Winter Bud - Chapter 90
Nanna took a deep breath and rolled her eyes. It was a dawn before daybreak. Blue dawn light shimmered through the emperor’s bedroom. After Nanna lost consciousness, the emperor moved her into his bedroom.
Nanna wanted to escape this room even if she had to crawl. She fumbled for the edge of the blanket that held the man’s scent. She didn’t want to cover herself with it. Because being surrounded by his scent made it feel like she was being held in his arms.
Cold sweat streamed down as she swallowed dryly. A sob surged up, but she didn’t want to let it out. Suddenly, a large hand came toward Nanna. Holding her breath, she felt the hand trace her damp forehead.
“You had a nightmare.”
A low, subdued voice rang in her ear. Nanna stiffened and turned her head. Since when was it? The emperor was staring at her. Nanna blankly looked at him.
“Nanna.”
He called her name, then gently lifted her limp body upright. Nanna trembled softly as she was held in his rock-like embrace. Orestes brushed her wet hair back with his large hand and tucked it behind her ear.
“There’s somewhere to go,” he whispered quietly.
Nanna, who was half out of her mind and reaching through empty air, looked up at him. Orestes, draped in dawn light, was somehow unlike himself. So Nanna thought this too might be a dream. Because his languid, somehow decadent look wasn’t like his usual self.
As she hesitated to answer, he scooped Nanna up in one motion. Without being able to resist even once, Nanna tightly grabbed his chest. Without saying where they were going, he left the bedroom and walked slowly down the corridor. Nanna fumbled at her lips, frozen stiff with an anxiety she couldn’t understand. Where are you going? She wanted to tell him to put her down, but her lips wouldn’t part.
The place the emperor finally arrived at was a room with the door half open. Nanna, who had been blankly looking up at the man’s jaw, slowly turned her gaze and stared at the doorway where loud moans were spilling out. This lewd sound that rang messily in her ears was the cries of a man and a woman. Flustered, Nanna looked at the man.
Why did we come here? Who is in this room? Before she could even ask, the emperor set her down on the floor. Nanna staggered, feeling her feet touch the ground.
“Your Majesty.”
“…There’s something I want to show you.”
He whispered softly. That voice was so ominous that a desire to run away surged up in Nanna at once. But before she could even turn, a long, thick arm wrapped around her.
“Do you trust Jerix Rotusi?”
The man who silently pushed the door open asked quietly. Nanna was led into the room by him, slowly, as if being sucked into a dark cave crawling with monsters. In the small bedroom now filled with dawn light, a naked man and woman were tangled together like beasts.
Not even realizing that Nanna and Orestes had entered the bedroom, the man was flushed red as he held the naked woman. Because it was the first time Nanna had seen Jerix with a face like that, she didn’t recognize him easily. He was completely ruined. So obsessed with burrowing between the woman’s thick thighs that his short hair was drenched in sweat….
The backs of the hands gripping her breasts had veins bulging, and his lips, spilling ragged breaths, were dyed red as they mercilessly stole at her nape.
“Ah, hng, aaah! Ngh, hng! It’s good. It’s good! Jerix!”
The woman, her eyes rolled back from the rough thrusting, screamed frantically. Then those brown eyes that had lost reason landed on Nanna, who was staring blankly. Only then did she realize. She doubted it, thinking it couldn’t be true. She thought she didn’t know why Orestes was showing her this scene. She thought that….
“…Jerix.”
Nanna called him. He still didn’t seem to notice her. It felt like her vision was turning white. Her sight was shaking. When was the last time she experienced that? Nanna slowly examined the man’s naked body. It felt like sharp shards of glass were mercilessly digging into the wrist where her artery lay.
Nanna felt like she wanted to die. Like she truly wanted to die…. That feeling was always a vague imagining. She didn’t actually have the will to die. It was just that living like that was so hard. Maybe it was nothing more than complaining. But now….
“Stop, stop….”
Her lips moved faintly. Then beautiful lips pressed against her ear.
“How is it? Nanna.”
“Hk….”
“Do you still want to stay by Jerix’s side?”
The crude whisper carried a bitter edge. Nanna looked up at him with empty eyes. Orestes, with an extremely satisfied face, pressed his lips to the corner of her eye. Her knees gave out.
***
It rained. Thea looked down at the woman lying with her head on her husband’s pillow. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing was so low and quiet that she looked as if she were dead. It felt like she was facing a dead woman, like a princess inside a glass case.
Orestes said he couldn’t give this woman up. Thea wasn’t surprised. Maybe because there was nothing left to surprise her. Maybe it was better than speaking in circles. She tilted her head and stared at the pale face of the woman who was once her maid.
She often told Orestes that Nanna liked him. Even though she knew he didn’t like her bringing those words up, she put them in her mouth like a habit because she wanted him to constantly deny Nanna with his own lips.
That it was unpleasant. That it was ridiculous for a mere maid to admire her mistress’s man. She felt like only by hearing that could she put an end to the anxiety inside her heart. Because Orestes was kind, and he respected what she said.
Unlike other noble men, he didn’t dislike that Thea wore pants and rode a horse, or that she took part in hunts with men. He wasn’t often physically affectionate, but whenever he lifted her waist and spun her around, that smile spreading warmly across his face made her think that it was still love.
She didn’t know. No. The truth was, she knew. Orestes was kind to her, but he didn’t desire her. So at least, he didn’t cherish her as a woman. There were many moments when she felt that. So maybe that was why it wasn’t this miserable.
“Wouldn’t it have been better if you just let me die?”
She opened her lips toward the man who returned to his bedroom without a sound and looked at her. He said he loved her even though he didn’t. Thea was once so fervent toward him that she wanted to fall for that deceit.
“It feels like even my death was deceived.”
She turned her gaze away and recited each word in a voice like a blade. Orestes only stared at her silently. His eyelids twitched. Strangely, heat pushed up to her eyes as if she might cry, but no moisture gathered.
Now, more than the woman sleeping like she was dead, she wanted to kill him. Murder him, butcher him…. The horrific surge of feelings made her weary and muddled. She clenched her fists with her lips pressed tight, and Orestes closed the distance.
“…I need you.”
“You need me?”
“We fit pretty well, don’t we?”
“You….”
Thea twisted her face. Her finely trembling hand slapped his cheek with a sharp smack. Shallow breaths scattered past her lips. In the middle of her pulse pounding wildly, dizziness rose.
“What do you want to hear?”
Orestes, straightening his head, looked down at Thea. The shameless face was as beautifully carved as a sculpture. Thea trembled and thought about what was ruined.
Orestes ruined her, and he ruined their memories and loyalty. Even if there wasn’t at least a fierce, passionate love between them. Even if Orestes’s feelings toward her weren’t love. Between them, there was a history and arduous affection that was never lighter than love, scattered all around.
At the very least, she felt that the relationship between the two of them, bound like that, was never far apart. But….
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msprism
I feel so bad for Nanna. She was so excited about finally having a peaceful life without powerful men forcing themselves on her and found a man who respects and cares for her only for him to be essentially cursed to forget about her and be reduced to “that”.