Ventorino Kingdom - Seeds of Discord (4)
"She went out again today...?"
Queen Katarina let out a hollow, disbelieving laugh.
This was already the fourth time.
The number of times Marc had slipped out of the royal palace in secret under cover of night.
Four out of the five days since he had first started doing it again, including the day he had gone out after a long absence. It was the first time he had ever been so obsessed with nightlife. If not for the days when her husband stayed home once a week—those rare nights when they still shared a bed as husband and wife—she wondered what on earth he would have done.
"Why... why...!"
Gnaw, gnaw.
The stress assaulting her mind so fiercely made her bite down on the nail of her own little finger.
On the first day, she had told herself she could understand it, to a point. Even so, she had recently been holding back from going out at night, and although it felt unfair to her, he must have been stressed by the suspicion as well.
But this had gone too far.
She had been enduring the churning in her chest for his sake, trying to erase his doubts.
Even when the boy had kissed her out of nowhere, even when he had spoken to her in that sweet voice, even when he had flashed that handsome face and used tempting words, she had not given in. In fact, she had even slapped his cheek hard. She had felt bad afterward and rubbed the spot for him, but after that she had kept her distance.
And yet.
"And yet... after saying all that to me, you're going to betray me like this?"
She was so dumbfounded she could almost laugh.
The queen looked at the maid who had brought her news of the king's outing. The maid was trembling under the cold atmosphere and Katarina's sharp gaze. She knew no trouble would fall on her personally, and yet Katarina's fury was simply too frightening.
"Bring Valdes to me right now."
"Y-Yes?"
"Valdes. The half-demon bastard attached to Princess Mercedes."
"R-Right... I-I understand!"
The maid nearly asked, “Shall I bring him here?” before hurriedly bowing her head and answering.
Summoning an outside man to the queen's chambers at this hour of night was dangerous, but Katarina could not possibly be ignorant of that. If anything, it was precisely because she knew it well that she had called for him.
At any rate, even the king had been sneaking out every night to fool around. It would not be strange for the queen, who already had a history of it, to think of taking a lover. As a loyal servant of both the king and the queen, the maid understood Katarina's feelings and circumstances to some extent.
She also knew that if Katarina strayed, she did not go as far as taking it all the way.
Put bluntly, even if the queen indulged herself for a while, it would not cause any major problem.
The succession had already been secured, and there was no rival with enough leverage to threaten the queen over a mere blemish or two. As long as she did not end up pregnant with another man's child, there were ways to smooth things over. That was how solid the king and queen's position currently was.
After the maid hurried out of the room, Katarina fell into thought.
She had called Valdes on a wave of anger, but now that she'd done it, doubt and regret were creeping in. Had it really been right to summon him? Should she have found someone else?
There was no option of not taking a lover in return.
That had been the way of things all along.
When that man cheated, she paid him back in kind. Still, she never crossed the line. So, under the pretense of revenge, she retained a little bit of dignity with herself, and when choosing a lover, she did so carefully. She never let herself fall too deeply, and she never touched carelessly.
That was what worried her.
"Haa...."
Up until now, it had been fine. She had not been greatly moved by her lovers.
But this time, driven by resentment toward her husband, she had called impulsively for someone with no hesitation at all—a handsome, young, capable boy who made her heart waver. The first man to kiss her before she could even react.
There was still time. If she sent him back right now, nothing would come of it.
And yet Katarina still could not make up her mind.
In the end, before her worries could even settle, Valdes arrived first.
"You summoned me, Your Majesty."
"......"
"Your Majesty?"
"Yes... that's right. You came."
The queen's mouth closed before she could say any more. She could not think of what else to say. Why had she called him so late at night?
While she hesitated, Valdes approached her.
"If you've called me at this hour... may I take that in a certain way?"
"...!! D-Don't get full of yourself... huh?"
Katarina had started to snap at him in a fierce voice when he suddenly took hold of her wrist. But she was soon forced to go still in confusion. She had expected him to kiss her again, or perhaps do something else strange, but he did neither.
"You've hurt yourself."
"Ah, uh...."
"Biting your nails is a bad habit. It would be best to break it."
"......"
Valdes took out the ointment he had applied to her a few days earlier and dabbed it onto the nail of her little finger. That made Katarina stare at him, startled, her eyes trembling.
"What's wrong?"
"Y-You...."
"Have you perhaps been imagining something strange?"
"......"
Her feelings were a mess.
How had he noticed the injury on her little finger? When her stress grew too intense, she had a habit of biting her nails. She knew it was a bad habit, but it was not easy to break. So, if she could not fix it, she at least made a point of biting the right pinky finger as discreetly as possible.
It was the smallest finger on her hand, and since she was left-handed, she did not use it much in front of others. As long as she merely bent it a little, it was hard for anyone to notice unless they looked very closely.
But this half-demon boy had noticed.
"Don't be so tense."
"...Who says I'm tense?"
Katarina shot back at him in a snappy tone, then let the tension drain from her body as his words suggested.
Come to think of it, there probably weren't many people who'd get slapped hard across the face and still try something stupid again.
Smack.
"......?"
"You let your guard down again."
But the boy in front of her seemed to be one of that rare breed.
For a reason different from her husband's affairs, the queen let out a dry laugh, both exasperated and helpless. He was truly beyond common sense. A half-demon, and yet he was doing this to the very benefactor who had allowed him into the royal palace—more than that, to the queen of the kingdom herself. And not just once, but twice.
And yet she did not punish him.
Valdes calmly wrapped the ointment-slicked finger in a bandage as if nothing had happened. Then, after carefully checking to make sure nothing was amiss, he spoke.
"It's done."
"...I see."
"Then how about... should I be going now? Or...?"
At the sight of the boy's faintly lewd smile, Katarina laughed.
"Yes. Why don't you try doing exactly what you want?"
With that, the queen casually brushed against his body, and Valdes kissed her.
He did not push his tongue inside. He knew Katarina well enough to distinguish clearly between the line he could cross and the one he could not. In any case, he had no intention of lingering here for long. At most, one month. Within that time, he would finish everything he needed to do in the Ventorino Kingdom.
The soft lips parted, and the queen's half-melted gaze sharpened again.
"I forgave you this time because I found you cute. But don't get above yourself from now on."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that attitude."
Even as she narrowed her eyes and warned him, Valdes was still smiling broadly. That smile made her heart beat strangely again. She forced herself to ignore how often her gaze kept slipping to his lips and hardened her expression.
She had already kissed him, so she had no intention of taking it back. But at the very least, she needed to keep control of the situation.
Up until now she had been wavering, off balance, and careless, but Katarina was confident in herself.
By now she had been with dozens of men. Except for two, every one of them had been a lover she had taken because of her husband. There had been men as capable as the boy in front of her, and there had been nobles too. Some of them had nurtured vain ambitions of climbing to a higher position by using her, but in the end every last one of them had been toyed with and discarded by her.
Even now, various plans were springing up in her head—ways to play with this boy, ways to coax him, ways to control him.
"I am the queen of this nation. One more time and—mmph!"
That was before she received another kiss.
"Mm... mn, chu, slurp, smooch...!"
Again, Valdes did not thrust in his tongue. Instead, he stubbornly bit and sucked at her lips. He kissed her until her plump lower lip swelled with saliva, all while meeting her eyes.
Katarina, too flustered to even think of closing her eyes, stared back at him with trembling pupils. Valdes could read the secret, burgeoning lust there, along with pleasure, and the desire to be loved by a man. The cravings she had buried deep in her heart were beginning to crawl back to the surface.
"Haaah, haa...♡"
As that sweet little breath slipped from her lips, Valdes stealthily shifted the hand he had been using to hold her arm and drew Katarina into his embrace. She twitched faintly, but she did not resist.
The boy's arms grew more assertive as he held her. His left hand crossed her back to seize her shoulder, while his right slid around her waist and casually brushed her hip. Even so, the queen only enjoyed the kiss in silence.
"Hah... fhaa...."
Even after their lips parted, she kept staring at him with hazy eyes.
"How is it? It's on a completely different level from anything you've done before, isn't it?"
"You. Haa, what the hell are you doing...?"
"I kissed you."
"......"
"A half-demon kissing the queen."
Her mind screamed at her that she should slap this boy immediately and drive him out. But she didn't. Her heart was saying the opposite of her head, and she chose to listen to that side instead. Even knowing that this half-demon was taking control of her, for some reason her body still would not move.
"I could tell just by looking."
"...Tell what?"
"That Your Majesty... wants someone to pin you down and take control of you."
"...Me? Want something like that?"
"Yes. And not just anyone—the sort of man whose status is far lower than yours."
Ridiculous.
She was the noble queen of this kingdom. There was no way she could want something like that. How had she even risen to this position? From nothing more than the daughter of a count's house.
She had to deny it. Deny it.
But her lips would not move.
In the end, Katarina could only stare at Valdes in silence. At the boy who was still grinning as if he knew everything.
"You don't believe me, do you?"
"O-Of course not...."
"Then just feel it with your body."
"What?! W-Wait...!"
She tried to stop him in a panic, but Valdes was faster. In an instant he was pressed against her, one arm clamped tightly around her waist while he buried his face at the nape of her neck. The damp, soft flesh touching her skin sent goosebumps racing over her entire body.
"Hiiht, hhk! Ah, ahh... haa...♡"
A sweet moan. A heated sigh.
She did not know why she was getting so worked up when he was not even kissing her, merely licking the back of her neck. Her body kept heating up, and the sensitive spots under her skin began to itch. If the skirt of her dress had not been so full, he would have seen without her realizing it that she was rubbing her thighs together against him.
No, no... I have to hold back... I have to hold back my moans...♡
She wondered if Valdes had somehow slipped her a strange drug.
Of course that was a ridiculous suspicion, since she had never once shared a cup of tea with him, but surprisingly, her guess had been correct. More accurately, someone other than him had been feeding her something very slowly over the last two weeks.
Mercedes and Mari.
Unaware of that, Katarina was confused, wondering whether she really did have the sort of disposition he had described.
With the addition of enchantment magic, she had been reduced from a noble queen to nothing more than a woman, toyed with at his mercy. Even though she clearly understood that much herself, Katarina still whimpered in his arms. It felt too good. She simply could not shake off his touch.
"Aah... hnnngh...."
"Lick, slurp... It's amazing, isn't it? The fact that you can't get away from my hands at all. Smack."
"Hk... haa...."
"Besides figuring out a woman's tastes, I can do things like this too."
The hand Valdes had around her waist slid forward along the folds of her dress. As soon as she felt his fingers touch her stomach, Katarina jerked and began to resist.
"T-There...! Hngh! R-Really, you can't...!"
"Don't worry. I'm not trying to touch your pussy."
"Hngh! P-Pus...sy...? Ngh!"
Thinking he meant to touch her sex, she shuddered in shock at the blatant word that came out of his mouth. Then, just as she was starting to relax because his hand had stopped on her lower abdomen, his fingers pressed there.
Push.
"Hiiih! ...Hah, haa... wh-what is this...♡"
"This is Your Majesty's womb."
"W-Womb...?"