Winter Bud - Chapter 14

“Your Majesty.”

“I know you. Even the lustful thoughts you held for me….”

Unlike his rough hands, his voice was quiet. Yet it was coarse and sharp enough to make Nanna tremble in fear. She clenched her lips and let tears fall. At the word “lust,” she felt as if she might die of torment. As though pressed under a lump of lead, she couldn’t regain her senses easily.

So the Emperor knew that from the very beginning, even before he had noticed her, she had loved him. And yet that long, lonely love, he called lust…. The face that had flushed with burning shame instantly crumbled at the fact that he had discovered it.

The Emperor spun her around. He seemed to want to observe her expression closely.

“Th-that’s….”

“I know you wanted me. So what did you do to Thea?”

“Nothing, I didn’t do anything.”

“No. You left her to die.”

“That’s….”

Nanna, who had been shaking her head furiously, froze stiff. She feared the Emperor might once again explode in rage over what had happened to Stateira. That suffocating terror was directed at her alone. The gaze that scolded a dog for failing to die with its master. In the face of that rebuke and rightful condemnation, she wanted only to die. If she could, she wanted to throw herself into the Tamburin River. Yet even in those freezing waters, she felt she wouldn’t be able to close her eyes.

“Truly….”

She trembled, eyes cast downward. She had envied Stateira. She had often been jealous. She had once resented the heavens, asking why not a single good thing was given to her. Yet Nanna had never slandered or hated Stateira enough to plot against her. That day had been no different.

“I too… I too regretted that I didn’t die. I thought, why was it not me but my lady who had to die? That’s what I thought.”

Nanna’s tears flowed without pause. The Emperor only looked down at her with indifferent eyes. Eyes that believed nothing, so there was no more need to defend herself. Nanna closed her mouth. Since she was stripped bare, he would push himself between her thighs.

She clenched her lips and blankly stared at his chest. Unlike her, the man who hadn’t undressed pressed down against her. The hand that had gripped her ass now forced her legs apart. The Emperor knew well. That such an act was nothing more than punishment, no more than mounting. That was why he called her “female,” “womb,” or “toilet.”

That was truly how he thought of her. So it was impossible to imitate Stateira, even if she died. Once, she had thought it possible. And now she was ashamed of that past, wishing she could bite her tongue.

“Mm, haah….”

The thick thing burrowing into her narrow hole was repulsive. Her wandering gaze fell on the joining place. It felt like watching a biological act devoid of even a hint of desire. Perhaps that was why her juices wouldn’t flow easily. An act without any foreplay was unbearably cruel.

Sometimes it felt like torture. She exhaled shallowly, trembling in small shivers. The column that pushed slowly inside was now fully buried. The sensation wasn’t good. There was no fullness, no overwhelming feeling. It simply didn’t feel real.

That the Emperor was raping her…. That he had shoved himself in to the base…. That she and the Emperor had come to this point….

What is fate? If she had known it would come to this, would Nanna have yearned for him in those days? Even if this reality wasn’t the result of her desire, maybe she would never have loved him.

Nanna truly hadn’t wanted it to end this way. There had been a time when she feared nothing more than flushing red under his gaze. When even the fact that her heart beat for him was agony. When it was unbearable to know that the woman he loved was her mistress before her eyes…. He was a man she couldn’t dare to hope for, not even in dreams, yet the sight of him pressing his lips to Stateira’s cheek had filled her with rapture. So….

“What are you thinking?” he asked. It was a low growl, like something scraping his throat. Like a beast’s roar in a deep register. Her cooled cheeks were wet again.

Nanna shook her head. “Nothing….”

“Aren’t you tired of deceiving me?”

“I was thinking of the past.”

At Nanna’s answer, something flickered in the man’s eyes. She realized she had made a mistake. She should have said she wasn’t thinking of anything until the end. But it was already spilled water. Nanna added, “Wh-when I was a child.” He didn’t react. Like groping still objects, there was no warmth.

“As Your Majesty said, I’m a lowly, vulgar woman.”

“And?”

“I never thought I’d end up like this… never thought I’d bear Your Majesty’s child. So, it just doesn’t feel real….”

Nanna wasn’t lying. It wasn’t what she was thinking in that exact moment, but in truth, Nanna often thought that way. How did it come to this? How did she come to meet such noble people she’d never even have reason to see in her life? Why was a lowly woman like her warming the Emperor’s bed? How did she end up borrowing her womb to bear his children?

“Mm, haah, ah…!”

Suddenly, he moved his hips. Nanna instinctively pushed against his chest with both hands. Considering her legs were spread wide and joined to him, it was a useless flutter. Still, Nanna didn’t want him pressing closer.

She stared at the man’s body moving above her without a word. She wanted to avert her gaze, but it was fixed in place like a nail. His amber eyes, sunk in shadow, were as cold as a reptile’s. She twisted her lips and bit down until she let out a moan from the harsh friction inside.

“Ah, ngh, ah, ah! Hhhk!”

The hand clutching her pelvis seized her full breasts. He pressed her erect nipples with his thumbs, rolling them gently. Then even her long-silent clit hardened, and her hole, which gripped him, began to grow wet. From that mechanical foreplay, Nanna wept again. But the Emperor didn’t care. Nanna covered her lips with her hand and blankly watched what he did.

He moved everything slower than she expected. The rotation of his hips, the circling of his hand over her clit. All of it was unhurried. Yet he gave no reaction to her words.

That unsettled her. The Emperor who wasn’t angry felt strange. He loathed Nanna. Just seeing her breathe irritated him. Why was she alive? Why did she get pregnant so easily? He hated even that.

Because Stateira hadn’t been able to have it…. Because she, who had everything, couldn’t be a mother. Nanna was the complete opposite. That was why she became empress, and that was why she was hated. Because betraying the woman he loved was something he could never forgive himself for. Naturally, Nanna became the seat of his disgust.

“Your Majesty. P-please, hurry….”

It was too hard to endure him, so she begged for him to finish quickly. The Emperor too must have wanted to release soon. Perhaps embracing her was torment for him as well. But what came back was only a cold stare. She stiffened her tear-streaked face. Then she tilted her head back and looked at the ceiling.

The Emperor thrust wordlessly. His hands clutched her shaking breasts as his dry face twisted while his hips moved again and again until he finally came. Nanna felt him pulling out. At the same time, she felt his seed flow between the quivering folds of her hole. She held back a gasp. After tidying himself, he left the bedchamber.

Nanna stared blankly at the ceiling. Wrapped in darkness… the world filled with the deep, hazy light of night rippled like a slow wave, endlessly vast.