AN: Oh gosh! And update! Could this be for real? xD I'm so sorry for the long wait here. As you may know I had a really really bad break up and upcoming divorce. And I also had a lot of work to get my business through all the corona shit going on.

However, this chapter is going to be fluffy :P Enjoy!

CHAPTER XVIII
Guardian Angel

"Tell me when I hurt you, Marik." I said softly and in a comforting tone while my hands removed Marik's bandages on his arm carefully. He sat on his bed and the room was illuminated by a few candles and a lamp on his night stand, which just gave a quite dim lightning. But it drew a striking contrast to his tanned face that almost took my breath away. "I'm trying to be as careful as possible…" I excused beforehand.

His lips formed into an understanding grin for a brief moment once Marik looked up to me. "Go on." He answered softly, but I knew he was trying not to grimace his face in pain. And I did like he said.

"It's healing good so far." I assured him and examined the wound. "But it will take some time though." A sigh escaped my throat before I carefully cleaned his wound with an alcohol pad. He moaned a little when he felt the burning pain of the liquid and I immediately felt sorry for having to hurt him. "I'm sorry." I apologised.

"I prefer this little pain over death - that's for sure." Marik said and smiled.

His words made me smile too. "Same goes for me. I can't imagine a life without you. To be honest…" I said with a saddened undertone in my voice. "It feels like I'd die from the inside just by the bare thought of losing you." And it was true. Whenever the massacre at the museum came back to my mind it felt like someone ripped my heart in two when I realised that he could have died right in front of me. In this moment of our - pretty unclear - relationship I would have never thought that I'd leave him on my own one day. I've been so blind.

Marik was silent for a while and locked eyes with me. "Don't think back, Jesara. I'm still here and I won't go anywhere." He said reassuringly while I wrapped a fresh bandage around his arm cautiously, but I never broke eye contact with him. "But I do feel the same about you and I'm feeling guilty that I allowed you to join the mission, because I could have lost you as well."

My lips formed into a smile, but my head couldn't find just one word to say. I just felt happy for hearing words like these out of his mouth. I felt how my cheeks started to burn like fire and my heart started to beat faster. But I could tell from the expression in is lavender eyes that he knew what was going on my head. I finished his new bandages and we sat right next to each other in silence on the edge of his bed. Without any prior warning he bent over to me and placed a kiss on my lips, which was just soft like a feather.

"Let's never talk about this ever again. We should better do something less negative." Marik then suggested.

I was still a little irritated from the sudden kiss and I wished it would have lasted a little longer. "You should get some rest and sleep now, Marik. It's late." I urged and pointed towards his pillows on his bed.

Marik rolled his eyes and shot me one of his charming grins. "I'm not a little kid anymore, Jesara. I thought we could have some fun after a day like this. Just you and me."

With those words spoken I blinked at him in utter surprise and my face turned bright red. My brain came up with various scenarios about what Marik could mean by that, but all of them were about that one thing we didn't do yet. My thoughts went wild and my mouth became dry.

"Why don't we have a little duel. Just you and me. Just for fun and then we'll go to bed." Marik suggested, wearing one of his smart smirks on his face. "We didn't have one in a while and as the number two in this organisation besides Odion you should train your dulling skills on a regular basis."

I blinked at him in surprise. 'Of course it's all business…' I thought and somehow I was a little disappointed. "U-uhm… okay. But I'm sure that I could never compete against you, Marik."

Marik shrugged his shoulders and smiled at me. "Of course not, but like I said. It's just for fun. A little good entertainment would do us good these days." And he was right. After all that happened during the last days it would be great to think of something else than death, revenge or something like that.

We sat across to each other cross-legged on his bed and shuffled our decks. At this time my deck was stuffed with monsters that looked good for me or had an interesting name, but they didn't have a lot in common with each other. It was a funny mix.

"Marik… you won't use the Winged Dragon of Ra against me, right?" I asked a little fearful. I witnessed it firsthand what it meant to be hit by an attack of the Winged Dragon of Ra.

He chuckled. "You really need to ask this? I won't even let it come near you, Jesara. The Winged Dragon is a card I use against enemies, not against my wife. It's too dangerous." Marik explained dryly while he drew his cards.

Every time he called me his wife it made me speechless, although I should have gotten used to it after our relationship became deeper and more than just 'being married as kids'. He already confessed he loved me too. I smiled somehow relieved, because his words proved that he cared about me like I did for him. "That's good to know…" I said after a few seconds. Marik answered me with a smile that said it all.

"You start first." He said and pointed his piano thin fingers towards the cards in my hand. I blinked at him a little confused. I almost forgot that we just started to play duel monsters.

"Oh, yes." I mumbled and took a careful look at my cards before I decided what to play first. "I play this monster card face-down and end my turn."

Marik didn't comment it in any way. "Makyura the Destructor (ATK 1600 / DEF 1200) in attack mode and of course I attack your face-down monster. Let's see what you have there." He gave me one of his winning grins.

I grinned at him a little shrewd and flipped my monster card. "My face-down monster was Marshmallow (DEF 500 / ATK 300)."

Marik knit his brow when he looked at my super cute card. "What the… This is not even a real challenge for my monster."

"You may think, Marik. Marshmallow is not just super cute. It may not have super high attack power, but it has an interesting special effect. You can't destroy it by battle and if you attack it in face-down position you loose 1000 life points." I explained and bit back a grin.

"You're kidding me…" Marik growled a little annoyed after a pink fluffy mini-monster cost him half of his life points.

Jesara 2000 LP / Marik 1000 LP

"No, I'm not." I said and drew another card because it was my turn again. "I'll keep Marshmallow in defence position and summon another monster face-down. It's your turn again."

His thin fingers drew a card and his left eyebrow was in thinking position when he looked at his cards. Of course he was thinking about how he could get rid of my Marshmallow. I loved this card, because it was cute and perfect to bug the opponent.

"I activate Stop Defence to switch your face-down monster to open attack mode. Let's have a look, my dear." He explained and gave me one of his grins.

Of course this turn of his wasn't what I'd call optimal. "Damn it…" I mumbled, because I really didn't see this coming. I switched my monster into attack mode and pursed my lips in annoyance.

"Witch's Apprentice (ATK 550 / DEF 500), nice." Marik said in amusement. "I also summon Gil Garth (ATK 1800 / DEF 1200) in attack mode. You've made a big failure by playing Witch's Apprentice, my dear Jesara."

I blinked at him. I didn't knew what he meant. The only bad thing was that he switched my monster to attack mode to be able to inflict my life points, wasn't it? "Why?"

"Witch's Apprentice has a special effect. It increases the attack points of every darkness monster by 500 attack points. It also gains 500 attack points itself - of course, but my Gil Garth (ATK 2300) and Makyura the Destructor (ATK 2100) also gain 500 ATK." Marik explained dryly.

"Oh…" I sighed in frustration. I didn't know it. I decided to pack this card into my deck because I liked its look. "I guess that's not a good thing…"

"It's not. Next I activate the spell card Tribute To The Doomed. After I discard one card from my hand to the graveyard it allows me to destroy one of your monsters. I choose your funny Marshmallow monster thing." Marik added another glorious part to his turn.

"Wait! What! No!" I squeaked when I had to move my Marshmallow card to the graveyard. This monster was supposed to keep my life points save from attacks, because it wasn't able to be destroyed by simple attacks.

Marik simply shrugged his shoulders. He didn't care about the bare frustration that was written to my face. "First I attack your Witch with my Gil Garth, which causes you a damage of 1200 LP."

"Oh no… my witch…" I sighed in utter despair, knowing I totally lost this duel.

Jesara LP 800 / Marik LP 1000

"The duel is over. I just attack your lifepoints directly and bring them down to zero." Marik said dryly but with a grin drawn to his lips.

I sighed again. "I'm a horrible duelist…"

Marik shook his head elegantly and the golden earrings along his jawline jiggled a little. "No, you are not. Your opening turn was great, but you relied on your monster only and didn't add spell and trap cards to your strategy. You need to be prepared for everything your opponent could do to you, not just defence. Your opponents want to break through your defence no matter what. Every card in your deck needs to work good with the other ones. As soon as you know how to combine them you will duel better."

I nodded with a sad face. "Thanks… I will mind that next time."

He answered with a smile, which was warmer than his signature duelling smile and stood up from the bed. Marik then went over to his desk and opened one of its drawers. I never knew what he kept in there, but it had to do something with the organisation and such stuff. My eyes followed his movements curiously.

"There's something I want to give to you." Marik said gently and turned around and his bright lavender eyes met mine again. He held something in his hand that looked like a duel monsters card. I choked a brow at him with shot him a questioning look.

"Oh okay?" I took a deep breath in as my heart started to race a little. I knew him. Marik wasn't the type of guy who gave presents on a regular basis and when he did it needed to be something very special. "What is it?"

He sat down beside me on the bed again and smiled at me. "Something you have truly deserved during the last days. I ordered one of my Rare Hunters to get it. I didn't expect those fool to find it so soon. Honestly I wanted to find and win this card personally, but I'm a bit out of order since the happenings in the museum. But well… here it is."

Marik then handed it over to me. I looked deep into his eyes before I took a look at the card. For a second I was lost for words. It was a beautiful special effect monster card, level seven. The letters on it where golden and the picture on it was shiny, which meant it was a super rare card. There was a stunning looking woman with short ginger hair and graceful angel wings - dressed in a white gown on it. "Oh Ra…" I said, still lost for words.

"It's called Guardian Angel Joan. She's one of the most powerful fairies in the game and known for its life point increasing special effect and strength. I know that you like fairies and angel monsters best and well… This seemed like the perfect card for you, because you have been my guardian angel a few days ago. If you haven't been there I'd probably be dead now. I wanted to say thank you once again." Marik explained in a gentle tone, which I didn't hear often in his voice. I almost started to cry and I felt how tears of joy slowly built up in my eyes.

"T-thank you…" I stuttered with a shaking voice. "I don't know what to say."

"Why don't you start with telling me how you like it?" He asked sarcastically, but Marik could already tell from my face that I loved it.

"I love it. I-It's just beautiful." I said gratefully and locked eyes with him again.

The corners of his mouth went up a bit. "Like you."

This words made my heart skip a beat and I held my breath. Marik wasn't also the type of guy who said things like this often. It meant a lot to me.

"Marik…" I said his name under my breath and tried to work up all my courage. "I'm falling more and more in love with you every day. I can't even imagine the pain if I had lost you in the museum a few days ago. I was so afraid."

A few seconds passed by before he said something. "Well… Thank Ra I had my guardian angel, who insisted on joining the mission against my will." He then wrapped his arms around me and pulled me closer to his chest, but he tried not to strain his injured arm too much. Our faces were close to each other again. I missed his nearness so much during the last days. "And same goes for me, Jesara." Marik said with a whispering voice, which felt like the silent melody of the wind stroking along the dessert dunes at night.

I accepted his kiss when he gently laid his lips on mine. First our kiss was soft and careful and I let him take the lead. The feeling of his mouth meeting mine made my senses go wild and so did our kiss a few moments later.

From this moment on I knew that nothing in this world could part us.

I was so wrong.

AN: Hope you enjoyed reading it :-) leave a review if you like. I hope I can finish the next chapter sooner! Xoxo and thanks for reading!