TRISTAN:
“Dahlia… Please. Dahlia, we’re almost there!...”
Up ahead, I could see chimney smokes in the distance. Thank the Goddess, we have finally reached Camdress!
However, Dahlia had already stopped breathing for a while now… I don’t know if she could still make it.
I clutched her icy body closer into mine. I tried to keep her warm with my flames, but it was of no use.
Her flesh might be less cold, but her chest wouldn’t rise up for air… Not even once since she had kissed me!
“Dahlia, open your eyes! We’re here!”
I could see some of the huts open their lamps as I approached. I must be causing quite a stir as I shouted wildly at my mate to open her eyes once more.
I reached the edge of the village, but a gate was standing shut against us.
“Help! I need a healer! Help us!”
I pounded on the gate as hard as I could. I had never been this desperate all my life.
“What? Who is it?”
“Help me! M
DAHLIA: I heard the door open and close at the living room, and I immediately went over towards it. “What happened,” I asked Thesla and Efiro as soon as they came back. Earlier when I woke up from my nightmare, I swear I heard Tristan call out my voice in a scream. I immediately bolted up from my bed and went out of my room to see what the commotion was about. However, due to Thesla’s insistence, Efiro and I stayed inside the house, trying to make sense of what the hell was happening outside. Thesla said there might be a possible invasion from slave traders, so he went out by himself. Judging from the screams we heard, there must have really been some violent people who wanted to get inside the town of Camdress by force. “A husband came with his sick wife… The woman was in bad shape, and he was frenzied…” The moment he mentioned the word ‘husband,’ my heart started to quiver. I remembered Tristan and how he had protected me unt
DAHLIA: Was I seeing things? Was my mind simply playing a trick on me? “Tristan!” I touched the man’s face with my free hand by instinct. This must be an illusion! How can I gaze at this lovely face after seeing him die in the collapsed cave? However, as soon as my fingers came in contact with his tanned skin, I knew it wasn’t a trick! This was a miracle. “Tristan,” my eyes started to tear up. “It’s you!” I had almost forgotten he was holding my right wrist until he squeezed on it very tightly. “Yes… I’m alive, Samalah!” He was looking at me with hatred. It was only then that I remembered how my face looked like for him. “N-No, I’m not… I am… not…S-Samalah,” I said in broken sentences as I wept. I wanted to hug him fiercely. I wanted to kiss him until the end of the world comes. “You trickster, what do you mean,” Tristan said growling at me. “You’re already caught red-handed, and you’re still trying to d
TRISTAN: I looked at Kaist Lyon as he tried to stop me from slapping sense back into Samalah once more. I can’t believe what he just told me. “Don’t touch her! She is my mate,” he repeated. I wanted to laugh. I would have believed him right then and there if he didn’t tell me the same thing before I seduced Dahlia into marrying me and leaving him on the altar. “So what,” I blundered. “I know you’re just trying to rescue her, but that wouldn’t work!” I looked at Samalah, and tears were still streaming down her face, but she looked equally confused as I was. If I didn’t know her so well, I could have been tricked into thinking she was really in a pitiful state. “No! Don’t you dare hurt her again!” Just then, we heard the sounds of boots coming towards us. “What are you doing?” It was the man from last night, the one who offered me a drink after the healer took Dahlia in. He came towards Samalah’s side, who
TRISTAN:After just a few minutes of reaching the healer’s house, the old man himself came out of the front door.“Ah, you’re the husband from yesterday, and…”At the sight of Kaist, the old man made a deep bow. “Your majesty, to whom do I owe this pleasure of seeing you again?”Judging from what he had just said, the old man seemed to know Kaist personally.“Sir Morland, it’s been a long time since I saw you. The lady you just helped, she’s Lady Dahlia Hurst. You remember her, right?”“Dahlia Hurst, you mean Jude’s daughter?... You have both grown up now, and I see you’ve met our Samalah too…”Sir Morland was eyeing the way Kaist was wounding up his arm protectively around Samalah’s waist. For some unknown reason, Albus and Arthur were also growling with displeasure at this act…“We haven’t been fully acqu
DAHLIA:This is driving me crazy!I’m sure that only fated mates could distinctly recognize the scents of their destined partners. Even when I had been engaged with Kaist or exposed to a handful of men in the Capital, their scents were never really unique to my nose, not unlike that of Tristan’s…So why then can Kaist recognize my scent?“Prince Kaist, if I tell you something insane, is there a possibility you will believe it?”He only looked intently towards me. I cannot distinguish whether he was suspicious of me or not.“Go on… What is it?”I held his hand. “Kaist, it’s me… Dahlia…”We looked for each other for a really long time. I held my breath as it all happened.“Which part was the joke in there because I didn’t really get it,” he said a bit sarcastically.“Kaist, you never told anyone except me about
DAHLIA: As expected, Tristan did not leave Samalah’s side for the whole day. I came inside the room carrying a tray of dinner when he still did not come out even after it was way past the usual time to eat. Seeing that he had fallen asleep by the bedside while clutching Samalah’s hand, I was careful not to rouse him. I quietly cleared the small side table so that I could put the tray and leave. Before I could safely exit though, a hand tugged at the end of my skirts. It was Tristan. “Don’t leave.” I let out a long sigh. “I thought it was better not to wake you. You seemed tired.” “Stay right here, so you could get that tray and leave for good.” Despite feeling wronged in so many places by what he had said, I sat beside him as he requested. “Take a good look at Dahlia… Take a good look at what you did to her.” Did he just blamed me for what happened to her? “Contrary to what you think, I didn’t do anythin
TRISTAN:I thought I was seeing things when I saw a body on the ground. As I came over, I realized that this man was someone I knew.I flipped him over, and I was right. It was Sir Casior, Livia’s lover. I hastily carried him into the village straight into Sir Morland’s abode.The dragon healer immediately set himself to heal him.Vampires have really strong bodies. There were very few things that could kill them, which was why blessed artifacts – weapons that are blessed by the Moon Goddess herself and can kill vampires – were considered national treasures in the Werewolf Clan.Judging by the deep gash behind Sir Casior’s back, there’s no doubt that he was attacked with a blessed artifact.“He is out of peril now,” Sir Morland revealed as he wiped the sweat off his head after a few hours of trying to heal Sir Casior.“Thank the Goddess then,” Samalah said.I shot her
TRISTAN: I cupped my head on my palms. When I first heard the king’s confessions, I couldn’t swallow his words too. I couldn’t believe that I once wanted to hurt my own brother so badly as well as the woman I loved so much in the world. “Tristan, are you alright?...” It was Samalah. I half-thought she had already followed Kaist to comfort him, but she was still here, her eyes full of unspoken pity. “Go ahead and come after him… Your mate needs you the most right now,” I said. Samalah did well by letting me tell Kaist the whole story behind our revenge from beginning to end. She must have really fallen for him considering that she never made any hateful remarks against his father and Talandor, like she used to. “You’re right… My mate needs me.” Just then, Samalah moved beside me on the long couch. “Why did you tell Kaist the truth? I can see you have been hurt as much as Kaist to reveal it, so why?...” “I… I don’t want to contin