It was the early hours of morning when Danika suddenly screamed. King Lucien
was in the library when he heard the piercing scream. It came again. Followed by the
rustle of bed sheets.
He walked in steady strides out of the inner room to see Danika screaming and
thrashing on the bed. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, and sweat poured from her
body, her breathing erratic.
“No! Noooo, Baski please! I must save Sally! No, please! I can’t leave her to t-
them!” she cried out.
King Lucien watched with a furrow of his brows. She was having a nightmare. Her
mind was trapped in the events of her last introduction day in the courtroom.
“No… you d-don’t understand, they will kill her! They hate me so much; t-they
will kill Sally because they… think… she is… me…!” she sobbed in her sleep.
As she lived that horrible moment again in her sleep, a crack from the ice-wall
King Lucien built around his bitter heart fell away. He watched the way she sobbed,
thrashing around. Pained screams emitted from her throat. And he asked himself, how
could he have possibly ever thought that she might be a devil pretending to be an
angel?
.
Danika was still thrashing on the bed and screaming, reliving the memory of
Sally’s heroic act.
As King Lucien watched her, it took him back to that day in the courtroom-that
very day Sally had screamed her heart out. He couldn’t help remembering the way it
affected this woman lying on his bed.
She’d shrieked at every agonizing scream of her former personal maid. She’d cried
at every cry. She’d hurt so much that she came to him for the first time. She’d hurt so
much, she chose a physical pain as an escape from the emotional pain.
He frowned in thought. When she started sobbing, he was forced to move.
He walked towards her and sat down on the bed. “Stop. It’s just a nightmare,” he
spoke calmly.
“Oh, stop whipping me. I d-did nothing wrong. Stop! Stop! It hurts!” she cried,
thrashing her head from side to side. Now her subconscious was replaying the torture
session from Vetta.
“Danika. Wake up,” he commanded again. It didn’t work. She only cried. He then
placed a hand on her arm with every intention of shaking her awake, but as his hand
touched her, she stilled her struggles and stopped crying.
Then she curled her body around his arm and settled back into sleep.
His brows furrowed further as he watched this development. She was gripping his
body hard, her body relaxed into sleep. He kept still and watched her as she slept. His
eyes took in her features: the long lashes of her eyes, the beautiful pale white skin, the
bow of her mouth and her pointed nose.
He didn’t know how long he had watched her until, finally; he could pull his arm
from her body.
He made a mental note to summon her personal maid tomorrow. It was high time
he did that.
The next afternoon, Vetta was happy as she sat on top of the horse. The wind blew
around the deserted part of the land. It was the first time she was going hunting with
the king, and she was very excited. It was also the first time he would introduce her as
the king’s only mistress, which made her happier.
The two other kings got to see her, and she went hunting with them. A moment
with her king. A moment alone with no other person-woman or slave.
Vetta tightened her grip on the reins of the horse and lifted her face to the sky. The
day couldn’t get any better.
“Who are we waiting for, my king?” she asked in a cheerful voice, the wind
caressing her closed eyes.
He said nothing. His expression said nothing, too. He was seated on top of his
horse, holding the reins, while the two other kings were also on their own horses,
talking together.
King Lucien kept some distance from them, his jaw set in a firm line.
Vetta opened her eyes and stared at him, and the thought came to her. Would the
day ever come when this man would smile? When he could laugh? Even in the
privacy of her mind, she knew the impossibility of the thought. It was such a pity—-
A movement caught her eye, and she turned to see the rustle of grasses in the
entrance of the deserted land that showed someone was coming. Must be who they’d
been waiting for.
When Danika came through the tall grass, Vetta felt something hard slam in her
chest. Danika walked closer to them and knelt. She bowed her head. “I’m sorry for
being late, Master.”
“You should be whipped for that!” shouted King Moreh, who was also glaring at
her.
Danika’s heart ran away in her chest with fear.
“No, I don’t think so. After all, we’ve been talking and having a good time while
we waited.”
She peaked up at the new deep voice gratefully. That was King Valendy, and it
was the first time he had come to Salem since the kingdom gained their freedom.
Salem was now the biggest of the twelve kingdoms because it was a joint kingdom
with Mombana.
King Lucien said nothing, just stared at Danika with those cold, hard eyes. It didn’t
scare her the way it used to because she knew that the hardness and coldness of his
eyes and heart had become a natural part of him. Unbidden, she remembered that
night after she’d been whipped when he took her up in his arms and they heavily
sedated her.
“Can your eyes ever be warm again?” she had asked in a daze.