Dirty Heart - Chapter 43

“Young Duke, if you do it like this, the patient will end up catching a cold instead.”

The attending physician looked down at Courtney’s condition with an awkward expression.

“Is that so?”

Lionel asked innocently. The physician let out a sigh, quickly picked up the damp towel, and wrung out the water thoroughly.

“You need to wring out the towel properly. And you should only place it lightly on the forehead. Like this.”

As the physician demonstrated, Lionel watched with a serious expression.

“It seems we’ll have to change all of the patient’s clothes and bedding. If we leave it like this, she’ll catch a cold.”

“I’ll do it, so leave.”

“Please don’t. Call the attendants instead. The wound is still deep. There is a risk of bleeding again, so you must be extremely careful.”

In the end, at the physician’s earnest insistence, the nurses came in and helped change Courtney’s clothes. While the bed sheets were being replaced, the physician examined Courtney’s condition with a stethoscope.

“Fortunately, she appears to be entering a recovery phase. In a few more days, she should regain consciousness.”

“Really?”

At the assessment that she was recovering, Lionel’s face visibly brightened.

“I’ll return in twelve hours to examine her again. By the way, how are you feeling, Young Duke?”

“I’m fine.”

In truth, he didn’t look fine at all. The fatigue from the journey hadn’t properly subsided, and the blue veins beneath his pale skin stood out. The collarbones protruding past the thin shirt looked far more gaunt than before. Since he hadn’t been eating properly, it was obvious he was growing thinner in real time.

The physician checked Lionel’s heart condition and expressed concern several times, but Lionel didn’t listen at all.

“You must not skip meals under any circumstances.”

Leaving that reminder, the physician gathered his medical bag and was about to stand when Lionel spoke quietly.

“About that.”

“Yes, Young Duke.”

Lionel hesitated in a way that didn’t suit him. But only for a moment. With a resolute expression, he opened his mouth.

“If I don’t receive a heart transplant… how long can I live?”

The physician deliberately put on a serious expression. A strange silence settled between them.

“I’ll be honest. If, by any chance, you do not receive a heart transplant….”

Speaking in a low, subdued voice, the physician calmly told Lionel how much time he had left.

“Based on your birthday, at the most extreme, two days. At most, you will not last longer than a month.”

“That’s shorter than I expected.”

Even after hearing such a dreadful statement, Lionel showed no change in expression. It was as if he were hearing someone else’s fate, not his own.

Meanwhile, the physician understood why Lionel was asking this. At first, he had doubted it, but after seeing him stay by Courtney Balkan’s side every single day, he became certain.

“Forgive me, but your words sound like those of a man in love. Symptoms like this usually come from emotional causes.”

“In love? That’s ridiculous.”

Recalling the conversation he had once had with Lionel, the physician spoke carefully, “Young Duke. Before, I asked if there was a woman you held in your heart. Do you remember?”

Turning his gaze toward the woman lying as if dead asleep, the physician’s face soon twisted in discomfort.

“The woman you’ve come to hold in your heart… is it Courtney Balkan? Is that why you’re trying to give up the transplant surgery?”

Lionel remained silent until the end, but in truth, it was no different from a complete affirmation.

“Young Duke….”

Soon, a low groan slipped from the physician’s lips. To live, the other had to die, and to save the other, he himself had to die. What kind of fate was that?

“…It’s a terrible tragedy.”

There could hardly be a greater tragedy than this.

***

He couldn’t even tell how much time had passed. Alex sat for days on end with both hands bound against the cold stone wall.

It was a hopeless situation, but Alex looked back on the life he had lived with a relatively calm expression. It was something he had prepared himself for the moment he defied the Duke’s orders, so he could remain composed.

The first face that came to mind was that of his lord, Lionel, whom he had served all his life. His frail master, prickly and unbearably arrogant.

But he was also someone lonelier than anyone else, someone with deeper wounds than anyone else. After losing his mother, the boy who had turned his thorns toward the world, Alex had watched that pain up close every moment.

“Young Duke of Erhardt! It’s an honor to meet you. I’m Alex Lanchester, assigned to be your escort from today!”

“I’m a body that can’t even leave the bed anyway. I don’t need an escort, so get lost.”

“My duty is to protect you, Young Duke! Please command me in anything!”

“What an annoying brat.”

He first met Lionel when he was twelve. It was an age far too young to serve as someone’s escort, but the Duke had placed Alex by the Young Duke’s side, saying he needed a companion his own age.

At the time, Lionel couldn’t even receive formal education and handled everything within a single room. That sight looked as lonely as a bird trapped in a cage.

Even if Lionel had kept Courtney by his side to obtain her heart, Alex couldn’t bring himself to blindly criticize his lord, having witnessed the grueling path he had walked. He knew how desperate Lionel’s wish to become healthy was.

“Seems like she still hasn’t woken up.”

After thinking of Lionel, Courtney Balkan’s clear face naturally came to mind next.

He had asked Liam to inform him when she woke up, but no news had come so far.

“I hope Miss Courtney is safe.”

Alex gave a bitter smile. She was a woman who had stolen his heart as if it were some trick of fate, so thinking about her unfortunate future made his chest ache.

“That doesn’t mean I want the Young Duke to die.”

Even as he wished for Courtney to live, he also wished for Lionel to be safe. He even thought that if he could sacrifice himself for the two of them, that would be an honorable death.

Step, step.

At that moment, the sound of heavy footsteps approached. Alex lowered his head as if what was bound to come had finally come.

“Well then, shall we begin?”

The man holding various tools in his hands was a notorious torturer. It was said that the number of people who had died under his torture reached into the thousands. Smiling as if he were enjoying himself, the man stepped behind Alex, who was bound in chains.

“Don’t worry. There was an order from the Duke not to kill you.”

Swish.

Soon, merciless lashes followed. The sharp leather whip struck Alex’s back without restraint. His thin shirt and flesh tore apart, and bright red blood burst out like a fountain.

“Kh…!”

Alex clenched his teeth to keep from making a sound.

“You’re tougher than you look.”

The man clicked his tongue as he watched Alex not let out a single scream.

“Let’s see how long you can endure.”

The torturer tossed the whip aside and next picked up an iron nail the size of a thumb.

Licking his lips as he looked at Alex in pain, he pressed the nail to his finger. Then, with slow movements, he began to push the nail under the fingernail.

“Aaagh!”

The pain was on a completely different level from the whipping, and a scream of agony finally burst from Alex’s mouth. From his bloodshot eyes, even tears of blood finally streamed.

“That’s it! That’s the sound! Just hearing it gets me excited.”

Each time the nail dug under his fingernail, Alex’s whole body trembled like mad. He could have begged for his life, but he bit his lips hard, shackled by loyalty to his lord and guilt for failing to protect Courtney.

“Ugh, ah…!”

At last, when all five fingers had nails driven into them, Alex’s body went limp as if he had passed out.

“Passing out already won’t do. You need to wake up.”

The man giggled as if amused as he looked at Alex’s limp body.

“For the third tool, this one will do.”

Soon, he picked up an iron skewer and began heating it over the fire.