Chapter 165

The taste of Ka'ik's blood was a mix of forbidden pleasure.

The second Delice was able to snap out of the temptation, she pulled away, her lips completely smeared with the evidence of her mistake. Ka'ik's red eyes were dazed and he slumped to the floor as soon as she stopped rendering him her support. She sprinted out of the bar room and when she heard him call her name like a faint whisper carried to her by the dry, suffocating air of a graveyard, she didn't look back.

An ache drummed in her head, and the speed at which she ran to her room didn't help. Different images flashed in her mind, voices that she was sure didn't reside, and a song, -no different voices singing along to some loud music, different heartbeats colliding, the smell of strong lust in the air, the rushing of blood through different veins and arteries and the taste- that taste. She could almost remember it. In fact, it felt like she was tasting it right now, but she couldn't be certain; The wolf's blood was all she could taste.

"Fuck!" she cursed, as another wave of headache hit her and she had to grab her head with her hands at either side, as if otherwise it would drop and roll down the floor.

She wasn't drunk.

She knew it, but something was wrong with her.

The images of that brown mask flashed in her mind, there had been floral designs on it.

She shut the door firmly behind her, and raced to pull out the box she was certain the mask was in. Then she pulled out the mask, and trailed the floral designs around the edges with her fingers, observing the simple design under the glow of the moon that seeped into the room through the small uncovered space of the window.

Her knees met the floor slowly, her intense focus on the object in her hands. Her sight was blurry, which was weird and it took a couple of blinking for her to be able to see the mask clearly again.

There! She remembered.

This mask wasn't hers, it was someone else's, she just couldn't remember whose it was at the moment, but she had met the person at the bar.

There was a lot she couldn't remember about that night, but she was certain that was the night she had met the father of her Medallion. She couldn't remember his face, his smell, not even the shape of his body, or what had drawn her to him in the first place.

All she had of him was this mask, which until now, she had never been truly certain of whom it belonged to.

But tonight, she knew.

She remembered.

Right after she had tasted Ka'ik's blood - she remembered many things right after she had tasted his.

Delice stumbled to her feet, the mask slipping right out of her hand when she realized what the implication of this might be.

For some illogical reasons, she thought that maybe Ka'ik was her Medallion's father - that man she could never remember. George had the power to make someone lose their memory, she had seen the evidence of that with what Mira did after her recovery.

What if, the reason why she had never really remembered the father of her child was because it was George she had met that night and he had wiped her memory away? Ka'ik's behavior towards her was very different from George's. Maybe they had spent the night together when he was in control and when George gained back control, he had made her forget. Maybe not just her, maybe he had done it to himself too.

She gasped from how wild her thoughts were running.

It was a wild card amid nothing but there was a reason for all that.

His blood was the one she had tasted tonight, his blood had brought back these memories as incomplete as they might seem.

It was his blood.

There just had to be a reason.

"Milady." Someone said from the darkness of her room, and she jumped, a little startled.

She had been so lost in thought, she hadn't noticed the intruder's presence.

"Akeem!" She finally said, looking right at him before he stepped into the light the Moon was providing. "I have been so worried about you. Where have you been?"

Something flickered in his eyes but he concealed it way too quickly for her to interpret whatever it was.

She had honestly been worried about him.

When his gaze shifted to the box and the mask on the floor, she stepped into his line of sight, commanding his attention instead.

"I have been busy, Sire. Is there anything you would have wanted me for? Is there anything you may need me to provide? I will do anything for you."

"No. I was just worried. I thought the Volakys had gotten to you."

"If they had, you would have felt it." He pressed his palm against his chest. "Here. We are connected."

"I am glad to know that you are alright." She waved his implied meaning aside, not wanting to indulge him. "Why are you here?"

"You drank from him." He stated coldly and she suddenly remembered that her lips were still smeared with his blood.

There was no need to ask questions, she knew Akeem, she knew that he must have seen her.

"I forbid you to tell this to anyone."

His jaw tightened, his body rigid beneath his black concealing assassin robes. "I would never reveal your secrets. But I've begged you to drink from me many times and you have refused me." Tears glimmered in his eyes. She knew the hurt that resided in them so much and that stubbornness.

He would never give up, would he?

"Akeem, we are not doing this again."

"Why should he attain such an opportunity to serve you in a way I would never. I have begged, many times and you have turned me down but you give to him on a platter of gold what I have toiled for without any attainment. What does he have that I do not? Why do I deserve your cruelty? Such wickedness. Why do you not have any mercy on me?" He paused, fighting the tears in his throat.

"You exaggerate the situation."

"And you break my heart."

Delice shook her head.

"You must learn to resolve this unnecessary obsession. I have told you many times that you mistake your feelings for what they aren't. I have had experience, I know how it feels. It is not good for you."

"Pardon me, Sire, but I believe that is mine to decide."

"I do not love you, Akeem. You must understand that."

"And you love him?" He didn't raise his voice, but the rage was enough telling.

"No."

"Then why can't you choose me?"

"Enough. You are trespassing."

He stepped back, his head bowed. "Forgive me. I spoke without thinking. I will not do it again."

Some moments of silence passed between them, heavy with tension.

"Why are you here?"

"To deliver a message. The White Circle beckons."

A meeting.

Finally.

There was a lot they needed to talk about. Especially the recent Volakys attack? Was that from the White Circle? What was going on? Why had Laura set Riza up?

There was just so much.

"Then we shall not keep them waiting. Come with me. Hurry."