She Belongs To The Devil

The messenger of Prince Edwin arrived back at Wyverndale Palace on the fourth day of his departure from Wyverndale. It was afternoon when he arrived and Prince Edwin was in the King\'s Court. Without wasting a minute to catch his breath, he went to see Prince Edwin and deliver the message back to him.

Prince Edwin was restlessly pacing back and forth in his workroom when the messenger knocked on his door. It looked like he was impatiently waiting for the messenger\'s arrival. And the moment he heard the knock, he sprinted towards the door and opened it himself.

"You\'re here!" He let the messenger get inside the room and locked the door behind. And he asked a little eagerly, "Did the King of Mihir send the reply?"

The messenger felt bad for his master because he already knew that Prince Edwin was going to be disappointed. "Yes, Your Highness," he spoke in a soft voice and took out the torn envelope and handed it over to Edwin.

Edwin was confused when he got the same envelope that he had sent. He looked at the envelope and gave a questioning glance to the messenger.

"The King of Mihir has written his reply on the back of the letter that you sent," the messenger tried to clarify that he was not the one to tamper with the envelope.

Edwin tried to keep his hopes high regardless of the condition of the letter. He took out the letter and unfolded it.

And the moment his eyes fell on the message that Reginald had written, his eyes were filled with disappointment. He kept on staring at the letter in disbelief because all that was written there was – "I will think about it" and that was it.

There was no explanation as to what he would think about. Would he think about making further dealings with Edwin? Would he think about having a meeting soon? Just what would he think about?

And Edwin\'s head began to ache when trying to decipher the meaning behind that lazily written sentence.

Seeing the Prince\'s disappointment, the messenger tried to console his master, "Your Highness, if it is any consolation, I would like to say that the King of Mihir looked like a spoilt teenager. He didn\'t look like he cared about maintaining the reputation or formalities and such."

Edwin glanced at the messenger and nodded his head. He finally smiled and dismissed his messenger, "Thank you for delivering and bringing back the message. You must be tired from the continuous journey. You can take a leave for two days and rest."

The messenger glanced at the Prince in surprise because he had never spoken this warmly to him before. And the Prince had never asked him to take a leave after coming from such long journeys ever before.

"Is there anything else that you want to say?" Edwin asked the messenger as he kept on staring at him instead of leaving the room.

The messenger bowed to the Prince with a smile. "No, Your Highness. I will take my leave now." And before he left, he handed back the jade token and the pouch of leftover coins.

"Oh, right! The token…" Edwin took the token from the messenger\'s hand and said, "Keep the coins to yourself. Think of it as a small compensation for your tiring journey."

The messenger was really taken aback by this drastic change in the Prince\'s personality. He bowed to Edwin again, this time with an immense sense of gratitude, and thanked him.

After the messenger left the room, Edwin glanced at the letter again. From what he was seeing in the letter and from what he heard from the messenger, he was bound to question the maturity of the Vampire King.

The more he thought about the King of Mihir, the more he believed that he was just a teenager who was brainwashed by Lillian into teaming up in her evil schemes.

And from the way he was so unenthusiastic to send the reply, he felt that either the Vampire King was having a second thought about the war or he was just being a typical unruly kid.

Edwin sighed and whispered to himself, "Either way, I hope he will call me for the meeting soon. And I really hope that he will be as easy to manipulate as I am thinking he might be."

He then kept the letter inside his pocket and walked out of his workroom to give the update to Adeline.

"Yes, come in," after hearing his sister\'s voice from inside her workroom, Edwin opened the door and went inside.

Adeline was buried in the vast number of paperwork that she had to go through. Even though it was just around 2 in the afternoon, she already looked like she had reached her limit for the day.

When Edwin was walking inside, she tried her best to behave like a lady but she couldn\'t resist yawning. She looked at her brother and apologized for the rudeness, "I\'m sorry, I am just a little drained."

Edwin stopped halfway in his track and asked, "If you are tired then I can come by later."

"No, no, it\'s alright. Actually, I also have something to tell you." She then pointed at the chair in front of her and said, "Please, take a seat."

"Er… my messenger returned back from Mihir a while ago. And, I think you might want to read the letter, though there\'s nothing much to read." Without wasting any time, Edwin took out the letter from his pocket and put it in front of Adeline for her to read… both sides.

Adeline read the letter in no time and she was puzzled when she read the backside of the letter. She flipped the letter back and forth, not believing that the King of Mihir actually just wrote a vague sentence.

"This is it?" she asked while raising her brows in skepticism.

Edwin pursed his lips and nodded, "Yes. Unfortunately."

Adeline scoffed and mocked the Vampire King, "Well at least he had the decency to put his Royal Seal on it."

"I think the Vampire King is just an eccentric teenager, at least that\'s what I perceive him to be." Edwin sighed and added, "I feel like the four days of the wait to hear from him was a complete waste. Let\'s hope that he will contact me soon though."

Adeline gave an appreciative smile and tried to lift up her brother\'s spirit, "I wouldn\'t say that it was a complete waste of your effort. At least now the King of Mihir knows that you are the one whom he will be talking with from now on. And that means we can go ahead with our plan to imprison Queen Lillian."

"And on that note…" Adeline shuffled through the documents that were on her table and took out a letter and said, "I also got a letter from the Mystic Coven. They are saying that we have to imprison Lillian no matter what. One of the witches saw a vision and they are saying that if Lillian is not captured on that day, then there will be a lot of bloodshed in the near future."

Edwin went through that letter and several frown lines appeared on his forehead. And he said in a sad voice, "I think I was overconfident enough to believe that I could manipulate the Vampire King to stop the war… Even the witches are already seeing visions of the war."

Adeline was also greatly affected by the fact that Agnes had had a vision of the war. Though she wanted to have the last shred of hope thinking that not every vision would come true, she was in the same situation as Edwin. She felt as if there really was no escape from the incoming war.

She glanced at Edwin and stated with determination, "At least we know that it is coming.. Now it is in our hands to prepare ourselves and hope for the best."