27.
His eyes, glistening with anticipation, clung stickily to her chest before slowly trailing downward. After tracing the contours revealed beneath her thin garments for a long moment, his gaze crawled back up to lock point-blank with hers.
Talia felt her muscles turn to stone. She knew she had to run, but her legs wouldn’t budge.
The man licked his lower lip, drawing closer with a slithering gait.
“If Your Highness would only permit me, I could…”
A rough hand, calloused and crude, brushed against the hair draped over her shoulder. She watched with terror-stricken eyes as her hair became entangled in his wooden, clumsy fingers.
She couldn’t breathe. She should have roared at him to dare not lay a hand on her, but no sound escaped her parted lips.
Assuming her stillness was consent, the man, who had been caressingly stroking her golden locks one by one, reached a hand toward her face.
His palm, coarse as sandpaper, stung her delicate skin. As she recoiled in fear, a large, gauntleted hand suddenly lunged from the shadows and seized the man’s wrist.
Talia flinched, stumbling back as if waking from a trance. When she looked up, she saw a pair of piercing, silver-blue eyes.
In an instant, her heart plummeted.
She instinctively pressed her back against the wall. Varkas, who had been looking down at her with an expressionless face, turned his gaze slowly toward the monk.
Whatever he saw in those eyes, the monk—previously frozen solid—began to tremble violently, as if he had encountered a ghost.
“I, I was only… Y, Your Highness…”
“Quiet.”
The heavy, low voice cut off the man’s excuses. The monk’s bloodless face twisted in harrowing agony. It might have looked like a light grip at a glance, but in reality, it seemed as if he were exerting enough pressure to shatter bone.
Varkas uttered slowly into the face of the man who was dripping with cold sweat.
“You wouldn’t want to make a scene, would you? Return to your place quietly.”
The monk, groaning in pain, nodded frantically.
Varkas released his arm and added, “It would be best if you don’t cross my path again until we leave this place.”
“I, I will bear it in mind.”
The man clutched his bruised, swollen wrist and whimpered.
Varkas gestured for him to get lost. The man did not hesitate, scurrying away in a panic. Varkas stared at his unsightly retreating figure for a moment before turning his head back toward her.
Talia lowered her gaze involuntarily. Even though she had done nothing wrong, her mouth went dry and her neck felt hot. As she fidgeted, nervously watching him, a chillingly calm voice resonated through the air.
“Follow me. I will escort you to your quarters.”
Talia, who had been holding her body rigid with tension, let her arms hang limp with a strange sense of exhaustion. A complex mixture of resentment and sorrow surged within her.
*I almost had something terrible happen to me. I was scared to death. Yet why are you so detached?*
Biting her lip in frustration, Talia hurried past him. Even if it killed her, she didn’t want to show him any sign of weakness.
After marching across the garden with her head held high in defiance, the dormitory for female believers came into view past a long colonnade.
Keeping her eyes fixed straight ahead, she barked bluntly, “I’m here now, so stop following me!”
Knights were standing guard around the building. She wouldn’t fall victim to a mishap like the one before.
She quickened her pace, but she couldn’t make it more than a few steps before she found herself trapped between him and the outer wall of the building.
Talia looked up at him with wide, startled eyes.
“W, what… suddenly…”
“If only you’d been burned once while playing with fire…”
His voice sounded as if it were scraping the back of his throat. He seemed to realize it himself, as he paused for a moment. Soon after, a more composed tone followed.
“Isn’t it about time you started being careful?”
She felt the color drain from her face. Varkas, who had been scrutinizing her with eyes as sharp as if he were dissecting her, twisted his lips.
“Or do you truly wish to throw yourself around so recklessly?”
Talia lashed out before she could even think. But once again, her wrist was caught before her hand could touch his face. Varkas added slowly.
“If that is the case, please restrain yourself for the time being. Until this journey ends, I have no desire to deal with any troublesome issues.”
She clamped her trembling lips shut. He released her arm and slowly turned away.
“I trust you understand.”
In that instant, if she had held a knife, she would have plunged it into his back without hesitation.
Like a fish swimming through deep water, Talia glared murderously at his retreating back. Then, feeling her vision blur, she quickly turned her head.
Even though she knew there was no way he would look back, she was terrified he might catch her crying. Scrubbing her eyelids roughly with her sleeve, Talia ran into the dormitory as if escaping.
* * *
The next morning, the ceremony proceeded as if nothing had happened.
Talia sat on the windowsill of her assigned bedroom, looking down at the twin siblings heading toward the altar and Varkas, who followed behind them like a guard.
By rights, she should have been among them. But she had made an excuse that she was feeling unwell and skipped it. She had rejected a ritual that an imperial family member was obligated to perform with a ridiculous excuse.
Under normal circumstances, the ceremony should have been postponed, but the event proceeded as scheduled in accordance with the Crown Prince’s firm insistence. Perhaps the monastery was happy with the situation. They wouldn’t have been keen on bestowing the blessings of the gods upon an illegitimate child anyway.
‘…Should I have just gone?’
Talia, who had been snickering, wiped the smile from her face as she watched Aila and Varkas standing side by side before the altar.
If she had joined them, there was no telling what she might have done. She might have even lunged at them, determined to kill one of the two.
‘Which of them I hate more… I don’t even know anymore.’
Talia, who had habitually brought her finger to her lips, lowered her arm again, not wanting to ruin the nails she had barely managed to grow out.
She couldn’t bear to watch any longer. She pulled the curtains shut and threw herself onto the bed.
As she curled up in the dim darkness, memories of last night swirled in her mind. The look of lust in his eyes, the hands reaching toward her, and Varkas’s icy gaze…
“If only you’d been burned once while playing with fire… isn’t it about time you started being careful?”
Talia pulled the quilt up and covered herself to the very top of her head.
Varkas believed she had seduced that man. Perhaps he wasn’t wrong. She had always driven herself into a corner with foolish actions… And it was his role to save her from those crises.
He had finally managed to escape that tiresome duty, only for a similar incident to occur again, so it was natural that he would be fed up. He must be truly sick of her by now.
She buried her face in her pillow and let out a dry, wheezing laugh.
She recalled the moment he had walked out of her life. Perhaps it was because something similar had happened just yesterday.
Staring blankly at the beams of light filtering through the curtains, Talia slowly closed her eyes. The buried memories unfolded in her mind, scattered and incoherent.