The Dragon Prince's Bride
Chapter 126. Impress him.

Chapter 126: 126. Impress him.

Aria had brought her bow and now both her and her dear husband stood together, each person facing their targets with their bows in their hands. "No cheating my love." He whispered and she glared at him.

"Stop calling me that and I shall not cheat. Especially when my opponent is just you. I know I am better." She said and he nodded with a little smile.

"You do know that cheating doesn’t only mean messing with my arrows, right? If you use your powers to control your own arrows, it shall also count as chea—"

"I know!" She hissed and looked around her before reducing her voice, "I know. And I am not going to use my powers." She said and a light grin laced his features as he nodded once again.

"" Ready!"" The call came and both husband and wife lifted their arms with their bows and arrows set, drawn and ready to release.

And although Neriah acted unaffected, she was nervous. It was the first time she was standing against someone who wasn’t an elf, someone who wasn’t from her palace back in Avelah. And she was standing against no other but Barak Der Drache. She had seen him shoot multiple times. He was good! She could not deny that.

She didn’t want to lose. Not to him...

"Ready, my fair lady?" He asked with his eyes on the target.

She scoffed, "My fine sir, I am an elf. A princess of Avelah, blessed by the goddess, I assure you, I was born ready." She said with confidence.

""Shoot!"" The call came and they both let their arrows fly. The whooshing sound of their arrows cutting through air seemed so loud, and although it moved fast, it seemed like it was in slow motion as the entire place went quiet and watched as the arrows cut through air headed toward their targets.

And bam! It hit the boards and ""His Highness, 100 points!"" The lady doing the announcement said, "" Her Highness... 100 points!!"" At the announcement, there was an uproar. The entire training ground shouting, clapping, stomping and chanting for her and her alone!

"" Princess! Princess! Princess!!""

They cheered, whistled, and clapped with much vigor. Much to Neriah’s shock. Of course there were always people cheering for her if she hit the target back in Avelah, but it was nowhere near this. It was never this intense. It was usually just a mild, refined clap. A little praise, a little cheer. Nothing so wild, it was really the first time for her.

The first time she was being cheered so much for merely hitting the center of her target.

And she looked at the board again and she frowned. She stared at his own. It was directly in the center of the board, while hers, albeit being in the center which was the 100 points circle, it was just a little centimeters away from the 80 points circle. A centimeter lower and she would have had 80 points.

She didn’t like that. She was too nervous because she had not held the bow in a long time. Although they cheered for her, she was feeling like she lost to him.

His was perfectly in the center of the board.

She wanted to do better, she suddenly wanted to impress herself more. But more importantly, she suddenly felt this urge to make her shoot be worth their cheer.

"Well well, I guess I now know one more thing about that night was not a lie. You really can rival me." He was mocking her. So she believed when she heard those words, but when she lifted her head and eyes, with her lips parted ready to give him a fitting response for his mocking words, she met his eyes upon her and what she saw was no malice, no form of mockery, not at all.

All she saw was a smile that reached his eyes, and an unfamiliar look of what seemed to be... endearment. And her lips closed, her head lowered and her long lashes swept over her slightly pink cheeks as she turned and picked up another arrow.

Now more than herself, more than the cheering audience, more than putting him to shame as Aria wanted, more than all that... She wanted to impress him.

"" Ready!""

And deep down, in a place that she didn’t want to exist, in a place inside the dark part of her heart, she somehow wanted to show him that there were more truths in that night than he could actually imagine.

""Shoot!""

More truths than the lies she had told.

After five rounds, they both came out as winners. It was 500 to 500. It was a clean and high draw. The audience was going wild with cheers of Neriah.

"No one is ever able to match me in archery." He confessed.

"What about your friend?" She asked and he paused and stared at her as though silently asking why she refused to use the female commander’s name.

"Well, Reg is actually good at everything, but fortunately for me, archery is her only weak point." He explained and Neriah could not explain the sudden joy she felt at his words. Was it excitement, was it a feeling of victory, or was it just pure happiness that she was better at something that the commander was weak at?

She did not know, but one thing was certain, his words made her extremely happy.

Since they came out with a draw, they had another round with the targets moved six feet back from their usual spot. The knights were silently biting their fingers throughout those rounds, but when they ended another five rounds of shooting and came out in a draw again, they went berserk!

Lifting seats, beating drums, raising a dusty storm as they stomped and stomped with much vigor. Never had their prince had a draw with anyone.

"We have had two equal five rounds and it was a draw both times my fine sir, it seems there is no winner this time." Neriah smiled with much pride. She was not certain she had ever been prouder. She impressed herself, and by the look of the knights going crazy, she impressed them too. And she could see it in his eyes, in the smile that had not left his lips ever since they began the contest against each other. He was impressed too. Pleasantly so.

He took a step closer to her and she craned her neck and lifted her head to stare at the man before her, "Oh, there shall be a winner." He said. "You see, when we get a draw like this after two equal five rounds, we need a winner, so another match is set, but this time not archery."

Neriah’s brows furrowed, "What do you mean?" She asked.

"I mean in a case where a draw is what ends the match like in our case, we write out different other tests like swordsmanship, joust and the rest on different pieces of papers and put it in a box. Then the audience gets to pick one of the two drawing contestants who would then go on to pick out one paper. Whatever match shows on the paper, they would partake in it and a winner would eventually emerge."

No! No! No!! Neriah was screaming in her head. Archery was the only skill she was a little confident in because it did not entail any physical contact between the two of them!

All others meant tangling with him one way or another and herself with this man!! He was bound to win in whatever other match!

But by the time he was done explaining, they had already brought the box containing the names of other matches and a young knight was pointing it towards her.

"The audience have made their choice. Put your hand in the box and pick out something, Neriah." He was smiling but this time she could see he was actually teasing her!! The damned man!

"You can do this Your Highness!" She heard Aria’s voice and she looked toward her maid and saw how enthusiastic her and the little fairy were.

"Go on, you can do this." He urged and she wanted to slap that smile of his face.

"" You can do this! Your Highness is the best!"" The cheer continued and they were making her really happy just a moment ago, but now they were getting into her and and just disturbing her Brian and she just needed everyone to...

"SHUT UP!!" She yelled at the top of her voice and the entire place went silent at once. Only the sound of the wind flowing was heard.

She inhaled and exhaled sharply, stared at her annoying ng husband with a desire to really slap him, but turned to the young knight holding the box instead.

She lifted her hand and dipped it into the box. She played around with the papers for a while before finally picking one out.

Everywhere remained dead silent as she opened the paper in her hands and her eyes fell on the words on the paper.

They dilated and her mouth formed a wide and silent oh. She was hoping she was reading the words wrongly since they were written in Tragish.

But then Barak collected the paper from her and hummed, "Ah, well then, we shall have a fistfight!"

Ahh! She didn’t read wrongly!! She was going to have a fistfight with her husband!!! With Barak Der Drache. "I am finished."

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