Sorry for the long wait. Here's your new awaited chapter.
Bright light filled the room, and Chocolat needed to blink repeatedly to adjust to the sudden brightness. Noticing the warmth beside her, she leant towards it, seeking comfort. That was until a groan broke the silence of the room.
Just then did she realised that not only had she spent the night with him, but she was also hugging a certain person from behind. Her face turned into a deep crimson red, and also immediately, she released him. Pierre continued to sleep by her side with events from the previous night came rushing into her mind.
"By becoming a queen, you will be able to unite both sides by preventing war as becoming a queen gives you the authority to control the witches and wizards from both sides. Becoming queen means preventing war. Preventing the death of your friends and family members that you cherish so much."
After hearing the words poured out of Pierre's mouth, the first thing that came to her were her friends. Repeated assaults were made to her friends, and all she can do each time was to observe with no actions taken.
But… Pierre's words stung her like a knife. No longer becoming a spectator from the sidelines, she will be able to protect her friends from these dangers. Her mother and Queen Candy may not agree with her decision, but for the greater good, she will protect everyone by being queen.
If becoming queen means protecting the ones I love, I would gladly take up the offer. Even if it ended up everybody hating me. I will do whatever I can to stop this war from happening!
She snapped out of her thought the moment she saw Pierre's face inches away from her. Too close of a proximity, she nearly fell off her bed before he barely caught her hand, preventing her fall.
"Pierre…Thank you."
"No problem, my beautiful queen," his voice echoed in her.
"And good morning." She replied him with a small smile of hers.
Pierre turned away from her, "I will leave you to get ready for school. Meet me in half an hour for breakfast downstairs."
"Wait!" Her hand caught his sleeve. "I don't feel well." She wasn't making that up. After getting a noir, her heart felt like it's getting ripped off her body. Adding to that, she felt uneasy and anxious on meeting her friends in school.
Her sight met hers in an instance before looking away. "Alright. I will inform the school of your absence." That made her sighed in relief. "Having a noir may be hard at first, but eventually, it will stay asleep forever."
With that, he left, leaving her alone in her room. Chocolat didn't know how long time has passed but she noticed her eyes were red and puffy when she woke up and the sky turned dark. Hesitantly wiping off her teary face with her sleeves, she hugged both her knees to her chest.
Chocolat was planning to skip her meals due to her lost appetite, but her mind flew to Vanilla's aromatic cooking, as well as the twin's homemade food. She couldn't help but kept thinking about them. Not a day has passed and she missed them already. Then again, it was her fault for choosing to accept the noir, that continuously thump painfully inside her, and not her friends.
She thought of her resolve into making that decision. She even left Duke with Vanilla. Moments after Vanilla's and Queen Candy's words came up, her mind instantaneously made up a plan on that spot. To prevent war between the two sides, it will be useful to be the queen of both Le Royaume and Orge.
However, there was still a possibility of Pierre lying to her about the following matter.
That's how Chocolat ended up where she is now. If Pierre really lied to her, then it's not too late to relay information about the Orge to Vanilla and the others. She will be the one behind the scenes. But without lying to her friends, she couldn't possibly lie to Pierre. Though she had set her mind on it, she wasn't ready to meet her friends just yet.
She felt a lump beside her leg, when she remembered that she took her mother's diary along with her, just in case even though the key wasn't in her possession. She was about to take it out before she heard her door squeaked open.
Thinking that it was Pierre, she fell back to bed, pretending to sleep. She was midway in doing so, when a young girl, dressed all in black, and a black cat entered, carrying a tray of food.
"I-I'm sorry, Chocolat-sama. D-Did I interrupt your s-sleep?" the girl spoke, timidly.
Chocolat managed to force herself to crack a smile. "No. Not at all. I just woke up."
She left the tray on the bedside table. "H-Here's your dinner, Chocolat-sama. P-Pierre-sama wanted me to inform you that h-he wouldn't be home these few days."
Chocolat let go a sharp breath when the Noir ached.
"C-Chocolat-sama! Are you alright? Would you like me to get you anything?" The girl asked.
She clutches her chest in pain, taking slow breaths at a time, until her breathing even out. "I am feeling better now." Recovering from her position, she let out a breath of relief before her stomach grumbled again.
This time, her face turned red out of embarrassment while the girl beside her laughed. "Here, Chocolat-sama, your dinner." Passing it to her, she added, "Also, I forgot to introduce myself. I am referred to as Berry. And her name is Cerunnos." She gestures to the cat standing beside her.
When her name was called, Cerunnos jumped onto Chocolat and meowed at her. Berry giggled before saying, "She seems to like you. She doesn't do that to everyone."
Chocolat stroke her fur, barely remembering the cat when she cast the spell into a cat and when the cat guided her way to Pierre. For a moment, she thought that her pain from the noir lessened but she shook it off as an imagination.
She took a bite of her dinner. "This is good."
Berry lightened up almost immediately, "Really? I made it myself truthfully. And I hope that you like it. Glad to hear that you do."
Chocolat smiled back at her, small smile but nonetheless.
Pierre was absent for the rest of the days, and Chocolat got used to the idea of his absence within the mansion. Berry and Cerunnos became her companions within the mansion.
Over the week, during their conversations, she found out that Berry was an orphan who was taken in by Pierre after she wandered around aimlessly for a while. Cerunnos, as expected, was Pierre's familiar. Unfortunately, due to some reasons, she couldn't speak like any other familiars do.
They occasionally brought her meals and had conversations over them. Otherwise, they hardly met up with each other at all, as Chocolat stayed in her room the whole time. Though Chocolat finally decided to sneak out of her room this very morning.
She scanned both of her dark surroundings before stepping out into the shadow. Her toes were hardly making a sound as she searched for the exit. She made her way down the pair of staircases and was prepared to exit the building if a familiar voice didn't rang out.
Curious, she peeked through a room located at the far end corner. From the corner of her eyes, she saw Berry on the floor and a woman holding a whip towering her. Several whipping wounds can be seen on her back. Cerunnos stand between the two, hissing at the woman, though she prepared to strike again.
Before the woman hit Berry, Chocolat moved in and grab onto Berry.
She was prepared to receive the hit when a flash of light brightened up the whole room. Berry and the woman spontaneously fled the area, leaving Chocolat uninjured.
The light dimmed down, and footsteps began to approach Chocolat and Cerunnos. From the shadows, Pierre appeared along with Juliet, wearing the suit of his, back from his absence.
Pierre approached Chocolat, a frown plastering that handsome face of his.
Wait
Did she just thought of that? Her blush rising up her cheeks as he stopped in front of her.
For a moment, Chocolat was considering the probability of her being grounded or something. Still thinking through other likelihoods of her punishment, her thoughts were halted when he placed his hand on her head, Juliet nowhere to be found.
"Don't." He pulled her into an embrace. "Don't ever do that again." Her hands reached out to return the hug.
It felt almost forever when he finally let go.
"Now that I am back. Back to business," Chocolat looked at him confused, when a sudden pain shot up, rising from her chest.
She clutched to her chest tightly, before the pain worsened this time and she fell blank into Pierre's arms.
Her eyes quietly fluttered open, taking note of her surroundings. She is once again in her quarters, Pierre standing beside the windowpane, glancing at the world outside. He turned his head to face her, eyes as cold as ice, unlike before where it looked so hurt and sad. Chocolat shrugged it off as her imagination.
"Now that you are awake, let's continue from where we were talking about before," Pierre pulled a chair to sit beside her bed, "It's about your noir."
"As you may have realised, your noir is unstable. I went back to the Magic World solely because of this matter." He looked at her comparatively for a few seconds before continuing, "I believe that to help you overcome this issue, you will have to start to collect noir. The first step in doing that is to return to school."
Chocolat stiffened right away.
Pierre noticed her change in behaviour. "If you are still not feeling like it, I guess that it may be possible to delay-"
"No." He was cut off by Chocolat, before making contact with Chocolat's fiery emerald green eyes.
"I believe that it's now time for me to make my entrance as the reborn Chocolat."
So how was it?
Before anything else, I truly apologise for the long wait. RL has really gotten up to me and datelines are chasing me like mad. But either ways, I managed to find time for me to upload the next chapter.
To reviewers:
Anon: Glad that you like it! Especially since its my very first one!
Guest: Here's your chapter! And I am trying to put in as many lovey-dovey materials as possible. Since I too ship them both.
Rahma dela: Hai! Saya tidak benar-benar tahu Melayu jadi saya perlu gunakan google translate. Maafkan tentang itu. Ia adalah dari Jepun dan penulisnya adalah Moyoco Anno.
Sparkle9510: Thanks so much for liking it. Here's the second chapter and I hope you like it too!
That's it for now. I will try and update asap. Reviews and comments are greatly appreciated. Thank you for those who followed and favourite this story.
Happy New Year~