After a week of reaching Tagia and meeting with Marigold. Diana managed to find a decent job as a waitress in a nearby tavern.
Louis, on the other hand, denied his royalty for the first time and joined the common people with their clothes and traditions, moreover he got himself a job as a blacksmith apprentice in a workshop on the other side of the Town.
Everything was going on the right track for a change; it was the first time since Diana left the palace that she really felt safe and not in danger in the wild or under the king's punishing dictatorial hand.
...until that one day when Alfred came back home with a nervous face.
He opened the door and passed himself in without greetings. He just went for a chair at the head of the table and sat in strange silence.
Marigold noticed the way he entered. She watched him from the kitchen. This wasn't the first time he came home feeling the toll of the whole world crushing on his shoulder.
Marigold always had a way to go with him. One of the many ways a man can be tamed. But at the same moment happy with it.
Food.
"What's wrong, my darling?" asked Marigold serving him some hot homemade food.
Alfred's eyeballs couldn't resist and he dug in almost instantly.
"Where's Diana?" answered Alfred with a full mouth.
"She should be here anytime now, her morning shift ends after about half an hour. Is there any news about your brother Richard?"
The man stopped chewing the food. He stared with a confused look at his wife. Behind his eyes. There was always his inner self screaming.
How does she do that?
To look through the man's soul so easily and expose all his secrets. Maybe it is the food? Nevertheless, he didn't say a word.
Someone began knocking on the house's front door.
Marigold went to open the door. It was Louis, he returned from the blacksmith workshop he was working in.
"Greetings, my dear. How was your day?"
"Tiring. But what's not in men's life ?" He smiled.
"Well. Eating is! Your plate will be ready in no time!" She said as she went to the kitchen to serve another plate"
"Didn't Diana come back, yet?" Louis questioned Alfred after some greetings.
The man didn't answer him. He was just focusing on his food.
"Did something happen to her !?" Louis feared for her. Alfred's silence was intimating in a way.
Marigold got out of the kitchen with another plate. "No, my dear. she is just late as always from that Traven, besides we are still in the early noon she will be here in no time"
"Then it is about your brother, isn't it?" Louis was curious. However, Still no answer from the other side.
Marigold began to worry; so she grabbed a chair next to her husband.
"We can help you, we are your family Alfred. you can't just carry every problem on your shoulders, learn to share the burden before you break beneath it"
The man remained silent.
Marigold was disappointed, her eyes dropped. She frowned and was about to stand up to leave..
Then she felt another hand bolted at her arm; contently begging her to sit...
"He is in the red castle" Alfred finally said
"OH GOSH.." Louis couldn't believe his ears.
"OH MY..." Marigold eyes widened. They both exchanged terrified looks.
The Red Castle. Of all places...the place where the devil sleeps within its habitant's twisted souls.
Astonishment was visible on both the woman and the prince, and to be fully sated... someone began to knock on the house door.
Louis swallowed hard "Alright, who is gonna tell her?"
"No one. This is a secret till I say otherwise". Alfred commanded with his familiar leader voice.
The three shared fearsome looks. They wished that that knocker would just leave them in peace already.
When Louis opened the door, he tried to hide his fright behind a smile.
"Darn it, Diana. You are late!" Louis smiled and was met by another pretty but exhausted smile from the returning Diana.
"Missed you too, hon". She greeted him with a hug.
"You must be starving, I will prepare you a dish right away" smiled Marigold while heading to the kitchen.
Everyone was playing their role except for the pioneer.
"What's with that face, uncle?". She said.
"Just a little tired, dear. How about you? tell me about your day inst---"
Suddenly another incident happened, as the man was interrupted by his necklace. Alfred's necklace turned to red colour, shining in faint wine-like rays. Exposing his lies to the open.
Alfred cursed trying to cover the necklace with his arm to Hide its brightness.
but it was too late. Diana eye's were all over in less than a second.
"Why red?" She asked with narrowed eyebrows. What are you hiding!?"
"Hide what exactly? Have you forgotten that I am a bandit. I kill for my living!"
"Wrong answer. I have been living here for 5 weeks now. None of the times you have left to do your dir- *Ahem* unusual work did you come with that face or with a shining necklace!"
He raised a challenging eyebrow. "You are overlooking something. This necklace shines with red rays. Red refers to blood. Do you see any of it around you?!"
She stared at him. Trying to figure him out. She wasn't buying any of his non-existent excuses.
"When my necklace shone red in that forest. I thought of everything except for that wolf. Uncle, if it's about my father. I will never forgive your secrecy!"
He remained silent but the necklace spoke higher than any words.
"Do you know about the red castle?"
Louis suddenly asked her out of nowhere without revealing the intention behind the question.
Diana looked with an exclaiming look. "Never heard of it, should I ?" Diana said pointing her eyes towards Alfred. She cornered him tight, just the same moment when Marigold approached the table with a plate full of delicate soup.
The three people (Louis, Marigold, and Alfred) began to exchange a hesitant look around each other as if they were about to wake a sleeping lion.
"Fine, I have both pieces of news for you" Alfred declared
"I knew it! Tell me then. Is it about my father". Said Diana standing with top-tensed nerves.
Alfred frowned.
Louis declared. "I, err...We think we have found your father...".
After she heard the news, Diana kept staring at Louis with eyes wide as an owl and mouth wide open. She felt all her strength fleeting her body even her hungry stomach was no longer capable of receiving nutrients.
"a....a....a...and t...the other one?" She stuttered with a broken voice. Not eager to know the answer to the question.
"He was captured by the slavers of the Red castle" Alfred continued after a long sigh..."I heard two men during my travels talking about how the slavers captured about 40 people or so. Those who survived a huge fire in a town that lies towards the west...Exactly where your town was. They say 10 of them were protectors"
"Wh...What...I...I don't understand! You already checked the town when I fainted. YOU TOLD THAT EVERYONE BACK THERE WAS SLAIN!"
"I did, and there was truly no one alive in that town. Even the houses were completely piles of burned wood" Alfred justified. "But I also told you There was no sight for your father in Endora"
She bolted up as her fists banged on the table in anger."That's hourseshit! WHERE IS THAT DAMNED CASTLE ?!". Her voice was so loud as she became more and more nervous and anxious.
"Raising your voice won't bring you an answer." Alfred comfronted her. "The Red castle is far to the south about 5-6 days on foot or 3 days or so on a horse, located on the borders between both countries.
King Wain allowed them to operate with slavery in his and King Marcus's land if they promised to fulfil his terms.
TAXES, They would pay a huge pile of money every year so the king doesn't kill them along with their castle. While King Marcus would love to knock every block of that shitty fortress, he is facing a political situation.
The castle is too near to the border of Wain's land, any aggresstion is considered an act of war.
As for the residents of the Castle. They are Top- tier criminals that capture, abduct even torture people only to sell them on the black market somewhere else using their secret slave trading network.
"SO HE IS ALIVE?!" the girl asked with much happiness.
"I don't know, Rumors say many slaves die in that castle because of bad treatment, we don't even know if he is in the castle, to begin with, It's just a hypothesis!" answered Alfred.
"And if he is alive there, you need to find a way to get him out !" Diana argued.
The three looked at her with questionable mentality.
"Wait, me!?" Alfred smirked. "ho ho, on no I won't. I promised to find him for you, not to risk my neck for him!" answered Alfred with absolute coldness.
Diana stared with tears gathering in her eyes "HE IS YOUR LONE BROTHER!" shouted Diana.
"My lone brother is a scoundrel! He refused to give me my righteous share of our mother's fortune and because of him I lost my arm to a bloody bear!"
"You lost your arm because you are a weakling and a bloody coward who just ran away so as not to face your own sorry trouble!"
In this fury response, the one-arm man slammed the girl with his hand during his outrage.
The blonde girl was traumatized and exploded with tears. Louis rushed to hug the girl and protect her from that lunatic. While Marigold stood between Louis and Diana and her angry husband trying to prevent a family crime.
"WANT TO SAVE THAT FUCKER, FINE! MIGHT AS WELL GO BECOME A SLAVE FOR THE REST OF YOUR PITTIFUL LIFE IN THE PROCESS!" Alfred shouted.
"Alfred, what's gone into you!"
"She did! Ever since I saw you on that wheat field. I keep seeing that maggot face every day in my dreams! Now, you little girl, heed my upcoming words...
I sheltered you and protected you for that long. And I provided you with a new home with new life and identities. But if your insolent mouth spoke again such words! I will---"
Louis intervened. "... not do anything, or you gonna face my blade instead!". Louis said the same second his fingers reached for the hilt of the blade.
"Do it, boy. I dare you!"
"ENOUGH!!!". Marigold shouted.
They looked at Marigold with attention.
"Please, just leave the poor girl alone..."
Silence....only Diana's sobs were interrupting it. She thought that when it comes to life and death issues her uncle would forget the past for the sake of the future, but it turns out that the news just added wood to the long-buried flammable hatred that hibernated deep within her uncle.
Marigold sat with both hands on her head... "Son, Take her to her room; let her have some rest, this will be a very long day," said Marigold to Louis in a sad yet soft voice.
Louis nodded and headed to her room with Diana in his arms. But not before throwing some assassin looks at Alfred.
Alfred's amulet finally returned to its original colour but Diana transformed into another girl after that day. A more feral one...