"Oh." I replied still out of breath. All the crying and stretching of my face had now aggravated my wounds from earlier in the day, making them sting and begin bleeding again.

"I have to go," I heaved, now that the initial adrenaline had worn off all I felt was complete embarrassment about the situation at hand.

"Don't even think about it," Langdon commanded me, still holding on tight to my arms, "since this occurred in my whereabouts, I shall see to it you are fit and healthy before you leave."

"Mr Langdon that really isn't necessary I can do it myself."

"Michael, my name is Michael." He told me, guiding me to stand up gently and holding me so I could use him as a support beam of sorts. "This is the part where you tell me your name," he whispered teasingly with a cheeky smile I couldn't resist.

"Maribella." I answered.

"Perfect," Michael whispered to himself, bending down to tenderly pick me up in his arms, "Come. I shall get you all cleaned up."

Considering I was held securely in his arms, I would have no choice in the matter. Michael led me through another door in his office which led to his bedroom. It was fittingly decorated how I would've imagined and extremely spacious. He set me back down after checking I could stand on my own and let me perch on the edge of his very soft and comfortable bed; obviously adorned with black and red silk covers.

"While I run you a bath take off those scraps of clothes and your undergarments. Just leave them next to you." Michael called through from the bathroom, diverting my attention from the alluring bed sheets.

I started doing as he said, only because it was the middle of the night and after the whole day's affairs I felt completely exhausted. For some reason, only when I was completely naked, did it occur to me I had nothing to cover up with.

"Uhh, Langdon?" I called through to him hesitantly, hoping and praying to God he wouldn't walk through the doors and see me stood here stark naked like an idiot.

"Call me Michael, and yes?" He answered, luckily still from inside the bathroom.

"I've fucked up." I responded with a sigh, now absolutely defeated. I stepped backwards from my spot and sat on the edge of the bed cross-legged with my head in my hands, cautious of my eye, not caring if Michael walked in and saw me naked, unlike moments ago.I was tired and hungry and all I wanted to do was crawl into a hole away from civilisation for a few days, or months, or years.

"In what way?"

"I don't have anything to cover up with and I already took off all my clothes." I said disheartened, on the verge of another crying session.

Before I could, a soft, warm blanket was wrapped around my shoulders and dropped down my back along with a hand removing my own from my face.

"No need for tears love, go and enjoy your bath." Michael instructed me, giving me and encouraging nudge towards the bathroom as he stayed put.

I sulkily stood and moved towards the bathroom door, just before I went in I looked back to Michael and he gave me a small smile as he stayed sat on the bed. I entered the room fully and closed the door behind me, locking it just in case.

As I turned around, directly in front of me was what looked like a king sized bathtub; surrounding it were pre-lit candles that gave the room an overall orangey glow. Suddenly feeling eager to relax in the water, I removed the blanket from my shoulders, folded it, and placed it on the closed toilet seat near the bath. I stepped one foot in at a time cautiously, testing the heat of the water before sinking my whole body in completely.

It was heavenly. The warmth wrapped around me like a cloak and almost felt like it was massaging the tension out of my muscles. I stretched my neck out in a circle and flexed my toes to the ceiling feeling nothing but complete euphoria as I simply led there. I must've stayed in there for at least an hour before I heard Michael knock the door.

"My dear Maribella?" He called softly through the locked door.

"Yes Michael?" I answered slowly, indicating how lethargic I had become from the bath.

"Don't you think it's time to come out now, it is rather late and I have some things I want to go over with you."

For some reason it had completely slipped my mind that I was in Michael's room and he was probably waiting for me to leave so he could sleep. My eyes widened in realisation, now feeling far more awake than I was, I leapt out of the bath and grabbed the blanket, wrapping it around myself as a towel and trying to dry off as quickly as I could.

"Yes, of course!" I answered eventually, wrapping the blanket around my partially dry body and going over to unlock the door; swinging it open to see Michael stood directly in front of me, his height meaning he towered over me so I had to look up to make eye contact with him.

"No need to rush, we have all the time we need," he explained gently, wrapping an arm around me and pulling me out of the bathroom to the centre of his room, "let's get you dry and dressed."

"I can go back to my room and get my nightwear, after all I'll be going back there anyway." I suggested.

"No you won't." Michael mentioned as casually as anything, walking away from me and towards his chest of drawers that I assume had his pyjamas in them.

"Excuse me?" I asked confused.

"Here-" he passed me a pair of black cotton shorts and a matching black cotton flannel shirt-"put those on and then we'll talk."

"Can you turn around?" I asked, holding my 'towel' up in one hand and the clothes in my other.

"Of course." He obeyed, turning around as I quickly slid the clothes on and folded the blanket up, keeping it in my arms.

"Okay, you can turn around again." I told him quietly.

He spun round to me, smiling once he'd seen I'd done as he instructed and walked over towards me with his hand held out.

"The blanket love, I don't want you getting wet again. At least, not with the water." He said with a sly smirk, knowing exactly what intentions his words hid. "So what is it you wanted to talk about?" I asked in a rush to try and ignore his previous comments, taking a seat on the edge of his bed and running my hands along my thighs to rid the nervous sweat that had gathered there.

Michael took a seat beside me and patted his hand on my thigh in a somewhat comforting manner, making me nervous for whatever he was about to say. He sighed before he started talking.

"Our first interview, did you notice how you experienced a flurry of emotions. One moment you were nervous, the next you became angry with no exact reason?" He began.

"I suppose." I said; looking back I realised the bought of anger I experienced really didn't have a lot of meaning and it was out of character for me. Even if I'm irritated with something, I can usually keep quiet with no effort at all.

"And you felt defensive and almost possessive, over yourself?"

"I guess." I replied, extremely confused. As if sensing my building frustration again, Langdon removed his hand from my thigh and put his arm around my waist.

"Those emotions you felt were because of our souls bonding together. You are made for me by my father, to rule by my side in the new world. I need you, and sooner than you think, you'll need me too. All I'm asking is for you to give me your trust, your patience and eventually your love and I will handle everything else. Please just give me a chance to earn your affection and I'll give you everything you want and need."

I didn't respond for a while. I didn't really know how to feel. On one hand, having someone to love and take care of me for my life sounded quite nice and considering the state of the world, I wouldn't have many options; however I have just met him and don't really know anything about Michael.

"Maribella?" Michael jolted me from my thoughts and gave my waist a small squeeze.

"Who's your father?" I asked dazedly.

"Would you believe me if I told you it's the Devil and I'm the Anti-Christ?" He replied gently with an almost teasing tone in his voice, giving my shoulder a soft nudge.

"Probably not."

"Then its not important."

I breathed out a light laugh and relaxed my shoulders to slump slightly. Michael smiled down at me and tugged me to lay against his chest, my head nestled just beneath his and comfortably tucked into his neck.

"Will you give me a chance?" He whispered to me carefully as if not to disrupt the peace between us.

"Yes." I replied without hesitation.

Michael breathed out a sigh of relief and his shoulders sagged, if it was even possible he pulled me further into his embrace and sort of rocked us in a sideways motion.

"I promise you won't regret this." He told me delicately, kissing the crown of my head. "Come on, lets go to bed."

Michael stood up and pushed my legs to scoot me down the bed until my head met the pillows, where I rolled my head in them, indulging in their softness. He left the end of the bed and went back to the drawer he went in earlier to pick some pyjamas for himself to wear and got quickly dressed in some plain black pyjama trousers but no shirt.

He climbed into bed with me and pulled the covers around us, almost blocking us off from the rest of the outpost. The lights and some candles had all gone out too, leaving us in utter darkness apart from the select candles that only gave us a glimpse of each other as we led on our sides, facing each other.

"Michael?" I whispered into the dark.

"Yes lovely?" He whispered back.

"What did you do with my clothes?" I asked in curiosity; after seeing Michael change it occurred to me I hadn't seen my ripped dress anywhere.

"I burned them, you'll have no use for them now." He said nonchalantly, gazing into my eyes with his brilliant blue ones.

"What do you mean?"

Michael huffed before answering me, "Darling, you are going to now have as much power as I do in this place. You won't be cleaning or dusting or serving anyone; or be anyone's punching bag," He hinted to the cuts and bruises still on my face. "You'll be a leader, a queen. You should never have been and no longer will be anyone's servant."

"What about Venable?" I asked timidly.

"What about her?"

"What will happen to her and Mead?"

"They will be punished for laying their hands on you in a harmful way, nothing you need concern yourself with, and then...let's just say I have a plan in motion. Come now, it's late and you've had a long day; let's sleep." He commanded, pulling my body to his and tightening the covers around our body; and for the first time since my arrival, I slept peacefully and heavily like I did before the bombs. ~~~~ I roused later than usual the next morning, enjoying how oddly comfortable my bed felt and the warmth that encased me. Then I opened my eyes and realised I wasn't in my room, but in one much nicer than my own; and the events of last night came flooding back.

I sat back against the headboard and rubbed my eyes to wake up a bit more, stretching my legs out and yawning.

"Someone's sleepy." Michael's voice came teasingly from the bathroom. I opened my eyes and gave him a sleepy smile, causing him to chuckle and come and join me again in bed under the covers.

"What's gonna happen today?" I asked huskily, still not fully awake.

"Today I'll be fetching you breakfast, continuing the interviews and speaking to Ms Venable and Ms Mead about their behaviour last night all while you will be in here resting and relaxing. If you'll allow me to I'd like to heal you as well." Michael finished, playing with my fingers on my hand closest to him.

"We don't have enough cubes for breakfast, we're on a shortage of food," I told him; the purples had only enough food for one cube, the greys got half a cube; if we were lucky.

"You won't be having cubes, trust me dear. Not to mention you're terribly underweight and need the nutrients of actual food to regain your energy." He explained gently, moving his hand up my arm and round my waist.

"I have a few questions." I stated, wanting to get a grip on as many things as I could.

"Of course." He complied.

"Do you have time for them now?"

"If that was one of the questions, yes; if it wasn't the answer is still yes." He told me jokingly, lying us both back down again like we were last night.

"Just now, you said you could heal me. What does that mean?" I began in my questions.

"You know how last night I said I was the Anti-Christ and the Devil is my father?" He started.

"Yes." I recalled.

"Well believe it or not, that's true. I am a warlock so I have...special abilities, lets say. Because of who my father is, I have extra abilities and enhanced abilities; one of which is being able to heal myself and also the ones I choose to have around me, which for the record is only you. If you'll let me use my magic on you, I can heal your lip and eyebrow so it won't cause you as much pain." Michael explained, stroking his hand delicately along the side of my face.

"Alright, show me what you've got Harry Potter." I joked, but by the look of confusion on Michael's face, he didn't get the joke. "He's a wizard in a film franchise." I expanded, luckily Michael shook it off and started telling me what I needed to do.

"All I need you to do for this to work is close your eyes and relax, think about anything you want but just remain still and calm."

"Okay." I agreed, thinking of the one place that made me happiest. I felt an odd sensation on the injured parts of my face, almost like it was burning but without the pain.

"Okay, open your eyes, its all done." Michael said. I opened them and saw him smiling widely at me. "You look even more beautiful."

"Thank you, now can I continue with my questions?"

"Proceed."

I laughed before beginning my questioning again. "Last night, you said the blood on my dress made me smell good. Have you got a blood kink or something?" I asked remembering his strange comment from the previous evening.

"To me, blood is, shall we say an aphrodisiac of sorts. Don't worry, you'll understand it more as time goes on."

"Okay, what about my dress? How did it suddenly get so tight it could strangle me?"

"I was afraid you were going to ask that." Michael sighed making me curious. "Last night, when we were sat after curfew, I was having your soul bonded to mine. I felt your frustrations and deflation and turned that into anger. Unintentionally, I made the dress tighter instead of loosening it and when I got out of that cloud of anger, you almost fainted from lack of oxygen. I ran around to your seat and ripped your dress as fast as I could and luckily you stayed awake. I'm sorry Maribella, I vow to you it will never happen again in any way, shape or form."

"So it was unintentional?" I asked in order to be clear.

"Completely. That has been and will be the only time I loose control like that ever." Michael promised me, his hand searching for mine and grasping it tightly when he did.

"Its okay Michael, I forgive you." I told him, feeling his overwhelming sense of guilt starting to build up. I ran my thumb over his knuckles in what I hoped was a comforting gesture.

"Thank you, my love."

We stayed just staring at each other and enjoying the moment when Michael sighed and moved to a sat up position. I stayed led down and simply looked up at him, watching to see what he was doing.

"You're so pretty, you know that?" Michael said all of a sudden.

I giggled at his sudden confession and answered him with a smile on my face. "You're pretty too."

"I'm pretty?" He replied questioningly. I laughed again before answering.

"Yeah, you've got cute little dimples that show through when you really smile, a smooth voice that could send anyone into a trance. Your eyes get somehow brighter when there's less light, but even when there is light they're still the brightest things in the room. You've got the facial bone structure of a God and perfectly symmetrical eyebrows that would make anyone jealous, not to mention your eyelashes that I would die for. Your hair looks like it's always done and doesn't even need you to brush it and it falls effortlessly down your shoulders-"