บท 54: 54. Talking and almost ''talking'' :)

''What is this? Everything is so dark...'' He stood there and tried to touch things as sudden darkness made him feel a bit uncomfortable.

She stood next to him and chuckled. ''Uhm...'' She tapped his shoulders. ''Your Highness, just open your eyes.''

he froze and then slowly opened his eyes. ''Cough. I thought I was blind for a second.'' Then his eyes got bigger as he saw a new room. No windows, no doors, no entry, no exit.

She slowly walked towards a chair and table on the side and calmly sat down. On the table stood pot with tea and when she started pouring, the amazing smell hit his nostrils. he quickly walked there and stared at her.

''You use healing herbs as tea? Are you sick?'' He was worried and it could be clearly seen.

She sighed. ''Your Highness, please sit down and drink this a bit. Then I will tell you everything. I really had to bring you here as I had no wish for people to know my story. Please.''

He nodded and sat down looking straight at her face. ''You can start. I will listen.''

From beginning to the end he didn't stop her or interrupt her as she showed all facets of emotions. from despair, hate, love, care until pure disappointment and loss of all emotions.

''...then the Edict came and my brother explained to me that you are dragon in human form. I guess this could be seen as my destiny. I don't want to start a new life with lies and deceit. This place, room or whatever it is, is my sanctuary. If one day I get to be attacked or I just don't want to come back. I will get in here and never come back. It's not a treat, its a fact.'' With a calm face, she looked at the flower that floated on top of her tea and with a slow gesture she sipped a bit of the tea to relax her scorched throat.

His whole being began to shake. To calm himself down he took the teacup with shaky hands and wanted to pick it up but all he could do is to spill the tea. He put it back and just held his hands under the table as he tried to calm down.

Suddenly a soft hand appeared in front of his face and tea fragrance enveloped his senses. ''Drink from my hand if you don't mind.''

Their eyes connected and a slight spark could be feeling that enveloped both of them, but Liu Mei felt shy so she quickly avoided his scorching hot gaze and neared the teacup his lips.

''Drink this. I have no idea about state affairs, but it must be hard handling all those bothersome people. You need to rest and relax your mind as well, or you will get sick. Do you think they care?'' Her soft voice calmed him greatly and he lowered his head and drank the tea.

But the moment she wanted to take it away he grabbed her hand and pulled her towards him. Unfortunately, she was already standing kind of bowed as she tried to help him drink tea so when he pulled her she literally plopped over his knees. She tried to get up but suddenly felt pain. ''Ahhh, what are you doing!?''

He smacked one more time her behind and then straighten her up to pull her back to sit on his lap. He held her tightly while she tried to get out his clutches. ''I do not think that this is appropriate. Please let me stand up.''

He just shook his head and hugged her tighter. ''Sit still or things might happen faster than you think.''

Suddenly she understood his insinuations and stopped moving while her whole face became beet red. ''Your Highness. I didn't ask you to come here for THAT. I wanted to talk about my secrets in peace, but at the same time I didn't want them to hear.''

''Is there someone on your side you don't trust?'' Emperor narrowed his eyes as he stared at her.

She shook his head. ''Not the people in my house, but I have no idea how many enemies you have, my brother has or on the end even I have. They might or might not have the ability to hide in shadows. I know, such thought might be strange, but I certainly could feel people staring at me even at my brother's house. Only in my own home and here not. But they don't have to see me, they might as well listen...''

He looked at her explaining everything while she moved her hands and made all the expressions needed. So cute. He stopped her talk as he neared his face in front of hers and almost touched her lips.

Her breath quickened for second and he could feel her heart beating up faster as light shiver enveloped her whole body. He patted her back and smiled. ''I am not a bad person. To become Emperor I had to be aggressive and mean. Even ruthless in some situations. But I still try to think the best for my people.'' He sighed.

Liu Mei relaxed seeing that he had no intention to go to the next step. She slowly stood up as she saw that he relaxed his arms and quickly sat opposite him. ''I know. Or no Edict could make me come here. Literally.''

He knew she really meant that. Her clear eyes were like doors to her soul. Wide-open, showing all her emotions clearly. He liked that about her since the first moment. ''Liu Mei. I really like you. Unfortunately, my situation now is... I really need time to clean some people up, but for that, I need to make their eyes get even greedier than they are now. For a while, I will maybe ignore you or even neglect you. Maybe even something worse. To protect you I need to do many things that normal people wouldn't do to their beloved. But that is the only way for me to protect you. Please trust me. No matter what, please trust me.''

Liu Mei sighed. ''Then it is as you want. I will do things accordingly to the things that will start happening around me. I will trust you. One year. I give you one year to clean up everything. If you can't do that, let me go. I won't be able to handle longer than that.''

He stood up and with just two steps came to her. He lowered his head and with the strange deep voice, he whispered. ''The moment you give yourself to me, no heaven or hell will be able to take you away. To leave me in ten years, you can forget that. I won't let it happen. Ever.''

She was so stunned that she made them come back to the room and wanted to back off again, but only with one step he captured her again and this time, there was no escape...