By moonlight's shadow

Chapter 51

If anyone had looked at Raphael at that moment except Snow, she would have very carefully understood that he was in love with her. And it was not something fickle, like the one which happened today and after a week they would say that it is not working out anymore. This was the kind of emotions which would stay on long after they were gone and linger on the earth so that the two star crossed lovers can come back and finish their unfinished love story.

Sonata and Akira both looked at the direction of Snow’s gaze and found Headmaster King standing there with a poker face and a strange expression in his eyes. It was not readable.

“Good evening Headmaster King,” said both the girls together in unison as they stood up while he replied back with a smile and a nod.

“Girls, I would like to speak to Ms. White in solitude, if you will excuse us. And while I am here I should not find any of you listening at the door. You can discuss that later with your friend. And stay close in your rooms so that you can reach here after I am gone. She needs to be looked after for some time,” said Raphael as he opened the door to her room wide which was notion that he was dismissing both of them. Akira pressed Snow’s hand once after she stood up and Sonata nodded at the Headmaster with serious eyes. Her ashen eyes darkening with the gravity of the situation and they both left the room.

Raphael slowly closed the door behind him after the girls were gone and then strode towards her bed with slow steady sure steps and then he came and sat at the end of her bed.

“You are never supposed to say such things about yourself Little One. You can never do something to hurt anyone at all, and while you think that you can but I know that you cannot. Never ever in your life call yourself a slut again. Do I make myself abundantly clear?” asked Raphael as his eyes were a blazing red. He was controlling a lot to keep his voice in check but underneath that calm was a raging storm and Snow could feel the intensity of the storm.

Snow looked at him with her eyes changing from green to purple and her hair fast becoming white and she nodded at him.

“Now come here,” said Raphael as he outstretched his arms and Snow pulled the covers back and slowly walked on her hands and knees to go and sit within the enclosure of his arms. Snow had always felt that Raphael was the summer to her icy cold winter and today it really felt that he was the warmth that she needed to stoke the fires of her heart. It did not matter that his hands and skin were always cold and hers warmer than him, it was his heart and what he conveyed with his silence that mattered most.

As Snow thought this she could hear him saying,” I wish I can keep you safe always Princesa…”

And Snow thought that her heart skipped a bit when he called her Princesa. It was what the Fae had called her, she did not that it was the fae but she suspected that it must be one of them.

“Why do you call me Princesa? You used to call me your Little One and I liked that!!” said Snow, innocently and she had an inkling that he would be shocked to know that she could hear his thoughts.

And she was correct in suspecting that he would be shocked.

“How do you know that I called you Princesa?” asked Raphael with shock in his voice which he soon cleared away but Snow could nonetheless understand that he was surprised.

“Why? You only said that you wished that you could keep me safe forever and then you said Princesa. That is the reason I asked why are you calling me Princesa,” said Snow looking up to his dark eyes which had surprise evident in them.

“You could hear that?” asked Raphael as he looked down in the purple eyes of his sweetheart.

“Yes, you spoke loudly enough for me to hear but then again we do have somewhat of a sensitive hearing,” said Snow as Raphael kissed the top of her head.

“Sweetheart, something happened last morning in your dreams. Do you have any recollection of that? Or the things that happened after?” asked Raphael as he did not pursue the matter anymore that he knew that Snow could now read his mind and the thoughts that were passing in them.

“I remember only what Akira and Sonata told me. Before that I remember that we were practicing magic and it snowed hard. Then Grandma came and we all went for hunting. I could have caught the lioness and the gazelle both but I did not feel like killing any one of them, so I let Grandma have her way. I then recall us coming back, then I came here, changed and brushed and slept. That’s it,” said Snow as she shrugged her shoulders to emphasize what she remembered and what she did not.

Raphael sighed inwardly. It was both a sigh of relief and of apprehension because now he would have to tell her every single detail of what had happened and then try and understand the extent of her increasing powers. But never in a million years had he considered that she would be able to read minds. None of the witches from the time of the Great Witch had this power and now she was here with all these powers and strengths and no one to tell him how to proceed.

“Something happened last morning while you were sleeping Snow and you screamed out when you woke up. You took a long time to stop shaking and quaking from fear. You told us that you were transported to some place else in your dream itself. Someone had captured you there and shackled you all up while telling you things about your mother and darkness and you said that he was a bad salesperson and then you said that somehow you broke free of that and came out and woke up. We were very scared, do you remember anything of that time?” asked Raphael as Snow looked at him in surprise.

“I don’t remember anything of this sort happening at all. Are you sure that this has happened and I cannot recall it? Because it is unlike me to forget something like this!!” said Snow, her expression thoughtful.

“Then you must not remember this as well how you sucked on your finger and then beckoned me to come to your bed and spend the night warming your bed???” asked Raphael with an expression of humour in his eyes and Snow turned red as r****h no sooner than he had spoken those words. She hid her face in her hands as Raphael laughed out loud and then hugged her tightly while burying his nose in her hair. She smelled like winter, cold, icy, but innocent and pure. There was no comparison of her being in his arms.

“Did I do that in front of everyone?” asked Snow, softly and Raphael nodded and Snow groaned once again.

“What am I going to do? Oh dear!!! And the things that I said to my Grandmother…I am sure that she will never see my face again,” said Snow as she hid her face in his chest as laughter rumbled inside him and he burst out laughing as he recalled all that Snow had said to Elizabeth but then he stopped laughing. There were serious things which he needed to talk to her about.

“I have been able to figure out what caused that burst out in you,” said Raphael as Snow turned in his lap and then put her arms around him fixing her curious purple gaze on his face.

“Rebecca was brewing up a love potion for me, and you were affected by the remnants of the magic still hanging in the castle air. She made pasta for me, with red sauce and the sauce being blood. And poured the potion in it so that she can seduce me,” said Raphael as Snow’s gaze started darkening and her eyes were changing into black.

“I am going to kill her slowly,” said Snow as her voice dropped to a whisper.

“Well I might have already called dibs on that and done it before you,” said Raphael with an expression which showed that nonchalance.

“You killed the witch? What about the pact? What are you going to say to the Elder Council?” asked Snow in a rapid pace as all the probabilities started occurring in her mind in rapid succession.

“I will come to that later on but right now we have to focus on your safe being. A creature came and captured you in your sleep, the time when you were the most vulnerable and called you a sorceress which means that there will be others as well and if they lock your soul away somewhere else your body might not perish but you would not be left at all. So we have to figure out how to protect you when you are sleeping. And that is of the utmost importance at this point,” said Raphael as he kissed her forehead once again and her eyes changed from black to purple.

“How did you kill her and what are you doing with her body?” asked Snow as she looked at him up once again. Raphael smiled at her indulgently, her dogged persistence had led her to achieve so much knowledge and power in such a short while and he admired her for it.

“I slashed her throat after I heard her confession slowly. And I kissed her in order to stop her from reciting the spells to stop her blood flow and seal up her wounds. I had no other way to gag her except my own lips. So I am really not sorry about that,” said Raphael as Snow smiled at him.

“What did you do with the body and the blood Raphael? I know that you are impervious to the effect of witches blood in your body, so what did exactly happen to it? You didn’t send the body back, did you?” asked Snow with her eyes narrowed at him in suspicion.

“No it is still in my office, it is in the ice chamber. I have asked Lillian to collect up the blood and store it. It is not every day that we get our hands on a full body of a witch and it’s blood. They might be poison to our kind but they are going to be helpful to you. Moreover I want her magic, that is her bones interred in a grave inside the Academy grounds…” said Raphael but Snow finished his sentence.

“So that the magic and the glamour spell which we ask to reinforce every year from one of the covens of a witch will not be required any longer. We shall have a natural defense system against any enemy forces,” said Snow as Raphael smiled at her indulgently. She was correct as always.

“It is a good thing that you did not send her body back,” said Snow as she looked at the floor thoughtfully.

“And why is that?” asked Raphael as he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

“Because we need her to poison the school with her blood, don’t we now?” Snow looked back at Raphael with her eyes black and a sinister smile hanging from her lips.