MBYS 18

Chapter 18

Eveline’s hand groped slowly across the empty sheet. All that gathered against her fingertips was the coldly settled air.

Under normal circumstances, Kailus’s large, sturdy hand would have heavily occupied that space.

Those nights when she had to endure pain that felt as though every bone in her body were being crushed, poured down through their touching skin by the ferocious demonic power.

It had undoubtedly been excruciating agony. Yet she had never imagined that a night stripped of that pain would feel so chilling and desolate.

Eveline quietly curled the hand that had been hovering in the empty air. The ink marks from scanning the crumpled dispatch three days ago still seemed vividly branded onto her palm.

Praying you are safe. Please, stay whole.

Return alive, and mock her with just one more arrogant sneer from those lips.

The fingertips gripping the sheets trembled minutely. The crushing darkness was deafening, and even the faint sandalwood scent he had left behind had long since completely evaporated from the room.

Morning sunlight was dyeing the dust floating in the study a pale white.

Eveline sat in the heavy leather chair in front of Kailus’s massive mahogany desk, exactly as she had the day before.

Four days.

Sitting before the desk abandoned by its master had somehow become her quiet routine.

Beyond the corridor, Lily’s light footsteps came and went.

The study door opened, and Albert stepped inside. A rare, excited flush of blood was visible on his normally composed face.

“My Lady, His Lordship’s army has passed through the city gates. He will arrive at the estate shortly.”

Eveline’s fingers, which had been resting on the edge of the desk, paused in mid-air.

“……I understand.”

Eveline silently closed her book and rose from her seat. The corridor leading from the study toward the central hall was already heated with a subtle commotion.

Not a single person noticed that her footsteps exiting the study were half a step more hurried than usual.

Nor did they notice how fiercely her hand, concealed beneath the folds of her dress, was clutching the hem of her skirt.

‘Penetrating wound to the left arm.’

Suppressing the sentence dizzying her brain along with a breath, Eveline arrived before the central grand staircase overlooking the hall. It was as she began descending the crimson-carpeted stairs.

With a heavy, grating sound, the tightly closed front doors swung open.

Kailus entered, accompanied by the heavy thud of mud-caked military boots striking the stone floor.

The acrid dust of the battlefield lay thick across his armor, and his left arm—which should have been wielding a greatsword—was tightly bound in rough bandages matted with clotted blood.

The moment his ruined appearance fully embedded itself in her vision, her breath caught short at the back of her throat.

‘And he claimed ordinary wounds close almost instantly.’

Her heart sank helplessly. Eveline tried to force her gaze away, but her body reacted before her reason could.

In the end, her hurried toes stepped directly onto the cascading folds of her dress.

Stagger— Her thin ankles buckled weakly.

Losing her balance as her body lunged forward, just as the hard stone floor at the foot of the steep stairs threatened to swallow her whole vision, a sturdy arm reeking of the smell of blood violently snatched her slender waist.

With a dull impact, an acrid metallic stench pierced her nostrils. The scent of dried blood, sweat, and battlefield dust. Beneath that raw fragrance, the dry sandalwood scent he used to leave behind lingered faintly.

Over the past three days, that body scent—which she had been forced to chase only as a faint residual shadow wandering the empty sheets, the backrest of the chair, and every corner of the study—pierced her lungs unannounced. Eveline’s stiffened fingertips twitched uncontrollably.

“……You’ve wasted away even thinner in the meantime.”

The man’s right arm, tightly caging her slender waist, exerted a persistent strength that she dared not even push against.

Held within his arm, Eveline lifted her head. Bloodshot red eyes were inches away. Beyond his roughly sprouted beard, a living, beating heart thumped audibly right through his armor.

“Have you…… returned? You are safe.” “The one who doesn’t look safe appears to be you.”

As the arm caging her was withdrawn, chilling air rushed into her waist.

“Albert.” “Yes, Your Lordship.” “Draw a bath. And have Edwin stand by.”

Kailus resumed his boot steps, ascending the stairs. As he brushed past Eveline, he dropped a low, dry remark without even turning his head.

“Wait in the study.”

His massive back receded. Eveline softly rolled the word “study” over the tip of her tongue.

Eveline’s footsteps as she trod the carpet and climbed the stairs were minutely slower than usual.

Opening the heavy mahogany door, she stepped into the study.

Eveline stood opposite the desk and calmly lowered her gaze. Encountering him at close range made his appearance far more vivid and imposing than the brief words on the parchment.

She repeated to herself that as a tool required to prove its utility, worrying over the master’s safety was only natural. Eveline tightly intertwined her coldly chilled hands and bit down gently on her bloodless lips.

He would be here soon. Just as she drew a deep breath.

Bang.

The tightly closed study door flew open.

Kailus walked inside, having finished washing.

His damp black hair was swept back roughly. The new bandage tightly wrapped around his left arm and the bruised, purplish marks resting near his collarbone briefly peeked through his loosely untied post-bath shirt.

As Kailus approached and sat down, the heavy leather chair creaked low under his weight. His red gaze swept across the desk. The territory documents he had left scattered haphazardly before his departure had been neatly sorted and arranged. His arrogant brow narrowed slightly.

“You meddled with my documents.” “I merely organized them. I did not read the contents.”

Eveline did not bother to add any further explanation. Nor did Kailus press the matter any further. He merely leaned deep into the backrest and propped his chin on his hand.

“I hear that lackey of the princess, Marcel, came looking for you.” “Yes. He demanded a search of the Grand Duke’s interior, so I refused. I invoked the laws of the Medical Association and the principle of the Lord’s sanction.” “You chased him off by throwing laws in his face?”

The corners of Kailus’s mouth twisted crookedly upward.

“You always liked reading books, but you’ve forged quite a plausible shield—enough to block the path of the capital’s old snake.” “Marcel mentioned that during the upcoming spring social season, the Princess wishes to invite the Grand Ducal couple.”

Eveline’s voice lowered a calm notch.

“And…… he mentioned my qualifications as the official Grand Duchess.”

Kailus fell silent for a moment. It was a look that suggested he had recalled the parchment tucked deep inside the drawer.

“An invitation popping out of the princess’s mouth is no mere banquet. It is a summons akin to an imperial decree.”

Kailus leaned his upper body forward, staring deeply into Eveline’s cool eyes.

“Yet there is no way to refuse. Well…… we will think about that later.”

Kailus rose from his seat. By now, pitch-black darkness had settled heavily outside the window.

“Three whole days were pushed back.”

Eveline’s spine stiffened reflexively. Three days’ worth of demonic power. It meant that the ferocious pain, suppressed and accumulated, would pour down onto her fragile body all at once tonight.

“……Can you endure it?”

Eveline’s ash-gray eyes flickered minutely. It was the first time. The first time Kailus had ever asked after her well-being before a demonic power transference.

Before she could fully chew over the meaning of that slight change, Eveline parted her lips.

“Has there ever been a single time I refused?”

Kailus let out a short scoff.

“Prepare and wait in the bedroom.”

Kailus’s bedroom.

Pushing open the heavy door, the flickering light of the burning fireplace cut a red slash through the deep darkness.

Kailus sat perched on the edge of the bed. His shirt buttons were loosely undone, and in the darkness, only the fresh bandage wrapped around his left arm stood out starkly white.

“You’re here.”

Eveline walked over silently and took her seat on one side of the bed. The searing heat of the fireplace hovered between the two of them. Kailus extended his hand. The moment Eveline clasped that hand without hesitation, her spine stiffened as if struck by lightning.

Demonic power amounting to several times the usual rushed across her skin like a waterfall. It felt as though molten iron were flowing and boiling along her blood vessels.

No, something even sharper and hotter clawed its way through, lacerating her fragile internal organs.

Eveline bit down hard on her lips. The coppery taste of blood spread across the tip of her tongue.

Not a single groan, not even a wisp of a scream, was allowed to escape outward. The moment she reached her limit and let go of his hand, Kailus would halt the transference, and then this horrific pain would bounce right back onto him in full force.

Kailus’s ragged breathing gradually grew deep and calm. His broad shoulders, which had been stiff as stone for three days, slacked, and the tight tension throughout his entire body drained away like an outgoing tide.

The jaw she had been clenching relaxed slowly.

Yet on the opposite side of their touching hands, a wretched hell was unfolding.

Inside Kailus’s large hand, Eveline’s hand grew as cold and icy as a corpse. Her pulse throbbed in a monstrous, erratic rhythm.

The dark blue-black veins on her fingertips, which had faded by a layer, grew terrifyingly darker until they were visible to the naked eye.

‘Just a little more. I haven’t absorbed it all yet.’

Eveline clenched her teeth until her jaw felt like it was breaking and gripped Kailus’s hand all the more fiercely.

Right at that moment, Kailus’s closed eyes snapped wide open.

“Eveline.”

No answer came back.

Kailus whipped his head around. Eveline’s face was laid bare under the flickering light of the fireplace.

All color had evaporated into a deathly pale complexion, and dark red blood continuously welled up and spilled from between her tightly pressed lips.

“Eveline!”

Kailus hastily hoisted himself up. At that movement, Eveline’s fiercely maintained grip on his hand suddenly gave way.

Dark red blood streamed endlessly down the line of Eveline’s jaw.

Her thin eyelids were half-closed without a shred of vitality, and her once-cool eyes had lost their focus long ago.

The last thing she saw at the edge of her blurring vision was Kailus’s intensely burning red eyes.