AIKO
The eastern gallery was deserted when I arrived that evening, the walls lined with portraits of Blood Realm royalty going back millennia. I paused before one—a striking woman with indigo eyes like mine, her black hair streaked with purple, her expression serene despite the obvious captivity in her pose. My mother, painted shortly after her "marriage" to my father.
I'd managed to slip away from my handmaidens by claiming a migraine, something that happened often enough that they didn't question it. But I had maybe an hour before Mei would come checking on me with one of her foul-tasting "remedies" that I suspected were partially sedatives.
"You look just like her."
I turned to find Kaito standing in the shadows, his silver-and-black captain's uniform blending with the darkness. As
