Ch.23 ۞ Verena ۞ Part III

"GREAT," SHE MOCKED AGAIN. "NOW, EMMALINE, we need you to step out of the bed. She has to be alone for us to heal her." Oh?

My sister nodded, got up on the bed, and jumped where the ground was clean. As the King and Queen of the Kingdom called Ceres came closer, they used some kind of spell to clean the ground from vomit.

"Your majesties, do you think you can heal old scars?" Emma asked respectfully and I glared at her.

"You don't have any scars, Emmaline," the King exclaimed, and that made me remember that they are the ones who healer her, and for that, I'm grateful.

"It's for Veevy, not me!"

They shot me a curious glared and I felt exposed. "Shouldn't you have healed those old scars already, with the brute amount of magic in your body, Verena?" The Queen asked.

"I should, probably, your majesty. However, for some reason we never understood, every time I cut myself to give my blood for Emma to use in her paintings, my wounds never fully healed. All of them turned into scars," I muttered, more than uncomfortable. "Why did you tell them that?"

"I'm trying to help," she sulked.

"Could it be because of the blood magic, aunt?" Aryan asked, and the way he called her spread a shiver down my spine. Is he really a Prince?

"Probably," she mumbled and caressed her chin.

"Blood magic?" We asked together, cringing.

I pursed my lips, "That's doesn't sound good."

The King grinned, "It's one the rarest type of magic, actually. Extremely dangerous to it's wielder and the victim of it. But very powerful. You both have it. We were only able to track you because you made lots of paintings with blood magic and the person who sold them, ended up spreading them in lots of points of the human world. It caused quite the chaos and we sent our kids to go after it and find you there. Took them almost 3 months, but you are here now."

"My paintings were magical?" Emma gasped.

"Thanks to using your sister's blood to paint them, yes. The blood of those with blood magic is extremely powerful and different than others. It has a potent power by itself," the Queen exclaimed. "Those paintings cause an illusion in the human mind, and although the paintings are static, in their minds, the drawings can move. It's like a drug for the eye."

I scowled, "Are you saying I unknowingly drugged countless of humans with my blood in Emma's paintings?" They seemed amused by the disgust in my face. "That is beyond messed up."

"So, my paintings were like the ones in Harry Potter," Emma grinned and I glared at her. "Oh, sorry. It just sounds crazy."

"What is Harry Potter?" They all asked in sync.

Sigh, "It's pretty much the most famous fantasy middle grade book series in the human world. With a total of 7 books, 8 movies, and many other things. The author may have a terrible conduct, but she's incredibly talented at writing, and became a billionaire thanks to that."

"What is it about?" The King asked curiously.

And the second of childish innocence I saw flickering in his eyes, made me genuinely amused in a good way. Seems like they aren't total jerks. "It's about magic. The protagonist is an orphan who gets invited to go to a magic school at 12. He's like, the chosen one to destroy the evil in the world of the setting. It ends when he's 16."

"The movies are amazing," Emma exclaimed.

I cringed, glaring at her, "The books are better."

Aryan arched his eyebrows, "Your school record said Emmaline was the avid reader out of you two, and you were into sports. But you seem to like books too," I felt my cheeks hot.

"When I'm with my lens, and the frontal top of my hair dyed, no one could tell us apart. I was the reader, Emma was into acting, and we were both in the sports team of school. The record are messed up, you shouldn't believe them," I pressed my lips together surprised by how friendly I sounded.

"Can you take off your boots?" The Queen broke the silence that installed in the room and I nodded.

Crossing my legs, I slowly used my free hand to untie the lace of my high heeled boots and took them off, putting on the side of the bed, and showing my nails painted black, and the bandages on my ankles. "Don't worry, my feet doesn't smell," I joked and the King cracked for a second.

"Why are your ankles bandaged? Are you hurt on them?" He came closer and held my right feet up, and I felt his words sinking in my bones, making me speak even though I didn't want to.

"One of the works Benjamin made me do to pay my debt, was to fight in underground rings where the only rule is not to kill. I was fighting in a ring in Gretna, a neighboring city to New Orleans, before I ran back to the city after my vision of my sister being in danger. And every time I fought in one of those, I covered my ankles and knuckles in a lot of bandages because it helps weighting the attack on the opponent," my mouth spoke alone.

"I knew you were on this shady shit. Why didn't told me? You know how worried I got when you came home?" Emma gasped.

I clenched my teeth, "What the hell? How did you do that? How you made me speak?"

"You are strong, kid, but I'm way stronger. I used coercion, it's a power innate of Faes that manipulates the mind of those of weaker power," what the hell? "Seems like it works on you."

"That's messed up," I gasped.

"You won't think that when you get stronger," he grinned and I had no counter for that. He's right, I definitely will.

"I'll take the handcuff out of your wrist now," the Queen exclaimed as she got closer to my arm. "Stay still," and I did.

When my arm was free, I let out a sigh of relief, caressing my wrist with my other hand. "Thank you, damn. That feels terrible," but she took my hands in hers and I frowned.

"Sun God above," is that supposed to be a curse? "I can feel lost of scars in your wrists." She shot me a glare. "Do you understand how dangerous is it to cut your wrists? It's the worse way to make you stop bleeding. It can drain all your blood, and your blood in question, is a weapon by itself."

I tried to take my arms away from her reach, uncomfortable, but she held me still. "I didn't think that far. The only thing I thought was that making a cut in the wrist will make my blood spill out faster and in larger quantities, so it'll fill a bucket faster. My sister needed to paint. She acts differently in her visions. She paints while having the visions, and that's why her arts are so vivid, even if they were all red."

"To think a Fae would do such a thing!"

I glared at Aryan, "Look, you can judge me. I don't expect any of you to understand what we went through, or why we had to do that. Rich and privileged people such as yourselves will never grasp the actual gravity of what happened."

"No. We won't. Thank Gods we won't," he mocked.

Avoiding his eyes, I clenched my jaw and turned to the Queen again, "My scars are old. I began cutting myself when I was 16, when we got back to being under Benjamin, after our last foster family jumped from the boat. It's been three years. And I cut myself weekly, so, there's a lot."

"Her inner thighs too," Emma exclaimed. "Oh, and if it's possible, they are less and almost unnoticeable now, but she also her a few on her back. She covers with the top, that's why it has a wide covered back."

"Emmaline!" I hissed.

"What? Maybe she can make them vanish."

Does she hates them that much? "I won't take off my short for you to look at them. You don't need to. They are identical to the ones in my wrists. And the ones in my back weren't made by knife, and are way older than that. I'm used to them, you don't need to bother."

"What are the ones in her back, Emmaline?"

I glared at the Aryan, as he used coercion on my sister, and the idea that he can do that to us too, didn't make me feel good at all. "That's personal!" I clenched my teeth.

But my sister was already under the affect of his damn power. "Four of our foster families were extremely aggressive and fucked up people. I used to be even more clumsy as a kid, and I ended up breaking lots of their things, and my sister always took the blame. The first two family used to beat her with the metal part of the belt, the third and the fourth were with a whip. The belt ones are smaller, almost unnoticeable, but the whip ones are like messed up lines."

"Why did it leave a scar?" He used it again.

"Possibly because she bleed too much and it always opened the skin on her back," she spoke thoughtlessly, her silver eyes, hazy. When she blinked again, she covered her mouth with her hands, guilty flooding her, but it was too late. "I'm sorry, Veevy. I…"

I avoided her eyes, feeling way too exposed, "It's not your fault." But their stares made extremely uncomfortable. I just wanted to be over with this and get out of here.