Drakkon

Chapter Twenty

"Your hair color." I pointed to it. "It's brown."

"Oh." He touched his short hair and smiled, bobbing his head. "My mother is from Kadios, believe it or not. I take after my father and I suppose the only attribute I attained from my mother is this hair of mine."

Just as we were going to continue our conversation, Nikator sped over to where we were at and touched my shoulder for a brief moment before pulling his hand away. Turning my attention to him, he watched me with his pretty blue eyes. "Lady Daiyu, are you prepared to leave this afternoon?"

My brows came together. "Leave? We're leaving this afternoon?"

"Yes, pretty soon too," he said as he glanced over at the sun's position. "We need to hurry to the palace anyway, since this place will soon be muddled with war. Master Drakkon is planning on finishing these pointless battles soon and he doesn't want to drag you into it. The sooner we leave, the better."

"But—" Right when I started thinking of Meilin in a somewhat decent light, I would be taken away from him and sent back to the palace? Not only that, but I wouldn't be able to talk to Yat-sen or see Atreus?

"Lady Daiyu, is everything alright?" Atreus asked me when he saw my distressed expression.

I smiled hesitantly. "I'll miss it here; or at least the company. Back at the palace, it's only Jia that I look forward to, and even then she only visits a little bit. I'll be alone."

Nikator frowned. "Vita will be with you soon, so you won't be completely alone."

"Yes, I at least have her to look forward to."

"Don't worry, once the war is over, at wedding the entire Peccata will be there," Nikator said excitedly, glancing over at Atreus. "How fun that will be? How many years has it been since all of us were together at once? Three?"

Atreus nodded. "Three. The last time was during Fang's wedding."

"You all haven't been together at once?" I asked them curiously. How was it that the six children that were raised together hadn't been in the same room for three years? "Was there a falling out of some sorts?"

Nikator shook his head while Atreus explained. "We all have been busy with our assignments, and our schedules and locations are always different than each other's. We all would like to be together as before, but it's hard to do so when we have so many other responsibilities. Of course there are times when five of us are together but the sixth is missing, or when we all meet up in pairs, but it's been a while since all of us were together in the same room."

"Why not ask the emperor? I'm sure he will give you guys a break every here and now—" I started.

Nikator clucked his tongue. "We're doing all of this for Master Drakkon. He insists we take a break and he doesn't like how some of us do our work, but he can't force us to do something we don't want to do. We want to do this for him."

"You all are very loyal to him," I said softly, awed once again by their trust and affection of Meilin.

"Of course," Nikator said with a wide smile, "he raised us and taught us everything. He's family."

"Family . . . " I smiled and patted his shoulder, before moving past him.

Would Meilin and I be a family one day? Would we have little children running around? If we had children, would they be as wild as him?