By the time Isla dressed the following morning and climbed down for breakfast, she already convinced herself hard enough that she had a terrible dream—a nightmare. But like most days, Cris had to ruin her fantasy.

He met her in the hallway and said, "We should book a flight soon."

She ignored him and continued down the hall and into the dining room. The morning sunlight streamed through the wide windows, casting light over the long wooden table. Ivor was already eating his bacon and muffins. Lola, her hair the color of sunlight wrapped in a blue chignon, was quietly eating in her usual spot to Ivor's right.

"I have the details of the Eastern Department of Lost Things with me if you want to look into it," Cris continued, an irritating shadow behind Isla. "They have a long list of clienteles you may be interested in, most of whom potential supporters when you become empress and—"

"Good morning," Isla curtly greeted Ivor, taking the seat to his left. The old, dying man just nodded with a small smile before he sent Cris a look of warning. Lola beamed from across the table. "What do you want to do today?" Lola asked, her cheerful voice rather forced.

"I'm thinking of going to the lake."

"The lake was closed last year," Cris said, placing a folder just beside the fork Isla wanted to grab and poke into his eye, one thong at a time.

"Then I'll go hunting."

"Not the best time for hunting. Too many stray nymphs in spring."

"Don't worry, Cris. I'll be shooting stray humans."

Cris rolled his eyes while Isla's flickered to the black folder beside her hand. Her jaw tightened. She blinked away and looked up to find Lola studying her. Then Lola smiled. "I'm thinking we can go shopping for—"

"I'm sorry, my lord," the butler interrupted, stepping through the doorway, eyes directed to Ivor. "You have callers—"

"We're not callers, we're here for breakfast," the familiar voice said, followed by a tapping sound on the hardwood floor. Isla rolled her eyes to the side to look.

Dressed in a gray sweater vest over a white dress shirt, the man walked into the room with his fancy walking stick.

"Good morning, Rowan," Lola greeted.

Their cousin walked over to the table, his eyes looking around the place as if he could see. He could not. It was his Curse. But he was so good at masking it that no one could truly tell. He had the uncanny ability to look one straight in the eye. It always gave her the chills. But that was his strategy.

Rowan enjoyed sensing people's unease. It came with the blindness, the sensing. His wing, on the other hand, was a different matter.

"I can't miss the famous Develler muffins," he said, moving his walking stick to the side until he found the empty chair beside Isla.

"Where's Diana?" Lola asked.

"Here!"

Diana looked different from Rowan. In fact, she looked different every day. Her hair was still brown, but her eyes were green and set wide apart. Her brows were thinner, her cheeks too hollow. And she looked a little older. Her hair and body always remained the same. It was just the face that changed daily since she got her Curse at eighteen.

Isla may be one of the very few who could still remember what she really looked like before her Curse, being able to look into the woman's head. But lately, she noticed that Diana's memories of her old face were also fading away. A pity, of course, because Isla genuinely liked Diana.

"It must be devastating to not remember your own face." It was a joke she would often throw at Rowan, but never at Diana. The lady was just precious. While Rowan could be insufferable, Diana was a welcome company.

Diana walked over to Ivor and gave the old man a big hug. "Did you miss me?" she asked.

"What are you talking about? You were here two days ago," the old man grumbled. "But I missed that look last week—the one with the rosy cheeks."

"You mean my Jane look. I'm sorry, Ivor. She rarely appears."

Scanning her cousin's thoughts for anything suspicious and finding none, Isla deliberately switched Diana off her radar. She had always been safe, but one could never be too sure considering the woman's father and brother.

"I see Martha showed herself again," said Lola, gazing at Diana's face when the woman sat beside her. They always had a special bond. Best friends, that's what they were. The two of them had given Diana's faces different names.

Rowan, on the other hand, was an entirely separate matter. At the moment, he was thinking about muffins. She searched further and then stiffened.

"Someone told me she already got it. They're keeping it a secret," the familiar voice was saying to Rowan. "Now, why is that?"

Rowan did not answer, but Isla felt his excitement. She felt him smile at his father's voice.

Blinking, she pulled back.

"Did you like it?" Rowan nonchalantly asked aloud.

She froze. "What?"

A cold, calculating smile curled his lips. "The muffins." He turned, his blind eyes staring straight at her. Thick brows hooded his deep-set black eyes, giving him a disarmingly handsome look.

"The muffins are as splendid as your eyesight, Rowan," she replied, stretching her lips. "I hope you can see my mocking smile."

"Isla, happy birthday!" Diana greeted. "Quite surprised when Lola told me you're home."

She forced a smile, eyes flickering back on the folder.

"But you've been missing out on a lot of the family drama!"

"I'm sure Isla has more important things to deal with nowadays," Rowan said while the servant placed a plate of muffin and eggs before him. Without turning, he added, "Am I right, Isla? Things are getting a little challenging lately, isn't it?"

Her jaw twitched. She wanted to ask him why he was here, but she already knew why he was here. The bastard must have been following her. But his presence here was not questionable at all, whatever his purpose may be. He would always drop by to check if Ivor was still alive. Their family estate was only half an hour away.

"Villain work is always challenging, but it's getting boring. How are your pets?" she asked.

"The Department of Mythical Animals is doing rather well, thank you," he replied. "I'm training a new Kitsune."

"Fox?"

"He's considering keeping it," Diana added, rolling her eyes.

Isla saw the black Kitsune in Rowan's thoughts. "Then I hope it develops the nine tails. You'll need over one to pull you along everywhere," she said to Rowan. Ivor had been silent, acting nonchalant, his knife grating his plate. The old man never grated his plate—he hardly had the energy. Therefore, he was not enjoying the light banters.

Lola and Diana engaged in the latest Luke Edner news. "I heard he's in East Isles," Diana whispered to Lola. "Did you see the photo? You think it was him?"

Ignoring them, Isla looked over to her secretary. Cris was bent on his phone, but Isla knew he was observing.

"I can perfectly do well with or without a pet, cousin," Rowan said.

"I see," she replied.

He scoffed, and she was once more pulled into another memory.

"Our sources are confident the emperor is keeping her Curse confidential. There's only one reason for that, son," Rowan's father was saying. "They uprooted the western Booth. Stupid thing to do, even for Isla. That only means she's desperate. And one thing that can make an Opulent desperate is if they get a bad Curse. The question now is—what is it?"

She withdrew from his thoughts, blocking him completely for two reasons: one, he was deliberately taunting her; second, she hated his father.

Lowell Westcott locked his own wife, their aunt, inside a room after she got her Curse and they barely ever saw her. He liked to think he could take his wife's part in the Develler clan, and he did great with his son. At twenty-seven, Rowan had embodied the same ambitious and manipulative trait of his father. His wing, one could say, was a great weapon.

Apart from the ability to sense emotions, Rowan could control it. But only if he touched you. Or if he had something you owned. Isla could write a bloody trilogy of the many times Lola, Diana, and she crept inside Rowan's room to take back items he stole from them. She also heard he had a secret room in the Westcott estate solely for items belonging to people he knew.

She forced out a laugh, making Lola and Diana turn to her with wide, questioning eyes. "Rowan thinks I'm keeping secrets."

He scoffed. Years of growing up with a borderline sociopath was enough practice. The sociopath being herself, of course.

"Are you children fighting?" Ivor sardonically asked.

"No," Isla and Rowan chorused.

"Then finish your breakfast."

Isla could not. Not when she was seeing Rowan's possible future. Clear and almost real.

Rowan sitting at the head of a long table surrounded by the Senators. He was in a room, the Office of the Emperor.

Her stomach churned, her flesh contracting in panic. She searched him again, for any other possible future.

There were a few, but him being the emperor was the clearest of all. Her eyes flickered to Diana, and she shuffled through the woman's possible future. And a shiver ran up her spine.

Diana standing beside her father while she watched her brother take his oath in front of an Opulent infant. Diana crying as her brother promised the infant to work hard to ensure its future, to give it the life it deserved as an Opulent.

"What's this?" Rowan asked, drawing Isla back to the present. He tapped the black folder with his hand.

Isla snatched it away, as if saving it from fire. "Reports."

He nodded. Then he smiled at her. "Of course." He sensed something from the folder.

"Department of Lost Things."

He frowned. "I sensed that you anticipate going there."

He just nodded. "Hmm." He helped himself into a bite of muffin and chewed. "What did you lose?"

She forced a smile. "Nothing."

His thoughts were telling her he did not believe her.

"I'll be managing one office," she blurted out.

"But what about your Villain work?" Diana asked.

Lola and Ivor were not moving at all.

"I resigned to do some work for the Department of Lost Things," she said to Diana. "Their performance is unthinkable. They failed to provide adequate assistance to the Department of Villainy last year and it's unacceptable. As a Develler, I have to do something. Ivor and our parents spent years in that department."

"There's nothing challenging with the Department of Lost Things, Isla," Rowan said.

"I don't know about you, Rowan," she said, "but I can clearly see some problems with the department."

"And which office are we talking about? The west? I heard their Booth is currently unavailable."

"No. The East. They have the poorest performance. They'll need supervision once more work comes in from the west."

"Eastern Arena." Rowan turned to Ivor. "And Ivor approves of this?"

"Yes, of course."

"Do you think it's going to be safe for you?"

She smiled wryly. "Have you forgotten? I'm a trained Villain."

"You've never been to the Eastern Arena."

"That's why I'm going."

"Does that mean you're giving up your position in the Department of Villainy?"

"I can always go back whenever I want." She stood, grabbing a muffin. "Which reminds me, I have things to settle," she added, escaping before he sensed the lie.

Cris jumped on his feet as she approached the doorway.

"Get me on a bloody plane tomorrow," Isla growled under her breath.

"Done," he replied.

***

The distant echoes of chirping birds, the mist that washed across the vast blue mountains in the horizon, and the smell of buffalo dung greeted the dozens of farm workers of Hacienda Gaston in the tiny town of Cale.

They expected a normal cleaning today after yesterday's sugarcane harvest, but they were unprepared for three things:

First, someone had burned the sugarcane field overnight, leaving the ground charred, acres of burned cane trash blanketing the field in black.

Second, and what would most likely be the town's gossip for days, was the perfect circle of an untouched patch of land in the middle of the field. Later, the neighborhood would speak in wonder and fear about how even the fire was afraid of it.

Third, the it was the young girl of around fourteen sleeping peacefully in the middle of the circle.