Funny how practically every time-travel or isekai story out there featured characters with useful skills. Skills they could use for survival or to charm the pants off people in a less technologically advanced era. Doctors and nurses who could save lives. Engineers who could build mind-blowing devices or structures. Hell, if she was any kind of scientist, or a farmer, or a plumber, she'd be infinitely more useful than a lawyer. What was her skill? Arguing. Yeah, not very useful, with or without a knife at her throat.
Why couldn't she have trained in some form of martial arts so she could whoop this guy in the ass? Or maybe even... singing, so she could stun him with the enchanting singsong voice she didn't have? No, here she was, unable to even use her arguing ability. Without knowing what sort of answer he was seeking, the next time she let out a croak, it might just be the last croak before her neck sprayed a fountain of blood.
So she sat still on the bench, staring back at Prince Jyu, hoping to bore him to death before her trickling blood ran dry.
Luckily, she never needed to find out how her hopeless plan would pan out.
"Please remove your weapon, Highness."
Her saviour appeared from the shadows in a suit of leather armour, his own blade laid against Prince Jyu's throat. Around a bicep, he wore an armband depicting the same emblem she'd seen embossed in the armour of all the palace guards.
With a light chuckle, the prince withdrew his dagger and wiped the blood on his white robes, without a care for the stain it left. Cassie's hand flew to her own throat, touching wetness. To her surprise, a silken handkerchief embroidered with a golden dragon appeared under her nose. With a disgruntled snort, she snatched the flimsy piece of cloth out of the prince's hand and pressed it against her wound.
"It's not nice of your king to have his guests followed," he said with a sideways glance at the guard.
Apparently satisfied that the Uviellan prince was no longer an immediate threat, the guard stepped back and sheathed his sword. "I was not following you, Your Highness. I was following her."
"What, me?" Cassie asked, though the answer was glaringly obvious to all. There was no other 'her' around. "Why?"
"Aye, why would King Dane be so concerned for his divorced wife's safety that he'd assign a member of his guard to follow her even in his own palace?" Prince Jyu asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "A little too caring unless you were still his wife, don't you think?"
With a bow, the guard offered, "My lady, I should escort you—"
"No." Cassie held up a hand and fixed her eyes on the prince and the irritating smirk he wore, like he knew more than what anyone else was letting on. Against her better judgment, her curiosity implored her to stay. "You may leave," she said to the guard. "I trust his Highness would not be so savage as to harm a defenceless woman." She gave the prince a twisted smile of her own as she removed the silk handkerchief from her neck, the bright stain upon it evidence of his savageness.
The guard hesitated as he looked between the two of them for a moment, then nodded. "I'll just be around the corner. Scream if you need me, my lady."
Cassie returned a nod in thanks, and when she faced the prince again, he was watching her intently with a raised brow. "Pretty, and brave. Definitely a fake divorce," he said, his words cryptic to her ears. She did not know why he was so convinced that the divorce was fake and how it mattered to him either way.
Folding her arms before her chest, she gave him an exaggerated roll of her eyes. "For someone who does not like to indulge in small talk, you're certainly wasting a lot of time." Without a dagger at her throat, she had no qualms about letting him know just how peeved she was. These royal dickheads had no manners at all, what with the way Dane locked her up after their first meeting, and this one here cutting her delicate skin. "Why don't you just tell me what exactly you mean about the schemes and fake divorce? Without talking in circles."
YOU ARE READING
Bride to the Cursed: a Snow White retelling
Fantasy[COMPLETED] When a king makes an order, he expects it to be followed. When King Dane divorced his wife, he expected her to get out of his sight and stay out of his sight. Not reappear three months later in his bed, spouting nonsense about being a 'l...
