TAKEN BY HIM

CHAPTER 5

"Yes!" Gem squealed in glee as she entered her room, ultimately startling Riblah who ended up throwing all the contents on the tray she was carrying to the kitchen.

"Shilla!" Riblah exclaimed holding her palm to her chest in shock. "Did you have to do that?"

"You have no idea why I squealed, if not you would be happy too," Gem said packing some clothes into a bundle. Riblah looked at the amount of clothes she was packing before becoming disinterested and bending down to pick the plates, albeit broken plates and scraping the pieces of food off the floor.

"Aren't you even going to ask?" She huffed.

"No!" Riblah turned to face her "if you want to tell me what happened, I know you will" She shrugged with disinterest.

"Well, my father after over a year of begging has allowed me to come to the village, precisely your house!" She finished smiling at the incredulous look on Riblah's face.

"You're fibbing!" She barked, expecting Gem to laugh obnoxiously and shout, 'I'm lying, silly'. But she didn't and Riblah sat down heavily on the floor.

"I'm not, why do you think I'm packing?" She smiled.

"Wow!" Riblah said before shouting, "no! No way! How come? Your mother? What did she say?" She bombarded Gem with questions, one after the other.

"Well let's just say whenever I want something nearly impossible, I ask them a year early," she beamed tying her bundle up and slinging it over her shoulder, "I've been asking them since last year, and after enough guilt tripping, they agreed."

"But?" Riblah asked, knowing there was definitely a catch to this.

"We have ten guards going with us," she smiled coyly.

"Ten," Riblah whistled appreciatively, "at least its not a whole garrison this time, let me clean up this mess and we will be on our way," she said with so much excitement it was contagious.

"No!" Gem shouted shocking Riblah who dropped the tray again and cursed loudly, Gem only smiled apologetically before continuing, "leave it there, the other servants can do it, let's go before my mother changes her mind," she coaxed Riblah who abandoned the tray on the floor all together and ran out the door, Gem following closely behind her.

Gem had bid her parents farewell earlier in other to avoid emotional blackmail from her mother. And the fact that it was Riblah's house she choose over Baruch's house had sparked her mothers suspicious nature, but with the right words and a whole lot of batting her eyelashes at her mother and even signing a contract that stated the time she was coming back, and consequences if she missed her due date which she was to accept gladly, her mother had agreed to her request.

Baruch was getting very frustrated. Riblah had not spoken to him for a week now.

Only occasionally nodding and pushing him to the limit by bowing down to him in greeting like she was supposed to do when you came across a royal, especially if they were not friends.

He did not understand what he had done wrong. 'Women!' He would suddenly shout which earned him knowing looks from his colleagues.

He hadn't done anything she did not like, and he knew that for a fact because she had allowed him to kiss her for five minutes, and she had eagerly kissed him back.

Going as far as exploring his mouth with her tongue, which had sent him over the moon.

So when he had confessed how he felt, he had not expected a slap and an outburst with tears, tears! That tore him apart with each drop that went down her silky cheeks.