their hands were chalices filled with wines. Their faces were lit with avid as if in peace and rest but suddenly erased when sequential thundering bombings emanated from the grounds of the castle.Is the vampire king already dead
“Afana!” My eyes forcedly opened as the same reaction and voice reverberated inside of my head like it was a direct call. I roamed my sight across the room I’m in and sighed, I’m still in the same room, no changes and still no one discovered traveled back in an important scenario time. It may look far from the dimly lighted royal room I saw, but the chills it sends feel the same. Perhaps, because this place witnessed the real history. The past that had been concealed by the anti-peace’s lies. Anti-peace congress’ lies. A sly smirk formed on my lips as a thought entered my brai
Third-Person’s POV“Two choices, Laxon personnel. One, to die and get buried with this place or, give me what I want. You better choose what benefits you the most.”With an arrogant smile and a wink, Denise Shadowstone pulled the door open and left a final glance at them before closing the door exiting.“She knew it. How? When did she—h*ck! Where is Verdiga?”“Stop fussing around, Gallardo.”“She knew how to use that emblem.”“Summon Verdiga!”“If she spoils out the truth, then all eyes will be on Laxon. We’ll be buried with this land, idiot!”
“He’ll only give you the crest once you accept the proposal.”“What proposal?”“The envelope he gave you the other day.” The glossy cream-colored envelope on my hand crumpled, replaying what his Beta said last night. He did give me a fake one and the envelope he gave me back in the cursed palace was actually a written marriage proposal as Marcus said! And what’s unacceptable was it just contains…‘Birds do it. Bees do it. Even educated fleas do it; let’s do it. Let’s fall in love.’ Who calls that a marriage proposal?!“Speed u
“Hakbang, alisto!” Yells the highest guard personnel in full authority, raising his riffle with its chamber on his shoulder level. He stood in the hold, full of power and control over all the high-skilled patrols. He wears this suit of blue and a red sash-like crossing over his shoulder and on it pinned different crests that, perhaps, represent the high rank he’s in.“Saje, shuwa, taddo!” With the count of the high guard, the terrifying banging of the drums filled the wide court hall. The drum was made out of vertically narrow lengths of wood with a slightly beveled edge to form its torso. Animal skin, probably, is stretched over the torso and was tightened with a rope. 
“The Alpha of Shadowstone conceived the Alderhaw’s child!” My ears shut down and my mind went blank. My body moved uncontrolled and on my hand was a sharp blade aimed right through my belly.“If I said my connection to that man had already ended the day we parted, should I also show an affirmation?” I tightly clutched the dagger and shoved it piercing the garment. I’m only a step away, and I couldn’t afford to lose that position I worked hard for just because of a minor reason.“If it means detaching all connections to that Alderhaw includes killing my own child, I don’t mind making a small sa