29.
Talia, who had been fidgeting awkwardly, spoke in a raspy voice.
“If… if you cut even a single strand of my hair, I won’t let you get away with it.”
He didn’t reply. However, his movements seemed to grow a little more cautious. Talia swallowed a dry gulp at the touch that felt almost as if he were caressing her hair.
Between the open edges of his shirt, his thick Adam’s apple and collarbones, which stood out as elegantly as a bird’s wing bones, were visible. She could vividly feel his supple yet powerful forearms twitching with every movement, and she was hyper-aware of his long legs, encased in wool trousers, positioned right beside her thighs.
Talia lowered her head to hide her flushed face.
“Ar—are you almost done?”
Could it really take this long just to untangle hair caught in a button? Or was she so nervous that she was perceiving this moment as unnaturally drawn out? Sweat began to bead on her palms.
She rubbed her hands against the pile of clothes on the floor. Then, seeing the flush creeping up to the inside of her wrists, she was startled.
Surely her entire body wasn’t red, was it? If it was, how unsightly she must look! She raised her voice, sounding irritated.
“That’s enough, just cut it off!”
Varkas, who had been lingering for quite a while—unusually for a man who was always sharp and swift—lowered one hand to his waist.
Seeing him pull out a dagger, she stiffened. He reached his arm behind her back again. Talia unconsciously grabbed onto the hem of his clothes.
“D-don’t cut too much, though, my hair…”
Before she could finish, there was a faint *snip*, and the slight pressure on her scalp vanished. Fearing he might have chopped off a chunk of her hair, Talia turned around in a panic.
Fortunately, there was no hair to be seen. Instead, a glistening gold button lay lonely on the floor.
She picked it up and examined it closely. The emblem of the Roem Knights was engraved on the well-crafted button.
She turned her head back to look up at him. Varkas was already standing, sheathing his dagger at his waist.
“How much longer do you intend to sit there?”
Varkas said in a blunt tone as he straightened his ruffled attire.
Talia got up, feeling awkward and inexplicably unsettled. She feigned a cough and held the button out toward him.
“Here, take this.”
“I have no need for it, so throw it away.”
Varkas said dismissively and glanced out the window. The red sunset was already painting the sky.
He turned his gaze back to survey the messy room and sighed as if exhausted.
“May I take my leave now?”
Talia nodded without a word. He gave a slight, light bow and left the room immediately.
Talia listened to his fading footsteps for a moment, then scurried to the bedside to retrieve her jewelry box. She placed his button in the very deepest corner of it.
That night, she couldn’t sleep due to a strange sense of excitement. Unidentifiable emotions made her chest ache. She chewed over his words, his actions, and the look in his eyes again and again.
Perhaps. No. That’s impossible. But perhaps.
Disorganized thoughts filled her head. It felt as though her brain might explode. Yet, somehow, she couldn’t help but smile. She tossed and turned all night, soaked in happiness.
However, it didn’t take long for her adolescent, nonsensical fantasies to shatter. A few days later, news of the engagement between Varkas and Aila reached her.
It was as if she had woken from a daydream. Worse than that—it felt as if she had been soaring to the clouds one moment, only to plummet to the ground the next.
She bolted out of the Annex Palace and headed straight for the training ground. Though he was scheduled to come find her at noon to fulfill his duties as an Imperial Guard, she could not wait until then.
Talia, having crossed half the Imperial Palace in one go, burst into the wide-open lot where the knights were training. She could feel the wary gazes cast by those who saw her, but she didn’t care in the slightest.
She scanned the area impatiently, looking for that ash blonde hair that shone with a pale light. Noticing that those filling the training ground were trainee candidates rather than regular knights, she turned around. If he wasn’t at the training ground, he was likely in his office.
She made her way toward the military office located right next to the training ground. As expected, Varkas was inside. However, he did not seem to be working.
As Talia pulled on the door handle, she heard a faint sob and froze. Through the gap in the door, she saw Varkas standing with his back to the window, and a woman buried in his chest, bursting into tears.
Frozen by a scene she had never imagined, she watched as the mystery woman lifted her head, looking up at him with desperate eyes.
“You don’t love her, do you?”
It was a voice so pitiful it made her stomach churn. The woman clung to him, begging.
“You’re only trying to marry her for political reasons, aren’t you? Please, tell me that’s the case.”
Suddenly, her throat tightened. The fact that a woman could beg him like that made her feel as if she had been struck on the head. She watched his face with a pounding heart. Finally, his firmly shut lips parted.
“I don’t see what meaning my answer could possibly have for you.”
It was a voice so dry it made her shudder.
Talia drew her shoulders in. Varkas, who had been staring down at the woman with a face as lifeless as a wax doll, tilted his head in confusion.
“Whether it is for political reasons or not, what would that change? I have promised to take the First Imperial Princess as my wife, and I intend to fulfill that promise.”
The woman’s slender back visibly stiffened. She was clearly feeling a pain as if her heart were being torn apart.
But the man did not stop there.
“I don’t know what you expected of me, but I made it clear from the beginning that I have no intention of responding to your feelings.”
The color drained from the woman’s neck. As if he didn’t even pity her, he added with a weary sigh, “I hope we can avoid such awkward encounters in the future. Now that the engagement is officially set, I would like to avoid unnecessary scandal.”
The woman stumbled back, then collapsed as if she had lost all strength. A flicker of annoyance crossed Varkas’s face.
A chill ran down her spine at that emotionless mask, devoid of even a shred of empathy. That expression, that look… everything was terrifyingly familiar.
Talia left the scene in a hurry.
Had she arrived just a little earlier, the one sitting on the floor sobbing would not have been that woman, but herself.
Just imagining that scene made her hair stand on end. If Varkas had directed that same look toward her, she would have died on the spot. Because of this, Talia became truly terrified of him. She was genuinely afraid of a man who could drive her to ruin with just a few words.
Naturally, her attitude toward Varkas became even more defensive than before.
He was closer to a natural predator than the object of her unrequited love. If she could not perfectly suppress these feelings, she would live the rest of her life in agonizing pain.