Diana Of Alcotta (Yrsoreth Chronicles 1)

27 ♔ A Dagger on Her Thigh

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Present day.

"You must have heard," Diana said. She did not look at him nor move an inch. She remained seated on her bed, hugging her folded knees.

The image of her hunched back, that seemed smaller than already was and her hair sprawled like a black frozen waterfall, looked vulnerable.

"...I did.," Xander, who had his list of questions, could not remember them in order.

Truth or not, the rumors wouldn't matter. In fact, it would be more beneficial to him. After all, some proper nobles that he recruited to his side will be more willing for their daughters to be his queen. Now that his friend Therese was slowly being freed from Niccolus, she too is a possibility. Their deal will end soon, and Diana wished nothing from him aside from what they agreed.

Yet, he was a ball of nerves and all levels of anger and relief. He had just come from meeting Avelyn and Bludis to confirm his suspicions. After much persuasion, to the point of begging, Avelyn was able to reencounter the night he was drugged. "Your fiancee looked like her, Pamela. It was four years ago, Your Highness, but I would never forget the face of my savior."

He must have known it at the back of his head. When she sang the lullaby, and her fidgety attitude back in the bar with Bludis were the signs. Avelyn mistook her for Pamela, the mysterious prostitute that became his savior because it was her, just across the room from him.

Xander took a step forward to her bed and finally faced her. From the blocked view of the window, Diana looked up to him and said, "We meet again, Your Highness."

He did not respond to her jest. Instead, Xander stared at her, extremely well. From the beautiful arc of her brows, the fine point in her nose to the slightly parted plump mouth—how could he forget?

He may have been drugged, but how could he not recognize her? Her touch, her voice, the smoothness of her skin.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Diana tilted her head to the other side, looking away from him at the same time. "There was no need. I would have taken the secret to my grave."

For a moment, Xander wanted to thank  Queen Claudette. If it weren't for her planned rumors, he would have never found out Diana's past.

He bent on his knees. This time, he was looking up at her. "Why, Diana?"

The latter smiled, but it didn't reflect her eyes. "Oh my, Your Highness, as a future king, you must not kneel to anyone."

A king must only kneel to the queen upon oath of marriage, never to a woman who sold herself for gold.

"Diana!" he screamed in anger.

Only then, the latter frowned. "I'd rather have you remember as your accomplice, Your Highness, not as a whore."

The silence between them was palpable, then broken with the rustles of his clothes as he sat beside her. "Tell me everything four years ago."

"...As you command..." Diana then recounted everything to him. Michael's debt, her rejected tutoring job, and her desperation. She then applied to the brothel and was chosen by Niccolus.  Even how she escaped were told to.

"It was too late when I saw his face. I could not back out too," she said.

Diana, looking away from him, added that the aphrodisiac was so potent that she too was intoxicated. Yet her voice was filled with shame as she apologized to him for taking advantage of his weakness.