The Royal Palace

- King Alfroid's POV -

I was busy playing a board game with my Royal Guard, who was known for his incredible tactics and strategies, when a loud bang on the door of my quarters interrupted the silence between us.

“King!” A voice from one of our servants followed the loud knock outside the room.

I looked at the clock on the wall and realized how late the night was. It was past three in the morning. We had enjoyed playing and I did not realize how quickly time had passed.

I heard footsteps coming from outside the room.

“Let him enter,” I commanded in an authoritative voice to the other Royal Guard standing near the door.

Our servant came rushing toward us. He was clearly agitated and nervous.

He bowed his head in respect. “Your Majesty, we have found Princess Helena in the river! She was unconscious and wounded!” He was panicking, and his first sentence was enough for me to stand up from my place and rush toward my daughter’s room.

To be honest, I could not believe his words. My daughter, Helena—I doubted that she would ever be wounded. I believed that my daughter could always take care of herself. Her strength was undeniably her own protection.

In less than a minute, I was able to reach her room. Shock overcame me as I grew more worried. I could not believe that Helena would be wounded like that. Her dress, which I had never seen before, was torn and stained with blood. Some servants were already attending to her, changing those bloody clothes.

“Alfroid, what’s with this commotion?” my wife asked, clueless as I entered the room and looked for answers.

I looked at her with inexplicable feelings as my heart rate increased.

“Helena was found wounded,” I answered, not sure of any details other than that.

“Huh?” she asked in confusion as she stepped in front of me and checked our daughter, who was unconsciously lying on her bed. Even my wife couldn’t believe it. Helena would never let anyone touch her. I bet no one could ever touch her without her permission.

“But… I was just with Helena,” she immediately said as she scanned the woman lying in front of us.

I could not understand her. It was our daughter in front of us. I knew I couldn’t be wrong. As the King of all Kings, as the strongest Lycan in the werewolf race, I knew that the woman in front of us was our daughter. Then who was Helena my wife was talking about?

Staring at my wife, I saw that she was also confused. I could see the worry in her eyes while she was looking at Helena lying wet and wounded.

“Mom, Dad, what are you doing in my room?” Helena, with her usual plain blank expression, entered the room. My eyes immediately looked in her direction, and my sight confirmed that it was her.

The coldness of her aura, the darkness in her eyes, and her cold lifeless voice—

That was my Helena.

If Helena was fine, then…

“H-heminica.” My wife started crying at that moment. She finally understood.

My knees weakened as my hands started to tremble. I knew at that exact moment that our daughter, who had been lost for a decade, had finally found her way back home. She was Helena’s twin sister, which explained why they looked identical.

“Alfroid…” My wife, still sobbing heavily, looked at me with longing and happiness mixed in her eyes.

I smiled at her and nodded, trying to calm her down when, in fact, I was as shocked as she was. I knew that the young woman lying on the bed in front of us, who looked like Helena, was also our daughter. I could feel my blood rushing through her. I could feel the bond of my wolf yelling that she was our daughter.

“Is she…” Helena came rushing toward us and immediately looked at her sister lying on her bed.

Her eyes turned from dark to something I couldn’t decipher, and after so many years, I was able to witness my daughter Helena’s vulnerability.

Her eyes scanned her twin sister. She raised her hand and brushed her sister’s unconscious face.

I could not believe that after a decade, our dear daughter, who was separated from us, had finally arrived back home. We tried to look for her back then, but fate was cruel. I was relieved that we found her unexpectedly. However, just looking at her unconscious and wounded had caused anger to emerge within me.

It was heartbreaking to see my daughter wounded like that. I felt heavy, but I could not look away. The longing for my daughter was too strong for me to ignore.

“Bring in the physician,” I commanded one of our servants, not even realizing that my voice was harsh.

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“I can’t believe that this is finally happening,” my wife said while she was still busy holding our daughter’s hand and scanning her body. The longing was evident in her eyes. She was emotional. We all were.

Even though I could see that Helena was not showing all her emotions, I knew she was happy.

“We totally look alike,” she said, and the amusement was visible in her voice. She sounded happy, but anger was evident in it, probably because of the condition of her sister.

“We are finally complete.” That was the only thing I could say.

- Helena's POV -

I could not believe my own eyes that my twin sister was finally right in front of me.

“How is she?” I asked the physician who treated my sister.

He looked at me with fear in his eyes, his feet shivering. I knew my voice sounded deadly, but I did not care at that point.

I was fueled by anger when I saw that Heminica was wounded. Whoever did this to her would pay the price I set. There was no way I would let this slide, not with the sister I had been yearning to see.

“Th-there are some i-internal bleeding, which I was able to stop. I could say that it would take some weeks for her to recover. S-she had suffered from the fall and the strong current of the river,” he stuttered in fear as he looked into my eyes.

I was used to that. Werewolves were all afraid of me, afraid to even look me in the eye. Others even hid in fear of my presence.

“How long would it take for her to wake up?” I said, trying to lessen the coldness of my voice to lower his fear.

“L-let’s give her time to r-rest, probably a day or t-two. I-I could see that she’s malnourished too,” he stated as he turned to look at my sister. “I have inserted a nutrient supplement into her veins to compensate for the lack of nutrients in her body.”

I clenched my fist at his words, too angry because of what I had heard. If I could kill right now, I would have already done it. The instinct to kill was kicking in.

Heminica might have had a difficult life. She probably suffered so much when she was away from us.

“Helena,” Father called me from behind.

“The hermit has paid a visit to our kingdom.”

I crossed my brows, remembering the old man who claimed that he could see someone’s past. I couldn’t trust that man. How could somebody see someone’s past? Aside from that, why would we even care about that old man when we were here with my unconscious sister?

“Let’s look into Heminica’s past. Let’s find out who made her this way,” my father added, sounding determined with that remark.

“Shouldn’t we just wait for her to wake up and let her tell us?” I asked in my plain usual voice.

Father shook his head, looking impatient. “We have waited for many years, Helena. We have been separated. I want to know the life that she lived being away from us."