Winter Bud - Chapter 13

“It doesn’t matter whose child he is.”

“….”

“He’ll grow up in the imperial palace.”

His voice was flat and indifferent. He asked, “That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Nanna should’ve nodded quickly, but for a moment, she almost said no. She barely held it back. Having just escaped that instant, her face flushed hot, and her nose stung.

Nanna didn’t want her child to grow up in the palace. When she’d spoken of her confinement, what she’d truly wanted was to leave together with her children. Perhaps it had always been because of this feeling. She didn’t want to leave her children beside this man.

She wanted to take them away from his side. That desire was as strong and alluring as her wish to die. Nanna trembled faintly, then parted her dry lips.

“I just… I just want them beside me.”

“All right.”

“Wherever I am… I want my babies to be at peace.”

Moisture trailed down her cheek. It so quickly pooled between her lips. The Emperor stared blankly at her. His eyes, like bottomless abysses where one couldn’t fathom what lurked, appeared very dark, pitch black.

It was strange. His eyes were a bright amber. Depending on the light, they sometimes blazed a fierce orange, sometimes softened to warm hazel. But they never looked black.

Yet to Nanna, his eyes always looked perfectly black. Like a predator’s gaze, sharp and menacing. So she quickly lowered her own eyes. No matter how she cried, he didn’t care in the slightest. Rather, he seemed almost uneasy, as though realizing she was an object that actually had emotions.

“Stand up.”

Nanna slowly straightened her knees and stood. Below her calves, a tingling ache spread, as though pricked by hundreds of needles. She knew what he would command. He’d tell her to lift her dress, or to strip. Nanna knew it already.

She knew the Emperor despised her. He lusted for her, and that only made him despise her more. He loved Stateira so deeply he couldn’t distinguish pure love from lust. Even now, he probably still did. He never drew a line between desire and devotion. That was why he felt disgust whenever he violated Nanna. More precisely, it was his own despair and frustration that twisted him into this. Into a savage beast who tormented and hated her endlessly.

“Take it off.”

The man lifted his glass and swallowed his drink as he spoke. Without hesitation, Nanna removed her dress. In a short while, she was naked. He looked at the translucent negligee that had fallen to the floor, then rose from his seat.

A shiver ran through her. To keep herself from bolting in fear, she bit her lower lip softly. She felt as though tears would come again. By now, this should’ve been nothing to her. She should’ve grown accustomed to it. But still, she couldn’t.

‘Stupid bitch.’

Nanna wiped her tear-soaked cheeks with the back of her hand. Why was she so foolish? Why so pathetic? Strictly speaking, Nanna hadn’t done anything so terribly wrong. The fact that she hadn’t died that day weighed on her too. That she hadn’t died in Stateira’s place. If she hadn’t survived back then, she wouldn’t be suffering such disgrace now.

Becoming empress wasn’t a stroke of luck for her. For a penniless woman like her to rise to such a position was nothing but a misfortune. She was empress in name only. In truth, she was nothing but the womb the Duke had offered up to the Emperor. Just another tribute, like all the others he had presented…. That was why she was mocked, not only by the Emperor but by the noblewomen as well.

Nanna was more used to the scorn and ridicule of noblewomen than to serving the Emperor at night. There was nothing laughable about it.

“Why are you laughing?”

“Did… did I laugh?”

Nanna asked quickly, shaking her head in panic. She was afraid he’d misunderstand. She hardened her expression, as always, and said firmly, “No.” She was terrified he’d think she was laughing at ease in front of him.

“I just… just….”

“Turn around.”

Nanna’s words were cut short. She thought it was better that way and hunched her shoulders as she turned her back. The Emperor didn’t want to have sex while looking at her face. At first, Nanna didn’t know why, but in time she understood and now it didn’t matter to her. Because even she didn’t want to meet his gaze.

He was a man who felt guilty for lusting after her. In truth, she preferred it this way too. She also didn’t want to meet the man’s eyes during sex. His expression of guilt at the moment he climaxed was painful for her too. The way he twisted his face as if constantly scorning her was the same.

So if possible, it was better not to look at his face. Nanna looked down at the hand grabbing her breast. It was an awfully big hand. As long and nimble as Duke Everhardt’s, each joint was thick. Even without force, the veins on the back of his hand stood out sharply, and even his hand terrified her.

“You begged the Duke not to send you to the Western Palace, didn’t you?”

“That’s….”

“And you thought he’d grant that.”

The Emperor’s voice was like dry sandpaper. The rustling whisper wasn’t particularly harsh, but Nanna was a woman who feared even his breathing. She parted her lips faintly, then only clasped her hands and shed tears. She thought he might grab her hair.

If she made a mistake, she might be slapped. Even without doing wrong. Just her being before his eyes could be enough. To the Emperor, her very existence was displeasing….

“So you sucked the Duke’s cock too?”

“That’s not true.”

“If you didn’t sell your cunt, then how could Alexis have been born?”

He laughed. As if it were something amusing. Nanna gasped, her face twisted. More than the tone of someone utterly convinced, what shocked her was the way he spoke of her violation by the Duke as though it were a joke, a piece of gossip. Nanna trembled, unable to contain the humiliation and betrayal.

“Speak.”

“H-hahk, ugh….”

A long cry slipped from her bitten lips. She endured him with her eyes shut, until suddenly her hair was yanked and her face twisted back to meet his gaze. The man was laughing, but it was distorted. So distorted it was terrifying. Enough that he looked like he was truly furious.

“…Your Majesty.”

Her moist voice slipped from her wet lips. He acted as though he didn’t hear. That terrified and saddened Nanna most of all. The Emperor ignored her pain. Sometimes, it even seemed he enjoyed it. Nanna’s screams and moans… everything she cried out beneath his heavy body seemed to fuel his lust.

Suddenly, his large hand seized her hair. The act was familiar, but the pain never dulled. Nanna’s hair was wrenched back cruelly, and tears fell. Her throat prickled with goosebumps as she groaned and panted.

“I never… never did that.”

Nanna lied. But it was the truth too. She hadn’t consented. She hadn’t done it out of desire. Had she ever once enjoyed it? She bit her lip. To have to lie like this before the man she had once loved was miserable. He flung her hair onto the bed. Nanna, naked, let out a muffled moan as she caught herself on the mattress.

He grabbed her ass. The plump flesh, round like a white moon, was crushed in his grip. Her wet eyes blinked. After Stateira had fallen, the Emperor had accepted her more easily than she had imagined. And he had taken her easily.

Even when he saw her naked, his cock hadn’t moved at first. But now it swelled quickly. They said pregnancy was a matter of constitution. What Stateira had begged an alchemist for secret arts to achieve, Nanna had done easily. Without anything special, she conceived quickly. She hadn’t thought it pitiful then, but only after she found herself in that situation did she realize the misery of it.