Three days passed by and I noticed that there was more of a hustle in the palace; servants were running around cleaning more, preparing more, and there was a livelier buzz all around. Meilin hadn't visited me during that time and I couldn't help but feel that he was ignoring me—either that or he was too busy to deal with me, much like he had done in the beginning.

When I was walking the gardens, alone since Vita had no need to be my bodyguard since the Peccata and Meilin were at the palace, I spotted Remus lying on the grass. I hesitated when nearing him, remembering that Vita had told me that I should never be alone with him because of his spontaneity. Pushing that aside, I took a few steps closer to him.

His ears perked up at the sound of my steps and he turned his head towards my direction. His blood red gaze met mine and he watched me blankly.

"Do you mind if I sit with you?" I asked him with a warm smile.

He stared at me for the longest moment. "I don't mind."

"Thank you," I said as I took a seat next to him. I smoothed my hanfu with my hands and settled down until I was comfortable. "So, Remus, you're the youngest of the Peccata, huh? What're you doing by yourself?"

He pointed at the soft blue sky, still lying down on the grass and making no move to sit up. "I'm staring at the clouds."

"Why?"

"Because I want to."

"That's good logic," I said with a soft laugh.

We both were silent for a moment after that. His gaze darted towards me and he watched me from the corner of his eyes. "I'm not smart," he told me. "I'm kind of stupid. Master tells me that I can't control myself and that I'm reckless."

"I don't think you're stupid."

"I don't understand many things," he told me with a frown as he continued to stare at the sky. "Master says I can't kill everything that gets me mad and I don't mean to. I don't want to hurt you, or else Master will be mad."

"You're not going to hurt me," I told him softly.

"I don't want to hurt you," he said. "You're nice."

"You won't hurt me, Remus."

"Why are you even talking to me? Aren't I scary to look at?"

"I think you're fascinating," I told him honestly. "You're a handsome boy and your hair is the prettiest shade of silver I've ever seen. I don't think you're scary at all; I think you're beautiful."

His eyes widened and he sat upright. "Beautiful? Doesn't that mean really pretty?"

I nodded.

"You think I'm good looking?" He smiled at that, falling back on the ground and rubbing a strand of his hair between his fingers, his gaze locked on it. "I've never been told I'm handsome. Usually people say that about Minos or Atreus. Nikator too sometimes."

"Can I touch your horns?" I asked out of curiosity, staring at the protruding white horns.

"Nikator told me they remind him of a baby goat's horns," he told me as he let go of his hair and stared back at the sky. "You can touch them if you want."

I touched it and just as Nikator said, they were like the horns of an animal. Still, it was interesting to find them on someone's head.

"I'm not smart enough to understand many concepts, so I don't really understand what a bride is," he told me. "What are you going to do to Master? Why does he want a bride?"

I blinked back in surprise at his question. Although he was fifteen, I quickly came to realize that he acted a few years younger than his age; it might have something to do with his upbringing or his life, but he needed special attention to help him grow. "Well," I told him gently, "A bride is a woman that a man takes to cherish and have a beautiful home with. A bride is your wife and she's the woman you start a family with."

Remus's eyes nearly bugged out of his sockets. The blacks of his eyes were more visible as he stared at me. "Why does Master want to start a new family?"

I licked my lips uncertainly. "I don't really know. I think he wants to make his family even bigger."

Hurt flickered in his red eyes and he frowned deeply. "But I thought we were enough for him."

"He wants to give you a little brother and sister to play with," I said instead, brushing back a few stray strands from his forehead. "He wants you to protect them and love them."

"Really? He wants to give us brothers and sisters?"

"Yes. Little ones to run with."

He didn't look too convinced. "I don't know about that. Maybe Nikator would like to run with them, but I don't know if I want to. I don't like running that much."

"You can still play with them," I said.

He shrugged, though it came off slightly awkward since he was lying on the ground. "I don't know about that. I'm not really that fun with kids. They're usually scared of me and they cry."

"You'll protect them, though, right?"

His red eyes met mine and he smiled. "I'm a Peccatum. My life is in your hands."

His words chilled me and I brushed back his hair with my fingers. "You're a sweet boy, Remus."

"You don't think I'm stupid?"

"No, I think you're very sweet and misunderstood."

"I'll try not to hurt you," he said. "But sometimes it's hard. I don't want to hurt you."

"Don't worry about that."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes." After another stretch of silence between us, I laid down on the ground next to him, staring up at the soft blue sky and the puffy white clouds. "You know," I said, "my sister, Lanfen, is your age. I'm sure she would love to meet you. She's one of the sweetest people I know and she's really interested in legends and myths and magic."

"Lanfen?"

"Yes. She's supposed to be coming to the palace anytime now," I said, unable to hide the excitement from my voice. I placed both of my hands on my stomach as I gazed at the sky, not at all concerned that my hair was going to be messy once I got back up, and that all the work the servants had put into fixing it up would be gone to waste. "My brothers and sisters are very kind and I love them dearly. I can't wait until they've come here. Meilin said that they should be coming soon."

"I would like to meet them," he said.

We both laid there for the longest time, Remus silently watching the clouds and the sky, while I was lost in thought about my family and when I would finally see them. Just as the silence was becoming more comfortable, Remus abruptly sat up, his brows coming together as he turned his head to the right.

"Is something wrong?" I asked him as I sat up, brushing my fingers through my hair and following where he was looking.

"I feel it," he whispered, his red eyes narrowing at something in the distance.

"Feel what?"

He lurched to his feet and started running towards the direction he had been looking at. I quickly rose to my feet and followed after him, struggling to keep up as I walked around the trees and rose bushes adorning the vast garden. "Remus," I called out when he was out of my line of sight. "Remus, where are you? What happened?"

The closer I came to the area where I thought Remus had run off to, the more lost I became. Although it was a garden and was surrounded by the walls of the palace, it was a large area, and I felt like I was treading into different corners of the garden I had never ventured to before.

"Remus? Are you there?" I asked as I moved past a clump of bushes. I pushed back a branch that was hanging low and entered a clearing, my voice dying in my throat as I stared, wide eyed, at the mess before me.

Two men were sprawled on the ground, twisted and dead, their eyes glassy and their mouths open as blood stained their faces. Remus was crouching in front of one of the bodies, his hands shaped oddly as long, sharp black claws overtook their normal appearance. His veins were standing out and the tips of his fingers were black, blood dripping from the sharp edges of his claws.

I screamed and took a step back, my eyes wide and my breath catching in my throat as I stared at the dead men. They looked like ordinary soldiers, both of them wearing uniforms. One of them had his throat sliced open and the other had a hole in his chest. It was also then that I noticed that in one of Remus's hands, he held a heart, blood running down his forearm. He was examining the hole in the man's chest while holding his heart.

I crumpled to my knees, my legs too wobbly to hold me up as I stared in horror at the bloody scene before me. Whimpering, I moved backwards, my body trembling at the corpses.

Remus dropped the heart on the ground, rising to his feet and looking over his shoulder at me. He had a calm expression on his face, as if this was all normal. "I killed them quickly," he said with a smile. "They didn't scream this time."

I looked away from him and couldn't stop from shaking.

Right when I thought things couldn't get worse, I felt a clammy hand clamp down on my mouth, another hand pressing down on my shoulder. "Don't move," a raspy voice said, as the man hauled me up to my feet.

Remus stared at the man holding onto me, his head tilting to the side as he examined him.

"You're a monster," the man spat at Remus. "Move, and I'll kill her."

"With what?" Remus asked. "You don't have a weapon."

The man stiffened. "I have a weapon." He removed his hand from my mouth and suddenly, I felt a cold metal blade against my neck. "Now, move and—"

Remus took a step closer.

The man pointed the dagger at Remus. "I told you I'll cut her if you move. Don't move!"

My heart was pounding in my ribcage chaotically, my mind a whirl of thoughts as fear bit into me. I couldn't comprehend what was happening and I felt nauseas. The fear and horror was breaking me and I couldn't help but hope that Nikator, or Atreus, or Meilin, or Vita, or someone would come to my rescue.

I wasn't sure if Remus was going to be able to save me, since I had a blade to my neck and the man could slice me up at any moment.

"I'm looking for the Dragon's whore," the man said to Remus. "Tell me where she is, and I'll let this girl go, and the both of us can go our separate ways."

My blood ran cold and my breath slipped away.

He was looking for me.

Remus tilted his head to the side, confusion playing on his face. "Dragon? Where's a dragon?"

"The Dragon's whore," the man said, pressing the blade back to my neck. "You can't possibly be that naïve to not know. Stop acting dumb or she'll get it."

Remus didn't look the least bit perturbed by the situation. He rose his hand, darkness dripping down his skin as his claws extended, looking sharper and blacker than sin. The man holding me trembled and tightened his grip on the blade.

"Don't—" he started.

Remus pointed at the man and dark whips rose from the ground and with lightning speed, snapped at the man, making him let go of me and howl in pain. I fell forward and barely had time to look behind and see the man be held down by black shadows. The shadows were gas like, tendrils of darkness steaming off of them like smoke.

The man's eyes widened and I couldn't even scream as Remus stood next to him and plunged his clawed hand into the man's abdomen.

"What is a heart?" Remus muttered, ignoring the man's scream as he yanked out an intestine. "I can't feel it when I touch it." He barely examined the intestine as he tossed it to the side. Pressing a sharp claw against the man's chest, he leaned forward, pressing his finger deeper into his chest. "A heart doesn't feel like it."

The last thing I remembered was screaming when Remus dug his hand into the man's chest, ripped it open, and held a beating heart in his hand.