Chapter-18 The council head's son

"You!" Madeline raised her voice at Elliana, but she noticed that Elliana wasn't the one who slapped her.

"Arohi!" Madeline screeched in pure anger, and the girl looked at her with droopy eyes.

It was clear she was a vampire and a very rowdy one at that. She had been listening to Madeline's trash-talking for a few minutes and couldn't help but step forward to stop the disturbance she was causing to her ears. There was a limit to everything.

"Shut your trash, will you? You have been going on and on when she isn't even saying anything. Is this how your kingdom teaches its princesses? If so, this illegitimate girl is far better than you," the girl called Arohi said, and Elliana took a deep breath.

"Madeline, I will pretend you didn't raise your hand at me and say these things about my mother one last time because I don't want to soil my reputation. Next time, I won't be so lenient -" Elliana was cut-off mid-sentence when they heard another presence.

"What is going on here?" A cold male voice reverberated in the corridor, and Elliana stiffened immediately.

Madeline immediately recognized the voice, and a soft smirk stretched across her face.

"Aditya!" Madeline put on a pitiful look and rushed to the new boy.

"Elliana is bullying me with the vampires now," Madeline hugged Aditya, and the latter looked at Elliana sternly.

Aditya was the son of the council head of the council of humans containing different bloodline mayors. He was a year older than Elliana and Madeline and was majoring in science. He was one of the most handsome eligible bachelors among humans for girls their age and an ideal boyfriend because of how gentlemanly he always acted.

Elliana had a major crush on him since she saw him for the first time in the royal Kingdom, but he was more smitten by Madeline because she was cunning, and he was brutally honest about it too.

Things just have to become worse, no? Was it not enough that Madeline was causing a scene and ruining the mood that Aditya had to arrive at? Elliana smiled sadly in her heart.

She still remembered expressing her feelings to him on her sixteenth birthday. Elliana had been thinking about telling him everything for quite some time, and coincidentally, he had arrived in the kingdom.

Aditya was like a good friend to her. She always envied his life because of how everyone respected him wherever he went. He was one of the most reputable teenagers she had met or seen in the entire royals.

For some reason, she was under the delusion that he liked her too. She meant, why would such a handsome royal person take time from his busy schedule to come and play with her, right?

So when she saw Aditya walking inside the kingdom with a bouquet, she was excited and thought he brought them for her.

She had run to the entrance with the biggest smile on her face. The smile, which immediately vanished when she noticed Aditya wasn't even looking at her. He was looking at Madeline, who looked atrociously beautiful that day.

Madeline knew Elliana liked Aditya, and that's why she deliberately asked Aditya to bring flowers for her to make Elliana jealous. And just like that day, Madeline used Aditya to hurt Elliana when she couldn't find any other reason or method. It was beyond sickening.

Elliana evened her mask to keep it intact before raising her head proudly. She has been weak in front of these people once. She didn't want to do that again.

She had promised herself that she would be the scapegoat for Madeline's evil deeds this one last time, and it includes taking blames for the mess that she always initiates.

"Is it true, Elliana?" Aditya walked ahead towards the girl that he always presumed innocent and caring.

"Will you believe me if I say no?" Elliana asked, looking straight into his eyes, capturing him in a way he had never thought was possible. Then again, he always gets drowned in these never-ending beautiful orbs, doesn't he?

There was something about her eyes that always drew him in. It had taken a lot of effort for him to pacify himself that he couldn't like Elliana. However, how can someone ignore a beauty like her? Her face and body should be a walking sin.

It was all good, and he was able to stay close to her until she developed the feelings and thought of expressing them. Aditya hated Elliana for it. He wanted to stay a bit longer with her. If she hadn't proposed, he would've spent more time with her without being awkward and giving himself a tough time over it.

Seeing Madeline clutching Aditya's shirt even more firmly, Elliana scoffed in her head before raising her gaze back to Aditya.

"You don't have an answer to such a simple question? I guess that's exactly where we stop interrogating someone whether she is guilty, right?" Elliana tucked a few strands of her hair behind her ears, and Aditya's gaze immediately moved to the long hair he always loved playing with.

How much he wanted to be the one to - he shook out of his thoughts when he saw Madeline cupping his face.

"I am not lying, Aditya. Arohi slapped me. Why do you think a vampire will slap me out of nowhere? And why the hell did it happen only after Elliana got married? She is guiding them to bully me," Madeline added further, and if the situation was any different, Elliana had clapped for Madeline for her brilliant acting skills.

Hearing Madeline's words and seeing her pitiful expression, Aditya looked at Elliana, whose face was a bit hard to read because of the mask, and squared his jaws.

"Elliana, just because you got married -"

"Aditya, accept my apologies, but I heard Madeline talking nonsense because she is still my half-sister. However, you -" Elliana looked at him straight.

"You mean nothing to me. Just because I am married? Have a correction here. It's because I am married now that you guys shouldn't mess with me," Elliana looked at the girl Arohi gratefully before turning around and leaving.

Miss Zoya, who saw all the commotion, noticed the princess stopping behind a pillar and wiping her tears that were threatening to spill, and she gritted her teeth.

She swore if she even met this Madeline human again, she would remember to slap her tightly and hurt her in a way she would remember for eternity.

Elliana stood behind the pillar for some time to calm her raging heart and dim all the memories trying to resurface and make her sad.

She didn't want to be sad.

Elliana clenched her fists before walking towards the garden mindlessly.

Blue looked at the princess, who looked so out of her character at the moment. When Prince told her to observe the girl, she thought she was just following a random human who was cunning, but hearing her own sister shaking her like this, even Blue felt bad.

'Have you ever looked at yourself in the mirror? This is how your mother must also look because you never took after your father. Do you want to look for that wh*re? Why aren't you trying to find your lookalike?' Elliana remembered her stepmom's hurtful words when she was only seven and woke up to a nightmare.

"Princess, I have been looking for you. Shall we go? The prince will arrive at the mansion soon, and we need to find something suitable for the makeup for the excuse of what we bought with the money or why we went to the mall," Miss Zoya rushed to Elliana, not wanting to let the princess roam alone and think about the sad things.

"I am sorry, I forgot. Is the payment done?" Elliana evened her expression before looking at Mise Zoya, masking her sadness, and Zoya's heart ached for the girl.

"Yes, princess. Thank you so much. This is the card," Miss Zoya handed the card to Elliana, and she nodded before placing it in her clutch securely.

"Let's go," Elliana said, scrunching her brows when she felt like she saw a shadow behind a tree.

However, as soon as she looked at the tree, there was nothing there. Elliana sighed before following Miss Zoya back to the car.

Her gaze flickered to Madeline and Aditya. To hurt Elliana even more, Madeline immediately held Aditya's elbow, and Elliana looked at the boy one last time before she sat inside the car.

"Start the car," Miss Zoya ordered the driver, and they left after that.

Meanwhile, inside the Limo, Sebastian, who had been having an online meeting with his friends overseas about the situation of vampires in their area, closed his laptop and looked at his phone that had a transaction message.

[$25000 had been successfully debited from your account ×××××××××××××]

Sebastian looked at the transaction message and remembered that he had given his black card to Elliana. He opened the message and noticed the transaction was made at the International University of Science and Business Administration. It was a co-ed University of vampires and humans.

Why did she spend the money there? Sebastian became even more confused with her expense and looked at Lucas.

"Lucas, call that co-ed International University and ask them the name of the student on which this amount is spent. Take the reference Id from the message," Sebastian ordered, racking his brains, thinking about all the possibilities.

Could it be that she was paying for her sister? They were supposed to enter college too, right? But why would she pay the fee for her stepsister? As long as he heard from her and Lucas, they never got along.

Sebastian looked out the window, closing his eyes till Lucas found out about the information.

As soon as he let his mind calm, the image of Elliana smiling at him with her eyes brimming with tears appeared in front of his eyes, and he scrunched his brows.

He shook away the image and tried to think about what he would do at the masquerade party that was in a month and how to infiltrate the hunters when the image of Elliana looking at him with hope when he found her near the lake appeared in his head, and he opened his eyes, annoyed.

What was his mind doing only thinking about that foxy girl?!

"Damn it!" Sebastian threw the Laptop beside him, and Lucas looked at his Prince through the rearview mirror, hurrying the receptionist.

"Sir, we found out the student's name," Lucas said, and Sebastian looked at him.

"The student is called Shreya Colton," Lucas said, and Sebastian scrunched his brows.

"Shreya Colton? Who is she?" Sebastian asked, and Lucas cleared his throat.

"Miss Zoya's adoptive daughter," Lucas said, waiting for Sebastian to react. However, the latter only nodded before looking out.

So this is how things are going to be, huh? Sebastian smiled evilly behind his mask.