Contract Marriage Rewritten
Chapter 27
As the wedding drew near and the day came to leave the fortress once again, Hyperion dressed in the cleanest, neatest clothes he owned before setting out. Even knowing they would only get soiled along the way.
Because of that, Gemma knew that Hyperion had taken a liking to the princess from a distant kingdom who was to be his bride.
‘So I thought everything would be fine once he took the throne, but I never dreamed a problem like this would arise.’
Watching Hyperion fret, eager to rush to the Empress, Gemma subtly offered her advice.
“Her Majesty seems to be having a hard time with all the work. It must be quite a burden, having ascended to the position of Empress so suddenly.”
“……!”
Hyperion was perceptive enough to catch Gemma’s indirect meaning.
That was why, seeing Laniakea tense at the sight of him, he had asked how she was feeling before naturally shifting his gaze toward the documents she had been reviewing.
After that, the conversation flowed more easily than he had anticipated. In truth, at first it was less a conversation and more a session of him explaining while Laniakea jotted everything down.
Even so, the distance between them narrowed little by little. Though it was ostensibly to make passing documents back and forth easier, Laniakea, who had initially sat across from him, had before long ended up sitting right beside him. That alone made Hyperion’s heart race.
He was even more thrilled when they came to eat together in the office. In the past, when he was merely a prince visiting the Imperial Palace, the most time he could spend with her was sharing a single meal.
Sitting far apart from his wife, that time had always felt far too brief.
Compared to then, she was now impossibly close. And perhaps because he had asked for a simple meal to be brought,
unlike during their awkward meals in the past, Laniakea took hearty bites of her sandwich as though truly ravenous.
Seeing her eat so comfortably in front of him made Hyperion all the more pleased. And then came the introduction to the spirit that followed.
The Water Spirit demanding sugar from him had been truly fascinating, and the sight of Laniakea conversing with that spirit had been even more wondrous.
Which made her falling asleep like this all the more unexpected.
Looking at the sleeping Laniakea, he felt a pang of regret.
He had wanted to talk with her more. About spirits—more precisely, he wanted to hear her story of when she had become close with those beings she casually called her friends.
Not that he disliked seeing her asleep. Even with him right in front of her, Laniakea had closed her eyes without a trace of vigilance. What was more, hadn’t she casually offered him her hand before drifting off?
Hyperion looked down at their clasped hands, fingers interlaced.
He had held her hand like this that night as well. Just before he thrust deep inside her, their fingers had been tightly entwined first.
Holding one hand so tightly that it would never come loose, he took Laniakea’s other hand as well. Even so, she showed no sign of waking.
‘Summoning spirits must drain more stamina than I thought.’
Fascinating and intriguing though it was, if that was the case, he had no intention of asking her to show him spirits again. If others were to witness it, nothing good would come of it.
Moreover, even if he had caught her in the act, the fact that she had readily shown him the beings she had kept hidden for so long when he asked to see them kept making his heart flutter.
Lost in his thoughts, Hyperion snapped back to his senses at a slight squirm in his grasp. Feeling stifled by his persistent grip, Laniakea was trying to slip her hand free in her sleep.
Settling himself properly beside her, he tightened his hold on her hand.
“Mmm…….”
Frowning slightly when her hand wasn’t freed as expected, she tried pulling away a few more times before finally giving up and going still.
Holding her quiet hand once more, Hyperion applied gentle pressure. Then, when it seemed too firm, he eased his grip.
Repeating this over and over until she became accustomed to having her hand captured by him, Laniakea no longer tried to pull away.
Only then did a satisfied smile appear on Hyperion’s face.
Before returning to the Imperial Palace, he had held his wife’s hand only once.
On their wedding day, when they stood before the bishop.
That moment had lasted less than a few minutes, yet the sensation he felt then still lingered in his hands. But even that was only through the fabric of gloves.
Whenever he visited the Imperial Palace from time to time, he would swallow dryly while looking at Laniakea’s distant hands.
‘I wish I could just hold her hand once.’
Hyperion used to startle himself whenever such thoughts crossed his mind.
Am I a pervert? Why am I acting like a man desperate just to hold her hand?
Though he tried not to dwell on it, the desire to hold her hand would pop into his mind at the most unexpected moments.
When he cut down an enemy, when his mind grew hazy in the bitter cold of deep winter, or when he mindlessly chewed through a wretched meal.
That was why, when he finally held her hand on their first night together, Hyperion had momentarily held his breath. It was even smaller and softer than he had imagined. And he loved it to the point of madness.
Yet that night had ultimately ended in a mess, and while worrying over Laniakea’s condition, the thought suddenly struck him.
Can I never hold her hand again……?
He had worried so much, but fortunately, as if giving him her hand was nothing at all, Laniakea had surrendered it to him.
His calloused hand, hardened from years of gripping a sword, slid between her slender fingers.
As his thick knuckles slipped between her closed fingers and grazed the tender flesh within, a faint whimper escaped through the sleeping Laniakea’s teeth.
It likely meant she found it ticklish and bothersome.
Hyperion slowly squeezed and released his tight hold once more.
Gemma and Tamil had told him. Never force anything, but touch her often so that contact feels natural to her.
At first, he wondered how difficult that could possibly be. Just holding her hand was like a gift to him.
But holding her hand now, he understood what Mr. and Mrs. Ency had been worried about.
In the end, he was only human; once he obtained one thing, he couldn’t help but crave another.
The very hand holding the one he had yearned for so desperately, now wanting to reach further, was proof of that.
Hyperion thought as he looked down at the pale fingers nestled in his grasp.
‘I want to devour them.’
He felt as though they would taste sweet if he swallowed them just like this. At the same time, a dizzying ecstasy would wash over him. What kind of new world would that be?
Hyperion slowly brought her hand to his lips.
Laniakea, quietly asleep without knowing where her hand was being led, looked so innocent it was almost pitiful.
With her hand brought near his face, Hyperion shuddered slightly.
He must have truly lost his mind. How else could a single finger of his wife’s make his breathing turn so ragged?
He couldn’t understand why he was acting this way himself. Throughout his life, he had rarely felt intense emotions.
In his childhood, at least, he seemed to have felt anger and sorrow.
After entering the monastery, he stopped raising his voice, and after going to the border, he stopped shedding tears.
It was a good thing. For survival, emotions were nothing more than a hazard.
The reason he had fought tooth and nail to survive was nothing grand, either. He was a prince. Though cast aside and abandoned, that remained Hyperion’s sole reason for being.
In his youth, during his stay at the Imperial Palace, his tutors had told him until their breath gave out:
You are a prince, and your existence is both your duty and your right.
He knew little of rights, but duty had to be fulfilled. The conviction that he must survive because he was a prince was the only thing that had kept him enduring.
So when another brother ascended the throne and he was no longer a prince, when even his right of succession ceased to exist—
could he not simply find a fitting death at the border then?
Around the time he was thinking such thoughts, the Empress had summoned him. And then, she had attached a wife to his side.
On that day, Hyperion received one more duty in life.
It was also the day he gained another reason to live.
“Laniakea.”
The lips that were about to devour the slender fingers in his grasp stopped their motion and called out to the master of this ecstasy.
Unlike his regret from a moment ago, he now thought it fortunate that she was asleep. Otherwise, she might have grown frightened and tried to flee once more.
Swallowing his heated breath, Hyperion slowly pressed a kiss to the back of the hand he held.
The failure brought on by his inexperience was enough at once. This time, he would prepare very slowly, yet surely, to lead it to success.
So that she, too, could share in the feelings he experienced.
‘This week, hands.’
Kissing another of her fingers, Hyperion recalled the next step Mr. and Mrs. Ency had mentioned.
‘Next week…….’
His eyes fell upon her soft, tender cheek.
That was what he wanted to devour next after her hands.