Chapter 583: Well, shall we go?
The silence that formed after Kael’s order lasted only a few seconds, but it was enough to make the three women uncomfortable in different ways. Sylphie looked away first, pretending to observe the details of the room as if she had not been the origin of the entire letter conspiracy. Irelia crossed her arms with a posture far too noble for someone guilty, while Amelia picked up her own cup of tea and took a slow sip, clearly trying to buy time.
Kael remained sprawled on the sofa, with one arm resting on the backrest and a lazy smile on his lips. He seemed relaxed, but his red eyes remained attentive. There was no real anger there, at least not the dangerous kind that could turn the afternoon into a disaster. Even so, there was a very well-sustained theatrical offense, and he seemed willing to enjoy it until the very last second.
"I am waiting," he said.
Sylphie discreetly pointed at Irelia.
"She started it."
Irelia immediately turned her face.
"I received a letter. That does not mean I started it."
Amelia placed the cup delicately on the saucer.
"Technically, Sylphie started it when she wrote asking for secrecy."
"Thank you," Irelia said.
Sylphie looked at Amelia with indignation.
"I trusted you."
"I trusted you too," Amelia replied, serene. "And now all of us are being interrogated by the man you asked us to protect from dangerous information."
Kael raised an eyebrow.
"Protect?"
Sylphie went still for half a second.
Amelia realized too late that she had used the wrong word.
Irelia slowly closed her eyes, as if accepting the inevitable fall of them all.
Kael sat a little better on the sofa, his smile diminishing.
"Now this has become interesting."
Sylphie released a sigh and walked to him. Instead of sitting beside him, she knelt on the sofa facing him, placing her hands on his legs. Her expression still carried a little guilt, but there was also firmness. She did not look like someone trying to escape responsibility. She looked like someone who knew exactly why she had made that decision, even if now she had to face the consequences.
"When you fell into a coma, I was desperate," she began. "I did not know when you would wake up. I did not know if you would wake up. Yggdrasil showed me that your soul was still alive, but she could not promise it would be quick. She said you needed time, and that I needed to decide what I would do while I waited."
Kael remained silent.
The lightness of the scene lessened a little, but did not disappear completely. Irelia and Amelia also grew quiet, because that part was not a joke. All of them knew that behind the comedy of the hidden letters, there was a real fear that had begun when Kael had nearly died.
Sylphie continued, looking directly at him.
"I chose to go with Yggdrasil because I wanted to become stronger. But I also knew that if you woke up before I returned and learned I was in an inaccessible place, training inside the World Tree, you would probably try to go after me immediately."
Kael opened his mouth.
The three women answered at the same time.
"You would."
He closed his mouth.
Irelia pointed at him calmly.
"There is no use denying it."
Amelia nodded.
"You would have gotten out of bed still half dead, asked where the entrance to the Central Realm was, and started an invasion with your body in pieces."
Sylphie completed:
"Exactly."
Kael looked at the three of them, offended.
"You have a very low opinion of my self-control."
"We have a historical view," Irelia said.
"Based on evidence," Amelia added.
"Recent evidence," Sylphie concluded.
Kael stared at the three of them for a few seconds.
Then leaned back on the sofa again.
"That is not fair."
"It is very fair," Sylphie said, softening her voice. "I asked them not to tell you everything because I wanted you to recover first. I wanted you to have time. I wanted that, when you came to get me, it would not be because you had woken up desperate, but because you were strong enough to cross the path without dying in the process."
"I almost died anyway."
"But you did not."
"That argument is horrible."
"I learned it from you."
Kael let out a short laugh, unable to avoid it. Sylphie smiled too, but her hand lightly tightened on his leg, as if she still needed him to understand the serious part behind the teasing.
Irelia approached and sat in the armchair in front of him. Amelia came soon after, settling beside Sylphie on the arm of the sofa, with an elegant posture that did not match the obvious guilt in her gaze.
"The letters were not constant," Irelia explained. "Sometimes they took a long time to arrive. Sometimes they came with parts erased because of Yggdrasil’s barriers. Some had only short sentences, saying she was alive, training, and missing us."
Amelia nodded.
"When you woke up, we thought about telling you. Truly. But everything happened too quickly. The Witch Kingdom, your position, Elion, the vampires, Nidhogg, Yggdrasil. Every time there seemed to be a moment, something new exploded."
Kael looked at her.
"Literally or metaphorically?"
"With you, the distinction rarely matters."
Irelia tried to hide a smile, but failed.
"Afterward, Sylphie sent a letter asking us to wait. She said Yggdrasil still did not want to open the path. She said you needed to resolve your own matters before going after her."
Kael turned his gaze to Sylphie.
"You ordered them to hide my letters."
"I made an emotionally desperate suggestion."
"With a drawing of thorns?"
Sylphie fell silent.
Irelia raised her hand.
"The drawing existed."
Amelia also raised her hand.
"It was very detailed."
Sylphie looked at the two of them.
"You two are terrible allies."
"We are excellent allies," Amelia said. "We are simply facing a greater force."
Kael pointed at himself.
"I am the greater force?"
"At this moment, yes."
He seemed satisfied with the answer for a second, then went back to pouting.
"I am still upset."
Sylphie climbed onto the sofa and sat beside him, fitting herself against his body without asking permission. Kael tried to keep his offended expression, but his arm moved by itself around her waist. Irelia noticed and raised an eyebrow.
"That looks like partial forgiveness."
"It is not."
Sylphie rested her head on his shoulder.
"It looks like it."
"I am accepting emotional bribery."
"Does it work?"
Kael looked at her.
"Unfortunately."
Amelia let out a low laugh.
Irelia relaxed a little in the armchair, but her expression became more serious when she remembered the reports on the table. The conversation about the letters had been necessary, but it was not the only subject waiting for Kael. There was another problem, and that one could not be solved with hugs, pouts, or cross-accusations.
Kael noticed the change.
"What is it?"
Irelia looked at Amelia.
Amelia sighed.
"Already?"
"He asked," Irelia replied.
Kael narrowed his eyes.
"There is always something else."
Sylphie raised her face from his shoulder.
"Is it about the Queen of the Vampires?"
Irelia and Amelia looked at her at the same time.
Amelia frowned slightly.
"You already know?"
"Kael received a letter at the witches’ palace before we came here."
Irelia turned her gaze back to Kael.
"Then you have already been informed."
"In summary," he replied. "She wants to meet me and talk about the recent events involving the King."
Kael rested the report on his leg and stayed silent for a few seconds, his eyes still fixed on the first pieces of information Amelia had confirmed. The room lost its lightness for an instant, not abruptly, but inevitably. The matter of the hidden letters still hung in the air like a small domestic betrayal, something that could be solved with teasing and kisses, but the Queen of the Vampires carried another weight. Broken treaties, spilled blood, political manipulation, and dead children did not fit with laughter.
He took a deep breath and ran his fingers through Sylphie’s hair, as she remained fitted against him on the sofa. The gesture was affectionate, but his eyes were already somewhere else, calculating paths, risks, and consequences. Sylphie noticed it immediately. She did not need a hundred years of divine training to recognize when Kael began turning a distant pain into personal responsibility.
"I do not have much of a choice," he said at last.
Irelia tilted her head slightly.
"You always have some choice."
"I have bad choices, worse choices, and choices that only delay the inevitable." Kael raised the report. "Now that I have involved myself in vampire affairs, I had better understand what happened internally with this Queen Liza."
Amelia frowned slightly.
"You are going to call her by name before even meeting her?"
"If she wants to talk to me about the King, she will probably prefer less theater and more objectivity."
"You are being optimistic."
"I am trying not to call this a trap before I am certain."
Irelia released a discreet sigh.
"That is already almost diplomatic coming from you."
Sylphie, who had remained quiet until then, raised her face from his shoulder. Her green eyes still held warmth, but also attention. She had missed many stages of that story while she was in the Central Realm, and now she seemed to be gathering the pieces little by little.
"I only know fragments," she said. "I heard names, felt changes, but I do not know what truly happened. Who is Liza? And what happened to the King of the Vampires?"
Kael turned slightly toward her. His expression softened, not because the subject was light, but because he was explaining it to someone who had the right to know. Sylphie had returned to his life, and hiding the dangerous parts from her would mean repeating exactly the kind of distorted protection everyone had tried to impose on him.
"You were gone too long, so I will summarize it in the simplest way possible." He passed his eyes over Irelia and Amelia before continuing. "Princess Elizabeth was hunted by the vampires because everyone believed she had killed Queen Liza."
Sylphie’s eyes widened slightly.
"Did she?"
"Not exactly. Or maybe it looked that way at the time. The situation was confused, and the official version was used against her." Kael set the report on the low table. "King Vlad was being controlled. We do not yet know by whom, or how deeply, but there was external influence over him. That already explains part of the kingdom’s absurd behavior, but it does not explain everything."
Sylphie became even more serious.
"Controlled how? Mental magic?"
"Something deeper than a simple suggestion. Perhaps a curse, perhaps a spiritual domination technique, perhaps some artifact. The reports my uncle left should have more details, but I have not read everything yet."
Amelia watched Kael carefully as she heard that, as if wanting to measure how far he was willing to go in that moment. Irelia, in turn, remained silent, but her eyes were fixed on him. Both knew he was only touching the surface of the problem.
Kael continued.
"When they invaded, they found the queen alive."
Sylphie went still.
"Alive?"
"Yes." His voice became a little lower. "Very weak, but alive. So the story that Elizabeth killed Liza began to fall apart. The problem is that by the time that happened, the vampires had already moved, had already broken agreements, had already hunted Elizabeth, and had already massacred people who should not even have been involved."
Sylphie’s hand slowly closed over his clothes.
"Children."
Kael nodded once.
"Yes."
Silence returned for a few seconds.
This time, no one joked. Not Irelia, not Amelia, not Sylphie. There were certain words that changed the temperature of a room simply by being spoken. Children was one of them. Kael kept his gaze lowered, not from weakness, but because if he looked at any of them in that instant, perhaps his anger would escape more visibly.
Sylphie touched his face.
"That is the summary?"
"That is the clean summary." Kael let out a short, humorless laugh. "The ugly summary involves an entire kingdom being pushed to act against its own interests, a princess turned into a scapegoat, a manipulated king, a queen hidden or kept alive in secret, and some organization behind all of it."
Irelia crossed her arms.
"And now this queen, who returned to the throne after all that, wants to speak directly with you."
"Exactly."
Amelia picked up her cup again, but did not drink.
"That may mean she wants help."
"It may."
"Or that she wants to evaluate whether you are a threat."
"That too."
"Or that she wants to know how much you discovered."
"Probably."
Sylphie stared at Kael for a few seconds, but her expression shifted subtly. The weight of the subject was still there, yet another thought emerged beneath it, inevitable and much more personal. Her eyes narrowed slightly, and Kael noticed before she even spoke.
"So that was one of the two women you mentioned."
Kael closed his eyes for an instant.
Irelia looked at Amelia.
Amelia brought the cup to her lips to hide a smile.
Sylphie continued staring at Kael with very controlled jealousy, which somehow made everything more dangerous.
"Queen Liza and Princess Elizabeth."
"Sylphie."
"I am merely organizing the information."
"You are organizing paranoia."
She raised an eyebrow.
"Paranoia?"
"Yes."
"You just said a vampire queen wants to meet you, and that a vampire princess is also involved in a massive political tragedy."
"That has nothing to do with it."
"You always say that before a beautiful woman enters your life."
Kael opened his eyes and looked at her with a tired expression.
"I do not even know if Liza is beautiful."
Irelia cleared her throat very discreetly.
Amelia looked away.
Kael slowly turned his face toward the two of them.
"Do you know?"
Irelia maintained her noble posture for two whole seconds.
"There are rumors."
Kael pointed at her.
"No."
Amelia completed calmly:
"Consistent rumors."
"Also no."
Sylphie crossed her arms over her chest.
"I knew it."
Kael took a deep breath, as if searching for patience somewhere beyond mortal comprehension.
"She could be the most beautiful creature in the world. Even then, this has nothing to do with me."
Sylphie tilted her head.
"Do you realize that your life makes that sentence difficult to accept?"
"I do, but I am still telling the truth."
Irelia smiled faintly.
"In his defense, Sylphie, Kael seems genuinely tired of collecting romantic problems."
"Thank you," Kael said.
"I said problems, not women."
"I withdraw the thanks."
Amelia laughed softly, and the tension in the room diminished just enough for the air to circulate again. Sylphie still looked jealous, but there was something playful in her gaze now. She was not truly afraid of losing Kael to a vampire queen she had not even met yet. She was merely readjusting her own place in a world that had continued spinning without her for a very long time.
Kael noticed that too.
He held her hand and brought her fingers to his lips.
"It has nothing to do with it," he repeated, lower. "Liza is a political problem. Elizabeth is a victim, or an important piece, or perhaps both. I am going to understand what happened because children died, because someone manipulated an entire kingdom, and because this can happen again."
Sylphie observed his face for a few seconds.
The jealousy did not disappear completely, but gave way to something more serious.
"I know."
"Then stop being paranoid."
"Do not push your luck."
"I am trying."
"It does not look like it."
Kael smiled faintly.
She sighed and leaned back against him, though she still kept her eyes half-narrowed toward Irelia and Amelia, as if the two of them held indirect responsibility for any beautiful woman appearing on the political horizon. Irelia answered with an expression of perfect innocence. Amelia, less convincing, simply drank tea.
Kael picked up the report again.
"If Liza retook the throne, she must be trying to consolidate authority. For that, she needs to control the narrative of what happened with Vlad, with Elizabeth, and with the massacre."
Irelia nodded.
"My uncle believes the same. If she acts quickly, she can avoid a civil war between the vampiric clans. If she acts poorly, the clans that lost power may turn against her."
"And if the organization that controlled Vlad is still active, it will try to prevent this conversation," Amelia added.
Kael looked at the report.
"Then the meeting cannot wait long."
Sylphie raised her face again.
"When are we going?"
Kael noticed the plural immediately.
"We?"
She held his gaze.
"I said I would go with you."
"I have not agreed yet."
"You will agree."
"That confidence is new."
"I became a goddess."
Irelia brought a hand to her mouth to hide her smile.
Amelia commented lightly:
"She is learning quickly."
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