IBWCD 09

Chapter 09

“Huh.”

Khalian swept a hand across his wet face, his dark hair tumbling in the downpour.

An unpleasant sensation washed over the shadowed face beneath.

The spire before him was said to have been built by the Count of Lawrence to hold heretics for trial.

Realizing what was going on, Kalian jerked to the aide standing diagonally behind him.

“Benjamin, what do you think a young lady of the count’s household is doing here?”

Benjamin smoothed his hair, disheveled from a full day of frantically following him, and replied.

“Hmm, at least he’s not interrogating the criminal himself. Noble blood, after all.”

Indeed. A noble was a noble, even if she was a half-breed who couldn’t inherit the title.

But what about her appearance?

She was dressed like a maid.

She was so thin that her bones showed.

A voice begging to be heard, desperate to know if her mother was alive or dead.

The gaunt woman, no better than a slum beggar, was clear in her words. She was not in a position to interrogate, but to be interrogated.

Callian drew her halberd from its sheath, remembering the mauve aura that hovered over the woman’s fingertips.

“Let’s see what brought me here.”

With a violent crash, the stone door that separated them split in two.

* * *

“Your Highness, what the…!”

Louise, who had heard of the uninvited guest’s visit, hurried into the dungeon.

It wasn’t just the fact that Evelyn had been imprisoned and abused, but that the dungeon held secrets that should never be revealed to anyone, especially the descendant of the warlock in front of her.

Dizzy with excitement, she blocked the path to the dungeon with her entire body.

“This place is under my authority as mistress of House Lawrence! How dare you trespass and disturb the order of the boudoir? It is not illegal to discipline a maid!”

This is the Count’s territory, and even if he were the Grand Duke, he could not use force or enforce the law.

Even knowing this, Kalian’s gait was unyielding. His mouth tilted upward as if he were about to spew venom.

“Maid?”

She stumbled back, terrified.

Tearing his gaze away from her, he scanned the labyrinth underground interior and spoke in a cracked voice.

“The bearer of a noble family’s surname and symbol is now being treated as a maid?”

The air around them instantly froze.

It was a voice Benjamin had never heard before, not even from the knights accompanying Kalian.

Louise, barely able to breathe amidst the eerie atmosphere of the prowling spirits, grasped the hem of her rain-drenched robe.

“I’m sorry, I was so flustered I didn’t realize I was talking. Oh, well, once you’re outside and have a cup of tea or something,…!”

“Can we go that way, and I’ll have tea with the lady.”

Louise’s eyes narrowed in confusion as Kalian casually turned to the left, as if no one had given him directions.

Still, she tried to feign nonchalance, gripping her stony thigh tightly and pleading once more.

“I realize this is the wrong place to be, of course, but I’m in the middle of a disciplinary matter, Sire, so please, please…”

“Discipline?”

“As you may know… Evelyn is to be betrothed to Viscount Fairfield, and rumors of such a child sneaking into the Grand Duke’s quarters have left her mother with no choice but to crack down on her unruly behavior.”

Married to a junkie old man who’ll die any day

Bored by the revealing remarks, Kalian swallowed back a rising curse and rubbed his brow.

As for the Lawrence family’s finances and Evelyn’s situation, he’d already checked.

Benjamin had scoured the information guilds in the capital.

“Bill Fairfield, seventy-two years old. Said to have an abnormal sexual appetite and to buy obedient, young women to serve as his bedmates. The young lady was exactly what the Viscount wanted.”

“On his terms?”

“With no family to run to, no backbone to stand up for her, I suppose he thought he could treat her as he pleased.”

Suddenly, he remembered the eyes that seemed to be begging to be saved.

Eyes that reminded him of the season of fresh green, eyes he’d seen at least once in his tediously long life.

“Hmm.”

Looking down at the floor, he knitted the tips of his brows together and took a deep breath, as if to clear his mind of the image.

He didn’t know why he felt so dirty, crawling to the bottom of the abyss.

“Isn’t it the wife who is unchaste, blinded by greed and running up debts at every turn?”

The high priest, Julius’ foster daughter Louise, used the excuse of consecration to spread Lawrence’s wealth around the temple.

Her extravagance was so great that when the budget ran low, she borrowed money here and there.

“If you’re trying to get your debts forgiven, doesn’t it make sense for you to become the Viscount’s mistress?”

With a grimace, he drew his magic sword and tilted his head as if to say that if she confessed her sins at this point, he would be lenient.

“I don’t understand why you would want someone else to bear that burden.”

“You are speaking too much. How could I be in a relationship with a crazy old man like that…!”

The words came out of her mouth as fast as they came out, and Louise bit her lower lip as if she realized she’d made a mistake.

Her eyes sunk into the darkness beneath the black hair that fell over her forehead.

“I think I’ve given you enough chances.”

A dark green aura flared over Kalian’s hilt as he muttered darkly.

“You’re not talking.”

The Tartaros, a magic sword passed down through the generations of the family, is violet in color by nature, but when it absorbs magic, it emits a murky green aura.

Its color has changed because traces of the drugs and spells used to cast the curse have accumulated in the enclosed space.

He flicked his finger lightly.

“You dare to use your extraordinary power to take another’s life.”

Then the aura leapt with a chilling fleshiness, prowling around the cowering Louise like infernal fire.

“My power hates good people and loves unclean things. What do you think? Wouldn’t you like to feel what it’s like to be poisoned by a curse?”

Louise threw her hands up in the air, looking like she’d seen a ghost.

“Agh! Please go away, please go away!”

Marcella’s dying face began to flicker before her eyes. It was an illusion created by her evil thoughts.

“I was only doing what I was told, what could I have done wrong…!”

She crawled to her knees, dropped her head at the Grand Duke’s feet, and began to tremble violently.

Kalian looked down at her, unmoved.

“Drag her away.”

“No, no!”

‘Just a little longer!’

She wanted to protest, but Louise’s mouth was already sealed with a contractual non-disclosure spell. It was a kind of tail-cutting.

“You’re tired.”

After the orderlies dragged the struggling Louise out of the room, Kalian walked down the long hallway in silence for a while.

And then.

Clang!

His eyes narrowed as he recognized the woman, her holy glow still visible in the dimly lit cell.

‘Had she lost her mind?’

Dangling from the crude chains, Evelyn’s arms were raised high in the air, her body hanging limply.

“I’ll do the rest. Everyone out.”

Crumpling his massive form into the cell, Kalian bit down on each of the knights, then removed the chains and restraints that bound her.

Clang!

The last of the restraints dropped to the floor, and he dropped to one knee, bracing himself firmly against her limp back and the backs of her thighs.

The feel and scent of her pale flesh washed over him.

“Ha, ha…”

He was about to pull away when a ragged gasp escaped the unbound woman’s mouth.

Kalian lowers his gaze to see if she’s awake, but her eyes are still closed tightly.

Even in his daze, the flushed cheeks were as vivid and promiscuous as his pent-up need.

Kalian pushed away the floating memories of that night and looked away.

Then, scooping her up in his arms to steady her spinning backward, he led her out of the prison.

‘Where should we go, it would be dangerous to leave her here at the Count’s estate.’

He slowly ascended the spiral staircase of the dungeon, wondering where she might be.

“This isn’t a dream… is it?”

Evelyn’s eyelids slowly lifted upward as she spoke.

Her plight was evident in her face, which was as lifeless as a smooth glazed porcelain doll.

One could only imagine how much of her life had been filled with resignation.

“I’m afraid so.”

He replied in an emotionless tone.

The strange vibrations in his heart must have been the faint anger of witnessing the abuse.

As he wrapped his arms around her slender body, her voice trembled in his ear.

“I knew you’d come.”

A dull ache in the pit of her stomach as she came face to face with the hope of a lifetime.

“I believed you, I really did…”

He was born with the destiny of a guardian, and from the day he was born, he was the center of the nation’s expectations and attention.

So there was no reason for his heart to feel as heavy as a stone in his chest when she said she truly believed.

So Kalian was a little confused.

“I told you, I’d find you, even if you took to the skies.”

He was silent for a moment, then looked her straight in the eyes, which were clouding over again.

“I have no reason to let go of someone who needs me, so you’d better not think of running away from me in the future.”

His golden eyes, once flickering with confusion, finally settled into calm.