Keeping Three Husband In Another Life

#2 - Where Am I (2)

~ Chapter 2 ~

This handsome man with red ruby eyes stares deep into my soul. He has this smile, the kind that will make you forget about all your nightmares. That red ruby of his tuck beautifully inside the swollen eye sockets from days of crying, and yet it still formed a crescent moon when he smiles— His hand cup the side of my face and the unknown thirst within me peacefully subdue, his touch is so tender and loving make me yearn for him more.

"Na..?"

"You look so tired?"

He takes both of my hands and kisses them continuously to ensure the warmth that once has been lost is back. I silently stared at him and summed up the situation that had occurred. Archduke Julius is the first name that mentions by the maid when I first woke up. He came in with tears in his eyes, his breath is out of rhythm from sprinting to my side, and the ways he sweeps my hair with so much affection indicate that he is my father. 

My heart tightens a little to the thought of having one. I had never known what a parent's affection was before in my life, which made me want to cry in happiness.

"Da-da?"

A slip of a tongue like a mild wave that touches the shore of the man's heart, he blinked his eyes slowly before he whisper to me with kisses.

"Yes... Dada"

His smile getting brighter than before, just one word from me swept all fatigue away from his tired face. The maids looking at us in relief, the side of their lips jumping in the air as if their first time smiling in a long time.

"What happens before to make all of them react this way?"

I thought to myself while I let the man's warm body collide with mine, in the midst of these happy crowds, my eyes catch a glimpse of priest Charles's pale almost blue face like the air has been sucked out from his body. Priest Charles stood silently with fear sitting on his face, our eyes met, and he spells "What are you?" with his mouth. 

He stares into my eyes like he tries to communicate. He makes those faces like he wants to believe that I understand every word that spills out of his mouth. He makes me question all that happens since I open my eyes to this strange world.

"Are you a Godsend, or are you another curse?"

"What the fuck he meant by that!"

A sound out of nowhere reverberates inside my head, like a hoarse man's voice in his forty's. I jump for a second when the voice tries to call out to me but when my eyes met with priest Charles, at that moment I knew that it is him. I lay there and wait for him to explain more.

"A curse crippled the prince's soul, and only a fragment of his weak soul happens to remain— before the curse eats away all of him, you come and eat the curse instead. What are you? "

 He looks around his surrounding to make sure no one watches, even though the maids are all focused on Archduke Julius, the knight looking at him confused. 

"Can you understand me?"

He says that with his lips, and I nodded my head, this one-way conversation ended just like that.  He turns his body to Archduke Julius and asks for his permission to research the curse that has fallen upon this prince Lunarvi on the palace's private library.

"Do you mean the cursed still remains in his body?"

"Yes, I'm afraid that is the case, but rest assured the worst has already passed... for now."

"The same thing will happen again?"

"Usually, the cursed will get weaker as the young prince get older, but in this case, I can't ensure in one hundred percent that this is the same case as the other curse."

Archduke Julius pauses for a second before calling the knight. His voice appears different; it's cold, heartless even. Two knights standing at the door walk to his call. 

"Find out which one of them did this, don't let the King know, we will correct them ourselves... And tell the house to be ready for retaliation."

"Yes, your highness."

The four of them stand not far away from the rest of the maids and me. Therefore we can hear everything they say. Archduke Julius's back is facing me, but his piercing cold voice gave me a clue to how pissed he is right now. Some of the maids panicked and look worried.

"Priest Charles, I will ask you again, from the four houses, which one of them you gave your loyalties to?"

"My family will always and ever be loyal to the House of El, and so do I."

The whole act in front of my eyes makes me shudder in disbelief. How can that loving man turn to this loathsome individual? I can see the side of Archduke Julius's face when he turns to see priest Charles bow down on his knee and declare his loyalties, the handsome man from before smile in the most wicked way possible, the dark atmosphere and the unusual surrounding scared me. What would happen next is a question that I wouldn't dare to ask.

"Da... da..."

The handsome man turns his head to my voice that calls for him. The cruel eyes on that red ruby iris slowly fade, but the fragment of it remains. He walks to me and caresses my hair.

"I'll get back at them, my child, a thousandfold."

"Nyo!"

"Revenge will only make everything worse."

I have lived a fair amount of years, revenge will only satisfy the ego and ruin people inside out. My heart is beating for this man and if possible don't want anything bad to happen to him. He is silent for a brief moment and looked at me carefully with a puzzled face when I acted like no baby could do. Suddenly priest Charles slips his way in and disrupts archduke Julius' newly formed doubt.

"I believe young prince Lunarvi wants to say that your highness should stay for a little longer beside him."

Archduke Julius looks at priest Charles with one brow lifted in distrust as he squints and scans the priest in front of him that looks rather fidgety. Archduke Julius gets back to me and gazes deep within my eyes.

"I think he understands every single word I speak."

My heart almost collapses at that moment, he looks at me like a cold-blooded meat-eater, a different being that does not look anything close to human. 

"P-prince Lunarvi is in the age where he started to perceive the world with his ears and eyes. Maybe what we did startle him... a little."

"Hmm... Maybe, you are right, Charles."

I try my best to keep an innocent laugh just like a dumb infant while he slowly turns back to normal. I stare at my small hand and talk to myself, what if he notices the sweat that trickles down my back, how much powerless I am in front of that vicious eyes, would he kill me if he found out that I'm not his beloved child? all the horrible outcomes that could happen to me if he found out about it swim at the back of my mind, pollute me with fear.

"Furthermore, young prince Lunarvi is not in his fittest condition and will ask for your highness to pamper him more."

The priest throws a whole lot of sugary excuses to subdue archduke Julius' doubt on me... yet now I'm the one that started to doubt my own existence and priest Charles's action. Is it their plans or coincidence? if they plan to kill this Lunarvi, then It doesn't make sense to doubt priest Charles. What if they just want to roll down this Lunarvi without killing him? Then obviously, priest Charles is their accomplice. Replacing his soul to a common and pitiful one that happens to be there. 

"But that still doesn't make sense. Why me? I'm not even from this world... Maybe... and somehow... Am I really a Godsend?"

Thinking this deeply makes my head hurt, I'll just leave it as a God blessing in the meantimes. I reach my hand towards him and call him once more with my most adorable voice.

"Dada... hehe."

A/n Don't forget to shower this chapter with like too.