IWAPUF 49

His golden eyes locked onto mine, their intensity sending a wave of heat coursing through my
body, as if his fervor had ignited something within me.
“I… don’t dislike you,” I said.
“What?”
“I don’t dislike you, Sir Tilt. Not at all.”
His eyes widened in disbelief, the golden hue shimmering with a flicker of hope.
“I never disliked you from the start,” I continued.
“But you…”
“So if you died now, I’d resent you for it.”
I could guess what he wanted to say next. He was probably wondering why, if I didn’t dislike him,
I had kept him at arm’s length. But I wasn’t ready to explain. Not now. If I confessed my feelings
in this moment, I feared my flushed face and racing heart—pounding so fiercely it might
burst—would betray me completely.
When I deliberately steered the conversation elsewhere, he fell silent, his gaze steady on me. The
The scorching intensity of his stare made me want to look away, but I held his eyes with stubborn
resolve.
“You can’t die now,” I said. “Not when you still have to take revenge on the First Empress for
putting you in danger.”
As I’d hoped, he followed my lead, shifting the topic without resistance. Despite the questions I
knew must be burning inside him, he betrayed no hint of frustration. Instead, he gave me a gentle
smile, his hand tightening around mine with a calm assurance.
I squeezed his hand back, my grip firm. I resolved that once I’d sorted through these tangled
emotions, I would answer his confession properly.
“Revenge on the First Empress?” he asked, his tone curious.
“It wasn’t a coincidence that your horse went wild.”
The memory flashed vividly in my mind: a section of the reins, cleanly severed by something
sharp.
“You’re right,” he said, his voice low. “It’s no coincidence.”
“I’m sorry,” he added.
“For what?”
He let out a heavy sigh at my question.
“It’s my fault,” he said. “I suspected the First Empress might try something against you, but I
didn’t expect her to act so brazenly, with such open hostility.”
“Why are you so sure it’s the First Empress?” I asked.
“During the break, I couldn’t find you anywhere, so I went looking. That’s when I saw someone
aiming a poisoned dart at your horse. I couldn’t stop them in time.”
I remembered how he’d shouted for me to dismount the moment he spotted me on horseback. He
must have seen the attacker then, preparing to fire the dart.
“The man looked familiar,” he continued. “One of the First Empress’s people.”
His expression darkened, as if he bore the weight of this entire incident.
“It wasn’t the First Empress,” I said firmly.
“Why do you think that?”
“If it were the First Empress, she wouldn’t have used such a sloppy method. You know that as
well as I do.”
Even a cursory investigation would reveal the culprit. This kind of blatant, careless act wasn’t her
style. The First Empress, who had survived the palace’s intrigues for years, would never handle
things so clumsily. If she wanted someone dead, she’d choose a method far more discreet and
certain. If she had truly set her sights on killing me, I wouldn’t be standing here now. She wasn’t
leaving me alone out of a lack of means—she was holding back because the consequences of my
death would be too great for her to bear.
“You’re right,” he conceded, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “It does seem too crude for the First.
Empress.”
“But the man was definitely one of her people,” he insisted.
“It wasn’t her,” I repeated.
“Do you have someone else in mind?”
I sighed deeply, my mind already piecing together who was responsible. Only one person would
be reckless enough to use the First Empress’s people without considering the repercussions.
“It was probably the First Prince’s concubine,” I said.
“Brother’s concubine?”
His brow furrowed as he tried to place her.
“The new favorite he took in recently,” I clarified.
“His favorite? Oh!”
A low exclamation escaped him as recognition dawned, his lips twisting into a wry smirk.
“The woman from that fertile family, right?”
His tone carried an uncharacteristic edge of sarcasm, as if some unpleasant memory had surfaced.
“She’s certainly capable of something like this,” he said.
“Did something happen?” I asked.
“No.”
His denial was swift, but I could tell there was more to the story. Logically, I knew it was probably
nothing significant, but the thought that he was hiding something from me stung. I debated
pressing him further when he sighed again, softer this time.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he said. “It was nothing, really.”
“I wasn’t glaring,” I said.
He shrugged, a playful glint in his eyes.
“Really, I wasn’t glaring.”
“I didn’t say anything,” he teased, his lips curling into a sly smile. Sometimes, Sir Tilt could be
so infuriatingly smug that I wanted to shake him. Like right now.
“Then why do you think it was her?” he asked, steering the conversation back.
“I put her in her place,” I replied.
“What?”
“Enough to keep her out of society for at least a year.”
His eyes widened as he stared at me, a mix of surprise and curiosity flickering across his face. I
didn’t have definitive proof yet, but I was certain the First Prince’s concubine was behind this. I
didn’t know what gave her the audacity to pull such a stunt, but even if the First Empress herself
were involved, this wouldn’t be brushed off lightly. This was the Emperor’s hunting tournament,
an event he personally oversaw. For something so disgraceful to happen under his watch was an
affront to his dignity. A year’s exile from society? For her, that was far too lenient. She’d likely
never show her face in public again.
“I wish I’d been there to see it,” Sir Tilt said, propping his chin in his hand as he gazed at me,
his tone tinged with regret. “Sounds like quite the spectacle.”
“It wasn’t exactly pleasant,” I said, narrowing my eyes. “And you keep dodging the subject.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” he replied, feigning innocence with another grin.
I sighed, exasperated. Every time I tried to ask about his condition, he deftly redirected the
conversation. I wanted to play along with his deflections, but it was painfully obvious his health
was deteriorating. Even without touching him, I could feel the heat radiating from his body. His
flushed face and the beads of cold sweat glistening on his brow told me just how much he was
enduring, how much effort it took to keep up his facade.
I understood why he was hiding his injuries from me. Trapped in this isolated situation, just the
two of us, I had no one else to rely on but him. He was carrying the weight of my presence as a
burden, determined not to let me see his weakness. His effort to shield me from worry was
touching, but his insistence on bearing everything alone frustrated me. He was my anchor, and I
wanted to be his as well.
But what could I do? Unaccustomed to situations like this, I had little to offer. If anything, I was
more likely to be a hindrance than a help. My body, untrained and untested, had long since
reached its limits. I’d never camped in my life, never learned how to survive in the wild. I didn’
I don’t even know where to begin to assist him.
If Sir Tilt were his usual self, it might have been different, but he was struggling just to keep
himself together. The last thing I wanted was to add to his burden. For a fleeting moment, I wished
I’d studied medicine, but I quickly shook off the thought. Regret was useless now—what was
done was done. Wallowing in what I couldn’t change would only hold me back. Instead, I needed
to focus on what I could do, right here, right now.
“Take it off,” I said firmly.
“What?”
“You’re making yourself worse by staying in those wet clothes. Take them off.”
He showed no intention of complying, so I stepped forward and grabbed his shirt, tugging at it
with determination. Caught off guard, he clutched the fabric, his face a mix of panic and
embarrassment as I started to pull it free.
“Wait, wait—Beonne!” he stammered.
“It’s going to tear if we keep this up,” I said, undeterred. “Shall I rip it, or will you take it off
yourself?”
He let out a resigned sigh, staring at me with an expression that suggested I’d just said the most
absurd thing he’d ever heard. The fabric stretched taut between us, on the verge of tearing.
“Rip it?” I pressed, yanking harder. Fine cloth or not, high-quality material was often
deceptively fragile. A little more force, and it would give way.
Realizing I was serious, he quickly composed himself, his flustered expression giving way to a
reluctant acceptance.
“Can’t I just… keep it on?” he asked, almost pleading.
“No,” I said flatly.
“I’m a bit shy, you know.”
I paused, loosening my grip on his shirt and looking up at him. He met my gaze with an awkward
smile, his usual confidence faltering.
“Better to be shy than to make yourself sicker,” I countered.
“You really don’t see me as a man, do you?” he said, his tone half-joking, half-serious.
“Why does this keep circling back to that?”
I let go of his shirt and crossed my arms, exasperated. He clearly had no intention of undressing.
Even in his weakened state, he was still stronger than me—a fact that made forcing the issue
impossible.
“If you saw me as a man, you wouldn’t be so quick to try and strip me,” he teased, his voice
light but pointed.
“Does it matter if you’re a man or a woman right now?” I shot back.
“Of course it matters,” he said, his brow furrowing as if I’d missed something obvious