Words That Cannot Be Taken Back
There was not a single lie in what she said. Yet the Duke did not seem to believe her. The silence stretched on, heavy and suffocating, and his thoughts remained impossible to read. Impossible to read. When no sign appeared that his suspicions and misunderstandings might dissolve, Tichite grew restless. Restlessness drove her to act rashly.
“I know what troubles you, Your Grace. I understand very well how much you despise showing your face. But Your Grace, as you know, I was brought here as the person meant to examine your illness. Therefore, there is no need to hide it even from me. In truth, I don’t understand why you are so reluctant to reveal anything to me. I have examined the naked bodies of countless patients—men, women, young and old. A patient need feel no shame at all in showing their symptoms to a physician. To speak plainly, I believe we must determine the severity of the condition you suffer as quickly as possible so that—”
“You talk too damn much.” Nyx cut her off with a single blunt stroke, as if he could no longer stand to listen. Beneath the irritable rebuke lay a clear command: know your place and stop overstepping.
She had meant it as thoughtful comfort, yet the Duke might not have wanted to hear such words from a mere Tilamin slave.
Tichite lost her voice in an instant. All her long persuasion rendered meaningless, she pressed her lips together as though someone had sliced the rest of her sentence away.
Her face burned crimson with embarrassment and shame. The one small mercy was that she had her back to him, so he could not see how badly her expression had crumpled.
Why did I believe he would listen to me?
Because, unconsciously, she had cast the Duke of Farrow as her own personal hero—reliable, kind, trustworthy.
But he was a fickle, strange man. Every time she saw him he spoke and acted like an entirely different person, making it impossible to predict his feelings or reactions.
In a situation like this, the words a subordinate could say to a superior were extremely limited.
I’m sorry. I spoke out of turn. I’ll correct myself. Any trite phrase would have sufficed. Yet her throat had closed so tightly she could not utter a sound.
“You seem to be misunderstanding something. I didn’t bring you here because I wanted anything from you.”
The man roughly shook the water from his wet hair. He let out a long sigh at Tichite’s motionless back.
In truth, he had been inwardly agonizing over how to end this conversation.
After long deliberation, he finally shoved her away with a miserably harsh remark.
“I don’t need you, so just get lost.”
Nyx Farrow never regretted words once spoken.
Not because he was a man who chose his words with care, but because he had never once considered that his crude speech might wound someone. He never deeply pondered the emotional damage or repercussions his statements might cause; in fact, he had never needed to. He lived surrounded by men who groveled the moment he raised his voice.
Everything about Nyx’s speech and behavior had been learned, absorbed, and hardened within male society. A ruler had to be firm rather than soft. He had to wield authority through martial prowess and rough language, demanding obedience. In the army, there was no opponent who could not be subdued with harsh words. Men who prided themselves on strength had to be ruled that way.
Having dealt only with weeds that stubbornly grew back no matter how often they were trampled, he had never learned that some flowers in the world, once broken, could never bloom again.
By the time he realized it, the words were already beyond retrieval.
“…I’m sorry.”
The woman’s voice was barely audible. It was thick and wet, heavy with the threat of tears.
Nyx realized too late. He should not have spoken to her the same way he spoke to the idiots he usually dealt with.
Her small, hunched shoulders trembled. She was fighting to steady her pounding heart and hold back her sobs. Only when she began to sniffle did the full awareness hit him: he had said something that should never have been said. He froze, utterly at a loss.
He felt he ought to soothe her or scold her not to cry over something so small, but the moment his words ended she bolted toward the campsite. One could even say she was faithfully carrying out his order to get lost.
For a long while Nyx stood rooted to the spot like a man who had dropped his reins. The river wind blowing against his wet body felt unusually cold.
Damn it, why did I say it like that? What possible grudge could I have against her…?
Her request to see his face had been a little forward, but it had come from a desire to help him.
The man swept a hand over his forehead, dazed. Cold water dripped steadily from his soaked hair, carrying the sting of failure.
It seemed the darkness had clouded not only his vision but his judgment as well. He had seen nothing. Instead of considering the other person with an open mind, he had focused only on his own narrow, petty interior.
Overwhelmed by embarrassment and shame, he had acted on impulse. That had been wrong. It was not even daytime; he had already finished his evening prayers. In other words, it was a time when he should neither commit sin nor surrender to excessive emotion.
Making a woman cry.
This was the first such sin in Nyx Farrow’s life. He scratched roughly at his scalp, unable to keep still.
Even setting aside the oath of chastity, he could think of several more reasons why he should not have been cruel to her.
That child went through far too much today.
He remembered her innocent eyes that had seemed to have no tolerance for verbal abuse. Her small, round face and those black eyes kept hovering in his mind. The more he thought about it, the more his chest ached with guilt.
After agonizing for a long time, he finally pulled his steel helm over hair that was still only half dry.
Tichite’s range of movement was exactly as self-mocking as she had described. No matter how far she fled or how well she hid, she could not escape the palm of the Iron Horse.
With nothing to her name—no possessions, no food, no friends—she had returned once more to her cramped little nest. The space between the iron pot, the wooden crate, the portable wardrobe, and the pile of spices was the only sanctuary permitted to her.
The Duke was tall enough to touch the carriage roof if he stretched out his arm. So the man braced himself against it and peered into the luggage compartment like a beast hanging from its cage.
When the enormous stranger suddenly appeared and shook the carriage, Tichite’s heart shrank to the size of a bean. She nearly screamed, but the moment she recognized the familiar shape of the helm she swallowed the cry.
“…Your Grace?”
The blazing campfire cast red light behind the man’s back. A shadow he created fell across Tichite’s face.
By now Nyx could have stopped being angry. Until a moment ago he had intended to do exactly that. He had even prepared a few words with which to apologize without stammering.
But the instant he saw Tichite crumpled inside the carriage like a book forcibly shoved onto an overstuffed shelf, every prepared phrase evaporated.
“Go and bring Louis.”
The Duke gave the order to a passing soldier. Unwilling to raise his voice any further in the moonlight, speaking quietly to summon the man was the greatest consideration and sincerity Nyx could manage.
Yet once summoned, there was no mercy in his vicious rebuke. His tone remained gentle while the content was merciless—bordering on personal attack.
“Louis.”
“Yes, Commander.”
“With those tiny knothole eyes of yours, does this look like a space a person could live in?”
“It does seem a little cramped, but…”
“A little? You call this just a little cramped?”
The Duke pressed down on the top of Louis’s head with a huge palm. As if to say take a better look, he shoved the older knight’s head into the carriage. Cold sweat began streaming down the graying nape of Louis’s neck. Whether the other man was older or younger made no difference to Nyx when he was dressing someone down.