Being a man with a Navy Seal's blood running through his veins, Jovan loved the experience of another mission. The promise of another victory. The necessity of the determination to succeed. The discipline that forced him to always level up, regardless of the danger or difficulty of what laid ahead. He trained and strove to never give up until the mission was completed. That was why he chose to become a Navy Seal. Not for the career aspect of it, but for the passion in it.
Oddly enough, Jovan began to see that similar passion in... Anil. Not necessarily of the same level as his, but he could not overlook the way Anil's eyes lit up at the prospect of rescuing his dear friend and avenging his beloved late Lala Şahin Pasha. It surprised Jovan, in the most positive way, to watch Anil become the man he had become since the day they met. If Jovan had to pinpoint the moment Anil changed from a cowardly rabbit into a man willing to listen to his instinct of a brave man, it would have been the moment Anil ended Zoja's existence.
Could Anil have harmed Jovan when he threw his trusted dagger at Jagoda's impostor sister? Of course. Could he have misjudged the dagger's target? Definitely. Could he have miscalculated the dagger's trajectory which could easily have resulted in the dagger missing its mark - or worse: piercing Jovan's chest? Most undeniably. But, it didn't. Why? Because Anil trusted his gut instinct instead of trusting the fear in his mind...
"I say we chain Zora up and let everyone know that we imprisoned her," Anil spoke through his teeth as he stood outside of the Boyana Waterfall with Blagun and Jovan, while they tended to their horses in moonlight.
"He's right!" Blagun nodded with a clenched jaw, agreeing with Anil for what appeared to be a first time in their lives.
"That is out of the question," Jovan shook his head and patted his own horse he had grown fond of. He knew perfectly well how important it was to fill Blagun in on the fact that Jagoda was still missing, and that Zora was the woman hideously pretending to be her sister. He was glad to have gotten the opportunity to do so as soon as he did. And he knew it was best that Blagun was as far away from Zora as possible when he found out about it.
"Why?!?" Blagun asked, and did a poor job of trying to conceal his simmering temper.
"Because if we do, all of the forces loyal to Zora - or threatened into obedience by her - would come after us. We have to use Zora's conceited and narcissistic way of thinking against her," Jovan explained in simple terms, but neither man understood what he meant.
"How?" Anil and Blagun replied in unison.
"Charming," Jovan smirked and clicked his tongue at both men reacting the same way. "We take her mind off Jagoda completely."
"How?" Again, Anil and Blagun replied the same way.
"By helping her with Our wedding preparations," Jovan advised them without looking up as he checked the condition of his horse's hooves.
"What?!?" Anil and Blagun exclaimed, and this time Jovan wasn't surprised at all by their identical responses.
"I proposed to her," Jovan spoke calmly.
"You did not..." Blagun said through his teeth while Anil tried to process the information with a dropped jaw.
"Yes, I did," Jovan replied dryly and winked at Blagun. "With Your ring."
"Which ring?" Blagun asked, confused.
"The ring that Your father apparently received from the late Lala Şahin Pasha," Jovan continued as he walked around the horse to inspect its hooves on the other side.
"The one I gave to Kinga!?!" Blagun snarled with fury.
"Yup," Jovan answered, unimpressed by Blagun's outburst of anger.
YOU ARE READING
THE TIDES OF TIME
Romance⚔️ "Being born and raised to respect life and its rules, Jovan Galanis made something of himself. He was ambitious, outgoing, disciplined, and righteous to his very core. His parents died when he was a young boy, and having been raised by his Macedo...
