Chapter 131: Whose head.

Chapter 131

The final stages of the meal were conducted in heavy silence. It wasn’t the kind of silence that screamed with hostility, but rather the cautious, measured quiet of two people who had realized they were stuck in the same orbit and were trying very hard not to collide.

Occasionally, the spell of the room would be broken by a brief request. “The salt,” Clara would murmur, her white eyes never leaving the sauce she was reducing.

Isabella would slide the cellar across the island without a word, her movements careful, her mind still anchored to the image of a skeletal King sleeping through a millennium.

They weren’t friends—certainly not after the library—but they were two women sharing the walls in a house that had been cold for far too long.

As they began to dish the food into elegant, minimalist bowls that looked far too expensive for a simple stew, the tension in Isabella’s chest reached a boiling point.

She cleared her throat, the sound echoing sharply against the vaulted stone ceiling. “How is…uh your magic?” Isabella voice was slightly hesitant when she asked.

She kept her eyes on the ladle, but she could feel the weight of the question hanging in the air.

It was the elephant in the room. Isabella knew that she had been the catalyst for Clara’s power failing—a surge of something she couldn’t explain that had momentarily stripped the witch of her essence.

They hadn’t spoken a word about it returning since the incident. Clara paused, the serving spoon hovering over a bowl.

She didn’t look up, but the air around her seemed to ripple with a faint, electric hum—a sign that the currents were flowing again.

“It is back,” Clara replied shortly, her tone clipped but not entirely biting. “It is… fine. Don’t let your mind wander to things you don’t yet have the capacity to control, Isabella.”

The silence returned, swifter and heavier than before. Isabella bit her lip and reached for her plate, her fingers brushing the warm porcelain.

She turned, intending to make the long, lonely walk back to the master suite—a space that felt far too vast for one person to eat in while a King watched from the shadows.

She had only taken two steps toward the open double doors when she heard Clara let out a long, weary sigh.

“Isabella.” The girl stopped, her back to the witch. She expected a sharp reprimand or a dismissal back to her room.

“Come,” Clara said. Isabella turned to see the witch leaning against the opposite side of the massive prep island.

She wasn’t looking at Isabella; she was smoothing out a linen napkin with a sudden, forced composure, her voice losing that occasionally edge of bitterness.

“There is no point in you sitting in that room alone. Sit. We will eat here at the island.” Isabella blinked, taken aback. She looked at the high-backed velvet stools tucked under the overhang of the island. “You… you want me to stay here? In the kitchen?”

“I want to ensure the vampire’s ’functional lie’ of a kitchen actually functions,” Clara remarked, though her eyes softened just a fraction.

“And I find I have little desire to eat here. Sit.” Isabella complied, sliding onto the stool with a cautious grace.

She watched as Clara set her own small portion down across from her. It was a surreal sight—the ancient witch and the werewolf girl, sitting in a multi-million dollar “decoration” of a kitchen, sharing a meal.

She wants to be friends, Isabella thought, a small, hopeful spark flickering in her chest despite her lingering suspicion. Or at least, she doesn’t want to be enemies.

The idea was a relief. As much as she feared Lucian and distrusted the secrets of this house, the thought of having another woman to talk to—even one as sharp and mysterious as Clara—was a lifeline.

She didn’t want to be a solitary prisoner in silk shirts; she wanted a connection that didn’t involve fated bonds or blood-thirst.

“Thank you, Clara,” Isabella whispered, picking up her spoon. Clara didn’t respond with words, but she gave a single, curt nod before taking a bite.

For a few minutes, the only sound was the clinking of silver against porcelain. It was a start. A fragile, quiet start to something that felt almost like a home.

“How do you feel knowing you are fated to an old man” Clara asked suddenly, her white eyes flicking up to meet Isabella’s.

Isabella paused, the warmth of the food finally reaching her stomach as she processed the question. “Fated to an old man?” she repeated, a small, involuntary huff of a laugh escaping her.

“I mean, I knew he wasn’t exactly my age, but after what you said… twelve centuries? It’s a bit different than just dating a senior citizen.”

Clara leaned back with a faint, almost invisible tug at the corner of her lips. She could feel the sudden spike in Isabella’s body heat—a radiating, fierce warmth that was far too intense for a standard werewolf.

It was a heat that belonged to something much older, much rarer, but the witch kept her expression neutral, refusing to voice the observation. She would try her best in calming isabella frayed mind.

“In the modern world, I believe they call that a ’significant age gap,’” Clara remarked, her tone dry and surprisingly light.

“Most girls your age are worried about whether a boy will text them back. You, on the other hand, have to worry about whether your boyfriend remembers what the air smelled like before the Industrial Revolution.”

Isabella blinked, her spoon halfway to her mouth. She hadn’t expected a joke—especially not one that referenced texting. “Did you just make a joke, Clara?”

“I’ve lived through the invention of the lightbulb and the internet, Isabella. I’m not entirely a fossil,” Clara replied, taking a delicate sip of her water.

“I’m simply saying, don’t let the ’King’ title or the ’Sovereign’ brooding get to you too much. At the end of the day, he’s just a man who has been asleep for far too long and has absolutely no idea how to handle a woman who talks back. He’s essentially a very grumpy, very powerful dinosaur.”

Isabella chuckled, the sound bright and genuine, echoing against the stone walls. The heavy, suffocating fear that had been clinging to her since the library began to lift, replaced by a strange sense of camaraderie.

“A grumpy dinosaur,” Isabella mused, shaking her head as she took another bite of the stew. “I don’t think anyone has ever described the Great King that way. I’m pretty sure he’d have your head for that.”

“And whose head might that be?” A voice was rumbled through the kitchen with a smooth, dangerous edge.

Isabella’s breath hitched, her laughter dying instantly as she nearly choked on a piece of carrot. She spun on her stool so fast she almost lost her balance, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird.

Lucian stood in the arched doorway, his silhouette imposing against the light from the grand staircase.

He had shed his formal jacket, his black shirt buttoned at the collar, sleeves rolled up to reveal the pale, powerful muscle of his forearms.

His gray eyes were fixed directly on Isabella, a faint, unreadable curve at the corner of his lips. Standing just a step behind him was Marco.

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