The Alpha King's Hated Slave novel Chapter 103

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"Thank you for saving my life, Anarieveta." Declan rasped at her hair.

"Thank you f-for staying alive." Vetta cried, "You have no idea h-how... how you have helped m-me now."

He continued, "All these years, I get flashes of our time in that cage...and my last moments. I felt so much hatred towards you," he admitted, "my memories were all jumbled up. I remember a betrayal from a woman that has taken punishments for the King. I remember the woman stabbing me."

Declan pulled back then and looked at her, "But as I stepped into the boundaries of Salem and my memories welcomed me, my heart set you free. I remembered fully then that it was the maid—Talia—who owns that rage and hatred."

"It would have been a disaster for me if your memories didn't return..." It was a joke, but it came out tearfully.

"It would have been. Because you would not have explained." He stepped back.

"There was nothing to explain. I stabbed you. You died." She shook her head, "There was nothing to explain."

"Now, you can allow that guilt to let you go. You stabbed me to save my life. Here I am today... Alive." Declan gave her a small smile.

She returned with a wobbly one. "Yes, now I can let everything go."

Declan found that word strange.

Then, Vetta faced the King again, this time Declan has laid her bare in front of him. So, she can only stand and wait for his decision.

It came when he closed the distance between them and enclosed her into his arms.

She went willingly, letting the tears flow. For the second time for as long as she can remember, he was holding her so close, so tight.

And yet, it doesn't feel like a lover's embrace like it would have felt like to her before. Why? Does it have something to do with the fact that she is starting to see things more clearly for the first time in sixteen years?

"Nothing has scared me in a long time than these those three minutes I thought you really did have a hand in Declan's dead." King Lucien grunted softly.

"It was the second hardest command the Monster King had ever given me... right next to killing Yeaha." her breath quivered, as she referred to Lord Gedony's wife which was her first kill, "I couldn't do it, it was t-too painful. L-Living with the thought that he died all these years has not b-been easy."

The King pulled back then, he turned and stared at his younger cousin who he'd thought was gone... who's return has freed his heart and gladdened it immediately. "I'm glad he is back too."

Declan grinned at him. That boyish grin that is always so familiar lights up his face and reveals identical dimples on either of his cheeks.

King Lucien returned with a smile of his own. It was a full-blown smile. The first of its kind.

Vetta's jaw slackened at the very sight of that transformation. King Lucien is smiling. Really smiling.

Searching her memories, she tried to remember the last time she has ever seen this look on him.

Her head came out blank. He is happy. Truly happy for the first time in sixteen years.

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