The Fifty-Seventh Chapter

It had been days—or perhaps weeks, he didn’t know. That day he saw Rosette in an instant, and just realized that he had just mistaken that beautiful stranger.

Leo should probably take a break from thinking about Rosette—even for at least an hour, if not a day.

“You seemed in deep thoughts again, brother.” Rhella then put a bunch of stir-fried mixed vegetables on his plate and a steamed lobster tail.

“I am just thinking what will be the vampires and werewolves move by now. I heard that Maebh Mul—I mean the Blood Mistress is still on track with the plan.”

“Liar,” Rhella casually declared as she took a bite from a smoke-grilled salmon.

“Where’s the lie on that, sister?”

“That you are thinking about your kind’s welfare.” She looked at him with a smirk. “You never actually did. All you did was think and think and fucking think about that bitch Rosette!” She then slammed the table in uncontrollable anger in just a heartbeat.

“Don’t call her bitch, you whore of a sister!” Leonardo Richards, without a doubt, slapped his sister—knocking her from the chair and falling into the carpeted floor.

But Rhella just laughed. She laughed like a maniac, a psycho. “I wonder, Leo.”

She jerked her face to him and made her annoying smirk more visible. “Even how many times you slapped me, does that make you think that it will make your Rosette come back in your arms? Do you really still hope that she will return?”

Leo was just holding his anger not to escape from his fist. Rhella clicked her tongue. “She’s already bones now you know, if not a dust in the wind.” She just simply laughed at that like a clown in a cornfield’s laugh.

But Leo is crying and sobbing, clenching his fists in anger and hopelessness. His sister speaks  the truth. If Rosette is really alive—and loved him that much—she wouldn’t think twice in showing up at their door to even say goodbye or sorry.

But in the couple of years passed, in the myriad of suns that had set and many moons that had risen, no Rosette had ever showed up to him. Perhaps she is now but an entity that exists in his mind and his mind alone.

If not for their wedding photo, he would probably forget how she looks. But that incident in the diner…he knew something was off. Leo has a hunch that there is something he doesn’t know that his sister probably does. He knows deep in his heart that Rosette is alive. Because if she is not…he’s probably been dead by now as well.

Unbeknownst to Rhella, he had cast an unbreakable bond between him and his wife the night of their wedding. During the very moment that they had consummated their marriage, the very moment he was thrusting inside her and Rosette’s moans flooding his ears, he had casted that spell. And when both of them reached the peak of their convergence, the summit of their sexual union, the spell was activated. A spell that would made him know if she is alive or not. A spell that will cause both of them to live or to die. Neither can die while the other one still lives. And since he is still alive…it means the other one is too.

Leo is positive at that. He just have to know where in this goddamn world she is. He watched as Rhella stood and just fixed her chair and self and returned to eating her supper—as if nothing happened. She just gave that cold speech of hers and didn’t even fight back at him. Perhaps she doesn’t have the energy to do so or maybe it’s because his upper body is naked and his sister seems to be affected by that.

Rhella is still a woman anyway, despite her being the temporary Heathen Queen. She is unmarried, sexy, has huge boobs, and probably good at rocking men in bed. He wonders why she is still unmarried where in fact several wealthy and influential men had courted her.

Leo stretched his arms in the air first before digging into his meal. Rhella just glared at him for a second. He secretly smiled.

‘This bitch seemed to be into me, hmm…’ Leo pondered. He stuck out his chest even further, highlighting his nipples and his well-toned body.

“Bon Appetit,” he stated as he scooped a mouthful of veggies to his moutn. He doesn’t care if he looks flirataious or seductive or just a total idiot, Leo is eager to know what is with Rhella—what she’s hiding and if she ever had sexual feelings towards him.

Unknown to Rhella again, he had long known that she was not his real sister. In fact, he never had a sister. He is an only son because his mother—the original Witch Queen—could no longer conceive another child. That’s why they adopted an older girl. Which kind of annoys him as he supposedly wants to have a younger, little sister.

Rhella is beautiful. It’s her attitude and Karen-istic attributes that annoyed him very much. And if she ever had some feelings for him…it’s time to acknowledge the presence of a dog to make one’s bidding. In short, he will use her feelings as the leash and Rhella as the dog and the pawn and the slave.

He is the original Witch King anyway as he has the blood of the original witch/heathen supreme blood. Rhella is just older and adoptive, that's why she was appointed as the Witch Queen. But this time…he will take what was originally his.

And Leonardo Richards will also do anything to make Rosette back in his arms again, no matter what the costs are.

***

‘What has gotten into him?’ She peered at him for a second. Leo was busy shoving buttered vegetables and lobster tail on his mouth. ‘What a jerk! Did he really think I don’t know about Rosette’s vampire status?’

Rhella pretended to be busy eating her apple crumble pie as Leo glanced at her for a heartbeat. She cleared her throat after sipping from her glass of red wine.

“I’ve heard that the Blood Mistress and the Death Summoners have found the bones of Rosette at the so-called virgin forest. They said she was feasted by those feral werewolves and blood-sucking vampires.”

She saw Leo’s nose flared. Rhella smiled.

Silence was prevalent between them for a few minutes—as if quietude had never been a tenant in their home.

Leo finally stood yet again and said with a thundering voice, “You are lying, Rhella! Rosette is alive!”

Of course she knew that he would not believe her being dead already. Rhella stretched out a hand to her ‘brother’. “Leo, dear. I know what you have been through but the truth is always painful to accept at first. You will eventually accept it as time passes by.  I will prepare for a proper burial for dear Rosette if that’s you wis—”

“I saw Rosette as Ezra’s Diner. A few weeks ago.”

It was Rhella’s nose that flared this time. “Impossible.”

“Indeed it is. That’s why I hired someone to observe her. A private investigator.”

She also stood in disgust and anger and jealousy.

‘Fuck that bitch!’ Rhella thought.

“I know that you know Rosette is a vampire. Yet, you just keep it from me. I will not ask why as it is already pretty obvious that you are jealous of her.”

Leo walked away from the dining table. He grabbed his coat and wore it. He then reached for his obsidian ring in his pocket and wore it on his middle finger.   “And one more thing…”

Rhella’s throat then bobbed as her rage was obviously oozing on its brim.

“Since I am now on the right age, I can now claim my title as the Heathen King. And you,” Leo clicked his tongue. “You are now demoted to but a scavenger witch—with no priority and privilege given. Not even you luxury and power. You are but a fucking dust in the wind, you lying whore of a bitch!”

The door then slammed, leaving Rhella confused whether she'll shriek or cry or burst in anger by setting this place on fire or follow Leonardo wherever the freak he’s going. She’s pretty sure he’ll be going to Rosette, and probably at the lair of vampires.

“A heathen loving a vampire. That is treason!” She yelled and the glasses broke. Rhella grabbed her coat and went to the door. As soon as she touched the door knob, her hand burned.

She pounded the door but it won’t open. She casted all the spells she knew in opening the door. She even performed blood magic by wounding her palm and drawing a symbol at the door. Still, she was stuck in this house.

“Fuck.” She kicked the shoe rack and duck at the tiled-floor. ‘Leo left me again—for that fanged woman!’

Rhella had nothing to do but cry and tried to set the house on fire using her witchfire—a fire derived from a witch’s blood by uttering ‘fuego’, the Latin word for fire.

Yet, as expected, her fire just turned into smoke as Leo had enchanted the whole house.

Rhella was left with nothing but herself. Frustrated, she lit a cigarette and turn the radio on. She danced into the music like a lunatic heartbroken young lady. She danced and swayed and drank beer and danced again with her naked body.

Rhella did that all night long even when the rooster crows three times. Even when the dawn breaks and morning came, she was still nakedly dancing and smoking and crying and drinking alcohol.

And Leonardo never went home even when afternoon came.