Rider King part 43 & 44

Centres’ hand comes to touch my shoulder. “I know it is a lot to ask, and I can only beg you for forgiveness.”

I inch away from him, disturbed. I know he’s putting Xelor before me, and I don’t hate him for it. What shakes me is him asking me to do the same.

Centres drops his hand.

“Do you love your son?” I ask.

“I do,” Centres answers without hesitation. “But my planet will always come first.”

My head hurts. I can’t handle this.

“Think about it, please,” Centres presses before walking out of the room.

I sink into a chair and reach for the water dispenser, needing to clear my head. The first sip I take makes me frown. The water didn’t taste right, or at least not like the water I’m used to drinking.

How odd.

Pushing it aside, I decide to get fresh air instead. I push the window open and look out. There’s not much beauty to see. The Capital has become a skeleton.

I turn when the door creaks open. It’s an elderly man, dressed as a servant. He keeps his head bowed and rolls a cart into the room.

“Please do not let me disturb you,” he says.

“It’s alright. Is Dramon outside?”

“Yes. He is waiting for you,” the servant answers as he dusts the empty bookshelves.

I watch him clear out the garbage, and reach for the room-water-temperature water.

“That water,” I point out. “Where did it come from?”

He frowns. “From the kitchens, my lady.”

“Right, but did it come from the well? I think something may be wrong with it. It tastes funny.”

“I doubt this. Everything is checked for quality before it leaves the kitchen.”

If the water is contaminated, then someone of higher access would have had to step in.

That bitch. She’s poisoning me. 

It’s not the paint that has been making me feel ill, and hurt everything from my appetite to my sex drive. It’s whatever I’ve been drinking.

“Alright. Thank you.”

When he leaves, I take a bite from one of the cookies that were left behind in the tray, but put the rest down when it tastes bad, too. I’ll have to wash out the disgusting taste of that water.

I walk out of the room, my head swollen with thoughts. I think of Centres, of Dramon, and the troublesome woman obsessed with him.

"What did Centres want?” Dramon comes up to me and touches my cheek.

I smile weakly. “Just to touch bases with me.”

“Are you alright, my love?” he lowers his lips to my forehead. “You do not look well.”

“I’m fine. Let’s um… let’s go to the room.”

“Beysha woke up briefly,” he smiles. “Would you like to see her?”

Relieved to have a break from the mess in my life, I straighten. “Can I go see her?” I touch his chest. “Please?”

Eager to please me, Dramon takes me to Beysha. She’s sleeping again. The room is clean and there’s a tablet on her lap.

There’s distress on Beysha’s sleeping face as if she’s having a bad dream. I’m I touch her hand, and then leave her to rest.

On our way to our bedroom, we cross Lady Greed in the hallway. As usual, she’s wearing an extravagant but unpractical dress, and heavy jewelry that likely belongs to Dramon and, by extension, me.

She glares. If looks could kill, I’d be on the ground. But since they don’t, she tries to poison me instead.

I have no shame as I shoulder past her. Her ridiculous skirts make her stumble, but Dramon makes no attempt to catch her.

In the bedroom, Dramon promises, “I’ll restrict her from this section of the palace.”

I nod, not feeling guilty about my treatment of that woman. I can’t wait to deal with her officially. She’ll get a lot more than isolation for messing with my water.

Dramon excuses himself to check on work matters, and I take my free time to check the many pairs of trousers that were brought down for me. I touch the items that remind me of my time in the wilderness, and I break down.

Centres’ words haunt me.

I remain on the ground until my sadness turns to desperation. As usual, I try to run from my stress. I ran from my human colony when I was young and suffocated; I ran from Centres when he demanded I married Dramon; I ran from Dramon when he hurt me, and I’m running now.

I pull a sack from under the bed and dump the clothes inside it. Then, I shove my belongings with trembling hands.

I couldn’t bring herself to close it, though. I couldn’t bring myself to vanish again. My disappearance after getting me back so soon would hurt Dramon, and he deserves better.

Figuring that I need more air, I wipe my face and have two guards escort her outside. I visit Treysa, who is more than happy to entertain me. I pet and whisper to her, and I quickly calm down. Soon, I realize how irrational I was being.

I’m stitchng my thoughts together when commotion erupts from the palace. I recognize Dramon’s voice. Worried out of my mind, I walk to the gated entrance.

Dramon bursts outside, holding the bag of clothes I packed and foolishly left them in our bedroom. He must have seen them and got the wrong impression.

He shakes the thing, and my clothes fall out.

“Why are you leaving? What did Centres do to you?!”

The guards become fidgety, not sure if I’m in danger.

Damn it. This conversation wasn’t supposed to happen like this.

“Calm down,” I raise my arms. “Centres…” I hesitate.

“What did he say?!”

Nerve-wrecked, I blurt, “He told me I’d distract you from your work that we would do more good for Xelor if we worked apart with me on the frontlines. So I… I was thinking…”

“So what?” his crimson eyes have never been this bright. He is beautiful in his rage.

“You were going to leave again? Leave like that first time and send me looking for you for the hundredth time? I am tired of chasing you, so why aren’t you tired of running? There is no sense in it! Haven’t you learned how precious time is after being robbed away for two years?”

You. You. You. There’s so many accusations.

“So it’s my fault!" I erupt, tears blocking my vision for a second. My emotions are a mess. I’m so angry with him that I shove his chest. Fuck the ink he drew on himself for me, fuck those arms that embrace me so warmly, I’m as angry as he is.

“You hurt me to the point that I have to save myself, and I still end up as the crippled bitch who should be grateful to have a Rider King interested in her.” I hit his chest three times.

“That is not what I am saying!” he grips my biceps and shakes me. “I am asking you to talk to me, for Fire’s sake. Talk and stop running!”

“I need to breathe before I can talk to you, Dramon. I need to collect my thoughts because I’ve been spending most of my life thinking of others. You— you suffocate me. I appear after surviving a traumatic event and a week later you’re trying to sleep with me?” I rip myself from his arms and give him another futile shove.

When I turn, my wrist is yanked so hard that I slam into him, hitting my forehead on his chin.

“That was for you. To make you feel better. Everything about this is for you. I took this insufferable title to find you, and I tore the planet apart as I searched.”

“Xelor will die without you. I was thinking about my options because I was torn between being happy with you and keeping Xelor alive. But here we are. You’re suffocating me again.” I push hard, and his arms give out. “We are dysfunctional.”

I take three steps back, and his gaze only catches fire.

“Well guess what, Venus. I’d rather be dysfunctional, I’d rather have a thousand arguments until you until understand that sometimes it’s alright to choose your happiness over other’s, I’d rather be suffocating than have you kidnapped and assaulted as you run off, alone. As much as I know you can protect yourself, it’s not your job anymore. It’s mine.”

With that, he bends at the waist and throws me over his shoulder, kicking and screaming.

Nausea has me gasping. I want to return to the ground to end this awful feeling, so I fuss so hard that I kick him in the stomach in my desperation. Of course, that doesn’t phase the formidable King.

“Stop! Put her down!” I hear Beysha yell. The argument must have woken her up.

Dramon continues to carry me on his shoulder even as I fuss.

“Put her down, she’s pregnant!”

Although my blows weren’t enough, the shock over those words has Dramon stumbling. I hold my breath as we both fall, and hope I don’t land tragically.

THUD.

Dramon flips last minute, and I land on top of him with my chest pressed against his face. The only part of me that took a blow was my hands.

Dramon sits up, face stunned. I’m on his lap now, mirroring his expression.

Beysha scatters to our side. “Venus? Are you alright?”

“What—what were you—” I can’t form a sentence.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Beysha fidgets with her fingers. “I never got to tell you. The last night we spent in the shack, I woke up and found you next to those fertility seeds we were eating— you know the ones that sprout in pregnancy? I saw a little seed coming out of one, so I stored it away to observe and completely forgot about it. Then I’m moved to the palace and find it in my belongings and faint and didn’t get to tell you,” she gulps. “I’m sorry.”

Dramon sits up and helps me off his lap, but his hand remains on my elbow as if ready to catch me if I fall.

“A child,” he repeats, face still set in stone.

Meanwhile, vomit threatens to burst out of my mouth.

Dramon nods. “Nothing changes. I will take care of it.” He grits his teeth. It’s odd. I would have expected Dramon to be over the moon at this news, and I don’t understand why he would suggest the child would be a burden in the first place.

“I forgive you for this,” he tells me. “Go get checked by a doctor.”

I’m confused, shocked, and half-unconscious as Beysha leads me indoors.

N: Dramon thinks she cheated, since they haven’t had sex in 2 years and she recently rejected him in bed. Still, he decides he will take care of the baby as if it’s his own. The baby is actually his. The end is near, ya’ll! And by the way, yes, the girl from Mafia Devil is cousins with Maksim