13

- Good! You know that the situation in the colonies is increasingly unstable... - Cael's eyes land on me as if remembering my existence suddenly- Arthur! Arthur! - Cried Cael.

- My sir? Did you call me? - Shout Arthur in the distance.

I look for him with my eyes and I saw the young captain leaving his control cabin at the top of the boat and hurrying towards us.

- Is she your new pet?

- Yes... Why do you ask?

- Just curious...Each year you appear with a pallaki different...

- She is different!

- Did you call me sir? - Arthur interrupted with breathless breath.

- Could you take Miss Kristma to see her accommodations and show her where my games room is?

- Yes sir! Come on?

- Yes! Sure!

- Bye Kris... It was really nice to meet you!

- Bye lord Benjamin. It was really nice to meet you too.

- Lord? By the old gods! I'm feeling older now. Thank you Kris! - He complained.

- For nothing Sir Benjamin Leonel, if you want to feel older again just greet me again- I provoke him back.

- I'll remember that, lady Kristma.

We laughed at our newly created Internal joke.

- Let's meet your room Kris? - Arthur repeated.

- Yes.

- Bye Lady Kris.

- Bye Sir Ben.

Cael looked at Ben steadily and still with his haughty chin and hands in his pockets while Benjamin who due to our fast interaction was with the countenance and posture somewhat more relaxed.

The size of the deck was proportional to the size of that ship's luxury. The pine-lined floor without being touched, large cedar masts and the ornamental designs on the floor, on the parapets and all kinds of utensils of the ship were extremely precise and colorful.

Arthur took me to a door carved under his cockpit and then guided me down the stairs that descended into the poorly lit space that opened into a lojg hallway from that same opening.

- We arrived at the first floor... - He announced lighting a blue light globe moved by the magic of silence - You, Sir Cael, Sir Benjamin and me will sleep here.

The orb of light detached from Arthur's fingers and began to roam through the grand hallway of doors carved into the ship's inner wood.

By walking from the luminous sphere the other matte spheres attached to each door lit. A several white spheres were showing their brightness and splendor until whole hallway was lights.

- Kris accompanies me... I will show you your room.

Arthur walked and I followed him until we stop in front of a door with the number 542 stuck at the top of the same door.

- This is your bedroom. Do you want come in or you want to go to the games room?

- I'm but could say to me what is the games room?

- I forgot to mention it. Before you arrive Cael asked me in one of his messages addressed to me to show you the games room.

- Okay but could you explain me what is this room?

- I will show you but before... what do you want to see first? Your room or the games room?

- My room.

- Okay... Please follow me.

Outside my little window the life began to bloom on the timid artificial lights that was radiating from the dark wooden huts covered in snow by the roadside.

I was too weak to feel any stimulus result from to the cold and the wind that howled around us. The only thing I could do was enjoy the smell food coming from the houses and to curse the latent headache that pissed me off in several possible ways.

- Let's stay here... - Caelwarned with his distant voice - My footman and I are hungry. It would be good for you to get some rest... maybe eat something...

- Yes...

As angry and hungry as I was, my brain was still working and my mind was still intact enough to stop me from starting an argument with Cael about him getting me hurt and keeping me hungry all day. Instead, my neurons worked in the company of my intelligence to find a way to change that situation.

That man had to have some weakness, some loophole so that I can trap that beast so that I can take that lion and make his mood swings no longer affect everything or almost everything that relates to me or the people around us.

I turn my eyes to the Cael dressed in his linen shirt and black riding pants.

Perhaps it was in his hair, his strong arms or else it was his frighteningly enveloping scent with citrus touch but I still wanted him, I still wanted that beast over me making me delirious with pleasure.

I know that emotionally speaking he's a failure. He doesn't know how to control his impulses by being even cruel and evil but I can't just erase the flame of passion and desire that burns in me.

Drus would curse me for wanting someone who shows a huge dark and uncontrollable side but I still want him. I want the voice deep and drawn in my ears, the taste of his lips.

By more angry, or sad, or scared even if for my own good I should avoid him as Liliane used to do I still want him.

- We arrived Kris...

The horses' hooves were slowing down until finally we stopped in front of a small lodging with a long and triangular roof. The soft, gleaming snow was accumulated on the windowsills next to the narrow entrance door.

Cael was the first to descend and soon after him I went. The place where we would spend the night was rustic simple with some rotten wooden tables and chairs turned up and piled up on the north side of the small hall.

- Can I help you?

A woman of short stature, slim body, thin hair, round face and brown eyes that by the nervous expression should be tired and without patience for outsiders asked pointing her red nose towards Cael.

Judging by the tone of her voice, her hips and the grimy apron, that woman should own that rustic hotel.

- Sir, we're closing! You want something? Otherwise...

- Want two quarter madam and three bowls of stew.

- Okay! It's gonna cost 1500 shekels of copper. Will you pay one half now and another half tomorrow morning or will you pay cash?

- I'll pay the full amount tonight. Filiph! Take my coin purse and pay her the amount she asked for. Kris... let's go to the room. It's very late and... ma'am! Could you...

- I do not deliver anything in the rooms! If you want to eat the stews you will have to get in the kitchen!

- Here is the payment ma'am!

The young man with gray eyes, curly hair and gentle face was handed a small dark bag stuffed with a good amount of coins to the lady who checked the authenticity of some of that small copper triangles using a golden canine stuck in her dental record.

- You can go upstairs... Your rooms are upstairs... - Suggested the lady concentrated on her gold.

- Filiph! You will stay here and will take the stew bowls to our room.

- Yes my sir!

- Yes Arthur! He is a magnificent man essences the best Master I have ever known in my life! - I lie trying my best not to let my repudiation and contempt appear while I was saying those words.

- All right, all right... The story Liliane told me was that on one of the nights while she was sleeping in her cabin, a few years before she went through the pallaki ritual and became one of Sir Cael's pallakis, she said she woke up with the sounds of a ritual, Yellow Day… and she told me that one of her friends was chosen for this ritual. So while she was hiding, watching what was happening to this friend, the ritual was initiated and she saw Sir Cael leading this girl and offering her up to chaos... could someone believe on that?

- No…No way at all! - I agree with my mind buzzing with the hypotheses that could justify why Liliane and Ilyada had fled Cael's dependencies and why Liliane hated our Master so much.

- She said that after that her friend came back very strange and confused. She said this friend didn't recognize her anymore, she started to walk away and she became a completely different person... I think that friend's name was Yolanda...

- Yolanda? Are you sure this was that the name of Liliane's friend?

Couldn't that be true... Yolanda was offered to chaos? She and Liliane were friends before? And the worst... what kind of monster of chaos has Yolanda become? What kind of monster is she under that white skin and angel face?

- Yes! And after a while Yolanda became one of Cael's pallakis... And yet, by the story of Liliane this girl named Yolanda has become someone despicable, cruel and bitter... A monster as Liliane told me.

- But this is impossible! In this ceremony the person who is offered becomes a monster of chaos! - I asked trying to get more information out of him.

- Yes and that part I also did not understand why I told you that Liliane is crazy!

- Yes... - I answer with my voice vaguest than usual.

I was completely shocked. That couldn't be real but... maybe that's the why Liliane refused to be near Cael...

But why didn't she show a deep resentment towards him? If it were me and Drus I don't even know what I would be able to do! Or what she would be capable of if it were the other way around. But the Yellow Day in theory turns the person who was offered into a monster and most of the time during that process the person dies... How iolanda survived and wasn't turned into a monster? Unless... only if instead of the body being turned into a monster her soul was turned and because of this she survived and forgot her friendship with Liliane...

- We have arrived

- Hi?