Four wings, a courtyard in the center of the palace as if set for mysterious dances, its floor shining like an ice rink. A steam bath brimming with the heat of hell, and a black rose farm with a curse written on its leaves.
Throughout the tour, Caster remained silent. He only spoke when he gave a brief explanation of each place. I expected him to be a social chatter befitting his first smile, but he satisfied himself and swallowed his tongue. Even his smile, when it appeared, seemed light and gentle, as if it had been placed solely to avoid arousing suspicion.
I wanted to engage him in some conversation. He seemed to me the only person in this house who could provide me with the information I needed… at least without malicious intent.
He stopped suddenly and said in a tone tinged with seriousness,
"The rules… these are for you. Don't wander out of your room after midnight. You're not allowed to receive any stranger, friend or lover, unless Grandma gives permission. No electronic devices on the table. Those are the first rules. The most important… they're not said, they're seen."
I raised my eyebrows mockingly.
"You know I'm not ready to comply until you answer my questions about these four stab wounds."
His eyes widened and he laughed with a childish, almost forced, laughter:
"Ask… I'll answer them all, pretty girl."
Pretty? A suspicious start.
"Why am I not allowed to leave my room after midnight? Don't tell me monsters roam around then."
"I hate to say it... it's worse than monsters."
So that's it. It seems I should stop making assumptions. This family only knows how to joke on the edge of madness.
"I'm not a child, Caster. Why exactly?"
His smile faded slightly, but it didn't fade:
"Your piercing gaze… your sharp tone… be careful, for here a head might be sold simply for style."
"My style? That's what I was born with, from a young age."
"And perhaps… to avoid being sold, you'll have to become as naive as I was."
So he wasn't as innocent as I expected. Yet, even as he threatened, something remained innocent in his smile, betraying the shadows of his words. He would continue to fail, Caster.
"The second question?" he said.
"You didn't answer the first."
"Yes. I answered, but you didn't notice."
I studied his eyes. What answer did he mean? I wanted to test him:
"What kind of monster, then?"
"Zombies… Pooh! … Come on, girl. That wasn't my answer. You'll find out soon enough. Now move on to your second question, for there are still laws that must be seen before they are understood."
Laws that must be seen? In this place, everything seems to be practiced first and explained later.
"And why aren't I allowed to admit strangers?"
He looked at me with contempt:
"Who would allow a stranger into his palace? Dah!"
Then I understood: the law was nothing but vanity. A habit rooted in a vain house immersed in its wealth. This isn't a law, it's a disease of pride.
"Well... and what are these laws?"
Here, his face twitched with a strange excitement... not the excitement of a child waiting for a toy, but the excitement of a bride being offered an engagement ring. A disconcerting look... and a harbinger of danger.
A library...?
A room measuring sixty square meters, its walls lined with books lined up like soldiers in an eternal line. Their colors ranged across the spectrum of the rainbow, unlike any other in this palace, which is tinged with death. I thought the pale brown color would consume the place as it had consumed the rest of the wings, but no... The books here are modern, their titles loud, perhaps even ridiculously trivial, as if they didn't belong in this magnificent tomb.
I silently wondered: Why did Caster bring me here in particular?
The second law I could see... does it lie between these shelves?
"You seem fond of reading..." he said with a hesitant smile, pointing to the shelves as if offering me a treasure trove of gold. "This shelf was filled by Stacker, and that was me when I was—"
"Caster," I interrupted coldly.
He raised his eyes to my face, his voice softening with obvious exaggeration. "My beauty...?"
"My beauty..." is another word added to the book of cheap compliments.
"Where is the law?" I asked, my tone sharp enough to convey that I knew it was my only weapon here, even if it irritated my interlocutor.
He sighed gently, then pointed toward a dark corner of the library, where a black door stood, its wooden frames almost betraying its age.
"There..." he said, as if the answer wasn't just a reference to a door, but to something bigger, deeper, and perhaps more terrifying than I'd anticipated.
"There...? Are you going to let me guess what the law is?"
A childish smile spread across his face, as if what truly pleased him wasn't giving the answer, but rather being misunderstood, treated harshly, or perhaps tested.
"Well... the story begins when—"
I interrupted him coldly, "Make it short."
I swear I'll regret that word when the time comes.
He took a deep breath and slowly pushed open the door. Behind him appeared another library, a shadow of the first one, but here the shelves were breathing dust. Books were stacked with helpless faces, their titles hinting at ancient medicine and forgotten sciences, more like intellectual tombs that had slowly rotted away. This scene was more fitting for the gloomy brown mansion than anything else.
Caster preceded me inside.
"Does the law forbid reading these books?" I asked.
That made sense; they looked enough to drive anyone crazy just by looking at them.
He replied with a smile, "I wish it were... but no. The first law is: Do not enter this room. Not just do not enter... but do not even think about entering."
He then pointed toward another door, hidden in a corner of the second library, as if it were an additional secret deliberately added to entice me.
Beautiful. Door after door, law after law. A palace that never ends.
"And what's the second law?" I asked, my tone tinged with sarcasm.
He smiled gently. "Don't you even enter this library, lest you see that door... and the devil tempt you, breaking two laws in one moment."
I bet he's thinking he's deep. To me, he seemed silly... and naive.
But I couldn't stand the smell of the place any longer, a mixture of something burning, rotting flesh, and damp mud. I quickly stepped outside, breathing in fresher air, even if it was the air of a palace haunted by eeriness.
"Relax..." I said with a light sneer, "I doubt I'd even bother with the first library. Now, what's the next law?"
A graveyard?
Behind the palace wing, a cemetery rises, the boundaries of which we can only see if we climb onto the windowsills: a courtyard crammed with graves, smoke curling from them like the eyelashes of night, and the number of graves doesn't exceed a dozen pale—like a scene from a twilight dream. The atmosphere there whispers of unspeakable things; something lingering and vulnerable, lingering in the lungs like bad memories.
I expected the second law to concern the kitchen: the vanity of this family makes one suspect that even food is forbidden unless it's served at a formal table. But it's worse than that—deeper than a cage of greed or a social norm.
"What does it matter? Why the hell do you have a cemetery behind the palace?" I said, omitting any kindness in my voice.
Caster answered, his tone unsurprised, "Her law is as clear as day: Do not approach her at night, even by mistake. And every Saturday, Grandma Suntra goes, kneels there for four full hours, and then returns. Her ritual is unquestionable."
"Kneel?" I said, as if holding a pen to record the chapters of madness. Dagger stabs, graves lined up, rituals stretching like an ancient arc—each new law falling on me like dust increases my desire to punish whoever dragged my mother here. Why, in heaven's name, did my mother marry a human? I don't think she's just greedy for gold or position; no, she sometimes does things I can't understand.
"The rules are over... Now shall we get to know each other better, my new sister?" His smile returned, as childlike and gentle as it was suspiciously tinged with emotion. When his smile faded, I felt a crackle in my bones.
I finally smiled. "I have a lot of questions, but I don't want to answer them now. I know I'm going to spend a week vomiting up what I saw, so hello—my name is Diana."
I extended my hand; he shook it with a similar smile.
"Caster."
I wanted to ask him about the owners of those graves, as the small number of them indicated that they were undoubtedly family-related. Their location behind the palace wasn't a coincidence, but a deliberate geographical choice. But I was tired of asking him questions that he always skirted around and only answered with what I didn't ask, so I preferred to focus on him, on getting to know him.
"So... how old are you?" I said as we walked through the palace's corridors.
He was a little confused and replied with a hesitant smile, "Fifteen."
I admitted to myself that he surprised me; his demeanor suggested he was no more than ten, while his features made him look older than me, or at least close to me. His chubby cheeks, which gave him a certain innocence, aroused my fleeting jealousy.
I couldn't help but smile, a part of my usual intensity broken. I approached him, stood directly in front of him, and stared at him with a deliberate smile. The more I looked at him, the more confused and red his face became.
Then suddenly, without warning, I lightly slapped his cheek with my finger and burst out laughing.
"Look at you... How sweet."
He smiled back, but this time his smile wasn't like every other time; it wasn't childish or playful. He smiled with his eyes before his lips... a heart-lit smile, as if for a rare moment in which he allowed himself to be fully reflected in my gaze.
"Okay?... Will you show me to my room, or should I waste my time searching on my own?"
His eyes widened again with that playful sparkle that was so characteristic of his, and he said enthusiastically, "Did you know that I designed your room? I'm sure you'll love it."
For a moment, I felt something strange... For the first time in my life, I'd seen someone who thought so highly of me, designing a place specifically for me before even seeing me. His heart seemed truly pure in the midst of this gloomy house, as if he were the only being untainted by the shadows of this family.
Sweet... yes, unusually sweet.
Then suddenly, without warning, he took off running through the halls, and I couldn't help but follow him, running after him, a mocking laugh creeping through me: Is that why I told myself I'd become more mature this year? Eighteen, and here I was, running after him with the agility of a child playing.
"The second wing!" he exclaimed, finally stopping, panting and laughing simultaneously.
He added with a wide smile, "Luckily, I chose your room next to mine..."
I raised my eyebrows coldly. Well... it was as if to say, "I'll be your biggest annoyance."
We entered my room, which he claimed he designed specifically for me, and it was beyond my expectations in beauty. I think the only thing this family has going for it is their refined taste. I hadn't expected to find people with such a delicate sense of Victorian structural details. The art of choosing the wood paneling impressed me... despite the gloomy shadow it evoked, its exterior shapes and dark colors were breathtaking. The white walls were like soft vanilla, and the bed felt silky and comfortable. Everything was exactly as I had dreamed.
I remember my old room: soulless, with just white paint, a functional bed, a desk with a computer on it, and a trace of forgotten chocolate. It looked like a hospital or a prison cell. Every time I tried to redecorate it, I ended up wandering around in a Pinterest labyrinth, then fell asleep exhausted, with nothing changing.
"Beautiful... Did you choose all of this on your own?"
As I walked around the room, I noticed a gleam of happiness in his eyes at seeing me so delighted with what he had created.
"No one would have cared... Honestly, I didn't do this because I wanted to please my new sister, but because I love surprising people and giving spaces my own unique character. I've never been allowed to do that before, so I took advantage."
"Are you saying I'm just an excuse or a means?"
"Exactly..."
We both laughed, and then he began explaining why he had placed this piece here and that one there. The furniture was so dense you feared getting lost in its details. As our minds raced through the design, we heard a soft knock on the door..
Caster looked at his wristwatch and sighed a long, bored sigh. "It's about time... and I haven't had enough of your company yet."
He walked over to the door and opened it. There stood his brother, Stacker, standing in the corridor, looking tidy and organized, unlike the way I'd seen him a moment earlier. He was dressed all in black, and his sleepy eyes still held that same coldness.
I took a step closer, trying to understand why he'd come, without interfering in their conversation.
"Can we delay it just one hour? Please..." Caster said in a childish, pampered tone.
"We've already wasted a whole hour because of your dear sister's arrival. Enough of this delay."
I didn't quite understand what they were talking about, but I caught a provocative remark directed at me, and I raised my eyebrows in surprise. "Excuse me...?"
Stacker looked at me coldly and ignored my inquiry. Before I could confront him, Caster burst in enthusiastically: "Okay... but on one condition... that we take my dear sister with us!"
I can't deny that his response pleased me. I believe I'll consider him a dear friend in the future.
"Caster..." Stacker tried to object, but Caster interrupted, grabbing my arm and hugging me enthusiastically.
"In the end, even if we were to leave her here... she'd be hunted!"
Their conversation remained vague and full of riddles. "Excuse me?" was all I could manage to say.
"Don't worry about her... the driver is waiting for us. You only have five minutes, and if she doesn't come, I'll go alone." Those were Stacker's last words before he left. I looked at Caster's face, puzzled.
"Five minutes is enough to get ready?" he asked.
I raised my eyebrows, wondering, "What the hell is going on... and where are we going?"
"We have an interview with an important person... We'll have a quick chat and then head back."
"Why do you want me with you? I've just gotten back from a long trip, and all I need is a hot shower and a little rest."
He grabbed my arm and looked at me with a childish smile: "I beg you... you'll have all the next few days to rest. Come on, after the interview, we'll go get ice cream and have some fun."
I couldn't say no. After all, this was a chance for me to get to know the city better, and from there, I'd get a practical lesson in how to deal with my brother.
"Just five minutes?" I asked, and he shook excitedly.
"The new clothes I put in the closet... Choose what you like."
As I was getting ready, I noticed that half the clothes in the closet consisted of elegant dresses, with no sweatpants or comfortable clothes to be found. I realized that this boy's mind was surprisingly conservative, clinging to the image of women as elegant and feminine, and men as strong and masculine.
I chose a soft blue dress, paired it with white Mary Jane shoes, and smoothed my hair before leaving the room. I found Caster standing there waiting, and when he saw me, his eyes widened in surprise.
"You look... really beautiful."
I couldn't help but turn around with a slight, princely gesture to further charm him and impress him.
His eyes sparkled, as if they were drawing hearts in the air. I loved this boy who lifted my spirits with such innocence..
We got out to where the car was waiting. It was a luxurious, black Bentley limousine, reminiscent of those cars in mafia movies, with the spacious back seats as a mobile bedroom.
Stacker looked at me from top to bottom with a provocative look, then said, adjusting something on his watch, "This is what we were missing... First, refuse her presence, then refuse her dress."
"Brother, don't exaggerate. Instead of taking your stress out on her, let's think of a solution to our problem."
Stacker shrugged indifferently. "A problem for you?... It just takes a little persuasion. Don't worry, my method will work this time."
Caster sighed deeply. "Obviously... same thing every time. Remember when you said the same thing and your method failed four times?"
"The problem wasn't the persuasion, Caster... it was your poor choice of customer. How do you want me to convince a woman who only wants to buy because she's taking revenge on her husband who lost money?"
"Well... I found her post saying that, so I offered her the deal."
My eyes flicked between Stacker and Caster with every word, trying to understand something they were saying... but they didn't mention their names. Not even Caster, who seemed somewhat rational to me.
I decided to break my curiosity by asking, "What are you talking about? Are you planning to sell something?"
"Family matters, I hope you don't interfere in them." Stacker answered dryly.
If it weren't for my strong personality—even if only half a percent—I would have kept quiet. But I couldn't.
"I've become part of the family... so I hope you'll give me an answer worthy of my question, instead of trying to dismiss me harshly. That just shows me you're annoyed by my presence."
"I'm annoyed by your presence, too."