Winter Bud - Chapter 20

“You remarried?”

Eight years had passed. So maybe it was only natural for him to have remarried. No, it was inevitable. He was the Emperor. And besides, she hadn’t given him any children. As far as she remembered, even back then, he had been under pressure over the matter of an heir. There had often been factions trying to depose her because of it. At the very least, if she couldn’t bear children. If she were barren, unable to produce an heir as Empress, then he should at least take a concubine….

There had even been public opinion that the abolished harem system should be reinstated. But Karl had rejected every one of those opinions.

“With who?”

“There are children too.”

“Then who is it? Who became your wife? Is it someone I know?”

“Someone you know very well.”

“Stop dragging it out and say it.”

She didn’t want to lose her temper. He must have been flustered too. But if he hadn’t wanted to face this moment, then he should have let Stateira die. Yet… Karl looked at her distorted face and hesitated before he spoke.

“It’s Nanna?”

“….”

“It’s her? You married her?”

That girl bore your children? A wave of dizziness hit. Thea’s eyelids, burning red, trembled pitifully as she let out a ragged breath. She couldn’t bear to look at her husband, so she turned her head away. Tears streamed down her cheeks. Still, her vision swam endlessly.

She remembered the face of her maid who had dropped to her knees the moment she saw her. A face as if confessing a mortal sin…. She was stunned. Bewildered. Why had she wept with that kind of face?

“So that was it. That’s why.”

A bitter laugh escaped. Her husband said nothing. Was it because there was nothing to say, no matter how many mouths he had? Her mind went blank. Children too…. That phrase kept circling in her head. How many had she borne? Since he said “children,” it must be more than one. Her blood felt like it was freezing.

It was only natural, and yet it didn’t feel that way. Because it was something she could never do. She had even tried to borrow the power of alchemy, but had failed in the end…. Her wet face twisted in agony.

“Should I congratulate you?”

“Thea.”

“How old is the eldest? I want to see them too. How many children are there?”

Stateira turned her head. A bitter smile broke out. But it wasn’t an empty question. She truly wanted to see them. Her husband and her maid’s children…. How many there were, how old they were, what they looked like—she wanted to know everything. Even if knowing now would bring her nothing….

“Bring them here. I want to see them.”

“Calm down.”

“I’m fine. Really. I’m trying to accept it.”

Stateira smiled. She tried to look at him with the most harmless smile she could make. But her husband didn’t listen. Instead of ordering his attendant, he placed both hands on her shoulders. She shuddered with disgust, her shoulders twisting as if a bug had landed on her. Truly, it was the first time she had ever felt such a thing.

How could she feel this way toward Karl… toward her only husband? Was this what it meant to live long enough? A hollow laugh slipped out. She smiled, yet her face twisted grotesquely. Tears streamed without end.

She tried to understand. It had been eight years. Things couldn’t possibly be the same. Karl was the Emperor. He couldn’t have waited only for her. And yet….

“I love you.”

Thea wanted to bite her lip and lift her gaze to him. Another woman…. The man who had remarried her maid, the one she had saved and cherished like a sister, was saying he still loved her. As if he didn’t even realize how horrific those words were….

“Then you shouldn’t have waited for me.”

“I couldn’t do that.”

His heavy voice spilled from between his beautiful lips like a groan. Thea trembled and shook her head. She would never understand him. As he said, eight years had passed, and things couldn’t be the same as before. But how could she ever love the man who had betrayed her as if he were the same man from the past?

“I curse you.”

“I don’t care.”

He smiled faintly. Stateira glared at him as if holding a knife. He gently cupped her wet face. His touch stirred old memories. Amber eyes tinged with the red of the sunset. Sacred and deep…. That mythical beauty made her heart race once again.

“You knew. Didn’t you? You knew I wouldn’t be able to leave you.”

Clutching her crumbling heart, she forced the words out. Karl couldn’t answer. Thea lowered her gaze. Even if Karl had chosen another woman, her place was still at his side. She was still the Empress. So it wasn’t her who had to disappear, but Nanna. Thea slowly nodded. But….

“You’ll keep her as a concubine?”

“Thea.”

Her voice, sharp with reproach, sounded almost hysterical. It was the Empress Dowager who stopped her. She too seemed to agree with her son’s words. Thea tried to regain her reason. It was difficult, but if it was something she ultimately had to endure, then she shouldn’t argue.

Karl said he basically agreed with her as well. There couldn’t be two Empresses of the Empire. That had never happened even in the history of the Old Empire.

“You alone are my empress.”

No matter how much time had passed. Even if she could never bear an heir…. In terms of qualities and foundation as empress, Nanna could never surpass her. The position Nanna borrowed as the daughter of Duke Everhardt had originally been hers, and a fake could never become the real one….

But she hadn’t expected he would keep her as a concubine. Thea quietly turned her gaze. Nanna, kneeling as if she had committed a mortal sin, looked like the wax doll she used to play with as a child. So small and delicate, so beautiful.

Suddenly, she remembered the past when she had spared Nanna’s life. She had been a devoted aesthete. Just as she had fallen in love with Karl, whom she had saved when he fled after his family was ruined, because he was beautiful.

It had been the same with Nanna. Because she was more beautiful than the wax doll her father had given her as a child. Her silver hair rippled like a blossoming flower. Her cheeks were radiant. Her small face, nestled in those cloud-like curls, looked like a sculpture finely carved by a master. Her graceful body that fell below her slender neck was the very ideal of a woman’s form.

The full breasts that Stateira could never have, the narrow waist, the smoothly curved hips, and the slim legs were utterly mesmerizing. Her bright sky-blue eyes were as pure as flawless aquamarine, her nose high, and her red lips full and lovely. So perhaps Karl also took considerable pleasure in holding her.

At that moment, Thea was consumed by an emotion so sharp it turned black. Pure murderous intent blazed like a fire in a furnace. She wanted to kill Nanna. The Nanna she had once cherished so dearly….

“She was once the Empress, Thea. And above all, she’s the mother of the imperial children.”

“….”

“You can’t return a woman like that to her original status.”

The Empress Dowager’s voice was firm. Thea, without turning her gaze, asked Nanna, who sat frozen.

“What do you think, Nanna?”

“I… I don’t care what happens to me.”

“Is that really so?”

“Even if I lived out my life in a convent instead of the Western Palace, it would be fine. As long as I could sometimes see the children… even just exchange letters with them, I could accept living under any name.”

Still weeping quietly, Nanna wiped her tears with the back of her hand as she murmured. She was sincere. She didn’t want to live as empress, nor as the Emperor’s concubine. Empress or concubine, it would be the same. The Emperor’s attitude toward her would not change.

He would glare at her as if he wanted to kill her, acting as though every misfortune and tragedy began with her. Better, then, to be shut away in a convent, to spend her life among old nuns until death. If such quiet and peace could be hers, she would be overjoyed.

To hear news of the children from time to time, to exchange letters with them….

“That can’t be allowed.”

Nanna lifted her gaze. That indifferent, low voice rang in her ears. She looked at the man who once again sought to strip her of everything.

“I can’t leave you that far away.”

The Emperor murmured in a dry voice. Nanna only stared at him blankly, lips parted, her face pale.