With a dash that was so quick, even her shadow could not follow, Clara sprinted on her heels and tore away in the opposite direction. Cursing under his breath, Zach shot after her- fast. The petite girl tore through the estate grounds like she had swallowed rocket fuel or something. Her feet barely seemed to touch the ground as she effortlessly avoided slamming into the grounds keepers.
With clear unbriddled excitement, she giggled happily as a couple of sheep, and a cart of cabbages nearly toppled her over. And yet, somehow, despite Zach desperately praying that she would at least stumble, Clara sailed through every obstacle like a little daredevil.
Zach swore hoarsely and called after her in a more than serious tone;
"This is no fuckin' joke Clara! Get back here! NOWW!!!"
Damn, how could a cold blooded killer like her be so petulant?! He wondered.
Really, Zach was literally trying to protect her from hurting herself. After all, just one misstep, and she could activate the high-density plasma blade.
The ruckus and noise both Zach and Clara had made in their little temple run, had attracted the attention of just about everyone. Unfortunately, the audience interpreted the scene in a totally wrong way.
"Heavens! Did you see??? Mistress Clara is running for her life!!"
"What?"
"It's that man, that one who practices dark magic! He wants to kill her!"
"Heavens!"
"He had the madness in his eyes! The blood rage from taking too much blood!"
"Oh no. I knew he was bad news."
"He wants to drink her blood, I'm sure of it!"
With Zach on her heels, Clara bounded down a narrow alley with firm sturdy walls on each side. Zach doubled up, thinking maybe he could get lucky and grab her if he lunged at her. But the alley way soon burst into an open street. Clara burst out at the other side unscathed.
Unfortunately for him, Zach unknowingly ran straight into a very powerful, armored knee. It slammed right into Zach's chest, almost knocking the wind right out of him. But at the dying moment, his instincts kicked in to block. Even that was hardly enough.
His stumbled back a couple of step, feeling the full weight of the assault in his arms. Then, his assailant emerged from the corner, bearing down on Zach. The man offered Zach his own version of highborn hospitality by introducing his right foot to Zach's chest- again.
Instinctively, Zach raised his two hands in an 'X' like manner. He ended up blocking the kick, but once again, the kickback sent him sliding back by a couple of steps. Now Zach was pissed. Who in the hell is this? Zach thought. And why is he attacking me like I stole his wife?
The two began to encircle each other. The setting sun in the distance cast their shadows on the ground- long and menacing. Then, with impressive quickness and agility, the attacker lunged at him at full speed, and swung his heavily armored right arm, hoping to smash Zach's jaw in the process. Zach easily ducked. But as he did, he realized the first arm had been a feint, designed to drive him in the direction of the mean punch coming from the left.
Zach navigated a dangerous curve in an equally grand maneuver, and at the same time, struck out with his elbow, hoping to smash the rib cage under the assailant's exposed arm. It landed home. But not with sufficient power, because he himself had not been one hundred percent balanced.
All this had happened within the blink of an eye. Zach could sense the other man's bloodlust and could not tell why he was so enraged. But he was more than willing to return his bloodlust back upon his own head. He readied himself, as did the other armored freak. Just as they were about to close in on each other, they both felt a small, but powerful hand, grab her arms.
"Why can't boys play nice for five seconds without trying to kill each other?"
It was Clara.
"Easy. . . " she turned to the other guy; "We're all friends here."
Armored dude took off his helmet, revealing a fine aristocratic-like face with a haughty set of eyes.
"Clara, I assumed this peasant was trying to harm you," he sheathed his sword. "I could not just stand by and watch."
Zach growled; "Boy did you just call me a peasant?"
"If I had known you were a peasant, I would not have wasted my breath on you." He shrugged nonchalantly; "I have dogs for that. Staining my royal tunic with your blood is a crime punishable by death---" He added dramatically; "Even if you're dead already."
Clara had to step in now. "Come on babe, you need to dial back your bravado by about a thousand percent."
Zach's left eye twitched. Babe?
Violet, who had heard about the ruckus, rushed in at that point. She caught Zach's confusion and swiftly made to remedy the situation;
"Zach please stand down. This is all a big misunderstanding."
He swung towards her; "You think?"
She ignored his sarcasm.
"This is Prince Luke, a good and trusted friend of ours from childhood." Then to Luke, she said; "And this is our friend Zach. He's the one who helped with my father's healing."
Both men sized each other up, but with completely opposite reactions. As soon as Zach heard the word 'prince,' he immediately tensed up.
Clara got flustered as soon as she saw sparks flying between the prince and Zach. She didn't want Zach to have any misunderstanding regarding her or her family. The presence of a prince could lead him to some negative opinions. Therefore she intervened immediately.
"Don't think too much." Clara whispered in a voice that was unusually sweet and enticing.
Zach jerked his head towards her in an attempt to figure out what this little imp was up to this time. These days he had been pestered and tortured in so many different ways that he couldn't bring himself to trust Clara to be serious this time.
"Prince Luke doesn't have as good a relationship with the royal family. For as long as we remember, he hasn't been back to the capital or to any branch of the royal family close by in a very long time. So there is no need to raise your guard like this."
Of course Zach wouldn't believe her so easily. He needed to verify this as well before putting down his guard in front of a stranger that had royal roots. He had a family now and he had to think of their well being along with his. He couldn't afford another exodus. His people wouldn't be able to bear it.
The sharpness in his eyes wasn't hidden from Clara. She knew he was having a hard time believing her due to his previous grudges with the royal family.
She didn't blame him for that. Instead she felt like she had to slowly get him to believe her.
"Prince Luke is a childhood friend of my elder sister and mine. We trust him and you can trust him too. He definitely won't let us down just for the royal family."
As she expected, Zach's fierce expression from earlier eased out a bit. Even though he kept running away from her routinely, he still listened to her from time to time when she wasn't playing around.
Prince Luke witnessed how close Clara seemed to be with Zach. She was not only whispering sweetly in his ear but was also clinging to his arm from the side as if she was afraid that Zach would run away from him.
He wondered why she was running away from him like that previously. Of course others were going to misunderstand when a man would go around chasing a petite woman like Clara with that bloodthirsty look in his eyes.
Still, Prince Luke didn't believe that it would be right to voice out those thoughts at this moment. Since he had done something wrong and had misunderstood Zach, he needed to apologize. This was the basic courtesy he was expected to adhere to as a role model among his generation.
"I am extremely sorry for not realizing that you two were acquaintances. Had I known, I would have tried to befriend this young friend. I apologize for attacking you without understanding the circumstances and for jumping to conclusions on my own."
Zach didn't expect that a haughty prince would be able to bow down and apologize so sincerely. Zach had already spent some time in a leadership position and he trusted his ability to judge people's character. Prince Luke appeared to be quite sincere as he accepted his mistake which was a rare thing to do for someone in a position of power. Moreover, there was no guile or deceit in his eyes.
Unknowingly, the caution and the distance in Zach's expression eased by a lot which was caught by the prince as well.
"But I was quite surprised earlier. You are pretty sturdy for a weak looking guy. Anyone who fell for your appearance is definitely in for a surprise. How do you train your close quarter combat techniques? I was almost done in by you if not for the element of surprise on my side."
Prince Luke complimented Zach on his skills. It was a way for him to show his admiration for Zach's talent and also a method to sweep the previous misunderstanding under the rug.
Zach on the other hand would have easily believed it if Clara had told him that Luke wasn't a prince but a swordsman.
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