The man grinned at the shivering people behind the wall with a cruel expression on his face.
"Found You!"
The man's voice echoed out, making everyone shiver even more.
But no one was as scared as the 13-year-old Princess Tilda Lockhart of Dafaren.
She tilted her head downwards and tried her best not to shiver before the beast.
But it was just that her body had refused to over her decisions when it saw the mighty man slowly approach her.
~Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
His footsteps were death sentences to her ears, the closer he got.
But no matter how stubborn her body acted, she still refused to cheer before this brute!
With that, she gritted her teeth and stood amongst her trembling ladies in wait, who were still by the way, protecting her with her hands spread out.
Seeing her standing up and pushing her way to the front, the 21-year-old giant couldn't help smiling victoriously.
Want to run away from your fiance?
Think again!
.
The 13-year-old Tilda looked at the mad man before her with hatred in her eyes.
All this could be attributed to her good mother and father.
Yes. She was a royal princess, with Prince Skye being her half-brother and whatnot.
That's right.
Dafaren was the empire in Veinitta, where she resided.
Here in Dafaren, she had lived the life of a puppet.
Her mother didn't like her, only favouring her elder sister.
This was also because the healer said that she had swallowed all her mother's sons in her w.o.m.b.
So her mother could never have another make child anymore, other than her eldest brother, Prince Kievan.
And so from her birth, her mother had seen her as an enemy, treating her like trash.
Her father was also the same as well.
His majesty, Alexander Lockhart, only spoke to her once a year or sometimes once in 2 years.
He knew nothing about her and was more focused on his sons.
Well, somehow she did understand this matter.
After all, growing up, her father would travel to several regions across the empire, only returning months and months later.
Sometimes, a round trip was as long as 8 months away from the palace, and other times it was shorter or longer.
This, she could understand.
But what irked him was that when he came back, he would only see his sons and hardly saw his daughters, except 2 who were his favourites.
In truth, Alexander at times didn't know how many daughters he had.
If not for official ceremonies from time to time or coming of age ceremonies, he would never know.
To him, women didn't have much value to begin with.
.
Anyway, before her life-changing event, Tilda had no love or hate for this father of hers.
But after a certain decision took place that stamped her fixture, she would be lying if she said she didn't loathe him.
Just because a notorious visiting prince from the empire of Lingingburg had visited and taken notice of her, her father had readily sold her hastily... Courtesy of her mother's words, of course.
But this itself wasn't the problem.
As a process, she knew that she would one day get sold off.
But not to this time of brute!
The bastard before him was too famous in Veinitta.
He had killed his other 3 wives by whipping them out to death.
And even when he visited Dafaren, he also loved whipping, beating and displaying his might out on the streets too.
He was a pervert who had r.a.p.ed countless girls.
And the way he looked at her gave her the chills.
Last time, they left both of them in a room alone, and he had already grabbed her body, doing unspeakable things to her while slapping her hard in the face as well.
She cried and complained, but everyone said that this was how he displayed his love for her.
In fact, he suggested that the fault was hers for putting up a fight.
Yes. He said if she didn't fight, she wouldn't have gotten hit.
Apparently, her actions have repercussions that she needs to be aware of and learn from her mistakes.
And so for the first time in a long while, she felt trapped with nowhere else to go.
.
Little Tilda didn't know what to do from there.
She got locked up in a woodshed for 3 days as punishment for resisting and cried for days, feeling that the world was too dark to live in.
From childhood till now, everyone treated her as if she were cursed.
Thanks to the omen she was tagged with from birth, even the palace servants were scared to get close to her.
The world was too dark for her.
Nonetheless, she did have a few people with her life that shone a little light into her life.
One was her maternal grandmother, who thought her mother was foolish and didn't believe that she was a bane.
One could say that her grandma loved her more than she loved her older sister or other grandchildren.
Her grandmother said she had a good heart and didnt for one second believe she was evil.
To her, Tilda was better than the scheming and dishonest hearts of her siblings and everyone around.
This, her grandmother snuck her people to be direct maids and servants around her.
She tried to protect her while not standing out too much.
And that's how she had a few peaceful days in the palace.
But after getting engaged with this bastard, her grandmother was also scared for her life and sent her people to take her out of the palace and flee.
But sadly, after travelling nonstop for just a day, her father's men, alongside her fiance's men, had found them here and killed off her guards.
And that's how she found herself in this mess.
Tilda thought of her life and fate feeling unwilling.
Why?
Why her?