C -21

The Contract Series (The Arrange Marriage)
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Chapter twenty one. A warm line of soft kisses that started between her shoulder blades and ended on her cheek tugged Sooyeon momentarily from sleep. She pried her eyes open and Taeyeon kissed her temple. “Good morning,” Taeyeon murmured. “I'm sorry I didn't mean to wake you, go back to sleep, I will be out for a bit" she assured the pregnant woman and Sooyeon acquiesced, slipping easily back into a dreamless slumber. The next time she woke again she was on her side, the blanket drawn to her neck from the front, her back bared to the cool morning air filtering through the window. Sooyeon stretched languidly, enjoying the loose feeling in her muscles. She felt better than she had in weeks, a combination of emotional and physical decompression, the magic of a good of course. She lay in bed for a while longer, enjoying the foreign feeling of complete relaxation. She reached for the water container sitting by the bedside and took a long gulp from it, the cold washing down and chilling her stomach. And that's when she felt something jumped in her stomach, she halted and it jumped again, like she’d just swallowed a fish on a line and it was wriggling, trying to get free, and then abruptly stopped. Sooyeon frowned and placed a hand on her stomach. “What...” she whispered to herself, and then froze, eyes widening as the realization dawned. 'The baby. The baby moved.' She thought and shot to her feet, scattering the remaining fruit in the basket that was near to her side of the bed. Exhilaration raced through her, warming her veins like wine. Her heart was hammering in her chest, and she nearly tripped and fell on her face in her hurry to go look for her wife. She kept one hand pressed to her stomach as she moved quickly out of their chambers as if feeling it with her hand could make it more real. Walking down the corridor, she almost bumped into Yoon ah who was on her way to the princess's chambers with a huge tray filled with Sooyeon's favorite breakfast dishes. "Your highness, is something wrong?" Yoon ah asked worriedly and wondered what could have went wrong for the princess to be running without her shoes on. "Taeyeon, where's she?" "At the lake, But..." The princess did not wait for her friend to finish whatever it was she was going to say as she hurried past her aiming for the lake where her wife was said to be. Yoon ah only wanted to remind her that she was barefooted. “Taeyeon?” she called. Her breath was coming in short, excitable pants. “Taeyeon!” She jogged a few more steps, scanning the lake area for the general's head from afar. She was at the garden that Taeyeon had been collecting her fruit. She should be close. “Kim Taeyeon!” “Sooyeon?” Taeyeon appeared from behind a tree to Sooyeon's right. She had two full baskets of fresh fruits and she dropped them both before jogging to Sooyeon, obviously worried. “Are you okay? Sooyeon didn’t answer, she wasn’t sure she could even form a coherent answer even if she wanted to. She could feel her smile stretching her cheeks, could feel her heat tripping in . She seized Taeyeon by the wrists and pressed her hands to her stomach. Taeyeon jumped. “What—” “It moved,” Sooyeon said simply. She watched Taeyeon's face flicker as she processed the words, paired them with where her hands were and Taeyeon's head shot up. Her eyes were wide, her expression unreadable. opened and closed once, twice, before she managed to force out a question. “It did?” Sooyeon nodded. Taeyeon smiled wide as her head dropped again, her eyes focused on Sooyeon's stomach. She moved her hands, tracing the gentle, barely-there protuberance. Sooyeon brought her hand up and tucked a strand of hair behind the general's ear, the desire to touch her nearly overwhelming in that magical moment, but at the same time, a sharp sting sliced through Sooyeon's neck and raced down her spine. She jerked and slapped a hand to the back of her neck. “What?” Taeyeon dropped her hands. “What is it?” Sooyeon couldn't answer. A warm, sick feeling was trickling through her veins, working its way up her face. She could feel something under her fingers, something firm and oddly fuzzy. Sooyeon pulled. It hurt; like a bee sting with barbs. “Sooyeon?” Her hands were sweaty. And there was bile starting in the back of . “Sooyeon, what...” Sooyeon brought her hand away from her neck and Taeyeon stopped. A dart lay in her palm, small and sharp and adorned with precise black fletching. The princess stared at it dumbly. A hot flash blistered through her body. She was shaking. “Sooyeon.” She saw Taeyeon's hands reached for her and then Taeyeon made a quiet groan like noise, like the air had been punched from her lungs strangling in . Her hands fell away abruptly. Sooyeon pulled her eyes away from the dart. Her head was heavy, and she lifted it with effort. There was a sword embedded deep in the center of Taeyeon's chest. Sooyeon froze. For a moment, a flash of terrified adrenaline diluted the drug working its way through her system, bringing everything into horrible, exquisite detail. The small precise circle of red ringing the sword's shaft and spreading slowly outward. The raspy sound of Taeyeon's breath leaving . A sloppy bubble of blood frothed and burbled over her bottom lip and Taeyeon's eyes shuttered and went dark, faster than a finger snap, and she fell away. The general folded on the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, her head canted back at an awkward angle, staring up at the sky with unseeing eyes, and Sooyeon felt an enormous hand reach inside of her, into her deepest, most essential parts and tugged, then ripped. "No, no please not again," Sooyeon whispered, over and over again, the words tripping through her brain like a debased mantra. "Please not again." She couldn’t move. She could feel the drug working its way through the last of her muscles, paralyzing her and focusing her world to a pinpoint of agony. There was no gradual pull to consciousness. There was nothing, and then there was the sudden sensation that she needed to throw up, that she was throwing up, right now, this very moment, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. ~~~ The princess wrenched her eyes open, gagging. She was on her back, staring up at the open sky. Her stomach heaved. She twisted, trying to roll herself onto her knees but her arms wrenched and she dropped awkwardly onto the ground, the right side of her face pressed into dirt. She vomited and immediately drove her heels into the ground, trying to push herself away from the yellow, rancid mess she’d left on the ground. She rolled onto her knees. A line of spit and bile trailed from her lips. It broke and slapped against her chin. Her arms were tied behind her back, the end of the rope looped around a thick tree. Sooyeon struggled backward, trying to relieve the pressure on her shoulders. The ground pitched and whirled as she lifted her head. She vomited again. And again. And again, until the vile bright yellow had faded to something that looked like faintly yellow water. Sooyeon dropped back against the tree. She was sweating and shaking uncontrollably, her arms crushed uncomfortably behind her. Bark bit into the skin of her forearms, but she was too weak to do anything more than roll her shoulders to try to find a more comfortable position. She closed her eyes and the needle-thin knife of memory drove into her abdomen. A gaping mouth of despair opened, threatening to swallow her whole. 'You can’t, she told herself desperately. You can’t fall apart. Not yet, you have to save Taeyeon again.' But they were just words, designed to make herself feel brave, and the princess could feel herself disintegrating already. Never in her life had she felt so vulnerable, so helpless. A toxic adrenaline coursed through her veins, pumping out from the tight ball of sick that had lodged in her stomach. 'Taeyeon's been attacked.' she reminded herself, and heat shot up her neck. She felt like she was going to be sick again. The image of Taeyeon falling backward played across her eyelids and Sooyeon clenched her eyelids tight and tried to will the image away. "Not again please." She repeated. “Good morning.” a man's voice said, his words were bitter and insincere . And when she looked up, she was stunned to see the culprit. Anger surged through her, momentarily muting the emotional havoc Taeyeon's possible state was wrecking on her. She twisted her head and found Nam Joon sitting a fair distance away, legs crossed as he ate what looked like the last bit of a chicken thigh. “You?" Sooyeon rasped. felt raw and sticky, and she swallowed hard. Nam Joon clacked his teeth again
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Taengislove89
This feature is totally unexpected, but much obliged everyone for your support, I wouldn't have done it without you all.

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Blue248
#1
Chapter 30: This is great, I really enjoy reading this author-nim, and thank you for being an amazing writer~~
KimKty #2
Chapter 13: Hye there. I am only on chapter 13 but i am already hooked. You are such an amazing writer.
alwaysdivine #3
I can’t believe I’ve only read this story NOW. You certainly have a way with words and it was amazing to visualize all the scenes in my head. You have a gift, author! I cant wait to binge the rest of your stories ^^ #taengsic
nayeoff01 #4
Chapter 7: daeng... i kinda want taeyeon to suffer..does that make me a bad person?T.T
nayeoff01 #5
Chapter 6: idiots😭
nayeoff01 #6
Chapter 5: EHATVTHE HEÇK?! I BET THE LETTERS ARE FABRICATED OR SIC REALLY WROTE IT BUT FOR HER DECEASED FATHER! AND NO WAY SOOYEON WOULD KILL TAENG!
nayeoff01 #7
Chapter 4: how can sooyeon can shift from being frightened to being hungry for taeyeon? 😭 no once can blame her though
nayeoff01 #8
Chapter 3: the mighty general is so cute, poison by eating broccoli? really?😭 i agreed that no human can resist such jewel
nayeoff01 #9
Chapter 1: eoooo interesting. At least the story won't be conflicted by taeyeon's identity because she already confessed to the queen from the start.