unable to say or do anything that I nearly forgot to breathe. He looked at me and shook his head as if he knew that I was going to ask "how".

I heard footsteps and saw Flint and Klas rubbing towards us. They wore stern looks on their faces that told me something bad had happened. This day seemed to be getting worse and worse.

"What is it?" I asked once they were close enough.

Klas glanced at Flint warily and the latter nodded. "We need to bring you in."

"Bring me in?" I frowned. "Where?"

"The Queen wants to meet you." Flint clicked his tongue impatiently. "She's waiting, we must hurry."

I turned to Vlad. I wasn't sure I wanted to meet Queen Rhea, not when I needed to find the answers. Not when all I wanted to do was crying myself to sleep with the hope that when I woke up, this was all turned out to be a dream. A nightmare but a dream, nonetheless.

"Lady Stavros!"

Flint's harsh tone woke me up from my train of thoughts as I whipped my head and faced him.

"We have to go now," he spoke in a softer tone, "the CG has secured the road, we need to bring you into the palace this instant before something bad happen."

I remembered what I'd heard earlier about C4 blowing up somewhere and figured it'd be wise to follow his instruction and this 'secured road' rather than going anywhere else on my own. "Fine," I nodded. "But he has to come with us as well."

Flint looked over at Klas then sighed. He probably regretted taking this assignment and thought of me as a brat. I didn't care what he thought as long as he'd take Vladimir as well. There was no way I was going to leave him. "The Queen only requested you."

"Well, if he's not coming, me neither."

Klas stepped forward. "You have to come, Lady Stavros. It's the Queen we are talking about and her majesty dislikes waiting."

Vladimir shook his head. "He's right. Avy, you should go with them. I'll be alright."

"No." I stayed firm. Vlad gave me a look, one that told me if we still had the connection, we probably argued through the bond. I turned to Flint and Klas. "Guess what, if you're not taking him, then I suggest both of you run back to the Queen and tell her that I won't be able to meet her." I took Vlad's hand and gave him a little squeeze. "But of course, when she asks why, you both need to tell her that the reason was that you two refused to bring my soulmate along."

"Honestly," I tilted my head to the left as I continued, "I'm curious about what Queen Rhea is going to say to that."

Flint cocked his head to the side, clearly pondering my every word. At last, he let out a deep exasperated sigh. "Fine. He can come." He hurriedly took my free arm and dragged me. "No time to waste. We have to move fast."

Since today was the worst day ever, I thought there would be an incident on our way to the palace but to my surprise, luckily there was none. We arrived at the palace fifteen minutes later and were brought up to the Queen's office, not the one with high pedestal.

"Queen Rhea," greeted Vladimir with a bow. I curtsied despite my inner self wanting to throw one of my snickers at her for being an ass these last few days.

"Lord Ambrosia." She smiled and slid her gaze to me. "Lady Stavros." Her hand moved to grab a thick book that I recognized as the Queen's Diary, the same one that Scarlet had stolen months ago. The mention of her name, even if it was in my own head, made my heart ache.

"As I am sure you know what this book is," said Queen Rhea as she opened the book, looking as if she was trying to find a certain page. "You must be well aware that this is one of the three sacred relics left by the three most powerful gods: Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades."

I didn't know that yet since telling her that wouldn't gain anything, I decided to keep my mouth shut and gave her a nod.

"This book was left by Zeus. Poseidon left a staff while Hades left us a key. Only the book was used throughout the centuries by our Queens, the staff and the key were remained unused."

"Why?" I blurted.

If Queen Rhea seemed surprised with my outburst, she didn't show it. "Well, we don't know they are for and since they are both our most precious things, we didn't want to risk accidentally impairing them."

"Okay," I swallowed before I continued, "is this why you called me here? To find the use of some old relics?"

I felt Vlad pulling the back of my T-shirt, warning me not to upset the Queen but I was already upset enough. I was upset about the accident that got so many people injured. I was upset that the factions, both old and new, didn't value others' lives. But most of all, I was upset that Vlad and I had lost the bond. So excuse me, if learning the history of The Hellenicus was not the top of my priority list.

Queen Rhea shook her head. "I called because the book has told me something." I was about to ask how an inanimate object was able to tell her anything at all when she pointed at the middle of one page. "It's written in Greek, I'm not sure if you're able to read Greek but it's said that The Lord of The Sky--"

"Zeus, angered by the violation made by Hades, cut the bond between the last remaining Stavros and her/his soulmate as a punishment not to meddle with the lives of The Children of The Moon, The Earth, and The Sun, for whatever passed the gate to the Underworld shall remain there until the reincarnation," said Vladimir.

I didn't know which surprised me more: him being fluent in Greek or the fact that Zeus had cut the bond.

* * *

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