Chapter 155 Red Heart

Nikolai

I walked into the living room and saw my entire family sitting and talking quietly amongst themselves.

They looked pleased that I had technically won the fight.

But why did I feel like I've lost?

"Nikolai." Max came and hugged me, followed my Nat, Andrei, Mikhail and finally Dimitri.

"We missed you brother." He clapped my back.

"I missed you guys too." I told them all.

A familiar looking boy came in, around the same age as my kids.

"He is ours." Max placed his hand on the kid's shoulder. "Kol Meer Romanov."

I smiled. Nat stepped besides Max and slipped her hand in his. They named their son after me. "It's an honour."

Max gave me a nod. I crouched down. Kol had the same baby blue eyes as his father and black hair like his mother. "Hey kiddo. I'm your uncle, Nikolai."

"I know you." He crossed his arms.

"Yeah?"

He nodded. "Dad sometimes talks about you when he has his big people juice. You are Klaus and Tori's father. And I'm named after you."

"You're right." And then realised he had a different accent. I looked up at Max and Nat. "You don't live here, do you?"

Max scratched his scruff and shook his head. "We have a lot to talk about actually. Go play with Klaus and Tori, Kol. The adults need to talk." He patted his son's back.

"Alright, dad." He nodded and dashed off.

Kol ran out of the door and that’s when I saw Eliyah leaning against the doorframe and hiding in the shadows. "Won't say hi?" We had bonded quite a lot in the one month I called him every day to check up on Ava. He had become a good friend of mine.

"I haven't decided if I should welcome you back with open arms or with a be mad at you for putting all of us through that shit." He pushed himself off the wall and walked towards me with a slight smile on his face. He tossed me a t-shirt which I wore quickly.

He had grown a lot. Mentally and physically. I could see it in the way he carried himself. He had an air of self-assuredness and charisma.

He shook my hand and gave me hug. "Took you too damn long to come back, man."

"I know." So much has changed.

"You're a vampire now." I stated.

"Couldn't protect her being a human," was the reason he gave me. And I understood it. "And I'm part vampire and part faye."

He uncurled his wings. One was a large, navy blue coloured wing, almost seven feet long and the other one seemed a little...stunted, it was barely two feet.

Something had gone wrong.

"I asked Avalyn to turn me. Didn't know I'd get some faye in me as well." He said.

"Can you fly?" I asked.

"No." He said but shrugged. "I think it's cool anyways. The feathers are sharp enough to slit a throat." I knew it. Ava's wings had cut me once unknowingly. If used as a weapon, those wings could do much more.

"I'm happy for you." I patted his shoulder before I turned to look at my family.

"Take a seat and then let's talk," Mikhail said.

I took my seat on the love seat and waited till everyone was settled. Nat was sitting on Max's lap, Mikhail besides him and then Andrei him. Valerie was sitting on the other couch along with Dimitri. Eliyah had taken a seat on the other couch. They all were looking at me, wanting to hear everything.

"What do you want to know?" I rubbed my face.

"Everything." Mikhail replied. "You died. How did you come back?" Nat slapped his arm for the blunt question but then looked at me curiously.

"I never actually died."

"What!?" All of them shouted together.

"Well technically I died but didn't get to the after-life part. I was sent into a different dimension. It's exactly the same as our world but just mirrored. But there were no living beings. Only me. No humans, no supernaturals, no animals or birds or even insects. It was so silent. So devoid of any scent. So...bleak." Memories I wanted to forget flashed in front of my eyes.

I didn't want to remember it. And it was the last thing I wanted to talk about.

My eyes fell on the large scar I had on my forearm. It looked like a big snake bite. But it hurt so much, the venom was so powerful that I was delirious for days. I had seriously considered chopping my arm off. I was just thankful that Fiyona and Valerie had been there. Or else I wouldn't have survived it.

"How did you get that?" Max asked. We had encountered several snakes in the woods growing up, we might have even caught them and played with a few. So getting bit by one seemed unlikely. We knew how to deal with them.

"That world was filled with...creatures." I swallowed. "Each different from the other. This was from a human-like creature that could turn into a snake." I barely remembered fighting it. It came out of nowhere and bit my arm as I was resting under a tree. The venom was spreading quickly but I knew I needed to kill it before I fainted or else I would have been its food for the day.

It had been a long, tedious fight. I remembered watching it turn into a human-like shape through my blurry eyesight. It stood on its hind-legs and supported itself up with his hands. I remember it's ear splitting hiss as it was running towards me for a final blow.

And then I remember a flash of golden wings—Fiyona's wings before I blacked out. Without even knowing who I was, Fiyona and Valerie had fought of that creature and tended to me for days before I finally regained consciousness, all because they felt a connection with me.

They had been the ones who cured me, who made sure I didn't do anything stupid like cutting my arm off. They saved my life. How they survived in that world for so long? I had no idea.

"You don't have to talk about it, if you don't want to," Dimitri said.

My jaw clenched. We always talked about everything. There was hardly anything we didn't tell each other. But this seemed like something I physically couldn't talk about.

"Was it that bad?" Max asked.

I gave him a nod, unable to say anything more. It was single headedly the worst experience of my life.

"How did you escaped?" Nat told us.

I nodded. "The curse Max told us about was true." I said. "The entire Aine generation was given a curse that the birth of their child will be the cause of their death. Except it wasn't death, it was doom. The curse was given to Fiyona by her own mother because she didn't approve of Faelern, apparently there was bad blood between their families. The only out from the curse was when someone stronger than the one who gave the curse renounced it."

"Fiyona's powers weren't strong enough. If you put the powers of her five generations together, only then you would be stronger than her mother. They had been waiting for Avalyn for a long time. Me being there messed up all their plans. Since Ava lived, the curse was broken, so no one else was coming. I didn't have enough powers at that time, I wasn't strong enough."

"Then how did you all escape?" Mikhail asked.

"I was already the King of Air and Fire. And I come from a pure blood line. And since I am Ava's mate, I naturally have a few elements of her powers. They trained me every day, all day and taught me to tap into that inner strength of mine. Fighting with those creatures so often made me stronger."

"Six months later, Fiyona deemed me strong enough— stronger than three generations of royal fayes. And in all, it had been seven months. I counted each day." I swear I did. "I trained hard and fought harder, without any complaint because I wanted to come back home, to my family, to Ava, to my kids." My throat closed again. They didn't even want me to come back. "We came back to the palace. The bonsai tree has powers. We used it and chanted a spell Fiyona knew and then we were back."

"That's one hell of an adventure." Andrei muttered.

"You have no idea." I clenched my jaw. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. No scratch that. I did. I wish Adrik went there.

I'm happy to be home. But I just hate it. It doesn't feel like home. Ava made it home. And she's here but she's not my Ava anymore. She's different.

"Tell me about what happened here." I said and everyone kept giving each other glances but no one said a word.

"Things have not been very....smooth." Natalia started, sounding weary.

"Fucks sake." Dimitri muttered before looking at me saying bluntly. "I don't live here anymore. Neither do Mikhail, Max and Nat."

What?

He exhaled. "After...her...I ran away to Silverwitch Bay, as I am sure you knew. I was in bad shape. And Mikhail followed to make sure I was okay. I had no desire to do anything or go anywhere for years. When I did, Gabriel was here. And I couldn't...I just couldn't see them together. I couldn't see...you being...replaced." His jaw clenched.

"Same." Mikhail muttered.

"So we went back to Silverwitch Bay," Dimitri said, a hint of shame in his voice.

"Poziarne was having problems, so we decided to go there for a while. And liked it there better." Max spoke for himself and Natalia.

"That and because I fucking hate Gabriel. Something about him just rubs me the wrong way. Max said it was best if we let Avalyn have another chance at happiness and don't get in her way. I agreed but I didn't like it." Natalia said. "He just...he seems all nice in front of everyone but he feels....too nice to be true."

"He's a good guy." Andrei said gently. "He came to Jivan to find his long lost sister. It had been three years since you were gone at that time. And initially Avalyn showed no interest in him despite them being mates. She didn't give him the time of her day but when she found out why he came here, she agreed to help. And then they grew close. After tha—"

"They got together. Yeah I get it." I snapped, not wanting to hear anything else.

"She was miserable, Nikolai." Eliyah said. "She hardly ate, hardly slept...she had become a shell of a person. She got better only after they got together."

"This is better? Do you actually believe that?"

"No. But the by-product is." Max cut in. "Avalyn barely got out of bed. The Kingdom was a mess. We did our best but it was difficult. Some rumour was spread and people blamed Avalyn for your death. There were revolts and anti-monarch uprisings. We could barely hold it together. That's when Avalyn realised that she needed to get it together or else she wouldn't be able to uphold her promise to you— the promise of joining you on the other side of the Moon after your children are ready to take over the throne. She did the best she could, all of us did, and while a lot of things improved, there was another uprising against having a female rule the Kingdom. Her kindness led to the slaves taking advantage of her. The secret of our existence was almost out into the world. That's when Faelern came and took care of it. He erased the memory from the minds of the humans and gave Avalyn a little talk. She grew a firm hand after that and the Kingdom finally started coming to order. Gabriel came around the same time, claiming that her sister mistakenly walked out of the portal Faelern created. And you know the rest."

I had nothing to say to that.

My Ava has been through a lot. I had been so fixated on making sure that she and our kids survived that I forgot to make proper provisions for the Kingdom. I had taken my duties lightly and Ava paid the price for it.

Never again.

The first thing I needed to do was make sure that the Kingdom was in order. And those who created all that trouble were punished. Including the slaves. Ava won't be able to save her precious humans this time.

I will make sure that her kindness is not taken advantage of ever again.

They are the reason she has lost the softness inside of her and become this cold hearted Queen. If she was ice, I'd be her fire. I'll melt her. And I was sure that once that ice was gone, my sweet, caring and loving Ava would come back to life.

I just needed a plan. And to make one, I needed to be alone.

"Do you guys mind if I go rest? I'm very tired." I stood up, rubbing my temple.

"Not at all. We can talk tomorrow." Max said. I nodded and I walked back to our— my bedroom.

The first thing I did was take a long, hot shower along with forcing my mind to not thing of anyone else. I need to decide my next plan of action.

I know that I'm going to win Ava back, for sure. But how I was going to do that is the main question. I know she is still physically attracted to me, the time when she came to talk to me in private proved that. I can totally use that to my advantage.

I dried myself with a towel before I opened door to the bedroom.

I caught a glimpse of Viktoria sitting on the bed and then slammed the door shut quickly. What. The. Fuck. I went to my closet and wore a pair of shorts before I walked out.

She looked up and pouted. "You didn't come to see me later, Dadda."

"Sorry, Princess." I smiled at her and took a seat beside her. She was holding a picture frame of Ava and I. She was standing in front of me and I had both my arms wrapped around her. She was grinning at the camera and I was kissing her cheek.

"Why don't you kiss Mama like this now? My friends' parents kiss each other all the time." Her fingers feathered over our picture.

"Because... because we aren't together anymore." I couldn't lie to her.

"What does that mean?" She looked at me with her big grey eyes.

"Why aren't you in bed now? When is your bedtime?" I changed the topic. I didn't know how to answer that question. And it was past ten. How is she not sleepy?

She gave me a guilty smile. "I sneaked out to sleep with you, Dadda. Is that okay? Can I sleep with you?"

"Of course." I nodded and scooted further into the bed. I pulled the blanket over both our bodies and she curled into me, snuggling deeper into the covers. "You can sleep with me any time you want, princess."

She hummed sleepily. "I love you, Dadda."

The doors opened and Ava rushed in, letting out a relieved sign when she saw Viktoria.

"And I love you, Princess." I pushed her curls behind her ear and she smiled lazily, her dimples popping.

"You'll be here when I wake up, Dadda?" She mumbled.

"Yes." I whispered. "Sleep, Love." I pressed a kiss on her forehead and heard her heartbeat even out.

"She's sleeping with me tonight." I whispered to Ava.

"I'll take her to my room, you won't be comfortable with her." She came near the bed to pick up Viktoria and I put an arm around my daughter, "I said she's sleeping here."

"Don't be ridiculous, Nikolai. You don't know anything about her or her sleeping habits. She needs her mother." She whispered harshly.

"Just because I don't know doesn't mean I can't know." I whispered softly. "I'll keep her safe, Ava. If there is a problem, you are the first person I will come to."

She turned conflicted.

"She wiggles in her sleep a lot. If she wakes up and can't sleep, tell her a bedtime story. If she had a nightmare and wakes up crying, hold her till she falls asleep. And for any reason, do not give her sweets. Or else she won't fall asleep at all."

"Thank you." I gave her a smile.

She nodded at me and the leaned over the bed and kissed Viktoria on the cheek. "I love you, baby."

I too, closed my eyes and imagined that it was for me.

I love you too, my Ava.