To His Hell and Back-Chapter 124: Suspicious Eyes

Water could serve as a mirror too. In moments like this, it was far more useful than a polished glass, more discreet and also more portable. A real mirror would have raised questions, made the subject aware they were being tested. And in testing someone’s truest self, subtlety was everything.

Arabella wanted to trust her sister. She truly did. But the dissonance... it was growing too loud to ignore.

Her gaze drifted to the brownish red liquid in her teacup. Tilting it ever so slightly before peering into its surface and there, rippling faintly with the movement, was a smiling face. Still Ariel!

Relief escaped her in a quiet sigh. She turned to Cassius, who had also been watching the tea’s surface.

Leaning in close, she whispered, "Do I need to use a real mirror?"

"No, clever birdie," he murmured, his voice laced with a rare note of approval. "Water reflects their true self just as well." But she caught the faint tension in his expression that hadn’t eased up and the slight knit of furrow between his brow. He still wasn’t satisfied with what he saw.

Arabella pressed her lips together. "I know something feels... off. I’ve felt it from the start," she admitted softly. Her arms folded around herself, a small gesture of defense. "But maybe it’s just because I haven’t seen her in so long. Still... I won’t let that cloud my judgment."

Cassius said nothing for a moment, only watching her. Her voice was steady, but her heartbeat betrayed her. He could hear how it was racing with anxiety and worry. Deep down she was conflicted, whether to trust or to doubt. Unlike his relationship with his sibling, Bella had form a sort of dependence to her older sister mentally and that wasn’t something to be blamed.

They only had each other to protect and the sisters knew that even though the world could go against them, they would never turn against each other. That sense of trust was far too deep that even if someone had pretend to be her sister, Bella would still want to trust her.

This foolishness was something that Cassius was rather impressed by.

Arabella, as a person, had never failed to impress him.

She was honest to a fault, unguarded in her emotions, and often wildly illogical in her choices. But that was precisely what fascinated Cassius. It was her sincerity which at times felt messy and unfiltered that had always entertained him. And perhaps that was why, for the first time in his life, he hesitated to speak the truth directly as unfiltered and full of sarcasm as he would have always done.

He could tell ever since he stepped into the room, how the woman standing before them felt like Arabella’s sister but at the same time not. There was something strange about her presence. As though Ariel was both herself and someone else entirely. A contradiction that defied logic, but felt too true to ignore.

Still, he hadn’t said anything. He didn’t immediately reveal the truth or confront Ariel. He didn’t threaten Ariel either which was something he would do as violence was always the fastest method to bring someone into confessing their sins. But out of consideration to Bella, out of the emotions of not wanting to see her look at him with a horrified look, he had held back.

For once. For once, Cassius Crown found himself choosing silence over provocation. Weighing his words. Measuring his tone. Not to deceive, but to protect. And that, in itself, was strange.

He had never softened himself for anyone. Not even to his sister, Marissa.

His bluntness with his younger sister had driven a wedge between them, but he hadn’t bothered to care. After all he always believed that Marissa needed to learn through all his cruelty and sharp words that softness had no place in the castle. That kindness was currency easily spent and rarely returned and that it would one day cost her.

But with Arabella... it was strangely different.

She made him consider things, worrying whether pointing out immediately that her sister wasn’t actually her sister would have hurt her heart. Worrying that if he accuse Ariel without a concrete proof that would make her to distrust him.

Sighing Cassius leaned back to his chair. How wonderful it would be if he could just wrung that neck and demand for answers. It would be more efficient, really. But who would want to see their sister choked in front of them? Even if he was distant to Marissa, he wouldn’t want to see her being harmed in front of him and so was Arabella.

"Since you had asked a question, Sir Crown," said Ariel, "May I ask some myself?"

"Do go on," Cassius answered showing a smile that was lazy to bother but Bella could almost hear the gears inside his head turning.

"Have you ever drunk Bella’s blood?"

The unexpected question made Bella to choke from her own saliva, panicking as she stared at her sister and shook her head, "O- Of course not! He doesn’t do such a thing to me."

"He didn’t?" Ariel looked confused as she hummed, "So you don’t drink her blood, you don’t get money or want any compensation from her but you are willing to do what she asked you to do, just like that?"

"Is it odd?" Cassius inquired with a grin.

"Very," answered Ariel with a frown, "You don’t seem to be the kind of person who is satisfied when given nothing in exchange of your work."

"Oh dear that is true but it isn’t all odd is it? At times people want to do good for someone else’s sake and similar to that, I had wanted to do something nice and kind to your sister. Is it so difficult to believe, older sister?" Cassius’s eyes narrowed faintly and Ariel furrowed her eyebrows, staring at him with disbelief.

"With all due respect as kind as you seem to be for bringing Bella to see me again, vampires that I knew aren’t as kind as you. They wouldn’t take nothing as a payment and that makes me wonder if you are pretending to be so charitable so you could later demand for something out of us."

Cassius chuckled in mirth, clasping his lips, "There is nothing that you could do which I would want, Miss Ariel. Do you believe that simply because most of the vampires you have seen are all greedy that I will be one? If that’s the case can I say all humans are coward and always ready to betray each other just because most of them do?"