Ch#184
184
“I’m sorry for startling you.”
As he wrapped his arms around her slightly trembling shoulders and stroked her stiff back, she let out a breath she had been holding and buried her face in his chest.
The heartbeat he felt through her thin nightgown was faster and more irregular than usual.
“You really… didn’t move an inch, like a dead person.”
“It only appeared that way on the outside.”
Barkas patted her soothingly while casting his gaze out the window.
The sun was already high in the sky. Perhaps due to the accumulated fatigue from the long campaign, he had been oversleeping constantly since returning to Raedgo Castle.
He took a deep breath, shaking off the sensation of cold, sticky blood that still felt as though it were clinging to his body.
“During my time at the monastery, I was trained to control my physical responses to the extreme. Because of that habit, I sometimes fall into a deep sleep that borders on a state of suspended animation.”
“You’re saying… you were just sleeping deeply?”
She looked up at him with eyes full of doubt.
Barkas cupped her pale cheek with one hand and wiped the moisture from the corners of her eyes with his thumb before answering calmly.
“Yes. It’s the first time in a while I’ve slept so soundly.”
“Are you sure you’re really okay? There isn’t some kind of problem or…”
“There is no problem at all.”
At his firm reply, her rigidly tensed shoulders relaxed slightly.
She let out a long sigh and muttered.
“I felt like my heart was going to drop because of you. You wouldn’t budge, and when I touched you, your body was ice-cold, and I couldn’t even hear you breathing…”
He gazed down at his grumbling wife’s face.
Her lashes, heavy with moisture, drooped downward, shimmering like gold. The blue eyes beneath them appeared even more vivid against the slight redness around her lids.
He lowered his head to get a closer look at those eyes.
It was only natural to be frightened if the man sleeping in the same bed suddenly stopped breathing.
Yet, why did such a natural reaction make his insides tingle?
He kissed the tip of her reddened nose and asked in a whisper.
“Were you worried that I wouldn’t wake up?”
“…Why bother asking something so obvious?”
Talia muttered in a huffy voice, her eyes awkwardly downcast.
In the past, she would have jumped back and denied it, but seeing her admit it so honestly made a corner of his heart tighten with a dull ache.
At the same time, a flicker of doubt arose. What could have changed in her heart over the past six months to make her attitude shift so much?
Had she perhaps gone through something so difficult that she felt she had to resolve to lean on him again?
As he watched her with questioning eyes, the woman, who had been shifting her gaze nervously, suddenly pressed herself close against his bare chest.
Barkas stiffened in surprise.
Through the thin nightgown, he could clearly feel the soft, full curve of her breasts. She wrapped her arms around his waist and tilted her head back provocatively.
“…If you’re going to kiss me, do it quickly.”
Feeling his ability to think evaporate in an instant, he lowered his gaze to her lips.
Following the persistent kissing of the previous night, her lips were slightly more swollen than usual.
As the sight of the red mucous membrane, like crushed flower petals, caught his eye, the icy chill circulating through his body retreated instantly, replaced by a heat so intense that sweat began to bead on his skin.
He gently took hold of her chin and leaned down. Soon, their hot, damp breaths mingled sweetly.
He pressed his lips lightly against hers, rubbing them back and forth before sliding his tongue into that moist, narrow space.
She naturally climbed onto his lap and clung tightly to his back.
The pressure of her soft thighs against his tensed lower body caused a tension in his abdomen that was almost uncomfortable, but he had no desire to push her away.
Barkas wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her even closer to him.
How long had they been like that?
As his arousal reached a breaking point, he forced his lips away and carefully pulled back. He moved to get out of bed, but she caught his arm.
“Why… aren’t you going to finish?”
Looking up at her dissatisfied face, the heat rushed to his head so intensely that his neck throbbed.
He barely managed to hold onto the thread of his reason.
“…The sun is already high. I have a mountain of work piled up, so I must get up now.”
He tucked a stray hair behind her ear and kissed her white forehead lightly. The woman, who had been watching him with a pensive look, asked in a slightly husky voice.
“When will your official duties be over today?”
“…I should be able to finish by sunset.”
“Then come to this room this evening. I’ll be waiting…”
Talia whispered suggestively as she traced the veins on the back of his hand.
At the blatant temptation, his lower abdomen tightened.
Barkas’s Adam’s apple bobbed heavily as if he were swallowing the rising heat.
Sweat broke out along his spine as he suppressed the urge to pin her down on the bed right then and there. Masking his state with a composed face, he placed his hand over hers.
“…Understood.”
He then pulled her hand to his lips for a kiss before standing up.
He wanted to pick her up and carry her to the second-floor bedroom, but he knew that if he touched that warm, soft body again, he wouldn’t be able to endure it.
He rang the bell to summon a maid to help her dress, then grabbed his coat, draped it over his bare shoulders, and left the room. He stopped in his tracks when he spotted the massive beast looming by the door.
The wolf, sitting on its haunches like a sentry right next to his bedroom, watched him quietly with its grayish-blue eyes.
Contrary to his concern that it might throw a fit over him having secretly taken its master away, the wolf was calm. The way it looked up at him almost felt as if it were pitying his situation.
Barkas looked down at those bluish-gray eyes, which were as rich with emotion as a human’s, with a sense of unease before finally heading down the hallway.
Having finished his preparations in an instant, he headed to the meeting hall to handle the official business he had skipped in the morning.
As he stepped inside the outer castle, built for military purposes, the knights gathered around a long rectangular table rose as one to show their respect.
Barkas responded with a slight nod, took his seat at the head of the table, and picked up a stack of reports.
Most were about friction between fiefs or damage from Zram raids. While attention had been focused on the war in the North, the barbarians had been diligently expanding their influence.
The mounted warriors of the East had been continuously tracking the enemies’ trail, but they had yet to find their stronghold.
Barkas set the report down with a heavy sigh and turned a question toward Lucas, who sat beside him.
“The Grand Priest suspects that some of the residents of the Grand Duchy are cooperating with the Zram people. What are your thoughts on this?”
“I’d like to dismiss it as nonsense… but considering the recent movements of the raiders, it is true that the suspicion of an internal collaborator is hard to ignore.”
Lucas ran a hand roughly through his thick, dark brown hair and continued.
“The raiding parties have been timing the soldiers’ shifts with remarkable accuracy. They swarm near villages or walled cities, kill the guards, raid the armories or granaries, and then vanish without a trace. This would be impossible unless someone within the territory was helping them hide.”
“Has a search been conducted?”
“We’ve carried out several inspections… but there were no particular clues or results.”
Barkas tapped his fingers on the table as he scanned the reports on the damage caused by the Zram tribe thus far, clicking his tongue.
“Investigate everyone who seems suspicious. To hide dozens of barbarians, it would have to be someone with considerable wealth. Instruct the investigators to focus on influential citizens whose families have been settled in the East for generations.”
Having delivered his instructions in his characteristically level voice, Barkas turned his gaze to Beyroff, who stood waiting to his right.
“Have those dispatched outside the walls not returned yet?”
“No, it seems they are still investigating.”
Barkas nodded and moved on to the next agenda. It was a discussion regarding the recruitment of additional trainees to replenish the thinned ranks. He quickly scanned the proposal for the supplementary budget and pressed his seal.
Once the review of the major items was complete, Barkas briefly relayed the information the guildmaster of the White Silver Alliance had brought the previous night.
The knights did not take the Northerner’s warning seriously. After all, the chances of the tide of war turning at this stage were extremely slim.
However, the report that the leader of the rebellion might have escaped Amasek was not something that could be overlooked lightly.
