"I can't believe I'm actually letting you come with me," Kai said as he stared regretfully at Sehun standing at his bedroom door. 

   Two separate bundles of Sehun's belongings lay at his feet, and his bow and quiver was strapped to his back naturally. Kai could tell from the set of his brother's jaw and the determined look in his eye that there was no talking him out of accompanying him to Araesia. 

   "Well, it's not as if you have a choice," Sehun said, shrugging. "I am joining you on your journey no matter what you say to try and dissuade me."

   His words didn't raise Kai's spirits in the least. They had argued and yelled at each other for the longest time the night before; they had only  stopped when the protesting shouts from Jaezin's criminals above Kai's room could actually be heard screaming threats at them.

   He sighed as he grabbed his sack of belongings from the floor and heaved it over his shoulder. In his bag, he possessed multiple concealable weapons, along with a separate pair of clothing and a drinking flask, filled to the brim with water. The one good thing about Sehun shadowing him during the trip was that he was an excellent hunter. They wouldn't have to worry about food at all.

   "We can get two horses from the castle stables," Sehun told Kai. "Baram hasn't been ridden in quite a while, and I haven't seen you ride in the longest time - " 

   Kai cut him off by abruptly covering his mouth with his hand. 

   "Are you really going to state your intentions about horseback riding with me?" he asked, raising his eyebrows. When Sehun just stared at him, he sighed and narrowed his gaze at him once more. Then he teleported behind Sehun's back and tapped his shoulder. 

   Startled, Sehun jumped back and faced Kai once more. Before he could say anything, Kai repeated, 

   "With me?" 

   Sehun pursed his lips and nodded sheepishly. 

   "Yes, I see your point," he admitted. "But are we really going to just teleport straight there? I don't think my body can handle that again." He shuddered visibly at the thought. 

   "No, that isn't quite possible," Kai replied, "My ability can't cover such a distance in one go. Especially since I have to bring you and all of our belongings together at once. It would drain me, make me faint, or possibly, kill me." 

   Sehun's eyes widened. "Then - the horses - "

   "We are not riding a five day's journey on the backs of animals when there is a much swifter alternative," Kai said sternly, shooting Sehun a look. "I will simply teleport us a suitable distance, one that I can handle. Then we will rest until I recover, where in this time we will hunt, eat and possibly sleep, and then we will teleport once more. We will continue such a cycle until we reach Araesia." 

   Sehun groaned. "How much of these cycles must I abide by?" he asked, seeming a bit afraid by Kai's answer. 

   "I'm not sure," he answered truthfully. "I haven't had anyone travel along with me before. Normally, by my lonesome, it would take around three times."

   "So you've been to Araesia before?" Sehun asked, suddenly interested. "On what sort of errand? I thought this was the first time."

   A short rush of panic ran through Kai's mind. It would be such a burden to maintain his lie from the night before, seeing as Sehun was set on coming with him. It was true that the King wanted him to infiltrate Araesia's palace and act as a guard so that he could also gather some intel before he were to execute the Princess, so he would be safe from Sehun's suspicions in that area. But for the rest...

   "You shouldn't dwell on that," Kai said, trying to sound as indifferent as possible. "They were minor, simple things."

   "Really?" Sehun asked. "Like wha - "

   "You ready?" Kai interrupted, grabbing onto Sehun's shoulders. 

   "What?! NO I'm - "

   And they vanished. 

   The Princess hadn't left her room since the night before, and it was already well into the afternoon. She'd declined any offers of food and she hadn't allowed anyone inside, not even Luhan. 

   This was a sort of rare trend for the Princess. Like him, she possessed an ability of the mind. Luhan was able to speak to any individual using only his mind, ever since he turned five years of age. Since then, his practice and training with his power enabled him to gain a large amount of intuition, where he was able to look at someone's face and see traces of their past before him. He was also presently working on being able to read the thoughts of others, but his attempts were rarely of any success. 

   The Princess, on the other hand, had the ability to see the future. 

   Anyone born of the royal Araesian bloodline had a touch of the foresight, and the Princess was of no exception. The only setback was, her power was much weaker than that of her father, King Seunghun. She had to concentrate for hours on end in order to maintain a single vision, and even then it would still confuse her, coming to her slowly and in unorganized bits and pieces. They also came in strange dreamlike apparitions, which she had to scrutinize very closely in order to make any sense of it. The future was also never set in stone, as the King always told her as a child, so she also could not take what she saw and use the knowledge recklessly. 

   Luhan disliked the times when she worked on a vision. Being the King's advisor and the Princess's childhood friend and servant, he had nothing much to do, now that the King was confined to his bed, riding out his illness of five years. It was not the sort of illness that could be ridden out, however. The King was bound to die even with the assistance of multiple healers, and, as a healer himself, he knew so. 

   Luhan also disliked visiting the King, though he would never say such thoughts to anyone. It was just that whenever he were to see the King's tired, worn body as he lay limp upon his bed, he would know immediately what he was thinking, for it was not only written all over his thoughts, but on his face as well. 

   The King was to die soon. 

   Although Princess Eunhee was not told such words, she was intelligent enough to comprehend the impending signs. He could feel her aura of stress and desperation even through her bedroom door as he stood in front of it, a tray of food clasped lightly in his hands. If she were to be Queen soon, she would need to be adequate. Fitting to a Queen's stature. She should not have to struggle so much with the simple act of interpreting a single vision. That was what she thought, anyway.

   As delicately as possible, Luhan closed his eyes and let his mind stretch out towards Eunhee's.  Finally, he touched his mind with hers.

   What does this mean? This only made it more confusing...

   Luhan smiled and chuckled quietly to himself. 

   Perhaps if you would let me inside and explain what your vision was about, I could possibly help you.

  He felt her surprise reach him, and after a moment, her exasperation. He could tell that she was sighing. 

   I do not need your help, Luhan-ah. I am perfectly fine interpreting this vision by myself. 

   It does not seem like it. 

   Slight tendrils of annoyance crept into her thoughts. 

   It is not something you can interpret from a single explanation, Luhan-ah. 

   Then you could give me multiple descriptions, if a single one does not suffice. 

   He felt her sigh once more. 

   You could just let me in already, you know. I know you're hungry, I can feel it. You will be able to think better with food in your stomach. 

   The only help you and the food you will bring to me is the assistance of getting me distracted. Now go away, and take your food with you.

   It was Luhan's turn to sigh now. He turned and stared at the door once again. She would not last long without food. The last time she was arduously working out a vision in this manner, she'd fainted from stress and hunger. As her friend, he did not wish to find her in such a vulnerable, weak state again. 

   If you do not open this door now, I am coming in by force.

   After a slight flash of surprise, Luhan could feel a tiny battle conflicting within her brain. On one side, there lay her stubbornness, and her desire to continue her endeavours without being deterred. On the other side, there lay her rationality and the underlying fact that it was useless to argue, for he would enter anyway. In the end, it seemed rationality won.

   I am coming. 

   The Princess  possessed a beauty that was unmistakable, ever since her birth. She had creamy, unblemished skin, long, shimmering hair that flowed down to her narrow hips, large, innocent doe-like eyes and small, pink lips. Luhan didn't remember a time when she had ever looked unkempt. 

   Until that day. 

   He smiled as she opened the door to her room with a long creak, revealing her disheveled self to him. It was evident that she hadn't slept at all the past night, being that her hair lay in long tangles down her shoulders,  and there were obvious bags under her eyes. 

   Luhan's smile didn't waver from his face. "You look horrible," he said, unable to keep the laugh from escaping him. 

   She scoffed and opened the door wider so that he could enter. 

   The Princess's room was in complete turmoil. She had moved all of her possessions - including her dressers, shelves, and bed - to a single corner of the room, leaving a massive open space, where only a blanket and a single bowl of water lay together in the center. The room was not of normal size; its proportion was similiar to that of a ballroom, in a perfect circle and just as large, where the ceiling reached a range as high as a small tower, with a circular glass opening. 

   Around the ceiling's rafters, doves who had flown in from the open window were perched, some peering curiously down at the two of them while a few others flew freely around the area.

   And all around them, floating and flying in every direction, were scrolls and volumes and pages of every kind, streaming through the air as if they were of the same living species of the doves that soared alongside them. They fluttered and drifted and to Luhan's amazement, some of the volumes even flapped, as if their pages were actual wings. A random page caught Luhan's cheek; he picked if off his face curiously and assessed its contents. 

   Scrying, Future, Past and Present, were its first words, written in a bold, flowing script. Luhan tossed it lightly back into the air, where it easily took flight once more. 

   Casually, the Princess picked a page out of the air and brought it to her face. Her small face bunched up in scrutiny, and she returned to her seat on the center's blanket without removing her eyes from the worn paper. 

   There was also something else about the Royal bloodline that Luhan never stopped marvelling about. All with Araesia's blue blood would have the ability to obtain any ability they wanted. King Seunghun, when he was not bedridden with illness, bore the powers of everyone who inhabited Araesia, no matter how strange or exotic it was. Although Luhan was not alive when the King utilized his abilities in all of its glory and splendour, his ears were never left empty of tales of the King's indescribable power.

   However, the only time when the Princess would receive her full power and ability was when she would turn eighteen years of age, at the exact time of the complete solar eclipse. There would be a ceremony, with all of Araesia to watch, and King Seunghun would rise and place his crown atop Eunhee's head and coronate her Queen of all of Araesia. 

   His only hope was that the King would still be alive and well enough to do so before Eunhee's birthday. However, for now, he was happy she at least possessed the power of telekinesis and foresight.

   "So what exactly are you trying so hard to scry?" Luhan asked as he took a seat in front of the Princess, watching her fondly as her eyes darted back and forth across the page she held as she read its contents. He placed the tray of food he brought in front of him, pushing it towards her. She studiously ignored his gesture and rose her gaze to his. 

   "Do you remember that time when we were both children, and I had fainted while we were picking flowers for your mother?"

   Luhan remembered. His mother had been murdered by a knight of Jaezin, when troops of their forces marched inside of his home village and burned it to the grounds. Eunhee had dragged his wailing form to an empty valley where she let him sit among the flowers while she picked a bouquet for his mother's funeral. There she had randomly fallen in a frightening fashion right before his eyes. It was one of the scariest moments of his life. He'd thought everyone he held closest to in the world was to die. 

   But then she had awoken, claiming to have had the strangest dream. 

   "Yes, I remember," Luhan said, feeling nostaligic. "You'd scared me half to death, and then awoken looking the most rejuvenated I'd ever seen a person." 

   She smiled. "Because I had just obtained my very first vision, Luhan!" she exclaimed, her smile stretching into a grin. "I had seen a young boy running through a dark stone castle, while a tall knight chased him down. Then, all of a sudden, he just disappeared."

   "Yes, you've made me recall the tale more than once," Luhan said tiredly. "Are you going to eat the food I brought or are you going to leave it there to rot?"

   To shut him up most likely, she took a bit of bread from the tray and stuffed it into , chewing and swallowing hurriedly. 

   Then, "He must have been in Jaezin's castle, yes?" she asked him. "I know for certain that it was not Araesia's palace, and the knight wore black armour. Only Jaezin has knights that wear such a morbid colour to battle."

   "Yes, probably," Luhan admitted. "But what does that vision have to do with the fate of Araesia, or any of us in general?"

   "Because," she said urgently, "I had a similar vision last night. I saw a young man, about our age, sitting in a corner of the same dark hallway I'd envisioned before. He had a eaten apple core in his hand, and a similiar tall knight dressed in black armour was addressing him. Then, as he was speaking, the boy disappeared."

   Luhan could feel her aura of enthusiasm spark around her slight form. The scrolls and volumes and pages around them seemed to float even more vibrantly than before, speeding up and flying higher towards the ceiling. 

   "So, what you're saying is, you think you have envisioned the same boy as you did when we were children?" Luhan asked. 

   "Yes!" she pronounced happily. "Whoever this boy is, he is of a great significance. It could not be coincidence that he were to show up in my visions twice in my life and not mean anything. He is no doubt an Araesian living and trying to survive amongst Jaezin's inhabitants. How else could you explain his power of teleportation? What if he could be...one of the Twelve?" 

   Luhan's eyes widened and he leaned in closer to her. "So, then what are you trying to do now?" Luhan inquired, looking down at the shimmering bowl of water before them. 

   "I am trying to scry him," she said simply. She picked up the bowl and presented it to him as if it were the most priceless artifact in the world. "If I am successful in scrying him, I will be able to see where he is,what he is doing at the moment, and hopefully, his situation. It is only then that I might be able to go to him and possibly recruit him as one of our own." 

   "We must make sure that he is of no harm beforehand," Luhan said rationally. "And if he could really be one of the Twelve, if we wish to have anything to do with him." 

   The Princess smiled. "Don't worry, Luhan-ah," she said. "I have a very good feeling about this. He will be of no harm to us, no doubt. He is an Araesian, of course." 

   As the Princess began eating from the tray of food, Luhan  could not help but feel a trace of doubt form within him. Before he could voice his feeling, the Princess doubled over and began to cough profusely. 

   "Eunhee-yah!" Luhan exclaimed, jumping forward and catching her in his arms. He raised her head to his and shook her. "Eunhee!" 

   As if on cue, she opened her eyes and met them with his. They had turned a bright gold. 

   Without a word, she disentangled herself from him and took hold of the bowl of water, bringing it close to her face. 

   And, to Luhan's wonder and amazement, the water began to change. 

   At first, it swirled around the bowl, spilling some of its contents onto the floor and onto Eunhee's dress. Then, the colourless shimmer of the water began to morph and shift, until different colours and hues came to existence. 

   Before long, Luhan could make out a small image of a young man with dark skin and hair clad all in black commoner's clothing, standing in the exact same valley that Eunhee and him had sat to pick flowers the day his mother died. Behind him stood another tall young man with white satin skin and a serious face. They both looked in front of them with a sort of curiosity and amazement that one only had when one were anticipating something. 

   Finally, the image moved to the scene that beheld them.

   They were looking out at the tops of Araesia's castle towers. 

   They were in Araesia. 

A/N: Thank  you so much for reading the third chapter! I apologize if it's too long, the introduction of Luhan and Princess Eunhee took
longer than I thought hehe XD Omg, I'm all excited now, everything's about to start! Haha!
Thank you to those who've subscribed and upvoted!! 

*throws confetti

Oops, sorry Jongin-ah... xD

And PLEASE don't be a silent reader!!! I love how I have so many subscribers and upvotes already, but I honestly adore feedback more! Haha! 
Thank you again for reading! And I may not be updating every day anymore, because March Break is nearing an end, and I'll have to get back to work Ahah! Sorry (>w<) 

Love you all! (P.S, sorry, it's not fully proofread yet xD)