I tried to launch another kick but he was quicker. Dante grabbed my left foot, holding them tightly against his chest. He took a glance at my feet that weren't anything pretty. "Do these belong to a duke's daughter?"
Perhaps, someone else in my position would feel awkward and ticklish because of the way he was holding my feet. But good looks could not make up for good personalities. I didn't try to kick him again. His hands were warm. I liked the temporary warmth that was seeping into my cold feet that were full of cuts and bruises.
I wouldn't mind if he cleaned them and put some medicines. But I was hoping too much.
He eyed me darkly as if he could guess what was going inside my head. "Did you run on your feet all the way here?"
"Yes," I replied with a deep frown on my face. Why was he being nice to Aloisia?
Dante placed my feet on his thigh. "You were Imnek Kaige Jin's fiancee."
What was he getting at? Was he asking me for confirmation?
He threw the next question at me. "Why did you start dwelling in black arts?"
I had no answer to that. I didn't even know that crazy ex-fiancee was a black sorceress. He probably had ideas about why Aloisia would dwell in black arts. His next questions were different.
"Did you kill your family and try to raise them as undead?" His voice turned icy. "Aloisia Annaliese Bloodworth, answer me honestly."
I swallowed my saliva. Magic was not rare in this world. Viessa could build magic, but she couldn't use it freely. Her magic was a physical type. She could bring inanimate objects to life. During the war, Viessa created a golem army.
But the principle of the magic in this world was the same as the law of the conversation of energy. Basically, energy could be converted from one form to another.
In her case, it was her life energy. She died of exhaustion because she used too much magic.
Viessa had a natural ability for magic. My ability to talk to animals could be considered the same. But there were people who didn't have the ability but they would still seek magic. Black arts gave hope to those people. But black magic went against the will of nature. There was a huge price to be paid.
Aloisia could have done it. I gave him an awkward smile. Aloisia's obsession with Kaige wasn't normal. She was a villainess. Redemption wouldn't be easy for her. "Does your royal highness want to kill me now?"
"No." The chill in his voice was gone. "You raised your father as an undead. So, it's fine."
Huh? I gaped at him. What did he just say?
"Too bad that he was thrown into the well of abysmal fire," He mumbled softly. "But you are my slave now."
"..." I opened my mouth wide, but no words came out. I had a feeling that I was alive because he thought that I could help him with black magic. The way he was talking gave me goosebumps.
"Kaige already knows that you are with me." He took out a key from his red jacket's side pocket and unlocked the cuffs around my ankles and wrists. "He will demand your return. If you want to live, you must do everything that I say."
I stayed quiet. I needed to hear what he wanted.
"You have to raise a few undeads for me." I bit my lip when he started poking the bruise on my feet. "In return, I will help you seek your revenge."
Damn! He had plans for the North Kingdom even before he met Aloisia. I couldn't hold myself back anymore. "Your royal highness, you can fuck off!"
The evil man started poking the cuts on my feet."Aaa!" I screamed. My eyes welled up. "That hurts! Don't do that, you crazy man!"
"A book." The prince gave me a slow smile. "I want to know which book it is.""It's a book…" I wrecked my brain. What kind of book? I couldn't say that I read the entire story on a laptop screen. I was dying from the poison. "Book of… book of…"
Dante let go of my leg and sat up. There was a large hickey where he had bit me. The blackened vein had turned faint blue. But he didn't seem normal to me.His lips were black. Dante blinked his eyes slowly, looking at me like a drunken man.
"So, he was being nice to you." Harvey gives me a hard look. "But you kept provoking him?"I place my elbow on the edge of the table. "I was just surprised. He was supposed to be a cruel emperor.""Yeah, but he sucked the poison out using his mouth." Harvey chuckles when I make a face at him. "That was thoughtful of him.""It wasn't thoughtful." I pick up the fork and stab the molten chocolate dessert. Two minus one is one. But that emperor tricked me.Not only that there was an antidote to that poison, but the method of sucking out the poison was crude. The antidote was also quite common. All the soldiers carried it in their pouches.The person who told me about the antidote was none other than Aloisia."He killed you twice and treated you nicely the third time." Harvey smiles at me. "Do you truly not think of him now?""He was a fiction
I pressed my finger on the hickey on my thigh. It was red, swollen, and rather hot. I kept thinking about his lip and the way he held my thigh. I wasn't an inexperienced woman, but it had been a long time since I had done it.Leaning against the wall, I found myself thinking about the most douche man in the universe. My friend, Fanny, always said that all women had an ex whom they wanted to throw in the cage of tigers.If I threw my ex I think that the tigers would get diarrhoea if they eat that disgusting creature.As usual, I was thinking about unimportant things.I was free to move, but I didn't leave the camp. There would be guards outside. It was still dark. The mountains could get cold and dangerous. I touched the back of my head. The wound was really gone. Did I really get poisoned?My stomach growled loudly."I am hungry." I lied down on the col
"I was thinking about King Kaige and Count's daughter."Viessa Vorn is Count Vorn's only daughter.
I was clutching my stomach and wondering if the emperor wanted me to die from hunger. Maybe he was punishing me for talking back to him. If I had chosen to be his concubine, would he feed me? But then, I wasn't that kind of woman."Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!" My stomach growled again.
Harvey Cunningham opens his mouth wide while blinking his eyes slowly. His face turns pale as he turns his head to his left, avoiding my gaze. He lets out an awkward cough.Why the heck is he reacting like this?
[Interlude]I stop and glance at Harvey. Sitting in his office again, I have a tornado going inside my heart. Sensing that I have paused my narration, he raises his head and meets my eyes. I look away, recalling the moment when Dante had left the room that day.Why do I still feel bad?I am not Dante’s wife. I am not his lover. I am not his woman. I belong to myself. I am self sufficient. I do not deserve men like Dante, Alphonse, or Kaige.But there is still an ache in my chest that won’t go away.So I don’t understand why I still want to cling on to Dante. Is it similar to the time I had clung on Raymond?
[Dante]However, the tumultuous ache didn’t leave him.Noises seemed to have blurred in the background like a lost ray of light that was trailing down from the sky. Kaige was furiously yelling at Alphonse who was looking at his feet and sighing. Savina shrugged, avoiding his eyes.Dante saw guilt in her eyes. Although she had owed him nothing, she was still feeling guilty. He could read human’s emotions easily, especially when he wanted to focus. Right then, she was in his focus. The ache was annoying in his chest, an evidence that he was indeed in love with the crazy woman.It was better if he said nothing. Dante left the room. He didn’t want Savina to see any strange emotions in his eyes. A
[Dante]“I didn’t expect this from you, Alphonse,” Kaige spoked before Dante could say a word.Dante rolled his eyes, but he remained quiet. Something was stirring in his heart. Something that felt better after Savina got off Alphonse’s lap. That ‘something’ was both familiar and unfamiliar. He had experienced it once, but it had never stayed with him for long. Was it love? He didn’t bother to cling to the feeling, and he hoped that the strange feeling would leave him. But it was impossible.His curse was slowly lifting. His heart was thawing, and he was feeling. When did he start feeling for this strange woman? To be honest, he could still pretend until the end that he didn’t feel anything for Savina. At the same time, the for
[Savina]When Dante came into the room, I had an urge to push Alphonse away and beg for mercy.The position was bad.I was sitting on Alphonse’s lap with my arms coiled around his neck. My skirt was lifted, thighs showing, and Alphonse’s one hand was right on it.His lips were close to mine, almost touching. Actually, he was quite stubborn, and it took me a while to seduce him. He was just about to kiss me when Kaige and Dante entered the room.They didn’t even knock. There was no gentlemanly bone inside them. And just why Kaige was looking at me as if he wanted to kill me? I could understand if Dante was offended since I was still his ‘wife’. Kaige
[DANTE]She was there. Alive. Too alive to his liking.Dante wished that he would have preferred it if she was dead or sitting in the same room with the undeads in the next room. If it was possible, he would love to gouge his eyes out by himself. Maybe the book should reset itself, or maybe he should forget everything.But he knew that forgetting was impossible unless Savina could fail again. Since it wasn’t possible, he let out a heavy sigh.Savina didn’t move. She looked at him with annoyance. Her sharp brows shoot up as if she was challenging him while sitting on Alphonse’s lap. Oh, only if she knew who Alphonse was or what kind of crimes he had committed.Nevertheless, he hated remembering how she had loved him while she couldn’t remember
[Dante]Dante rushed into the mansion, trying his best to steel his heart. He couldn’t smell blood except for the dead rotten blood of the undeads. Savina’s blood was too familiar to him. She had died three times
[Dante]As he had expected, Aloisia’s lair was right where it was previously. He knew that she would move to the lands of undeads soon. If his guess was right, there were undeads in the co
[Savina]Alphonse pushed me down on the bed. His body pressed against mine. His hands were on my waist, squeezing them hard as he delved his tongue into my mouth and sucked on my tongue. From a hesitating adult, he had turned
[Savina]I leaned closer and cupped his face, pressing my lips against his. Before I could continue, Alphonse broke away the kiss as he laid his hands on my waist and held me still. I couldn't move. He stared into my eyes and