“Mmh.”
Luan groaned low. The throbbing grew sharper as time passed. The inside of his mouth had split, so the faintly metallic taste of blood kept lingering, and his left cheek had swollen up pitifully.
That hand of his is as fierce as ever.
Maybe because the memory of being struck while growing up was carved into his body, the unpleasantness hit harder than the pain. No wonder Luanisiel went on strike from salvation and everything else.
“…Hold still. It may be cold.”
Kirian held out his hand carefully. In it was an ice pack wrapped in a white towel. The hesitant hand touched the cheek ever so carefully. Anyone watching would think the cheek might shatter the instant it was touched.
Tap. The cold chill met the burning cheek.
“Ah.”
“Sorry. Did it hurt?”
“No. It’s just cold.”
It was a flat reply, but Kirian fretted even over that short reaction. Is it really so distressing that his person was hurt within his own palace? It struck him anew that, at some point, he too had come to fall within Luan’s guard.
Kirian lifted the ice pack away slightly, then carefully pressed it back.
“Bear with it a little. I won’t press hard. I just need to bring the swelling down.”
Kirian’s red eyes wavered right before him. They were full of deep guilt and sorrow. It was an expression as if he were the one who’d been struck.
Luan didn’t avoid the gaze and simply looked back. This emperor’s more sensitive than I’d have thought. And the soft-touch streak is enormous, too.
Anyway, break time’s still work time… does this count as a workplace injury? Either way, it happened inside the palace, which is the emperor’s jurisdiction, and the duke went on a rampage because the stack’s been building up while I handle the emperor’s affairs, hasn’t it.
Should I get this sorted out?
This sort of thing had to be nailed down clearly. Since I got hurt anyway, I’d better claim what’s mine so I feel less cheated.
“Your Majesty.”
“What is it? Should I call the physician again if it hurts a lot?”
“No. Not that. Let’s talk about compensation.”
At Luan’s dry voice, Kirian faltered. Compensation? Now, in this situation?
“This situation is a case of me being assaulted in a public place while carrying out my duties as empress, is it not?”
“…What are you trying to say?”
“The face is the empress’s asset and a means of maintaining dignity. It’s been damaged, so the loss is severe.”
Luan pointed at his swollen cheek with a finger.
“If it scars, my value on the remarriage market drops.”
“…What?”
Kirian’s brow twitched. Remarriage?
Of course, Luan hadn’t given remarriage a single thought. He’d merely come up with a reason for how to squeeze out more compensation.
“So please budget separately for treatment costs, compensation for psychological damage, and hazard pay.”
Luan was serious. No matter that the god had guaranteed it, if that god was the very pinnacle of sloppiness, that was another matter. He was starting to worry about the get-rich-quick life of I’ll make sure your money never runs dry after the divorce. Better to secure as much capital as he could. Even if Kirian condemned him as undignified, it couldn’t be helped. Retirement planning is everyone’s task.
“…”
But Kirian’s reaction was different from what Luan expected. He didn’t condemn Luan or get angry. He just… wore a strangely sad expression.
“Do you need money?”
Kirian asked low.
“Obviously. Money goes out just from breathing.”
“I’ll give you all of it, however much you want.”
His answer came without hesitation.
“Name whatever you need. I’ll open the entire treasury if I have to.”
Oh, so this is the tycoon… no, the emperor class. Just as Luan was about to cheer inwardly—
“In exchange.”
Kirian set down the ice pack and gently cupped Luan’s uninjured cheek. His thumb grazed Luan’s lips.
“There’ll be no remarriage.”
“…What?”
“Don’t even think about going to another man.”
Luan nodded reflexively. Well, it’s not like I actually intend to remarry—I only brought it up to get compensation. But he failed to notice the tenacious glint in Kirian’s eyes.
“I’ll think about it once the money’s deposited.”
But recklessly changing the terms was a disadvantage in negotiation. He deflected casually. Kirian bit his lip as if displeased, but didn’t press further and pressed the ice pack back to Luan’s cheek.
The night deepened. It was a night when the full moon shone especially bright.
The physician had come and gone, the medicine had been applied, and Luan—who had once again eaten his dinner well, just as Kirian fed it to him—was now ready for bed.
“Well then, sleep well, Your Majesty.”
Luan pulled the blanket up to his chin and gave his farewell. It was effectively an order to leave. I wish he’d just go now. He’s been a burden all day, I could die.
But Kirian wouldn’t budge. He sat in the chair beside the bed, arms folded, looking down at Luan. Luan blinked.
“You’re not leaving?”
“I’m not leaving.”
“…Why not?”
“I’ll sleep here tonight.”
Luan’s eyes went round.
“There’s only one bed here, though?”
“I know. It’s not cramped.”
“No, it’s not a matter of cramped or roomy… since when did we sleep together, all of a sudden? No—more to the point, we’re in the middle of the divorce cooling-off period.”
Normally they should be living apart, but the present arrangement was all thanks to the early, suspicion-filled Kirian insisting on keeping Luan close. But this time, too, Kirian spoke as he pleased, rules be damned.
“There’s an exception clause.”
“What?”
“Should the empress be injured, the emperor is obligated to nurse him at his side for twenty-four hours.”
“…This is the first I’m hearing of such a law.”
“Because I made it just now.”
“…?”
“I make the laws.”
It was shameless beyond belief. Luan let out a hollow laugh, dumbfounded. But seeing the serious look in his eyes, he didn’t know what to say.
“Don’t worry. I won’t lay a finger on you.”
That’s not what I’m worried about. There was no reason for Kirian to lay a hand on him in the first place. He had Aiden. As Luan sat there just blinking, Kirian rose from his seat and headed for the long sofa.
“I’ll sleep here.”
“Won’t that be uncomfortable?”
“It’s more uncomfortable if something happens to you.”
What could possibly happen to me while sleeping? But he couldn’t scold the man as he draped his outer coat over the sofa and lay down awkwardly in just his shirt. His legs were so long his feet poked out past the edge of the sofa. It was an absurdly shabby bed for an emperor to lie in.
Luan gazed at the sight steadily. Why go this far? Is it really something to feel this much guilt over—just because I got a little dizzy and took a slap to the cheek?
Ugh, what a soft-touch fool.
Can’t tell if he’s a good guy or just dense. Luan clicked his tongue inwardly. But there was no way to drive him out either. Force didn’t work, power didn’t work, and the man was the sort who’d even make up laws as he pleased. Luan pulled the blanket toward himself.
“Suit yourself. But if you snore, I’ll throw you out.”
“I don’t snore.”
“We’ll see.”
Luan turned his back abruptly and lay down. The lights in the room went out. In the darkness, only the breathing of the two could be heard.
How much time had passed? In the bedchamber settled into darkness, only the moonlight seeping through the gap in the window lit the room.
Crammed onto the sofa, Kirian had his eyes closed but couldn’t fall asleep. Because at some point his every nerve had stood on end at the faint, now-regular breathing coming from the bed.
…Is he asleep?
Luan’s breathing was steady. He might well have tossed and turned with the cheek aching, but whether from the medicine or that peculiar indifference of his, he seemed to have fallen into a deep sleep.
Kirian opened the eyes he’d shut. The ornate ceiling showed faintly in the dark. There was no way sleep would come. He’d lost count of how many times his heart had lurched over the course of this single day. He quietly rose from the sofa and approached the bedside without a sound.
Standing beside the bed, Kirian looked down at the sleeping Luan. Faint moonlight scattered down over the platinum-blond hair. Skin white to the point of pallor. Long, drooping lashes. And… the darkly swollen left cheek.
Kirian’s brow furrowed. He wanted to reach out and touch that cheek, but couldn’t quite make contact, afraid Luan might wake. He carefully brought his forefinger beneath Luan’s nose.
He’s alive. He’s breathing. Only then did the heavy thing pressing on his chest seem to lighten a little.
“…Hah.”
Kirian sat in the chair beside the bed and bent forward.
Everywhere, I was a ghost.
That dry voice he’d heard in the daytime echoed in his ears like ringing.
A presence that might as well not exist. A defective product who had to live holding his breath.
Those words had cut deeper than any blade through Kirian’s chest. Regret surged in.
The past five years. The time he’d neglected and turned away from. To Luan, it had been hell itself. From the hell of the ducal estate to the prison of the imperial palace. And the one who had turned him into an invisible man was Kirian himself.
I… thought I was the victim.
After the late emperor’s suspicious death, he’d had to make himself a scarecrow just to save his own skin. To the Duke of Requies, to the nobles. The tragic husband forced to take the son of his enemy’s house as empress. And so he’d believed he had the right to hate Luan.
But it wasn’t so. The true victim was this man—caught between their struggles for power, thoroughly isolated and erased.
Why didn’t I look in on him, even once?
Kirian carefully laid his own hand over the back of Luan’s. The warmth touched him. It was cool. He felt a pang of anxiety. The dark-red blood pouring out. The tottering body. The man who seemed as though he might leave at any moment.
The one who had made him this way was Kirian himself.
And then another regret raised its head.
The divorce agreement.
He bitterly regretted having accepted that document with a let’s see how this plays out. Cooling-off period? Six months? None of it mattered. He should have torn the document up right then and there.
No—he should have made it so Luan never brought up wanting a divorce in the first place.
But… why?
Kirian asked himself. Was it guilt? A sense of responsibility for failing to protect him? Or remorse for letting him be struck?
Of course, those feelings were there too. But that alone didn’t explain it. The feeling now was too hot and too clinging to be explained away as simple sympathy or pity.
The urge to pull Luan into his arms this very instant and beg him not to go. The possessiveness that wanted to lock him away somewhere only Kirian could see, unwilling to show him to anyone else. The way the world felt worth offering up when Luan smiled at him, and the way his heart dropped when Luan wore a cold expression.
He was confused. What on earth was the true nature of this feeling?
It’s only been a month.
Kirian smiled self-mockingly. For five years they’d been a pair who didn’t even call each other by name, who rarely even saw each other’s faces.
And yet, a mere month. Could a person’s heart truly be turned this upside down in so short a span?
Hatred into interest. Indifference into obsession. Was such a change even possible?
Have I gone mad?
Or had the wall of indifference he’d spent five years building actually been thinner than a single sheet of paper? Had he been waiting, for five whole years, for this man to reach out a hand?
The answer was unknowable.
It was still too early to fasten the name love onto this feeling. Too tender to define as mere possessiveness.
But one thing. Even amid the confusion, one fact was clear.
Strength entered Kirian’s hand. He gripped the sleeping Luan’s hand just a little tighter.
I don’t want to let this man go.
That much was certain. It didn’t matter whether the divorce cooling-off period ended, whatever prescription the temple handed down, whatever scheme the duke cooked up. A future where Luan vanished from his side was now beyond his power even to imagine.
“…I won’t let you go.”
Kirian whispered softly into the darkness. It was a vow with no one to hear it, sworn to himself.
“Even if you say you hate me, even if you try to run. I’ll never, ever let you go.”
If it meant making up for five years of regret, he was willing to spend the rest of his life. If what Luan wanted was money, he’d ransack the empire’s treasury for him. If what he wanted was freedom…
No, that he couldn’t give. The freedom to stay at his side, perhaps—but the freedom to leave him, he could not give.
“So… stay there. Not as a ghost, but as my empress.”
Kirian pressed his forehead to the back of Luan’s hand. The pulse transmitted through his fingertips seemed to overlap with the beating of his own heart.
