♛Shadows Lurk♛ Darkiplier x Reader

« ♡ » Chapter 11 - The Letter

Dark dipped his pen into the inkpot placed delicately at the top of his desk, resuming the sentence he had been writing on the page of a small journal; it was a plain leather-bound book with several wads of crisp, lined paper tucked neatly inside, not a single page out of place.

Anti blurred into the room suddenly, and Dark looked up from his writing.

"Anti, why can you never knock?" He asked in an exasperated tone.

"Sorry, I just always forget to I guess." Anti noticed the small book on Dark's desk. "What's that, your diary or somethin'?" he leaned forward to get a better look at it but Dark closed the book over.

"That's none of your concern. What did you want to speak to me about?"

Anti straightened up, rubbing the back of his neck. "It's uh... about the human," he started, looking off to the side.

Dark tightened the grip he had on the pen in his hand, and Anti almost thought it would break in two.

"If you're here to inform me that she has escaped then you can see yourself out before I rip you to shreds myself," Anti could see how much effort it was taking Dark not to snap at him.

"What? No, the lass hasn't escaped. You think I'm that terrible at me job?" Anti added indignantly. "I came to talk to you because..." he trailed off.

Dark took a deep breath to calm himself, placing the pen on his desk. "Because?"

"Because I have a... proposition for you," Anti concluded confidently.

Dark sighed. "I've had about enough of people trying to tell me how to act towards that menace," he said. "If your next statement is anything along those lines then I implore you to shut up." Dark sounded tired, rubbing his eyes.

"No, of course not! Nothin' like that!" Anti said.

"Are you sure?" Dark looked up at him.

"Well..." Anti looked off to the side again.

"Honestly, Anti, now is not the time." Dark stood from his chair, grabbing the notebook off his desk as he walked to the door. "Pester me any other time you wish, but not now."

"I guess it's not that important, but that's why I thought I'd tell you now! So that you'd be able to mull over it for a while..."

"Anti, please," Dark said again. "I truly do not have time for this."

"So ye want to hear Die out but not me? That'd be right," Anti said, becoming frustrated.

"Anti," Dark stopped walking, turning to face his friend. "You know that's not what I meant,"

"No, no, by all means, go and do whatever you need to, it's clearly more important than me," Anti said.

Dark sighed again. "I've written a response to the other rulers." He said.

"What?" Anti dropped his petty attitude. "What did you say to them?"

"I told them..." Dark paused. "...that if they want to question Die's loyalty to the kingdom, then they're effectively questioning mine. I said that there would be no more talk of Die's behaviour under my rule and that I was perfectly fine determining his intentions myself."

"Holy shit..." Anti breathed. "What did they say?"

Dark shook his head. "What can they say? If they dare question my word they know it won't be good for them- any of them. So hopefully that quiets them for a while. At least until I can figure something more permanent out."

"Like what?" Anti asked.

"I'm not sure yet."

The room fell silent.