Meeting again

Hurai( Eleven)

"You should sit still, sister," Fera said in a low warning tone, as she watched Hurai continuously fidget on her seat.

"Sit still? I have no idea how you do it. If I don't move now, by the time Instructor Terror shows up I won't be able to stand up at all," Hurai groaned out loud, seconds away from jumping to her feet and stretching out her legs for relief.

"We've only been sitting for two hours and you're already complaining? We still have one more to go before we'll be done,"

"...how does us learning how to sit still make us better princesses when Darun is off learning how to wield different kinds of weapons?" Hurai continued to complain while looking at her sister who rarely spoke during their lessons which was why she instantly noticed the vicious look that flashed across her small, cute, and child-like face.

They were still young so the both of them looked a lot alike, something they both took advantage of whenever they wanted to.

"Don't speak that bastard's name close to me," Fera hissed not hiding the expression of anger on her face right before she wiped it off, going ahead to stamp a neutral and princess-friendly expression there,

"Do you hate him that much?" Hurai slowly asked, unable to fathom why Fera would hate Darun since he was their younger brother.

"He. Is. Not. Our. Brother," Fera replied, enunciating her words one after the other while staring off into the distance not moving a single muscle in her body, as she sat unmoving in her chair, in the study where they both were.

"You hate him because he has more right to the throne than we do," Hurai gently stated, her eyes clear and entirely void of the childish mischief and ever-charming smile she always had on her face.

This slightly threw Fera off who even if she was expecting Hurai to be able to deduce such a thing on her own, she wasn't at all expecting her to plainly say it out loud.

“We’re older by a full year but simply because he’s a boy, he has more right to the throne?” Fera replied, gritting her teeth in anger, her tone dripping with animosity even with the neutral expression she had on her face, as she thought of their eight-year-old brother.

"He's nothing but the son of father's mistress. Father making her queen after our mother's death makes it worse," Fera whispered under her breath, still boiling with pent-up anger.

“Do you want to rule that badly?” Hurai replied with a bored expression on her face not at all having any lingering feelings of either hate or love for her half-brother and step-mother.

“I’m the oldest,” was Fera’s simple reply, and although Hurai felt the urge to say more on the topic, she didn’t.

“I’m leaving…” Hurai suddenly said right before she jumped on her feet, ignoring the numb and stiff sensation she could still feel in them.

“You’ll get in trouble. What if she comes back?”

“...and you’ll help me get out of it,” Hurai replied, sending a knowing look at her sister right before she made her way to the door but she had barely taken a few steps when she heard her sister speak,

“Happy birthday, Hurai…”

“Happy birthday Fera…” Hurai replied with a huge grin on her face, hurrying out of the room the second she was done speaking.

She had been conscious of the time since she began the lesson for the day and it wasn’t simply luck that the etiquette teacher needed to step out and had been gone for long.

Getting a maid to bump into her and stain her gown had taken a lot of coaxing and a bit more money than she would have liked. Which was why she couldn’t afford to waste the opportunity.

The moment she was out of the study room, she ran like she was being chased by the hounds of hell.

“Would he actually come? Would he dare to?” Hurai asked herself even as she made her way to the special spot in the garden for her getaway.

She made it there without anyone batting an eyelid, even when she speed walked as quickly as a princess like her could.

Finally after a little fiddling with the bricks, she was out. For the past two years security around the palace became stricter especially with the incident of the rogue wolf even after she tried to convince everyone that a good wolf had rescued her before running away but no one believed her.

Even her sister had joked about her needing to learn better ways to tell a lie.

Thankfully, it had gone back to the way it used to be, particularly in the inner palace where the king lived. Especially since the forest that bordered it was heavily guarded at the border against any intruders.

Making sure to keep her hair and clothes as tidy as she could, she ran into the forest, just at the edge of it, making sure not to go too deep.

She had only been standing for about a minute when she suddenly realized how dumb she was to decide to come again to the forest simply because of a promise she had made to a little boy three years ago.

“Why should he risk his life and come or even keep such a stupid promise?” Hurai mumbled under her breath as she looked around the huge forest she was standing in, unable to figure out where to begin looking for him even if he was in the same forest.

“This is stupid!” she mumbled to herself for the last time, turning around to leave with a slightly disappointed expression on her face when she suddenly heard the loud snap of a branch behind her.

Hurai instantly froze and beads of sweat instantly pooled on her forehead as her recalling the bad experience she last had in the forest. In a moment, she placed her right foot forward, prepared to bolt out of there when she heard a distinct and somewhat familiar voice behind her.

“You’re not leaving already are you?” a young male voice from behind her said in a light jesting tone,

“W..why would I?” she replied with an unnoticeable stutter in her voice, as she turned back around, still feeling a little nervous to see the young man that looked no less than seventeen standing still and unmoving a few steps away from her.

“That’s good. It took a while for me to get here and I’ve been waiting for a while,” Kal replied with a small smile on his face, wishing he could tell her that he had been waiting since morning and it was already late in the afternoon. At one point he was sure she wouldn’t show up but seeing her in front of him more than made up for it.

“Ahh…” was all that escaped from Hurai’s lips as she stared at the young man in front of her. His clothes were ordinary, but everything else about him stood out. On his forehead was a small tattoo of the half-moon which made her wonder what other tattoos he probably had. Even his face was striking with a childish charm to it, regardless of his red eyes that seemed to bore right into her soul when she looked at him. His black hair…

“I don’t mind you staring but we should sit. Making a princess stand is probably a crime,” Kal said beckoning for her to follow him before he turned around and began walking deeper into the forest.

Snapping back to reality the moment he spoke, Hurai only hesitated for about two seconds before she followed right behind him, trying to hide the slightly red color of her cheeks at the thought of how she had been blatantly staring at him, a little thankful that his back was turned towards her as they walked.

“I guess it's obvious that I’m a princess…” Hurai said filling the silence between them as she followed him, while cautiously looking around.

“What about you? How can you easily come here without being caught?” She asked with a curious expression on her face. She was still waiting for an answer when she suddenly felt Kal suddenly stop walking.

“We’re here…” he announced, and Hurai was shocked to see a very small clearing in front of her, with a simple cloth laid on the ground in the center where she could sit. Without waiting to be asked, she sat down carefully on it, making sure to draw most of her gown towards her right before watching Kal sit on the bare ground without batting an eye.

“He looks like he’s used to it,” she thought, staring at him again making sure to look away the moment she felt he was about to look at her.

“It’s obvious you’re a princess but I’m only the son of one of the people in charge of the border,” Kal carefully explained, leaning against the tree behind him as he did and staring a little above Hurai’s head as he spoke.

“I know my way around and people overlook my presence since I look so young,”

“You do?” Hurai thought, wondering how much taller he needed to grow before he could be noticed, considering that he was about a foot taller than her. Does that make me invisible? Hurai thought with a negligible frown on her face.

“How old are you?” Kal asked. It was the first question he had willingly asked her since they met.

“You don’t have to tell…”

“Eleven. I’m eleven today. You?”

“Sixteen. I should have brought a present,” Kal said with a long sigh right before he got to his feet.

“It’s fine, you can get me one next time we meet,” Hurai said as she also got up. It was obvious that it was time for him to leave. The fact that they could even spend such a long amount of time uninterrupted was already a miracle.

“In three years?” Kal asked with a small smile that instantly lit up his face and made Hurai feel even more at ease as she smiled back.

“Of course. I won’t forget,” Hurai replied, a little amazed to see him disappear in the next second almost like he wasn’t even there in the first place.

“Fera isn’t going to believe me, which is why I won’t tell her,” Hurai muttered in a low voice to herself as she stared at the empty space Kal had been standing in, before she turned around and began walking in the opposite direction towards the palace garden.

She had been gone for so long that she hoped her sister had been able to properly cover for her.

In another part of the forest was Kal, whose hands were completely drenched in blood, his face an expressionless mask as he stared into the empty and dead eyes of the naked man lying in front of him with a gaping hole in his chest where his heart was supposed to be.

Gone was the Kal, with the small and cute smile: The one Hurai thought she knew.

Splattered blood decorated the sides of his cheek like a motif as he stared unfeeling at the dead body lying in front of him,

“One down…two more to go,” he thought, stashing the still pulsing heart in his hand into the bag he had with him, hoping that the scent of blood drew more werewolves to him.