Chapter 41 Broken Trust
My eyes ask gently as he stares at me. I can’t see any lies in his eyes, I can’t feel any fakeness in the way his hands caress my cheeks.
I don’t know what to believe anymore.
My hands shake as I hold his hand that’s softly touching my cheek. His eyes look confused as I slowly move his hand away from me. I step back from him a few times.
“Saera…” he calls my name softly, like he can’t understand what I’m doing.
“Kaizer, are you hiding something from me?” I ask him quietly.
I’m scared of any answer he might give, scared I won’t be able to handle the words he might say right now.
He frowns at me and steps closer again to hold me, but I choose to step back and keep our distance.
“What did you do to her?!” Kaizer shouts loudly.
The two male vampires groan and clutch their chests in pain, even the princess is crying out too.
I turn to Kaizer right away, I can’t let him do this. He can’t kill them.
“Kaizer! Stop this please. They didn’t do anything wrong, I wanted to come here myself!” I shout back.
“This was planned, Saera! That crow in Aetherio was part of them. They meant for you to come here.”
“I know,” I answer shortly.
“Then what happened to you? Why are you keeping your distance like I have some contagious sickness?”
When he tries to step closer again, I move back once more. He curses under his breath a few times at what I’m doing.
“Answer my question first, Kaizer. Are you hiding something I need to know?”
He just stares at me for a few seconds, like he’s thinking about what to say before he speaks again.
“I’m not hiding anything from you, Saera. Ask me whatever you want to know, I hate that we’re like this. Let’s go home, let’s go back, Saera. I missed you, you’ve been gone from my side for months. You don’t know how slow time feels when you’re not with me.”
He holds out his hands to me, but I only stare at them.
“Then who’s Cosette? Who is Cosette to you, Kaizer? You want her alive, right? And you need me to bring her back to life.”
When I say this, I watch Kaizer’s reaction closely. As I look at him, it feels like I’ve been doused with ice-cold water when I see how stunned he is by my words.
It looks like what I saw was true, this isn’t some magic trick by Princess Tatiana, because I can see the shock in Kaizer’s eyes.
“Saera… I need to bring her back. I need your help.”
When Kaizer says this, I can’t hold back my tears anymore. I cover my ears tightly.
“Let me explain.”
He tries to pull my hands away, but I keep covering my ears.
“Enough, I already heard what I needed to know.”
I move even farther away from Kaizer, who won’t stop stepping closer to me.
“What did they do to you, Saera? We can’t be like this, how do you even know Cosette? God! They brainwashed you! What did they tell you? You can’t believe them.”
I hear the princess laugh, she’s still stuck between the hard ice and the palace wall.
“Leave her alone, vampire, no more women will be your victims.”
My eyes widen when sharp ice shards start floating in the air, ready to stab the princess.
“Now you want to kill me too? Aren’t you satisfied with the three women you killed? Why don’t you look to your right to see your collection of women whose lives you took?”
Kaizer looks at the three women the princess mentioned. When he sees them, the floating ice shards that were about to kill the princess fall to the ground.
“Why… are they here?” Kaizer asks in a shaking voice.
What is this now, Kaizer? Another confirmation?
“Kaizer…”
“Saera, you believe me, right? I won’t lie to you.”
I don’t have the strength to believe him anymore.
“Kaizer, give me back my mirror. Let me go home, I don’t want to be a tool for any vampire. Let me go back to the world I came from.”
Kaizer’s face goes blank when he hears me.
“You’re joking, Saera. You can’t leave me again. Listen to me, I can explain. Whatever they told you, don’t believe it, only believe me, Saera.”
When he holds my hand, I yank it away from him roughly.
“You? Should I still believe you, Kaizer? You used me! And you’ll use the other girls just to bring your lover back to life! What will happen to me? Once you take the throne from Larkin and become king, and your woman is alive again, she’ll be queen! What about me? The woman who can satisfy your bloodlust? What do I have against the one you truly love? I’m just some girl from the prophecy who’s useful to you.”
I wipe my tears away over and over. Everything I saw earlier is starting to make sense.
The princess was right, vampires will always be for their own kind. Humans like us will always be tools. If I let the two worlds stay connected, more people will be hurt, more will cry, and more innocent women like me will suffer.
“Saera… What are you talking about? You’re the woman I lo–”
I cut him off because I slap him hard across the cheek.
Instead of reacting to the slap, Kaizer holds both my shoulders.
“Wake up, Saera! I am your mate! I’m the one you should believe!”
I struggle to get out of his grip. Once I break free, I move farther away from him. He can’t touch me anymore, I only get more confused when I feel his caresses. I can’t tell right from wrong.
Kaizer curses repeatedly because I keep avoiding him. He turns to the princess and her brothers to kill them once and for all. I’ve done this before and I’m not afraid to do it again, I stand in front of Kaizer and meet his eyes, which are no longer red or black.
They’re grey. His emotionless eyes.
“Add me to the three women you killed, Kaizer. Add me to those you’ll end, I don’t want to stay in this world any longer.”