Chapter 103 - [Bonus ] A Meeting House

All three of them sat in the spacious interior of the passenger seat of the car with Zi Mei in the middle. Jessica orders the driver to drive and then a heavy silence fell over them. Zi Mei has so many questions now. She stole a glance at Damon King. 

The boy - no, he is a man, definitely not a boy - was grinning and looking like a cat after it ate a canary. Smug and proud as if he had achieved something monumental. 

"Are you a dragon too?" Zi Mei finally blurted out, breaking the silence that was stretching longer and getting uncomfortable. 

This elicited a deep laugh from Damon King. 

"You couldn't be more wrong than that!" he said. 

"Well, then, since you know about dragons and you are not one, then what are you?" Zi Mei tried again. Could it be that he is a normal human who knew about dragons, just like her? But then Jessica knew him. 

"Wouldn't you want to know," Damon King said, winking at her cheekily. 

Jessica huffed loudly. 

"Look, Mister King, I don't know what you are playing at but please explain why you are hanging around Thorin's mate?" she asked Damon, sitting up to look at him. Damon King sat up and returned her gaze. 

Zi Mei, caught in between both of them, sank as far back into her seat as possible. 

"Why? Is that forbidden? I merely find mortal places of education amusing and I had time to burn," Damon replied flippantly. He leaned back and looked out the window. 

"Even though you had helped in ending the war, that doesn't mean Thorin will take your presence here, especially around her, lightly," Jessica said, referring to Zi Mei. 

Zi Mei is perplexed. She doesn't understand what is going on except that Damon King had helped end a war. She wondered if it was the demon war that Thorin got injured in. 

So, Damon King is definitely not human if he is powerful enough to end a war. Once again, she wondered what he is. He can't be a demon…can he? But if he was a demon, Thorin would know when they were both running after her. Thorin spoke to Damon and did not find him suspicious at all. 

"Oh don't be such a stickler to keeping within the rules of the realms," Damon King said dismissively. 

"These rules exist to maintain the harmony of the realms," Jessica replied, her tone slightly annoyed. 

Zi Mei glanced at her. It sounded like the Ice Queen is getting angry, she thought. 

Damon King shrugged nonchalantly. 

"Since I am already here, I am merely having some fun, you know, to relax and de-stress, think of this as a vacation for me," he said. 

"Hanging around Thorin's mate in college does not seem like a vacation to me, more like a threat," Jessica bit out.

Zi Mei sat up at this. Did she say threat? Is this Damon King dangerous? 

"Now look what you did! You frightened my new best friend!" Damon said, noticing the alarm on Zi Mei's face. He smiled reassuringly at her. 

"Hey, chill, I will never threaten your safety, after all, best friends look out for each other eh?" he said, using his wide shoulder to jostle her in a friendly manner. 

"We are not even friends…much less best friends," Zi Mei replied. The nerve. 

"Awww…you are breaking my heart…my poor heart…rejected and trampled over when my intentions are pure and innocent," he said, clutching his chest in jest. 

"Zi Mei, it is in your best interest to avoid him in future," Jessica told her. 

"Hey come on! I am not that dangerous, honestly, why are you prejudiced against me from the start?" Damon King protested. 

"You are the demon king, who can be more dangerous than that?" Jessica retorted. This time, Zi Mei shrank away from him and stared at him in shock. 

"WHAT???" she exclaimed. "Yet you invited him to sit in here with us!!!" 

Damon King rolled his eyes and sighed exaggeratedly. 

"Hey, there's some misconception going on around here," he said. "If the devil can give up hell to set up a posh bar and live here, why can't I be a student here and live a normal mundane life?" 

Zi Mei is still gaping at him in shock. To think that the last few days he had been annoying her at every turn and she has been rude to him more than once. Actually, most of the times. He could easily have killed her. 

"Come on Tan. I am harmless," Damon King said, giving her shoulder a soft push. 

"You are a demon!" she said accusingly. She turned to Jessica. "Why didn't Thorin realise that when they met outside my college?" 

"That's because he is THE Demon King so he has camouflage powers that even a dragon elder could not get pass," she replied. 

Zi Mei is now panicking inside. Does this mean even Thorin will not be able to defeat this Demon King? Is he here to kill her too? 

"I am not here to kill you if that is what you are thinking right now," Damon King said, as if he read her mind. She shrank further away from him, crowding on to Jessica's side, practically leaning on the dragon. 

"No, I can't read your mind…I only know how most humans think," Damon King said. He looked at Jessica. 

"Okay, fine, I will tell you why I am here," he said. He gestured towards Zi Mei. "How much does she know about the war?" he asked. 

"Enough," Jessica replied cryptically. 

"Hmm…so it's okay to talk about why I'm here in front of her? Sure, she won't freak out even more?" Damon asked. 

"Excuse me, 'she' is sitting right here. I can hear you," Zi Mei piped in. 

"There, you have your answer," Jessica told Damon King. "But I think it is wise that we talk with Thorin around," she added. 

"Right. Thorin. The dragon elder who was fatally wounded and managed to come back from the brink of death," Damon remarked. 

"Brink of death? What?" Zi Mei interrupted. She thought back to finding Thorin unconscious and bleeding from a wound. She had thought he was dying too. 

"Just shush," Jessica told her. She glared at Damon King. "He is meeting his mate at her house so we can all head there together and hold the meeting there," she told him. 

They are now talking over Zi Mei as if she wasn't sitting right there, between them. 

"Meeting at my house? So now my house is a meeting house?" Zi Mei interjected but they ignored her. 

"That sounds like a good plan, so let's go to the meeting house," Damon King replied Jessica. 

"Yes, lets. I hope you will stop following this one around after the meeting," Jessica said, referring to Zi Mei as 'this one'. 

"Hey!" Zi Mei protested. 

"I find her rather cute, why can't I hang around her?" Damon King shot back.

"You know why! You could adversely affect her," Jessica said. 

Damon King frowned at that. He looked at Zi Mei this time. 

"You are not pregnant are you?" he asked boldly. 

"What?!?" Zi Mei exclaimed in surprise. "That's a rude question!" she added. 

"No, it's not. I need to know for the safety of your child and you," Damon King replied. 

"What?" Zi Mei felt like a broken recorder that kept playing the same words out loud repeatedly.