Contract Marriage Rewritten
Chapter 17
He had struck out with such force that the pen flew from his hand, sending ink splattering through the air. Naturally, Laniakea’s hands and dress were left in a complete mess.
“Ah…”
Staring at the ink stains marring the luxurious gown she rarely wore, Laniakea stood frozen for a moment, at a loss for what to do.
Hyperion seemed just as stunned.
Paying no heed to the pen rolling across the floor, he stared blankly at Laniakea before snapping back to his senses and hastily taking her hand.
“I am sorry. I…”
As he spoke, he caught hold of her stained hem, his hands hovering in frantic helplessness.
Had Lucy not entered with the tea at that exact moment, the two of them would have remained standing there indefinitely, paralyzed by bewilderment.
“Your Majesty!”
Lucy shoved the tea cart into the corner as if hurling it aside and charged toward Laniakea with the momentum of a stampeding herd of buffalo.
“Calm down, Lucy. I’m not hurt.”
“Yet, Your Majesty! Suffer this grievance not, we implore thee!”
It was commendable that she had been studying diligently, determined to be a proper maid now that her mistress was the Empress, but she seemed to have picked up a rather archaic book. How else could she have suddenly started spouting vocabulary from over a century ago?
Pulling out a handkerchief, Lucy dabbed at the stains on Laniakea’s hands, then turned her head to glare at Hyperion.
Seeing the unmistakable hostility in her eyes, Laniakea quickly tugged on Lucy’s sleeve.
“I told you, I’m fine.”
So please, hide that look in your eyes!
She worried Hyperion might take offense at such blatant animosity, but—
“They said you were of the Lupin tribe… Loyal indeed.”
Watching Lucy shield Laniakea, he wore an expression of subtle satisfaction.
That was as far as it went, however.
Wiping the smile from his face, Hyperion held out his hand toward Lucy, who was still dabbing at Laniakea’s skin. It was a silent order to hand over the handkerchief.
No matter how fiercely devoted Lucy was to Laniakea, she could not afford to act recklessly before the Emperor. Laniakea nudged Lucy’s side.
What are you doing? Give it to him, quickly!
With an air of reluctance, Lucy surrendered the handkerchief to Hyperion. Just as he smiled and reached out to wipe away the remaining ink on Laniakea—
“Your Majesty! Here you are! Everyone is waiting. Quickly, to the council chamber…”
Signo poked his head through the open doorway, his face brightening with relief the moment he spotted Hyperion.
Hyperion’s gaze instantly turned sharp as flint.
“Tsk.”
He clicked his tongue in brief, palpable regret. Sensing the frigid glare directed his way, Signo protested aggrievedly.
“Your Majesty ordered me to round them all up—no, to summon them immediately regarding the House of Lieben, so I was only following your command…”
Whining as though treated with utter injustice, Signo fell silent under Hyperion’s increasingly icy stare and quietly slunk back behind the door.
Even so, the urgency of the matter was clear; from behind the door came his voice, persistently pressing that there was still a mountain of schedules left to attend to.
Hearing this, Laniakea gazed quietly at Hyperion. As busy as she was, he was bound to be even busier.
Taking time out of his packed day just to bring the contract was surprising enough. He could not afford to waste any more time wiping away ink stains.
Lightly catching the handkerchief in his hand, Laniakea spoke.
“Please, go ahead. I’m not hurt, so you don’t need to worry about this.”
“Still…”
“If it concerns the House of Lieben, I think you should attend to it at once.”
The House of Lieben was the family of the former Empress. If the ministers had been summoned on that account, it had to be the most pressing matter among everything Hyperion was handling right now.
Looking at Laniakea as she urged him to leave, he bowed his head slightly.
“I truly apologize.”
“It really is fine. Lucy, could you help me?”
Signaling to Hyperion that there was no need to linger, Laniakea called for Lucy, and after a moment of hesitation, Hyperion finally turned and walked out.
That had happened two days ago.
Laniakea looked down at her hand. Though Lucy had scrubbed so vigorously that it felt as if her skin might peel off, the ink embedded beneath her nails had yet to fade completely.
Tracing the ink splatter on the contract from that day, Laniakea mused to herself.
‘I think I will be fine, but will His Majesty?’
Sharing a bed was something she had prepared herself for ever since the marriage was arranged. But was the same true for Hyperion?
‘They say men can share a bed with a partner even without any feelings.’
The endless whispers and gossip she had overheard at banquets flashed through her mind once more. Putting it all together, it seemed most people could manage it, but…
Laniakea’s gaze drifted to her still-stained fingernails.
Could he really do it when he hated the mere touch of her so much that he struck out in recoil?
Was it simply because it was late at night? Normally, she would have muttered to herself that it was better to stop overthinking and go to sleep, retreating straight beneath the covers.
Yet, for some reason, her thoughts about Hyperion kept branching endlessly into new ones.
‘He was remarkably generous about divorce, too.’
Perhaps that was because he already had an eye on the future.
Right now, an heir was urgently needed to suppress the former Empress’s faction while stabilizing and consolidating imperial authority.
Would that still be the case in the future, however?
Someday, he might fall in love with someone. When that day came, the current Empress would only be an obstacle. Perhaps that was why he had offered to grant a divorce whenever she wished.
‘What kind of person does His Majesty fancy, I wonder?’
Unlike the other princes, almost nothing was known about Hyperion.
With the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Princes, every trivial detail had been public knowledge—their favorite colors, their preferred dishes, even the precise size they liked their steak cut into.
Even so, outside of those who had accompanied him from the Border like Signo, Laniakea knew more about him than anyone else.
It was thanks to the handful of meals they had shared over the past three years. No one else had ever spent even that brief amount of time with Hyperion.
Recalling the few memories she had of him, Laniakea tried to imagine what kind of person he might fancy.
A dazzling beauty like the 2nd Prince favored?
Someone plain and quiet like the 3rd Prince preferred?
Or perhaps an obsession with a woman who was already married, like the 4th Prince…
“Ugh…”
Unpleasant memories from the past resurfaced along with the thought, prompting Laniakea to rub her arms and slip the contract into the drawer.
If she had time to entertain such thoughts, she would be far better off falling asleep as quickly as possible. Another grueling schedule would begin the moment she opened her eyes tomorrow.
Crawling under the duvet, Laniakea felt drowsiness gradually wash over her and thought to herself.
Whoever Hyperion might marry in the future, it certainly wouldn’t be a woman he recoiled from in shock at the slightest touch.
* * *
Time passed, and the day to go to the Main Palace finally arrived. The day for them to spend their first night together had come.
According to imperial protocol, the Emperor and Empress resided in their own separate palaces. However, their shared bedchamber was located in the Main Palace.
The Empress’s Palace, the Main Palace, and the Emperor’s Palace stood adjacent to one another in that order. Because the Empress’s Palace and the Emperor’s Palace were entirely separate buildings, they could easily go days without seeing each other's faces unless it was a night designated for them to share a bed.
For that reason, there was an old saying in the Empire that people gauged the state of the imperial couple’s relationship by how often the lights in the Main Palace were lit.
‘Well… they say that if they were truly in love, they would simply move into each other’s palace altogether.’
In a book of unofficial imperial history she had read once, it was recorded that the First Emperor and Empress had holed up in each other’s palaces for a month at a time, refusing to come out and driving the ministers to utter despair.
Having had numerous children, the various detached palaces currently within the Imperial Palace grounds were said to have been built during that very era.
Turning over such idle trivia in her mind, Laniakea stepped out of the bath in the Main Palace. Calling it a bathtub was an understatement; it was vast enough to be called a pool.
As she stood, the waiting maids scrambled forward to dry her body and dress her in nightclothes.
Watching them, Laniakea swallowed a sigh. Even for someone who had rarely been waited on, she could tell their service was clumsy.
‘I’ll need to sort this out quickly.’
Hyperion had dismissed every employee in the Imperial Palace, sparing only the maids and manservants who handled general menial labor.
His actions were not unusual. It was standard custom for the palace staff to be replaced when a new Emperor ascended the throne.
The problem was that the former Empress had been driven out in disgrace, meaning most of the personnel had been replaced without any proper handover of the duties in the Imperial Palace—especially in the Empress’s Palace.
‘I need to recruit ladies-in-waiting right away.’
Though Lucy had become her maid, she could not manage everything alone, and she lacked experience in many areas. In the first place, Lucy had entered the palace as a guard, not an ordinary maid.
Capable hands were in high demand, yet she could not simply accept anyone. While applicants were pouring in with letters of recommendation from various departments and noble houses, she would have to carefully screen and select from among them.
Had she been any other Crown Princess, it would not have been a difficult task. She could have hosted banquets, built connections with high society, and received recommendations for suitable candidates.
Yet for Laniakea, who had never been active in social circles and held no ties with anyone, there was nowhere to gather such information.
That worry lingered even after she entered the bedchamber. To get the Empress’s Palace functioning properly, it was a matter that required urgent resolution above all else.
‘And there’s no one I can even consult about this.’
It was at that very moment.
“Laniakea? What are you pondering so deeply?”
Startled by the sudden sound of Hyperion’s voice, Laniakea lifted her head. What met her eyes was the firm, damp chest of a man, glistening with remaining drops of water.
