96 Invisible String
Ruby found herself walking aimlessly and mindlessly. She was dragging her bare feet on the roads, fields, and woods for she didn’t know how many days.
She didn’t know where she was going or what she was doing. She was in a state of trance.
All she knew in her heart was that she had to reach somewhere. There was this constant pull that she felt in her heart, almost as though she was tied by an invisible string and someone was pulling the other end of that string.
And with each day that passed, she could feel that she was closer and closer to her destination. She started to move her bleeding feet even faster when she felt the pull getting stronger. She needed to find the one who was tugging on her heart.
‘I’m close...’ a voice resounded in her subconscious mind.
And she kept on heading forward until she bumped her head on someone’s rock-hard chest.
“Ahh!” She pressed her palm against her forehead and rubbed it.
“Are you okay?”
She looked up when she heard the sound that felt like music to her ears. She saw a young man who was so attractive that she had to hold her breath to look at him. He had shoulder-length raven black hair, a perfectly carved face structure with a distinct jawline, and a pair of beautiful amber eyes.
.....
Ruby had no idea how and why she was standing in front of that man. Not long ago, she remembered being in so much pain that she thought death would be an easier option.
But now, she felt as though she was already in Heaven because, for one, she wasn’t feeling any pain in her body except in her feet. And next, she thought that the man in front of her was an angel.
“You are hurt...” she heard that man’s angelic voice again. And she finally started to breathe again.
The angel turned to look at another man who was standing behind him. And that man left after he got some instructions.
Ruby’s angel looked at her again. He looked at her from head to toe, and then asked, “Are you... lost? You don’t look like you are from here.”
Ruby finally looked at her surroundings, only to find that she was in a place that she didn’t recognize at all. The people there also looked different than her. Most of them had a bit tanner skin and shiny black hair. And their accent also sounded somewhat different than what she was used to hearing.
She turned to look at the man whom she had thought to be an angel and replied, “I... don’t remember...”
That man looked sorry for her. He led her to a bench and asked her to sit down. And when she did, he asked her again, “You don’t remember anything about you?”
“I was sick. And after that...” Ruby tried to recall how she ended up in this new place but she couldn’t. All she recalled was the feeling that she was forgetting something important. And it made her really uncomfortable.
She tightly closed her eyes and shook her head in an attempt to push that discomfort away. And she completed her sentence, “After that, I don’t remember anything.”
“Do you remember where you are from?” that man asked her again.
And she replied, “I am from Silver Keep.”
He nodded. But it looked like he had no idea where that place was. He was about to ask her something when the man who had run off earlier returned with a box in his hand.
Ruby’s angel then asked that man to clean the wounds on her feet.
That man instantly knelt in front of Ruby and helped her with her wounds.
Her angel then opened the box and took out a really beautiful pair of brown shoes with short wooden heels. He placed them in front of her feet and asked, “Wear them. A lady shouldn’t be walking around bare feet.”
“They are for me?” she looked at that expensive-looking shoes and asked in disbelief.
“Yes. Try them on.”
She tried the shoes. And it was a perfect fit for her as if they were made just for her.
That man then praised her, “It looks good on you. Think of it as a gift from me.”
“Thank you for your kindness,” she said in a soft whisper while looking at her new shoes.
Ruby still couldn’t believe that this place wasn’t heaven. No one had ever been so nice to her, especially not someone who looked like an angel from Heaven.
She then looked up at him and asked innocently in order to confirm that she wasn’t dead, “Am I in heaven?”
That man suddenly inhaled sharply, almost as if he was startled awake from his dream. And he immediately looked away from Ruby.
Just when she was thinking that she was in a dreamland, she felt her heart shattering when that angel rudely dismissed her, “I think you should go back to where you came from.”
And just like that, he turned around without even sparing a glance at Ruby and walked away as fast as he could.
“Yes,” Ruby whispered monotonously. She had again entered the state of trans. And she got up to return back to her home.
But a voice was screaming in her head to follow that man she had just met. It was telling her that he was the one she was supposed to meet and then stick by his side until her last breath. But at the same time, another voice was telling her to follow his order.
Ruby felt like tearing her head apart because the voice was getting too loud in her head.
And suddenly, she snapped and screamed uncontrollably.
“Shut up!”
Ruby felt a tight slap across her face.
The stinging pain finally woke her up from her dream. And when she opened her eyes, she sadly found herself tied in that dungeon.
‘It was all a dream?’
Ruby felt like crying her eyes out. She wasn’t ready to come back to her painful reality yet. The dream had provided some solace to her heart, at least until before it ended badly.
But now that she was back inside the dungeon with a pair of red eyes glaring down at her, she wondered why she didn’t die from that fever that she got after getting bitten by that large dog.
Ruby suddenly furrowed her brows because something clicked in her mind.
‘That dog... why did it have the same pair of eyes as that man in my dreams?’
Ruby widened her eyes in suspicion. By now, she had some guesses as to what kind of creatures the werewolves were based on what she had heard from the vampires and based on some changes that she had felt within herself.
The vampire who had slapped her was still standing in front of her and giving a hateful glare to her for no apparent reason.
Ruby dismissed his demeaning glare and said with haste, “I remember! I remember a few details. Whom do I need to say it to?”
“To the King, obviously.” That guard rolled his eyes at Ruby and turned to gesture at another guard to inform the King.
He looked back at Ruby again and then warned her, “When His Majesty comes here again, make sure to respectfully bow to him. And if you try to pull off the stunt as earlier, I will kill you even if His Majesty decides to spare your life. You filthy dogs have no rights here.”
—
“Will you tell me what’s going on with you, Eve?” Alexander couldn’t stand his friend pacing back and forth in the room for an hour straight. “Maybe I can help you if you tell me what your problem is. Is something going on back at home?”
Everard shook his head without even sparing a glance at Alexander. And he continued to walk around, trying to figure out why he was feeling so restless.
‘Did something bad happen to Anna? Or did something happen to my father?’ He sighed and pushed his black hair away from his face.
He looked out of the window to see if he could see any of his messengers bringing some bad news to him.
At the moment, he didn’t see anyone from his window. But he still felt that something was definitely not right and that the bad news was going to arrive soon. ‘Why am I getting this feeling that something bad happened to someone who is close to my heart?’
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