The Selection: Bride Of The Dark Dragon

LARA

I didn’t understand at once what was going on but luckily Prim’s reaction was better than mine.

“What the chaos?!” she snapped and looked at the tower behind her. Her beautiful face turned pale, and I knew that it wasn’t a good sign. But deep inside I still kind of hoped that she was just sorry for the beautiful part of the palace and accidental victims of the explosion…

“No…”, she whispered, and I saw guards running in our direction, shouting something, “That’s where they have Council meetings…”

The guards took us into the circle, all of them were shouting something about safety and dungeons… And I just looked at the destroyed tower… There were at least three or four stories there all of which were gone now.

Council… wasn’t it where Prim told me Demir was supposed to be now?

Cold sweat swithered down my spine as I looked into the princess’ eyes and met…coldness. She looked at me with such eerie coldness that I stepped back.

“Demir…”, I squeezed his name out of myself with force, my voice sounding hoarse and broken.

She did not answer but just nodded quietly, confirming my worst fears. And without hesitating or wasting any time, I threw myself out of the guards’ circle and ran in the direction of the explosion.

“Wait!” the princess shouted somewhere behind me but I did not care, “Lara!”

I ran and I ran, feeling b***d pumping through my heart. Everybody seemed disorganized and running in the opposite direction, but I kept going. All I wanted was to find him and make sure that he was fine.

He should be fine! Because… because if something happened to him, I would not be able to live. The thought itself was making me lose breath.

He meant too much. He was…everything! He… I loved him. I loved him so much that I felt pain in my chest.

The huge wide staircase that led to the tower was covered in dust and smoke. And the further I went, the more bodies I saw. Dead people, hurt people… Maids, servants, knights, lords… But I didn’t see him.

“Lara!” Prim grabbed my hand and I turned to meet her angry gaze, “You are not supposed to be here! In events like this, you need to follow assigned guards and…”

She stopped talking, her eyes somewhere behind my back, and the amount of horror and pain in them was overwhelming. Brighta, Goddess of Light, tell me she didn’t see him! Tell me it wasn’t Demir that she looked at with such an expression…

The princess pushed me away and ran to a man lying under pieces of stone in black clothes and I felt how everything inside of me died… His hands were lifeless when the princess started to remove the bricks around him.

I choked on the air around me that smelled of smoke and death. Tears blurred my vision when two strong hands grasped me and turned me forcefully.

“Lara!” Demir looked at me with worry in his eyes, his hands roaming my small frame, checking for potential damage, “What are you doing here?!”

He pressed me against his hard and warm body and I breathed in his scent for the first time, my fingers digging into his flesh. Alive! He was alive!

“Oh, thank Goddess!” I whispered and then looked at him through wet lashes, “Demir, I thought… I… Prim found a body and…”

I pointed in the direction of the princess who was now dirty from all the work she was doing with her guards and we hurried to her.

“Ryker!” Demir kneeled next to his friend and in just a few seconds got his body out.

“Brother!” Primrose bit her l*p, “Is he…”

“To the healer!” the emperor commanded and disappeared in dark flames. The princess ran past me and I followed her even though she wasn’t happy about it.

We walked for quite some time before we entered a spacious room full of beds and I realized that this was the healers’ wing. Demir was already there, next to Ryker’s bed and an older man was trying to heal the young gerdian.

“How is he?” Primrose sat on the edge of the small bed and took Ryker’s hand, squeezing it.

“He’ll live,” was all that the emperor said.

“But what was it? What happened exactly?!” I managed to ask the question that was really bothering me. The brother and sister looked at me with a tense expression. And it did not escape me that Prim was not happy to see me. She stared at me as if I was an eyesore and I had no idea why.

“It was an assassination attempt,” Demir sighed and looked away.

“But who did they try to kill?” I wondered and got no response, figuring it out on my own, “You?! Demir, they tried to kill you?!”

“It’s all right, Lara,” he said softly, “Don’t think about it. It doesn’t matter anymore. I wasn’t even there. They miscalculated.”

“But Ryker was there!” Prim interjected and glared at me as if it was my fault.

A sudden thought came to my mind, “Wh-who did this?”

They did not answer and a chill went down my spine.

“Was that…someone from the White Archipelago?” I demanded as if I had any rights to do that.

“No, of course not,” Demir came closer and brushed his palm over my cheek, “Don’t overthink it, Lara. It has nothing to do with you.”

“If you say so,” Prim chuckled darkly, and I did not like it. She was blaming me for some reason, and I had no idea why.

But looking at how worried she was for the man on the bed, I knew it was not the right time to ask. However, I felt that something was wrong. They knew more than they were telling me.

“Prim,” Ryker whispered but in the quiet room the words echoed and the princess’ cheeks turned red even though she pretended that she did not hear it. I glanced at the emperor and he seemed to be surprised with everything that was going on. But then he turned to me and took my hands, “Lara, I need to get back there and check on the rest. Primrose will take care of Ryker but I want you to stay in your room and not leave. All right?”

“All right,” I nodded. The last thing that I wanted was to become a nuisance. I could find out the truth behind everything later.

Dark flames surrounded me and in just seconds I found myself in my bedroom, with Lisa and Sandra worried sick for me.

“My lady!”

“Thanks to the chaos you are all right!”

They both looked genuinely happy with me being safe and started chatting about everything that they knew so far.

“It was definitely an attack by the reds!” Sandra insisted.

“Impossible!” Lisa splashed her hands, “Inside the palace?! They can’t get in here! That was an accident!”

I went to my balcony and looked at the destroyed tower that was visible from here. Three stories gone… did not look like an accident to me.

I waited and waited that night, but Demir did not arrive. I took one of the books that he gave me recently with the name “The Last Dragon’s Heir”, hoping to find some useful information in there. And my cheeks flushed again at one of the scenes at the very beginning… That…dragon emperor was definitely choosing provocative books for me on purpose. However, it helped to kill time as I was captivated by the unusual story and I didn’t notice how the sun rose again…

The dark flames of dark magic appeared before my eyes and I jumped off my seat…