An Unfamiliar Duty
Blink. Blink.
Laniakea slowly closed her eyes, then opened them again.
What in the world was in front of her?
She knew perfectly well that it was a man's chest, and yet she had never seen one from so near. The sight refused to feel real. The only thought that surfaced was that it must be terribly firm.
Just then, a droplet still clinging to the nape of his neck slid down his chest and rolled away.
Laniakea's gaze followed it lower.
Well-set muscle carved a deep groove. It was tighter than anything she had ever seen, even on a statue, and for a moment her fingers twitched of their own accord. Had she held on to her reason a second less, she would have traced the droplet's path with her own hand.
Then the droplet stopped. A faint scar lay there, drawn long across the skin. It had paled with time, but there was no mistaking that it had been a deep wound when it was first made.
What kind of scar is that?
She was leaning in for a closer look when Hyperion drew his collar shut.
The broad, solid chest she had been staring at, utterly spellbound, vanished between the soft folds of a bathing robe. A pang of disappointment struck her before she knew it, and only then did she come back to herself.
Wait. Whose body had she just been looking at—and where?
The moment her thoughts resumed anything like their proper course, Laniakea started up from the bed in alarm. The mattress dipped beneath the hand she braced against it, and her body swayed.
"Ah—ah?"
Unable to decide whether she was about to pitch forward or fall back, she flailed, and Hyperion caught her hand and drew it gently toward him. Thanks to that, she took a small step his way rather than the other.
"Oh."
It was not a hard collision, but her face brushed the robe covering his chest. With it came the clean scent of soap that clung to someone freshly washed, and beneath that something heavier—the scent of his body itself. When that unfamiliar fragrance closed over her all at once, Laniakea went rigid with tension.
Hyperion stepped back at once, opening the distance between them.
"Forgive me."
"What?"
What, all of a sudden, was he apologizing for?
"I was tense, and an old habit took hold of me. Before I knew it, I had erased my presence and come inside."
At the mention of erasing his presence, Laniakea understood at last. He thought she had been startled because he had spoken without warning.
"It's quite all right. I was lost in other thoughts, and when I came to myself I didn't even manage a proper greeting."
She started to bow as she said it, and he gave a light wave of his hand, as if to tell her there was no need. She still felt courtesy demanded it, but somehow she was certain that if she lowered her head his face would harden into something even more frightening, so she gave the idea up.
The former empress isn't here anymore, anyway.
In the past, whenever Laniakea happened to attend a banquet, the former empress had demanded—with nothing but a look—that she bow not only to her, but to the princes beside her as well. That, she claimed, was etiquette. The maids and noblewomen around them had glared with eyes like axes, and Laniakea had had no choice but to lower her head in perfect deference.
There was no empress watching her now, and no one nearby to police her every movement. The only person who could rightfully demand a greeting from her was Hyperion, and he looked so thoroughly displeased by the notion that there was no need to bow.
"Is something the matter? You seemed to be thinking rather deeply."
"Well, it's…"
She had been about to say she was troubled over choosing a maid, but she hesitated, then shook her head.
"No. I think I know what I ought to do now. It isn't anything grand enough to trouble Your Majesty with."
A lie. She was still agonizing over whom to take as her maid, and she had no idea how she was meant to choose.
If she thought about it, Hyperion was the best person she could have consulted. She knew the houses that supported him, but there might be others who supported him in secret. In that case, she could bring in one of their young ladies as a maid. If those ladies found the post difficult, she could ask for a recommendation from among a cadet branch.
One of them might even catch His Majesty's eye.
Then some head of house might already have petitioned him to place a daughter of his family in her service. If someone came to her as a maid for that reason, Laniakea fully intended to welcome her with pleasure. A maid's post was that important, and for a discussion that needed to stay discreet, Hyperion was the right person.
She knew it, and still she shrank from telling him what weighed on her.
He'll think me pathetic if I can't even handle something this small on my own.
Since coming to the Empire, Laniakea had received no education beyond the basics. Because of that, once she had suddenly become empress, every duty that rushed in upon her felt overwhelming. But she could not say she was struggling. It would only sound like an excuse for her own incompetence.
Set beside a struggling Laniakea, Hyperion was perfect. He had been forced to leave the Imperial Palace as a child and had never been properly educated either—little different from her—and yet he carried himself as though he had been prepared for all of it. It was a mercy that at least one of them was flawless rather than both of them a mess, and still she could not stop herself from drawing inward.
Her confidence dwindled by the day, but she could not let it show. Unrest still crowded around Hyperion, and until he had secured the imperial authority she could not be the one who held him back.
I can't do the work carelessly just because I'm someone who will leave soon.
And even if the time was short, she did not want to be remembered, afterward, as incompetent and clumsy. So choosing a maid was something she had to settle alone.
When Laniakea made her polite refusal, silence settled over the room for a moment. She glanced at him, wondering whether her refusal had wounded his pride, but it did not seem so. Instead he stroked his chin a few times with one hand, then opened his mouth with visible effort.
"First—might we talk for a moment?"
With that, he sat on the edge of the bed. Laniakea quickly sat facing him.
Once she was settled on the moderately soft mattress, it struck her all at once why she was here.
Tonight, this man and I…
She tried to endure it, but her throat kept swallowing dry. She did not think she had been this tense since childhood, when she had stood before her parents and her sisters to call a spirit.
Just as she began to fear the silence might last forever, Hyperion spoke first.
"I think I must ask your forgiveness in advance."
His voice dropped lower still.
"It shames me to say it, but of all my many duties, this is the one I am not accustomed to. I should tell you that now. Every prince of the Empire bears the duty of producing an heir. But I spent my childhood in a monastery, and after I came of age I was on a barren border, so I never received the education the other princes did. So… I may make this difficult for you. I may hurt you."
He sounded genuinely sorry.
"If, at any point, you find it hard, tell me at once. I will stop immediately."
At the seriousness in his voice, Laniakea nodded.
Honestly, she thought that would be impossible. From everything she had gathered, once the act began, men moved to satisfy their own desire no matter the state of their partner. And even if they stopped because it was hard, they would only have to begin again. Better, then, simply to endure.
When she nodded, Hyperion rose and removed the bathing robe he had been wearing.
Fortunately, taking it off did not leave him entirely bare. His upper body was uncovered, but he still wore comfortable trousers meant for sleep. Embarrassment warred with fascination, and Laniakea stared blankly as he undressed. Without the robe, the muscle wrapping his body showed all the more clearly.
Even the glimpse through his open collar had been sculptural enough to steal her breath. Fully revealed, it struck her less as brutish than as beautiful.
He really is nothing like the other princes.
The three princes who had left this world had grown up sheltered beneath the empress's protection. People said a prince's duty was to temper his body and train in the martial arts, but Laniakea knew very well how irritated they became at so much as a single drop of sweat. When the imperial house held a swordsmanship exhibition, they swung their blades a few times before the imperial knights in movements anyone could see were clumsy. The knights pretended to fall before those shoddy attacks, and offered flattery of the sort that went, "With His Highness's martial skill so outstanding, the Empire's future is secure."
Listening from a corner, she had been speechless with disbelief. Someone else was risking his life on the border, and the praise poured onto the princes.
Here and there across that tightly wrought muscle, small scars showed. The men who had treated swords like playthings in the palace gardens would never have borne them.
Noticing her gaze, Hyperion gave a bitter smile.
"Forgive me. It is not a pleasant sight."
Before Laniakea could say that was not it at all, Hyperion came to stand before her and spoke in a low voice, almost a whisper.
"If you do not mind… may I help you?"
Help her? With what?
She understood a moment later. His fingers, which seemed to tremble ever so slightly, had caught the collar of her robe.
He was asking to undress her.