As soon as they dismissed the attendants and left the corridor behind under his guidance, a garden thick with marigolds, daisies, and rosemary came into view.

The rain-soaked plants filled the air with the dense scent of wet grass and herbs. Breathing in that sharp fragrance, Aila turned her head and looked up at Varkas.

“What happened last night?”

At the hesitant question, the man who had been walking silently turned his gaze toward her.

Aila stared directly into his eyes. Nothing was reflected within those pale blue irises. Looking into those colorless eyes that seemed only to mirror everything exactly as it was made her chest tighten anew.

Will there ever come a day when I exist inside them?

As she drifted into that thought, Varkas’s tightly shut lips finally parted.

“There was nothing Your Highness needs concern yourself with.”

“......So something did happen.”

Varkas offered no reply. Instead, he strode out into the rain-soaked garden.

Heavy raindrops rapidly whitened his broad shoulders and back. Aila watched that cold, unfeeling figure ahead of her with dissatisfied eyes when Varkas suddenly extended one hand toward her.

“The puddles are deep.”

The meaning behind those words dawned on her immediately, and Aila shot him a sidelong glare with reddened cheeks.

She did not want to throw herself into the arms of a man who had behaved so cruelly. Yet neither could she simply leave her fiancé standing in the rain waiting for her. After pretending indifference for a moment, Aila finally approached him as if reluctantly giving in.

Varkas bent slightly and slid one arm beneath her knees before lifting her effortlessly into his arms.

Just as she had done since she was a little girl of five, Aila rested her head against his shoulder.

“Do you know you can be rather unfair?”

His brows lifted faintly at the abrupt accusation. Instead of painstakingly explaining the tangled emotions inside her, Aila merely wrapped her arms around him more tightly.

Varkas enveloped her completely within his cloak and crossed the wide rear garden. Aila buried one cheek against the collar of his clothes.

He smelled of sharp herbs, faint metal soaked into armor, and something dry and melancholic that reminded her of fallen leaves or hay. While she lost herself in that cool scent, the unpleasant emotions inside her faded away as though they had never existed. Aila let out a self-mocking laugh.

It was ridiculous, becoming excited like an inexperienced young girl over something that, to him, was nothing more than an old habit.

This man treated her kindly only because he was honoring a promise made to her mother. Kindness born of duty. Nothing more, nothing less. Even though she knew that perfectly well, she could not stop the ache spreading through her heart.

Cruel man. You might as well not be kind at all. Then I could have been satisfied with nothing more than a political relationship.......

She lowered her eyes sadly.

“I will have bathwater prepared in your room. Warm yourself afterward and get some rest.”

Having crossed the garden in mere moments, Varkas stopped at the entrance to the residence as he spoke. Aila nodded.

He climbed the stone stairs lightly and bent slightly as if to set her down.

At that moment, the sky flashed brilliantly, followed by a deafening crash of thunder.

Aila reflexively wrapped her arms around his neck.

The heavens seemed to shake beneath the continuous roar. Golden lightning tore through the black clouds. As she blankly stared at the apocalyptic sight over his shoulder, her eyes suddenly caught a pale figure seated by a second-floor window.

For a moment, she wondered if she was witnessing some horrifying illusion. Aila parted her lips soundlessly.

The flashing light illuminated a face so beautiful it bordered on grotesque. The pale face perched atop that fragile neck looked as though it were blazing with terrifying hatred.

It was not as though she had been unaware of her half-sister’s extraordinary beauty, so why had the sight shocked her so deeply now?

With her vicious eyes gleaming beneath the storm, Talia resembled an angel of death. The ominousness of her appearance stole Aila’s breath away. Then Talia, who had remained motionless as a statue, suddenly seized the flower vase beside the window. A moment later, the ceramic object came hurtling toward a pillar near where they stood.

Aila screamed.

Thanks to Varkas shielding her, she avoided being showered in shards of glass, but a small cut opened across Varkas’s face. Aila hurriedly pulled out a handkerchief and pressed it to his cheek.

Maintaining his usual indifferent expression, Varkas accepted it and held it against his face before glancing upward.

Following his gaze, Aila saw Talia still glaring at them, and her expression hardened.

As though she felt not even the slightest guilt over her actions, Talia stared down at them with burning eyes before twisting her lips into a distorted smile. Her blood-red lips looked like a rose crushed beneath a boot. 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

Something worse than anger writhed inside Aila’s chest.

The half-sister she had always regarded as insignificant suddenly felt, in that moment, like the most ominous and dangerous existence in the world. It felt as though the evil spirit that had condemned her mother to a life of misery was now trying to drag # Nоvеlight # her as well into a pit of grief.

Aila shuddered at the horrifying premonition.

* * *

The rain that had fallen throughout the night finally weakened at dawn.

Having spent the entire night nearly sleepless, Talia stared vacantly out at the garden illuminated by the pale morning light.

The once-vibrant blades of grass lay half-submerged in muddy water, reeking of heavy wet greenery, while the flowers that had decorated the flowerbeds in brilliant colors sprawled across the ground like corpses with their necks snapped.

Watching the scene with darkened eyes, Talia climbed down from the bed and approached the small table before the fireplace.

The untouched food atop the silver plate had hardened cold. Her indifferent gaze swept over it before she picked up the small knife resting beside the tray.

Though it had been made for cutting food, it looked perfectly capable of slicing through human flesh as well.

Talia ran her fingertips along the sharp edge before slipping it into the pocket of her robe and leaving the room.

Damp moisture clung heavily throughout the corridor. She walked through the thick, sticky air as though swimming through it, gripping the ice-cold knife tightly.

Her palm became soaked with cold sweat. Whether from tension or excitement, she could not tell.

Perhaps it was both.

Moistening her dry lips, she crept up the stairs like a stray cat.

Aila occupied a room on the highest floor. Reaching the top of the staircase, Talia pressed herself against the wall and examined the dark corridor carefully.

Fortunately, no one appeared to be guarding the door.

Letting out a small sigh of relief, Talia cautiously stepped toward the door at the end of the hall.

As she approached the wooden door reinforced with iron bands, a faint medicinal scent pricked her nose. It was the smell of incense burned to calm the nerves.

Talia twisted her lips.

So last night had not been entirely comfortable for Aila either.

Recalling the sight of Aila turning deathly pale at the sight of her, Talia let out a quiet giggle. But the scene that surfaced immediately afterward dragged her mood straight back into the abyss.

Her face twisted savagely as she shoved a hand into her pocket and gripped the knife handle.

Her entire body trembled violently.

The moment she saw Varkas carrying Aila through the pouring rain in his arms, she had felt something she had barely managed to hold together collapse completely inside her.

Talia roughly scrubbed at her blurring eyes with the sleeve of her robe.

It had been her one and only memory.

A memory she had buried deep within her heart for years, secretly taking it out to revisit over and over again.

Did they really have to turn even that memory into nothing?

Couldn’t they have left at least one thing behind as something special that belonged only to us?

Her mind boiled with rage. She knew the emotion was irrational.

Even so, she could not forgive them.

She wanted to punish Aila for stealing even the last sanctuary she possessed. She wanted to return to that man the same pain she herself had suffered.

Talia tightened her burning eyes and stared at the firmly shut door.

Once she crossed this threshold, there would be no turning back.

Perhaps history would remember her as a wicked witch who murdered an innocent imperial princess. She did not care. She was already regarded as the vilest of villainesses. If she fell even lower than this, what was there left for her to lose?

Her trembling hand slowly closed around the doorknob.