Chapter 134

Elise’s resistance ebbed noticeably, as if she was still stunned by the realization that she had bit him. Even after Rezette let her go, her gaze remained fixed on the corner of his mouth. When he deliberately licked the blood lingering on his lips, her transparent golden eyes trembled faintly.

Her eyes followed the bead of blood clinging to his tongue, transfixed.

Rezette suppressed a shaky breath, swallowing hard. She should have slapped me for breaking my promise not to force her. After all the times I’ve controlled her, why does something so trivial weigh on her now?

Strangely, her sudden act of defiance had stalled the downward spiral of their conversation. The room fell into a tense stillness, broken only by the faint rustle of Elise leaning off the bed to reach for the side table.

She returned with a small tin of ointment meant for bruises and pressed it into Rezette’s hand.

“Take this,” she said flatly.

Rezette stared at her in silence.

Elise avoided his gaze. “There’s nothing more to say between us. My answer will stay the same, no matter how many times you ask—and it’s far from what you want to hear. I just… want to be alone now.” She moved to leave, muttering, “Ow—”

“Where do you think you’re going?” Rezette’s hand shot out, pulling her back into her seat. Her attempt to escape their exhausting back-and-forth was cut short.

But as his eyes met hers, the words he intended to say faltered on his tongue.

His heart pounded wildly as he stared at the small, unassuming ointment tin in his hand. That simple gesture carried more weight than he could comprehend. This side of her hadn’t changed—she worried about him, cared for his well-being, as though he were human. As though he weren’t a beast in every sense of the word.

Even if it was just meaningless pity born of her inherently kind and gentle nature, it didn’t matter. She was the only one who had ever offered him such tenderness.

Yet she refused to extend the same care to herself.

Rezette glanced down at the small tin in his hand before his eyes flickered back to her.

“Elise.”

“If you don’t want to get bitten again, don’t touch me. Just stop—” she snapped, her words sharp but faltering.

“Were you trying to die?”

Her lips, which had been scolding him with such intensity, trembled and closed tightly.

It was a continuation of their earlier conversation, though now it cut deeper, touching on the core of the matter. Rezette, his expression unreadable, gently wiped the moisture from her lips with his thumb, his voice softer this time.

“When?” he asked again, quieter, more insistent.

“…A long time ago,” she replied, her tone distant, as though the memory was something she wished to bury.

“How long ago?” he pressed, his concern darkening his gaze.

Reluctantly, Elise muttered, “When I was about fifteen.”

A wave of cold dread washed over him. Fifteen. Far too young.

“…Don’t look at me like that,” she muttered, her voice defensive. “I wasn’t that young. Your own fifteen wasn’t entirely innocent either.”

Rezette’s reputation at that age—as the Emperor’s ally in leading a rebellion—was infamous across the continent. But he couldn’t, and wouldn’t, place her on the same level as himself.

His throat tightened at the thought. “Why?”

Elise’s expression hardened. “You don’t need to know.”

“How?” he asked, his frustration rising. “Why would you—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” She shook her head firmly. “It’s not a memory I care to revisit.”

Her refusal hit him like a wall, closing off any path he had hoped to follow. Rezette had planned to remove anything from her surroundings that might trigger the memory of that dark time, though he was uncertain how to go about it.

Still, he had gained something from this exchange.

The knowledge that she had once chosen death for herself settled a question that had lingered in his mind for too long.

Though Elise appeared to possess an unshakable will to live, her carelessness toward her own body spoke otherwise. It disturbed him how casually she spoke of dying, as if it were a simple choice—this was the second time he’d heard her say it directly.

The line between life and death was terrifyingly thin for her.

Realizing this, Rezette had begun inspecting her wrists and neck while she slept, searching for any scars he might have missed. Once he confirmed there were no signs of self-inflicted wounds, his suspicions shifted to poisoning. Perhaps she had overdosed on the medicine she needed—or worse, refused to take it altogether. The possibilities seemed endless.

“If you won’t tell me why, I’ll take it as permission to draw my own conclusions,” Rezette said, his voice low and steady as he pressed down on her frail back, holding her close despite her efforts to pull away.

“Your life in Argan was worse than death. There was nothing there to console you. The Emperor stood by as you made that choice,” he continued, his tone hardening. “I’ll interpret it however I want.”

“…I understand what you’re misunderstanding,” Elise replied softly, her voice trembling. But she hesitated before adding, “But…”

With no other option, Elise rested her cheek against his chest. For a long moment, she said nothing, then murmured, “…‘That incident’ wasn’t because of Andrei.”

“Then what?” Rezette asked, his voice tight with frustration and confusion.

“I just… hated waking up every morning. It only meant one more day I had to endure.” Her voice faltered as she spoke the words that had haunted her for so long.

Rezette remained silent, his body rigid against hers, waiting for her to continue.

“I thought it was about time for it to end. That perhaps God was ready to take me. But no…” Elise’s voice broke slightly. “He kept me alive with such stubbornness. So, I figured if He wouldn’t take me, I’d leave on my own.”

The weight of her words hung in the air, leaving him speechless.

“It was, at the very least, something I could choose,” she finished, her voice barely above a whisper, filled with a kind of hollow resignation.

Above her, Rezette’s throat bobbed as he swallowed hard, struggling to process the depth of what she had just revealed. Elise suddenly felt an uncomfortable shift in the air.

She had never spoken so openly about her inner turmoil to anyone—not even to Andrei. This was an old, festering wound she had kept hidden from the world. And now…

Now, someone was looking at her with an expression she had never seen before.

Sneaking a glance up at him, Elise was startled to find his face twisted in something unfamiliar. He looks angry.

A strange sensation churned within Elise’s chest, like a wave crashing inside her. It was an unfamiliar feeling—something she couldn’t quite place. A large, soft weight seemed to rise from the narrow confines of her throat. Before she even realized it, the words spilled from her lips, her voice trembling as they poured out.

“I knew, even as a child, that Andrei and I were bound by some fate,” she murmured, her eyes distant. “My parents often whispered about it by my bedside when I was very young. About what would happen if I died. How Andrei wouldn’t be able to handle it alone. Whether the imperial family could even survive without me…”

Rezette remained silent, his gaze fixed on her, watching as her words unfolded like a story long buried.

“Sometimes, they’d sit Andrei down and instruct him directly,” Elise continued, her voice soft but carrying the weight of old memories. “They told him that if one morning he found me dead, he’d need to cast preservation magic on my body as quickly as possible…”

“What?” Rezette’s voice was barely a whisper, a thread of disbelief woven through his words.

“They said not to bury me, to seal me and the bedroom I died in. Back then, I didn’t understand why, but now I do,” she said, her voice hardening with the realization. “They wanted to make sure that even if I died, they could extract every bit of magic left in me. But, you know…”

A heavy silence fell between them. Rezette’s expression remained unreadable, though his eyes never left her.

“It didn’t feel much different from the life I was already living,” Elise went on, her tone hollow. “Dead or alive, it seemed like it wouldn’t matter much.”

She paused for a moment, the words dragging her deeper into a past she had long tried to bury. “I was destined to never step foot outside the palace walls. To live and die in the bed I was born in. To be preserved forever in that state. So, the day of my death didn’t matter. I didn’t want to live even a day longer—until I saw Andrei fall to his knees before me, sobbing uncontrollably, barely managing to save me.”

Her voice faltered for a moment, but she quickly steadied herself, continuing with a quiet force.

“I wasn’t in my right mind then, but neither was Andrei. He suffered just as much as I did. You don’t know the tears he shed for me. That’s why you can talk about him so easily.”

Rezette’s eyes narrowed, his silence heavy with the weight of her words. He could feel the pain in her voice, but it didn’t change the coldness he had for the man she spoke of.

“You don’t know what kind of world he was left in after our parents died,” Elise went on, her voice breaking slightly. “How often he broke down in front of me, or how tirelessly he worked to protect me, alone. You don’t know anything, and that’s why you keep painting Andrei as a heartless person. I regret abandoning him so easily back then, even now.”

Her voice remained calm, steady, but it was the calmness of someone who had long reconciled with their inner turmoil.

Rezette stayed silent, absorbing everything she said. It wasn’t because he was moved by the tragic details of her past or pitying her for the childhood she had suffered.

Preserve her body? 

What?

The absurdity of how her life had been treated hit him first. The thought that her death had been so casually planned, as if it were just another part of the royal machinery, left him reeling.

Elise continued, unaware of the storm brewing in his chest. “From then on, I vowed to make my death meaningful, to use it in the most valuable way possible. Because that was probably the reason I was born.”

And then, like a fire igniting inside him, rage surged up, consuming everything in its path. This anger was far deeper than what he had felt when he’d picked up the strands of her severed hair from where she’d escaped before. The heat that coursed up the back of his neck was sharp and unbearable.

So, she’d been living with these thoughts since she was fifteen?

No one, no one, is born to die in service of others. And certainly not a princess. Not his woman.

“Unbelievable,” he muttered under his breath, the word slipping out like a bitter taste in his mouth.

The laughter that had once bubbled inside him drained away, leaving only a hollow scoff. The rage churned within him, leaving no room for reason. If the emperor of Argan, the late emperor, or the empress were standing before him now, he might have killed them on the spot.

“So, I won’t die so meaninglessly like you think. That’s the point,” Elise said, her voice steady, almost defiant. “Andrei is here, and now my body isn’t even entirely my own, so I’ll do my best to keep surviving—Rezette, are you listening?”

Her calm words, especially when she mentioned her brother, only stoked his anger further. He could barely hold it in.

Rezette shut his eyes for a long moment, trying to steady himself before he lost control. He opened them again, his gaze piercing as he asked, “So, the conclusion is that you’re still going back? To that place?”

There it was—the wall between them. As it always had been. A wall built by the twins, reinforced by the world they had created together. A bond that once burned him with the desire to tear it down completely.

What is this nonsense?

He moved suddenly, grabbing Elise’s face as she tried to look away. He forced her to meet his gaze, the anger in his eyes raw. “Why should I care about the tears of some foreign emperor? Those things don’t even register as problems for me.”

Elise, her expression unwavering, responded, “Of course, you don’t need to know. I never asked you to understand. All I’m saying is that this is who I am, so just… let it pass.”

“What matters to me—dammit—is that you’re going to him. In this condition. Elise.” His voice cracked, frustration and desperation creeping into his words.

A curse escaped his lips, his grip tightening on her. Two people were already leeching off her magic. There was no way she would survive caught between them. Argan needed the abundant power of a fully blessed Grandel, not a frail woman drained by the child inside her.

But this was her choice. She had made it. And that meant he couldn’t interfere? Why?

She was his. Why couldn’t he stop her?

“Why should I sit back and let you go?” Rezette whispered, his voice tight with suppressed fury, not even pausing to breathe. “I hate the idea of sharing you with anyone. Let alone losing you entirely. Why would I ever let that happen?”

His words came out sharp, laced with a raw edge of anger. There was no time to temper his emotions; the thought that she wanted to leave him for such a wretched place sent a surge of rage through him. He had once believed she was a princess, adored and cherished by the world. But now, the truth felt like a gut punch.

A terminally ill patient, trapped in a hospital room, had it better than she did.

Grinding his teeth, Rezette locked eyes with Elise, the intensity in his gaze almost burning. “Am I the crazy one here?”

Elise’s lips parted, but no words came out. Her eyes flickered with a mix of confusion and disbelief, as though she couldn’t quite process what he had just said.

“Elise, is it so strange that I’m furious?” His voice cracked slightly, but he didn’t care. “Should I grab random people off the street and ask them? Find out if there’s any man alive who wouldn’t lose his mind hearing that the woman he loves has been searching for a way to die?”

Elise stared at him blankly, as if he had just dropped a bombshell she couldn’t have possibly anticipated.