Walking onto the crowded street, Florence saw people pushing their carts towards Blue Lake. Many stalls sell food and snacks, some have games and some sold random items like a statue of an owl.
The streets were lit up by torches, lighting the night with festive spirits. Lawrence went around with Lillian to for look books at many different stalls while Florence ate to her content.
"Mother, I got these books for only five silver coins" Lawrence showed her his hoard.
"Yeah, after you keep negotiating with the man!" Lillian narrowed her eyes. Using telepathy she said to him, 'you used your mind control on him, didn't you?'
Looking back at Lillian, Lawrence smirked evilly, 'of course I did. These books costs more than twenty silver coins, I'm not using all my money on them.'
She looked at the twins staring at each other like they were going to break each others' necks. Florence laughed naively, "that's a great deal for all those books."
Putting this aside, the three continued their way around the festival. Florence walked around when she saw one of the stalls turned red. She looked up at the sky to see a the blood moon shinning onto them.
"How beautiful!" Lillian commented.
Absentmindedly, Florence stepped back and bumped into another person. "Oh- I'm sorry!" She apologized looking up at the tall figure behind her. The person wearing a cloak didn't respond, just stood there like a mannequin.
Feeling the awkward atmosphere, Florence wanted to walk away with the twins. But Lawrence's usual calm face turned hostile and Lillian looked up strangely at person in the cloak.
"Lillian! Lawrence! Come on let's go!" She urged the twins to leave. They finally removed their gaze at the person and went to their mother.
The person still stood there looking at the three figures disappear among the crowd. With a smirk he murmured to himself, "I finally found you."
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Strolling around the festival, Florence noticed the twins were being weird ever since they encountered that cloak man. "Are you guys tired? Shall we go back?"
"Yes, mother" the two said simultaneously.
Arriving at home, Florence started making dinner since the twins didn't eat as much as she did. She decided to make rice and a simple meat dish. Florence took the tomatoes and took the guts out and put it on the side. She seasoned the minced meat and stuffed it inside the tomatoes, and steamed it. After its steamed, she used the tomato guts and seared it.
"Lawrence! Lillian! Dinner's ready!" Florence yelled from the kitchen.
"It's my favorite! Ahhh!" Lillian shrieked looking at the tomatoes. However, before she could take a bite, knocking was heard on their door.
"Eat first, I'll go see who it is" Florence said. Making her way to the front door, she opened it and knocked her forehead on something hard.
"What the-" she looked up to see a person's pair of eyes... a very familiar pair of eyes. Florence widened her eyes in shock as she remembered that misty night with her one-night-stand. Being dead drunk she couldn't remember much, but his pair of eyes could never leave her mind. Looking into the pair of obsidian eyes, they looked right back at her, as if staring into her soul... as if trying to devour her whole.
"Mother, who is it?" Lillian peaked out from the dinning room. She stopped dead in her tracks and sent a telepathy to Lawrence, 'it's him again!'
Lawrence ran out from the dinning room to see his mother stared at the man dressed up in a formal suit.
"Who are you?" Florence asked in a gentle voice as she stepped back looking at his appearance. He didn't look like a beggar, what kind of beggar have a beautifully designed suit like that. Was he some kind of Minister or Official?
He had coarse black hair paired with his black eyes. His shoulders were broad and his face was finely sculpted... full lips, thick eyebrows, beautiful eye shape, sharp jawline. Florence wondered if God had his favorites because this was one fine man. His aura, though domineering and powerful, didn't scare or pressured Florence.
"I am Irvin Wen Calascione," the man said with his charmingly deep voice. "I am the father of your children."
Calascione, where have Florence heard that name? ...Oh shit.
Her face went pale as she had a realization of who this man might be. Of course she would realize, she would be an idiot if she didn't. There's only one Calascione family on this world, unless this man was imitating them.
"I'm sorry sir, I think you got the wrong address," Florence smiled and slammed the door, but the man used his foot to stop it.
"I did not" the man forcefully opened the door. Irvin looked back at the twins who stood in front of their mother, as if trying to protect her even though they were shorter than her. Irvin found this scene too adorable, but held back his laughter because of the atmosphere.
"I finally found you after all these years, how cruel of you to slam the door into my face" Irvin gave a low chuckle. "Florence De Blume, be my Queen. As the mother of my children, I will make you my rightful Queen and take my twins to become Prince and Princess of the Calascione Kingdom."
"You are not the father of my children! How do you know even they are yours!" Florence rebuked.
"It's easy. As a demon, we have an ability to feel if someone is of our kind" Irvin explained slowly making his way towards her. "My ability told me these twins have my blood running through their veins, demon blood."
"I have never seen you in my life! How could you know they're yours?"
"I was the cloak man that you bumped into at the festival. When I saw the twins, I knew immediately they're my kin... the royal family's kins" Irvin stood in front of her.
"Lawrence, do you feel a connection to this man?" She turned to her son, her last hope to making excuses.
"I did mother... both me and Lillian," he replied looking at the man he resembled. "We felt something, but didn't know what it was. I thought it was a feeling of malice so I was guarded."
Lawrence was only six years old, though he was very intelligent and tall for his age, there were many things he didn't know about, like the demon side of him.
Florence didn't know what to think of this situation. The evidence clearly pointed that this handsome man is the father of her children, but this man was royalty. Something she thought she would never touched upon again.
The man's the Demon King for God's sake! How the hell is he going to knock on her front door and declared himself to be the father and take her away to be his Queen?
Lillian was unusually quiet watching the drama rolling. Seeing the awkward silence she spoke up, "will you like to talk this over some dinner?"
"If my daughter says so, then of course" Irvin then turned around and commanded his right-hand and left-hand man to stay outside before following Lillian into the dinning room.
Florence didn't even see the group of people in the front of the house with Irvin's body blocking the doorway. But she didn't move from her spot as she was facing a dilemma of choices.
"Mother" Lawrence looked up to his mother's troubled face. He heard from Auntie Lena about his mother's tragic story of being banished from the palace. He wanted to convince her to take up the offer of being a Queen, but he also didn't want his mother to suffer in another palace. Lawrence rather live peacefully with his mother and sister in this town than let his mother suffer the same possible fate in the palace. But if she were to accept the offer, Lawrence would respect it and help his mother go through it all because he treasured her and his sister dearly.