Yay! I fixed it!

I felt someone shake my shoulder. I stirred, and opened my eyes.

"Arianna," Tristan said. "We're here."

"Here?" I asked, sitting up and rubbing my eyes.

"At Orland's house," Tristan replied.

"You found his house?" I asked.

"Yeah," he replied. "Cecilia and Jake lied before when they said they hadn't heard from them. He sent them a letter a few years ago, a birth announcement. And all letters have a return address."

"Huh," I said. "Well, let's go."

As soon as I stepped out of the carriage, my jaw dropped. The house wasn't a house at all, or at least not like any house I had ever seen. It was about the size of Bianca's mansion back in Trampoli, but possibly bigger, and even more ornate.

"Do you…know what he does for a living?" I asked Tristan.

"He's a doctor," he replied. "Or maybe a surgeon of some kind. Cecilia and Jake weren't sure, either. But yeah, that house is even more ridiculous than I would have thought."

We started to walk up the long pathway to the huge double doors at the front of the house. We passed fountains, flowerbeds, and lots of signs saying "keep off the grass", until finally, we got there.

There was a string with a bell, and Tristan pulled it. We both waited, wringing our hands nervously. Finally, I heard something that sounded like someone saying, "You know I hate answering the door!", and one of the doors opened.

I did everything in my power not to take a step back when I saw the person standing there. He was a man, or rather, an elf, about Mom and Dad's age. He had blonde hair that went down to his chin, and pale skin. Everything else, I had seen in the mirror. The eyes, the ears, and…the facial expression. I knew that he must have been Orland.

"What are you staring at?" he asked. "I don't have time to give food to vagabonds."

"We're not vagabonds," Tristan said. Orland laughed, but it didn't seem like a kind one.

"Well," he said. "I suppose not. Vagabonds wouldn't know that word. But the word's becoming trite, isn't it?" He paused. "So, what are you, then? Circus performers? You don't see twins in many other places." I thought of a quick lie that I thought would work, from what I had learned about him so far.

"We're housekeepers," I said. "But our last employer didn't need us anymore, so we decided that we'd look for work again." Orland raised an eyebrow.

"That's convenient," he said. "I had to let some housekeepers go last week. They were so incompetent, they couldn't even dust off my diplomas correctly. Have you dusted diplomas before?"

"Yes," Tristan replied. "Many times." I had to try my best not to laugh. Tristan had always been a terrible liar, and I could see the nervousness in his eyes as he completed that ridiculous sentence.

"Come right in, then," Orland said. "I'll show you what sort of jobs you might be doing around here."

We stepped inside the huge house, and I couldn't help but look around. I saw Tristan looking at a statue, and as he reached out to touch it, Orland smacked his hand away.

"Don't even think about touching that," he said. "It cost me over two hundred thousand gold. That's worth more than your life!"

"Yes, sir," Tristan replied. "My apologies."

"Good," Orland said. "Now, if you'll just follow me, the swimming pool is this way. It's one of a kind. It was designed by-"

"Daddy?" I heard a little girl's voice ask. Orland rolled his eyes as a girl with lavender hair, blue eyes, and pointed ears ran down the stairs. She was probably even younger than Zoe, maybe about three, and she was dressed in much nicer clothing.

"What is it now, Isabella?" he asked.

"Who'd theses?" she asked, pointing to me, and then to Tristan.

"Remember what I told you," Orland said to her. Isabella looked blank. "About speaking properly?"

"Oh, yeah," Isabella said. She furrowed her brow, as if thinking very hard about something. "Who…are these…people?"

"That's more like it," he said, patting the little girl on the head. "Anyway, they're here to help us. They'll pick up your toys for you if you leave them on the floor. Speaking of which, why don't you go play?"

"I go play," Isabella said to herself. She started to go back upstairs, repeating "I go play" to herself over and over, and eventually turning it into a song.

"Annoying little thing, isn't she?" Orland asked us once she was gone. "Complete accident, too. But I guess you don't need to hear about that. Anyway, the swimming pool. I'll show-"

"Honey?" a woman's voice asked. "Who are you talking to?" Orland looked irritated again.

A woman who looked very much like Isabella walked toward us. She was also dressed in fancy clothes, and holding some sort of cocktail glass in her hand.

"Serena," Orland said. "These are our new housekeepers." He paused. "I know this isn't really important, but…what are your names?"

By then, I was so fed up with Orland's snooty attitude, and the fact that he called his own daughter, my half-sister, an annoying accident, that I didn't think it was worth hiding the truth anymore.

"My name is Arianna," I said.

"And I'm Tristan," Tristan said.

Serena's drink slipped out of her hand and fell onto the ground. Orland also froze.

"Oh my God," Serena whispered. Orland, however, recovered from the shock fairly quickly, and his expression turned into one of disdain.

"So," he said. "What's happening back in Alvarna? Let me guess, Leonel's come out of the closet by now?"

"Don't talk about Dad like that," Tristan said.

"I can talk however I want," he said. "This is my house, and you've disrupted it."

"Not as much as you've disrupted ours," I said. He raised an eyebrow in amusement.

"My, my," he said. "You really are Aria's children, aren't you? And for the record, she disrupted a lot of things, including her own life."

"Drinking spiked punch at a party doesn't make her responsible," Tristan said. "It makes her a victim."

"Ah, yes," Orland continued. "But Leonel…he was the one who put that stuff in."

"Because you made him!" I protested.

"He had a choice," Orland said.

"You said you would stop harassing him if he did it!" Tristan shouted.

Orland sighed.

"Look," he said. "I never wanted kids, and especially not with Aria. I never liked her. Always acting so cheerful as a child, and then later…she acted like she knew everything, like she was so smart! And everyone liked her, just because she could use a sword and make a few sarcastic remarks." He paused, frowning. "When I found out that I had slept with her, I was disgusted. After all, I had no feelings for her, except for feelings of pure hatred. And then, when I found out she was pregnant, I was repulsed! I acted like I didn't care, but in fact, I wanted to kick her so hard in that expanding waistline of hers that there wouldn't be any further problems with my life. Imagine…if I had decided to be a supportive father, then I probably wouldn't have been able to go to college and become the successful doctor I am today! I would probably be living on Kyle's filthy old farm!" He paused, and then smirked at us. "In short, I hate your mother, and wish you two would have somehow died before you were even born. That way, there would have been no chance that the mistakes of my past would come back to haunt me."

It was silent for quite some time, and I tried to hold back tears. I could see that Tristan was trembling with rage.

"You," he said. "Are sick."

"Not sick," Orland replied. "No, not sick at all. Just someone who wanted the best for himself." He sighed, as though he didn't have a care in the world. "I don't think there's anything more for you to hear at this point, and, quite frankly, I don't like looking at you. So, if you could leave, that would be wonderful."
"Gladly," Tristan said. "Come on, Arianna." We turned around, and started to leave the house.

We walked down that long pathway again, and got into the carriage as quickly as we could. I broke down there.

"I can't believe it," I sobbed. "N-Nobody's ever been…s-so cruel to me…to us…"

"Don't worry about him," Tristan said. "Mom was right."

"About what?" I asked.

"When she said that Dad's more of a father to us," he said. "He's our father, not that jerk." He sighed, and smiled at me. "Come on, let's go home."

As Tristan left the carriage, I realized that he was right. Sure, Orland may have been our biological father, but Dad…I couldn't even think of everything he had done for us. He had taught us everything a father should, ranging from teaching me to play the piano, to taking care of us when we were sick, to the dreaded "talk". But most of all, he loved us like his own kids, not caring for a second that we weren't.

Finally, I realized how excited I was to be going home.