(Chapter 3: heated kiss part 2/3)

“What happened next?”

“rumors then spread that I was a cursed child of sinful act of my father that the gods took his wife and his child and because of that my father mistreated my mother more until she died, when I was young, people around the palace treated me like if they touch me, they will be cursed or something so I was always alone”

‘He was like me, we have the same experience’ she said as she blushed at the thought but she forced herself to listen more

“but one day, when I was in the garden the place you were just a while ago, the prince, Alim when he was just a little boy, came to me and I bowed to him as the servants always do but he said this lines to me ‘cousin, why would you bow like a servant, when you are not a servant but a royal blood, stand up and take my hand” 

*flashback*

“Get up my cousin, come on”

“But  my  prince,  we  are  not  related,  I  am  just  a  son  of  a  servant,  a  sex  slave  to  be precise so I am no royal but a servant”

“Oh, come on, your father is my uncle, so his blood is your blood too, and you’re still my cousin”

“Why sire, why would you think highly of me when people around call me a cursed man, aren’t you afraid of me?”

“mortals doesn’t have the right to judge other mortals, even my father, the king need to know first the person or need to learn the truth before he has to judge someone, only the gods have that rights, and for me you’ll  always be my cousin,  when I grow up and become a king. I’ll crown you as the prince and my next heir if I don’t have a child of course, but  if I do have I’ll have you as my advisor instead so people well respect you,”

“But”

“No more buts Ata”

“Yes, and I vow to you forever will be, my loyalty will be in you prince, king or not,”

“Well I bid, that I’ll have a child, I don’t want to use women without love, so I doubt”

“hehehe, I bid 10 copper coins for that”

“Make it 15“

“Deal”

*end of flashback*

“Since then, I was always with him until now, he was the kindest person I’ve ever known, and he never disrespects women, as a symbol of his respect towards me, even though I always tease him”

“Well, I think I really misunderstood him but—“

“But what? Well I need to tell you this, sometimes Alim acts like a woman, when he said something, sometimes it is the opposite of what he really thinks or feel, if he said he hates you so that means he said he loves you” he smiles “ you can’t see it in his actions but you can feel his care,”

When ai-ka heard the words she remembered Hepa’s words about the things that can’t be seen by just an eye and then “wait” Ata, said when he said he hates me that means he loves me, but he actually said he doesn’t like or love so does that mean he likes’ at this thought she blushes ‘and the feeling of warmth on his arm, is his care? Wait… no,no,no don’t think this way’ if she blush pinkish, this time she blushed red as red as a tomato on her thoughts as she remembered the midnight when she kissed the king,

“Did I say something?”

Ai-ka doesn’t want to pick up the topic so when there was a knock she rattled herself to open the door then she stumbled with the prince and now she was pinning the prince under her weight when suddenly

“Ai-ka, little—on-one, Ata?”

“My king!!” said in unison

“WHAT’S THE MEANING OF THIS, Ata is this why you said you have important things to do and you”

The both young teen stand as the king went near them, first the king faced Ata but he faced the girl with a hurt, angry, fuming,

“you’re a WHORE” he said as he almost hit the girl but stopped himself, but even the word itself hurt her much as she haven’t given time to explain things, now the king was mad at her, and not only that she destroyed the relationship between the two cousins,

The king couldn’t express his emotion and he doesn’t want to hurt the girl so he went to leave the two,

But Ata, was following him persistently to let the king listen to him

“My king; please listen to me”

“Why? -- The person I least to think to betray me was you but how could you do this to me”

 “My king please listen to me you misunderstood this, I meant no betrayal to my king and if you want a proof, I am willing to cut my head off as the symbol of my loyalty to you”

“I am have no, hatred towards you, but the woman, she almost killed herself just to escape my warmth, but now she’s a whore, she’s—“

He was cut off when Ata punches him on the face and pinned the king on the wall as he was furious

“my king if you truly LOVE her, you speak no ill to her,-- Is this the new Alim, because the Alim I knew, was the person who doesn’t judge  anyone without knowing the truth yet, if you truly love her, don’t judge her, know the truth first” he said with a loud, angry voice

And it’s new to Alim. As this is the first time he saw his cousin to be mad at him, and it came to his senses, that his cousin was undeniably right, he was wrong. He digs in right away towards his emotion, he quarried into his jealousy and now not only that he hurt the girl he wants but also his beloved cousin

After Ata finished his lines, his senses struck him down and he immediately bowed, heads on the floor as the servant always does for forgiveness

“My king, I am indeed sorry about what I did to you, if you order your men to cut my head off, I’ll accept that but please forgive me”

“Cousin, why would you bow like a servant? When you are not a servant but the crown prince, here stand and take my hand”

“But my king, I hit you”

“Well, I think I really need that to snap out, and besides you’re not the first one to hit me, maybe the law was not applicable to someone that were important to me”

“My king” he said as he took the hand of his king

“Come, talk to me, tell me what happened, and let’s take a nice air in the garden”  

They seated near the small swamp, when they both arrive in the garden and started to talk

“Well what really happened there?”

“Well we were talking about you, I asked her why she hates you and she said you were too arrogant, you spoke ill to her”

“that’s the reason why she hates me, well I guess I admit, I’ve hurt her many times and now, I know I hurt her again, I just want to gain her trust, but Hepa told me to gain her trust is by doing something she never thought I would do, but I can’t think of anything she never knew that I can, is it doing some magic or something more?”

“Apologize to her”

“Huh?”

“Yes, Alim, the thing she would never think you would do is to say ‘sorry’ to her, because you were the king, she will highly doubt that you will ‘express regret’ because she was just a slave”

 “Apologize to her; say sorry to her… express regret do you think… she’ll accept it?”

“Well come to think of it she might if you do it correctly and something special and if you need some help about ‘girl problems’ it is I the king of love and romance”

“Yeah, the king of broken hearts, you got busted 15 times this month, last month was 13 and you think you can help, come on” the king said while chuckling the words,

“Wow, that hurts” Ata said mockingly hurt but then he became serious “do the things correctly Alim cause I think she really likes you”

“Really!!!” the king burst out of happiness when he hears it “tell me why?”

“Hmmmm… Before that, I would like to know if you told her you hate her”

“Yes, I mean I said something like that, why?”

“Well when I said you act like a girl and sometimes what you said is opposite of what you feel, then, I saw her thinking something then she blushed and I was about to ask her, when you knocked on the door and she went panic and I think she wanted to get off the topic so she tried to open the door but she was ‘too clumsy’ that she tripped over onto me and that’s when you enter and misunderstood us”

“Oh, I think I was stupid, I gave in to my feelings that easily, argh…. I kept doing things harder than to make things easier”

“It’s alright my king just try to make things better again, well lets go now and we have to rest as we still have morning rituals tomorrow”

They went inside and the king tried to check Ai-ka, there he saw Ai-ka was definitely hurt because he heard her crying, he felt so much guilt in his heart, how could he hurt the girl he loves not just once but many times and went to his room and tried to sleep with a heavy heart…

It was after his morning rituals he went to do his weekly sparring with his master,

“You’re not in yourself today my king” his master said as he throws some fire balls to the king as the young teen blocks the balls with his shadow form shield

“I am fine, Thoth, I am fine” this time it’s his turn he quickly controlled the shaded part of the place to form into some sharp objects and fire towards his master as his master reversed the attack towards him but he dodges and attack his master with his blade as his master blocks it with his staff,

“I am aware my king, that you have something in your mind that kept your concentration low” the magician released some fire and Alim tried to reverse his attack but when he did the magician fired some form of shadow balls and hit the king, and quickly he runs towards and place his staff on the king’s neck

“well this is the proof that you have a low concentration, this is not good my king, what if enemies came and you have a low concentration, come let’s talk about your problem” the magician said as he helps the king stand and they walked together towards the resting table where the healer was waiting for in case of emergency

“Well, maybe I have a bit of problem but don’t mind with it Thoth” he said as he sits. The so called magician, with brown long hair the was covered with white cloak, look into him, staring him with its violet eyes

“I don’t think it’s a small problem if it kept bugging you”

“It is about the girl you brought sire?” the woman beside the magician asks,

“Yes, Ania,” sighed “well I want to gain her trust as you said to me but it became a lot harder and harder everyday when I—“

“Fall in love, my king?”

“Wait, who’s this girl you were talking about?” The magician asked

“Well my beloved husband, it is the girl the king found on one of his raids and know what” she explains and she whispered something secretly

”what? So it means, did you see this on the future?”

“Shhh---- yes”

“What future Ania?”

“Nothing my king, soon you will find, but now you have to think about your problem ‘love problem’”

He frown but began talking about his problem “she said she hates me because I am too arrogant and selfish, and I speak poorly to her, well I admit yes, but I was mad that times, I always give in to my emotions, “he sighed “Hepa, said I should do something she won’t think I could do and Ata said the thing that she won’t expect me to do was to apologize’,”

“They were right my king, to gain her trust was to let her see that you meant nothing about those words and you’re willing to take back those words” the healer said

“and to earn her love you must take a slow step, first earn her trust, when trust is built friendship will come, friendship sometimes is called the key to open a relationship beyond, you can slowly show her you want her more, and if you do, the right way you can have her” said the magician

“love is something you can’t buy or have, ask, nor force it easily, even a king like you need to earn it, A love that was carefully earned is a kind of relation that isn’t easily broken, but remember this always my king, trust builds any relationship, and this trust is hard to gain but easily breaks and once you break it, it’s hard to gain again and sometimes you can’t never gain it either again,” the healer added

“So I need to earn her trust to earn her love, slowly, step by step, and never break the trust I gain and the key to gain her trust was to say sorry and take back the ill words I’ve said to her but how? I mean, I can’t just say to her ‘hey I am sorry’ or something like that”

“Well that thing is you to think my king, think about something to make her believe on your word”

“Okay, I’ll think, but we should go now our meetings will start soon”

“Yes my king” said unison

The court meeting was the same as always, people tried to convince on trying to get more days to achieve their taxes, others wanting a permission on their products, others about the sentences to give, and others was political aspect, etc. those times his head spin as he thinks about what should he do to make Ai-ka believe on his words, but even he was the wisest king nothing came up on him so he needed his two high ranked council his advisor and his uncle

“May I have a word, on both of you vizier Uab and high council Atef” 

“Yes my king” said in unison

“I’ll ask you what you will do if you want to make an apology and you want that person to believe in you”

“Is this all about the girl you found on your raid, sire? Is this the rumor girl that your fond of?” said by his old vizier,

 “Yes, she is, the girl not just fond but loved”

“but sire, she’s just a slave and what I’ve heard you made her your sex slave, why would you love her, she’s not worthy and besides why would you make amends to her, when she was just a lowly dirty whore” his uncle said with a bit of venomous tone

“DON’T CALL HER A WHORE, SHE’S NOT AND SHE WONT BE, she’s worthy enough with my love because she’s not lowly nor dirty as you said uncle, she’ll be my wife, my great royal wife, your future great queen” he said in incensed tone 

“I am, sorry my lord, I was just concerned about what your people will think about if the rumors say the great king of kemet marries a sex slave”

“I don’t care, I want her, and no else”

“well my king, I would like to remind you, you can’t be too sure about your future, you have to find the person with a phoenix’s birthmark, before that person becomes eighteen, and as I remember it will be a few months by now she’s going to be eighteen and if you don’t still find the one, you won’t live much long if it’s what it really meant about ‘need to find or you have no choice as the book says” the vizier interrupts the heated conversation between the two members of royal family

“well about that” he paused, he was so sure about that Ai-ka is the one but he wants to prove something so he decided to lie “I am still looking for that person ,I gave a command to the soldier to keep finding the one and I have assigned Ata for this”

“Oh, the worthless slave boy” his uncle said in hiss

“DON’T SPEAK, ILL TO HIM WHEN YOU’RE IN FRONT ME, I WON’T TOLERATE ANY DISRESPECT FOR THE PRINCE” He pounced his arms on his throne

“Ok my lord, I was just concerned of you. And he meant nothing for his words. But anyway you asked me how to make an apology” the vizier tried to disperse the king’s anger so he whispered something to the king and the king was amazed on the idea

“You mean, I have to do that, so she would believe the things I would say?”

“Yes, my lord, to gain the trust and believe you, you must let her show you are indeed true with your words by letting her see that on your strongest manner you are willing to bow down to her to make an apology, even if you’re the king of kemet”

“Thanks, vizier Uab, I have to prepare my apology, please go to my room after an hour I want the both of you to be witness of my apology”

“Yes, sire” said in unison”

(Continued on part 3 of this chapter) (Chapter 3: heated kiss 3/3)