Diane stares at each one of them as they leave the room, including Thaddeus.
But being the last person that is about to step out of the room, Diane draws the shirt of Ephesus back and closes the door when the rest went out and locked it.
"Don't think you aren't noticeable. You are too gentle to be a soil tester"
Ephesus says nothing but allow a corner of his mouth to raise slightly. How noticing she is.
"Who are you?" Diane asks.
The both of them are really close and any slight movement, Diane's forehead will be passing under the nose of Ephesus.
"My identity is what I disclosed to you, your highness"
"I am not a coward. I have met handsome men like you and they are ditchers"
Ephesus eyebrows shot up the moment Diane indirectly called him a ditcher.
"The only reason why you're still alive and not in my ass's oven is because there is something quite familiar with you and I am yet to find what it is. You gave a type of aura that still needs to be disclosed. I repeat, who are you?"
Ephesus smiles both teasingly and in thoughts.
"I must say, I'm impressed... " he whisper and lean forward.
His lips slightly touching the forehead of Diane.
"You see, Princess... If you are really curious about who I am and not what I want to do, why not you try to get me to tell you"
They to get him to tell me? What does that mean? Diane can't be anymore surprised than she already is.
"What does that mean?" she asks
Ephesus kisses her forehead, smiled and slowly walked out of the room, leaving Diane speechless.
To Ephesus, kissing a Princess's forehead signifies respect, which is true in the Kingdom of Azel. If you refuse to disclose your identity, you kiss the forehead of the Princess or lady, then she is under your control and will never ask for your identity again, until you tell her.
But to Diane now...
The kiss meant a lot and Ephesus do not know what he has just infused in her body. He has infused a kind of flying feeling into her that she has never experienced before.
Why is that?
Ephesus steps out and his men surrounds him. "What is it, your highness?" Simon asks in a whisper. And a very low whisper.
Ephesus says nothing but stare at the ground.
The kiss that signifies respect... Is it just respect it signifies? Or it makes something to rise up...
Something that must have been buried deep within your heart, or something that has never risen before in you? Does it rise up in you when you kiss the girl?
Ephesus breathes in and out.
"Let's go"
In the room, Diane is petrified and still in a daze. Gosh, is his lips soft or what?!
She touches her forehead. The spot where he kissed and brought her hand down just to stare at her fingers. The fingers she used to touch it and then she stared straight at the door.
It all happens slowly.
"What have you done to me?"
Vilva and the rest of Diane's maid girls rushed into the room to check on her the moment Ephesus steps out and saw their Princess staring at the door.
"Your highness? Are you alright?"
Is she alright? Does she looks alright? Even Diane asks herself these questions and sighs.
"I'm fine. Get ready for the tour, we leave in thirty minutes"
"Are we to tell the men?"
"Yes. Make it known to them"
Diane answers a bit too quickly, but the girls says nothing further and just exit the room.
"Her highness has said that the tour is in thirty minutes" Vilva says in respect as the four girls scurries but stops beside Ephesus and his men to tell them what Diane has said.
Ephesus nods and Vilva and the three girls left to the other rooms to let them know.
Esther, however, narrows her eyes at Miles and Miles just smirks lightly at her.
Esther smile a little, though it vanishes the moment she turned to leave with the other girls.
In the mind of Ephesus, war is ongoing.