"If you continue on sending people to ’try’ and convince me or use the reasoning that witches had been serving Lycans for centuries, then I am going to treat witches just as how they were treated in the past," Matthew said, a sinister smile appeared on his handsome face. This only made Ulva more and more irritated.
"Do we have an understanding?" Matthew asked.
"Yes, we do."
"Good." Matthew nodded. He then took a step back and removed the pressure that Ulva felt earlier. "Ah... one more thing. I am going to marry no one but my mate."
Hearing this Ulva’s face turned red from anger.
"That is not going to happen if you wanted to be king. That is."
"Then give the position to my brother. He wanted it." Matthew said. "He could have it."
"Matthew this isn’t a small thing. You have to— "
"Why can’t you give it to him?"
"You— " frёeωebɳovel.com
"Give him what he wanted and leave me alone. Isn’t that going to make everything easier?" Matthew put his hand behind him as he observed Ulva’s reaction.
"I cannot just decide on this matter. The King— "
"The council who followed me would support Drigo."
"What?"
"All seven of them would agree to make him King."
"You— "
"With that said, Drigo shall be named the next King. Don’t you agree with me, Priestess?"
.....
The conversation ended without any resolution. Ulva decided to leave to talk to the King while Ava stayed.
She glanced at Matthew, her gaze complicated. Then she gulped and said, "Since when?" she asked after she made sure that the room is sealed. She needed to be more careful.
Matthew sighed. "I actually expected a dramatic reveal. Perhaps under the rain or after I saved you."
"Since when!?" Ava asked again.
This time, Matthew answered. "Since I came back," Matthew’s honesty surprised her. She expected him to deny, say no and try to convince her that he was Matthew.
"Why?" she asked. Why and how? What happened? How did he occupy Matthew’s body!? Ava had so many questions to ask him. Yet, she had to control herself.
She could feel something different about him. But she thought this was only because they had not seen each other for more than nine months. People changed and she expected this to happen.
But this? This is too much!
What happened earlier pretty much confirmed her suspicion. This— wasn’t Matthew. Or at least the soul was not Matthew’s.
Her Matthew would never kill without reason. He would never say that he loved the smell of blood! Matthew would never act like a psychopath!
"Aren’t you going to ask me how this all came to be?" Matthew asked in response. "I knew you had questions and I am going to give you the chance to ask. It would make you understand things better."
"Then talk. How the hell did this happen?" Ava had her guard up. This man was not her Matthew. It was the dangerous Josef who liked to kill people. While she was confused as hell, she also needed to be careful as Josef was using Matthew’s body.
"Matthew and I are one," Matthew said. "In simple terms. We were both parts of a fragmented soul." He approached Ava, and almost immediately, Ava stilled. Her heart jumped and started racing inside her chest. He was close— too close.
But she had no time to even think about this.
"I was not allowed to leave that place while the other part of my soul was in this world. It was given to Matthew’s mother, and when she became pregnant, the remnant of my soul occupied the Lycan body."
"Lycans and demons. They cannot exist together."
"True. And that was the reason why it took me years to get out of that place."
"Then what changed?"
"Someone stupidly suppressed the Lycan."
Ava frowned. That would make sense but she was honestly curious about the reason behind Matthew’s honesty. How could he just tell her something like this?
"I can see what you are thinking, Eve."
"That is not my name."
"But it is."
She folded her hands into two tight fists as she lift her chin towards him. "You are changing the topic," Ava uttered.
"The Lycan inside me is not dead," Matthew said. "I did try my best to control it but I believe your scent had made it... more active."
Ava’s face reddened. Was he talking about the fact that she slept with... him?
She gulped.
She didn’t see any signs of Josef when he came back.
"You deliberately fooled me," Ava said.
"I have to," he reached out and tried to touch her face but she turned her head away, avoiding his hand. Seeing this, he withdrew his hand and smiled. "I don’t have any other choice."
Ava pursed her lips. She didn’t know if she should be upset at herself for sleeping with him and not even noticing the difference or be upset with him for deliberately trying to copy Matthew, fooling her in the process.
In Ava’s defense, there is no reason for her to suspect anything about Matthew. She trusted him. It wasn’t her trait to overthink the simple changes that must have happened in the few months that they had been away from each other.
But still, she felt completely stupid for not being so observant.
How could she just... let him touch her?
Anger reared its head and she was tempted to blame him. But at the end of the day, this was her fault.
She glared at him.
"Demons cannot come in this plane."
"Wrong," Matthew said. To Ava’s relief, he took a step away from her and refilled his wine glass. "Demons have always been with humans since the start of human history. Shifters and witches existed before then. Did you really think humans would let other kinds rule them?"
Matthew continued, "But some things happened and humans realized their mistakes. So they chose to trap demons in that place. The Pits, was it?"
Ava gulped. She had some ideas about demons from the books that she got from Josef’s library but she couldn’t even read most of them.
"Where is Matthew?" Ava asked.
"Do you really want to know?"
Ava nodded.
"Then asked that witch."
"Who?"
"What was her name again? Ah... Babaylan." Matthew said. "She would explain everything."
"She knew?"
"Of course, she does." Matthew smiled. "After all, she was the one who helped me."
"And why are you telling me everything?" Ava asked.
Matthew shrugged. "Perhaps pretending that I care about others had become so tiring." Matthew had that sinister smile on his face that reminded Ava too much of Josef. "Or maybe I just hated the pretense and the hypocrisy that surrounds this place. Either way, the fact that I am Matthew and Matthew is me, would not change."
Ava speechlessly glared at him. What does that even mean?
"Don’t you dare hurt Matthew’s body!" Ava said. And without waiting for him to say another word, she removed herself out of the room by teleporting away. She didn’t care if the other witches would know about it. She didn’t care if Ulva would receive the news about her teleportation.
She needed to talk to Baba!
...
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