Annan had almost accepted the assignment on the spot. He would have, if he hadn't still been planning his revenge in the Flower Capital.
But Annan didn't get to decide. The Crimson Princess believed he could do it, so she entrusted him with a mission to the Land of the Dead as her envoy.
"I don't know what I'm supposed to do..."
"Just deliver a letter to the Skeleton Duke."
"I don't know how to deal with the undead..."
"Those bones and scraps of cloth hardly move. Leave them alone and you'll be fine."
"I don't—"
"No more refusals."
Annan had no choice but to say, "I don't know the way... Princess, will you come with me?"
The Crimson Princess looked shy. "I have to stay at the Castle. Dracula, take David there."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"David?"
"It's the new name I've given you." She tilted her chin up slightly. "But I'm the only one allowed to call you that."
Annan thought of David from The Seventh Night, a human taken in by a princess of the fallen Vampire Clan... Did she know something?
But Lena, for all her pride and innocence, didn't seem to have a scheming bone in her body. Dracula, on the other hand, looked like the villain beside some important figure, plotting every sort of misdeed.
"Remember, Annan, the name the Princess gave you matters more than your first embrace."
The Crimson Princess reacted even faster than Annan. "Who gave you your first embrace?"
"Wood," Annan said without thinking.
Her voice held both gratitude and jealousy. "I've never heard that name..."
"Just an ordinary vampire from the Northern Frontier."
The Crimson Princess already knew Annan wasn't a local, but she still knew nothing about his origins, nor did she want to. The Butler, though, might know