Kai didn't want to admit it, but he felt a small sort of delight in the King calling for his assistance. 

   It had been a while since his last assignment, and it had been far too easy and swift for his liking. Without an assignment for him to take on, he was merely just a young man without a reason to exist. 

   He watched the King silently from behind the curtain to which he had teleported. He looked slightly more agitated than usual; his shoulders appeared rather tense, where his hands were folded together in an seemingly anxious demeanor underneath his chin. He was the perfect picture of a distressed King who'd found out moments before that his kingdom was declared war upon. 

 Was that what this was about? Could situations in the outer world be so difficult that they could result to this? Kai didn't know. But he was intrigued enough to find out. 

   He teleported to the center of the throneroom, in complete view of the King. 

   "You called for me, Your Majesty?" he asked, executing a deep bow. 

   The King did not move an inch from his position. He stayed like that for a moment longer before finally opening his mouth to speak. 

   "Yes, Kai, I did," he said, his voice a deep rumble. "Unfortunately, I have another assignment for you. This one is rather much more...pressing than the others I have assigned to you." 

   Pressing? 

   "How so?" Kai asked, narrowing his eyes at the King. 

   He finally raised his gaze to the young man and locked his jaw as he looked him up and down.

   "Before I tell you this, I want you to know that you are a subject whom I trust, wholeheartedly. You do know that, right, Kai?" At the corner of his eye, Kai noticed vaguely that the King was slowly turning the ring upon his middle finger very slowly as he spoke. 

   "Yes, Your Majesty, I do," he answered, knowing fully well that he could not answer in any other way. "Thank you, very much." 

   The King's mouth quirked up slightly at the side. "There is no need to thank me, Kai. If you wish to thank me at all, merely carry out the tasks that I give you." He continued to twirl his ring slowly around his finger. "There is someone in Araesia whom I believe to be a great threat to our kingdom. This in itself is already a perfectly good cause for an execution, yes?"

   Slowly, Kai nodded as the King watched him with dark, glinting eyes. 

   "Good," he said softly, "It's good that you understand. For this job will help the well-being of our kingdom by a great amount. You do know that, right, Kai?" He waited patiently once more for Kai to nod. "Good. You should know this, for if you do not, then many of my subjects could suffer, even die, from this threat. One of these subjects could also easily be your brother, Sehun." 

   Kai's hands balled into hard fists behind his back, though his face remained expressionless. 

   "Who is it that you need me to take care of, Your Majesty?" 

   The King smiled at him, though the gesture looked more eerie than welcoming. 

   "Princess Eunhee, Heir to the Throne of Araesia." 

~~~

   Kai sat motionlessly atop his bed, staring blankly at the stone wall in front of him. His room was very much as how he remembered his father's to be: neat, small but not cramped, complete with a desk, a bed, and a short shelf which held a limited number of scrolls and volumes. He did not enjoy reading; it had always been Sehun that had inherited their father's love of literature. The pieces of literary works he owned were only obtained by him from Sehun, which he had no choice but to accept.

   He loved Sehun very much. Without their father or mother, it was true that they were the only two alive that they could call family. Although it wasn't often that he was permitted to see his brother, Kai didn't mind at all if it meant that he was safe and content. If there was a main reason for him to carry on doing the King's assignments anyway, it was because of Sehun. 

   Song Eunhee. The Princess of Arasia. 

   Kai would be lying if he said he was not surprised to receive such an order. The King had never before sent him to assassinate a woman, much less one as important as the Princess of their opposing monarchy. And the way he wanted him to kill her...it was something Kai had never before in his worst nightmares dared to do to a woman.

   He would have to leave early the next morning, which meant that he should muster all the sleep he could into his schedule - 

   Kai whipped his head to the door, where the sound of a footstep had just originated. Kai was not only skilled in a variety of weapons and in controlling his power, but he also had excellent hearing. He had hearing that could make out any sort of noise, even the sound of a pin dropping from a distance of thirty feet. And his hearing was never wrong. 

   Kai's room was located at the very bottom of the castle, even underneath the dungeon. There was only one humanly way to enter his room other than teleporting, and that was through a hidden trap door at the very back of the kitchen cellar. Whoever was nearing his room was most likely not there for an innocent purpose.

   The footsteps were nearing even closer now, almost to his very door. Kai felt his skin tingle the only way it could when he was about to teleport. Taking a slow breath, he closed his eyes and disappeared from his bed -

   - and reappeared behind the unknown individual. Before he or she could react, Kai grabbed ahold of the person's shoulders and channeled his energy through the both of them  - 

   - and the two reappeared at the very top of the tallest castle tower, Kai's elbow at the person's throat while his other arm held him up.

   Kai could now tell that this person was indeed a male, a tall one at that. A dark hood covered half of his head, concealing his face and possibly his identity. The evening wind tore at the both of them, sending icy chills through Kai's thin clothing. The only light that allowed them capable of vision was the soft glow of the moon, as it was already deep into the night.

   "Who are you?!" Kai yelled, shaking the nameless man. "Who sent you? How do you know who I am?!" 

   As Kai shook him, the hood of the perpetrator fell from his head, revealing the shocked and terrified face of -

   His brother, Sehun. 

   "Um, because I'm your brother!" Sehun yelled back, his face frozen in alarm and horror as he peered to his side and realized the height they were at. "What the hell are you doing?! Bring us back, you madman!" 

   Kai stared, dumbfounded, at the distressed face of his younger brother. Then, after a moment, he felt his lips crack into an amused grin.

  "Sehun!" he said  fondly. "What were you doing coming to my room? You always said that you found it eerie and uncomfortable, being under the dungeon that held so many of the kingdom's most infamous criminals." 

   "You're right at that!" Sehun yelled agitatedly at Kai. The wind was tearing at his hair, morphing it into a variety of comical styles.  "But I have to say, this is far worse!" He used his free hand to whack frantically at Kai's shoulder. "Get us the hell out of here!" 

   For what seemed like the first time, Kai looked up and assessed the scenery he had brought them to. 

   "Ah, right," he said. 

   And then he wrapped his arms around his brother, and the two disappeared. 

    Right when the two reappeared in Kai's bedroom, Sehun fell from his brother's arms and landed on his hands and knees, retching uncontrollably. 

   Kai knelt beside him and patted him strongly on his back. 

   "The first few times are the worst," he said gently. "You get used to it after a while." 

   Sehun pushed his arm away, wiping his mouth contemptedly. "Do you really think that I'm going to want to keep doing that until I do get used to it?" he demanded incredulously. He pushed himself up, rejecting Kai's offers of assistance,  and collapsed face first on the bed. "It's a wonder how you manage it." 

   As Kai sighed and sat beside him, slowly his back (all the while sending tingles of delight through his body), Sehun began to wonder. 

   Did Kai really do such jobs for the King? When he was listening in on their conversation, did the King really mean what he thought? If his brother really was the King's private assassin, then he didn't really know his brother at all. The older brother he admired and loved and looked forward to seeing every day had a dark side to him, one that he'd never thought Kai could ever have at all. 

   He had to confront him on it. 

   "Kai," he said softly into his pillow.

   "Yes?" he answered. 

   There was a pause as Sehun hesitated. Then, "I overheard your conversation with the King."

   Silence. Kai's hand immediately stopped his back; instead it recoiled back to his side, where it lay balled into a tight fist. A somewhat tense atmosphere came to existence, which was preposterous, considering the fact that nothing had ever been tense or awkward between the two young men before. 

   "I see," Kai answered, choosing his words carefully. "How much did you hear?"

   Sehun sighed, trying not to be too put down by the fact that Kai was no longer touching him. He furrowed his brows and thought back. "I think...just a portion of it, until Kyungjin caught me snooping and pulled me away," he said truthfully. Abruptly, he sat up and turned around, examining Kai's face closely. "What did King Myung Seol mean...when he told you to take care of the Princess of Araesia?" 

    For a moment, Sehun thought he saw a hint of panic in his brother's expression. Then Kai turned his head away from Sehun's scrutiny, his face wiped completely of any emotion. Sehun wondered if he even saw anything there at all. 

   "He meant nothing by it," Kai said, sounding indifferent. "I am to infiltrate Araesia's palace and act as one of the Princess's guards. The King suspects that she may be a threat to our kingdom, so I shall watch over her decisions and such. That is all." 

   Sehun pursed his lips and continued to stare at Kai, looking for any sort of clue that he might be lying. 

   After a moment, Sehun sighed again and lay back down on the pillow. 

   "You would do well at it," Sehun said. "At infiltrating the palace. You're good at those sorts of things. Being secretive and such."

   Sehun noticed in his peripheral vision the way Kai's shoulders relaxed after he spoke. 

   "I hope so," Kai answered, laying back alongside Sehun, where they stared at the ceiling together. There were slight cracks on it, from where Sehun didn't know. He made a mental note to come down another time to fix it. "If I do not do well, it could surely mean my life."

   "Well, it wouldn't be of a great problem to you, now wouldn't it?" Sehun commented, smiling. "You could just - " He made a whooshing gesture with his hands, "vanish. In the blink of an eye." 

   Kai chuckled. "That," he said, "is going to help me greatly, I must admit." 

   "When are you leaving?" Sehun asked, turning his head to look at Kai. "Tomorrow night? Next week?"

   "In the morning," he answered. "I was planning on getting a lot of rest tonight, but judging by how you are here, I suspect you wish to keep me awake some time longer." 

   "In the morning!" Sehun exclaimed, eyes widening. "When were you planning on alerting me of your absence?" 

   "I don't think I will be gone for long," Kai replied. 

   "Of course your stay will be prolonged!" Sehun retorted. "You are infiltrating a kingdom. You will need time to blend in, get others to trust you and such. You are aiming for the place of one of the Princess's guards for Christ's sake!" 

   "It will be fi - "

   "Well, it won't matter how long you're going to be staying, for I am coming with you," Sehun said, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. 

   All of a sudden, Kai grabbed hold of his brother's shoulders and rolled them over the bed. They landed on the floor with a thud, and before Sehun even realized what was happening, Kai was pinning him down, eyes sending a glare like daggers to his. 

   "What do you mean you're coming with me?" he asked dangerously.

A/N: Thank you for reading the second chapter! Well, so this is really where the story starts xD Subscribe if you'd like and please leave a comment anytime! Any sort of feedback is loved <3 :D