The Demon Lord's Bride (BL)

I stared at him, hard, trying to find any trace of teasing or mocking. Perhaps he was just playing tricks on me? Perhaps he just liked to roleplay as a prince charming?

My mind was fighting...fighting to find any loophole so my heart would cease beating so loud, louder than the fireworks. Fighting to find a way for my mind not to trip and be swayed into the delusion of a fairy tale.

But there was nothing inside the gentle smile and the firm gaze that I could use to trample on the bubbling feeling tickling my heart. Slowly, softly, he turned me to face him, and those tickles made me float even higher.

"Do you think I’ll make you my bride just for the fun of it?" he pulled me close, gently, and I had no will to fight it.

"...why?" I managed to respond after a long silence. "I’m an enemy."

"Are you?" he brushed the hair covering my face because of the wind, and for some reason, I thought he was seeing through me, that he knew I wasn’t actually Valmeier. Maybe because there was a part of me that wanted him to know. "Do you want to kill me, sweetheart?"

"No!" I answered hurriedly that it seemed as if I was snapping.

"Have I been treating you like an enemy?"

I shook my head, the small stones Zia attached to my braid bouncing and clanking against each other.

"But...why? It’s not like we’ve met before..."

At that, I saw a slight change on his face, those ripples in his eyes that always came when he seemed to experience an emotional shift.

"We’ve...met before?" my eyes widened at this revelation. "Where? When?"

He didn’t answer, and he didn’t look like he wanted to answer either. "Why? Why aren’t you telling me?"

He averted my gaze then, lips pressing like a stubborn kid who refused to tell his secrets. What? What the hell is this? When?

No, wait, I was certain that I had never met Natha after I transmigrated here, so I tried to dig into Valmeier’s memory.

But if there was one thing that Valmeier was bad at, it was in remembering people’s faces. He was raised in a secluded monastery, and had little interest in the outside world. He wasn’t the type of person who wanted to have a big place in this world, so he rarely socialized, and this, was easy to be used by the Kingdom. Even if Valmeier met Natha once, unless the Demon Lord left out some big impression, he wouldn’t bother to remember it.

And even as my face scrunched in concentration, I couldn’t recall anything from Valmeier’s memory vault.

How could you?! How could you meet someone this handsome and not remember it, dude? I couldn’t help but grunt in annoyance. I knew this priest had no interest in man—or even woman, for that matter—but how? Could? You?

When I looked up, his aversive face annoyed me even more. "This is unfair!"

In my annoyance, I hit his shoulder. But instead of answering, he stared at my fist and chuckled instead. "Don’t laugh!"

"Why, what’s unfair?"

"You always know what I’m thinking about, but it’s so hard to know what’s on your mind!"

I said that in a raised tone, and belatedly realized it might come out wrong and angered the Demon Lord instead. But he flashed an amused smile, and the silver eyes curled into half-moons.

"Hmm, it’s nice to know that you’re curious about what’s on my mind,"

This...demon. "Don’t tease me!"

"I’m not," he laughed, flicking my forehead lightly.

"I told you not to laugh!" I hit him again, but it might as well be a tickle, for there was no sign of him getting affected. Instead, he laughed harder, and his face looked like he totally enjoyed the situation.

Damn it, he was so annoying! Since hitting him was useless, I grabbed his face and squeezed his cheek. It was kinda hard since he was so tall. "Why are you laughing, huh?"

He stopped laughing then, but his lips still stretched into a smile. "I’m happy."

"You’re happy seeing me getting annoyed?"

My squeeze turn into pinch, but he didn’t make any movement to stop my hand. Instead, before I realized it, his arms were already circling my waist, pulling me closer.

"I like seeing you like this, unreserved. I want you to do it more; getting angry, getting annoyed, demanding things," he stared into my eyes, and my hands slid off his face in sudden nervousness.

Why...did he look like some kind of male lead in a romance drama? I didn’t even realize that he had shed his disguise, back to the Nightmare Natha. With his hair swayed by the night wind, and his horn glinting under the moonlight. The colorful light of the lanterns played shadow on his face, and he looked mesmerizing enough for me to lose my voice.

One of his hands came up to stroke my cheek, and I felt it burn, despite the coldness of his fingers. "I like seeing you being casual with me," that hand moved to grab my own, and he brought it to his lips. "I’d like it even more if you would reciprocate my feelings."

I felt like I could hear the sound of my heartbeat. I was sure he could hear it too, how fast my pulse was as his lips traced the inside of my wrist. And my eyes, my hearing, my senses, could only focus on that.

"Val," he called for me, in that gentle, low voice of his, with eyes akin to a twin fullmoon, hypnotizing. "May I kiss you?"

By how he asked for it, I knew it wouldn’t be something indirect like the last time. This time, he was asking for a real kiss, on the lips, and my heart stopped for a split second.

Here, with his arm on my waist, I was glued to him. Vaguely, aside from my loud beating heart, within that thumping sound, was Natha’s own beat. He looked at me, patiently, with an unwavering smile and softness.

God, what a beautiful creature he was. I would have said yes in a heartbeat, if it wasn’t for the tangled memory of my previous life.

Could I really take the responsibility for it? Answering his feeling when my own heart was still a mess.

And yet—

I craved it. His affection. Even if it was selfish for me to do so.

But right now, when we were so close to each other, when all I could see was him and no one else, I wanted it.

"I...I never kissed before," my reply came in a weak voice, almost like a whisper. I almost thought he wouldn’t be able to hear it amidst all the other noises. But gently, he craned my head, so I faced him clearly.

"Then, would you like to give me the honor of being your first?" he asked, like a prince from a fairy tale.

Truly, like a creature of a dream, so befitting of his race, the dreamwalker. Perhaps all of this was actually a dream? To have a Demon Lord confess he had a feeling for me, of all things...

Ah, but this comfortable coldness in my waist and cheek felt so real. The way my hands hung on his shoulder, the way my fingers clutched into his clothes, and the way his silver eyes bore through my soul.

There was a smile on his face, and I thought he must have sensed it; the eagerness inside my mind. My lips parted, but I was too nervous to make a sound of affirmation, so I just nod.

The moment I did, his thumb swept the earring bearing the disguise spell, and even if I couldn’t see it, I could feel the change in my hair and ears. He gave me a satisfied smile then, wordlessly telling me that he preferred to kiss me in my original form.

Ah, the way my cheeks burned.

When he lowered his head, and his face came closer and closer, every sound seemed to get amplified by twofold; the fireworks, the carnival music, the cheering of enjoyment. And it was all exploding the moment his cold lips touched mine.

It exploded, and turned quiet. And my ears were filled only with the sound of my heart’s drumming. I had no idea what his lips tasted like; all my senses felt paralyzed. It felt like there were butterflies flapping their wings inside my stomach, tickling me from the inside.

It was short and chaste, that first kiss, and if anyone asked me, I wouldn’t be able to give them a decent description. That short time was enough to put me in a daze, and all I could do as he pulled away was stare dumbfoundedly.

"How is it?" he asked, stroking my cheek tenderly. "Do you like it?"

I blinked once, twice, and I had no idea where this ability to respond to him came from. "I don’t know," my fingers tightened on his coat. "Why don’t you do it again?"

I could feel his laughter before I heard it, lips stretched out across my own. This time, it wasn’t chaste. His hand pulled me even closer, pressing our body together, fingers weaving into my hair and supporting my head, as he tilted his head to place his lips better.

I felt his lips moving on mine, nibbling on my lower lips, as if taking small bites of some delicacies. The initial coldness melted slowly, like electric ice cream sending tingles all over my body. Slowly, awkwardly, as I let him lead on, my lips followed his movement, like a faithful student.

I had no idea how to kiss, never done that before, so I was probably awful at it, just copying the way he moved his lips on mine. In the past, there was a time during those nights we spent talking to each other, when I thought that maybe, that man would kiss me, when he looked at me with a soft gaze and leaning too close—

No! No—I shouldn’t think about someone else. I didn’t want to think about someone else. These lips, these cold hands, the person who embraced me with affection wasn’t anyone else but Natha.

My brain swirled in a messy vortex of thought as I gasped. "Natha..."

Name. I had to call his name, so I could only think about him and no one else. I grabbed his clothes tightly, sucking in desperate breaths. "Natha..."

I looked at him, filling my vision with beautiful colors of blue and silver. Right here, right now, I didn’t want anyone else but him. The silver eyes widened and rippled in barely suppressed emotion. Desire. Desperately, like someone hanging on a safety line, my panicked, hazy mind called his name.

"Natha..."

And then I couldn’t see those moon-like eyes again, with his hands tightening on me, pulling my face into a different kind of kiss.

A kiss that threw all my messy thought away, a kiss that filled me with him, and only him. A hard, fervent, passionate kiss. Our lips, which had been warmed from the previous exchange, felt hot and wet against each other. The moment we met, I felt his tongue slipping in, still bearing the remnant of coldness. It danced and explored, coaxing my own to tangle, and the butterflies inside my stomach must have flapped their wings so strongly because I felt like I was floating.

My head felt light, like cotton candy, like it would melt away with a drop of water. I gripped his arms tight for an anchor, but soon I found myself breathing roughly, lungs forgetting to function.

I gasped, parting our lips in the process, but Natha chased my lips, locking me inside another fervent kiss, and slowly felt like I would collapse—either for lack of air or from the intensity of his kiss.

He kissed me like he was hungry, like he was banned from eating something before and now started devouring.

"Nath—w-wai...t...mmph!" my hand flailed weakly, but fortunately found its way to his face. I pulled away, parting our lips, and put my fingers above his lips before they found their way to mine again.

Thankfully, this time, my signal was reciprocated. Natha paused, eyes still boring at me, but his hands no longer pulling me closer. I tried to take a breath, filling my lungs with air again, and Natha started to loosen his hold on me.

"I’m sorry," he stroked my hair, the surprised face told me he didn’t mean to kiss me that hard either. "I shouldn’t—I’m sorry, sweetheart,"

"No, I’m just..." I stepped back, panting, trying to regulate my breath. "G-give me a minute..."

He let go of me, slowly, as I leaned into the stone wall. I held my hand against my chest, which had been beating so fast that I felt like I might get a heart attack. I had no idea how I looked right now, but my face and neck felt hot, as if burning, and my stomach felt ticklish.

But before I could even manage to calm down, there was a sudden voice resounding within the rooftop. "My Lord, it’s really you!" the excited voice was followed by loud footsteps, and I saw a hulking demon with deep green skin walking merrily toward Natha. "I suddenly felt your presence a while ago and immediately come to—"

The demon, who joyfully guffawed before, suddenly paused when his eyes caught my presence. And then, at a dreadful speed that not even Natha could match, he shot his hulking body forward, lurching toward me.

"CABA!" if it wasn’t for Natha shielding me, the demon’s claw would have already grazed my face.

"My Lord, what’s this human doing here?" the demon hissed, bloodlust thick in the air, even as Natha grabbed his shoulder and pushed him away for me. "Why is the priest that had tried to kill you...is here?"

What... ƒrēenovelkiss.com

What?

I tried...to kill Natha? When—

It was then that I remembered a long, deep scar on his shoulder, above his heart. An un-erasable scar caused by an artifact. I recalled the hard expression on his face then, and I felt like I wanted to throw up.

The one causing that scar...is the Spear of Judgment in my possession.