Chapter 8 · The Reason I Hated You

Before her mind could even register the situation, her body reacted first.

Thwack!

The pillow guarding the head of the bed sliced through the air toward Erhan.

But unfortunately, it did not even graze his shoulder and fell powerlessly to the floor.

“You might want to fix that violent habit of throwing things first.”

“Why are you here?”

Isadel asked with bloodshot eyes.

Instead of answering, Erhan bent down and picked up the pillow.

Then he calmly tossed it back at the foot of the bed.

“Is there some reason I shouldn’t be here?”

“What is this?”

When Isadel roughly raised her wrist, the chain clinked and swayed.

“Can’t you see?”

“What, are you going to tie me up like a slave and keep me as a pet now?”

“If you promise not to do anything foolish, I’ll release you.”

“Foolish, you say.”

Erhan did not answer right away.

The blue eyes looking down at Isadel sank subtly.

“…Like throwing yourself off to die. That kind of reckless thought.”

Unlike his expressionless face, his eyes wavered, lost for a split second.

Like a man recalling a memory of someone he had failed to catch as they fell long ago.

Isadel did not miss that tiny crack.

A cold sneer formed on her lips.

“Ah, now I remember.”

“……”

“Your mother died just like that, didn’t she?”

Erhan’s jawline hardened stiffly.

Isadel did not miss his reaction.

And she deliberately dug into his deepest wound.

“They said she threw herself from the northern tower.”

“……”

“For a slave to take her own life in the imperial palace—how audacious.”

“Stop it.”

Erhan warned lowly, but Isadel did not stop.

“Your mother was quite the noisy wench right up to the moment she died.

A Hwa-in, yet she must have thought her death was some noble sacrifice.”

“Stop it, Isadel.”

“Your kind are nothing but things to be used and discarded anyway.

Cheap drugs. You’re not human. You’re not human!!”

Before she could even finish speaking.

Erhan, who had closed the distance in an instant, roughly seized Isadel’s shoulders.

His grip trembled uncontrollably.

“Stop it, Isadel! Please stop! I said stop!”

Unlike the grip that seemed ready to crush her, his suppressed voice was trembling pitifully.

Isadel slowly looked up at him.

‘Still reacting so transparently…’

The man who had never lost his composure had finally broken down.

As expected, this wound had not yet healed.

The blue eyes wavering as if about to shatter at any moment were proof of that.

…Yes. You always had those eyes.

As if you alone were wronged.

As if you had done nothing wrong.

With eyes so cruelly pure that they turned people inside out.

The day I first saw you, you had those very eyes.

* * *

It was fourteen years ago.

It was less than a month after my mother’s funeral that I first saw Erhan.

The summer peonies my mother had cherished most in life were blooming lavishly throughout the imperial palace.

But unlike that brilliant color, a winter-like chill had not yet left the palace.

It was a truly strange season.

The first to break the silence of mourning was Duke Genoa.

“Your Imperial Majesty.”

Entering the audience chamber, he bowed excessively, almost to the point of exaggeration.

Emperor Aderus received the duke with empty eyes.

“Welcome, Duke Genoa.”

“You must be grieving greatly, Your Majesty.”

“……”

“Moreover, the Empress departed without even leaving an heir…”

On the surface, he was offering words of condolence, but in truth, it was a subtle slight against the empress who had died without bearing a prince.

At the same time, it was an indirect revelation that he had no intention of recognizing Princess Isadel as heir.

The emperor swallowed a sigh and continued.

“Anyway, what is it you wished to see me about?

If it is not urgent, then later…”

As if waiting for those words, Duke Genoa smiled faintly.

“I have brought a small gift to ease Your Majesty’s troubles.”

At his gesture, the imperial guards opened the doors of the audience chamber.

Soon the harsh metallic sound of chains dragging across the floor echoed through the hall.

Two people appeared in the audience chamber.

A woman shackled at the wrists, and a boy clutching the hem of her clothes.

Though their attire was shabby, the woman was a beauty so breathtaking that it stopped the breath at a single glance.

The boy was no different.

Though he was only about seven years old, he had golden hair and clear features that belied his ragged appearance.

Were it not for his clothes, his fair looks were such that one might believe him the young master of some noble house.

Isadel, standing beside her father’s throne, naturally turned her gaze to the boy.

Her eyes, which had been scanning the young slave with suspicion, suddenly stopped in one place.

‘…Pretty.’

It was an admiration that slipped out unintentionally.

Clear eyes resembling the color just before ice melts.

Those transparent blue eyes, without a speck of cloudiness, were sparkling brightly with a warmth that made it hard to believe he was a slave.

“They are Hwa-in.”

Duke Genoa said proudly.

“Even in the slave market, they commanded the highest prices.”

“…Hwa-in, to me?”

When the emperor’s brow twitched subtly, the duke did not miss the opening and drove in the wedge.

“Would not that woman be a comfort to ease Your Majesty’s sorrow?”

Five-year-old Isadel looked up at her father with trembling eyes.

And she saw it.

Her father’s gaze lingering on the woman, just for a moment.

Young as she was, she did not fully understand the meaning of that look.

But instinctively, she could feel it.

A vague unease that that woman might take her mother’s place.

Isadel turned her gaze to the boy hiding behind the woman.

The boy, who had been hanging his head, had at some point carefully raised his eyes and was looking at Isadel.

“……”

In that instant, Isadel felt her stomach turn for no reason she could name.

She resented herself for having thought, even briefly, that those eyes were beautiful.

And suddenly, she had a premonition.

That she and that boy with the terribly clear eyes would be bound in a long, wretched entanglement.

* * *

Clink.

At the sound of the chain, Isadel’s blurred vision returned to the room.

Before her stood no longer that frail boy, but a tall man.

Time had passed and he had grown, but his eyes alone still held the transparent light of that day.

Erhan broke the silence first.

“There’s something I’ve wanted to ask for a long time.”

“……”

“Why did you hate me so much? Simply because I was… a lowly Hwa-in?”

Isadel’s lips twisted, and a dry laugh burst out.

“You’re asking because you don’t know?”

“……”

“How long had it been since my mother passed when that woman began entering my father’s bedchamber?

She bewitched my father with the same power you possess and defiled this sacred imperial palace.”

“That was…”

“I know. It wasn’t your will. I know it wasn’t your fault.”

“Then why on earth…”

Erhan looked down at Isadel with endlessly quiet eyes.

Isadel silently stared back at him.

The answer to that question had been decided long ago.

She had simply never put it into words.

‘…Your eyes.’

I hated those eyes.

Even knowing your mother was my father’s plaything, you always had those eyes.

Even knowing how much I loathed you, you were never daunted.

Those eyes that looked at me, lingered by my side, and smiled as if nothing were wrong.

Every time I saw them, my stomach twisted.

A slave sold into the imperial palace.

A mere Hwa-in.

Even after all your hope had been hacked to pieces, your unbroken innocence was unbearably revolting.

So I trampled on you more cruelly.

Believing that someday those eyes too would cloud over with despair.

If I was trapped in hell, I had to drag you down there as well.

Isadel coldly suppressed the surging emotions.

Then, with an indifferent face, she answered.

“Reason? There is no such thing.”

“……”

“I just hated that you breathed in front of me, that those filthy eyes took me in.”

“……”

“I simply hated your very existence.

Does that satisfy you?”