Roxana
Chapter 15
Chapter 15
The Way to Protect the Female Lead’s Older Brother
Chapter 15
* * *
Lant Agriche took various factors into account when taking a woman. In other words, he did not bed a woman merely because she was beautiful enough to stir his heart.
In fact, the women who were my mothers shared almost nothing in common.
Their appearances varied wildly—from women as breathtakingly beautiful as my own mother to those bordering on plain.
Their temperaments were just as diverse, ranging from bold, commanding women who carried themselves like lionesses to meek, fragile flowers raised in a greenhouse.
Until now, I had simply thought, This man truly has unpredictable tastes, but that was not the truth.
In the end, I reached the conclusion that Lant Agriche took women into his house as wives because they possessed talents across all kinds of fields.
It was almost as if he were conducting some varied genetic experiment.
Even so, among all of them, the reason my mother had caught his eye was, without a doubt, her beauty.
It was hardly a filial thing to say as her daughter, but her striking looks were truly the only virtue my mother possessed.
Of course, I was fond of her gentle nature and tender heart.
Yet in this household, such traits could never be virtues.
I could have bet Jeremy’s very hair that Lant Agriche did not find such qualities charming in the slightest.
However, when I was eight years old, what saved my life before Lant Agriche was ultimately this extraordinary beauty inherited from her. In a sense, I had benefited immensely from my mother.
For me to avoid her like this might very well be an act of utter unfilial impiety.
Though realizing that afresh did not mean I had any intention of returning to the room where she was waiting right now.
Click.
After escorting Jeremy back to his room, I headed to where Cassis was kept.
At any other time, I would have stayed longer to coax and soothe Jeremy before leaving, but not today.
Choosing him over immediately going to my mother was already enough for now.
I needed to maintain a certain distance from him.
“They really only did the bare minimum.”
Scanning Cassis’s condition, I knit my brows.
Just as I had seen earlier, Cassis was bound in the anti-monster restraints and a gag. Fortunately, his major wounds had been properly treated, but the smaller injuries remained untouched.
I stepped closer to examine his wrists and ankles.
The skin chafed by the restraints was torn so severely it was painful just to look at.
When I lifted his wrist slightly, an unpleasant screech of metal echoed from the chains tethered to the post. The same chains bound his ankles.
The room was quite desolate. Perhaps that was why Cassis, lying abandoned in the middle of it, looked all the more pitiable.
At least his arms were no longer pinned to the wall as they had been in the dungeon, so it was somewhat more comfortable than before, but that was all.
First, I removed the gag wedged in Cassis’s mouth.
Since I could not release the restraints entirely, I settled for applying the medicine I had brought with me to his wrists and ankles, then wrapping them in bandages.
I meticulously examined the other injuries across his body and treated what had been neglected myself.
I had known it, of course, but the way this family treated their playthings was truly cruel. Then again, was it only their playthings?
In this Agriche household, what wasn’t harsh, and what wasn’t excessive?
Once the treatment was finished, I did not leave Cassis’s side immediately. Instead, I quietly gazed down at the face before me.
Unconscious, Cassis looked remarkably gentle.
To see a boy with such an innocent, clear countenance reduced to this state made Agriche feel like a truly wretched blight.
Though, naturally, Agriche was indeed an undeniable evil in this world that deserved to be wiped out.
Letting out a sigh, I sank to the floor and leaned my back against the wall.
Perhaps because I had been straining my mind so much more than usual lately, a wave of weariness washed over me.
Or perhaps the fatigue was only catching up to me now after the subconscious strain and tension of keeping Cassis constantly on my mind.
I cast a sideways glance at Cassis beside me.
Lying on the bare floor covered in wounds, he looked particularly sorrowful today.
After watching him for a moment, I shifted closer. Then, I lifted his head and placed it onto my lap.
A solid weight settled over the thin fabric of my clothes. Still, resting his head on my lap would be slightly more comfortable than lying directly on the hard floor.
Though I had possessed no other choice, it was true that… I felt guilty for turning a blind eye while Lant Agriche struck him earlier.
Watching Cassis being attacked had pricked at the conscience I had pushed aside while surviving in Agriche.
Moreover, seeing him like this stirred a bit of pity in my chest.
In Pedelian, he must have been the proud Young Lord of Blue, loved and respected by all.
No one would have doubted that a brilliant future lay ahead of him.
Yet in the novel, Cassis met a gruesome, miserable end.
No one had even known of his death until Sylvia uncovered the truth of her oppa’s disappearance three years later.
Jeremy was a vicious villain in the novel, but when it came to the woman he loved, he had a foolishly blind, devoted side.
Because of that, he had spilled everything he knew about Cassis’s death in Agriche to Sylvia, whom he had abducted.
Cassis had been tossed around as a plaything in Agriche before eventually being utterly broken and killed.
Broken both in body and in mind.
Just how harrowing Cassis’s time in Agriche had been was not described in great detail in the story, nor did I remember every single detail.
Yet I vividly remembered the truth: that Cassis’s death held neither glory nor mourning.
Facing a person headed toward such a future gave me an odd, unsettled feeling.
Then again, my own future was just as bleak.
If I were to look into a mirror right this moment, I would see another person destined to die in the prime of youth.
“I don’t want to die, though….”
To prevent that, I first had to keep Cassis alive.
Yet if I failed to get him out of Agriche….
Well, should I try coaxing Jeremy then? So that he wouldn’t kidnap Sylvia later on.
No, perhaps it would be better if Jeremy and Sylvia never met in the first place.
Of course, that was a plan I could formulate later if things went awry.
Lost in these wandering thoughts, my hand moved unconsciously.
Before I realized it, I was gently stroking Cassis’s hair, just as I often did with Jeremy.
Sitting like this brought an ill-timed sense of peace.
Once Cassis was brought into my personal space, my heart eased a little.
Only now did it truly feel like he had fallen into my hands.
While some siblings shared their playthings, those with strong possessiveness, like Charlotte or Jeremy, had no such inclinations.
So I could simply use a similar pretext.
That way, I could keep Cassis by my side far more safely than when he was locked in the dungeon.
Of course, since Lant Agriche would not want Cassis to live too comfortably under my care, I needed to mind appearances on the surface.
Then, struck by a strange sensation, I lowered my gaze. Cassis, beneath my hand, still had his eyes closed.
Disheveled from my touch, his hair fell across his forehead.
“That’s odd.”
A quiet murmur slipped from my lips. A question had suddenly surfaced from the texture against my fingers.
“Did someone wash him in the meantime? Why is his hair so soft?”
Tangled between my fingers, Cassis’s hair was remarkably soft, no less than Jeremy’s.
It even felt clean and smooth, swaying as if he had just stepped out of a bath.
Yet unlike Jeremy, who lived comfortably as a young master in Agriche, Cassis was someone who had been tormented in the dungeon for days on end.
I knew full well that in such squalor, far from washing, he had barely been able to eat or sleep, subjected to sporadic floggings.
As proof, his body remained soaked in blood even now. Crimson stains clung to the very strands of hair I was touching.
Given that, there was no way anyone had washed him, and yet….
It was similar to the dissonance I had felt earlier when watching Cassis being dragged away covered in blood.
“There’s no smell, either.”
Come to think of it, it seemed to have been this way all along, not just now, but ever since the dungeon.
The very moment that muttered thought left my lips, I felt the head beneath my hand give the faintest, almost imperceptible twitch.
It was an extraordinarily subtle movement. Had my body not been in direct contact with his, I surely would have missed it.
At that moment, a sudden thought flashed through my mind, and my eyes narrowed with a sharp startle.
…Could it be that this man is awake right now?
