"Um... Your Majesty," I call him while I quickly put the same beige dress over my body. The chest where Ed's ashes are is in my hands. I promise myself that it will always be close to me. Always.

"Call me Lyall, werewolf girl." The sound of him putting on his pants reaches my ears even though we are on the opposite sides of the cave and our backs are against each other. I am facing the forest, while he faces the cave's dead end.

"Uh.. Ly–Lyall..." His name sounds strange coming out of my mouth. "Why was everyone surprised when I told Naver that he has a progressing cataract? You never got to explain to me about that."

After putting on his shirt, he puts on his boots, then walks to my side. "Oh that. It's because Naver can make people see their own demon side when you look into his eyes. Most would see some sort of monster. Only a few could see nothing, which means they have pure hearts."

I look up into his eyes. "So, what does that make me? My demon is seeing someone having a progressive cataract?"

Lyall bursts into laughter at my words. He holds his stomach and for Goddess' sake, I see his eyes tearing up.

Low standard of humor. Tsk tsk tsk.

"No, silly," he says between his laughter, "Naver really has cataracts due to age. He has been seeking healers' help for it."

"So, that means...?" My mind suddenly connects the dots. "I have a pure heart because I couldn't see any demons?!" I can't believe this. Pure heart? Me?

How crazy is the world if someone like me is deemed to have a pure heart? The standard is too low...

Out of the blue, he picks me up in his arms. "What are you doing?" I cry out.

"I'm not letting you walk to my kingdom barefoot," he says, "So, hold on tight." Before I can protest, he runs fast to his kingdom with me in his arms. As a reflex, I circle my arms around his neck but honestly, I feel pretty secure when he carries me.

In just around fifteen minutes, the lycan king has brought us back to his kingdom. The guards recognize him immediately and open the gate. The people in the streets and the public market also stop whatever they are doing just to stare at us. I can see their shocked faces, but none dares to inquire.

Feeling awkward, I squirm in Lyall's embrace. "Put me down," I whisper to him, "This is embarrassing..."

"No." His refusal comes so quickly.

Lyall ends up carrying me back to his castle, where Albus is running to him with panic clear on his face. "Your Majesty!! Where have you been?" The old man seems like he has aged at least ten years in the time we were gone. There are several knights and the lycan king's sister is standing on the stairs, looking down at us, too.

Lyall doesn't stop for any of them. Not even greeting the panicked Albus or his sister with sharp eyes. He walks past them as if they are not worthy of their time, straight to his room.

"L–Lyall," his name is still so strange to my tongue, "Why not greet them first?"

"Why should I?"

"They were worried about you."

He puts me down near the bed. But before I can hear any of his answers, I feel a churning feeling in my stomach. Immediately, I put Ed's chest on Lyall's bed, then run to the bathroom and puke my gut out in the toilet.

Goddess. This morning sickness!

Surprisingly, Lyall gently pulls my hair so it wouldn't fall to the toilet while I continue to let out liquid from my mouth. "You didn't even eat last night...," Lyall says as if he just realizes this. "Are you okay?"

I cough several times before finally flushing the toilet. Then I wash my hands and mouth in the basin. "Yeah... I'm fine. The wind must have gotten me."

"The wind?"

"Yeah... feeling unwell because of the cold weather...? Have you never heard of that expression?"

"That is so bizarre."

I shrug. Deep down, however, my heart is beating so fast. I hope he believes me and thinks nothing more about me puking. It is a relief when he walks to his room to grab some towels, and then no longer a relief when he says, "Take off your clothes," for the second time.

My mouth gapes. I quickly hug myself, just like I did in the cave. "W–what do you want this time?"

He smirks again as he hangs the towels he just brought behind the bathroom door. Lyall leisurely takes off his shirt and pants and then throws them both to a basket. Not only that, but he takes off his boxer too.

So, now he is naked.

Naked.

Oh, Goddess, I haven't blinked in a few seconds. And no matter how I tell my eyes to never look down... I blame it on my wolf, honestly. My eyes betray me as they look lower and lower and...

Oh... wow...

"Enjoying the view?" His voice snaps me back from my trance. I quickly look up, finding his eyes twinkling with amusement as he grins madly. Then I cover my face, only leaving a slight gap between my fingers to see. This is so embarrassing.

"What are you doing?" I can feel my cheeks getting hot.

"What do you think?" he asks as he takes steps closer to me and I take steps back. "We're taking a bath. Don't you feel nasty after not showering for a day?"

He keeps advancing when I keep going backward. "B–but... we don't have to... to... shower together..." My eyes go to the door behind him. In a fraction of a second, I am already running to the door, but he catches me easily in his arms. As if I am a feather, he carries me to the large bathtub he has.

"Do you want me to take off your clothes as I did in the cave?" he whispers in my ear, sending tiny electric jolts to my skin.

"N–no!" I try to push him away but instead, he lowers us both into the tub, with me sitting in front of him.

To my surprise, he puts his face on the slope of my neck. His breaths burn my skin yet make me freeze on the spot. This is not the first time he is giving me this butterfly sensation in the pit of my stomach. And I blame my wolf too for making me feel this way.

"I don't want to part from you yet," he whispers to my skin.

"What?"

"Stay." His voice sounds like a plea. "Talk to me."

"W–we don't have to talk in the bathroom, right?"

"But I don't want to part from you for even a second."

I blink. Thank the Goddess he couldn't see my face because I am sure as hell that it is red as a crab. This lycan king sounds like a teenage boy in love. Then again, he has gone years without emotion... so this might be a normal response.

His arms hug my body tightly. And when I suddenly feel his hot lips on my skin, my hands reflexively turn the shower on. "Oh, shit," I cry out, "It's hot..."

Lyall's chest rumbles with laughter when he quickly turns the cold water on to balance the temperature. Then he switches to the running water tap to fill in the tub.

I am already drenched in water. Remembering that my beige dress is really transparent, I hug myself even more.

"Since you're already wet," he says, "Might as well, don't you think?"

With a red face, I finally take off my dress too and put it on the bathroom floor. Then I hug myself again when Lyall starts pouring soap to make bubbles for the water. I am thankful for that because the bubbles will help me cover my body. Just wish the bubbles will form sooner.

Another thing I am worried about is... 'little Lyall' poking my back. I try to sit as far away as I can from the man, but he seems to make it a mission to make myself even more uncomfortable. He starts washing my hair without my consent.

Honestly, his massages are really nice. But his hot skin always sends that electrifying feeling all over my body. I don't know how much more electricity I can handle.

"Your hair smells so nice," he says. "It's luscious, dark, and long. And your skin is so smooth too." His finger trails my spine from my neck to my tailbone, sending much more electricity than I can take. So, I change the topic, hoping that he would stop praising and touching me at the same time.

"Why did your mother curse you into becoming a stone?"

I was right. The question does stop Lyall from scrubbing my hair. He even leans away from me slightly. But he keeps a few strands of my hair on his fingers and he is playing with them as he tells his story.

"Because she was my father's chosen mate. Her name is Miranda. Both of them fell in love without the mate bond and were determined to be with each other." He stays quiet for a long time, only fiddling with my hair. At least the sound of water running fills the silent room, and the bubbles have risen to cover my bosom. I assume a more relaxed position.

"Until my father met my mother, Siera," he continues, "They were fated mates. No matter how hard my father tried, he couldn't disregard the mate bond. And he couldn't reject her. So, my father took my mother as a concubine."

"But my mother is more likable than Miranda. And day by day, my father felt more attracted to my mother. Miranda became jealous, and the jealousy piled up over the years. The day I was born, Miranda tried to kill herself. Father stopped her and since then, she has never left her room."

There was silence again. Longer than before.

The water has reached the maximum capacity of the bathtub and is running over, so I turn off the faucet. But even then, Lyall still stays silent.

Unable to withhold my curiosity, I turn to check on him. And I am stunned by what I see.

Lyall has a pained expression on his face. His eyes droop into a sad line and his throat seems to wobble. He is holding back his emotion.

Without thinking, I put my hand on his face. "It's okay. You don't have to tell me now." My words make his eyes widen.

Then I decide to return what he has done to me. I turn my body, put shampoo on my hand, and wash his dark hair. He doesn't resist me, even when a werewolf girl is touching his head, where his crown is supposed to go. Lyall even leans down to give me more access to his hair, like an obedient puppy.

After washing away the shampoo from both of our hair, I am ready to go out of the tub. But Lyall's words stop me. "Miranda killed my parents with dark sorcery when I was fifteen. She wanted to rule the kingdom herself, but I... killed her. In her dying moments, she cursed me to turn into stone because... that was how she felt my father was doing to her. My father slowly turned into stone for her. He couldn't love her anymore and started giving her the cold shoulder."

He takes my palm and inhales deeply the scent of my skin. His eyes suddenly flick from sadness to so much intensity. "Now you have my scent intertwined with yours," he says, "No one will dare to touch you."

Before I could respond, he suddenly gets up, puts on his towel on his lower abdomen, and walks out of the bathroom door. Just like that!

Perplexed, I take a few minutes to gather myself. I pull off the drain, then follow Lyall to the room with a towel covering my body.

But when I get to his room, there is no one. Lyall is gone.

On the bed, there is a white bathrobe. Next to it is a shirt and a pair of boxers, folded neatly with Ed's chest on top of them.

Confused, I choose to wear the white bathrobe first, then try opening the door. "Lyall?"

The door wouldn't open.

I blink.

When I try to open the door again, it still wouldn't budge.

My jaw drops at the absurdity of this. He was opening up and being so vulnerable to me and then he locks me in his room? How dare he?

I run in the opposite direction, to the window I have jumped twice from. The window is locked too. No matter how many times I try to yank the lock, it wouldn't budge.

"Son of a bitch," I mutter.

My fists are clenched, and my jaw is taut. There is a firestorm brewing in the pit of my stomach, burning those butterflies Lyall created just moments ago into ashes.

–to be continued–