Elena’s POV.
“Do we even know where we are going?” Darius whispered through gritted teeth as we followed the group of slaves to an unknown direction.
Following Killian’s order, we had ruffled our clothes to look tattered and disguised as dirty slaves to mix with the rest of the slaves. But he never specified the next step after that, hence Darius’s frustration.
“The slaves serve everyone, surely some of them to Aragorn’s chambers, we just have to be patient,” Killian’s whispered and a wide smile broke out on my face. Killian will always remain the smartest man I know.
“Wipe that smile off your face Elena, a slave should not be smiling,” he snapped at me. I was tempted to burst into laughter seeing how hard he was trying to stay furious at me, but given the situation, I tried to hold it back in.
Suddenly, a strict looking woman walked up to us with a known frown on her face. I could tell she was the chief maid, that was always their facial expression.
“You,” She suddenly pointed at Greene. My heart literally stopped beating, could she have spotted that he wasn’t one of them? I could tell that he was literally freezing in fright.
I swiftly turned toward Killian and despite the relaxed look on his face, I could tell he was freaking out inwardly.
No, This can’t be happening.
“You will be in charge of master Aragorn’s mate and child’s chamber today,” her words dropped like bomb on us.
Aragorn has a mate? And a child also? This is where he hid them from the prying eyes of his enemies. How smart.
I have never seen a Lycan king this cowardly.
She proceeded to share the rest of the day’s activities among the slaves until it remained Killian, Darius and I, with one of the slaves.
“And the rest of you, rush down to master Aragorn’s chamber right now,”
It literally took everything in me to stop me from jumping up in excitement. Everything seemed to be working out perfectly for us.
She took a last glance at us before turning around and walked away.
“Greene, C’mon,” Killian quickly signaled him to draw closer.
“Did anyone hear that? Aragorn has a mate that he’s keeping a secret?” He gritted, trying to muffle his intended scream.
“This is not the time to express surprise, we have to take this shot for to advantage,” Killian blurted, carefully looking around as he spoke to avoid being heard by the rest of the slaves. “Greene, you know what to do with the mate and child, it’s time we play his game too,” he smirked.
“Yeah, but we might have a little challenge, I don’t know my way to her chamber, I wasn’t paired with an actual slave,” he said.
“Well, you will surely find a way, go on now,” Killian replied. Greene was quiet for a moment as though he was trying to figure a way out, suddenly he nodded and gave Killian a knowing look before walking away.
“What’s with the secret conversations? do you not know we should be at master Aragorn’s chamber by now before he has our heads on a spike?” The extra slave who was assigned with us suddenly blurted out angrily.
“We are just trying to get to know each other,” Killian spoke up and he chuckled.
“I hope you can do that in the afterlife after master Aragorn has had you beheaded, I’m not going to let you take me with you,” he spat, turning around and started walking away.
“Hold on, he’s going to do that because we are late to his chamber?” Killian asked, quickly walking fast beside him while Darius and I tagged along.
“Why do you speak like you have only been here for a day? Are the lessons from other unfortunate scapegoats not enough for you?”
“No… Uhm… Yeah… Of course I’ve witnessed everything,” Killian stuttered, trying so hard not to give our mission away. “I’m just sad that he chose to treat us this way,”
I was trying hard not to burst into laughter seeing how perfectly he has fit in to the act.
“All you have to do is abide strictly by his rules and avoid falling victim, besides, he practically owns our life now, I mean he could have killed us in those wars but he chose to rescue us instead,”
Killian and I exchanged quick glances. It was finally coming to me.
Aragorn had built this community by rescuing few of them from different wars that he’s been to. He manipulated them into working for him as slaves in exchange for saving their lives.
How more cruel can he be?
If it was possible, I wished there was a way I could set them free from his shackles, but unfortunately, I’ve got my own problems to deal with.
I turned towards Darius who has been awfully quiet since we got here. He looked surprisingly relaxed but also had a distant look in his eyes.
“Hey, are you okay?” I whispered to him.
He slightly turned to face me. “Sure, why not?”
I could tell he was lying.
Why is he being strange? Could this be about our little conflict back on the road? I wanted to apologize for my unintended outburst but given our situation, I’ll probably do that later.
Suddenly, Killian stopped as soon as we got to a nicely furnished building which I instinctively assumed to be Aragorn’s house.
I watched as Killian turned towards the slave. “You can take care of things around here while the rest of us will take care of the insides, that way we’ll all have lesser work loads,” Killian suggested and surprisingly, he nodded with a smile. I had thought he would protest but with the smile on his face, I could tell he was happy to not be seeing Aragorn.
Killian signalled us to follow up as he proceeded into the house.
Despite how strong I tried to be, I was literally trembling as we walked through the passage way.
“Elena!” Killian suddenly screamed grabbing my shoulder in a swift move and pulled me into his arms. Almost immediately, I heard the sound of a creaking metal on the floor, and looking down, my eyes nearly popped out of its socket as I saw a blade on the floor. Someone had tried to strike me with it.
“Well hello there, I have waited too long,” his cold voice sounded through the walls of the house.