If he had said no, maybe she would have been able to change his mind.
But he didn't reject her request outright. Instead, he gave a lot of explanation for the rejection. There is just no way for his mind to be changed after he has said all of that. It would be as if he had wasted his time.
Actually, trying to get him to change his mind right now will only make him very angry. After all, it would be as if she didn't hear what he said or agree with it.
So she moved on with her second requests.
She smiled and said, "I am not happy that you have refused to help our son, but I can understand why."
He nodded. "I hope that what you understand about my rejection is that I am not willing to break the rules of the family for a bastard. I also hope that you appreciate my calmness about this because I should have taken offense at your outrageous request."
As he spoke, his eyes began to light up. The blue of his eyes became brighter. It was a sign that he was angry.
"After all, you have just asked me to commit a crime. It takes great restraint on my part not to send you away from my presence at this moment."
Lady Vena spoke. "I appreciate your restraint. Thank you."
The two last words she said seemed to puncture the inflating ball that Augustus had become. He lost his anger through the two holes created by the words and began to deflate.
He snorted but said nothing. So Lady Vena continued. "My second request is still related to our son. He wants to leave me to live in the city on his own. I want you to force him to stay."
Both Lady Delia and Augustus said, "What?"
Her request was certainly unexpected. It was also ridiculous.
Augustus said, "I don't understand what you're saying."
"I am not saying anything complicated, and I am not asking you to commit a crime. I want you to help me protect your son by intervening in his efforts to live on his own."
Augustus still felt that he was missing a lot of things, which was why he asked, "Why can't you tell him not to leave?"
Lady Vena replied, "I told him not to leave, but he is hell-bent on leaving. I've had to go looking for him and forcefully bring him back for the past year. He just doesn't want to live with me."
Augustus began to laugh. "A ten-year-old boy running away from home. This is hilarious for many reasons, one of which is the fact that you are asking me to intervene in this matter."
Lady Vena frowned and said, "This is not funny. This is a serious matter. I've dislocated his arms and legs several times, but he wasn't discouraged. I had to fracture his ribs yesterday to prevent him from leaving. He is still unconscious right now, but I am sure that as soon as he wakes up, he will want to leave again."
The more Augustus and Delia heard, the more they realized that this matter was serious. They still find it incredulous and unbelievable, but they have to take things seriously if it is true that the boy needed to be made unconscious to stay at home.
Augustus shook his head in disbelief. "I have never heard of that kind of combination of the crime of a child and the punishment. Why doesn't he want to live at home? Are you maltreating him?"
She huffed with indignation and said, "I am not maltreating him. He is an eleven-year-old boy at the seventh transformation. That didn't happen just because of his hard work. I spent a lot of money on resources for him."
"I might have pushed him a little bit too much during training, but what really made him angry with me is that I lied and tricked him about something."
Augustus' stopped eating. He asked her calmly, "What did you do?"
She shook her head. "It's nothing serious. I just took him to make blood flow."
Augustus exclaimed, "So early? Isn't it a little too young for that?"
She said with pride, "He is not too young. He did well, actually. He made blood flow on his first try. My boy is a genius."
Delia rolled her eyes because of the boasting but said nothing.
Meanwhile, Augustus was still confused. He asked, "I'm surprised that he did well at such a young age. But how will he get angry if he performed well?"
He can't understand why taking Arthur to kill someone will make him angry because making blood flow is a common rite of passage. He is especially confused since Arthur did a good job of it which meant he shouldn't have had a problem with it.
His question stopped Lady Vena from beating around the bush. She had to come clean.
"He didn't want to do it at first. So I threatened him with the life of his pet and also lied about the crimes of the target."
Augustus nodded in understanding. "I can understand why he would be angry for being tricked. After all, I too was tricked by you and taken advantage of. So I know how that feels."
It was Lady Vena's turn to roll her eyes. She did so and asked impatiently, "Are you going to help me or not?"
He chuckled as he said, "You're not going to like this."
She groaned. "Come on. You rejected my first request, and you're going to reject my second request too? That's not right."
He snorted. "I know what you did there. You made the outrageous request first so that I will want to make up for letting you down and be compelled to grant your second request. But it won't work on me."
She gave him pitiful eyes and said, "Pretty please. You don't even need to do much. You don't even need to show up. Just send someone over to instruct him not to leave and make the guards at the entrance of the compound refuse to let him. That's all I ask for."
She pleaded again, "Please do this not for me, but for your son."
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A/N: If you haven't written a review yet, please consider doing so now. I need the assistance of my readers to make my book a success.