"Who's Catherine?" Phoebe asks me.

I can feel my eyes burn through my skull, glaring at the door that had just closed. My hands grip the bed sheet so hard, my knuckles go red. "Chase?" Her knuckles graze my arm, feeling the worry and concern in her bloodstream. My breathing pitches back to normal as she touches me. I stop gripping the sheets underneath me and my eyes shift back to blue as I start to calm down.

And I don't even know why I got mad in the first place. "Sorry." I muffle. "Are you okay?" She asks.

I look at her and give her a reassuring smile. "I'm fine, don't worry about me."

"Who's Catherine?" She asks again. "She's my little sister." I say, smiling. She nods and looks away. Her mind is clogged with anxiety, asking herself what to say. I can feel her twitching, feeling awkward and uneasy. 'Calm down, I don't bite.' I speak into her thoughts. 'Oh well, I kinda do but, you know what I mean.' Her cheeks grow pink, remembering that I can step into her mind anytime I like. 'You're such an invasion of privacy.' She giggles.

I laugh at her remark. "Why are you so rattled up?" She questions. I stare at her for a moment, confused about what she's talking about but when I realise she's talking about Catherine, I answer. "Nothing, I'm just really cautious of what information gets fed to Catherine. Overprotective brother hormones." I tell her. She laughs and gazes up at me. "I wish my brother could be like that, you know?"

"You have a brother?" I asked, surprised. She smiles. "Yeah. His name's Felix. Well, he only really became my brother before you kidnapped me. Before that, we were strangers." She looks out into the room. I can sense the thoughts in her mind, remembering the warmthness in her brother's voice as he hugged her a few hours back.

"What do you mean strangers?" I ask again, intrigued by her back story. She adjusts her position, moving further away from me and shifting her legs out. "For the past 9 years, he abandoned me in the palace. I stayed there, alone. An entire wing just for me. I was so alone, desperate for someone's company." She explains. My heart aches for her. Goddamnit. I feel every one of her emotions. I lean closer, wrapping my arm around her back as she lays her head on my shoulder. "I'm sorry." I tell her. "It's okay, it's not your fault. It's mine." I didn't quite understand what she meant by that. But I didn't push it.

"Why did he neglect you for all those years?" I ask, finally letting my hands scavenge to her hair, letting my fingers run through them. "He was mad at me." She starts. I'm quite surprised she let's my hands wander around in her hair, but she doesn't mention it. "When I was eight, my parents were taking me out of the castle one day. We went to the borders when a vampire clan attacked us. My father told me to run back and get help but I couldn't move. I only ran when a vampire attacked him. I didn't make it in time though." She explains.

"When I told Felix, he took a few stronger werewolves to go help but when he came back, the only thing he brought with him was my mother's necklace, covered in blood." Her fingers trace over the silver necklace in her hands.

"My parents didn't just die that day, but a part of Felix did too. I didn't see the loving brother that brought me food every night anymore. I could see in his eyes that he'd grown cold." She adds.

Something in her speech triggered that memory inside me. That last moment, stuck in a hallway burning itself down. Catherine in my arms, crying and yelling at me to get out of there. My mind was somewhere else, finding a way to get to my parents. "My parents died too." I tell her. "I'm sorry." She whispers. "I could've got to them, if only my head was in the right place. I could've saved them. But I was too late." I say, defeated.

"It wasn't your fault." She turns to me, smiling weakly and brings her arm around my neck, hugging me from the side. "Maybe we do have something in common." She whispers. I laugh faintly and run my fingers through her hair.

"I'm sorry." I whisper. She looks up at me, meeting my eyes. I can almost hear her out loud saying, his eyes are pretty. "Why are you sorry?" She murmurs. "Everything. I ruined your future, your hopes and dreams. I just walked up and stole everything from you." I mumble. She pulls back, looking at me confused. "You didn't ruin anything. I mean, if you really are my mate, that means all of this is to happen. Even if there's something terrible coming, this was all meant to happen." She tells me. I smile down at her and bring my head down, kissing her forehead.

I lay my head there for a moment, taking her in whole. "You do know how to get into a girl's heart." She whispers. "It's not me. You see, we were made for each other. Every part of you, it was all made for me." I laugh, trying to scare her. "That is so creepy." I look out the window, seeing the sun slowly seep from behind the mountains. "Come, let's go up to the roof." I tell her, taking her hand in mine and dragging her out the room.

I walk up the stairs and open the door to the balcony. A gust of cold air greets me as I get outside, blowing my blue locks into my eyes. "It's so chilly on your side." Phoebe tells me. "And it's so hot on yours." I tell her. We walk to the edge of the balcony, leaning against the wood railing. "This place looks so comfy. So cabin-ish. Wood walls and flooring. It's so comforting." She says, looking around the house. "Do you live here?" She asks. "I wish. It's a lot better than the castle. I live there." I say, pointing to the huge palace on the cliff of the mountain. She nods in response and looks up, following my finger.

"Don't waste your time looking at that depressing place, look there." I take both sides of her head, moving her gaze to the horizon where the sun slowly crept out. Her mouth forms an 'O' as she stares at it, lighting her eyes with the reflection of the sun. It slowly comes out from the line where the sky meets the sea, seeping out and lighting up the sky. "The sunsets here are beautiful." She says, mesmerised. But then her smile fades. Her face goes rigid and I can feel her shaking. "Are you okay, Phoebe?" I ask her. She turns to me with absolute horror. "Sunrise. I need to get back to my palace. My brother's celebration. I need to get there. Now."

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I stop just at the end of the border. "This is as far as I can go." I tell her, bringing her off my back and setting her on the ground. "What do you mean? You came through just as fine last night." She says. "Royals of the opposite kind can't go through during sunrise or sunset. We'll just burn dead." I explain to her. She nods and looks out towards her palace.

"Thank you. For everything." She thanks me. "Tonight, again?" I ask, eagerly. "Tonight. After sunset." She responds. "But wait, how am I gonna get past my brother? He'll sense my scent now that we're closer." She quickly alerts.I sigh and let my body weight sink. "Seriously? Can't you just say, 'Fuck it! I'm gonna go get some wood, won't be back till sunrise?'" I whine.

She stops for a moment, as if she's considering it. "Wait, are you actually taking that into consideration?" I ask her. Her eyebrows furrow and her eyes squint. "No idiot, your idea sucks." She replies. "Ouch." But then I remember something. "I have an idea!"

She looks at me and brings her eyes smaller, giving me a this-better-be-good look.

"Tonight. I'll show you." I tell her, adjusting my coat. "Fine but, it better be good. My brother is smart, he won't just let me go out for wood." She turns back around to me and brings herself up onto her tiptoes, planting a soft kiss to my lips, making my cheeks tint slightly pink.

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"You didn't tell me your mate was a werewolf." I walk into the palace shared area where we all sit. Catherine lays herself on the large arm chair, resting her feet on the footrest while she files her nails. Nick stands next to her, beside the fireplace. I glare at him as I enter. That little bastard.

"Chase, why didn't you say anything?" She throws the filer into the fire, burning it and sending the flames to grow larger. "I'm not a child anymore! You should be telling me these things!" She gets up from her chair and stomps towards me. Nick laughs, hiding his face by facing the fire.

I'm gonna kill him.

"I was but I didn't know how you were gonna react." I tried to think of an excuse but she wasn't buying anything. "It doesn't matter about how I react! When was anything about me?!" She raises her voice. "Cath-" I try to speak but she cuts me off. "Just please. I'm your sister. I should be knowing these things. You can't just abandon me out of everything. I'm already so alone." She says, calmer than her last speech. I suddenly feel a pang of guilt. Whatever Phoebe had experienced and whatever her brother did. I was doing that right now.

"I'm sorry, Catherine." I say, defeated. "You better be." She mumbles. "I just- I just don't want you going through this alone." She's been caring about me from day one. Always about me. Always thinking, how will Chase react? What would Chase do?I'm just the selfish brat that can't control his anger. "And you know, your powers. They're getting out of control. I want to be there to help you." She tells me. "I don't want you to end up like- Him." She shudders at the thought. "I'm sorry. I'm such a selfish person, aren't I?" I mutter. She laughs, harshly as if she's forcing it. "Yeah. You are." She leaves the room and Nick turns around, showing his grin and mischievous smile.

"I would totally pay for that." He winks at a servant walking past that happened to be holding a few glasses of water in her tray. "And do you happen to have any popcorn?" I can hear him asking her. She nods and he winks again. He whispers some instructions to her and she nods and takes the empty glass from his hand and walks away.

"I am going to kill you." I growl. "How 'bout after I eat the popcorn?" He suggests. "I can't die on an empty stomach. That is just depressing." He says. I continue glaring at him as the servant comes back with a bowl of popcorn for him. "Oh thank you," He bends down to her height and looks down at her name-tag. "Janise. Thank you Janise." She nods again and walks off.

"Your servants don't talk. It's like, they do everything you ask and they don't talk. Is there like, a nodding language?" He asks me, stuffing a handful of popcorn into his mouth. My anger eases just by watching his stupidity. "I could never be mad at you." I sigh. "But seriously, you're a real dick for telling her." I point my finger at him. "Yeah I know. Just think of it as if I were giving you a favour. Want some?" He pushes the bowl into my face, offering me some popcorn. "I'll skip. I need to breathe." I walk out of the room through the glass doors. Out here, there's a beautiful garden with tall vines and pink wild flowers.

I lay down on one of the benches beside a vine growing up a wall and think about the small things around me like how it took years for a plant to grasp on a wall and grow taller than it.

"I don't want you to end up like- Him." Catherine's speech lingers in my head and I quiver just at the thought of it. I remember Phoebe telling me about how a vampire clan attacked them all.

It was because of him.

Before my mother and father were royals, there was a different king.

He was my uncle. Lord Cassius.

He had this anger implanted inside of him. He'd been struck with a dark light from hell that ate him alive. He couldn't control his temper and every time he grew angry, the fire inside him grew stronger. The vampire clan was forced to seek refuge from him. So my father killed his own brother. To save everyone. He battled with him up in the mountains for days. We grew worried. Scared he wouldn't return. I waited for him for days.Until I grew impatient.

One night, when I was eight or so, I snuck out of the castle and climbed up the mountain's edge to see if my father was okay. There, I saw him fighting my own uncle. Cassius was on top of him, holding a knife to his chest. I leaped out for him, "No!" I cried. They both turned their heads in shock as they saw me approaching. My uncle Cassius looked at me, my father and his knife.

I remember it all like it was yesterday.

Cassius then took out his hand and used all his force to strike me with a blinding black light. It shot me right at my chest. I remember being knocked to the ground with dark mist covering my eyes. When I got up to apply pressure to my wound. It was untouched. There was no wound or scar left. Nothing. I looked back at my uncle and he smirked at me. "Do me well kid, do me well." And with that, he fell to the ground. Dead. That day, my uncle had passed on that darkness into me. And there was no escaping anymore.