Thad

The day after Seren escaped, Hamid woke up to the news of his daughter's disappearance.

He did not care at first, since he knew his daughter whenever they had a dispute, she would disappear for three days, staying by her mother's grave. He knew that she would come back soon.

He simply waited for her; however, a week passed, and she still hadn’t returned.

He started getting angry, stomping his feet while walking, and went to the family graveyard.

“OK, you can drop it already!” He yelled, but saw no one. She wasn't there. He jumped from grave to grave and made sure to look everywhere. Soon his anger shifted to worry. He felt his guts getting devoured by worms of paranoia.

She was his precious daughter after all, he did everything just to make sure she lived a happy and fulfilling life.

But suddenly, there was no trace of her, like she had been poofed, leaving no message behind.

All kinds of thoughts ran through his mind, worried, he scrubbed his hair aggressively, and he went to his wife's grave, sitting beside it.

“She is gone!” He said.

“What should I do?”

He sat, resting his head over her soil.

“Even the lands went to dire straits when you were gone,” he told his wife.

Then he remembered Duke Thad and how he had saved and found his daughter when she was kidnapped once. Maybe he would help in finding her again.

He quickly sent a letter to Thad, saying that he needed his help finding Seren again.

After a few days, Thad was expecting the message since he had been watching Seren for a while.

After receiving the message, he started sending messages to Seren with forget-me-not flowers, he told her that he would go to her father’s palace, and that it would be near for her to accept his marriage request, as it would be her only choice.

Seren was not reading the messages and only hiding them, and he knew it.

This time, to force her to read it, he sent someone to the cottage to put a forget-me-not necklace by her window.

When Seren saw the necklace, she held it, crying. It was the same necklace she had given the little girl. She ran to Owen, begging him to check on the little girl that she had encountered in the poor neighborhood, as guilt ate at Seren.

It was the first time that Owen had seen this vulnerable side of Seren. Influenced by her reaction, he agreed to go and check on that girl and her family.

Soon enough, Thad went to Hamid's palace with a rare tea as a gift.

Hamid invited Thad to stay temporarily in the palace as a guest to help him find his daughter.

While living in the palace, Thad thought of a new plan. He thought to kill Hamid, and his offspring, and stage a fake will that Hamid gave him the land to take care of, and so he sent to Seren a hit man to assassinate her.

As the moon rose, the assassin monitored the cottage and the movement in it, making sure everyone was asleep before he made any further advancement.

What he did not know was that Lotus was in the bathroom and not asleep.

He broke into the house and ran silently. Lotus got out of the bathroom to see a tall, dark figure pass by; she was shocked, but her feet moved on their own.

She started running, her pulse rising, oxygen felt heavy in her lungs, her arms numb.

She yelled, “SEREN!” The scream made Bala wake up.

Lotus reached Seren's room before the assassin did. Seren woke up, seeing Lotus bursting into her room and throwing her arms around her.

Bala ran after Lotus's voice, but was late.

Seren confused by the gesture, but welcomed the embrace, when suddenly a tall figure towering over them showed up with him a dagger on it a design of a forget-me-not flower and threw his hand to slash through Lotus, Seren tried turning around to fight back but was late, as the same time Bala entered and attacked the man quickly leaving him drop on the ground.

As Seren held Lotus, she realised that her hands were getting wet; it was blood soaking her hands. It took her a while to realise that Lotus was bleeding and that she had been slashed on her shoulder, watching her hands getting soaked in her friend’s blood made her face go numb, she could only hear her heartbeat.

She gently lifted Lotus, and Lotus was smiling, “You are well,” she whispered.

“Stay well,” Lotus's body temperature dropped drastically.

Seren yelled to Bala to help her. Bala entered the room, as she glanced at the body of Lotus; she ran and hugged it, “No, please stay with us.”

“Call the doctor!” Seren said.

“No need,” Lotus coughed.

She slowly extended her hand and wiped the tears off Bala’s face, “Don’t cry…”

“bala…” she had troubled inhaling.

“Take care of Seren… ok?”

Seren held Lotus’s other hand, crying, “Please, don’t…”

Lotus’s hand fell from Bala’s face onto the ground as she closed her eyes in infinite slumber.

Bala’s eyes widened, “No! No!” she shook Lotus’s corpse, “please! please! I…I…” Bala started crying loudly and yelled, “They killed my flower!”

“They killed her…”

Bala hugging Lotus as she cried.

Seren, on the other hand, was trying hard to breathe. She ran outside, then ran in circles, she laughed, thinking it was a nightmare and soon she would wake up, but she didn’t. Her knees were so weak, and she experienced tunnel vision; she felt as if oxygen was too heavy to breathe or as if her lungs were cut. She fell on her knees, trying to breathe through her mouth, but the air would get stuck in her throat and she would cough as she cried and wailed, her clothes and hands were still soaked with Lotus’s blood.

“My fault! It was all my fault!” she yelled, screaming.

She quivered, then grabbed and pulled on her hair, then started hitting her hair.

Owen had just come back from the short trip checking on the girl as Seren's request, when he returned, he saw Seren in that vulnerable position, soaked in blood.

He moved without thinking and grabbed both of her hands away from her hair, he held her face.

“Calm down,” he tried soothing her.

“What happened?”

But Seren was not able to answer, she was too traumatised to talk. He held her hand and helped her stand.