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There were some minor changes in the interior but the black stone adorning the walls accompanied by minimal furniture consisting of a king sized canopy bed and a black couch underneath which rested upon a plush white rug were the same as she remembered from her memory. Even those four doors were located at the same points.

"Your expressions tell me you've been here before."

She hadn't noticed him standing so close behind her. His unexpected voice had lead her to twirl around immediately to face him.

"I... have."

She didn't know why she felt flustered without any particular reason.

He expressions did not give any of his feelings away as he continued staring impassively at her.

"May I?"

He had his hand stretched in front of her.

Although he hadn't said the whole question out loud, she knew what he was talking about. Lowering her eyes wordlessly, she turned around to let her back face him.

For a brielf moment followed by her actions, the room was enveloped in a mind-numbing silence. She could hear nothing but her how rapid breaths echoing around in her reddened ears.

'Why isn't he doing anythi-'

Suddenly a cold hand touched the back of her neck turning her eyes to saucers.

'He has removed his gloves?!'

She could feel his hands playing with the loose end of her curls, twirling them around his long fingers before letting them dangle down her back once again. It kept going on for some moments before he eventually moved them to the front of her shoulder with the tip of his icy finger. He made sure to do it ever so slowly that she was barely able to keep her breath in check.

After he was done assaulting her hair, his fingers leisurely moved down the back of her spine making small popping sounds as they unfastened the small buttons trailing down her nightgown. Soon enough, the gown came loose almost falling down her shoulders before she rushed to place her hands on her shoulders in order to hold the drooping dress close to her chest.

Once again, a tremendous silence fell over the room. This time, along with her convulsive breathing, loud swooshing of blood rushing in her vessels also clogged her ears. She was facing the other way but the feeling of his unwavering gaze burning a whole through her back was as clear as the day.

Worry creased her brows as his unsettling behaviour stayes put, much longer than she had initially expected. It was unnerving her.

'Is there something wrong with my back?'

Just as she thought he wouldn't be speaking anytime soon, his grave voice filled the empty room.

"The marks have visibly fainted."

"Huh?"

Clutching her dress tight, she turned around swiftly to face the stoic lord standing behind her. He was looking strangely at her as if he couldn't recognize the person standing in front of him.

"A major part of the spell has been fulfilled, therefore it has fainted in comparison. The day of the commencement of the spell is fast approaching."

She didn't know what to think. Her mind was swarmed with countless scenarios in form of numerous small puzzle pieces, trying to connect different dots to expeditiously draw a reasonable conclusion.

'It happened after Gabriel disclosed my legacy to me. I had initially visited Ruth to ask about my lost mother. She had cast this spell in order to inform me of my eccentric heritage. Is this it? As soon as everything is made known to me, the spell will be fulfilled and I'd disappear from here?'

From the moment she had stepped inside this world, all she had wanted was to go back somehow, but now that the possibility of her departure was soon arriving on her doorstep, her heart didn't seem to feel any particular happiness regarding her situation.

"You lied to me, Faith."

'What?'

Her unstoppable train of thoughts was successfully brought to a grinding halt by a grim voice addressing her in a heart-rending manner.

"Something happened that night in the church and you hid it from me."

"N-No.."

With his smoldering gaze fixated stubbornly on her, she could barely manage to utter another lie through her quivering lips.

"Are you saying you did not hide anything from me?"

"I-"

"Gabriel is your ancestor. Is he not?"

'How...'

She was pole-axed, staring horrified at the man clenching his jaw in front of her. She could see how angry he felt by the way his veins were popping out on both sides of his neck, travelling up to his jaw where a small clicking was fairly visible.

"You told me the witch sent you here because you went to acquire information regarding your lost mother and her family. Your mark faded noticeably after you went visting Gabriel, not to mention the peculiar eye colour you share with him and his daughter. Tell me, if I'm wrong?"

The situation had gone way out of hand. She couldn't see any choice but to hang her head low to shield her face away from his scrutinizing gaze and mutter a low answer in response,

"You're.. not."

"What else are you hiding?"

Her heart rate suddenly skyrocketed at his next question causing her to clench her fists tightly around the fabric she was already holding.

'I want to tell him everything. Every single thing.'

Before she could open her mouth to let out her next words, her ears started ringing with the subtle warning Gabriel gave her the night he helped transfer Henry from church to the basement of the castle,

"Remember your oath as I shall not be held accountable if you stray away from that path. Ares is a vampire and no matter how much he loves his beloved, he will never spare her family for assassinating his mother—for breaking his family apart. Beware, Ares maybe a royal but he has only lived for twenty nine years on the face of earth. He can never escape a hunter backed up by a whole town, especially when he refuses to harm his people with his own hands."

'What do I do? What do I tell him?'

She wanted to tear her hair out of her scalp with frustration. She had always been bad at making decisions. She wasn't too confident in herself and always ended up questioning her choices in every small affair, but this was no small deal. It was a matter of trust and oath.

Gabriel's warning had now been replaced by Ares' prior statement. If this madness kept going on for long, she was sure she'd end up drawing blood from her tightly clutched fists.

"Promise me, my husband."

Her lowered head slowly lifted up to stare inside his ruby irises,

"You have to make a promise to me, your wife and afterwards I'll tell you everything you want to know."

She watched as his gaze softened a bit at her manner of addressing him but soon it hardened back to the way it was before.

"What do you expect of me to promise?"

"Safety. The safety of Gabriel and his daughter."

No emotion passed through his eyes for a considerable amount of time as he kept them trained at her small frame, giving her a long hard look.

"Do you honestly think I would harm the source of my only chance at eternal happiness?"

"But what if this happiness is fake?!"

Her unforseen inquiry caused his eyebrows to furrow with uncertainty.

"What do you mean to say?"

"Please, just guarantee me their safety and I'll tell you everything."

His piercing gaze slid down to the floor for a moment before he shook his head ever so slightly.

"You have my word."

She pressed her lips together as she whirled around to turn her back on him once again. Her shame wasn't allowing her to maintain eye contact with him any longer.

'I can't believe I'm doing this.'

Heaving a dreadful sigh, she closed her eyes for moment before parting her lips to narrate every single event from that horrifying night. She told him everything. Her coming from a line of vampire hunters, Gabriel assassinating Ares' mother during childbirth, Deborah using all her powers to cast a spell on Gabriel's blood as per the King's orders, the unique irises their family shared, the death Gabriel's wife faced, the killing of Ares' original vampire beloved by Gabriel's hands and his own daughter suffering the consequences of his actions resulting in the secondary blood bond establishment due to Ares' blood getting mixed with Gabriel's lineage.

Lastly, she told him about their first encounter where she found him in the basement of his very own castle, rotting as a chained statue and kissed him impulsively under a trance created by the spell leading to her becoming the first female of her lineage to fed him her blood.

"That's how you recognized me as your beloved. After satiating your hunger, you fed me your blood as well to heal my injuries. It resulted in a blood bond formation between us—me and the future Ares."

After she was finished telling everything she turned her head sideways to steal a glance at him. She was waiting for him to say something, anything, yet no reply came from his side. He hadn't interrupted her before either, not even once.

'Why isn't he saying anthing?'

When the silence became too much to handle, she turned around begrudgingly to face the music. What awaited her left her appalled beyond words.

The handsome chivalrous lord who'd been able to successfully carve his name on her heart, now had a betrayed expression plastered all across his face. His eyes, wide with disbelief, were brimming with a crimson liquid pooling uncontrollably in their lower rim. A lone scarlet trail was trickling down his cheek from his left eye, ending near his chiseled jawline. She could also see a few red drops scattered on the floor near his foot.

Dare she say, he almost looked liked the first day she had seen him down in that basement.

Betrayed.

Hurt.

Damaged beyond repair.

"My lord..."

Her small whisper seemed to have brought him back to his life. Upon hearing her voice, his lashes blinked impulsively, letting another crimson drop free from the cage of his delicate eyes.

"You are telling me you are not my true beloved.."

She could feel tears pricking the back of her own eyes. His words appeared normal but the tone he was using could almost be described as a.. silent plea.

He was pleading her to lie and save him the pain of going through that agony again.

The torment of losing his beloved, again.

"Yes."

"My people betrayed me. I was chained, burnt and turned to stone.. for centuries?"

It was paining her on a great level to see him this devastated.

"Yes."

"You are here because I saved the daughter of the man who killed my mother and my beloved?"

She was barely able to suppress a sob that was trying to tear its way out of her throat.

"Yes."

"I wish I had not made that promise to you."

Her heart sank into her stomach as her eyes shot up hastily to find him already moving towards the door to step out of the room.

"Are you going to kill him?"

He stopped midway through his second step towards the door. He remained deathly still keeping his back facing her.

"Do you view me as someone who does not honour his words, especially a word given to my own wife?"

His unpredicted statement caused her her furiously racing heart to skip a beat.

"Do you still want me to stay your wife?"

She had thought that after hearing everything he wouldn't like to do anything with her, especially considering his reaction prior to her time travel to the past. He was always avoiding her in the future, calling her names like, 'Daughter of the Abbot' and 'Daughter of a traitor.'

'Wait a sec, how did the future Ares know that I was a descendant of Gabriel?'

Just as she was about to ask the question out loud, he gave her a short answer to her previous inquisition before swiftly moving out of the door, leaving her staring shocked after his disappearing figure.

"You are and will forever be my dear wife."