Chapter 92
A dim light clung stubbornly to the window, as if chasing away the dawn and summoning the morning.
It was only then that Kalian released Angela from his fiercely possessive embrace. And it was only then that Angela realized they had slipped into this place under the cover of darkness—it was Kalian’s private study.
In the midst of all that urgency, he’d somehow chosen the most soundproof room in the entire mansion. Angela sat there in a daze, letting out a single incredulous chuckle.
A heavy weight settled over her bare shoulders. Tilting her head slightly downward, she saw it was Kalian’s coat. He wrapped her in it from behind, as if sharing his own warmth with her.
Angela let out a low hum at Kalian’s tenderness—he’d held her frost-chilled body all through the dawn, yet worried she’d catch cold like any ordinary person.
Sensing that subdued vibration, Kalian pressed a lingering kiss along the straight line of her neck.
But was that gesture meant to convey something else?
“It’s finally all gone now.”
Those cryptic words slipped from Kalian’s lips. Angela, leaning fully against his broad chest, tilted her head and murmured, “Hm?”
Kalian didn’t respond right away. Instead, he planted a light kiss on her cheek before speaking.
“The scent of water.”
“……”
“It’s all faded away now.”
Angela twitched, trying to sit up straight. But Kalian’s arms held her firmly in place, leaving no room to escape. She was startled, yet her best way to express it was blocked.
“What on earth….”
With no other choice, Angela finally parted her stiff lips.
“How… how do you always notice?”
“Today,”
Kalian murmured, burying his nose into her shoulder as if double-checking that the scent had truly vanished.
“As soon as I got close, the watery aroma hit me hard.”
At his words, Angela recalled the unusually turbulent currents that had swept over her when she’d set out to find Dominic.
She glanced down at Kalian’s large hands enveloping her. Could others pick up on this too? Or was it some unique ability of Kalian’s alone? Curiosity stirred within her.
Forgetting that she’d just been caught off guard by Kalian’s pinpoint accuracy, Angela pondered whom she could bring in to verify this.
Mary? Emmet?
Then Kalian’s tightly sealed lips parted once more. The voice dropping onto her shoulder carried a different chill from moments before.
“I think I can guess where you’ve been without even asking—”
In that unfinished sentence, Angela sensed a coldness her own chilled body couldn’t match.
“May I be angry now?”
Ah, of course. He was upset. That’s why his embrace burned like fire, yet his voice was so icy.
But nodding and letting him have his way felt unjust to Angela. She’d explained it to Kalian last time—she’d only attempted it because she was certain. She was confident she could enter Dominic’s dream precisely.
Moreover, even if she encountered Grace inside, Grace couldn’t harm her in someone else’s dream.
She hadn’t done anything dangerously reckless, the kind Kalian despised. Being pierced by Dominic’s sword hadn’t left a single scar, so it hardly counted as risky….
“You treated our promise lightly.”
Angela froze mid-thought, her mental list of excuses for Kalian halting abruptly. His cool voice tickled her shoulder and climbed along her neck.
“You promised to come straight to me if your heart was hurt.”
Soon, it brushed her cheek.
“You can’t sit alone in such a dark place like that. It breaks my heart, you know.”
The reproach settled like a kiss, laced with a faint sigh. Angela shrank slightly. She uncurled the fingers she’d folded while counting her defenses. Before Kalian’s words, she found no room for excuses.
The moment she realized her heart was wounded, she should have run to Kalian. Before he spotted her head dropping toward the floor, she should have demanded he hold her tight to keep her from crumbling.
Why had she wandered off, suffocating in some hidden corner, when he was her very breath?
Angela’s hand hovered in the air, stroking Kalian’s arm that held her, before she spoke. All she could offer now, belatedly, was the truth.
“I was stabbed here with a sword.”
Her pale hand, wandering over Kalian’s arm, came to rest on her faintly hollowed abdomen. She hadn’t said who did it, but Kalian would understand.
As proof, the hand that followed hers and grasped it bulged with blue veins, pulsing faintly. Even a subtle tremor could be felt.
“There was a child version of me, cradled so tenderly. But it looked just like Grace. When I tried to pull it away, she thrust the sword right at me.”
Angela listed off a few sentences in a casual tone, then added abruptly.
“He must have cherished the daughter in his arms so much.”
In that instant, Kalian understood what had truly wounded Angela’s heart. It wasn’t the sword.
What pierced her sharper than any blade was a past she had never possessed, and could never have.
Kalian knew what it felt like to have that unfold before your eyes. It was like being shoved off an endless cliff.
He’d been thrown from that same cliff once. Right after learning who had given birth to him, when he was still in his teens, too young to deftly convince himself he was fine.
Every time he saw that affectionate gaze toward Beatrice, or the utmost care toward Angela, a surge of envy would well up—could that have been mine?
Fearing that emotion might spill from his eyes into the world, Kalian had to close them each time, like a blind man.
He gripped Angela’s hand tightly, imagining her feeling that same despair he once had. To keep her from being swallowed by any cliff.
“Shall I… comfort you?”
As he asked, Angela burst into genuine laughter, a sudden “pfft.” With her free hand, she pulled down one side of the coat Kalian had draped over her and countered.
“How much more?”
The exposed skin was covered in reddish marks. Ones Kalian had made throughout the dawn. Yet, even faced with this array of love’s evidence, Kalian replied as if it were nothing.
“As much as you want.”
Kalian’s hot lips touched her reddened skin once more.
* * *
Those seated around the enormous circular table were the heads of the noble houses participating in this war. Without exception, their faces were shadowed, stained with dark worry.
It was because word had spread that the Duke of Bilton’s house would not be marching out.
“Which of the two do you think is mad?”
The Duke of Bilton, rumored to have holed up in his mansion for days on end, his mind teetering on the edge, and Count Florence, who had stepped forward to wage war without the central pillar of the empire’s military might—the Duke of Bilton.
At the question of choosing which one, everyone swallowed their groans. Declaring either mad would bring no benefit in a situation where war loomed right before them.
Emperor Truga had yet to take sides on this matter. It would have been better if Truga had made the choice himself, but it was clear the emperor felt burdened by this unprecedented situation. He might even be waiting for the nobles to come flocking with petitions on what to do.
Some viewed this as a power struggle. There were opinions that Kalian was using this opportunity to oust the Duke of Bilton and become the real power in the empire himself.
After all, Kalian Florence was set to become the Duke of Bilton’s son-in-law, so what could he possibly gain from that? But rumors had spread far and wide that the crown prince of the Taran Kingdom had killed his father, King Kanak, and even his half-brother, the third prince, to become king.
Even those sharing the same blood couldn’t overcome greed and would thrust a blade— so what meaning did merely becoming a son-in-law hold?
Thus, insisting it was clearly a power struggle, and that in the fight between the two, only the bystanders would suffer, Count Matterson was the first to speak, spitting his words vehemently.
“Neither is in their right mind.”
His tone implied, why even bother saying it? As if his mouth ached from the effort, Count Matterson clicked his tongue with a tsk.
The noble across from him frowned as if finding it frivolous, then countered in a dignified voice.
“It’s Count Florence. He made that decision knowing full well how many private soldiers the Duke possesses— if that’s not the act of a madman, then what is?”
As if waiting for his mouth to close, the noble seated right beside him immediately chimed in. His tone was somewhat aggressive.
“I heard the duke’s daughter personally sought an audience with His Majesty the Emperor to declare that her father’s condition is not normal. There must be some issue for her to do so.”
The rebuttal poured out at once from yet another noble.
“Wasn’t the Duke of Bilton’s eldest daughter never on harmonious terms with her father to begin with? Moreover, after the recent death incident, I heard she moved into the Florence mansion entirely. There’s no guarantee she didn’t lie for the count’s sake.”
“Then what do you think is the reason a perfectly sane Duke of Bilton is shutting himself away like that?”
“How would I know that? Anyway, the situation is suspicious.”
The conversation flew back and forth sharply. But it was nothing more than a fruitless quarrel. Only unclear speculations abounded. The current reality of having to fight the war without the Bilton house’s military remained unchanged.
Then.
“The Duke of Bilton.”
One noble, who had been sitting quietly listening to their bickering, finally spoke.
“Is indeed unwell.”
It was Count Konrad.
“How do you know that, Count Konrad? Have you met the Duke of Bilton, who’s holed up in his mansion without budging?”
The noble who had been siding with the Duke of Bilton asked sarcastically. In response, Count Konrad met the eyes of not just that noble but each person seated around the table squarely as he voiced his opinion.
“It seems the incident with his eldest daughter’s near-death was the trigger. He nearly buried his living daughter with his own hands— how immense must that shock have been? Even I would struggle to stay sane after such an experience.”
Speaking as if, as a father with a daughter himself, he could fully understand, the nobles who had fallen silent began to lend their ears to Count Konrad’s words.
“I hear he suffers from frequent nightmares. He doesn’t eat properly and sometimes spends the entire day lying in Lady Bilton’s room. How could we entrust command of the battlefield to someone like that?”
“……”
“I don’t see the reduction in the number of soldiers as the problem. History shows as much, doesn’t it? Defeat always stems from the incompetence of the commander.”
Count Konrad glanced around the circular table once, then gave a light nod as if to say the choice was theirs.
Deeper furrows of concern than before rose on the nobles’ faces. As he regarded their expressions, Count Konrad recalled Empress Anette’s request.
‘If by chance a meeting arises among the nobles due to this war, you must guide it to flow according to Count Florence’s will. Under no circumstances should command go to the Duke of Bilton.’
Count Konrad had nodded without asking further questions beyond the story Anette conveyed. From the moment she had taken his daughter Natalina as a maid when he was nothing but an insignificant noble, he had already been the empress’s man.
When he first went to pay his respects, Anette had self-deprecatingly said that serving a empress in name only was hardly a glorious task, but in the end, it was Empress Anette who had granted the approval for his first import item, exotic medicinal herbs.
This was a war against Rasill, who had killed his father and brothers, so it was unlikely, but even if Anette chose to thrust a blade into Phaelon in the war with the Taran Kingdom, Count Konrad would have stood by her side.
Watching the atmosphere gradually tilting toward Count Florence, Count Konrad reached for his teacup. This tea, too, was one he had decided to import, receiving approval from Anette to bring into Phaelon.
Savoring it with satisfaction, Count Konrad set the cup down with a deliberate clink. The nobles’ scattered gazes converged on him.
“Well, what do you think we should do?”
It was time to walk the only path available.
