Roxana
Chapter 7
Chapter 7
The Way to Protect the Female Lead’s Older Brother
Chapter 7
Something suddenly touched his lips.
A round, slightly soft object. A faint, familiar scent of medicinal herbs drifted from it.
Cassis had no trouble recognizing what the girl was offering him.
It was a medicinal pill made by refining and concentrating essential nutrients, allowing a person to endure for about three days without food after taking just one.
Cassis himself had taken one before heading to the border.
The girl had likely noticed the bowl rolling across the prison floor.
As if Agriche had no intention of killing him immediately, they provided food once a day.
Yet it was an unidentifiable slop—little better than filth—that brought a wave of nausea at the mere smell of it.
Furthermore, even if they had served a feast of delicacies, Cassis did not have the slightest intention of touching anything given by Agriche.
“Why should I trust you and take what you give me?”
Even if it came from the girl, it was the same.
Cassis did not trust the person before him either.
Granted, there was something enigmatic about her demeanor, and she had claimed she did not wish for his death, but…
Even so, he did not trust her enough to meekly swallow whatever was pushed toward him.
Above all, he still did not even know the identity of the person standing before his eyes.
At Cassis’s refusal, the girl fell silent for a moment.
“Is that so? Then I have no choice.”
The next moment, sensing an ominous presence right before him, Cassis realized something in a flash and hurriedly opened his mouth.
“Wait—!”
Thud!
But it was already too late.
“Ugh!”
Cassis groaned as a sharp pain drove into his abdomen, just like when he had first met her.
Yet perhaps because his condition was better than last time, when he had been thoroughly poisoned, he did not pass out immediately.
The girl looked slightly troubled by this.
“Ah. Did I hit you too softly this time?”
“Are you seriously saying that right now…?”
“Sorry. Just one more hit.”
Immediately after, an even stronger blow slammed straight into his abdomen.
You underhanded little…
This time, Cassis had no choice but to lose consciousness.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
When he saw the girl again, Cassis could not help but react with sharp hostility.
He was furious that she had knocked him out as she pleased, and utterly bewildered as well.
To make matters worse, this was not even the first time she had pulled such a stunt.
“You said you didn’t want to eat what I gave you. So I had no other choice.”
As he growled, the girl spoke in a soothing tone.
Yet only her tone sounded apologetic; the substance of her words was anything but.
“And that justifies knocking someone unconscious?”
“Then will you eat obediently from now on?”
Facing Cassis’s fierce glare head-on, the girl did not even bat an eye.
“Well, I like that you’re cautious. It’s admirable that you don’t easily let your guard down, even around someone who seems to approach you with goodwill. In the future, try not to take anything given to you by anyone other than me. After all, no one in this house will ever approach you with good intentions except for me.”
What kind of person gave the disease only to offer the cure?
Cassis truly could not fathom this girl.
Judging by the youthful cadence lingering in her voice and the blurry silhouette caught in his vision, she seemed around his age or perhaps slightly younger.
Yet her actions and words lay far beyond anything he could have imagined.
She had already knocked him out twice, but in the end, taking what she gave him had never caused him any harm.
Though he had no intention of admitting it aloud, frankly speaking, his physical condition was actually more comfortable than before.
Furthermore, she was now speaking words that sounded as though she were worried for him.
Unlike when she struck his vitals without mercy, her touch when checking his wounds was incomparably careful and gentle.
Thus, Cassis still could not properly grasp what kind of person this girl was.
Cassis closed his mouth and gazed intently at her.
Of course, doing so did not allow him to see anything clearly.
Yet, as if doing so might allow him to read the atmosphere of the person standing before him or uncover the intentions hidden within, he simply kept his quiet, wordless gaze fixed on her.
The girl did not disturb Cassis as he probed and pondered; she merely waited in stillness.
After a brief silence, Cassis slowly spoke.
“Tell me what you fed me this time. The scent of medicine still lingers in my mouth.”
“Painkillers and antibiotics. I can’t treat the visible wounds because they’d draw attention. Bear with it for a little while. If you wait just a bit, I’ll make things more comfortable for you than they are now.”
“How could you possibly do that?”
While the girl had answered the first question immediately, she held her tongue on the second.
“You…”
Cassis wondered about her identity once more, but thinking she wouldn’t tell him anyway, he asked something else instead.
“Do you truly believe I can walk out of here alive?”
Yet even as he asked, Cassis already knew the answer.
“Lant Agriche must have brought me here with every intention of killing me.”
Unless one were a fool, there was no missing Lant Agriche’s intentions in dragging him here so brazenly.
Whether as a political provocation against Pedelian, a simple vent of frustration over the ceaseless friction with Pedelian, or both.
In any case, Agriche had no intention of letting Cassis leave alive.
If he were to leave Agriche alive, it would undeniably sow the seeds of war.
Pedelian would never forgive Agriche for daring to strike them first, and Cassis had no intention of letting this humiliation pass either.
“Who says so?”
The girl asked in a voice that sounded somewhat uneasy.
It felt as though she wanted to deny his words.
“Lant Agriche.”
“…”
When Cassis answered with a sneer at the absurdity of it, the girl fell silent. What kind of silence it was, he could not tell.
Cassis found himself slightly curious about the expression she might be wearing right now.
After some time passed, a slender voice drifted into his ear once more.
“You won’t die. Because I…”
But she did not finish her sentence.
Silence settled over the prison once more, with only the soft, shallow breaths of the two tickling the quiet air.
Just then, a faint noise drifted over from the distance. For some reason, it sounded rather noisy outside.
As if the girl had heard it too, he sensed a slight movement in front of him, like the turning of her head.
A moment later, she stepped closer toward him.
“Take this.”
Judging by the touch against his lips, it seemed to be medicine.
Cassis stared quietly down at her face, now closer than before. In his vision, which had grown ever so slightly clearer than yesterday, her faint outline was still discernible.
For a fleeting instant, it felt as though their eyes met in the dark.
Soon, Cassis’s lips parted slowly. For the first time, he accepted the medicine offered to him without a single word of protest.
Because the medicine dissolved the moment it entered his mouth, swallowing it was easy even without water.
The girl did not leave immediately, remaining standing before him.
At other times, she would leave the moment she finished checking on his condition. Could this have something to do with the commotion heard outside moments ago?
Sharpening his senses to catch every faint stimulus around him, Cassis spoke once more.
“Your name.”
“What?”
“You. What is your name?”
Though she had refused to reveal her identity, he wondered if she might at least give her name.
Yet no answer came from the girl.
Just as Cassis chuckled bitterly to himself and was about to give up, thinking, As expected, a soft, whisper-like voice reached his ear.
“Roxana.”
Roxana.
Cassis silently mouthed the name lingering on his eardrums, as if engraving it into his mind.
Roxana…
It was the name of the dawn that arrives when the shroud of dark night is drawn back.
