Three horses emerged from the blizzard, with three riders in white.

"I felt him here," the first rider, a young woman, said. She wore her hair in an ornate braid with flowers woven through it. Her hanbok was a stark white, with no pattern, like she had just left a funeral. She got off her horse effortlessly and pointed ahead to the snowbank.

"I see him," the second rider, a well-built man, said quietly. He too dismounted his horse without issue, walking over to the body. Even in the darkness, he successfully found the hand and reached into the snow, grasping the body and pulling it out.

The discarded man was young. His skin was blue from being frozen. His eyes were fogged over, blinded completely by ice. His hair was long, cascading past his shoulders. He was much too still, unblinking and unmoving.

"His heart has stopped, but he has not passed," the man said. "I feel his mind...it is still there. Like a fading star."

"He's beautiful," the final rider, another woman, spoke. Her voice was musical, like bells in the wind. Her hair was in a bun, pinned with a white jade hairpin of a flower. She dismounted and smiled at the young man who was still clinging to life, evidently. She had piercing silver eyes. "So much potential."

"You do realize," the woman with the braid spoke, "turning him means he can't be your Voice."

"He is far, far too beautiful to be a Voice. Besides, it is high time we give our Heir a sibling, is it not?" the rider with the musical voice smiled at the man, who responded in kind, his gold eyes glinting in response to her silver irises.

"Very well." The woman with the braid bowed slightly and stepped back.

The final rider approached the body, removing her hairpin. Her hair fell like a waterfall down her back. The man shifted the weight of the body in his arms so that the rider could kneel next to him. He placed the head with the empty, unblinking eyes in her lap, the backed away to give her space.

The woman placed the hairpin over the body, suspended between her pinky and other three fingers. She moved her hand over him until the hairpin dipped slightly over the body's stomach, where the young man's simple clothes had been stained red.

"Found you," she said, smiling. She pulled her hand towards herself.

The body in her arms twitched, then shuddered. Its vocal chords trembled with a hum, which became a garbled scream.

"Easy, now," the woman cooed. "It will be over in a moment."

The remaining skin turned blue. Ice crystals multiplied agonizingly, coating his dead tongue and splintering out from his pupils. The voice gained strength, but also became more hollow, like a cavern in a mountainside. The cries that came from his mouth were so far beyond human.

The woman grasped the hilt of the hairpin and stabbed it downward.

The body ceased its trembling, save for its voice and its eyes. It gasped for air it no longer needed.

"Welcome back, my Prince," the woman said warmly. "You are safe now. No one will ever hurt you, ever again."

The body began to cry tears of ice.

Yun Seo's eyes flicked open.

He was in a bedroom, one that was only tacitly familiar due to the gray walls and crystal chandelier. His suit had been removed, and he was wearing a pair of loose-fitting pajamas with the while logo of a flower on the front. There two IV drips in his arm - blood and saline, it would seem. He did feel better, more whole, than he did in the alleyway.

He sat up slowly. There was no sign of Jiwook, but that wasn't alarming. His aunt wouldn't have just left him stranded, so he was probably back to his normal life for the time being.

The files, however, were not in the room with him. That was alarming.

There was a knock at the door.

"Come in," Yun Seo said hoarsely. His voice had gone through some stuff post-interrogation, it would seem.

The door opened, and a young woman entered. Based on the mask covering the top half of her face and the security uniform, this was a Voice employed by his aunt. She was less demure than other Voices he'd encountered, but in all honesty, that was his aunt's taste. She preferred women with muscle. The mask on her face was purple and flared out like wings, matching the color of the flower logo on her uniform.

"The Countess sent me to tend to your needs," she said, her voice containing a lilt that felt just slightly off, as though she was putting on an accent he couldn't place. A consequence of the mask, most likely.

Yun Seo nodded. "What shall I call you?"

The uniformed woman shook her head, about to lead. "There is no need for you to call me anything. I am her assistant."

"No," Yun Seo said earnestly. "How you choose to be addressed...is valuable to me. It does not have to be your name."

The woman paused, and then nodded. "You can call me Maesil."

Maesil. Plum blossom. The same as the flower on Yun Seo's shirt, and the sigil carved into his hand. "Very well. You can call me Yun Seo then."

"You would not rather I use your Signifier?" she asked, perplexed.

"My Signifier is not a full picture of who I am, like it is for some. Besides..." Yun Seo smiled warmly. "I feel that it is more...intimate, to tell you that name."

Maesil began removing the IVs from Yun Seo's arm. "Yun Seo...was your name?"

"Was, yes." He watched Maesil more closely, not feeling any sort of discomfort as the needles were removed. Maesil had short hair, to make it easier for Listeners to feed. This was typical of a career Voice. Based on the name she chose, he began to understand - this woman was dedicated to his aunt. She would die for her.

He could relate to that kind of love. Seojin.

"When did you begin using it again?" Maesil asked.

"When..." Yun Seo faltered, before gaining the courage to speak up. "When my brother forgot his. He...he is much older than I am, though our age of turning was fairly close. He came back from a trip one day, and he was...not the same. He then told me he'd forgotten his name a few decades ago, but that trip, something happened and he realized how much of him was missing. He vanished not long after."

The woman nodded at him. "Thank you for telling me."

"Thank you for listening." Yun Seo smiled at her. "Please tell The Countess that I would like to speak to her about the whereabouts of the files we appropriated."

Maesil bowed, professional once again. "I will do so promptly, Yun Seo."

"Thank you, Maesil."

Maesil left fairly quickly, though he caught a smile on her face as she left.

Yun Seo finally felt enough strength to stand up. It was early morning in Seoul, he could tell from his window. He knew from the logo that he was in the House of Blossoms, his aunt's stronghold in this city. Being a luxury hotel, it was easier to find than The Keep, but Yun Seo had always assumed that the Keep needed more discretion since they were the governing body pf Seoul. Besides, his aunt did not turn away non-Listener customers, much to the chagrin of other members of The Keep.

The Listener stretched his shoulders, feeling the loose approximation of bones inside him pop. He hummed at the relieving sensation, then cracked his finger joints. His pinky, frustratingly, popped too far out of its socket, and Yun Seo had to put it back, which took about two minutes to properly align and get it working again.

The door behind him opened. "Are you quite finished with that, my idiot nephew?"

Yun Seo rolled his eyes, but turned back to his aunt and smiled. "Just about. It's very...unintuitive."

"I'll say. What possessed you to give yourself bones, of all things?" The Countess was an elegant woman, Her makeup and hair were distinctly gothic, but her top was a more modern corset-style peplum top. She had gray eyes much like Yun Seo's, but there was an inhuman glint to the pupils - the telltale sign of an apex predator.

"Love," Yun Seo said simply.

She scoffed, but the smirk on her face showed that she was not disapproving. "Well, how are you feeling?"

"The blood is helpful, as is the saline. Thank you." He bowed slightly. "I do need to have a proper feeding, though."

"Would you like me to call a Voice back in? I have a few on docket."

"Absolutely not," Yun Seo said dismissively. "I'll reconnect with Jiwook later. I want to...comb through things with him."

"Very well." The Countess pulled out a file, which she'd been holding behind her. "I took the liberty of photocopying everything for you and highlighting the things I thought you might need for your investigation. You have been out for approximately thirty-six hours, so I suggest you reacclimate."

Oh! "You are not...angry?"

The Countess sighed loudly. Yun Seo knew that sound, that was the sound that he was about to get ripped into harder than he was when he was first created.

"Yes, I am angry." The Countess stared daggers at him. "I am angry that you recklessly made a Mask, used your Veil with reckless abandon, and let a human release a Mask with you in the room. You could have died if I hadn't sensed you nearby." Her expression softened. "But am I angry that you are investigating the mysterious disappearance of the woman you love? Absolutely not. I would do the same."

Yun Seo nodded, taking the file with another bow. "Thank you."

"You better find this woman you've told me so much about soon, or I am going to have people following you in conspicuous black cars." The Countess walked to the mini fridge and helped herself to a beer. "Now, there has been an...interesting development in your investigation."

"Yes?" Yun Seo asked, opening the file to acclimate himself with The Countess's shockingly thorough notes.

"That building caught on fire after you left."

Yun Seo blinked, then slowly looked up. "Pardon?"

"No humans were killed, but those Remnants were completely annihilated." The Countess took a swig of her beer, talking about death as though she was talking about the weather. "It looks like they were afraid of retaliation."

"By...The Keep? We have due process via trial for enthralling."

She shook her head. "I don't think so. I believe there is a new faction that is in opposition to your parents."

Yun Seo raised an eyebrow. "You're in opposition to my parents."

His aunt waved dismissively. "I am not in opposition. I simply have different ideals. You didn't have complaints when I carved that sigil into your hand, did you?"

"I suppose not." He stared at the sigil within his palm closely- a five-petal blossom, with spikes splitting the petals in half from the center, encased in a pentagon. The inscribing of this sigil was the last time he felt true pain, and that was maybe a hundred years ago.

"In any event, there appear to be a few companies involved. They are all owned by the same chaebol. Take a wild guess, which one?"

The younger's eyes fell on the notation The Countess had left for him. "Cosmic Media and Industry Partnership."

"Yes."

"Seojin's parent company."

"Also yes. Evidently, the Park family made a business deal in the '20s with a Listener outfit that has since been dissolved. They are in the Keep's records as sympathetic, but under the Park name, not Park and Choi or Cosmic Media Partnership."

Yun Seo's eyes flashed dangerously. His fingernails began elongating into points, turning a stark black. "She joined that company to be safe from abusers," he growled.

The Countess came up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Easy now. Don't ruin your newly acquired bones."

Yun Seo took a deep breath, the sensation of air in his core calming him somewhat. His nails stayed long and sharp, but lost their inky color. He looked up at her. "What do you think I should do?"

"I think you should call your mother," The Countess said flatly. "At this point, you need to loop her into what you are doing. And if they are connected to Listeners, they will respect the authority of The Keep."

Yun Seo nodded solemnly. It was a good plan - not foolproof, but a better plan than he could come up with considering how angry he was. "Okay...okay I'll calm down and talk to her. But first, I'm talking to Jiwook to let him know."

The Countess raised a brow. "...does he not know your Signifier?"

"I didn't think it was important."

Yun Seo watched despondently as his aunt covered her mouth and laughed so loudly that the entire floor could hear. "YOU ABSOLUTE FOOL!" she chided him. "YOU WENT ON A HEIST WITH A MAN WHO DOESN'T EVEN KNOW WHO YOU ARE?!"

"Gomo..." he said softly. Auntie...

The Countess had literal tears in her eyes, tears that were crystallizing into ice with her essence. "YOU DUMB BASTARD!"

"GOMO!"

"SORRY BUT THIS IS HILARIOUS!" She calmed down enough to grin at him. "Okay, it looks like you have somewhere to be. You best be going, but do stop and get a coffee downstairs. Like a peasant."

Yun Seo glared at her. "As far as the general population is concerned, I am a peasant. My parentage is irrelevant. And I will take you up on that coffee."

"Whatever you say..." The Countess grinned and bowed towards him, mockingly. "...my Prince."