17
Talia fixed a wary gaze upon the boy looking up at her with clear, luminous eyes.
“What brings you here?”
“I slipped away from the palace to see you, Sister.”
He spoke with a cheerfulness that bordered on insolence.
Talia knit her brows. Her younger half-brother, Asros, who had barely turned six, had always been a thorn in her side.
Though they shared the same mother, the worlds they occupied were as different as heaven and earth. This boy with the innocent face was the legitimate prince born of an imperial marriage, while she was nothing more than the shameful seed of a tawdry affair.
Watching Asros receive his baptism amid a chorus of blessings, Talia had been consumed by a venomous envy. She had loathed that tiny scrap of flesh that could not even open its eyes.
Senevier, sharp enough to read every trace of that malice, had never once permitted her eldest daughter—who was no longer of any use—to approach her precious son.
As a result, Talia saw her brother only during official ceremonies. This was the first time she had looked upon the child from so close since his baptism.
She frowned, glancing past him into the hall.
“Did you come all this way alone? If Mother finds out…”
“I didn’t come alone. Berens came with me.”
The boy pointed toward a dim recess of the hallway. Only then did Talia notice the man in black standing where the shadows gathered thickest.
A man with the pallor of a ghost, who had once guarded her. Now he stood beside Asros, his gaze sharp and watchful, as though he would cut her down the moment she showed the slightest sign of harm.
Bitterness surged within her. Those dark eyes seemed to reaffirm that she would never matter to anyone.
Concealing the venom churning inside her, Talia asked coldly,
“What do you want with me?”
“I heard you’re leaving on a long journey soon, Sister. So…”
“I’m leaving on a journey?”
Talia cut him off, her tone turning shrill.
Startled by the sharp edge in her voice, the boy hesitated before speaking with measured care.
“Mother said you would be coming with us on the pilgrimage…”
Talia stared blankly down at his face, then burst into a harsh, mocking laugh. The boy flinched, shrinking back a step. Even through the eyes of an innocent child, did she look like a madwoman?
Clutching her stomach through her laughter, she leaned down toward him, her voice sickeningly sweet.
“And what else did Mother say?”
Asros hesitated, seeming to finally realize how much he was upsetting her.
Yet he was not the sort to swallow his words merely because he felt intimidated.
“She said you might be married soon. That someone named Count Serian sent an offer…”
The boy faltered and fell silent.
Her expression must have turned grotesque. The man who had been watching in silence took a step forward, placing himself between her and Asros. Did he truly believe she might lose her mind and throttle the little thing?
Ignoring the bodyguard, Talia stared fixedly at her brother’s naive face.
“So? Did you come to offer your congratulations? To give me a fond farewell now that your disgrace of a sister is finally being wed and cast out of the palace?”
The boy’s shoulders twitched, perhaps sensing the malice coiled beneath her soft tone.
He protested, looking wounded.
“Once you marry, Sister, it will be even harder to see you than it is now… I only wanted to speak with you before that. We share the same mother, after all.”
There was a faint longing woven into his words.
“I always thought it would be wonderful if we could be close, like the First Princess and the Crown Prince. But if you leave, we might never have the chance. That’s why I came.”
Talia looked down at those wide, hopeful eyes, utterly unmoved.
Because of this boy, she had been reduced to nothing.
The Empress, the Emperor, and the lovely, brilliant prince born between them.
She was merely a blemish to be erased from their pristine portrait. The brighter Asros shone, the deeper the shadows swallowed her whole.
It was humiliating to know she envied this child to the point of sickness. In truth, she could hardly bear to look at him.
She curled her lip in a cold sneer at the boy’s misplaced hope.
“Were you hoping I would throw my life away for you, just as the First Princess does to make her twin the Emperor?”
“That’s not what I—”
“Even if you hadn't asked, Mother has already planned how best to use me for your sake. If I am being married off, it is solely for your benefit. So discard those useless notions, little brother.”
Asros had no defense against such unmasked cruelty. The bewilderment on his face laid bare just how thoroughly he had been shielded from the world.
He had never stayed awake through the night, trembling in fear. This was likely the very first wound he had ever suffered.
A sharp smile touched Talia’s lips.
“I have no intention of playing the devoted, loving sister. I despise you just as much as I despise the twins.”
Tears welled in the boy’s large eyes from the shock. Talia drove the blade home without mercy.
“If you understand that, then disappear.”
Asros bit his lip, choking back a sob, and turned on his heel to flee down the empty corridor. The man in black vanished after him into the dark.
Talia locked the door and walked back to the window. The sky, which had still held faint traces of blue moments ago, was bruised with twilight.
The servants who had been hauling luggage were leaving the grounds one by one to rest, and not a single knight remained in sight, having long since retired to the barracks.
By habit, she brought her index finger to her lips, only to flinch at a sharp sting. Dark red blood seeped from the torn skin around her nail. At the sight of it, the bile churning in her chest rose straight to her throat.
Choking down a scream that clawed at her throat, she snatched the cloak hanging in the corner and pulled it over her thin surcoat. Then, without taking a single maid, she slipped out of the detached palace.
END