Chapter 13
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 13
The maid’s hand shook with such violence that she could barely lift the spoon. Unable to bring it to the bowl, she squeezed her eyes shut, trembling.
She seemed to believe, however vaguely, that if she simply held out long enough, she might escape this nightmare. Perhaps she was praying for someone to appear and put a stop to it.
Thalia snatched a knife from the table. Her voice was ice as she issued an instruction to the man standing by.
“Pin her finger to the plate. Since she dares to ignore my sincerity, I’ll have to take one off as an example.”
The man moved instantly, seizing the woman’s hand and splaying it across the silver plate. Thalia gripped the tip of the maid’s index finger and raised the heavy meat knife high.
Terrified, the maid shrieked.
“I’ll eat it! I’ll eat! I’ll eat it all!”
The woman frantically plunged her spoon into the bowl. She began to shovel the broth—and the bird’s carcass within it—into her mouth.
As if believing she could endure the ordeal if she didn’t taste it, she swallowed the chunks whole without chewing. But she couldn’t manage more than five spoonfuls before her body revolted, and she retched everything back up.
Even at that wretched sight, Thalia remained unmoved.
“Eat every last bit. I expect to see the bottom of that bowl.”
The maid, gasping and heaving, turned a gaze filled with pure terror toward her. It was no longer the look of scorn she had once held for the princess. It was the look of someone staring at a monster.
Thalia gave a silent command with her eyes, forbidding her to stop. The maid sobbed bitterly, trapped in a cycle of eating and vomiting, then eating again.
Unable to bring herself to chew the rotting bird, she repeatedly forced the broth down only to throw it up seconds later. Her face, smeared with blood, tears, and bile, turned ashen. Finally, her eyes rolled back into her head. Her body collapsed onto the carpet with a heavy thud.
Thalia stared down at the maid, who was convulsing with foam at her mouth, then gave an arrogant tilt of her chin toward the frozen servants.
“Clean this up.”
She threw the dirty plate at their feet and added, “And bring me fresh food. This time, make sure it’s proper.”
*
After that day, the servants’ relentless bullying stopped as if it had all been a fever dream.
The maids treated Thalia with the wary caution one might use for a live explosive, and some displayed outright terror. They no longer cast contemptuous glances her way or whispered cruelties within her earshot. Whenever Thalia appeared, everyone was quick to bow their heads, their mouths clamped shut like clamshells.
Naturally, rumors of the Second Imperial Princess’s wicked nature spread through the Imperial Palace like wildfire. Those who heard how cruelly she had tortured an innocent maid who had served the Imperial Family for over a decade clicked their tongues at the young girl’s malice.
The priests lamented that the spawn of a viper had crawled into the Imperial Household, and the Empire’s loyal subjects expressed concern that the tyrannical princess might tarnish the dignity of the throne.
However, there was one person who was pleased by Thalia’s atrocities.
On a day just before winter, the Empress, wearing a dress as deep blue as her own eyes, visited the Annex Palace.
Thalia, who had been descending the stairs with a stiff expression to greet her, found herself stopping involuntarily. The moment she saw Senevia, her throat tightened with an overwhelming sense of longing.
This was the mother who had turned her back so coldly. After watching that slender back as Senevia heartlessly shook off her hand and walked away, Thalia had firmly vowed never to love her again.
But when Senevia crossed the wide hall and kissed her on the cheek, that resolve crumbled like a sandcastle before a wave.
“Hello, Thalia. You look truly lovely today.”
Senevia smelled of roses, lilacs, and the sweet scent of ripening fruit. It was miserable to realize how much she had missed this intoxicating fragrance.
Senevia looked down at her daughter’s dark, unyielding face and offered a coaxing smile.
“You must be quite upset because I haven’t visited in a while. Forgive me. It took some time to prepare a special gift for you, you see.”
Thalia looked uneasy. “A gift...?”
“I heard how effectively you tamed those insolent servants. Since you have pleased your mother’s heart, you must be rewarded.”
She spoke in a singing, canary-like voice and turned gracefully. Only then did Thalia notice a boy slowly walking across the hall.
Thalia caught her breath. Barkas was approaching, dressed in the uniform of the Imperial Guard, as if he had been formally knighted in the intervening months.
The sunlight streaming through the window shattered against his ash-blonde hair, scattering light in every direction. The sight felt as if it were piercing her retinas like shards of glass.
Senevia stepped beside the boy and gestured with one hand, as if displaying a trophy.
“This is the handsome knight who will protect you from now on.”
The boy stopped before her and paid his respects.
His eyes, which had once shone with the promise of a crown, now flickered coldly, containing only dagger-like anger and a faint sense of humiliation. Anyone but a fool could tell he had not come here of his own volition.
The boy looked down at her with eyes that seemed to be viewing an inanimate object.
“I am Barkas Raedgo Sieorkan.”
His voice was so dry it sent a chill down her spine.
“I have been assigned to serve by your side until Your Highness’s coming-of-age ceremony.”
His tone suggested he hoped that day would arrive as soon as possible so he could escape this humiliating duty.
Thalia looked up at his cold, mask-like face with a desolate gaze. His frigid eyes, dry speech, and stiff attitude were once again making her feel insignificant and contemptible.
She tried her best not to shrink back, but she could find no way to stop the heat of shame from rising up her neck.
In that moment, Thalia realized with certainty:
This beautiful boy would not be her hope, but her agony.
And a most terrible one at that.
* * *
When the rain that had been drizzling for days finally stopped, the intense sunlight began to beat down, as if heralding the Season of Fire.
Aila, crossing the bustling courtyard in search of her fiancé, wiped the beads of sweat from her forehead and narrowed her eyes against the glare.
The wide open space usually used for military drills was packed with dozens of wagons, harness merchants, brawny packhorses specially bred for pulling carts, and soldiers transporting various equipment needed for travel.
After a brief frown at the scene, which resembled a chaotic marketplace, Aila’s eyes brightened as she spotted Barkas checking the condition of a warhorse near the outer castle wall.
Instead of the white combat uniform symbolizing the Roem Knights, he wore a black iron breastplate over a black tunic adorned with intricate embroidery. He looked more like an Eastern nobleman than a knight belonging to the Imperial Guard.
Aila smiled proudly as she watched him. Once this mission was over, Barkas would leave the Imperial Guard and undergo the succession process to become the Grand Duke of Sieorkan.
And she would study by his side to become the mistress of the Grand Duchy. That had been their destined future since the day he followed his mother into the Empress’s garden.
Yet, Aila sometimes found herself overwhelmed by doubt as to whether such a day would ever truly come.
Barkas was always polite and occasionally even kind, but Aila knew there was an unbridgeable distance between them. For Aila, who had suffered as much as that distance allowed, it was hard to believe that he would truly become her husband in just a few months.