Chapter 5
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 5
“You never seem to realize that there are lines you simply should not cross.”
Barkas spoke in his characteristic monotone. However, his handsome face was twisted into a fierce mask, his patience clearly pushed to its breaking point.
Thalia tried to wrench her arm from his grasp, but the trained knight’s iron grip was like a shackle. Standing before the Crown Prince and Aila like a loyal shield, Barkas pulled Thalia closer and spat the words directly into her face.
“Just how much further do you intend to sink before you’re satisfied? Is hitting rock bottom still not enough for you?”
“My rock bottom?”
Thalia tilted her chin up defiantly and let out a sharp, mocking laugh.
“My noble Lord Sieorkan, do you honestly think you know the first thing about the depths of human depravity? Don’t act so high and mighty.”
She leaned in close to him, a sultry smile playing on her lips. Unlike other men whose expressions would turn dazed by her gaze or her scent alone, Barkas didn’t show a hint of agitation. His eyes held nothing but sheer loathing.
A sudden impulse seized Thalia—to drive her fingernails, which she spent every night meticulously sharpening, straight into those icy pupils.
“From where you stand, I must look very low indeed. But I still have a long way to go before I reach the absolute worst.”
She stared straight into his eyes as she spoke. Within them, a distant quagmire seemed to lurk.
This man would eventually push her into that very abyss. If that was the case, she would at least leave deep claw marks on their future before she fell. That was only fair.
Her deep blue eyes glowed with a venomous intensity. As Barkas looked down at her malice-filled face, a dangerous glint flickered in his own eyes. As they stood there, glaring as if ready to kill one another, a piteous voice drifted from behind his back.
“Barkas.”
The man, who had looked ready to run Thalia through a moment ago, immediately turned toward his fiancée.
Aila wore an expression so forlorn it would make anyone’s heart ache. She gingerly tugged at the edge of Barkas’s coat, her voice pleading.
“I… I want to change my clothes. Will you take me out of here?”
“…As you wish.”
Barkas wrapped an arm around Aila’s shoulders and turned away. It was as if Thalia’s very existence had been erased from his mind; he didn’t spare a single glance back over his shoulder as he led his fiancée out of the banquet hall.
Thalia felt the madness that had possessed her drain away all at once.
In its wake, despair, pain, and jealousy rushed in to fill the void. Yet, even through the agonizing ache that felt like her insides were rotting, she maintained her composure.
Wearing a triumphant smile as if she were the victor, Thalia walked toward the terrace where the wine and food were laid out. People scrambled out of her way as if avoiding something repulsive.
Ignoring them, she picked up a fresh glass with an elegant motion. But before she could take even two sips, Count Serian, who had been watching the confrontation from afar, hurried over and snatched the glass from her hand.
“It would be best if you left the banquet hall immediately.”
“And why is that?” she asked, her tone nonchalant as she reached for a plate of pomegranates. “Didn’t you hear the First Imperial Princess tell me to enjoy the banquet to my heart’s content? I haven’t had nearly enough fun yet.”
“I admire your nerve, Your Highness, but a dangerous beast is glaring at your back as if he’s ready to pounce at any moment.”
The Count gestured with his eyes toward the Crown Prince. Just as he said, Gareth looked as though he were on the verge of drawing blood.
Thick veins stood out tautly against his sun-bronzed neck, and his tightly clenched jaw muscles twitched. He was clearly barely suppressing an explosive temper.
Normally, she would have provoked her brother further, goading him into some horrific atrocity, but she didn’t have the energy left for it now.
Thalia dropped her bravado and placed her hand on Count Serian’s forearm. She exited the banquet hall swiftly, though not so fast as to make it look like she was fleeing.
A carriage was already waiting in front of the garden. As the personal guard opened the door as if he had been expecting her, Thalia stepped up onto the footboard. But just as she was about to settle into the plush seat, someone violently shoved her.
Thalia tumbled onto the floor and looked up. Gareth, having pushed past her personal guard, thrust his head into the carriage, his gaze murderous.
“We are barely tolerating your existence,” he growled, wrapping a rough, calloused hand around her throat.
The personal guard, unable to bring himself to lay a hand on the Crown Prince, could only shout in protest at the sight. Gareth ignored the buzzing knight and tightened his grip on her neck with both hands. Thalia instinctively thrashed her legs and dug her nails into the back of her brother’s vein-ridged hands. But he seemed blinded by a rage so total he couldn’t even feel the pain.
Gareth spat the words into her ear.
“And we have been enduring it for a very, very long time. Enduring, and enduring, and enduring.”
The Crown Prince’s vivid green eyes blazed like fire.
“So you don’t need to provoke us any further, sister. We already hate you quite enough…”
Gareth finally released his grip and straightened up.
Thalia clutched her throat with both hands, gasping violently for air. She couldn’t stop coughing, her face flushing crimson as she wheezed. The Crown Prince’s sinister voice pierced her ears once more.
“Keep this in mind. Your mother’s antics and a filthy illegitimate child like you strutting around the palace—it’s all only temporary.”
With that, he kindly closed the carriage door himself and walked away.
Thalia, struggling to push herself up, noticed that two of her carefully manicured nails had snapped. She knitted her brows. Thick blood welled up at the tips of the dangling nails. She stroked them with a sense of satisfaction and murmured in a raspy voice.
“…I’ll have to grow them out again.”
She would sharpen them even more next time. So they could pierce all the way to the bone.
A dry, hollow laugh escaped her lips. She didn’t even know why she was laughing.
The useless personal guard, who had thrown the door open to check if she was safe, looked down at her with a look of utter bewilderment. To him, she must have looked insane. Perhaps he was right. She must have gone mad a long time ago.
She lay on the dark floor of the carriage and giggled for a long while.
* * *
The entire Imperial Palace was in an uproar. In a few days, the First Imperial Princess and the Crown Prince were to set out on a pilgrimage. It was a custom that any descendant of Darian, the Great Emperor who unified the nations, had to observe upon reaching adulthood.
Usually, women departed before marriage and men after turning twenty. However, at the Crown Prince’s insistence that it was only natural for two people born on the same day to receive the gods' blessing together, preparations were made for both of them.
To protect the two individuals whose status in the Empire was second only to the Emperor and Empress, an elite unit of the Imperial Knights was deployed. Naturally, the one appointed as the supreme commander of this expedition was Barkas, who held the position of Commander of the Imperial Guard.
Consequently, Thalia often saw him from the window of the Annex Palace, busily moving about the inner courtyard.
Today, he was out in the drizzling rain, inspecting the condition of weapons, horses, and various travel gear. Thalia leaned over the windowsill, watching him without so much as a blink.
Barkas looked up at the sky as if gauging the time. The sight of the silver rain softly veiling his face filled her vision.
It had been raining just like this on the day she fell in love with him.
Thalia drifted back to that day.