The Knight's Mysterious Maid-Chapter 286: Lockwood (2)

"So, you are married now. Is this some sort of miracle, or love at first sight which would also be a miracle for you?" Rafael asked, still finding it hard to believe that Edgar had gotten married. The only reason he didn’t think Edgar was toying with him was because of a letter Tobias sent complaining about Edgar’s choice of a wife

"Congratulations by the way. I would apologise for not attending, but I was not sent an invitation."

"No one was. It does not matter how I came to be married. All that matters is that I am married. Should we ever care to do a proper wedding you will receive an invitation or you should finally grow some balls and marry the maid you have been having trouble with, we can all attend a wedding," said Edgar, watching how Rafael looked away like he had something to hide.

When he left Rafael’s manor, Edgar thought it wouldn’t be long before Rafael would be with the maid. Anyone who was using a snake to scare others was worth marrying. Knowing Rafael, Edgar didn’t think it would be this hard to get the maid to like him. Rafael never had an issue with getting women.

Now Edgar wondered if he should have stayed to play matchmaker to get the two together. It would have been entertaining to see Rafael act as if he wasn’t attracted to his maid, especially after what Rafael would say over and over again about not wanting to be with any of his servants.

Rafael didn’t see a wedding in his future anytime soon when he was still getting to know more about Annalise and he was starting to worry about her coming back to the manor. She was acting strangely and the more he thought about it, the more he worried that she might not be returning.

"It is complicated. More complicated than going out on a battlefield," Rafael replied.

He listened to Edgar laughing at him. Either pitying him or enjoying that he had joined in acting like a fool for a woman. Now he wished that Edagr knew nothing about Annalise.

’`It will get better or not," said Edgar, patting Rafael’s back to cheer him up. He was somewhere in Rafael’s state since Alessandra made him act unlike himself sometimes. "It is amusing to hear that you are trying to woe a woman. They are normally ready to jump into your bed so you never had to do much courting."

Rafael wasn’t fond of the way Edgar was getting fun out of seeing him worry about his relationship with Annalise. Tobias had been busy sending letters about Edgar’s life so Rafael had some knowledge of how Edgar was acting a fool these days.

To make Edgar realise he had no room to laugh, Rafael asked, "As amusing as you getting married? I heard you killed your wife’s father and punched Daniel for her. The great Edgar has become the new Tobias."

Edgar stopped walking to look at Rafael. This game of who was the bigger sucker at the moment was not something he was going to win. "I hear you are sulking around your house trying to get your maid to like you. You are mistaking the person who is the sucker. You are the one meant to claim that title," Edgar replied.

Edgar considered himself to be in a better position than Rafael since the woman he loved had proposed to him while Rafael was trying to court the woman he liked. At least he was married to the woman he was acting a fool for.

Edgar and Rafael were so busy trying to think of ways to make each other look like the bigger sucker, that they did not notice the king, Tobias Castro was right before them.

"You two," Tobias said, bringing the attention of the two men to himself. "Are you two really trying to see who is the bigger sucker?"

"No," Edgar and Rafael replied in unison. It was no question of who among them was the biggest sucker when it came to women.

"The position of the biggest sucker goes to you," said Edgar since they were things Tobias did that made him feel embarrassed. Many times he had to walk away to avoid feeling embarrassed for another person.

Rafael ended it by saying, "We are trying to decide who is second."

The king wasn’t happy to have Edgar and Rafael in the palace since all they did was bully him. If not for the fact he needed to send Rafael to the border and to speak to Edgar about the missing women in town, he would not have called them here. Probably.

He wasn’t sure he wouldn’t invite them since he was in need of people he could trust here in the palace.

Rafael placed his hands in his pants pockets and listened to Tobias not liking when he was with Edgar and about Edgar looking different. He followed the two men to one of Tobias’s private rooms and listened as they spoke of the issues they faced in town. Issues with a man named Grant who he was familiar with.

Grant Henson was a man with power and it was the Hensons family Rafael wanted Tobias to call upon instead of him for whatever he needed, but now that Grant was trying to force Tobias to take his granddaughter as a mistress, Tobias would not call upon the Hensons.

As much as the work Tobias placed on him annoyed him, Rafael sometimes didn’t mind it since there weren’t many people for the king to call upon. Rather than waiting for Grant and his followers to make the first move which might be an attack on the king’s life since Tobias didn’t have plans of bringing other women into his marriage, Rafael thought they should strike first.

Rafael would lend his knights so Tobias would have the men needed to go up against Grant. He would rather take care of this now so that when he left Lockwood to go back to his manor and Annalise, he would not have to leave her again to take care of Grant.

"There is too much for me to deal with alone these days. I am near the point of losing my mind," Tobias said, desperately needing a week-long rest, or for all the fools in the kingdom to drop dead. "We are having a lot of trouble at the border recently. I need this to be over with so it is not an issue my future children must deal with. I am sending you there to take over, Rafael."

"I’ve already made the order for the border guards to follow your command. Whatever issues your knights have with them must be forgotten for now. Use whatever approach you think is needed for us to claim the border. This cannot go on much longer," said Tobias.

Rafael was aware of Tobias calling him here about the border, but he was hoping he wouldn’t be sent there to take over from the border guards to find a way to end the war. He would be away from his parents and Annalise longer than he planned because he could not up and leave when he wanted to as the new person in charge of leading the border. fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com

He had to send a letter back to the manor to have Annalise come to Lockwood to be with his mother so his mother would not be alone for so long.

"I wanted to send Edgar at first, but now that he is married, he doesn’t seem interested in war. I am not bothering him about it anymore since he is taking care of the missing women. I am counting on you, Rafael. If you succeed, I will reward you and your knights when you return," Tobias promised.