“...Is that what comes out of your mouth?”
I felt like I was suffocating.
'I'm such a fool that I turn a blind eye and pretend not to know what happened to Madame Marcel.'
Everyone in the castle was whispering behind their backs. Vermont and Temnes. Even though I was told that it was natural because it was a marriage without love that was forced, I couldn't keep my mouth shut because I had heard such things from him.
There was no such thing as a wife's rights over her husband. The treatment could have worsened to make matters worse by asking Kaian about Madame Marcel's business.
When it becomes clear that his wife has noticed or knows about his mistress' affairs, rather than feeling sorry and ending his affair, he becomes shameless and continues his relationship openly, dismissing it as 'something even the hostess knows about'. There was a lot to do.
'I put up with it because of the baby.'
I was scared of what Kaian would say, but now I was even more scared that the baby would be born and the parents' relationship would become very public.
'I thought I just had to endure it.'
On the outside, I could act as if I had seen nothing as if I had not heard anything, as if I were someone who enjoyed the abundance that Kaian gave me.
However, when Kaian suddenly spoke as if I and Valquiterre might cause some inappropriate misunderstanding in the eyes of others, I couldn't bear it at all.
Nevertheless, very passively.
I didn't scream, nor could I swear out of ny displeasure, and all I could say was, 'I can't believe you said such a thing to me in such a rude way.'
“It means you have to be careful with your actions.”
Kaian gave me words even more strength.
“Your Majesty the King is still unmarried. Aren’t the eyes in the kingdom focused on Your Majesty’s marriage?”
"Yes. I understand.”
I suppressed the feeling of not wanting to accept it.
“I will not take a single step out of my room until Your Majesty returns to the castle. Then is it okay?”
“Claudel.”
“You really don’t trust me.”
The words I heard from him in the royal castle once again rang vividly in my ears.
‘I am not your enemy. Me too... I'm Temnes.'
'But you're Vermont.'
I had a clear memory of my maiden name being called again from the mouth of the man, who had coldly pushed me out of the line.
'I can't trust you, Claudel.'
Even after hearing those words, I waved my hand endlessly in the empty air. Then, who knows, maybe even a handful of straws will be grasped. Sometimes, the urgent and anxious mind of a woman with no one to lean on can make her make a thousand, ten thousand gestures in vain in the air. In his mind, I continued to do such fleeting things.
In the end, I was the one who got hurt after telling Kaian, ‘Don’t you trust me?’
“That’s not what you meant, right?”
He spoke in a commanding tone as if he had no intention of persuading me.
“You’re overly sensitive. Let’s stop this story here.”
I did not answer but pursed my lips.
This was because I was so upset that I couldn't control myself and my pride was hurt.
Kaian, who was staring at me, pinned me down.
“Anyway, while serving His Majesty, mistakes or unpleasant incidents should never happen.”
"All right."
I didn't want to answer, but I forced myself to answer, and then Kaian left the bedroom.
I sat down on the bed and let out a long sigh.
After closing the door, Kaian realized that it was a mistake.
'I left my clothes behind.'
He had forgotten the classy matriarch's clothes suitable for the dinner that covered Claudel's body at the lakeside earlier.
"Ha."
He was in such a bad mood that he had trouble taking it back.
While the dinner was in full swing, Claudel quietly left her place. He thought it was because the doctor had repeatedly told him that women who have children tend to become unwell.
But after a while, Valquiterre also left the banquet hall, and when neither of them returned after a while, he suddenly had a bad feeling.
The reason he headed to the shore of the Lake in search of them was because of Kaian's astute instincts.
When he saw the two of them standing close to each other and talking, he felt like he was going to spin as soon as he saw them. Objectively, they were a pair that looked very well-matched. However, it was absurd that one of the two was his wife who was carrying his child.
'...Go back to capital?'
'You mean me?'
Finally, when he saw Claudel's smiling face looking at Valquiterre, his discomfort exploded as if a fuse had been completely lit.
The woman who entered the stable period gained weight and became more relaxed. She was so pretty that she could lift and lower a person's heart just by gently lifting the corner of her lips.
This person, who usually stood out as if she had a soft glow due to her skin being much whiter than that of ordinary women in the South, looked like a fairy on a night outing, with her red hair and white skin clearly visible in the dim light coming from the castle, even though she was standing in a dark place.
And Valquiterre seeing her.
For a moment, Kaian was overcome with a strange sense of anxiety and acted like a surprisingly crazy person.
He picked up the noise that was meaningless, wrapped up the woman dressed in a dress that revealed her body, and took her to the bedroom as if dragging her.
There was resentment and sadness in Claudel’s eyes.
'You really don't trust me.'
Kaian immediately understood what she was saying. She was recalling his rejection in the royal castle.
'How can I make you trust me?'
'I might believe it after giving birth to a successor. I hope you try.'
Sometimes he seemed to easily recall, in a few words, the heartaches she had experienced in the past.
It was his judgment and decision to deliberately hurt Claudel as if he were attacking her and to hold Claudel in his grasp so that she could not move.
He was afraid that she might be taken advantage of by the Duke of Vermont if he knew that her heart was entirely devoted to him.
He was confident that he had made the best choice for Temnes. However, every time he encountered Claudel's face like that, he became confused as to whether it was really the best thing to do.
There was a moment when he didn't know what to do because she loved him, and even when she was hurt, he was happy alone.
He thought that this kind of love could never be one, but he believed that it would be the best love between two enemy families.
Now Kaian keeps looking back at the choices he made, wondering if he made some wrong choices.
As a successor, Kaian was taught and raised to make his own decisions from a very young age, but once he made a choice, there was no going back, so he never reevaluated it.
As the head of the Temnes family, his words and actions are unconditionally correct.
'But I wonder if I'm doing it wrong.'
That feeling was very unfamiliar. If it weren't for Claudel's work, he could still choose one of the options as decisively as before, without any room to deviate from his decision. His work was the only exception.
Moreover, he was very concerned about what Valquiterre was doing.
'This doesn't make any sense.'
The look in Valquiterre's eyes at Claudel stimulated his sense of déjà vu. He's definitely seen Valquiterre's expression like that before. Before he blindly begged him to give him something that was Kaian's, he was always pretentiously and exaggeratedly affectionate or kind. It's like a beast that sets a trap and waits until its prey is caught.
'That's the look you make when you're looking at her.'
There were times when the beautiful face he praised as if an angel from heaven had come down from him, was particularly kind, and it was a meaningful smile that he only showed when he wanted to find out how important something that appealed to Kaian was to him.
Valquiterre did not covet anything unless it was something that Kaian cherished. However, if he did not take away or give away the items that Kaian valued, he would destroy them.
'It's already been more than ten years since Valquiterre did something like that.'
Besides, Claudel is not even a thing.
But what is this premonition that keeps making him uncomfortable?
“You haven’t grown up yet.”
Kaian thought that this might be because the child's beating of having something taken away by Valquiterre still remained a part of his memory in his mind as a full-fledged head of the family.
“So, when do you plan to go back?”
Kaian decided that he would start by taking care of Valquiterre's return schedule tomorrow.
On a sunny day, Valquiterre, lying on the shore of the Lake, mumbled boredom.
“Are you not coming today again?”
The third day ended with a night of welcome dinner.
Valquiterre could not even see the ends of Claudel's hair.
“Is it my fault?”
When he returned to the banquet hall, looking at Kaian's expression, he thought they had been fighting about something.
“But if I wanted to meet her, there would be nothing I could do to stop her.”
Valquiterre got up from the grass.
He picked a few flowers that caught his eye and made a small bouquet, then got up and headed to Claudel's room.
Without feeling lost, the room she was staying in was the room used by the ancestral Duchess, Madame Elise, so Valquiterre headed there without any hesitation.
He knocked on the door of her room, and a maid with brown hair and brown eyes opened the door for him, looked at him in surprise, then bowed her head politely.
“Claudel.”
“Your Majesty the King.”
He was about to ask her why she didn't call him Bark, but he ended up seeing her paying attention to her maid.
In other words, she didn't call him 'Bark' since the two of them weren't together right now.
“Are you in any pain? It’s going to be hard to see your face for a few days.”
Claudel shook her head at his words.
"No. I just stayed in my room for a long time to rest.”
“You said that because you were resting. I still don’t remember bothering you when I came to the estate.”
When Valquiterre spoke jokingly, Claudel lightly laughed along, but then her face fell again.
“Bark. I have something to tell you.”
“What is it?”
When Claudel made a serious face, he felt something happy.
'Is there anything you would like me to do?'
He was ready to listen to anything she said.
“Actually, I’m having a baby.”
'I'm such a fool that I turn a blind eye and pretend not to know what happened to Madame Marcel.'
Everyone in the castle was whispering behind their backs. Vermont and Temnes. Even though I was told that it was natural because it was a marriage without love that was forced, I couldn't keep my mouth shut because I had heard such things from him.
There was no such thing as a wife's rights over her husband. The treatment could have worsened to make matters worse by asking Kaian about Madame Marcel's business.
When it becomes clear that his wife has noticed or knows about his mistress' affairs, rather than feeling sorry and ending his affair, he becomes shameless and continues his relationship openly, dismissing it as 'something even the hostess knows about'. There was a lot to do.
'I put up with it because of the baby.'
I was scared of what Kaian would say, but now I was even more scared that the baby would be born and the parents' relationship would become very public.
'I thought I just had to endure it.'
On the outside, I could act as if I had seen nothing as if I had not heard anything, as if I were someone who enjoyed the abundance that Kaian gave me.
However, when Kaian suddenly spoke as if I and Valquiterre might cause some inappropriate misunderstanding in the eyes of others, I couldn't bear it at all.
Nevertheless, very passively.
I didn't scream, nor could I swear out of ny displeasure, and all I could say was, 'I can't believe you said such a thing to me in such a rude way.'
“It means you have to be careful with your actions.”
Kaian gave me words even more strength.
“Your Majesty the King is still unmarried. Aren’t the eyes in the kingdom focused on Your Majesty’s marriage?”
"Yes. I understand.”
I suppressed the feeling of not wanting to accept it.
“I will not take a single step out of my room until Your Majesty returns to the castle. Then is it okay?”
“Claudel.”
“You really don’t trust me.”
The words I heard from him in the royal castle once again rang vividly in my ears.
‘I am not your enemy. Me too... I'm Temnes.'
'But you're Vermont.'
I had a clear memory of my maiden name being called again from the mouth of the man, who had coldly pushed me out of the line.
'I can't trust you, Claudel.'
Even after hearing those words, I waved my hand endlessly in the empty air. Then, who knows, maybe even a handful of straws will be grasped. Sometimes, the urgent and anxious mind of a woman with no one to lean on can make her make a thousand, ten thousand gestures in vain in the air. In his mind, I continued to do such fleeting things.
In the end, I was the one who got hurt after telling Kaian, ‘Don’t you trust me?’
“That’s not what you meant, right?”
He spoke in a commanding tone as if he had no intention of persuading me.
“You’re overly sensitive. Let’s stop this story here.”
I did not answer but pursed my lips.
This was because I was so upset that I couldn't control myself and my pride was hurt.
Kaian, who was staring at me, pinned me down.
“Anyway, while serving His Majesty, mistakes or unpleasant incidents should never happen.”
"All right."
I didn't want to answer, but I forced myself to answer, and then Kaian left the bedroom.
I sat down on the bed and let out a long sigh.
***
After closing the door, Kaian realized that it was a mistake.
'I left my clothes behind.'
He had forgotten the classy matriarch's clothes suitable for the dinner that covered Claudel's body at the lakeside earlier.
"Ha."
He was in such a bad mood that he had trouble taking it back.
While the dinner was in full swing, Claudel quietly left her place. He thought it was because the doctor had repeatedly told him that women who have children tend to become unwell.
But after a while, Valquiterre also left the banquet hall, and when neither of them returned after a while, he suddenly had a bad feeling.
The reason he headed to the shore of the Lake in search of them was because of Kaian's astute instincts.
When he saw the two of them standing close to each other and talking, he felt like he was going to spin as soon as he saw them. Objectively, they were a pair that looked very well-matched. However, it was absurd that one of the two was his wife who was carrying his child.
'...Go back to capital?'
'You mean me?'
Finally, when he saw Claudel's smiling face looking at Valquiterre, his discomfort exploded as if a fuse had been completely lit.
The woman who entered the stable period gained weight and became more relaxed. She was so pretty that she could lift and lower a person's heart just by gently lifting the corner of her lips.
This person, who usually stood out as if she had a soft glow due to her skin being much whiter than that of ordinary women in the South, looked like a fairy on a night outing, with her red hair and white skin clearly visible in the dim light coming from the castle, even though she was standing in a dark place.
And Valquiterre seeing her.
For a moment, Kaian was overcome with a strange sense of anxiety and acted like a surprisingly crazy person.
He picked up the noise that was meaningless, wrapped up the woman dressed in a dress that revealed her body, and took her to the bedroom as if dragging her.
There was resentment and sadness in Claudel’s eyes.
'You really don't trust me.'
Kaian immediately understood what she was saying. She was recalling his rejection in the royal castle.
'How can I make you trust me?'
'I might believe it after giving birth to a successor. I hope you try.'
Sometimes he seemed to easily recall, in a few words, the heartaches she had experienced in the past.
It was his judgment and decision to deliberately hurt Claudel as if he were attacking her and to hold Claudel in his grasp so that she could not move.
He was afraid that she might be taken advantage of by the Duke of Vermont if he knew that her heart was entirely devoted to him.
He was confident that he had made the best choice for Temnes. However, every time he encountered Claudel's face like that, he became confused as to whether it was really the best thing to do.
There was a moment when he didn't know what to do because she loved him, and even when she was hurt, he was happy alone.
He thought that this kind of love could never be one, but he believed that it would be the best love between two enemy families.
Now Kaian keeps looking back at the choices he made, wondering if he made some wrong choices.
As a successor, Kaian was taught and raised to make his own decisions from a very young age, but once he made a choice, there was no going back, so he never reevaluated it.
As the head of the Temnes family, his words and actions are unconditionally correct.
'But I wonder if I'm doing it wrong.'
That feeling was very unfamiliar. If it weren't for Claudel's work, he could still choose one of the options as decisively as before, without any room to deviate from his decision. His work was the only exception.
Moreover, he was very concerned about what Valquiterre was doing.
'This doesn't make any sense.'
The look in Valquiterre's eyes at Claudel stimulated his sense of déjà vu. He's definitely seen Valquiterre's expression like that before. Before he blindly begged him to give him something that was Kaian's, he was always pretentiously and exaggeratedly affectionate or kind. It's like a beast that sets a trap and waits until its prey is caught.
'That's the look you make when you're looking at her.'
There were times when the beautiful face he praised as if an angel from heaven had come down from him, was particularly kind, and it was a meaningful smile that he only showed when he wanted to find out how important something that appealed to Kaian was to him.
Valquiterre did not covet anything unless it was something that Kaian cherished. However, if he did not take away or give away the items that Kaian valued, he would destroy them.
'It's already been more than ten years since Valquiterre did something like that.'
Besides, Claudel is not even a thing.
But what is this premonition that keeps making him uncomfortable?
“You haven’t grown up yet.”
Kaian thought that this might be because the child's beating of having something taken away by Valquiterre still remained a part of his memory in his mind as a full-fledged head of the family.
“So, when do you plan to go back?”
Kaian decided that he would start by taking care of Valquiterre's return schedule tomorrow.
***
On a sunny day, Valquiterre, lying on the shore of the Lake, mumbled boredom.
“Are you not coming today again?”
The third day ended with a night of welcome dinner.
Valquiterre could not even see the ends of Claudel's hair.
“Is it my fault?”
When he returned to the banquet hall, looking at Kaian's expression, he thought they had been fighting about something.
“But if I wanted to meet her, there would be nothing I could do to stop her.”
Valquiterre got up from the grass.
He picked a few flowers that caught his eye and made a small bouquet, then got up and headed to Claudel's room.
Without feeling lost, the room she was staying in was the room used by the ancestral Duchess, Madame Elise, so Valquiterre headed there without any hesitation.
He knocked on the door of her room, and a maid with brown hair and brown eyes opened the door for him, looked at him in surprise, then bowed her head politely.
“Claudel.”
“Your Majesty the King.”
He was about to ask her why she didn't call him Bark, but he ended up seeing her paying attention to her maid.
In other words, she didn't call him 'Bark' since the two of them weren't together right now.
“Are you in any pain? It’s going to be hard to see your face for a few days.”
Claudel shook her head at his words.
"No. I just stayed in my room for a long time to rest.”
“You said that because you were resting. I still don’t remember bothering you when I came to the estate.”
When Valquiterre spoke jokingly, Claudel lightly laughed along, but then her face fell again.
“Bark. I have something to tell you.”
“What is it?”
When Claudel made a serious face, he felt something happy.
'Is there anything you would like me to do?'
He was ready to listen to anything she said.
“Actually, I’m having a baby.”
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