9 Torren

I woke up the following morning to see Torren staring at me.

'Why are you staring my lord?' I asked stretching out my hands.

'Can I not admire my beautiful wife while she is asleep?' He caressed my cheeks and jaw smiling. Now I sat up on the bed.

'You look all fine this morning, did you heal yourself?' He looked at me like he was confused.

'Why do you say that my lady'

'Well, you healed me the other day, so I thought you would do same for yourself'

'I do not posses such power. I can heal another but definitely not myself' saying that he pulled up his cloth and I saw the wound from the arrow. I touched it gently wishing I could instantly take it away like he took my wound away at the time I was hurt. He hissed of pain and I withdrew my hand.

'I'm sorry my lord, I... I just wish I could do something to take away the pain, I really don't want to see you hurt' I said looking up to him.

'Perhaps there is something you can do my queen. Something that will magically heal me and take away all the pains' as he said it, he caressed my lips looking into my eyes. I didn't need to ask him what I could do because I could already tell. My eyes was locked with his for a moment before he started to bring his mouth close to mine. I thought he wanted to kiss me and closed my eyes till his lips gently brushed my forehead and then he pulled away.I was quite disappointed. I had expected a kiss on the lips, Torren noticing my disappointment laughed gently and brushed his lips on my cheeks then tickled my tummy. I never knew this assumably dangerous vampire could be playful.

'Don't ever risk your life to save me ever again Diana' he said now looking serious and right into my eye with no trace of playfulness found in it.

'I had no control over my actions yesterday Torren, but even if I did, I would put a knife to my throat if it would save you' I pulled up the sleeve of my dress to see my hurt wrist, that was only when I noticed it was gone. Not even a scar was visible there. I smiled and pulled Torren closer to me. 'What have you done my love?' I didn't even know when I called him that.

'Your love?, Diana' he laughed hard. He was blushing, his cheeks quite red, he was so excited and he couldn't even contain it. Looking at him it didn't look like he was in pain, 'I see your pain has been taken away Torren'. Now he remembered he was pretending to be hurt just to draw me close to him. 'Right, It still hurts so much' he hissed of pain and put his hand over his hurt chest. His hiss was purely faked. I smiled and got out of bed throwing a pillow at him playfully.

'You better get up Torren, I'm sure your people are eager to meet you' With that I left Torren's room for my room. Torren kept blushing over 'my love'. He really did seem harmless at that time.

Back in Galtelo, Queen Qarinah was boiling up in anger.

'I knew men from your kingdom will always fail' she blamed empress Liah who ignored her.

'Listen Qarinah, this is not time for that OK. At least he didn't entirely fail' King Stephan tried to put out the fire Qarinah was trying hard to lit.

'He did Stephan. That arrow was meant for Diana not Torren, he only just messed things up and then got himself killed'

King Stephan had nothing else to say to Qarinah so he shut his mouth up. Some moments later, empress Liah spoke up.

'Torren is indeed stronger than I ever imagined. Queen Qarinah, King Stephan we did to prepare. Torren is not an easy one to take down but that is not a problem. Our powers together will poison him and put him to sleep for months or years but it is definitely not powerful enough to kill him' Empress Liah was not the one who spoke much but once she did, she would walk out not bothering to find out if her listener have questions or not.

Queen Qarinah still wasn't at rest. When Lord Torren gave her the powers that she seeked, she had thought she will be able to use it against him but things hadn't turn out as she hoped.

Back at Darca.

'My lady I am sure nobody in this kingdom would want Lord Torren or you dead. I think whoever he was, he sneaked in from another kingdom' Kahlan explained to me. I was trying to find out who would want my husband dead.

'The arrows belong to the Drigos your highness' sir Magnus said making his way into the palace with one of the arrows in his hand.

'A man from Drigo would never be able to get into Darca unnoticed. He won't make it far into that forest, Drigo is characterized by men and women who would never be able to do anything to save Themselves. They are weakenings sir Magnus' Kahlan said as she inspected the arrow.

I took it away from her 'I smell foul play. This arrow indeed belongs to the house of Drigo but I am sure that man who shot it is not from Drigo. Only one person can be this smart' I already knew what my stepmother's tricks would look like.

'My lady who do you think it is?' Kahlan asked.

'You both leave me. I need to speak to my husband'. With that, they left and I went off to search for my husband. I knew it was Qarinah, this was one of her many ways of warning someone and I knew that arrow was for me but what I didn't know is why Qarinah would want to kill me. I had to find out.