On another part of the vast Snow Forest, Sunmi and her soldiers stop, when they notice a hurt soldier on the ground, Sunmi jumps from her horse and runs to the soldier, she shakes him softly.

“Wake up, please, wake up.” Sunmi repeats until the soldier coughs blood and looks at her with almost dead eyes. “S-Sunmi-sshi, w-we couldn’t….s..top..them.”

Sunmi narrow her eyes looking at the agonizing soldier. “What are you talking about?” her voice filled with an unsure tone.

“People…are..in..danger…th..ey…are…not..g..oing…to…stop.” The soldier coughs again and dies leaving Sunmi shocked with the information, closing the eyes of the dead soldier she notices the soldier is not from Winter, but the heavy damage on his clothes and broken armor doesn’t let her know from where he comes.

She slowly gets up, putting the soldier's dead body leaning in the log of one of the pines of the forest. “I want you to bury this man as he deserves.” she notices some prints from the soldier, maybe when he was hauling himself to search help, looking at her still shocked soldiers she gives them an order “Let’s follow his prints, we have to know what he was escaping from”

The soldiers nod and they start following the prints until Sunmi starts noticing some black dust on the floor, until one of her soldiers calls her. “S-Sunmi-sshi, look.”

Sunmi looks up and she wishes she hadn’t when her deep black eyes look at the horrible scene in front of her.

A small village, burned to ashes, she can see the bodies of men and children burned, and others with wounds of swords, the snow below them painted with an almost brown-red, she snaps and enters to the destroyed village. “Search for survivors! Quickly!” she barely hears her soldiers responding, she and her soldiers search since it is a small village they can search faster, however, they only find more dead bodies.

“There are no survivors. Sunmi-sshi.” One of the soldiers reports with a crestfallen head.

Biting her lips and clenching her fists she nods and turns around, but she stops looking at the village with narrowing and unsure eyes thinking. “I’m almost sure that there were more people in this village… and what’s even worst there are few dead bodies of women...when this village had more women than men…”

One of the soldiers calls them and Sunmi runs to see what did the soldier find, the soldier points at a barely, but visible, carriage prints.

Sunmi touches the print and clicks her tongue, the print must have been there for days, however, there’s a tiny chance that they can follow the prints and find the ones behind the tragedy and the possible kidnapping.

Nevertheless, before doing that, Sunmi has to inform Wendy, she goes to her horse not before ordering the soldiers. “Search in this part of the Forest until I come back, I’m going to inform this to our Right Hand.”

And with that she mounts her horse and rides as fast as she cans to the castle, wishing for the security of the Kingdom because this can be the first but not the last village the reavers might destroy.

------------------------------------------------------------

Feeling someone or something breathing on her hair, the hazel eyes girl tries to hide until she recognizes the soft snort of her mare, trying to wake her up with her snorts and caresses until she pats her mare's head and slowly gets up, stretching her arms and rubbing her eyes.

“Didn’t know you were a sleepy head”

She searches from where the familiar husky and melodic voice comes until she finds the warrior standing beside her horse, the wolves calmly laying down, looking better and healthier than yesterday.

It’s just then when the Queen realizes the warrior is standing like she was not hurt yesterday by bear claws and opens her eyes wide. ”Why are you standing? You can open the wound that is still healing!” Seulgi voice sounds alarmed and concerned.

Irene lifts an eyebrow before scoffing slightly, her playful smirk showing on her cherry lips as always. “I appreciate your concern, but I’m not made of glass, also, the wound is not that serious.”

Seulgi frowns. “Are you trying to act strong? Because I can almost believe you.”

The warrior and the Queen look at each other until Irene bursts out laughing loudly the warrior holds her stomach. “Suns! , you look adorable, trying to act angry.”

“I’m not adorable! Don’t provoke me, Irene!” Seulgi tries her best to sound intimidating but ends up sounding like an annoyed child.

“Yeah, say anything that you want but you don’t even scare a fly, snowflake.” Irene raises her eyebrows teasing the Queen even more.

“Don’t try me. Even Sunmi feels scared of me sometimes.” Seulgi keeps giving her best on acting angry but that just makes the warrior laugh again.

“Maybe your shining knight can feel scared, but I’m not her.” Irene chuckles and shrugs. “Besides, you just said sometimes, not all the time.”

The Queen growls annoyed and sighs looking away, Irene’s arrogant tone makes her look at her again. “You will get used to losing against me, I guarantee you that, Snowflake.” Winking at her the warrior walks to her horse without waiting for a response.

Seulgi snorts, she bites her lip smiling irritated, she really cannot believe how someone can be so arrogant but gentle, is she really the woman she was talking to last night? Seulgi can’t find an answer.

“Seems like we can leave now but we should be fast, we’re near the tundra and there are no trees that can hide us if something goes wrong.” Irene looks at the hazel eyes girl before leading the horses out of the cave not before petting the wolves' heads. “Thanks, pals, you were great, next time I will bring you all a big steak.”

The light blonde looks at the woman carefully, searching for any signs of discomfort because of her wound but she thinks either Irene is good at masking her pain or she is a questionable human, she sighs and hugs all the wolves before she goes with Irene. “Be careful you all, Tzuyu will feel sad if she doesn’t see you around.”

The wolves whine like they agree with her and watch from their cave how the mare walks with her owner to the dancing warrior and her horse until they are just blurry silhouettes.

--------------------------------------------------

Seungwan looks at the sleeping Dahyun with a caring look, sitting beside the sleeping tofu she softly puts the warm sheets until the pale girl is barely visible, she gets up and with silent steps she gets out of the room finding the rust red-haired woman, waiting patiently outside the room, the summer muse choose to stay outside since she wanted to respect Wendy and Dahyun’s privacy.

Wendy appreciates the gest from the tall bubbly girl, taking even more interest in her, she walks until she taps softly the tall woman's shoulder making her look at her and smile. “Is everything okay with Dahyun this morning?”

“Yes, she is sleeping like a Seul-“ Wendy puts a hand on before finishing the sentence coughing because she was about to reveal Seulgi’s bad habit of sleeping like a hibernating bear.

Sooyoung frowns curiously about the sudden interruption of the Winter muse. “Seul?”

“L-like a bear, I just messed up my words, I must be sleepy.” Wendy laughs nervously, making the tall woman narrow her eyes but luckily the summer muse doesn’t ask more.

“She is going to wake up tomorrow, maybe.” Sooyoung taps a finger on her jaw thinking how much that little girl can sleep, she can’t help to wonder petite people sleep too much, Irene tends to sleep too much, when they are not in the forest and they are on a guesthouse of a small village.

“Or the day after tomorrow because Dahyun loves to sleep.” Wendy chuckles while she starts walking making signs to the tall woman to follow her.

Following Wendy, the tall woman can’t help to look around the castle whistling. “This is indeed the castle described in the books Irene used to read when she was young.”

Wendy quirks her eyebrows at the mention of the Dancing Warrior, feeling curious about the comment of the Summer muse.

“The dancing warrior likes to read?”

“Oh, yes, she likes to read, so much that I can’t count the nights I put a blanket on her back because she fell asleep while she was reading.”

Seungwan hums, noticing how the muse doesn’t reveal too much information of the dancing warrior, not that she suspects something, she knows Summer people can be weird sometimes, and this is one of their weird cases.

“By the way.” The Summer muse makes her get out of her inner thoughts. “Why are you called ‘Wendy’?” Sooyoung tilts her head curiously.

“Oh, that’s a funny story actually.” Wendy can’t help to laugh. “I was given that name because our Queen had problems when she pronounced my name, she would call me Seonkwan, Sougwan, and the list goes on, so she told me she would call me Wendy since my name was so difficult.”

Sooyoung can’t help to laugh loudly. “How old was the Queen?”

“She was six, but even at that age some words were complicated for her.” Wendy chuckles. “However, she surprised me when I asked her why ‘Wendy’”

Sooyoung stops laughing when she notices the soft look on the Muse's eyes. “Why? What’s the meaning behind her choice?”

“She told me, Wendy means, ‘friend’ so every time she called me Wendy, she would feel even better because that name reminds her of her first friend.”

The Summer muse opens her eyes wide. “She told you that when she was six?”

“Quite impressing, isn’t it?” Wendy looks at the snowy sky outside the windows. “Since always, even though she is young, she is so pure, innocent, and precious, sometimes I still see that innocence on her unique hazel eyes.”

Looking at the smiling Winter muse, Sooyoung smiles a little, feeling touched and impressed by the close bond of the Queen and her muse, she looks at the Winter muse's pale but soft side profile, she heard, Winter people are the most beautiful people in all the kingdom, that’s what the rumors said, when she saw the Queen and people of the village she believed the rumor but now that she is looking at the Winter petite muse, she can’t help to feel mesmerized

“Beautiful” Sooyoung says.

“Did you say something?” Wendy turns to look at her with a kind smile.

“Yes, you are beautiful, Seungwan.” The summer muse voice is firm and confident making the petite muse get her pale cheeks in a crimson red tone, the tall woman notices this and laughs. “You are a little too red”

Wendy curses herself and tries to hide by just starting to walk again mumbling a low ‘Thank you’. Sooyoung walks behind her looking like a tall bubbly puppy chasing the Winter muse.

----------------------------------------

Laughing loudly, the warrior's loud laugh can be heard in the whole tundra where they are walking mounted on their horses.

“Stop laughing! Is not even that amusing!” a blushed Seulgi watches the warrior even climb down from her horse because she can’t handle her own laugh.

“You were six! And you couldn’t pronounce Seungwan's name correctly?! Who calls her Seonkwan?!” Irene manages to speak between her own laugh, she feels a slight pain on her wound but she keeps laughing anyway.

“I was a CHILD!” Seulgi tries to talk to the warrior who just makes a movement with her hand that she reads as “If you say so”.

Irene is the first person that laughs at her like this, Sunmi just chuckled a little but this insolent warrior who is even smaller than her has the audacity to laugh her off of the story of her having problems mispronouncing Seungwan's name.

Seulgi decides to take a bunch of snow, she makes a decent snowball and throws it at the warrior, the snowball kicks the back of her head, successfully silencing Irene.

The light brown-eyed woman turns slowly and links eyes with the Queen. “Did you just…throw a snowball at me?”

“I’m going to throw one to that little face of yours if you keep laughing.” Seulgi narrows her eyes, growling irritated.

“My face it’s certainly little, but it makes me look even better looking” Irene winks before dodging another snowball. “Oh, that was going to be a good shot” then another snowball is thrown and Irene dodges it again. “That wasn’t a good one but if you keep trying maybe one day you will hit me with one.”

“Can you just stay silent while I try to hit you?” Seulgi growls irritated.

“Are you angry?” Irene tilts her head.

“Oh No! Do I look like I am?” Seulgi answers sarcastically.

Irene narrows her eyes but before Seulgi can say another thing she feels a snowball hitting her lips.

“Now, THAT’S a good shot.” Irene says while she laughs not fearing the tension emanating from the Queen.

“That’s it.” Seulgi says while she starts making snowballs and throwing it to the warrior who dodges them easily.

“Tsk Tsk, your archers would be really disappointed right know if they saw how bad your aiming is.” Irene keeps dodging until she and Seulgi are circling their horses, the animals looking at them with questioning looks.

Seulgi loses Irene from her range of view until she feels snow on her hair, gasping, not believing the warrior actions, she just lets Irene laugh for a little until she tackles the warrior gaining a surprising yelp from the caramel-haired woman.

Now Irene’s back is full of snow, Seulgi laughs triumphantly, Irene looks at her with wide eyes but smirks looking at the Queen above her.

“I didn’t know you were into this type of…affection” Irene raises up her eyebrows with an impish movement.

Seulgi frowns until she realizes what the warrior is trying to say, she is currently sitting on the warrior’s thighs, her hands are on the snow beside the warrior's abdomen, Irene hands and hair are spilled gracefully on the snowmaking her look not so innocent.

Feeling her cheeks even exploding because of the embarrassment, Seulgi gets up faster than a thunder putting a hand on . “I-I’m s-sorry.”

Irene chuckles and gets up, masking really well the pain on her rib, not that today hurts too much but still hurts. “You don’t need to apologize, Queen, maybe I teased you too much, but it was worth it.”

Seulgi just sighs but she still feels the red on her cheeks, it’s been a while since she acted so childlike, trying to attack someone with snowballs, she is the Queen, and the Queen should’ve resolved the ‘argument’ with words, not with snowballs.

Looking down she notices big prints, bear prints, she crunches down, looking carefully. “These are bear prints, but why are they heading to the Snow Forest if they’ve always been here on the tundra?” Seulgi narrow her eyes.

“I would say, they are searching for food, but the bear that attacked us wasn’t searching food, he was enraged, almost mad.” Irene looks at the Queen.

“Exactly, and usually the polar bears are quiet when they are searching food, they’re not scandalous.” Getting up, the hazel eyes girl sighs softly. “And I’ve never seen a polar be that enraged, just brown bears but the polar bear? He is the quietest of the three types of bears we know.”

Irene nods in agreement. “Maybe there’s something making them go wild, or someone, but with luck, she will tell us that.” The warrior walks to her horse.

“She?” Seulgi asks.

“The Witch.” Irene climbs onto her horse, looking at Seulgi mounting her mare. “Let’s go, we still have a long way to go.”

The black horse and the warrior starts galloping leaving the young Queen with even more questions but she starts following them galloping with her mare.

--------------------------------------------------------

Sooyoung looks with astounded eyes and mouth open wide, the enormous library of the castle, she almost looks to the roof because she thought there might be books too.

Wendy smiles and laughs quietly, she moves her head a little to signal the tall woman to follow her.

“W-we have to search in every single book?” Sooyoung looks at the Winter muse with a shocked look.

Seungwan laughs, shaking her head. “No, that would take us months, there are five thousand books, however, we don’t need to search in the ones that talk about medicine, food, knights and, etcetera,” Wendy explains until they stop in front of a small door, searching for something on the big sleeve of her dress, she finds a key, opening the door, she lets Sooyoung pass first.

Sooyoung enters and notices the room has a circular table on the center of the room and there are five bookshelves distributed in the small room, she calculates there must be thirty or fifty books per book shelve.

“Only The Queen and princess can enter here, muses too but we have to ask permission to the right hand who is me in this case.” Seungwan looks at the tall woman. “There are books and papers that have precious information about the Kingdom and are not for everyone's eyes, that’s why they are here.”

“Then how about the books Dahyun was carrying when we found her?” Sooyoung looks at the petite muse.

“Oh, those were common history books, everyone can read them but maybe she was searching for some clues there.” Wendy searches for something in one of the bookshelves and takes out one book, then another and another, until she takes out almost ten books, placing them on the center of the table, she handles one to the tall muse.

The rust red-haired woman takes it and opens it finding old handwriting she feels like she is almost looking an oxidized sword. “How many years do these books have?”

“Some of them are two hundred years old, the oldest has three hundred.” Wendy explains while she sits. “Although we are talking of books only, the papers that are just single pages are the oldest here, they talk about us, the muses when we were sent by the gods, I presume the first muse was the one writing those papers.”

The tall muse opens wide. “The first muse? She existed six hundred years ago if I’m not mistaken.”

“That’s correct.” Wendy handles the papers written by the muse and Sooyoung looks at her surprised. “Can I really read them?”

Chuckling, the Winter muse nods. “Of course, we, muses are beings sent by the gods, beings that are trustable and with pure heart without any dark ambition.”

The tall woman nods, that’s true, even if a muse can feel, betrayal, hate and other bad feelings, they cannot take revenge or hold a grudge, even if they try to, they can’t.

Reading one of the papers with interest, she finds the first muse wrote about how they come to the ground of the humans, the purpose of them, the connection with their ‘partner’ and even how long they can live.

“So this is the origin of all, the things that they explained to me in the house of muses.” Sooyoung smiles feeling happy to know even more about their origin.

Smiling while she looks at the tall muse she can’t help but feel her interest in the rust red-haired woman appearing again. “What did they told you at the house of muses?”

“Well, that we ‘arrive here’ at our designated house of muses, we have a baby form when we arrive and we are highly protected, only the lady or lord of the station where we are born can go to the house of muses since it’s protected by the force of the gods and instead of soldiers protecting us, there are animals, for example in Summer, the Tigers are the ones protecting us, in Spring Panthers protects them, in Autumn silver bears protect them, and here, if I’m correct, Dire wolves.” Wendy nods quietly waiting for the muse to continue. “After we are eight or ten years old, we can go to visit the place where the lord of the station resides, a castle or another type of structure, only if we are selected, we stay there for the rest of our lives, if not, we must go back to the muse house to stay safe from dangerous situations or people, and if we want to go out and wander around, the animals must us.”

“That’s correct, our gods, the night goddess and the sky god, are the ones who made us and sent us here, we can feel their emotions, even the animal’s emotions, we are deeply connected to this ground, sometimes we can even know the weather.” Wendy completes.

“Nevertheless, we can’t see the future, or predict dangerous situations, like the one we are facing.” Sooyoung sighs.

“Well, that would be very helpful right now.” Wendy sighs too but decides to ask a question that has been wondering in her head for a while ago. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.” Sooyoung smiles looking at the petite muse with interested eyes.

“Why or how can be possible for the dancing warrior to have a muse? We can only be given to a few noble people.” Wendy asks linking eyes with the tall muse.

“Oh.” Sooyoung her head but looks at the expecting petite muse again. “There’s a reason, but, I made a promise, and I’m afraid I can’t tell you unless she wants me to, I hope you can understand.”

Wendy smiles lightly at the loyalty of the Summer muse and nods understanding but she asks again. “Is this related to one of your Summer traditions?”

“Yes but that’s not the only reason.” Sooyoung smiles apologetically. “But I can share a little with you how was when I was given to her.”

“Oh, I would love to hear that.” Wendy rests her cheek in the palm of her hand looking deeply curious and interested making the tall woman laugh a little.

“I was the youngest of all the Summer muses at that time, I met her when I was eight, she was choosing her muse but I was playing with our tigers, I was really shy when I was little, so I couldn’t even look at her, because I felt intimidated by her beauty although she was only ten, it was at that time that she was being praised by her beauty and her abilities that were blooming perfectly, and then, she approached me first.”

-Flashback-

Sooyoung feels a soft tap on her shoulder that makes her turn around and gulp when she sees the young warrior smiling at her. “Hello! What are you doing alone here?”

The muse hides and looks down still intimidated by the beauty in front of her. “I’m n-not alone, the Tigers are here with me”

“Ah, so you must like animals too much!” the caramel-haired girl smiles but notices the muse is not looking at her. “Why are you not looking at me??”

Sooyoung plays with her dress still looking down. “Y-you are too p-pretty.”

The young warrior opens her eyes surprised but she laughs softly.” Thank you, but you are really pretty too!”

It’s when the young girl calls her pretty that she looks up, finding the warrior's wide and bright smile, she didn’t expect the caramel-haired girl recognition.

“You have to look up and feel proud of your beauty, you look really bubbly and refreshing!” the caramel-haired girl pets the muse's head still having her bright smile on her lips.

Sooyoung can’t help but smile widely feeling happy, the young warrior is not only beautiful, but she is also just like everyone else describe her, bright and confident, despite her age she would always make everyone feel better and not intimidated once they talked to her, some of them said that even with exchanging a few words with her was enough to brighten their day.

The caramel haired girl feels surprised when she sees the bubbly smile and laughs happily. “See? You even look adorable and prettier when you smile”

Sooyoung laughs a little feeling shy but not intimidated anymore. “T-Thank you.”

Humming, the young warrior extends a hand to her. “I really like you, would you like to be my muse?”

The young muse opens her eyes wide and gasps feeling shocked “M-me? But W-why?”

“Because I like your energy the most, and I like to follow my heart, and my heart tells me you are going to be an interesting and extraordinary partner, also I would like to see that bubbly smile every day! It’s so sunny that it gives me energy” the warrior smiles again even brighter.

Sooyoung feels a blush on her cheeks, amazed by the pureness and honesty of the warrior she slowly but surely takes the caramel-haired girl's hand, she doesn’t know what to expect from being the muse of the young warrior but she can already feel a special connection with her, the light brown eyes that look at her with energy and like an excited being, there’s pure Summer in those eyes, they are fiery, honest, warm and bright, shining with energy she decides to trust her heart too and follow the unique warrior.

-End of the Flashback-

“She has always been different, her sister is calmer and also a wonderful warrior, but Irene is always hungry for more knowledge, adventures, sword techniques, and…freedom”. Sooyoung looks at Wendy wearing a nostalgic look on her eyes. “She may be arrogant in a funny way, sarcastic, cynic and a tricky woman, but she is the most loyal and straightforward person that I know, it takes a while to know her really well, but she is like a box full of surprises, that’s what is unique about her, you will never know what to expect, she is like a wild stream, but that stream is filled with bright and pure energy”

Wendy looks at Sooyoung with a soft smile, the care and love the Summer muse has for her partner is lovely and it amazes her to be able to almost feel their close bond.

“Maybe you and she were meant to be.” Seungwan says with a mellow tone.

“Maybe, maybe the gods were kind enough with me to put me on her way, destiny or not, I’m grateful, and I’ll always be.”

Seungwan and Sooyoung link eyes, Wendy feels trapped in those mellow eyes, so expressive and so honest, the deep chocolate eyes she actually would adore looking for a long time with her brown light orbs.

“Oh, and another thing!” Sooyoung decides to break their eye contact. “You can call me Joy if you want to, Irene gave me that name.” the tall muse shares.

“Is it again because of one of the Summer traditions?” Wendy raises a curious eyebrow. “And why Joy?”

“Yes, and she gave me that name because...” Joy winks and looks at her. “Because I bring Joy to the life of anyone that meets me.”

Wendy feels her cheeks getting warm again at the coquettish attitude of the muse but a loud knock makes her stand up and ask who is knocking.

“It’s me, Sunmi, meet me in your chancery room as soon as possible, it’s urgent.” And with that, she hears the footsteps of Sunmi disappearing.

Wendy opens her eyes surprised and hurries to get out of the room with Joy following her close until they meet the knight in Seungwan's room.

“What happened Sunmi?” Seungwan asks as soon as they are in her room

“I was on my way to search for some clues about the Princess situation, but my men and I found an agonizing soldier, however, his armor and clothes were too damaged to know from where he was from, and his last words were ‘People are in danger, they’re not going to stop’ “

Both muses open their eyes wide and shocked, before they can say a word, Sunmi speaks again, “One of my soldiers reported a burned village, men, few women, and children…all dead. “

Seungwan and Sooyoung feel even more shocked at the information, Wendy gulps and puts a hand on . “Did you find any survivor? Or a suspect?”

Sunmi shakes her head with disgruntled eyes. “We suspect the ones causing this, kidnaped some of the survivors, we found carriage prints, this could mean a lot of things, a people seller, kidnappers who want to abuse people, or a message for the Queen.” The knight explains with a frustrated tone.

Wendy rubs a hand on her face thinking, as Sunmi said, a burned village could mean a lot of things, however, she has to stay calm and think correctly.

“I want you to send a bird to the ladies to warn them about those people, put more security in the principal door of the castle town, send more soldiers to the close villages, and search those people like a hound, we don’t know, what in the snowy hell they are trying to achieve.” Wendy orders with an angry and worried to death frown.

Sunmi nods and runs out of the room, leaving a thinking Wendy sitting on her chair and a Sooyoung worried looking at the window, fearing for the security of her partner and The Queen, she just shares an anxious look with Wendy, making the petite woman takes her hand and grip her softly trying to transmit or take the security and calm she needs right now.

Joy answers with a soft grip too, both women feeling like pillars for each other, in this situation that is turning even grimier.

-----------------------------------

Here's a little update for you guys ;), and even more mysteries are added to the list, *sipping coffee* 

By the way, did you guys saw Zimzalabim got two wins?! I'm honestly so happy for our girls they deserve it, hope we can get them more!

See you later! Thank you for reading c:

Eat and rest well!  ;))