Chapter Two

2 Years Later… The Wolfmane Tribe

The bright morning sun breaks through the slightly pulled-back curtains, but that isn’t what abruptly wakes up Kai from his deep slumber after a night of partying and celebrating Niklas after his coming-of-age ceremony. It was definitely a night to remember, but the morning seems to be one to forget.

Dragging himself out of bed, Kai pulls on a pair of sweatpants and opens his bedroom door to see what all the noise is first thing in the morning and sees the house staff rushing around the halls with brooms and mops and various other cleaning supplies.

“What is going on?” he manages to ask one worker as he runs past.

“Oh, your Highness, my apologies. Have you not heard? We’re expecting important guests to the main house, so we’re preparing everything for their arrival.”

He rushes off again with a bow before Kai has the chance to question him more.

Special guests? Father said nothing about this.

After putting on more appropriate attire, he leaves his room and stalks to the dining room, where he suspects his father is having his breakfast feast as usual.

Walking up to the doors, he throws them open.

“Why am I just now finding out about these special guests? What are you up to?”

Erik Pendersen raises his deep blue eyes, slightly hooded with morning exhaustion, evidence of the late-night hunt.

“We’re having the House of Iversen over tonight, from the Raseri Tribe. You will be introduced to their first daughter, Aurora, as a marriage candidate.”

“What?” Kai bellows, his voice filling the large hall. “Marriage candidate? What nonsense is this, I haven’t even had my coming-of-age ceremony, let alone found my mate. Yet, you want me to just marry anyone?”

Erik Pendersen slams his fist on the table. “What is nonsense, is the fact you’re about to reach a mature age and have yet to even find a mate! Do you not understand how weak that makes us look? We are the High Alpha Tribe; we are the leaders of our kind and the beacon that lights hope in their hearts. I’m not sure what we have done in a past life to deserve this, but if you haven’t found a mate by now, there is a large chance you may never find one, Kai. That is a truth we need to face, and now.”

“So, we’re going to lie to them with a fake High Luna? Someone who isn’t even fated to me, and you want me to make them the next High Luna of the Wolfmane pack?” Kai scoffs.

“What else would you have me do? Have you thought of any solutions? You can’t lead a tribe as an Alpha with no Luna to stand next to you, or you will never reach your maximum ancestral power. It has been this way for centuries; our kind cannot exist without a mate.”

Kai lets out a growl of frustration. “Why the hell is that? Humans have never had a problem; companionship is a choice for them. Why must we always be tied to one another?”

“Does it look like I have all the answers? I am following along as everyone else is, just trying to get home and guide our kind as the prophecies have told me to. I am not a God, Kai.”

None of us are, yet that doesn’t stop us from acting like it.

“Then why must you take control over whom I have as my mate? If the true Gods have decided I am unworthy of one, why are you the one to make that decision?” he asks.

Alpha Erik closes his eyes briefly and furrows his brow. This isn’t the peaceful morning he was looking forward to, but it is definitely the one he was expecting with this son of his.

“Because I am your father and for the time being, the High Alpha of this tribe and all tribes. I am a leader before I am a father, but I am both for you. We need to show everyone that even if they fall, we never will. Do you understand what I mean by this?” his father asks with a stern look.

Of course, Kai understands better than anyone how much their family needs to be a pillar for everyone else to lean on, and no matter how big the pressure may become, they can never falter or fall.

“It won’t hurt to at least meet her, right?” his father adds.

Kai just groans and turns to leave, knowing this conversation won’t get much further with his father, at least for now. Kai doesn’t plan on sitting back and allowing his father to arrange his marriage before he has the chance to find a proper mate.

I can’t be the only one without one…right?

“I forgot to add, one more thing,” his father calls out.

“What is it now?”

“You’ll be attending the Alpha ceremony for the Raseri pack next month, I won’t be able to make it, so you’ll be going in my place.”

“What? Why not Beta Viktor?”

“He is busy preparing for his ceremony. His son, Niklas, has already come of age; it won’t be long before his father is training him to soon take over the position. You can learn a thing or two from your friend. You can leave now,” his father waves him off.

Kai rolls his eyes, thinking back to the barrel of ale Niklas was drowning in just last night, and wonders what his father would think of him then.

“The Iversen’s will be here within the hour! Get dressed properly!” his father gets one last jab in before the door slams behind Kai.

Grumbling the entire way, he returns to his room to change into appropriate attire as his father said, then does the exact opposite of what he said and leaves the house through his bedroom window.

Like hell, I’m sticking around for this.

Ducking through the small dense forest that shrouds the main house, he makes his way to the training grounds where he is sure to find a certain someone to unload his problems onto.

As suspected, Niklas is concentrated on his shifting in the training grounds, using the small and weak Harbin Jonsson, a junior warrior who just turned 16 last month. Though he is still relatively weak in comparison to the other senior warriors such as his brother, Gunnar, Harbin is extremely book-smart and a miraculous tracker.

His ability to read a person’s movements and predict their attacks makes him great in battle and during hunting parties but lacks the strength and ability to fight back. Niklas has been working for a few months on his self-defence, but by the way, he seems to be shaking in his armour as he squares up with the 8-foot-tall rust-coloured wolf, the effort seems to be for naught.

Kai stands off to the side and watches as Niklas charges toward Harbin in wolf form, his large paws creating tiny earthquakes as they slap against the dirt-covered ground. He isn’t even charging at full speed and Kai can tell he doesn’t intend to use his full strength, yet Harbin is still cowering on the ground before Niklas has the chance to strike, waving his sword out in front of him blindly.

“What do you plan on achieving doing that?” he calls out to Harbin.

The tin-covered head turns to Kai and falls off to reveal Harbin’s tear-streaked and terrified face, his rust-coloured hair sticking to his face with sweat and probably more tears as his green eyes fill with tears of relief at seeing Kai.

“Why do you guys put me through this?” Harbin wails and tosses his helmet on the ground. “This is torture! Why do I have to be a warrior? Why can’t I just be a regular tracker?”

Kai chuckles and shakes his head. “Because a tracker is still required to head out on hunting parties, and you never know what can happen. We live in a world where no one knows we exist, and if they do, you’ll most likely be put through a lot worse than this, especially if any human were to ever see that,” he says and points to Niklas.

Shifting back and tossing on a pair of pants, Niklas walks over with a grin to join them.

“You need to be able to defend yourself, we can’t always be there to do it ourselves,” he says. He ruffles Harbin’s hair and gestures for him to take a break before turning to Kai with a more serious look.

Kai doesn’t have to say anything. “You already know, don’t you?”

“Know what?” Niklas shrugs.

Kai punches him in the chest, hard enough to send him stumbling a little.

“You son of a bitch, your father told you, didn’t he? How long have you known?”

Niklas snickers. “What? That daddy dearest is arranging your supposed mate for you? I’ve known for a week now, but I was sworn not to say anything. If you think I’m afraid of you, imagine how terrified I am of your father?”

“You could’ve at least told me, it’s not like I would have said anything to him.”

“It seems you fail to remember that your father is the High Alpha, therefore no one can ignore a command from him, it’s physically impossible,” Niklas chuckles.

Kai doesn’t fail to remember, he is the one person who knows his father’s temper the most, especially when it comes to ignoring commands. Being his son, he is also the only one who can ignore the power of the High Alpha, and in turn, piss off his father even more.

Someone like Niklas is unable to ignore it, more so that he is the son of the Beta, he is more inclined to follow the command of his Alpha.

“Yeah, I get it, but still… you couldn’t have given me a heads up or something?” Kai jokes.

Niklas shoves him lightly as they leave the training grounds and walk towards the kitchen hall. “It can’t be that bad. I heard the daughter of the Iversen family is pretty attractive, so there’s that, at least.”

“What good does that really do me?”

Niklas shrugs. “At least you won’t have someone you aren’t attracted to, even if she isn’t your mate. As a mate, you have no choice but to be physically and mentally attracted to the other, but that won’t be the same in your case.”

“Having an attractive mate is the least of my concerns, and you know I really don’t believe in all that crap. I’ve met some people who would argue that fact about being attracted to their mate, or the idea of rejecting a mate wouldn’t exist.”

The air between the two becomes thick as they both remember the friend they lost not too long ago when her mate bond was severed against her will and she was unable to bear the pain it brought. There have been many stories of one mate rejecting the other if they don’t approve of them, and many of those victims don’t have the bodies to handle the physical and mental pain that wreaks havoc throughout their body for days on end until the bond is completely severed.

The worst part is only the soul whom the bond was severed from experiences the pain – not the one who severed it.

“I don’t understand how you can even deny it, we’ve all seen the mate bond for ourselves, and we have seen the damage it can do when broken,” Niklas says.

“Because I’m going to be 21 soon and I’m the only person my age that hasn’t found a mate yet. I’m the only son of the High Alpha and I don’t have anyone to call Luna when I take over soon. If our family is so mighty, and I do believe we have done the best we can, then why am I being punished like this?”

Niklas has heard this complaint many times and never knows what to say to comfort his friend. “I’m not any better, I’m a few weeks older than you and I’m still a lonely, sad sack like yourself.”

“Not finding a mate and ignoring my mate are two different things,” Kai points out, causing Niklas to grimace at the reminder of the fact that he does have a mate, just not an ideal one.

“What were you saying about being attracted to your mate, no matter who they are?” Kai teases.

“That isn’t the case, and you know it. She isn’t from an ideal pack, and you know my father will have a heart attack when he finds out. It’s not like she even knows yet, anyway.”

It falls silent between them again before Kai takes a deep breath.

“Well, then you might not like what I have to say next.”

Niklas stops just before getting to the canteen and turns to Kai with a suspicious look.

“Why is that?” he asks.

“My father has asked me to attend the Alpha ceremony of the Raseri pack next month in his place, and you’re going with me. So, you just might run into her.”

Niklas lets out a groan and hangs his head.

“What if I say no?” he mutters.

Kai lifts his head and his silvery-blue eyes light up. “You can’t if it’s an Alpha command, can you?”

“You seriously suck.”

~*~

It has been two years since the day Rune rejected Serenia and left her in hopes of dying off on the forest edge. To her dismay, he informed a servant at the Omega House and her mother overheard, causing her to rush out in the middle of the day with no shoes or proper attire.

Serenia experienced the pain of her mate’s rejection for several days after, becoming sick and bedridden for weeks. Several times she nearly thought it was her time, the pain became so unbearable at points she didn’t think she could handle it any longer. Once she finally recovered, she learned how quickly the rumour of her illness had spread, and how the tribe came to find out the truth about it.

Savea wasted no time telling everyone once Rune confirmed with her that Serenia was his mate, but he rejected her the instant he found out, only she didn’t tell the full truth.

Some in the Raseri Tribe believe Serenia faked her mate bond with Rune to try and win him over, even going as far as to fake the pain of the bond rejection when he refused to believe her in the forest.

She has been unable to show her face around the village without someone throwing harsh words and accusations at her, never willing to give her a second to speak her truth, not that they would believe her anyway. Unable to walk freely around outside anymore and caring for a bedridden mother who fell extremely ill after running out in nothing but a nightgown and bare feet to find Serenia, neither has left the main house since.

They are quickly approaching Rune Iversen’s coming-of-age ceremony where he will also be sworn in as the new Alpha of the Raseri Tribe and announcing his future mate. Serenia knows better than anyone that even if it is Savea he chooses, she won’t truly be his mate, neither Rune nor Serenia have one now.

Once you reject your mate, you are sacrificing your chance to ever have one. No one who has ever rejected their first mate has been granted a second one, and the relationships they form after are usually with those who have lost their mate or rejected theirs the same, the bond never truly existing but both accepting the other regardless.

It is said, however, that if you accept someone else as your mate after rejecting the previous one, your relationship will forever be cursed with misfortunes. One example is a couple from a different tribe where the woman rejected her mate so she can take another lover. Where she was once fertile, she soon became completely infertile and unable to produce any kin, let alone carry them to full term.

There have been other stories where a couple has experienced misfortune with every child they do end up bearing, they are born either very sickly or with zero ancestral power and therefore are unable to manifest their wolf spirit and fall to the bottom of the chain, never able to rise.

Just like Serenia.

Not being able to go outside also means she hasn’t had the chance to work on her manifestation. But why bother? She has just been rejected by her mate, for her older sister no less. She will never have a companion to be by her side throughout her long lifetime, what is the use of her wolf spirit? No other man would ever look at her once they found out how little ancestral power she has, and how she has already been rejected by her fated mate.

Her only hope of ever living a better life than she is now was to find her mate and run off with them and hopefully be welcomed into a more loving and accepting family, bringing her mother with her.

Now, what else can she do? Running away isn’t an option. Where would she go? She can’t take her mother long distances on foot, so running to the next tribe over isn’t an option either. On the bright side, having Rune as a mate wouldn’t have made her life any better either, and she wouldn’t have been able to take her mother, they would still be stuck here.

Rolling over in her cot, she groans into the frigid room. Unable to sleep she gets out of bed but stops when she sees a shadow pass under her door.

“Serenia, are you in there?” she hears the small voice of her elder sister, Savea.

She opens the door with a sneer and looks up at Savea. “Where else would I be?”

“Still have such a nasty mouth on you. Probably won’t have much of this confidence once tomorrow comes,” her half-sister sneers back, her dark green eyes lighting up with excitement.

“What’s tomorrow?”

Savea scoffs and throws her head back as she laughs. “Still playing pretend, are we? Don’t act like you don’t know tomorrow is Rune’s coming-of-age ceremony, where he will also finally be sworn in as Alpha. It’s also where he is going to announce that I’m his mate, and the future Luna of the Raseri Tribe,” she adds with a sickening smirk.

Serenia keeps her face emotionless despite the turmoil building in her stomach.

“Did you really come here just to tell me this? In the dead of the night? Seems like you’re the one with too much confidence and nothing to back it up. I know as well as you do that you and Rune aren’t true mates, that’s why you’re worried and here to warn me to stay away from the ceremony, isn’t it?” Serenia chuckles to herself, having seen this coming from a mile away.

“Well, you have nothing to worry about, I don’t particularly want to attend.”

Savea’s face falls into a frown. “You don’t have a choice. It’s an Alpha ceremony, everyone in the tribe has to make it, even if you’re sick. So, since you seem to still understand your place, make sure to continue doing so tomorrow. I don’t want anything to mess up my day.”

“Isn’t tomorrow Rune’s day? It’s his birthday and he is the one becoming Alpha, not you,” Serenia points out and cocks her brow. It’s no surprise that even during a ceremony dedicated to someone else, Savea will find a way to make it about her.

“It’s both our days, I’m his mate and the future Luna once we get married and perform the bonding ritual – ”

“But it’s going to fail, why even bother trying?”

Savea grimaces. “It’s going to work because Rune and I will be given a second chance. The Gods must have been mistaken when they made you his fated mate. There is no one more perfect or made for someone like Rune than me. You’ll be lucky if you get a mere servant as your mate, that’s the status quo that you will always belong to, Serenia. Don’t ever forget that.”

Tossing her another wicked smile, Savea slams the door and leaves.

The day hasn’t even begun yet and Serenia can already tell it’s going to be an unpleasant one. She has no way of skipping the Alpha ceremony and she already knows she will be the center of attention for all the wrong reasons tomorrow, Savea is bound to make sure Serenia is humiliated as much as possible, just because she can.

It isn’t anything Serenia isn’t used to, but that doesn’t stop her from getting upset and frustrated. Why has her life turned out like this? What has she done in a past life to deserve such a cruel one this time?

Ugh, whatever. Complaining about it isn’t going to change anything, and trying to sleep right now is useless.

Serenia climbs out of bed and grabs a thin shawl her mother made her a long time ago in an attempt to chase the basement chill away. She wanders upstairs, sneaks out of the house through the kitchen back door, and climbs the back of the house until she reaches the roof, just above her sister Skai’s room.

“Jesus, Serenia, do you just never sleep?” The coarse, half-asleep voice of Skai rings through the open window before her head pops out to look up at Serenia with a scowl. “Why are you up here right now? Crying over the ceremony tomorrow and having to watch our sister get engaged to your mate?” she chuckles while climbing out the window to sit on the sill.

Keeping her attention on the large moon above her, she asks her sister, “Do you really believe Rune will be given a second chance at a mate?”

Skai scoffs in disbelief. “Someone like him doesn’t even deserve one to begin with, he isn’t going to treat Savea the way she is hoping, and you can’t be fated to someone who already has a mate, she just hasn’t bothered to try and find them. She really thinks that she and Rune are meant to be, but even I find that ridiculous.”

It’s true, Skai has always been closer to Savea than she has been to Serenia, both being raised by mothers who come from high-standing families, though only one has the title of Beta Wife, while the other two are considered mistresses, like Serenia’s mother – despite being the rightful mate of Brant Hansen.

“How can you find that ridiculous? Don’t you just want her to be happy? It seems she thinks Rune can bring her the happiness she desires.”

Skai snorts again. “But you and I both know she isn’t going to find what she is looking for. Savea isn’t the rightful mate of Rune, and now that he has severed his mate bond with you, he doesn’t have anything. What is stopping him from going after another girl? As the Alpha, he needs to produce tons of heirs, better the chance of us finding the prophesized Luna.”

“You don’t think Savea is that prophesized Luna? She has the most ancestral power out of the three of us, you know?” Serenia points out. She has never been jealous of her eldest sister for being born the way she is, it’s just a fact and there isn’t anything she can do about it, Serenia has learned that the hard way.

She has tried changing her life, but she was born the way she was, in the life she has. She was born with little ancestral powers out of her older sisters, and there isn’t anything she can do about it except try her hardest to manifest as much as she can. But Savea lets everything go to her head, taking any ounce of special treatment that she can get, which is most likely where the idea that she deserves nothing, but the best comes from.

“I thought you and her are close? You never talk bad about Savea like this, only about me.” Serenia shrugs.

“We’re sisters, there isn’t much I can do about that, but it doesn’t mean I have to like either of you. I don’t particularly hate or like Savea, and I feel no difference toward you. We’re all surviving, that’s all we have done for hundreds of years, waiting like dogs for our treat to be handed to us but making no move toward bettering ourselves.”

“What do you mean? How else do you obey a prophecy that came out of nowhere?”

Skai lifts her arms exaggeratingly in the air. “That’s what I mean! For hundreds of years, we live in this realm without any communication from Asgard or any of the other realms that have been sealed off, yet out of nowhere this prophecy comes to us about a random girl who’s going to be born and save us all, but we don’t know where she will be born or what she will look like. Doesn’t that sound strange to you?”

Skai does have a point. Many have tried to point out the prophecy as a fake dream that the High Alpha at the time made up to keep his own family in power, but soon every Alpha of every tribe was given the same prophetic dream in the same manner as the High Alpha had described it.

“Do you think someone is playing a trick and got all the Alpha tribes in on it? I think that sounds even stranger,” Serenia says.

Rolling her eyes, she brushes it off. “Whatever, I don’t really care anyway. I just want Savea and Rune to finally get married so she can move out, and I can have her room. Hey, maybe that means you’ll get my old room if you’re lucky enough.”

“I’d rather you gave it to my mother, I’m fine with the basement.”

“Seriously? What is wrong with you? Why do you settle for the life you’re given?”

Serenia gives her a weird smile. “Because it’s the life I’ve been given, what else can I do? Maybe one day some luck will come my way, and I’ll find a suitable person to take me away from here, but those chances were taken from me once my fated mate turned out to be Rune, and he rejected me. No one wants a rejected mate with little to no ancestral powers, not to mention my current status in my own house.”

“I suppose you’re right. But are you really going to give up just like that? Not that I care, but you don’t exactly have the greatest life here.”

Serenia smiles to herself. “I never said I was giving up, I’m just in no rush to try and change the destiny I’ve been given, I’d like to see where it takes me. I’m not exactly in a position to do much, which means if I try anything drastic, I just risk putting myself in an even worse-off place, right?”

Savea just shakes her head and leans back against the roof of the house, laying her hands behind her to look up at the star-littered sky.

“Have you ever noticed that?” she asks, pointing up at the moon.

“Noticed what?” Serenia asks.

Savea draws a circle with her finger around the large outline of the moon.

“The moon always seems to look the largest on the nights I find you up here. Do you somehow know it’s going to be a full moon or something?”

Serenia shrugs. “Not really, I just come up here when I need to think and be alone, but that never seems to be the case,” she says with a pointed look at Savea.

“It’s not my fault you’re so loud when you come up here, I hear you every time and think someone is trying to break in or something.”

“Yet even after you find out it’s me, you still stay here,” Serenia teases.

Giving her a disgusted look, Savea scoffs before turning around and heading back inside silently, leaving Serenia to chuckle to herself at the odd relationship she seems to have developed with her older sister. She remembers a time when Savea used to torment her just as badly as Skai and her maids do, but somewhere along her path, Savea seems to have grown up a little.

Thinking back to their conversations about mates, Serenia realizes she has always wanted to ask Savea if she has ever found her mate but never thought they were close enough for her to bother answering.

She is passed the age to have already felt the presence of her mate if they were close, but like Skai, she doesn’t seem to be actively searching for them. By now Savea’s mother, Lady Helda, should be bringing her to visit other tribes through parties and coming-of-age ceremonies using the Omega House name.

This is the way high-ranking tribe members search for their mates if they do not feel their presence within their own. Tribes always send out invitations to large events or ceremonies to other tribes, but only to high-ranking members. Although the rank of an Omega is rather small, it is still among the top and therefore, their house should be receiving many opportunities for Savea to find a mate.

I wonder if she has already found them, and like Skai, despises them.

It wouldn’t surprise Serenia, it seems all the members of their house think they are above everyone else unless their mate is an Alpha, they aren’t worth their time. She doesn’t understand where this state of mind came from, and can only believe it is from her father, who resents his title and position and is feeding that into his children.

Serenia rarely has the chance to see him, let alone the permission to be in his presence for more than 5 minutes, so she hasn’t had the chance to be conditioned as such. She has been given a window to look at from the outside, seeing what the rest of her family is like having been cut off and isolated.

Thinking like this, my life might not be all that bad.

She knows this is wishful thinking, but she is grateful that she isn’t experiencing the same exhausting pressure and brainwashing that her sisters are, though it seems Savea might have the ability to break away from it.

Regardless, it isn’t any of Serenia’s concern, seeing as she has never been a concern to anyone other than herself and her mother. With that thought in mind, she climbs down from the roof and sneaks back through the kitchen door, swiping a muffin and bagel prepared for the morning. Walking carefully to the second floor, she knocks on the last bedroom door where the light doesn’t reach, before opening it slowly and creeping inside.

She sees the sleeping silhouette of her mother on the bed, the blankets rising slowly with her soft breathing. Placing the muffin and bagel on the bedside table, Serenia reaches over and touches her mother’s forehead carefully to feel if her temperature has gone down.

To her relief, it seems her mother’s internal temperature has gone down, and her aura is coming back stronger, the dark purple glow dimming around her. This is something Serenia has realized she is the only one that can see, the aura people carry around them, and the moods they are feeling through them.

With this, she has been able to tell a person who they are, before even holding a conversation with them or learning their name. There isn’t a single person she has met who doesn’t have an aura around them, and there isn’t anyone else she has met who seems to see them as she does.

It was her mother whom she first told about it, who also told her it isn’t something anyone else has. She didn’t have to warn Serenia for her to know this isn’t something she should be sharing with others and hasn’t since that day.

Once she has made sure her mother is recovering well and has something to eat when she wakes up, knowing she is never invited to the dinner table and doesn’t have any personal maids to bring her food or help serve her, Serenia makes her way quietly back out the door.

Although her mother has always preferred to do things on her own, there are some things she is no longer able to do with her frail and unstable health, but she is still always the last one to be taken care of and fed at every meal. This angers and confuses Serenia after the stories her mother has told her of how much love her father used to show her. It doesn’t make sense for someone to mistreat someone they claim to love so much, their actual destined mate, the way they do.

Making her way back down to the main floor, she passes through the hall to get to the basement door but feels her heart drop to her stomach as a flash of blue outside the window passes by the side of her eye. Whipping her head in the direction she believe she saw it going, she catches the tail end of someone’s shadow, before they disappear around the side of the house.

Serenia waits for the guards around the house to be alerted, but there is nothing but silence that follows. Rushing to the other side of the house back toward the kitchen, Serenia breaks through the back door and takes a look around.

I swear they went this way…

She turns back around to the corner where the shadow disappeared around and comes face to face with one of the patrolling night guards.

“Miss Hansen, what are you doing out at this hour?” he asks.

She tries to peek around him but sees nothing.

“I thought I saw someone outside the window,” she says and points toward the main hall window.

The guard frowns and signals to his partner behind him to check the area.

“We haven’t come across anyone on our patrol, but we’ll keep a closer eye out. Back inside now,” he says and ushers her towards the back door.

“Wait, why can’t I be outside right now? It isn’t illegal.”

“We’re expecting important guests this morning and we’ve been informed that some have been sent early to make sure everything is prepared. We don’t want anyone outside in case they arrive and cause trouble,” the guard explains and continues to push her to the doorway.

“How special are these guests that we’re being barred inside?” she asks.

He just stares blankly at her and waits for her to open the door. With a sigh she turns the knob and goes inside, knowing she won’t get anything out of the stubborn guard and sneaks back down to her room.

Just who in the world is so important, and would visit here?