Chapter 166: Chapter 166
DAHLIA:
It was a long shot plan, but I was desperate…
“Alright, Dahlly. Let’s take a walk.”
It was a breezy night, and the full moon perfectly illuminated the path near the town walls that we took.
“I remember you used to like taking long evening walks,” Kaist remarked. We had stayed silent since I had asked him to walk with me. Perhaps he too was having a hard time parting with me today.
“That’s right. Walking clears my head. It seemed like my troubles would disappear when I take a long leisurely walk like this. But Kaist, didn’t you also like walking?”
“Umm, yes and no…”
“Yes and no? What do you mean?”
“I only liked taking walks because you loved it, and I always wanted to be the one who walks beside you when you’re sad…”
I had almost forgotten Kaist’s confession about feeling the fated mate bond between us. His ability to distinguish my scent was proof enough of that. He must have suffered greatly to see me abandon him on our wedding day and to learn that I got married to someone else…
“Kaist, I have a question… Did you ever resent me for not feeling our bond?”
He slowed down his walk. I paced my own walk beside him, waiting intently for his answer.
“When I realized you were not coming to the wedding ceremony, I felt crushed… I knew you were forced by Duke Hurst to go through with it, but I didn’t think you would actually run away and leave me in that state...”
My conscience stabbed me uneasily with guilt with each word Kaist said. However, I stayed silent and let Kaist continued his speech.
“After a while though, I realized you weren’t entirely at fault… You have told me about your concerns of finding your fated mate, and I did nothing but push you towards the wedding without properly explaining why… I wanted you to see for yourself that I was your mate, so I stayed silent, but I guess that wasn’t quite right.”
“If only I had confessed to you back then and explained why I was so adamant to become your husband, I wonder if things would have turned differently for us…”
I wondered about it too… I wondered what my life could have been if I wedded Kaist and rejected Tristan’s offer of running away with him…
Maybe this was all my fault to begin with. The moment I took Tristan’s hand in marriage, I had brought all these calamities upon us.
I wondered; if I were given a second chance to do this again, would I readily change my fate?
These were all useless ideas… What was more important now is the present.
I have the red ruby in me, and I could stop all this nonsense if I choose what’s right…
“Look at that, the flowers are blooming,” I said to Kaist, pointing at the clump of wild amaryllis nearby.
I ran a bit towards the blooms. Under the night sky, they looked really pretty.
“Wow… I never thought these flowers can grow on their own and still be this beautiful,” I mumbled.
“Yes. I thought that they needed a lot of tending and care to bloom, but maybe the palace gardener wasn’t saying the truth after all,” Kaist also remarked.
True, they didn’t look like the flowers that were tended with care inside Kaist’s palace, but they still looked as lovely as the ones back in there.
Just like these flowers that had persisted on their own against the harsh woodlands, maybe I should try to grow up a little bit on my own too…
“Kaist, all these years, I have never said it, but thank you…”
“For what,” he remarked, a bit surprised.
“Thank you for being my friend, my shoulder to cry on, and even up to this day, my savior.”
“Dahlly, you speak as if we will never see each other again. Frankly, it’s depressing,” he said ruefully.
“Indeed. Maybe it will take a long time for us to see each other again, your majesty. Who knows?...”
I bent down and plucked the prettiest wild amaryllis, and then, I reached to one of Kaist’s breast pockets, and fixed the flower in it.
“Take good care of yourself, Kaist… No matter what the outcome of this fight, please promise me one thing…”
“What is it?”
“That you’d become a better king than your father in the nearest future…”
I stepped in closer to Kaist, my best friend and my protector. I leaned towards him, wrapping my arms around his neck, and I gave him a kiss.
In our years of being betrothed, I had never kissed Kaist on my own. He and I had never confessed our feelings towards each other. I have never been able to tell him I appreciated his care and his presence all this time…
It must have agonized him to keep the knowledge that we were mates by himself. It must have pained him to watch me walk away without knowing how he had felt since then…
“Thank you,” I said as I pulled away from his lips, “and good bye, Kaist…”
“What do you -”
Before he could realize what I had meant to do, I kept my hands over his face and used it – my healing powers so that I could induce Kaist into a deep sleep.
I didn’t know if it would work, but I had to try. I was crying while still clutching Kaist’s face in the palms of my hand.
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry, Kaist… Forgive me…”
His body gently slumped into me as he fell into a trance. I tried to ease his fall as much as I can, helping him down into the flower bushes nearby.
The only person who believed me to be Dahlia, and therefore the only one who could compel me to go back to papa and run away from this war was Kaist…
After making sure that Kaist was alright as I laid him to rest, I called on the darkness yonder.
“Come out… I know you’re there. I know you’ve been following us.”
I heard a deep sigh. Tristan came out, scratching the top of his head.
“Why did you do that to your mate?”
Good... It seemed he has not followed us for a long time, judging on how he didn’t seem to know the content of my early conversation with Kaist.
“I did it to stop the war.”
“How is putting him to sleep going to stop the war?”
“The red ruby is with me… We can stop this war if you take me there.”