In a dimly lit corridor, lined with large-sized paintings of flowers on both sides, a tapping sound echoed. An extremely gorgeous woman of hopelessly irresistible proportions strode alone in the long, empty path as she observed the art hung on the walls. Her wavy, light purple hair came down below her shoulders, which bounced against her back with every step she took. There was an air of regality around her, but also hidden underneath, was the fierce and menacing aura of a seasoned warrior.

Her silk blouse, golden in color, was fastened tight and accentuated her heavy, firm bust, which was a marvel in itself with the roundness and bounciness of her bosom. The long sleeves fashionably open at the shoulders served as protection against the cold weather. Her long-golden-skirt, shielded her from the chilly breeze coming through the large door at the end of the corridor. The shoes, which made a clicking noise, had a few inches of heel beneath them and made her already majestic buttocks look even more mesmerizing. 

“Impressive…” Suzanne smirked to herself at the only picture which piqued her interest. Conspicuously, among all the floral paintings, it was one of the only two life-sized portraits. Her teeth peeked out of her full red lips as she mused to herself about the implication of hanging Raymond’s and Miranda’s portraits opposite each other.

“Hehe…” She giggled to herself and shook her head at the actions of her eldest daughter. A thin strand of hair flitted across her face and the contrast of the violet hair against her milky-white skin highlighted the dangerous charm of a mature enchantress.

“I’ll have to ask her about it later,” muttering that to herself, Suzanne pushed open the door to Miranda’s room.

The room was on the top floor of the building and was the biggest in the house. The only other room was on the other side of the corridor and right now Suzanne had occupancy in it.

Suzanne was a little miffed since the morning when Miranda forbade her from going to the forest and checking up on Raymond, but she wasn’t one to hold a grudge on such little things. Nevertheless, it was a little disheartening to see the frigid demeanor of her eldest.

Given that Miranda had never been one to show much affection to anyone, except her cousin, she shouldn’t have been surprised. As a mother, though, she was a little worried about Miranda’s lack of interest towards the women in their family.

…

Miranda gave a cursory glance when Suzanne entered the room and tiptoed beside her.

“Mother,” she greeted half-heartedly but kept her gaze on the window and towards the path leading to the eastern gate of the city. She had specially designed the room in such a way that she could look out and observe the whole city of Ryhor from the windows on the walls, but today she stood stuck to only one of them. She had been waiting to catch a glimpse of her cousin and nothing else seemed to be able to hold her attention. The long wait was getting to be a little too worrisome.

…

“Hah…” Suzanne sighed and followed her gaze and took in the view of the city. It had changed a lot from what she remembered. The number of houses had increased drastically, and the roads and pathways looked well planned out.

There was a layer of snow on top of the buildings, but the roads were clean of any. Somehow, the place looked livelier than ever before, even if the weather played a large part in it. Moreover, the wild tribes who earlier made up the majority of the residents now seemed to have come around to be more like the genuine kingdom population.

I guess Miranda did a lot of work for it to be like that…

She glanced at her daughter, who looked a little lost and sad. The mild breeze blew Miranda’s gorgeous, silky hair, lending her a melancholic flavor, which was quite fitting in the backdrop of the bleak surroundings around Ryhor. Still, there was the undeniable shine of a ruler on her face, a magnetic aura that could compel subservience from those around her. As was often the case, Miranda had let her long, azure hair flow freely to her back. Of all the five Tygrine women in the family, Miranda had the longest hair, and she never forgot to show it off.

As the wind picked up, a few locks of her hair ran down her forehead and over her big, beautiful eyes. Suzanne lifted her hand to console her daughter, to hug her close and take her sadness away. In the end, the frigid aura, the do-not-come-close air of Miranda, unnerved Suzanne, and she settled for smoothing out the edges of the white garb. It was a beautiful dress that covered Miranda’s entire body from her neck to her feet, and without a doubt, it must have been tailored by an expert to catch every tiny, beautiful edge of Miranda and her hourglass figure.

…

“Hmm…” Miranda hummed when Suzanne awkwardly tried to comfort her. She had seen from the corner of her eye when her mother had started to lean in for the hug but then changed her mind at the last moment. Sadly, it wasn’t something new or surprising to her. She wasn’t close to her mother, not since she was three years old.

Suzanne had always been like a whirlwind of sorts; she would come and go, be extremely affectionate for a week or two and then months would go by before Rose and Miranda saw their mother again. Naturally, it left some resentment in the twins, especially in the elder one.

“They’re late,” Miranda muttered, even as her eyes remained locked on the road towards the east gate. She couldn’t bear to watch the troubled display of her mother and decided to break the air of weirdness that permeated between them. Suzanne had been trying; Miranda could see that, but her mind would always take her back to the days spent lying in wait for her mother and all the motherly actions of Suzanne would lose weight.

…

“Yes!” Suzanne exclaimed in relief, glad to be rid of the silence. Suddenly, she turned to her left and asked, “why did you not go with Lily?” When her daughter didn’t show any response to her query, she added unhurriedly, “I believed that you would be the first to go to Ray…”

After a few moments of quiet, which felt a lot longer to Suzanne than they actually were, Miranda commented offhandedly, “they’re twins as you well know. So…”

“So? Don’t tell me-”

Miranda shot a glance at her mother, and Suzanne unwittingly stopped her words midway. She wanted to say that it had never stopped Miranda before, but the uninterested gaze of the azure-haired beauty threw her off, flustered her. And that was that for the topic. Sometimes it felt to Suzanne that maybe Miranda was the adult in their relationship. Communicating with her eldest daughter had always felt stiff to her, as if the both of them were putting on a ruse to exchange information.

Suzanne was having a hard time with it. Why does this feel so fucking weird?! Are we always going to be so stiff with each other?!

Why can’t she talk like a normal person?! Inside her mind, Suzanne screamed her lungs out at her daughter. She, a mighty general, a veteran warrior, whose name was enough to make anyone shake in their boots in the whole of surrounding kingdoms, was at a loss of how to deal with her own daughter. Though she had wanted to make up for the times when she should have been there as a mother, it was hard to get rid of the resentment that had been brewing inside Miranda for so many years.

So ironic… Suzanne laughed at her helplessness.

Rose, the younger of the twins, was a lot different than Miranda, and Suzanne never did have any weirdness communicating with her or showing affection as a mother. It was very unlikely, in Suzanne’s opinion, that Miranda had been holding a grudge against her.

After all, Miranda was far too refined and wise for something silly like blaming Suzanne for doing her job as the kingdom’s marshal. Even so, it wasn’t hard for Suzanne to notice that Miranda liked to keep a distance between herself and everyone else, including who should be closest to her: her family members, and especially her twin.

Of course, Raymond is excluded from that… Now that I think about it, she’s like an entirely different person in his presence… She’s like a perfect being of love and compassion, like there isn’t anything that could ever begin to upset her…

Suzanne smirked to herself at the craftiness of her daughter. It felt to her that she could use this knowledge that Miranda wasn’t the same caring person when dealing with anyone else other than Raymond at some future time. Leverage this to maybe have fun at the expense of the infallible Miranda.

Amusing! She was still in the midst of picturing her daughter’s face, aghast, embarrassed, and blushing, when the sharp voice of Miranda rang by her ears. And it took her a few good seconds to understand what was being said to her.

“So, when are you leaving?”

Huh?! Did she just ask me to leave in a roundabout way? Heartless!

Suzanne didn’t let it show that she had been a little rattled by the sudden voice of Miranda. It might be considered rude to ask this to your own mother, but she had known that Miranda was never one for showing much sentiment. Suzanne was a bit miffed that she was essentially told to piss off, but she understood that this was no time for sentiments. A war was coming, and they had to make the best use of what little time they had left to make preparations for it. If they just remained sitting on their laurels, then they could only dream about gaining anything in it.   

“Today. I plan to leave today. Yes, after I talk to Raymond… I will leave for Beltran with Ingrid.”

Miranda raised an eyebrow at those words. And for the first time since Suzanne had entered the room, Miranda turned to face her. There was a little surprise in her voice as she asked, “aren’t you being a bit hasty?”

“Well, maybe…” Suzanne folded her hands beneath her bosom before she continued in a serious tone, “But the thing that I came for, it’s been settled and quite miraculously so if I may add…” A contemplating look came upon her face. “It’s for the best that it happened naturally,” she added in a softer tone.

The thing that Suzanne was referring to was, of course, Raymond’s awakening. She had earlier planned to force it out of him, to pressure his mana to condense and awaken his attribute. Just that morning, she learned from Miranda that Raymond had awakened. Relief had washed over her at that instant, and although she did wonder about how Miranda came to know it, she was too over the moon at the time to care about it. The next thing she wanted to do was to hug him close, but when she was about to hurriedly set out and go look for Raymond, a ‘wall’ had blocked her path.

“Even still, you could stay for a few more days…” Miranda’s eyes questioned the reason behind the rash nature of her mother’s departure from Ryhor.

Suzanne smiled thinly but kept her lips shut. There were a lot of things, words, and feelings bottled up inside her, but it was hard for her to let them out at this point.

After a few moments of miserable silence, Miranda uttered, “is it that serious?”

“Uh huh.” Suzanne had already lost the frivolous, leisurely air of hers by this point. And there was a sharp glint in her eyes as she nodded grimly to her daughter’s words.

“Don’t you think it’s too soon?”

“No. We can’t be late! We shouldn’t!” Suzanne emphasized the gravity of the circumstances and the necessity for action.

The two women exchanged a look of understanding between them at those words, like it was understood that the situation had gone beyond what could be called a rumor or a deliberate attempt to spread misinformation. A war was coming, a very real one.

Miranda sighed to herself and then turned to once again look outside the window. It felt to Suzanne that her daughter was hiding something. More accurately, Miranda was trying to choose the proper words to articulate in such a way that it would leave Suzanne with no option other than to answer the question.

Miranda gestured towards the city and asked, “what happens to this?” Her brows furrowed as she added pointedly, “what are our plans going to be for this place?”

Suzanne kept her silence as she gazed out through the window. There was no denying the fact that Miranda had put too much work in the place. She hesitated to tell her daughter that her plan was to abandon it after the war intensified.

They, the Tygrines, were always going to go back and claim their rightful place when the chance arose. This, the kingdom of Gelodesh, was built as a stopgap a few hundred years ago. It was established to serve as a foothold when finally, they led their troops in conquest of their birthplace, deep towards the center of the continent, towards Tygrinia.

We have to make those fucking usurpers pay… The fucking empire and those phony fucking traitors posing as emperors…

It was no coincidence that the capital of the empire had a name that sounded so similar to their own; after all, it was named such by their ancestors. However, that was something Miranda didn’t know, and neither did her twin or her cousins. Suzanne seethed with rage as she thought about the events of her ancestors.

I think we can’t wait any longer… it is their destiny… and also mine…

Miranda was next in line for the throne and all would be revealed to her when she finally did ascend it. After that, it would be her decision to either tell her cousins and sister or pass it to the next generation. But the situation had changed drastically. Suzanne guessed that the time that was prophesied had arrived. The war was the signal of the beginning of the times when they would strike back.

We can’t hold back even an ounce of our strength… or else, Suzanne shuddered imagining the consequences of jumping into the war half-heartedly.

“You know, right?” Suzanne posed the question in a soft voice.

“No! I don’t!”

“Hah…” a sigh left her mouth when she saw the steely gaze of her daughter. There was no way Suzanne would believe that Miranda couldn’t understand the implication.

“We don’t have enough-”

“So!” Miranda interrupted before Suzanne could point out that they didn’t have enough resources to take care of Gelodesh while still fighting.  

“Why do we have to fight? Why can’t we just stay?!” There was a passionate plea behind those words. A look of helplessness and dejection flashed on Miranda’s face, but somehow her waterfall-like hair made it so that she looked magnificent, in spite of it.

“We-I- listen.” Suzanne found it hard to justify her reason without giving Miranda the whole picture, and she wanted to tell her too. But when she saw how much progress Miranda had made with the natives, how much livelier this place had become, the words just wouldn’t come out of her mouth.

“I can explain it to you, but that wouldn’t change the fact that you are angry, and rightfully so... But I just want you to remember what I told you when you were little… Do you remember that?”

…

It wasn’t even a few minutes until a look of realization dawned upon Miranda, and then her expression changed to a worried one, “That thing?”

A slight nod of the head from her mother confirmed Miranda’s doubt. She clearly remembered that day; there was no way she could forget it because it was the day that Raymond and Lily were born. It was such an exciting day, and when she first laid eyes on those cute little eyes of Raymond, it was like the world had stopped around them. It was only that night that her mother told her something that made a huge impression on her three-year-old brain. It was cryptic and hard to understand, but throughout the years, she could never forget those words.

“They are the most vulnerable to the curse of short life!”

Suzanne had told her in a grave tone. Miranda had become scared of it. But it had been a weird thing for her because Rose was clueless about it. Suzanne didn’t say anything more to the three-year-old Miranda and a lot of times when Miranda had asked Suzanne about the meaning of those words, she was rebuffed and told to wait for the right time.

During Miranda’s stay at the capital, she had tried numerous times to search for information about curses. Though when she couldn’t find any literature on them, not even a word from the old timers at the palace, it gradually got pushed to the back of her mind. And now, although she did remember it, she didn’t pay much mind to it. She always believed it to be something that endangered their lives and devised that the best way would be to fight against it head on rather than trying to cure it.

So Miranda wasn’t that scared of it and it didn’t bother her as much as it did during her childhood. After all, she was not a weak child any longer and could look after herself and her two cousins. Miranda didn’t scare easily, and she had enough self-belief and willpower to not cower in the face of some unknown curse.

…   

“The next time you come to Ostorth, I will tell you everything. Even if Samantha doesn’t, I will…”

“Humph!” Miranda snorted indifferently.

“Well, it’s not like we have to completely abandon it… And it is still in the future-” Suzanne paused and then apologized, “Sorry.” The sharp glare from Miranda warned her not to patronize her. The mention of the Capital and Samantha didn’t evoke many happy memories in her daughter, Suzanne could tell.

I just wanted to comfort you a little… Suzanne couldn’t help but lament once more about the distance in her relationship with her daughter.

“So, what are you going to tell me now? Can you tell me about your visit to Beltran or is it still not time yet?”

The sarcasm was not lost on Suzanne, but she knew that she had earned it. To the east of Gelodesh was Beltran, an ally kingdom. Historically, they had shared good relations and had helped each other in times of need. Ingrid Beltran, the famous healer and the next in line for the throne, was a good friend of Suzanne’s.

“We are trying to have a war conference of sorts with all the surrounding kingdoms…”

“I already got that part. And?”

Judging from the sharp tone of Miranda, Suzanne was sure that her daughter was still upset about the matter of Ryhor. But she was helpless to do anything about it and just tried to put up with her rude remarks.

“The real reason is to drum up support for our campaign and judge their reactions. We have to be ready in every step of the way if we’re going to do it.”

“I suppose so…”

Suzanne sighed to herself, witnessing the lukewarm reaction of the azure-haired girl leaning against the windowsill. She tried to say something more, to tell her about the plans but saw that the girl was not in the mood for it. Her attention was elsewhere, namely peering out the window.

From time to time, Miranda would gaze out the window and back. The rhythmic tapping of her foot signaled that she was getting impatient. Raymond had yet to return and Suzanne was sure it was playing heavily on Miranda’s mind.

“About Raymond,” Suzanne started. She wasn’t surprised when Miranda narrowed her eyes at those words, seemingly at full attention.

“What about him?”

“You can’t always keep him in the shadows…” Suzanne remarked.

Miranda stared at her mother, their eyes locked together. There was a glint of stubborn defiance in the young woman’s eyes. But after a while of the imaginary tussle, she gave in to the resolute and uncompromising gaze of the mature woman.

“I know,” Miranda muttered, almost as if to convince herself.

It was a little hard for Suzanne to see the downcast look of Miranda. She lamented the fact that she had been the cause of it, that she had continuously told her things that made her sad. Even if Miranda was distant to her, and even if she was rude at times, as a mother she forgave them, overlooked them.

“I wish I could tell you something to uplift your mood,” Suzanne muttered and bleakly glanced to the snows in the distance.    

“Then,” the daughter, seeing the dejected look on her beautiful mother’s face, decided to extend an olive branch, “Tell me about that time when you went to Badafloat…”

“Hmm, why?” Suzanne cutely tilted her head to the side at the unexpected question, but inside her heart was jumping for joy at the smallest of possibilities that maybe Miranda was beginning to forgive her.

“I want to know.”

The even tone of Miranda didn’t give away the reason behind her unusual query, and it made Suzanne wonder. It had been a long time since she went that deep into the north. The last time was before Ryhor was a proper city, and her children hadn’t even been born yet.

It was seldom that she had to brag about her exploits, since they were well known, even in the surrounding kingdoms, but Suzanne didn’t want to let go of this chance to leave an impression on her daughter. The kingdom knew her as the invincible Marshal; the world praised her as a fierce warrior, but all she wanted at that moment was to be a mother, a mother her daughter could be proud of, and maybe that could help lessen the distance between them.

“Well, as you know,” she started with a gloating tone with her nose tilted up. “It’s very dangerous to go up there that deep inside and even more if you’re alone,” Suzanne paused to gauge the reaction of Miranda, but the calm face of her daughter told her that she had to do more to impress her audience. Composing herself by taking a deep breath, she continued, “it’s extremely cold, and the lake is much farther than you think.”

“How much- Sorry, I want to know exactly how much time it takes to get there.”

“Maybe six days?” Suzanne shut her eyes and lazily ran her hand through her wavy, violet hair as she tried to recall her ‘adventure’ in the Northern Forest.

“Yeah, if you travel on foot for ten hours a day, I think it would take you around a week. It’s a shame you can’t ride a horse there…”

“Oh?”

“Yes the canopy is too thick, and the ground too uneven, the beast gets restless.”

“And, what did you see there? Is it as rumored?”

The sudden, enthusiastic reaction of Miranda excited her and thus she resumed her tale animatedly, “Yes! It’s just as the rumors say. It’s extremely large, and the mysterious thing is all of the water remains unfrozen.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, with the cold, you would think that it would be frozen solid but no.

“And tell you what…” Suzanne leaned in close and whispered conspiratorially, “I think there is a huge prime beast under that lake!”

“Are you sure?!”

“Well I don’t have definite proof, but I have an intuition that it is the major cause of all the beasts going crazy every once in a while… I think there’s a definite relation between the two things.”

…

The weariness on Miranda’s face became pronounced as she contemplated her mother’s musings about the secret of Badafloat lake.

If it can hide from even Mother’s senses, then… For all her aloofness in dealing with Suzanne, Miranda had no doubt that her mother was powerful. Since a young age, she had known this as a fact that her mother was the strongest warrior in the kingdom, and apart from her Aunt Samantha, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that nobody could even come close to possessing Suzanne’s level of power, even if she fought them in her sleep.

Maybe because she was young back then, but that would be a stretch…

“And after that? What’s beyond that?”

“I don’t know!”

“You don’t know?”

“No! I didn’t go any further than that…”

“Hmm,” Miranda hummed to herself.

…

“Do you think there would be more powerful beasts if you went deeper?”

Suzanne flinched at her daughter’s words, even as her eyes narrowed. She hadn’t been paying attention because of the myriad of things that had occupied her mind recently, but Miranda’s line of questioning was suspicious, to say the least.

“Why? Why do you want to know?”

“Will you tell me first? Please?”

Suzanne stared at Miranda for a good while longer before she opened her mouth, “There may very well be, those dangerous prime-ones. But I don’t think one could easily encounter them, even if one went looking for them.”

“Hmmm…”

“Don’t tell me you are planning to go there?”

Suzanne was perplexed by the noncommittal way Miranda dodged her question by walking towards the door. It was frustrating how the younger woman kept mum and was about to leave the room after having just glanced at her without giving anything away.

But why? I don’t see the point of doing that… unless!

A sudden thought flashed through Suzanne’s mind, and it terrified her greatly. There was much that she wanted to know and much she wanted to say, but Miranda was almost out of the door at that point. Suddenly, the reserved and stiff nature of their relationship seemed like a grating thorn to Suzanne. It was as if Miranda didn’t trust her enough. So she couldn’t hold back the words she had longed to say.

“It’s not like I can stop you, even if I want to, but Miranda… you shouldn’t be so skeptical of everyone around you. I advise you, as your mother, to be a little more forthcoming, at least with the ones close to you.”

Miranda stopped in her tracks. She remained still, her hand against the door and with only her gorgeously mesmerizing back in the view of Suzanne. As the moments ticked past, the atmosphere cooled down considerably from the warm scene a few minutes ago. And just when it felt like it could not get any worse, Miranda sauntered away.

“Everyone is competition.”

The airy voice of Miranda filtered through the gaps of the now closed door.