–Lyall–

I let out a big puff of smoke in the night air. It is dark, still, and quiet. The smoke travels beyond my window. It hits Naver's magic shield, lighting up those golden vines that cover my entire room.

This is the seventh time this has happened. When my adrenaline is high, I can force myself to transform, but transforming back to my human self is always so painful. Only Naver, Ganesh, and Athena know about this. And they have been helping me to cover this fact up. Whenever danger comes, they help me make excuses on why I don't transform.

I turn to the bed inside the room, where a small, fragile figure sprawls so peacefully. I don't think I can get bored seeing her chest rise and fall when she is sleeping.

'You are not your darkness, Lyall,' she said to me.

The smoke gets stuck in my throat as soon as I realize cigarette smoke can be bad for the baby. It's a struggle to cough silently while trying not to let out too much smoke in my room.

How can I forget Mars is pregnant? Stupid.

I felt so in need to smoke, to calm myself down, that the fact Mars is heavily pregnant escaped me. Now that I know, I jump out from the window, through Naver's shield, and land on the ground below effortlessly.

Only then do I let out the smoke and cough I've been withholding on my throat. "Goddess damn it," I curse. My throat burns. I shake my head to let the pain slip away before taking another deep breath of my cigarette, then exhaling beautifully into the air.

I thought I could smoke freely once I am outside of my room, but of course, that doesn't happen.

"I knew from the very moment I laid eyes on Mars that she would be the answer." Naver walks slowly to me. My ears perk up and my nose sniffs the air. He is alone, with no sign of Athena and Ganesh.

"Princess Athena and my brother are sleeping," he answers my mind. He does that almost all the time when we are alone, which is why it is futile to keep secrets from him.

"Answer to what?" I let out another heavy puff of smoke. My eyes are drawn to the moon in the night sky. It's almost a full moon.

"To your darkness."

I look at Naver, then I let out thick smoke on his face. The Oracle doesn't flinch. "You mean to say she is my light?"

Naver takes steps toward me through the heavy smoke. Despite his cataract eyes, he seems at ease to find his way. "No," he says, "But she's someone who can see through your darkness."

Inhaling deeply, I tell him, "It'll swallow her. Like it did Adina."

Surprisingly, Naver shakes his bald head, then takes the cigarette from my fingers. He inhales and exhales smoothly, creating heavy circular smoke on my face. "This time it's different."

The smoke makes me cough. "Different how?" How am I coughing when Naver, with over a hundred years in his belt, wasn't even bothered the slightest with the smoke?

"Adina loved the idea of you," he says, "That's why she became obsessive about you when she realized you were slipping away from her grip. She tried to hold on too tight that she lost you completely. But Mars..." The Oracle takes another step toward me. His eyes glow white, as white as the lone moon in the night sky. "That girl sees through you, cursed or not cursed. She sees the scared, vulnerable boy inside."

His words sound annoying to me. So I grab the cigarette from Naver's hand and drop the cigarette to crush that rolled paper on the ground with a loud scoff. "That's rich coming from someone who told me to use her to get to Adina."

"No," Naver waves his hand. A golden thread of vines picks up the cigarette pieces and, like a puzzle, the vines combine them all until it is one cigarette yet again. The vine glues each piece, then puts the cigarette in Naver's hand. A spark of fire comes to life from one of the vine branches, which Naver uses to light the cigarette.

He inhales deeply, then exhales a cloud of smoke that takes the shape of a woman in front of me. It's a figure I would recognize in a heartbeat. Those gentle curves I don't think I can ever get out of my head.

It's Mars.

"I said you should use the boy to crush Adina's influence through Mars," he says, "Not everyone can make a Shadow Walker turn its loyalty like that. But you do know I was saying that to snap you out of your disappointment, right? I was trying to trigger your protective side of Mars instead."

I reach for the cigarette because I so badly need to inhale a smoke right now. My hand goes through the smoke that makes out Mars's shape, disintegrating them into the night air. But Naver slaps my hand with his golden vine, takes a deep breath of the cigarette, and exhales another junk of smoke that reforms Mars in front of me. His eyes glow even whiter.

"What disappointment?" I pout.

"The disappointment because you thought Mars accepted the boy's darkness much easier than your darkness," the old man answers. I can't lie, his words infuriate me so much. "You were blinded by jealousy of the boy."

Yup. The more he opens his mouth, the more annoying he becomes.

I reach for the cigarette for the second time. But really, I am destroying the Mars-like smoke in front of me. Yet, of course, Naver only needs to blow another smoke to form Mars.

"You can't get rid of her," he says, "You don't want to."

"You don't know that." I hear the growl in my own voice. It surprises me a bit how angry Naver is making me.

"Oh, don't fool yourself, boy." Naver uses his low tone. "As much as you told the council that you're only keeping her for a year, you know you're going to fight to keep her yours forever." He takes another blow, reforming the miniature Mars in front of me for the third time.

I raise my hand to erase the imaginary Mars, but Naver stops me from doing so with his words. "It's not me who keeps making up Mars in your vision." His glowing eyes respond to his words. "It's you. Your mind is filled with her. All the damn time, boy."

Such a shady old man. So all this time, he's been playing with my mind.

"Why don't you just admit it?" he blows three times to my face. "And do something about it."

The smoky Mars finally disintegrates with the wind. Naver's eyes dim too. "After all, she's claimed you as hers," he continues, "That was the only way for her to be able to save you. You were too stubborn to keep your wall up that she had to break it by claiming you."

The golden vines move to me. They pull on my shirt, revealing a fresh bite mark near my collarbone. When those vines touch the scar, it sends a prickling sensation to my skin. My blood runs faster near that area. I am feeling the weight of our bond.

Looking down, I whisper, "She did it to save me. Not because she wanted to." And that is the biggest thorn I have discovered since I woke up.

"So?"

Naver's blank look surprises me. He acts like I am being too overdramatic about this. "What are you going to do? Reject her claim?"

I gulp. "It's the right thing to–"

"Bullshit!" Naver is never one to talk harshly like this. "What are you afraid of, King? Why do you deny your own heart that is obviously screaming the other way around?"

"I..."

His eyes glow again. Those vines retract from my skin. "This is why the boy won over Mars from you. As much as we have to give, we have to be ready to receive, too. She's given you the key to her door." The old man is only two inches away from me. He stands taller than I usually see him. "Man up."

Those vines quickly wrap around Naver's entire body. Both the vines and Naver's eyes glow even brighter. So bright that it hurts my eyes. And just like that, they disintegrate into golden dust.

As annoying as he was, Naver was right. I think of all his words and what I remembered before I blacked out earlier until dusk turns to dawn. Just me and my thoughts.

And my feelings.

At one point in the night, I scoff softly at myself. Emotions are such complicated abstract things. We can deny it all we want, but it really is the foundation of how we make decisions, of how we portray ourselves to the world.

Why do men like to disregard emotions? And say things like 'Emotions are just for women?' I've lived a life feeling nothing at all.

It's bland. It's barren.

It's not a life. And I don't wish it for anyone at all.

Because now that I have tasted emotions again, my world has become so colorful that I don't want to go back. I want to keep the oak tree Mars planted inside of me.

I know what to do now.

Before the last line of dawn turns to morning, my feet bring me to the dungeon. My warriors bow to me. Seeing my expression, they let me be on my own after opening one of the cells for me.

I take a few steps toward the boy, chained to the roof and floor. The pendant is on the boy's neck, preventing him from using his shadow magic.

"Hello, Shadow Walker," I greet him.

The boy rolls his red eyes in front of me. "My name is Sky now."

"I don't care," I say as I step toward him, "I'm here to propose something."

I swear the boy's red eyes gleam. The shadows formed on the cell wall grow bigger. At least, the boy can't really use those shadows.

"But Mars can't know about it."

***

It takes a few days for me to complete my impromptu plans. There were a lot of things I needed to do. I barely slept at all.

By the time I am done, I know there's only one thing left to do.

My feet take me to the one room I need to be in. The room has changed a lot in the past weeks. I know Mars did that to annoy me, but honestly, I couldn't care less about the room's décor.

When I open the door, I expect to see the pink room I saw before. Yet the room has returned to how it was before. Well, except for a couple of furniture. The room has also been fixed. I personally sent a magically gifted blacksmith to fix the room fast so that Mars can rest in my room comfortably as soon as possible.

Of course, I can put her in another room for a while. But my room has been enhanced with magic and now that I know a Shadow Walker has been coming and going from my room, I amped up the protection even more with Naver's help. She's a lot safer in my room.

I was told that Mars has just returned from her academy activities. I also heard she has gotten closer to some students in the academy, and even Roy has apologized to her in the days I am gone. She has been asking for Sky too, which no one can answer other than, "Let's wait for the King to tell you, personally."

The maids reported to me she has increasingly been staring blankly at the door, waiting for me to come. So when I finally walk in, she looks at me wide-eyed. Mars blinks a few times, making sure I am real.

It feels like we are back to the time I returned after locking her up in my room. We are both stiff as boards.

My eyes travel from her head to toe. She seems healthy. Her baby bump has gotten a little bigger, but she still looks beautiful in the silver slim-fitted dress. By now, everyone in the kingdom should have noticed her pregnancy. But no one has dared to ask her or me directly.

I have so many things I want to say as soon as I lay eyes on her, but all I can mouth is, "Hi."

"Hi," she returns my greeting.

There is an awkward silence between us for a while before, finally, I snap. "Listen, I need to tell you something. I know you're worried about..."

"You," her word stops me. I blink, making sure that I heard correctly. "I'm worried about you, Lyall," she says. Her voice is so sweet and angelic.

"I was going to say, 'Sky,'" Not going to lie, I love hearing what she just said. I love it so much that I have to walk to my small bar and pour myself a little wine to slow my giddy heart.

"Well, him too," she continues, "But I'm worried about you too. How are you feeling?"

I gulp the entire glass. Then pour the wine again. This time, I fill the entire glass for courage.

"I'm fine." My hand puts the glass to my mouth, and I end up drinking to the brim. When I am done, I have more courage to say what I have come to say.

"Mars," I call to her, but my eyes are stuck to my hands. "I can reject your claim."

The room becomes quiet instantly. None of us are breathing at the moment.

"I can reject your claim over me. And you will have the freedom to choose another life partner." I let out a long breath. "I know this is not exactly what you came here to do. It's not what I had in mind either. If I had never met you, I wouldn't be the man I am now."

Mars is quiet. But I don't have the courage to look at her now.

"I thought things were great. I could feel it again, and you have really become the biggest muse in my life. Yet I was jealous of the boy. And then..."

The bite mark on my collarbone feels a little itchy. It feels so stuffy that I have to loosen my shirt collar.

"And then you marked me." I gulp the lump in my throat.

"I can reject you," I repeat. "And then give you a new identity as a lycan so you can live life as free as possible, live the life you have always meant to have. I owe you at least that."

"I can reject you." I drink straight from the bottle. The nerves are really getting to me. I finish the entire bottle with just a few gulps.

"But... I don't want to."

I finally say it.

"I don't want to reject you."

Still not looking at her, I say, "I want you as mine. I want the entire world to know that this werewolf girl is mine. And if you will allow me, I would love to be the father of your child."

–to be continued–