back to himself, shook off the remains of his power and opened his mouth about to argue, when I held up a finger and snapped,
“No, now it’s my turn and puffing out cock feathers isn’t the way!” Then I walked over to the King ignoring Gryph’s laugh, when he said,
“By Gods, ah lik' this lass.”
“I must say, she is an utter delight, is she not, brother?” Vern added making Trice growl back at him before saying between clenched teeth,
“Aye, a fucking delightful pain in mah ass!”
“I heard that!” I told him over my shoulder after I let the King lead me away, making Trice just wink at me in a sarcastic way.
“Don’t think I don’t know what you did back there,” the King whispered down at me as we travelled down an open corridor that was arched and offered access to another private garden. But this time, it was one that had a lush fountain at its centre that looked like water running down the branches of a carved stone weeping willow. Wow, sculptors must have had a field day with this place.
“What do you mean?” I asked when we had passed the sight, wondering what the King had meant by that comment.
“You created a big enough distraction so that we would focus on you and not fighting each other… I believe you humans call it, defusing a bomb.”
“I don’t want them getting hurt, I don’t want anyone getting hurt, especially not those I care about,” I told him whilst sneaking a peek at the brothers over my shoulder, who were thankfully following without any severed guard’s heads in their hands.
The captain was also in front of them, with his guards at the rear.
“It is a noble sacrifice and not one that will be forgotten by either party, I can assure you.”
“Despite what happened in there, I really did believe you when you said that you didn’t want to hurt me,” I said, now doing so as a way to judge his response and hopefully have it confirmed if this was still true or not.
“But of course, for what a waste that would be indeed,” he said running his hand down the top of my hand that was still rested in the crook of his arm. This was before he used that same hand to reach out and push open a door at the end of the corridor that led into a gallery of some kind. Beautifully detailed paintings of landscape after landscape adorned the pale but smooth walls of the castle and one that was the perfect setting for displaying these masterpieces. Especially where such vivid colour seemed to explode off the canvas’ at you. It made me want to stop and admire them and the King noticed.
“My sister is the artist and spends most of her days with paint in her hair, much to the dismay of our mother.” I smiled at this as it was clear that despite his teasing, he was extremely proud of his sister’s talent. You could see the warmth in his eyes when he looked at them. Eyes that reminded me of the same blue flames he could obviously command.
“My mother is the artist in my family,” I told him as if wanting to share this part of my life with him.
“You do not share in this gift?” he asked, and I laughed.
“Who, me? Are you kidding, even my stickmen have problems.”
“Stickmen?” he enquired making me elaborate,
“Think rudimentary cave drawings and you will get the idea.”
“Ah, I see,” he said with a smirk.
“No, my talents lie mainly with dead people.” At this his eyes widened making me laugh again.
“As in digging them up, not being the one to put them there… I’m an archaeologist, and my talent comes in the form of reading and researching… or at least that was my job until all this happened,” I said with clear melancholy that hadn’t been needed but just slipped out.
“But you are still a Princess?” he asked, obviously wondering what a royal was doing by having a job.
“Kind of, I mean yes, my father is King of all Supernatural life on Earth, but I didn’t exactly want to follow down the family footsteps, if you know what I mean, not with me being completely human and all,” I said as we approached a door at the end that looked more like one that would lead into a room or private space. But this was when the King laughed and said,