Rendezvous in the Romanowskian Empire

18. Camp barbarian

Althea

My hands hurt from being tied behind the wooden pole for this long. The constant struggle to free myself had bruised my wrists.

Two guardsmen who had tied me were stuck on the camp's entrance, ogling my face like the fools they were.

"What?!" I snapped.

One of them dared to step inside, but the other held him. "You want to invite the devil himself to rip your head? This woman is precious, don't you see her eyes, blue as the skies itself?" he wondered aloud.

At the same time, what sounded like a slap resonated across the area. Both turned around and went pale at something they saw. In no time, they were gone.

I squeezed my eyes shut, nervousness eating me away. My AI book was with that master invader. If he throws away the laser pen kept in it, God knows how will I be able to write my travelogue further.

Heart - Only if that hot mess decides to keep you alive hehehe-

Deciding to ignore the residence of Devil Coretta, I pressed a thumb to my right wrist, somehow hoping to ring in Cheryl.

"Cheryl.. Cheryl?" I whispered.

"Oh my God, Oh my God Oh my God, yessssssss!"

"Cheryl? Are you there?"

"I know, I'm just sooooo excited! What? There will be other concubines also? Well they can go fuck themselves, oops- ahhahaa I mean they can do whatever they want but my moves will be the best on Alexander!"

"CHERYL?!"

"Ah, give me a moment, ladies... Hey Cors, what sup?"

"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA I AM GOING TO DIE?!"

"That's all? Well, poor you would return to the twenty-first century according to the last message that popped in the AI book. So no worries. Okie byyeee."

And she hung up.

I imagined killing her in her sleep and slumped back in defeat. The haystack I sat on dipped further, making me sit straighter than before.

It would be totally embarrassing if I get squished down the loose hay. It wasn't a bean bag after all. I tried on another one.

"Hey Lorenzo, you there?"

The sound of metal clashing with metal clanked in my head.

"Lorenzo, what are you doing?"

"Hey, Coretta. Got no time to talk, babe.''

"You bastard! What should I do to explain I'm not after your Ira? She's throwing herself at me!"

Metal clank!

"Why doesn't your bitch ass self understand this?!"

Metal clank!

"You moron!"

Metal clank!

"Fuck you!-"

I hung up.

"Hello, Aarmen?"

His call went to voicemail where he had left a message
"Busy studying with Euclid."

So he really found that great mathematician. I sighed heavily before contacting the last straw.

"Dunkin?"

A disgusting voice filled my head. Someone was puking the hell out of themselves.

"I know you are well-versed that a pharaoh's organs are to be taken out before the mummification process but son, who told you to do it?" an old voice gurgled.

"Uh.. I- I thought I could do it, arrrgghhhh!"

More puking voices filled the receiver, and a nauseating sensation covered my stomach.

You know the sick feeling you get when you hear someone puke, that, in turn, starts a puke reaction into yourself.

I gagged and ended the call.

Closing my eyes, I threw my head back to rest against the wooden pole. I breathed deeply.
Exhale, inhale, exhale.

It went on for a minute before I decided to open my eyes.

My heart leapt to my throat.

Master invader stood with his arms crossed, watching me with an emotionless expression.

I realised he had removed his armour, but I couldn't drool over his abs.

The intense structure they made on his torso drove me insane.

My heart, stuck in the throat, was begging to come out and slither across his feet. That was the intensity with which the treacherous organ was beating.

I lowered my gaze, breathing heavily.

I can't handle him if I wanted to survive in this century.

With the stance of a predator, he walked forward. An emotionless hunk who had decided to torture me through his presence itself.

"Read it," he ordered, opening a random page of the AI book in front of my face.

I blinked out, focusing my disturbed conscious on the travelogue. When I was about to speak the information, reality came crashing back on me.

Don't you know this is a sensitive project where we have to keep incognito and not be a part of history in any way?

"I won't," I said, backing out to look straight into his light brown eyes. I may as well die, but giving out information would alter history.

Or that's what I thought.

The look of pure anger told he wasn't expecting this.

Slamming the book shut, he hurled it across the camp in fury. My precious AI book flew across the cramped rag bed and onto the resting collection of swords, making everything tumble down in a crash.

I was scared stiff as a doe caught by a mountain lion.

First, with his physique and now anger. He was so large, when he knelt in front of my seated self, we came face-to-face.

Gripping the sides of my head, he shoved me with such aggression, my head hit the wooden pole. Tears blurred my vision at the impact.

He is a barbarian. Why don't you admit it, poor heart?

"Listen! you uncivilized woman of Egypt," he snarled,
"You do what I say, otherwise..."

There was a pause as a slow grin spread across his jaw.

He brought his fingers to my temple. I flinched at the touch, thinking he was actually going to slap me.

"I know very well how to make a woman speak," his voice lowered to a threatening tone.

"Would you want me to use other alternatives?"

My breath hiccuped shakily through the tears, chest turning heavier by the second.
The tears flowed freely this time because never was I so afraid in my life.

Just imagining what he was implying brought a chill down my back. I shook my head vigorously, trying to stop the waterfall that only showed my weakness.

A pleased expression settled on his stone-carved face, to know he had threatened another woman into submission.

But I wouldn't let him buy it.

Say it with adrenaline that I sucked up a ragged breath and alleged the truth on his face.

"This is how you prove your manliness? By hurting helpless women who are clearly weaker than you?!"

He didn't expect the anger in my voice, despite the tear-stained face. Standing up from his bent posture, he marched across the camp, eyes trained on my red ones.

I couldn't figure out what he'd fetched from the rugged cloth wall until he lashed it on the ground.

My blood ran cold.

It was a whip.