Chapter 8: Chapter 8

KAMORA

“Is anything wrong?” Kamora asked the young lord.

“Is this your first time in this manor?” he asked.

“Hmm.” She nodded. “Though at times I feel like I have been here before. Still, it has to be because this place is so beautiful.” She grinned, waving it off.

“Really?” he exclaimed, his eyes gleaming with something unreadable. “Are you sure it’s not because you have been here before?”

Kamora frowned slightly. “Forgive me, my lord, but why are you asking me all these questions? You haven’t even told me your name.”

The young lord huffed, looking away. “You have no right to know my name.”

“I thought we were getting to know each other,” she pouted.

He glanced at her sideways. “How can you not know my name?”

“I am new here. Everyone addresses you as the young lord. So I do not know your name.”

“And what will you do when you know it? Would you call me by my name?” he asked.

Kamora shrugged. “If you so wish, my lord.”

When he didn’t say anything, she smiled.

“Do not worry then. I’ll keep calling you my young lord.”

She turned around and walked toward the oven to check what she was baking.

The warm, sweet scent of cookies had begun to weave through the room, rich and inviting. Kamora took a slow inhale, her eyes fluttering closed as a smile crept over her lips.

“Jarosh,” the young lord said suddenly.

Kamora paused and turned around to face him. “My lord? What did you say?”

“My name is Jarosh,” he repeated.

Kamora smiled. “That is such a beautiful name, my lord.”

The young lord huffed and looked away. “You can call me that if you want.”

“Really?” Kamora exclaimed.

“But not in public!” he warned. “I do not want to seem too soft.”

Kamora laughed but nodded. “Okay, Jarosh.”

He looked at her again, and the strange look he had in his eyes earlier returned—curious, uncertain.

Before she could ask him about it, the door opened, and in walked Lord Maroke.

Kamora quickly bowed. Jarosh jumped down from where he sat.

“Father, what are you doing here?”

Kamora was also curious.

The air seemed to shift with the lord’s entrance, growing heavier. His presence loomed over her like a storm cloud, overwhelming—nearly suffocating.

~Kamora.~ That voice. It was his. The one from her dreams.

She knew it without a doubt—it had always sounded like a song made of silk, sometimes joyful, sometimes aching with pain.

“I was told that you made a ruckus the other day because you wished to see me,” he said to his son, his voice wrapping around her like warm honey—dangerous, alluring. “So I came to meet you.”

Though Kamora didn’t look up, she sensed Jarosh’s frown.

“Why didn’t you just call for me? Why did you come all the way down?”

She felt Lord Maroke’s gaze sweep over her, and her skin tingled beneath it.

“I heard you were busy. It was an odd thing, so I decided to check it out.”

Jarosh huffed. “What’s wrong with me being busy? Kamora was just teaching me how to bake cookies…”

The room went still. Kamora’s heart thudded against her ribs like it wanted out.

“Kamora, you say?” Lord Maroke repeated, her name curling off his tongue like sin.

She gulped and bowed lower. Any deeper and her forehead might kiss the counter.

“Good day, my lord. The Young Lord wished to have cookies and asked for my help in making them.”

The lord was silent for a beat.

Then he said, “Look at me. I do not like people hiding their faces away from me.”

She straightened immediately, and the moment her eyes met his, something inside her cracked.

Her chest tightened painfully, her soul crying out to him. She didn’t understand it—didn’t understand the storm of emotions pulling her toward this man.

Was he part of her past life? Did he know her? She doubted it.

He looked at her like he was seeing a stranger.

“You are teaching my son how to bake, you say?” he asked, glancing at the oven.

Kamora nodded.

“If what I perceive is your creation, then you must be very good. Though it doesn’t smell like the usual ones we eat here.”

“It is different, my lord,” Kamora said. “As it is not uncommon to those not of nobility.”

“You are baking cookies eaten by commoners?” he said, now casting a glance at his son with a slight frown. “I never knew my son had such…interests.”

“How would you know?” Jarosh grumbled, looking away. “You are hardly ever around.”

Kamora’s heart squeezed. She looked at Lord Maroke, trying to gauge his reaction. But aside from the faintest flicker of a frown, his face remained unreadable—cold, detached.

No regret, no sadness. Nothing.

She clenched her fists at her sides, trying to smother the hot coil of anger that ignited in her chest.

The lord’s eyes flicked back to her, and for a terrifying second, she felt like he saw it—her anger, raw and unhidden.

“I can’t deny that I am curious why you suddenly wish to eat a commoner’s delicacy,” he said to his son, though his gaze remained on her. “But I am pleased that you have found something worthwhile.”

He turned to Jarosh again, and his expression shifted into something more calculating.

“Why didn’t you simply ask Claudia? Why did you single her out from the rest?”

Jarosh’s face went blank. “That is for me to know.”

“You are preventing her from doing her job. That is not very considerate of you.”

“I merely asked for her help!” the young lord huffed. “She can always go back to whatever she was doing.”

“And what about when you need her again?”

“I’ll call her back,” the young lord said proudly.

Lord Maroke turned his attention back to Kamora.

“I have a proposition,” he said.

“Please do continue, my lord,” she replied, bowing automatically.

He was quiet for a breath, then said, “Firstly, always look at me when I speak to you.”

Kamora quickly raised her head, cheeks burning.

“Secondly,” he continued, “what do you think of becoming my son’s personal maid?”

Kamora’s eyes widened.

Jarosh let out a loud, “Really?”

“You will attend to every one of my son’s needs and focus solely on him. Your chores will also revolve around him. What do you say? I won’t force you if you are unwilling.”

Jarosh turned toward her.

Though he stood proud and tall, there was unmistakable hope flickering in his eyes. Kamora swallowed.

Claudia’s warning echoed in her mind. This was the moment she had been cautioned about.

Her gaze flicked from Lord Maroke to Jarosh. The past she had outrun had finally caught up to her in this manor.

If she wanted to survive, she could no longer evade it. So she exhaled slowly, a grin blooming on her face.

“Thank you so much, my lord, for this opportunity. I accept.”

Jarosh’s face lit up with a smile so wide and sincere, it warmed something inside her.

Whatever happened next, she told herself, the time she’d get to spend with this young Fae lord would be her greatest reward.