Transmigrated Into The Body Of The Cursed Prince Wife
Chapter 108: Unwanted emotions

Chapter 108: Unwanted emotions

Ave stood outside the dining hall, stunned and a little bit hurt by Lucian’s behavior, even though she told herself she didn’t give a damn, as it was for the best he treated her this way rather than being sweet to her, which was hard to resist like last night. If he continued to treat her the way he did the other night, it would only be a matter of days before she’d end up breaking the walls she had built around her heart and mind to keep herself protected from any emotions of attachment and feelings.

She didn’t belong here and didn’t want to belong, she didn’t have a home here nor a body of her own, and the fact that being around this prince would break the hardened walls around her heart, she would rather he keep ignoring her until she would find her way back. But deep down, she felt her chest constricting at the way he ignored her and an emotion she didn’t recognize rising to her throat, which she swallowed back.

What was wrong with him? He had been so nice last night, and now he was back to being all aloof and indifferent with her. Could it be that he was indeed bipolar? Ave thought as she stood there for God knows how long until the three princesses, who were heading to the dining hall, spotted her and came to pull her along inside.

"Why are you standing here idly? Have you forgotten what happened the last time we arrived late, Selene?" Thalia whispered softly as she hooked her arm around Ave’s and ushered her inside the hall along with the twins, who were discussing their matches—men they both didn’t like, but their mother was forcing them to get acquainted with to form a marriage alliance.

Ave, who heard the elder princess’s words, snapped back to her senses as she was ushered into the chatter-filled hall. However, before she could speak or even react, Thalia had unhooked her arm from hers and whispered, "We will be meeting in my chambers at lunchtime to try the other dresses, the ceremony is the day after tomorrow. We have to prepare for our final practice. See you then." She smiled and walked away to her seat with the twins, who offered her smiles before following their elder sister.

Ave watched them as they walked to their seats, but as her place wasn’t here with the royals, she began to walk toward the curtains, though not fast enough, as she noticed almost all eyes on her. It made her wonder why they were staring until one of the guests, a princess, sneered, "I thought she was no longer a princess? Why is she wearing royal attire?"

"Tsk, perhaps she’s trying to attract the attention of another prince to secure her royal title. What a shameful way of thinking." Another laughed in mockery, causing everyone to laugh along with her, including Princess Madeline, who was sitting next to Lucian, who didn’t even act like he heard anything they were saying as his emotionless eyes were on her.

As if noticing he was staring at Ave, Princess Madeline pouted her lips before glaring at Ave. She had thought she would get rid of her today with the help of that useless Catherine who had brought some useless dress, saying it belonged to Selene and had some forbidden powers. However, regardless of what they did, it showed no signs of any powers, and Madeline had angrily thrown it into the fireplace while emptying her cup of tea on the stupid maid’s face for getting her hopes up this morning.

And as she noticed how the second prince was looking at his former wife, she felt a stab of jealousy and stood up to gain his attention to her by pretending she was feeling dizzy and swayed before falling towards Lucian. But, even without looking at her, he seemed to predict her movements and shifted his chair to the side, and to Madeline’s embarrassment, she fell to the floor instead of into Lucian’s arms, causing everyone’s attention to move away from Ave and back to her.

Ave stifled a laugh as she watched how the princess had made a fool of herself, but before she disappeared into the curtained area, her eyes locked with a pair of dark ones that had been staring at her intensely. Other than Lucian’s, they belonged to the first prince of Banzai, Prince Aaron, and when she looked at him, she offered him a small smile, which he returned and then winked at her before she walked into her part of the dining side.

Lucian, seated at an angle that made him see Prince Aaron’s expression at the table, didn’t miss the exchange between the two before Ave disappeared from his sight. His expression darkened even more, and a vein throbbed on his forehead as he clenched his fist under the table.

He stared at the curtained area of the dining hall, completely ignoring the annoying princesses filling his ears with their useless chatter that made no sense to him at all, while he fought down the strong urge to walk into that part of the dining hall and mark the woman behind the curtains as his, to make sure any male who approached her would not be taken lightly by him.

He directed his glare towards the first prince of Banzai, who like him, was staring at the curtained area, further irking him.

Inside the curtained area, Ave sat down alone as usual. However, she was somehow grateful for being in a separate area, away from the lousy halls filled with spoiled royals, and away from that jerk Lucian and Aaron, who had winked at her like she was someone he had known for a while and looked at her with those dark eyes of his that always seemed like he knew a secret about her that even she was unaware of.

Perhaps she was thinking too much into nothing, Ave thought as she dismissed his thoughts and looked towards the royals through the curtains where the elder guests were now walking in, along with the Empress and the fourth consort, then the Emperor and his minister advisor. She heard how the hall quickly fell into a dead-drop silence as everyone stood up to bow in respect, and since she was seated and hidden, she didn’t bother to stand—an advantage of being behind the curtain.

Once everyone settled back down, she heard the Emperor clear his throat and begin to talk to his children, something she had already gotten used to before every meal in this palace. After he was done discussing every single child’s marriage, the topic changed and was now directed to the elder guests at the table, who were now discussing the upcoming war.

"Valarie is said to be gathering their soldiers and feeding them potions to give them supernatural strength, as our spy has reported, I think we also need to prepare our soldiers to face them, defeat them, and end their betrayal for keeping witches and people with powers hidden for so long," one of the elder men representing a king of another kingdom said.

"To think we have been so clueless about this and even sat with them last year at the Emperor’s birthday ceremony repulses me every time I think about it. They should have been killed along with the people of Gina long ago," commented another elder, who Ave couldn’t see but felt unsettled by his words. Killed for what? For being different and possessing powers that hadn’t harmed anyone?

She had heard about this war but had thought they had changed their minds from fighting it, but it seemed they hadn’t.

"We have no reason to panic because they are training supernatural soldiers. With Prince Alden and Prince Lucian leading our army to Valarie, we will emerge victorious as we always did in every war," assured the Emperor to the people, who were now looking concerned at the thought of Valarie attacking them with their supernatural soldiers.

It was no secret that Lucian was like a monster on the battlefield, as rumors of how he fought had spread for a long time and how fast he could heal. Since they would be facing inhuman soldiers, much of the attention was now directed at the second prince, ignoring the first prince, who was the commander of their army.

"With you as the leading soldier, we have nothing to worry about, Your Highness," said a man among the guests to Lucian, who had not said a word since he’d walked into the hall and sat there like a statue with an aloof expression.

He was always the cursed prince to them until they needed him for something, Lucian thought with a silent displeasure.

"That’s why he would have made a good leader if most people weren’t against it, and now that my dear daughter has decided to pick him as her husband, the Banzai kingdom would be glad to support him if he were to be given back his position, Your Majesty. And now that he will be going to this war, I think he deserves as much after his return," Queen Katrina added with a smile on her face, catching not just Lucian off guard but also the Empress, who had told her son to make his move on Princess Madeline to secure his position as the Banzai kingdom were the must powerful in the Empire.

Elara glared toward her son, who looked completely lost in his thoughts, with his head held down, not paying attention to anything going on around the dining hall. Her hands balled up under the table.

The Emperor’s eyes found Lucian’s, who looked surprised by the fact that the Banzai kingdom was willing to support him if he were to marry their daughter, whom he was completely uninterested in and found annoying.

"I didn’t know you had picked a bride for yourself already, Lucian," the Emperor remarked as he looked from Lucian to the blushing princess sitting next to him. "If you two really like each other and the Banzai Kingdom is willing to support putting you back in line, it will be discussed in the royal court after the war, along with your marriage to the princess."

Ave, who was listening to everything from behind the curtains, felt her heart tighten into an unbearable knot at those words. Once Lucian was married to that spoiled princess, no doubt she would be cast aside to the position of a servant, not even his concubine.

Only his marriage to Madeline would make the Emperor consider putting him back in line for the throne, where he would ascend with the support of the alliance he would gather before then. What would her role be in this world once he took the throne and married another woman? Would she be taken back home or stuck here forever because she had failed to make him love his wife, even though he had taken the throne for the right reasons?

Ave didn’t know what to feel anymore with how everything was turning out, but then she decided to put all thoughts aside once her breakfast was brought to her. She would do her best to help him gain alliances, and after that, she would keep finding ways to go back to her time, even if it meant using spells to take her soul back to her real body. She didn’t belong here anyway, and she wasn’t supposed to feel anything for the second prince that would cloud her mind with unwelcome thoughts and feelings.

’It’s best he marries the Princess,’ she thought, her gaze cast down on her food, while fighting to keep the bubbling thoughts and emotions at bay so they wouldn’t stray to the point where she would become a pawn to her own feelings until she would no longer be herself.

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