Returning to Echt reminded Yuki, all over again, just how different Gouna was from the duchy. She already missed the natural, friendly and serene air that characterized Gouna which sharply contradicted how busy and independent the atmosphere of Echt was.
Back at home, Yuki and Jacek were scolded by their mother for embarking on the trip after seeing Jacek's condition. She was very upset that despite assuring her that they would return home safely and unharmed, Jacek came back with such serious looking wounds. Nonetheless, she was pleased that her son had kept his promise to keep Yuki out of harm's way.
When night fell, and the brother and sister pair devoured their mother's food that they had missed so much, Yuki fetched some herbs which she was going to apply to Jacek's wounds.
"Are you not tired?" Mrs. Adlerian asked Yuki after seeing how untiringly she worked when she had just returned from a trip.
"Ahh…I…well…"
"No matter, you can just leave Jacek to me. I will take care of him while you go up and rest up," Mrs. Adlerian proposed and reached out to receive the concoction in Yuki's hand.
Yuki hesitated briefly before reluctantly handing her mother the green paste that sat in her palm. She glanced at Jacek with a doubtful expression but he rendered her an assuring smile and beckoned for her to leave.
"Then, I will retire to bed now, mother, brother," Yuki announced before parting from the two.
"Argh!!"
"Oh, keep quiet! Are you not a man?!"
"Show me a book in which it is written, that men cannot feel pain! How inconsiderate of you to treat me so unkindly even when I am wounded. Am I truly your son?"
"Stop being dramatic and sit still!"
"Argh…YUKI! Your beloved brother needs you!"
Yuki smiled and shook her head as she made her way towards her room. The mother and son seemed to be having a meaningful moment together.
"Ahhh!!!" Jacek screamed agonizingly.
…
While Yuki laid in her bed and waited for the goddess of sleep to work her charms, she found herself, unexpectedly thinking of Kaithenn. It was like an involuntary reaction to returning to the duchy. For whatever reason, his full name resounded in her mind over and over again. His bottomless dark eyes surfaced in her mind.
Slowly, Yuki shut her eyes in order to visualize his face properly. "Kaithenn Valthanae …" she muttered tenderly as she gradually drifted to an unfamiliar dreamland.
In the darkest corner of Yuki's room, a silhouette stood with arms crossed, staring at the defenseless frame in bed. The silhouette neared the sleeping Yuki unhurriedly and sat beside her after reaching the bed.
The inquisitive crescent moon that hanged over the sky, with an intention of satisfying its curiosity, briefly cast its brilliant light upon Yuki's room to divulge the silhouette in Yuki's bed. The moon rays cowered as they touched the stunning visage of a long-haired man, who squinted at the sudden exposure to the moon's radiance.
When the light dimmed, Kaithenn's eyes adjusted to the darkness once more. He brought his hand to Yuki's innocent face and stroked it at a leisurely pace. As soon as his hands touched her cheek, the girl stirred. Kaithenn seemed unfazed as he watched Yuki rubbed herself in his palm. He stared at her with such intensity, Yuki subconsciously buried her face in his hand, as if attempting to hide from his burning gaze.
While one of his hands was captured under Yuki's delicate face, the other brushed the few strands of hair that tried to conceal the girl from him. Just as Kaithenn was about to place the hair he had collected behind Yuki's ear; consecutive loud thuds approached the room from behind the door.
After hearing the footsteps, Kaithenn tried to retrieve his hand, but the girl grasped his retreating hand and placed it on her cheeks. She clenched his hand tightly, despite being fast asleep.
The steps grew nearer and nearer while Yuki's hold on Kaidenn's hand grew firmer the more he tried to take it back. Kaidenn slowly leaned into the girl, brought his lips to her forehead and place a tender kiss there. The longer his lips remained on her, the more Yuki loosen her grip on the hand she clung to.
Yuki's door swung open to reveal a hunched Jacek standing at the door. He held in his hand an oil lamp that flickered when breeze surged into the room from Yuki's opened window. Jacek's face clouded. He leaped towards the window, trying as much as possible to be noiseless, though he did terribly at that. When he reached his destination, he shut it with caution while wondering why Yuki had left it unclosed in the first place.
"Jacek…" Yuki drawled as she rose, she raised her head and examined the frame by her window with narrowed eyes. "What are you doing there?" Yuki said and sat up when she confirmed the person was indeed her brother.
Jacek turned around and leaped to Yuki's bed. When he reached after a painful venture, he plunged into her bed. He looked over his shoulder at Yuki, "I was coming to check up on you. Why was your window opened though?" his tone was both reprimanding and concerned.
"It was open?" Yuki was puzzled. She was sure she closed it before going to bed, was she wrong? "I must have forgotten. But still, you should not overwork your feet!" Yuki chided.
"Can I sleep here tonight? I keep getting an ominous feeling to not stay apart from you." Jacek's expression was stern, but Yuki ignored that and laughed.
"Just say you loved us sleeping together and wish to repeat the experience. What ominous feeling?" Yuki scoffed and chuckled.
Jacek blushed momentarily before clearing his throat to make his comeback only to be pulled by his shoulders gently till his back touched the bed.
"No need to be shy, I can share my bed with you this once…" Yuki continued to laugh.
Jacek said nothing. He only watched with a warmed heart as Yuki got out of bed, stooped to his feet and delicately removed his slippers and placed his legs one after the other on her bed. Then he watched her return to the bed and lay next to him. "Are you cold?" Yuki asked.
"No," Jacek responded. "Is it just me or you are in a good mood this evening? Are you that happy to be back home?" Jacek studied the girl's expressive face.
Yuki shifted and laid in a way that would make her face her brother and smiled, "I look happy?"
"Mm, like you had a good dream or something."
"I did, actually, I had a nice dream…It was of my mother. As the image of her in mind grows blurrier by the day, it was nice to see it so vividly in a dream. Even her touch and her kiss felt real…" Yuki fondled her cheek and forehead as if to regenerate the feeling that still lingered on those spots.
Jacek stared at his sister. His expression relaying both his contentment and envy. He wished Yuki would smile like she was doing when he held her too. He wished, even though it was sinful, that the place Yuki's mother held in Yuki's heart was his. Was it wrong of him to want to be his sister's most loved person?
Jacek's thoughts were interrupted by a gentle caress on his chin. "You are no less important to me than my mother, you know. I cherish my mother as I equally do you. I only hope you let her stay, as long as possible, the person I love best. Do you hate being the second person I love most?"
"I will probably be demoted to number three soon."
"And why is that?" Yuki asked with knitted brows.
"You seem to be someone who will forget family once they fall in love," Jacek scoffed.
Yuki was rendered speechless. "How did you even draw such a conclusion for heaven's sake?" Yuki gaped at Jacek who actually looked serious while speaking such nonsense.
"Because you love deeply, and you love only a person at a time. Also, your commitment to the people you love is almost questionable. If you ever fall in love, I believe that man will be the luckiest in the world, but woe to mother and I for being the people who will receive the crumps left of your heart."
Yuki was both amused and taken aback by her brother's words. In love? Her? She had never thought of that before. Love was something she neither envisioned in her future, if she had one, nor her messy fate. Considering how dramatic her life already was, Yuki had it somewhere deep in her mind that, a committed relationship would be the peak of her thespian life.
"Why are you not refuting? Are you seriously pondering over it? Yuki! You can't be that ungrateful. Will you seriously choose a lover over me?" Jacek was genuinely shocked and disheartened that Yuki did not reject his nightmarish assumption.
Yuki laughed at Jacek's reaction and her thoughts cleared. "How can I refute something when I don't know what kind of man that fate will send my way. Imagine I fell for someone like the duke? What are the chances I will look at any other men? What are the chances that I will look at you?" Yuki teased while feigning seriousness.
Jacek gaped at Yuki in utter shock. "You ungrateful girl! I do not permit you to be courted until you are twenty!" Jacek said firmly.
"Isn't that in just two years? I can wait." Yuki laughed while enjoying the feeling of being the one between them that was rendering the other speechless. The feeling was out of her world.