Chapter 106
Lionel finally had to accept it.
The fact that he was someone who could never stand by Agnes’s side.
Even if Agnes were to forgive him, that fact would never change.
Forgiveness and qualification were two entirely different matters.
Saying that he simply did not know would not excuse him.
Claiming it had been a mistake was equally meaningless.
“So this whole time, I really believed all I needed was a little time.”
Lionel pressed his burning eyes hard with the palm of his hand.
Simply disappearing from before Agnes for a while would solve nothing.
His very existence had to disappear from Agnes’s life forever.
He deserved to be abandoned by Agnes.
Yes.
That was undoubtedly true.
And yet, even at this very moment, Lionel still desired Agnes.
The moment he accepted that he might never be able to see Agnes again, paradoxically, his feelings for her became clearer than ever.
Shamelessly…
He loved Agnes.
It was the name of the emotion he had already realized, yet had never dared to call by its name, using his conscience as an excuse.
It was the moment the feeling he had desperately tried to believe was hatred finally revealed itself.
At some point, Agnes had become the standard by which his entire world revolved, to the extent that he would ignore every principle and every value he once held.
If this was not love, then what was?
Agnes had already become Lionel’s world.
He had simply realized it far too late.
But he would never speak these feelings aloud.
Lionel realized that even the word “love” could become another set of shackles for the Agnes of today.
Those words would not be an act of reaching out a hand.
They would be an attempt to bind someone who could no longer escape with nothing but emotions.
They might even become a declaration that stole away the last freedom she had left.
Above all…
Someone like him had no right to harbor such feelings for Agnes.
Therefore, the only thing this emotion—too disgusting even to call love, an emotion built upon hypocrisy—could do was leave Agnes’s side.
At least once, he had to grant what she wanted.
The matter of Raul Herben Guten was the same.
The very thought that he had the right to decide Raul Herben Guten’s fate was arrogance.
Once Raul Herben Guten’s safety had been secured, every decision afterward should belong entirely to Agnes.
If Agnes chose to leave together with Raul Herben Guten, he would make it happen.
If Agnes wished for Lionel himself to disappear from the Eschwald Empire, he would gladly grant that wish as well.
Choice and decision were no longer Lionel’s to make.
Only…
Not yet.
Only after everything had been resolved.
Only after Agnes’s safety had been completely guaranteed.
If he were to be abandoned, it had to happen then.
Honestly, he was not confident he could refrain from clinging to her.
When that moment came, he might fall pathetically to Agnes’s feet and beg like a dog.
He might promise to spend the rest of his life atoning, over and over again, if only she would allow him to remain by her side.
Otherwise…
He might never be able to live a sane life without Agnes.
But none of that mattered.
What happened to someone like him was of no importance.
Lionel stopped in the middle of the room, now reduced to complete chaos.
Among the military uniforms and medals scattered across the floor, there was only one thing that remained perfectly intact.
Agnes’s pointe shoes, carefully preserved inside their case.
Unconsciously, Lionel reached out his hand.
Then he stopped.
Blood was still flowing from his hand.
He had almost stained them.
With his own blood.
Those immaculate white pointe shoes.
The dream of someone he should never have dared approach.
In the end, Lionel could not bring himself to take the pointe shoes out.
Instead, he embraced only the case with both arms.
Then, in a voice too quiet for anyone to hear, he repeated the same words over and over.
“I’m sorry.”
“…I’m sorry, Agnes.”
“I realized it far too late…”
“And someone like me dared to keep you in my heart.”
I’m sorry.
I was wrong.
Those were the only words he could say.
Above Lionel, who stood motionless in the room strewn about like ruins, the shadows of the window bars, cast by the setting sun, stretched heavily over him.
The prison that had once confined Agnes was now descending over Lionel instead.
☆☆☆
By the time the crimson sunset settled over the ducal estate.
The Bardo trading company, beneath the same crimson sky, had likewise fallen into turmoil.
The door to the reception room was violently thrown open.
The Winterbolt Knights stormed inside and surrounded Chloe.
“Arrest Chloe Bardo for spreading malicious rumors that defamed the honor of the Duchess of Valheim!”
While the cold declaration echoed through the room, Jerome watched the scene from the opposite side with great interest.
He had only stopped by because Chloe, desperate over the possibility of losing the trading company, had become rather bothersome, and he intended to humor her for a while.
Yet the way things were unfolding was unexpectedly entertaining.
“What do you think you’re doing?! Colonel, help me! Colonel!”
“Furthermore, effective immediately, ownership of the Bardo trading company is hereby revoked.”
“Colonel! Please do something! You promised you’d help me obtain the trading company!”
At Chloe’s words, Jerome widened his eyes.
As though it were the first time he had ever heard such nonsense.
“Me?”
“Yes! You said you’d reward me for the information I gave you!”
“Ah.”
“So that’s what you meant.”
“But did I ever explicitly say what that reward would be?”
“Colonel!”
Letting out a scoff, Jerome downed his whiskey in a single gulp and rose to his feet, draping his jacket over his shoulder.
Then he walked over to the bound Chloe.
He gently embraced her.
As though comforting someone pitiful.
“I’d say letting someone as lowly as you spend time with me a few times was reward enough.”
“You should know your place.”
Whispering those chilling words into Chloe’s ear, Jerome stepped away and lowered his brows.
“It’s unfortunate how things turned out.”
“But an adult should solve her own problems, Miss Chloe.”
“C-Colonel! How can you do this?!”
“Regrettably, I doubt we’ll have another chance to see each other.”
“Perhaps never again?”
After patting the deathly pale Chloe lightly on the back, Jerome walked past her while humming an unfamiliar tune.
Then, as though nothing had happened, he slowly departed, passing by the window dyed by the sunset.
Listening to Chloe’s shrill screams behind him as though they were pleasant background music.
“No! What did I do wrong?!”
“It’s my trading company!”
“It all belongs to me!”
“It belongs to me, not Agnes!”
☆☆☆
Leaving Chloe’s distant screams behind, the ducal estate had once again become completely quiet, as though no disturbance had ever occurred.
After the sun had set, silence alone remained throughout the estate.
Within that peaceful stillness, like the quiet of a cradle, Agnes slowly opened her heavy eyelids.
The first things she noticed were an unfamiliar ceiling and the strange feeling of unfamiliar bedding.
“This isn’t Lionel’s bedroom…?”
Faced with the unfamiliar surroundings, Agnes supported herself with a hand on the bed and sat up.
Then she let out a small gasp as pain shot through her palm.
“Ah…!”
Lowering her gaze, she saw neat white bandages wrapped around both of her hands.
“What…?”
She gently moved her fingers.
A stinging pain immediately followed.
Before she could even wonder what had happened, the bedroom door burst open with enough force that it nearly broke.
“Agnes!”
The one who entered was Lionel.
As though he had sensed her presence instinctively, he had rushed over like a panicked child.
Only after confirming Agnes’s face did he barely manage to stop himself.
Agnes looked up at Lionel.
Then she suddenly noticed something strange.
Lionel was wearing a glove on his right hand.
His cravat was tied unusually tightly around his neck, covering even the collar of his shirt.
He had always dressed formally.
But now, with not even the slightest bit of bare skin visible, he looked like someone desperately trying to hide something.
“I’m sorry.”
“I said I wouldn’t appear before you.”
“But… I was too worried about you…”
“Worried about me?”
When Agnes asked, Lionel reacted a beat too late.
He could neither sit nor stand beside her.
He simply lingered awkwardly, like someone who no longer knew where to place his hands.
Unable to bring himself to touch her, Lionel only held his hands in the air as though he were wrapping them around Agnes’s.
“Are your hands alright?”
“They don’t hurt too much, do they?”
“Should I call the doctor?”
At his question, Agnes looked down at her own hands.
“I was actually going to ask.”
“Why are my hands… like this?”
At that question, Lionel’s expression subtly changed.
“You… don’t remember?”
“Remember what?”
Confusion filled Agnes’s eyes.
Her memories ended around lunchtime.
All she remembered was the sudden wave of anxiety, the suffocating sensation, and running toward the bathroom.
Nothing that happened afterward remained in her memory.
Everything beyond that point was completely black.
As though it had been cleanly cut away.
It was as though someone had taken scissors and cut out that entire stretch of time.
The fact that she did not even know what she had forgotten only made Agnes feel even more anxious.
“Did I… do something wrong?”
At those words, Lionel’s heart sank heavily.
Standing before a gap in her memory she could not verify, Agnes had naturally assumed that she herself had made a mistake.
But that was not true.
She had done absolutely nothing wrong.
Lionel could no longer remain standing.
He knelt before Agnes.
The sinner should have been himself.
Not Agnes.
“No.”
“You did nothing wrong.”
“Nothing at all.”
Agnes’s gaze settled upon Lionel.
“It’s just…”
“I did something foolish again.”
Unconsciously, Lionel tightly clenched the hand hidden beneath the glove.
“You were hurt because of my mistake.”
Lionel lowered his head deeply.
Even looking Agnes in the eyes felt like something he had no right to do.
Every word that left his mouth made his tongue grow heavier and stiffer.
Even so, he had to tell her.
That he had only now learned that he was the one who had done this to her legs.
That despite everything, he had fallen in love with her.
That he was sorry someone as vile as himself had dared to love her.
That she should never forgive him.
Yet at the same time, fear was driving reason from Lionel’s mind.
Did he truly have the right to speak?
Wouldn’t he once again wound Agnes simply by speaking too carelessly?
As countless emotions merged together and swelled within him, cold sweat trickled down his back.
He had to…
He had to speak.
Yet he could no longer remember how to begin.
How to move his tongue.
How to produce a voice.
Even though he wanted to speak, his body refused to obey.
Still, he barely managed to force out enough strength to open his mouth.
At that very moment, Lionel’s eyes trembled.
“…?”
His lips had clearly moved.
Yet no sound came out.
Lionel grabbed his own throat.
As though the words he could not say had become trapped inside it.
“…”
But no matter how many more times he strained his neck, the result remained the same.
His voice would not come.
“…Your Grace?”
Even when Agnes called out to him, Lionel remained frozen with his head lowered.
The fact that a single sentence from him had destroyed the woman he loved had become engraved into every part of his body.
It filled him with rejection and nausea.
Toward the very act of opening his mouth to speak.
☆▪︎▪︎▪︎☆
