Death-Bound

Prologue

Prologue

Searching for that one person who would even complete me is nonsense as the months had passed and turned to years. But how can I rest knowing that she is out there waiting for me to protect her from everything that had happened. I know she is alive, for I am living as well. We are bound. We are one. And I am still seeking her, trying to find her in all of the Seven Deserts.

“My Lord, Slave traders had been at port. You want to go look?” asked one of my generals. I wanted to buy all the slaves I can see whom reminded me of her. Although  I cannot find her amongst them. But this time I felt her near me. As if the wind is taking me to where my heart is, for she is my heart. She is the life that breathes in me. She is my soul.

And I saw her standing in the midst of all the women set out for the bargaining. Her hair chopped into an inch from her scalp yet her beauty was above all of them. Her sun burnt skin had bruises painted on her legs, mostly on her thighs, suggesting the abuse that she had suffered with her battered body. Her figure so thin and delicate but you could see her strength in her dignified stand. She stood up like the royalty she is, but there was something about her that does nor resemble the person I love.  I wanted to kill all of them who’ve made her to what she is now.

I wanted to take her without delay. To shelter her for the hell that she had been through,  but when she looked deep into my eyes I know that she can never be the same person she once were. Her soul had died.  It was as if she buried her soul to save it. I was too late. I bought her  that day for more than the asked price, but I can never bring her back to herself.

“She is still mumbling words we cannot understand my Lord, but we assure you that she is a big help with all the things in the kitchen.” her caretaker informed me. “I do think that she have an odd way of cutting meat though.” Months had passed but I cannot even see her. I tried to see her but she refused all the things I did, to stay near her. She refused to say her name, so, they named her Jem.

I was looking at her in every moment. She had moved from slave to a servant, now, she is in my army. She is slowly moving forward. But the same melancholic drive surrounds her. Her emotions are blank, and she would not even try to smile. If only I could assure her that everything will be alright. That we will move forward as if nothing happened.  But I am the Emperor I don't have business among servants. No one could tell who she was, cause she refused to utter her name nor she refused to act or dress in the manner that her people would do. She had been badly broken by the bandits who took her that day. The day she was travelling to be my wife.

“She doesn’t talk nor smile. She refused to interact with everyone. But being the way she is made her capable of many guard duties. Her ability in combat surpassed many men. She could even outsmart the strongest of our soldiers.”

However, I couldn’t let her go. She is far too precious to lose once again. I wanted her near me, but I didn’t know the outcome of my stupidity when I almost lose her yet again through the hands of one of my mistresses  when she became one of the high baronesses. My mistress some how knew about her past and she wanted to eliminate her just to send a message to all the women that would be in her way to be one of the head concubine.

“She almost died my lord. I saw her tied up in that woman’s room. Her blood soaked her garment. Poor, poor Jem. She was only trying to be a good servant for the Madame.” Margaritta told, as she wanted one of her maidens safe from harm’s way. 

I cannot lose her, not now nor ever, so a made a deal with the Gypsies—a deal which was never been tried for almost a hundred years, but was written in the hands of history, a deal which made a Queen of her land be the death-bound of the Empire’s Emperor. I know the consequences of my actions but my constant fear made me do so. If she refuse to wed me, then I will in all means would bound her to me.

I can never let her go, but she was continuously faltering away. I have to seal her fate by my side. I had made her my death-bound. By doing so, I am loosing myself to her. I crave for her presence. I crave for her touch. However, I can never really have her, for she was my death-bound. She will be my servant, my assassin. She will do my bidding but she can never feel anything that is against the code of a master and a death-bound. She is mine to keep, but is her really mine?

I have lost myself into loving her from a far with barriers in between. I felt like drowning in the same air that we are breathing in. I am selfish to love her like this, but how can I deny what I can grab with my power. She is all that I wanted, all that I desired. But looking into her eyes gives me so much guilt as I could not protect her. But as she become my death-bound we are continuously struggling to be who we are and to be what the world wants us. The way we are losing ourselves to our fate, our destiny which swallowed our lives whole the moment I made her bound to me for all eternity. That was never even the beginning of our story, for history made a crazy way of repeating our fate over and over for thousands of years. Our never-ending love continues to the ends of time.