Chapter 2.5
She couldn’t reveal Kian’s existence just like that. Kian was like her last line of defense.
However, Ines didn’t realize that by saying that, she had completely changed Rayan Eleanor’s way of thinking.
“A method I’d never understand in my whole life…”
He seemed to think for a moment, then smoothly lifted the corners of his lips in a smile.
Even a fool could tell it wasn’t a smile made out of joy.
“…Fine. I get it.”
The weight that had been pressing down on Ines’s body disappeared. But the Grand Duke didn’t step back.
Ines fixed her gaze on the slow, steady rise and fall of his uniform’s collar. He stayed silent for a long time, as if deciding what to do with her.
She felt nervous. Ines licked her dry lips.
“What are you going to do to me…?”
“I don’t understand why you keep asking me that.”
His reply came immediately, unlike what she expected. The impatient anger that had clouded his noble face earlier was now completely gone.
“Have I ever harmed you? I think it was the opposite.”
Rayan casually continued as he undid the buttons of his uniform coat.
“Did my people mistreat you while you were in the imperial palace?”
“That’s… not it.”
“If even one person treated you poorly, tell me now. I’ll drag them here and make them kneel in front of you.”
“N-No. Everyone was kind. I never lacked anything…!”
“Is that so?”
He tossed the black uniform jacket onto the sofa. His shirt and vest, pulled tight, were half-drenched, revealing the movements of his defined muscles.
“Then you’ve betrayed me.”
Rayan laughed as he unbuttoned the cuffs of his sleeves.
“I clearly showed you kindness. You even expressed your thanks for it. And the very next day, you ran away.”
“…”
“So before Lezan and Eleanor, the one you tricked was me. Try and deny it.”
His words seemed to carve themselves into her eardrums.
He was right. He was the one who had stopped her from being thrown into Lezan’s underground prison and taken her to Eleanor’s room.
He had never loudly demanded anything from her. He never yelled, hit, or forced her into anything…
The dark and sensual atmosphere he gave off overwhelmed her. Before she realized it, Ines found herself nodding as if hypnotized.
‘That’s right. He was the first person who was kind to me…’
[Get a hold of yourself, Ines.]
If Kian hadn’t sharply warned her, she might have truly believed that.
…!
She snapped back to her senses. When she realized she had been briefly swayed by his presence, heat rushed to her cheeks and ears.
“I know you only treated me well because you wanted to use me.”
Ines quickly turned her head, avoiding his gaze.
“You… were trying to make me choose you. That’s why you were so kind to me.”
“Go on.”
“You couldn’t actually make me the crown princess of Lezan. So you chose the next best option. I don’t know what Eleanor received from Lezan in return for that… but…”
“…”
“I’m not a fool. It wasn’t that hard to guess from the beginning.”
There was no response from the Grand Duke. Perhaps because she had hit the mark.
Once he was out of sight, her voice gradually became more composed.
“Your Highness. I won’t go back.”
But as she stared at the rain slashing down the window, Ines didn’t realize what kind of look he was giving her.
“I understand that it might feel like betrayal. And I know I caused you a lot of trouble. But…”
“‘A lot of trouble’ doesn’t begin to cover it, Ines.”
He cut her off mid-sentence, not giving her a chance to argue.
“Surely you’ve heard that your escape almost caused another war.”
She thought he was angry at her defiance, but that wasn’t it. His voice was calm.
But there was a sharp edge in what he said.
“Who knows how many more innocent people could’ve died like dogs? Maybe this time, Lezan’s royal heads would’ve ended up displayed on the walls. So don’t try to soften it with words like ‘trouble.’”
Cracks appeared on Ines’s face.
She had been born a kind person. And the man before her knew exactly how to shake someone like that.
‘I can’t let words like that sway me.’
Ines tried hard to hold herself together.
She thought of all the times she had been treated worse than a bug since birth, of the countless nights she prayed not to starve or be beaten the next day.
She remembered the cold Jenaire Palace, where no one ever protected her.
She recalled the countless hostile gazes that followed her every time she stepped out of Eleanor’s room in the Lezan palace.
“I’m not a person of Lezan, Your Highness.”
She believed she was allowed to be this selfish, at least once.
“And I was never a person in Jenaire, either.”
“…”
“Why should I sacrifice myself for people who never even treated me like a human being?”
The only thing Ines had done wrong was being born. Everyone said that alone made her less than a bug, so she never even realized how unfair it was.
She had spent her short life being brainwashed. It had become familiar. But after just six months of living outside, she started to want more.
“I don’t know about power struggles between nations. All I know is, if I had stayed there, I would’ve died just as miserably as always. That’s why I ran. Is that such a crime?”
It was the first time she had ever said such words out loud. Her voice trembled with tears, but it was firm.
“Does a bastard child not even have the right to run away? That… that just doesn’t seem right to me.”
“…”
“I didn’t learn much, so I don’t know how to say it properly. I just want to be happy.”
“…”
“At the very least… I want to live like a human being.”
Rayan listened quietly to her words, then suddenly smiled.
“The world doesn’t value that kind of reason.”
In a world where power moved based on causes and justifications, one person’s happiness was worth less than a page in a fairy tale.
The weak being sacrificed was natural. Protecting the many by sacrificing the few — that was how Rayan Eleanor, a ruler, thought.
For a woman as insignificant as her to disappear for half a year — how much had that shaken Eleanor’s position? How many times had they nearly lost the Gelnor Plains, which they had taken from Lezan?
How many absurd demands had that arrogant Jenaire made using her disappearance as an excuse?
How sick he was of chasing her across the land…
But instead of lashing out, Rayan quietly studied her face.
At what point would she falter?
Which words would she reject, and which ones would draw her in?
“…I know.”
“…”
“But I don’t understand why we have to care so much about what the world thinks.”
Ines looked at him just as he looked at her — a pure, searching gaze.
But Ines was the one who found his weakness first.
“Your Highness. Do you know what they taught me in Jenaire?”
“…”
“They taught me how to seduce and please men.”
“What?”
A small crack appeared in his calm expression. Rayan’s face hardened with a terrifying seriousness.
“Have you ever been with a man?”
“N-No.”
Ines turned pale and shook her head.
The woman in charge of her education in Jenaire had been an old head maid.
She had been beaten harshly, but she refused the order to actually try it. She’d rather hang herself than obey.
“If I had, I wouldn’t be here. I would’ve taken my own life. But I still learned a lot.”
Her eyes reddened with shame.
“They said once I became the crown princess, I had to bear a royal heir… I’m sure it would’ve been the same even if I’d gone to Eleanor.”
At the end of her thin voice, the tears she had barely held back welled up again.
“I don’t want to live like that.”
“…”
“I never wanted to live like that.”
She didn’t want to cling to a man she didn’t love, receive his seed, and bear his child — especially not for someone who didn’t even want her.
“I don’t want to be with someone I don’t love…”
If it came to that, she’d rather live miserably on the streets.
And even more so, she didn’t want to act like a prostitute toward the man she truly wanted.
Ines couldn’t bring herself to say that aloud. She bowed her head.
‘I’ve said enough. Now he’ll back off.’
He wouldn’t even want to touch her. He wouldn’t want to kiss her like before. She twisted her body to get away from him.
“You must be disgusted. I understand. That’s why I told you. Now please let me go.”
“…Do you even know what you’re saying I’m disgusted by?”
“I know you don’t want me. No one wants a bastard who was trained to do the same thing as a prostitute. Even I wouldn’t want someone like that.”
“…”
“A bastard who ruins Lezan’s honor is better off dead. You could just report that I ran away without knowing my place and died somewhere.”
Her voice was now almost pleading.
“I’ll live quietly. I won’t hurt anyone. I’ll live like a mouse…”
“…”
“So please just go, Your Highness.”
Rayan stared at the woman who whispered so desperately to him.
Unfortunately for her, he had no intention of letting her go.
She still didn’t even understand what emotion of his she was triggering.
It was annoying. It made him scoff. She seemed so pathetic. And yet, he couldn’t stop looking at her. Until he figured out why, he wouldn’t let her run again.
He didn’t care what method she had used to escape.
This time, he’d make sure she didn’t even have the chance to think of it.
‘She said she stayed in that herb shop for a while…’
Rayan remembered the old man who had run around calling Ines’s name.
He had no hesitation about what he was thinking.
This woman was his, no matter what.
So no matter what he had to do—
What difference did it make?
A faint smile formed on his lips.
“…Fine. I understand.”
