I could remember the day I progressed with my plans. It was a Tuesday, sometime around November. It was quite cold outside, but in this orphanage, the ovens were lit brightly. It was quite the cosy place, and this wasn’t just the children who thought so. We hired quite a few more humans from the slums and they all seemed to be quite content with the situation, despite sleeping less than previously.

“Hold it. Hold it. Now.” And I was sadly not enjoying this relaxing feeling at all. I stacked crates with Hannah. Luckily, they were so light even I could lift them, but as there was no one else up for the task because they were all eating. I sadly had to do this fpr whatever reason. In any case, we couldn’t do this too long either.

We had an appointment, a rather important one at that.

“Time!” I exclaimed after we finished around half the crates. Hannah, finally freed of her burden, even exhaled loudly, probably out of boredom than anything else though.

“Finally.” She said and opened the door to the storage room, revealing three kids staring at us with puppy eyes.

“Lucy … Hannah, please don´t go!” Needless to say, some of them became immensely attached to me, including this trio. Luckily, no fight broke out over me yet. Sighing, I went on my knees and looked into their teary eyes.

“Hey, Paul,” I ruffed through his brown hair in an attempt to cheer him up which seemed to work somewhat. “, I´ll be back in no time. I know you miss me but I also know you are strong. And before you know it, we will be playing games together again.” The six-year-old rubbed his teary eyes but nodded, nonetheless.

“Rupert, I don’t want you to go into bed saddened, so I got this for you.” I opened a nearby chest, took out a stuffed teddy bear and gave it to him with a smile on my lips. Like always when I gifted these kids anything, they opened their eyes wide, only to take it and run off with it. A bit saddened by this defensive reaction, I turned to Leonie, the oldest one of the trio. I gently grabbed her shoulders and pulled her closer to me to whisper in her ears.

“Leonie, I want you to keep an eye on the others. And make sure they listen properly tomorrow when the teachers come. Can you do that for me?” Surprisingly, she didn´t nod but rather went for a hug right away. This was the first time she did so as she usually had quite the fear of contact, but it made me quite happy nonetheless, even though I had to twist my neck awkwardly so she wouldn’t touch my skin directly.

“I will!” She said, took Paul´s hand and walked away while waving, probably to search for Rupert.

A short while later, as we sat in the White´s unmarked family carriage, Hannah switched places to sit right beside me.

“You know most of them are hoarding food?” Yes, I did. I already talked to quite a few of them, but rarely managed to succeed in stopping them.

“Yeah.” I said drily, while I hoped time would fix this issue.

“And you also know they would go back to stealing the moment you let them down?” That was even more obvious. They lived years in the harshest conditions this planet had to offer, it was only natural they would go back to the old way if I threw them away.

“Nobody is innocent.” I claimed.

“Do you think they deserve all of that?” Deserve? Nobody deserved anything, and I was just doing what I wanted to.

“What about you? Do you think you deserve the life you are having right now?” I asked while eyeing her fine maid dress. She was sleeping in the best bed there was, even gained some weight and served me. There couldn’t be a better life.

“No.” She said, looking away from me for the first time since this conversation started.

“See.” I said.

“Everyone has seen what you did. You are singlehandedly responsible for setting up this orphanage, you are the reason why the living standards of those in the eastern slums are rising considerably. So much in fact, that we have quite the immigration to there. They all know you are benevolent or whatever you want to show them. You can stop now.” She explained and returned her gaze towards me. I could see the anticipation in her eyes, but couldn’t tell her the truth because I feared Aska would listen in. And I couldn´t risk giving him any proof I went back to the old ways of liking children. So far, I could still write everything down as a sophisticated publicity stunt.

“I know.” I simply said, but still saw in wonder how Hannah started to smile brightly. I looked away from her, hoping she got the hint. Luckily, she didn´t push any further and let me remain in silence for the rest of the trip. Only as the carriage came to a halt did she speak up again.

“Are my ears hidden?” She asked and turned around slowly. Shortly afterwards, she grabbed the long item, wrapped in layers and layers of cloth and wrapped it around her shoulder.

“Good enough.” I said after looking at her blonde, long hair for a few seconds. I stood up and let Hannah help me get out of the carriage, surrounded by hundreds if not a few thousand teenagers who went to school. We were still quite far away from the gates of the academy, but it was already quite crowded on the sidewalk. Hannah held up the left hem of my dress, probably to save it from the dirt on the ground, but also so that she wouldn’t get lost. After all, there was no way I would get lost there, was there? Holding up the other side of my white dress, we strolled with all of the students through the gate.

Today was the first day of the new semester, the day where the second prince would enrol into this school, and the day where I would finally meet a person I wanted to ask so many questions. But first, we had to enter the school grounds, which was fairly easy considering there were so many new students. There was a slight difference between us and the majority though. We didn´t wear any uniform, but rather the clothing we wore usually. This mostly happened if the families who sent their kids there were poor, which directly resulted in them being bullied.

But we were clearly different. The necklace I stole from the whore clearly showed there was more to me as the sapphire reflected the light beautifully. My dress basically screamed of high nobility while Hannah clearly wore maid clothing with a rather suspicious item on her back.

At that time, I was incredibly glad the newspapers didn´t manage to print pictures yet, otherwise I would be immediately swamped with bootlickers. This way though, they all kept their distance as soon as they had the chance.

“Stop being so beautiful, you make us stand out.” She whispered into my ears as we were a few hundred meters into the school grounds and the students started to disperse somewhat.

“Beautiful? Me? Oh, Hannah, that’s so sweet.” I told her and began to search for someone. Without any real goal in mind, we strolled across the campus, seemingly admiring the buildings as if we didn´t see the royal palace daily. In contrast to that, this seemed incredibly plain.

As we were slowly walking through a small park as we heard noises a bit off the main road. Shrugging, we made our way there as we had nothing better in mind anyway. The noises apparently came from four boys who were conversing rather nicely … one of them, a poor fourteen year old who couldn’t even buy a single school uniform in all his years there, was bullied by the three others.

The poor boy, probably only here through tuition that covered the basics, hugged a book about magic as if his life depended on it, while the other three brutally shoved him against a tree.

“… just because you are slightly better at magic doesn’t mean you can cross our way. Filthy prick, do you even know how much these shoes cost? More than your life, and you ruined them! How do you intend to pay me back?” asked the boy in the middle of the trio. He stood tall above the three others, had silvery whie hair and a very deranged sense of fashion. I mean, why else would he wear green, brownish shoes that definitely did not fit the mostly black school uniform?

“Hey there!” I said and stepped out from the last tree covering us. The three of them immediately turned around to stare at Hannah and me, while the other boy exhaled loudly.

“Hi …” said the boy on the left, his cheeks going beet red as he saw me.

“Uhm … so we kin-“ I started, but was soon interrupted by the right boy who apparently had more eyes for Hannah.

“Are you two freshmen?” He asked, completely ignoring the boy behind him who sank down on the tree in an attempt to make himself as small as possible.

“Ah, yes. So, we were ju-“ I said, but was interrupted by the boy again.

“Do you want us to show you around?” He asked while the boy in the centre looked at me quite differently. With a strange curiosity, he looked at me from my head to my feet with his blue eyes.

While I hesitated to answer directly, he approached me until he stood a mere step away. His nostrils widened as he took in the air and looked down onto me, while I kept smiling and smiling.

“You are quite unique.” He said and closed the distance even further. Disgusted, I leaned away from him to the side as he brought his face even closer to my shoulder and he began to smell my hair. While he didn´t touch me, he was way too close for what was acceptable, both for me and for Hannah. Without much hesitation, she shoved the creep away from me and pulled me towards her. I caught her staring angrily at him as she was preparing to draw her dagger while I tried to defuse the situation by laughing loudly.

“Is it my new soap? I knew I shouldn’t have washed with it.” I said while smiling brightly towards the creep.

“Maybe. Maybe not.” He said and squinted. “Can I see your eyes?”

“Sure.” I said and dragged my magical sunglasses further down until they only touched the tip of my nose. Through the gaps, he could very well see my green contact lenses. Luckily, I only had to wear my sunglasses and not actually have them in front of my eyes to function, and so I could confidently say he was quite thrown off guard by my eye colour.

“Let´s go.” He said as I pushed my glasses further up again.

“Hey, I thought we would show them around?” One of the other hoodlums said but swiftly followed his silver-haired boss. My gaze was glued to the back of the silver-haired boy the whole time as he left the area. I would remember him, that was for sure. Mostly because of that smell … not quite a werewolf … but very close to it. Maybe he lived with them or something else, but this wasn’t a trail I could investigate in person right away.