In a secure room somewhere in the palace stood a giant fish tank large enough to accommodate two whales. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

Inside that fish tank, a slender silver blue shark cut through the water currents like a hot knife to butter.

Waves formed, spilling over the edge of the tank and flooding the room floor. No one was here, no one but the shark.

His movements were quick of full of agitation.

If anyone made the mistake of walking in, they would become his dinner.

Kai had no idea how long he had been swimming for. All he knew was the tank he had grown so accustomed to no longer felt warm and comforting the way it used to.

He switched back to his human form, floating on the surface of the water, his eyes focused on the impossibly high ceilings that seemed to grow even further apart from him.

It had been a month.

A full thirty days, and the Princess hadn’t stepped foot in this room once.

She used to love this place. It was her second favorite place, next to her laboratory.

As Kai drifted over the waters surface, his mind cut back to the moment, the first time he laid eyes on the Princess. He didn’t believe one person could have so much beauty. If she shared her beauty, a hundred people would benefit and there’d still be more left.

What was such a beautiful woman doing with saws and knives and all manner of torture devices?

It wasn’t that Kai didn’t know torture. It was that no one as lovely as the Princess had ever tortured him before.

It took days before he got used to her methods. She was cruel but the scientists that had taken him from the ocean when he was a little shark had been far crueler.

He didn’t mention this.

He kept quiet, watching her do her thing. When he was disobedient and she roasted his fins, he laughed inside because the scientists would have cut his leg off and watched him regrow it.

When he was too touchy and she’d drain his water and leave him in the sunning bed, he’d sweat almost to death while whistling happy tunes.

When he was good and she let him eat a miserable prisoner, he wondered when next she would cut into his skin.

But now?

Now everything was different.

The cold murder in her eyes was gone.

She saw his scars and shuddered. He gave her his teeth and she screamed in horror. It had been thirty days and she hadn’t visited him. She hasn’t locked him up. She hasn’t punished him.

She hasn’t done anything!

Kai kicked the water, groaning in anger. "Fuck!"

He noticed it the first time. Lying close to her in bed and asking for his teeth back. She gave them back without hesitation. Almost like she was...disgusted.

"Cutie was never disgusted with me..." he muttered to the empty air.

He used to see her almost every day and now? She acted like he didn’t exist anymore.

He glanced at the door, wishing it would open and she’d stroll in with her signature strut, her spores more on her left side than her right because she said her left was her brilliant side.

Ah, another thing.

This Cutie was right handed.

Kai leapt out of the water with the agility of a trained killer.

Nothing made sense. Nothing at all. She was all wrong. She was smiling and laughing and being kind! She offered to heal Leon! For the first time in years, Kai saw what her yellow spores looked like and felt like.

She never used yellow spores.

Who are you?

Who are you and what have you done with my cutie?

Not caring that he was dripping wet, he walked out of the room and headed for her chambers. The palace was silent and cold, majority of its inhabitants already fast asleep. It was easy for Kai to make his way through without obstructions.

He got to the Princess’s room and pushed the doors open.

The first thing he spotted was the strange green vines creeping all over the place. He dwelt on them for exactly half a second, before advancing towards the Princess’s bed.

And there she was.

Oblivious to the world around her, soft silver hair covering her pillows, her blanket and a spare pillow hugged to her chest.

Even in her sleep, she was smiling.

Kai growled, his features sharpening as he bared his teeth.

She only stirred, mumbling something under her breath followed by soft laughter.

Kai’s brain flatlined.

Weird. Weird. Weird all over and over again.

He got close. Close enough to feel the warmth of her skin, the scent of her mild pink spores. Close enough that if he lunged out, he’d slit her throat before she knew she was dead.

Yet, he couldn’t move.

He reached out, his claws sharpened, aimed over her face. But when his touch met her skin, he softened.

She hissed at the feel of his cold palm, but her discomfort didn’t last long. Her facial muscles relaxed and she leaned into him.

"You’re not my cutie, are you?" He whispered.

She didn’t reply. Of course she couldn’t reply.

Frantic approaching footsteps shattered the calm of her room. Kai ducked into the shadowed corner before the maid burst into the room.

"Your highness! Your highness please wake up!"

The princess stirred, grumbling with displeasure. "What is it?"

"It’s your husband, Lord Ray! He’s been poisoned!"

She shot to her feet. "Poisoned?! Ray?!"

"Y-yes! You need to hurry, please! He’s refusing treatment!"

Kai watched as she raced out of the room, no questions asked, dressed in her nightdress, name still barefoot.

She just got up and ran? Since when did she care about Ray like this?

Kai straightened to his full height, his face full of confusion. What the hell was going on with this woman?!

***

Anna ran all the way down to Ray’s room, tears clouding her eyes, her mind chanting one sentence over and over again like a cursed mantra.

It’s my fault.

The state of Ray’s room made her cry even harder. A room? It was more of a plain, unfinished cave. There wasn’t even a single chair in sight. No windows either, and only one door. Anna vowed to fix it later but now her mind was on the beastman slumped over the floor.

"Ray!" She cried out, partly in relief and partly in horror. The soles of her foot ached as she ran up to him. Her knees banged against the floor but she barely felt it. "Ray? Ray? Please say something!"

She gently held Ray up and laid his head on her lap. Something fell out of his grasp, clinking to the ground as it rolled over to her foot.

She recognized the small green bottle and its gold cap.

More tears rushed to her eyes and before she could stop it, she began to wail.

"What were you thinking?! Who made you do this?! You’re...you’re going to...."

Ray heard faint noises. It reminded him of when his father drowned him for disobedience. Back then, the sounds of the land became silent, muffled. It was the first time Ray felt real peace.

But this time, he didn’t feel any peace.

Something cold was dripping on his face. Someone’s gentle hands held him. Someone was calling his name.

Slowly, his eyes drifted open.

His vision swirled in and out of focus before settling on the pretty face in front of him.

Delicate, fair, her big eyes clouded with even bigger tears.

"A-Anna?" Ray tried to speak but his throat had been turned raw by the poison.

"Ray! Oh my goodness you’re okay! You’re a-alive!"

She’s Anna...the Princess.

Ray just called her by her name and she didn’t react violently.

She’s crying. Crying for him. Real tears.

She came for him.

"Stay still, okay? I’ll heal you. Fuck how much poison did you drink?! Did Leon put you up to this? I swear if he did, I’m going to fucking butcher him!"

Warmth wrapped around Ray.

Warmth as he had never felt before. It was sweet, tingly, and made him want to fall into a deep sleep.

A soft yellow glow filled his visage and it didn’t take long to realize what it was.

Her yellow spores. On him. She was using her yellow spores on him!

Ray blinked, wondering if he had died and thus was his version of the afterlife. One where his wife was kinder to him.

But no. He wasn’t dead. His heart was still beating, faintly, but it was there. Anna’s warmth felt too real to be a vision. Her voice going on and out about the graphic things she’d to Leon was not an imagination.

She was actually here.

Ray didn’t know what propelled him to move. But something did, and his hand came up and touched the side of her face.

Shivers ran through him.

"Soft..." he whispered through a tried smile.

This was the first time he was touching her this way.

She didn’t flinch. She didn’t smack him away.

She just blinked at him.

Then her cheeks turned pink and her spores flared to an almost white.

Ray gasped.

What...what was that?

It felt...it felt so...

Ray’s eyes fluttered and he made a sound he didn’t think he was capable of making.

"Oh my goodness I’m so sorry! Did that hurt?! I don’t think white is for healing...fuck! Anna don’t fucking kill him! Sheesh!"

Ray shook his head. He wanted to tell her that it wasn’t pain. It was something much more better than that. But the words wouldn’t come out. The tingly sensation ran down his entire body, and he felt something stir.

If she noticed, she didn’t say anything.

Now, Ray was more than confused.

He’d drank the poison as a test. To know if the Princess will care about him or not. He wanted to do this first before becoming Leon’s spy.

He didn’t know why. He refused to admit, even to himself, that it was because of hope. Hope they maybe she had become a better person.

The woman healing him right now? Holding him like he mattered? She was not who he expected to find.

She smiled at him, and he felt like he’d been thrown in open sunlight. But this sunlight was warm, and gentle, and pleasant.

He would bask in this sun all his life and never get tired.

"Hey, are you okay? Does it still hurt?" She asked, even when he told her he was fine.

He was used to poison. It was merely part of his training. She knew that. So why was she asking?

Unless...

Feeling strong enough, Ray sat up and faced her.

"I need to tell you something. It’s about Leon, and I have a feeling you won’t like this."