Rags To Royals (Royal #1: Book 1) | ✔

67

-• i like you •-

Ignoring the way my heart begins to race at his words, I ask him, "Why did you do that?"

His response is nonchalant. "Do what?"

"Take the blame for my mistakes." I clarify, knowing he already understood my question. But okay, if he wants to prolong the conversation by stringing around baselessly, I've no qualms.

"I don't know." He states.

My brows pull together, befuddled at his reply. "What do you mean by you don't know?"

"Can I see you tonight, Princess?" He asks, taking me aback with the question.

"What?"

"I need to see you tonight. I'll come to you."

"When?"

"When it's the right time."

"So in the dark?" I guess.

"Yes. When it's dark."

I lick my dry lips and sit down on the bed to take a deep breath. His words were starting to drown me. Yet the way he said it, rejuvenated my every inch. "Rudra,"

He hums.

"Why is that not your name?"

He falls quiet.

"What is your name?"

"Should you know my name, to know me?"

I let out a shaky breath. "Isn't that how world works?"

"I didn't really see much of world." He replies. "And still, I saw enough."

"You didn't." I murmur.

"Is there a good side to it?" He whispers.

I shift back on the bed and rest my head on the headboard. "There's a beautiful side to it."

I've no idea how we ended up talking about this when we started from questions and accusations, but my heart feels at peace in here, it settles down in my chest, willing to beat in synchrony of his breath.

"I never knew."

"Now you do." I add softly.

"What it's like?"

"It's pretty sad," I nod, smiling painfully. "There's longing, and memories, and hopes and dreams, and there's pain in every moment, and unexpected smiles, it's tripping and exhilarating, you dance and you laugh, and you sit by the river, hearing the sound of ripples, but then you turn on the loud music and sway to the flashing lights. You taste the bitterness to intoxicate yourself and you watch others stumble to feel better about yourself. But you also hold hands and stroll through the park, you play with kids and buy them balloons. You watch them giggle and hear it thrum within your bones. You share and you steal, but at the end of the day, you dream, and you hope, and you unexpectedly smile. Because it's tripping and it's exhilarating."

"It's really pretty sad."

"But it's still pretty." I mumble.

"Is that your version of this world?"

"Version?" I repeat. "Versions are fixed and perfected, world cannot be fixed and perfected. It's my side of the world. The one I see, the one I live in, would love to live in forever."

"Oh,"

"What's your side of the world?"

"Dark." He whispers. "It's selfish, with grimy walls that smell, no- no, they reek. They reek of dishonesty, deception, and false promises. And blood, it's everywhere. In everything. Touched and stained. It's what a battlefield would like after a war. Naked swords, drenched in blood, abandoned by their warriors. Murky days swallowed by grey skies, wisps of smoke permeating the air as bodies burn and burn and burn, and then ashes. You walk through them, and they cling to your feet, creeping into your skin, someone's flesh and bones, now sticking to your soul. You don't know who among them you killed or who among them stood by your side, but you don't stop to wash it off, you charge forward with it, into another battlefield, ready to fight another war."