Mistakenly Eaten

65. A Knight Of The Storm

“Romeo, I don’t think you should be leaving on your boat in this weather.” Monique held a weeping Irene in her arms, patting the little child’s back with her hands, complaining to her husband inside her bedroom, pacing back and forth inside the room, as her little infant wouldn’t stop crying and at the same time, even she felt anxious that her husband had decided to take a huge risk by sailing his iron boat in to the ocean.

“Come on, Mon! you know I have been through bigger and hellish storms than this one. Don’t you worry. You know these tides and waves bring the biggest stock and more stock means more money.”

Romeo scuffed at his wife, putting on his shirt and getting ready to leave.

“But at least take someone with you. What about that fishmen of yours, Jack! Why are you going all alone, on your own?”

Monique kept the best of her pace, as she tried to handle both her daughter, who had comparatively calmed down due to Monique’s continuous movements and her husband, who was not willing to listen to his wife and had decided to go fishing in that bad weather, so that he could catch a bigger net of fish that came up to the surface during the high tidal moving weather.

It was a take it or leave it, one shot only, sort of opportunity for the guy and he wasn’t willing to leave it at all.

“Jack had gone to his village because his mother is sick. And the other fisher is also drunk and must be lying on the side of a road, so it is just me. But Mon, come on! You know me… you know your Romeo.”

“But they are saying that storm would get stronger during the night and that’s why they issues the warning to stay inside our houses. Romeo, I don’t why, but I feel so much unrest and fear in my heart.”

She once again tried to argue with him but he only smiled sheepishly at his wife, who stopped pacing for a moment, looking at the man, who made her courageous and not just that but also made her realize what real and true life and love meant.

Romeo walked up towards his wife and took off his silver cross locket. He put the locket over Monique’s head and left it on her, a ritual he always did before leaving for any hunt.

“Now! You must feel at rest and you must always know that even when I am gone, I am right here with you.”

He smiled softly at her and pecked the top of her head, softly kissing his little daughter Irene as well.

He walked out of the room, ready to leave, as he collected the keys to his boat and his flashlights as well but stopped when he felt a soft tug on his hand, that made him turn around and looked down to find Althea staring back at her father sheepishly.

“Mama is saying don’t go! So please Papa, don’t go.”

She told her father, who smiled as he bent down and pulled Althea in for a hug.

He hugged her tightly, as if she was the soul and strength that he needed for survival in life.

Everything that he had ever done and had become a strong and wishful man, who worked and struggled hard to be able to live in a beautiful even though small, but cozy home, where he could provide a comfortable, if not luxurious life, to his family.

It was the news of her mere existence, when Monique told him that she was pregnant that made Roneo realize that it was time for him to get serious in life and to start worshipping his family, for who, he took big risks, just like the one he was about to take. The adrenaline in his body that came to his body, that became the jest and the reason for him to struggle hard and become something, to make his daughter and his wife proud was driven because of his love for his family.

His very own family.

He sighed, growing up an orphan, he never had someone to call family and when he heard from Monique that he was going to become a father, which meant that it was the moment for him to have a family of his own and never even in his wildest dreams ever, he was going to let go off that opportunity.

So, without thinking much, he immediately eloped with Monique and came to the small town of Positano, where he worked hard, day in and night out, exhausted himself and was able to buy a small land, where he had built a small house over the past eight years and wanted to expand that house and give his very beloved daughter and wife the life that they deserved in his point of view.

Althea was always the closest to his heart because she gave him an essence of what it felt like to be a part of a family and when she held him back from going in to the storm, he did take a pause.

And when she requested something from him, it was like a carved line on a rock for him, that could never be undone and her demands were meant to be met by her father, for whom, she was the true princess of his heart.

Romeo smiled gently and perched down on the ground, as Althea stood rubbing her eyes and yawning, still in her night gown signifying the fact that she had slept earlier in the night but Monique, who stood by the door of her bedroom, still holding a now napping Irene in her arms, looked slyly at the father daughter duo, understanding that whatever command came from the little princess’ mouth, her father always fulfilled it.

Romeo pulled Althea to her chest and hugged her tightly.

“Fine! I won’t go.” He smiled feverishly and Althea simply yawned and rested her head on her father’s shoulder.

Monique also felt finally at peace that Romeo had decided to stay but her happiness was short lived as Romeo went back to his old and pre determined plan.

“But do you believe that your dad, is a knight?” he asked Althea, bringing her back to face him.

She nodded, now her eyes gently opening up again.

“You remember that story of the knight that I told you about…”

“… who saved the princess from the tower during a stormy night?”

Romeo nodded with a soft smile, happy that his daughter even in her sleepiest states, remembered the stories he told her.

“Yes! That one! So, don’t you think that your father is a knight and he can beat through every storm and came back to his princess?”

“Yes, I believe you Papa.” Althea bright smile that appeared on her face, lightened up Romeo, and he needed nothing more than the light in Althea’s eyes to brighten up his soul even in the darkest of the stormy nights.

“Then! You go there and wait by that window.” He pointed towards the single French window that rested in the drawing room of the house. “You wait right there and look at the ocean and see how your dad will defeat that storms and come back to my little princess.”

“Okay Papa!”

She giggled with excitement, as her father gave her a task and pecked on her forehead.

She rushed towards the window, sitting down and watched the sky the entire night.

When Romeo left, Monique was still not happy as her heart felt restless.

Althea on the other hand, considered the storm and the flashlights and the loud thunders that kept on scaring her throughout the night as her enemies, knowing that her father will defeat those monsters in the skies that ignited those sparks but when the morning came and came her father’s lifeless body, delivered to them on his wrecked up iron boat, it was an enough sign for Althea to be left scarred and scared of the lightening in the sky and the loud thunders, that told her that they were cruel and each time they echoed in her brain, they reminded her of they defeated her father and took his life and soul away from him.

To her, her father was her knight, the strongest man she had ever known and if the storms had defeated him, she only feared what it could do to her.

That’s the moment her eyes came across the flash in the sky, she felt paralyzed with fear and her mind strained with constrained thoughts of the inevitable death and its cruelty approaching me.

She laid scared underneath her quilt, hiding herself from the gruesome thunders but at the very moment when she heard the windows being shut closed from the inside, she felt curious, wondering if there was somebody to protect her.

She wished to find her father, somehow miraculously returned back to her to tell her that he was indeed her knight who had fulfilled his promise or perhaps, she wouldn’t even mind a hallucination of him but it wasn’t the case.

In fact, who stood in front of her, was a complete and a mere shock to her core.

It was Nicholas, who held a smile on his face, assuring and warm and his hands held behind him, as if hiding a present for Althea.

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Well, do you think Althea's knight is finally here?

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