Warrior's Princess

Chapter - 17

Rick sat down next to her and rested a hand on the top of her head. "I'm sorry I brought you into this," he said.

"What are you talking about? I brought myself into this," Jasmine pointed out, wondering what on earth he was talking about. "I mean, if I hadn't chosen to stay with Burns, the creature would never have attacked me and Ardeth would never have had to save me, and - "

Rick's head whipped around and he stared at her, confusion evident in his eyes. Jasmine concluded that whatever he was sorry about wasn't what she thought he was sorry about. "Wait, what are you talking about? Did he attack you? Who's Ardeth? "

So he was being the overprotective brother again, Jasmine groaned inwardly. "Rick, I'm not a child anymore," she began firmly, knowing that she'll have to have this conversation with him sooner or later. "You can't decide what I can and cannot do with my life."

He clearly didn't seem to be happy. "But if you had listened to me, Jasmine, you wouldn't have ended up with them," he spat, clenching his hand into a fist. "I wish I never left you with Burns, you know. You don't know how worried I was when I saw that you had ended up with those men!"

"And you don't know how worried I was when you decided to join the Legion and left me all by myself, not even sending me a single letter!" Jasmine retorted, raising her voice as her earlier embarrassment vaporized and was replaced with anger. "As you said yourself, Rick, the past is the past, and I'm alive, well and happy, thanks to Ardeth. So why don't we just accept this and move on? I'll like any man I want to. Those men would never harm me. You don't see me stopping you from liking Evie, do you?"

"Who said anything about me liking Evelyn?" Rick protested. "What I'd like to know is - who's Ardeth?"

Uh-oh. Jasmine shifted nervously, the fire she had earlier disappearing as he asked the question. "Let me just say that I have no problem with you threatening the Americans to stay away from me, because, frankly, I don't like them either. But when I do find someone I like, I'd prefer it if you'd not scare my betrothed away...not that you'd scare Ardeth easily."

Rick raised his eyebrows. "Yet again, who exactly is this Ardeth person?"

"Oh, just the man whom you threatened with a stick of dynamite," Jasmine answered, waving a hand dismissively, smirking.

Rick blinked once. And then twice. His eyes widened as the memory dawned upon him. "WHAT?!"

••••••••

"She's impossible! Honestly, that woman is insane!" Rick exclaimed, and he bursts into the room, and paced around the floor, muttering to himself. Jasmine laughed at her brother's anguish, after a long talk, he had decided to give Ardeth a chance and went to talk to Evie only to return in anger.

"Big Brother, Evie's taking responsibility for this. She's the one who read from the book and seeing as how you didn't stop her, she's thinking that you need to take responsibility for this as well. I think she's hurt that you're pushing her away like this." Jasmine said. Rick looked at his baby sister slightly surprised and confused.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Rick, it's obvious that you two like each other. She's hurt that you're actually taking the deal that you made to her into account. She thought that she meant more to you than just a deal." Jasmine explained.

"You really think she likes me?"

"I know she likes you"