“Wh-what?” Estel stammered, her voice barely a whisper as she blinked in surprise. “C…can you please repeat that?”
The Witch gazed at her intently, as if considering what else to say.
“I said that I like you,” she decred
“B-but why—”
Before she managed to finish her question, the Witch suddenly leaned in and captured her lips in a hasty, yet very much fervent kiss.
Time seemed to stand still.
Her mind spun with a whirlwind of emotions—shock, confusion, and an unexpected warmth that blossomed in her chest and spread through her entire being like wildfire. Her skin tingled where the Witch’s hand lightly brushed against her cheek; the softness of her lips was both foreign and intoxicating, igniting a spark she had never felt before. Her heart pounded erratically, each beat resonating with a blend of fear and curiosity…
“My dy, the guest room has been prepared.” Adrianne’s voice came from outside the door. “Shall I show your guest her room?”
Heart racing, she found herself too breathless to muster a reply as the Witch broke off the kiss with a smile and a flush of pleasure.
“What a cliche interruption, am I right?” she whispered, standing up and walking to the door. “Good night, Estel.”
“G…” she stumbled over her words, her mind still reeling from the myriad of emotions flooding her. “G-good night…to you too…”
-
“The bath is now ready for your use, my dy,” Adrianne informed as she cleared the tea set and pced a night light candle on the nightstand.
“Thank you.” Estel nguidly nodded her head. “And what about the Witch?”
“She has already settled into the guest room with no issues,” she replied. “Will you be requiring anything else?”
“No need, thank you. You can take your leave now, Adrianne.”
“Then I bid you a good night’s rest, my dy.”
After the bedchamber door clicked into pce, her facade of calm instantly colpsed. She went over to her bed and flopped down across it, rolling over on her side to face the moonlight filtering in through the curtains.
“I wonder what she meant by that,” Estel muttered, stretching her arm out across the mattress and feeling the silken, cool sheets beneath her still-flushed skin. “We were just strangers up till recently, why would she…and all of a sudden too…”
Her thoughts trailed off into a jumble of unanswered questions as she stared bnkly at the fluttering curtains, repying the moment in her head over and over again. Gently, she ran her fingertips over her lips, hoping to feel the tender warmth lingering there.
“Estel, seriously, what are you doing?” she chided under her breath before shaking her head vehemently. “Never mind, getting into the bath should help clear my head…”
Letting out a bemused sigh, she idly got out of bed and made her way into the antechamber, slipping out of her day clothes before she entered the bathroom. Adrianne had already filled up the bathtub and prepared the soap, so all she had to do was put her clothes away to one side and step inside. She lowered herself in the tub till the bubbles reached her neck; the rush of warm water quickly worked its magic to soothe her body, melting away the knots in her muscles. Closing her eyes, she began to contempte the day’s events.
“To think that there was a time not too long ago that I thought I’d move to the castle and never step foot into this house again,” she mused. “And now, the Crown Prince is probably in his chamber sharing his bed with a commoner woman, while here I am about to have my chastity stolen by a Witch…Estel von Livroche, have you been pced under a curse or something? What would Father say if he knew about your current predicament?”
The soft pops of bubbles and crackling of firewood that heated her bath filled the silence. Unable to shake her overwrought state of mind, she absent-mindedly blew bubbles across the water’s surface until it was time for her to exit the bath and rinse herself off. She dried herself off and put on a chemise in the antechamber before hitting the bed again. She tossed and turned, rolling around in the sheets, before finally punching her pillow in frustration.
“I can’t sleep like this,” Estel groaned.
Sitting back up, she pulled open the drawer of her nightstand and took out the Witch’s memento. Well, the Witch might have called it by the exotic-sounding name of a ‘flip phone’, but she had yet to figure out what that really meant.
Flipping it open, she was greeted by a white screen filled with text—the message about Gerald that the Witch sent from her own phone. Though it was originally written in the Witch’s nguage, the Witch was generous enough to throw in a transtion so that she could understand it.
“If I remember correctly, pressing this button leads to the main menu, which brings up all of these funny-looking icons…hmm, I think she said that this one is the ‘camera’ function, didn’t she?”
She couldn’t help but let out an impressed “ooh!” as the camera began to project her surroundings on the glowing surface.
“I wonder what will happen if I press this button—?!”
A sudden, blinding fsh erupted from the phone, momentarily lighting up the room and startling her. She gasped, the burst of light causing her to drop the phone onto the sheets.
“That scared me good…” She fumbled to pick it up and squinted at the tiny surface, trying to make out the impression of her room that it captured. “Woah, this thing can actually freeze time just like the Witch said! Witchcraft sure is amazing…oh, I know! What if I flip it around like this and press the button again…?”
