[CHAPTER 107]
The question that followed sounded cold enough to sting.
Even so, Havrich felt nothing but gladness, because it had been so long since Lincia had asked him anything.
“You don’t need to worry about me.”
“Then make sure I don’t have to worry.”
“I will.”
And the fact that she admitted she was bothered by him felt strangely sweet.
“Will you be going for a walk again today?”
“No.”
Her answer was curt, yet Havrich felt satisfied just by getting a glance of her violet eyes now and then.
Nine months.
That was what Lincia had given him.
If he could, Havrich wanted to stay by her side the entire time and spend every moment trying to win her heart back.
But there were matters he could no longer ignore.
He had already skipped several procedures the moment he heard Lincia was in danger.
Havrich gently stroked the tips of Lincia’s fingers, then stood up.
The smell of food drifting up from below suggested it was almost time to eat.
“Would you like to have lunch together?”
“I’d rather eat alone in my room.”
“I’ll bring it to you.”
* * *
It was late in the evening.
“Have you eaten dinner?”
“Yes.”
“I’m glad you seem to be eating well.”
Lincia had no desire to eat with Havrich.
She still could not eat properly, and she did not want him to witness that.
There would be no difference from before.
He probably already knew she wasn’t eating well, but knowing indirectly and seeing it directly were not the same.
These past few days, even though Lincia acted cold, Havrich remained the same.
He asked her questions even without getting proper answers, and kept wanting to do things together.
Each time their eyes met, there was a trace of relief in his own.
He was a man who had won a civil war.
He had cut every chain by turning his land into an independent duchy, so why was he acting like the lesser one, clinging to her?
To define it as love felt wrong, because Lincia no longer wanted to love him.
One-sided love always ends in exhaustion.
She had experienced that herself.
Lincia looked down at her baby’s face.
Ever since naming the child, she found herself seeking the baby a little more often.
Unlike other infants, the baby rarely cried, so the child did not require much care.
And unlike the man who no longer smiled, the baby grinned brightly all the time.
Each time she saw the smiling child who looked so much like Havrich, memories of the academy came flooding back.
Back then, I didn’t know anything, yet I liked him so much.
The child kept dragging her into the past.
Lincia gently stroked the baby’s soft cheek.
“So you were here.”
When Lincia turned her head, Havrich was standing there.
Even though it was quite late, he was dressed as if ready to leave.
Lincia had been ignoring and pushing him away lately, yet seeing him dressed to leave made her heart drop as if sinking.
What a contradiction.
She did not enjoy seeing him.
Yet the thought of him leaving pleased her just as little.
“I was looking for you.”
She stared at him with a sour expression, and the man strode over and grasped her hand.
“I’m going to the main castle.”
“So?”
“To bring fairy tales, picture books, brushes, and a paint board.”
His expression looked troubled, likely because he did not want to leave the villa without her.
“It will take about two weeks.”
Havrich fiddled with her hand.
Rubbing her fourth finger, he placed something into her palm.
A thin, rounded ring.
She had lost it after Julius’s kidnapping incident.
She never imagined Havrich would have it.
“This is…”
A purple gemstone that matched her eye color sparkled on her palm.
“I want us to hold our wedding when summer comes to the duchy.”
The moment he spoke of marriage, Lincia remembered the man who once gave her a ring.
She had loved Havrich back then, yet she could not picture a future with him.
“The child you bear will have violet eyes.
If it’s a daughter, she will be beautiful like you.
If it’s a son, he’ll have gentle eyes.
I look forward to the seasons we’ll share with our child, but I worry as well.
If the child is delicate like you, they might fall ill often.
I don’t want our child to suffer.”
“Lincia, I…”
“I want to be the child’s father.”
He had once spoken of a future with steady, unwavering eyes.
She remembered accepting the ring, deceived by those words.
The memory surged, and something hot pressed painfully inside her chest.
“I don’t want it.”
“It’s yours.”
“I said I don’t want it.”
Lincia tried to hand back the ring he forced into her hand, but Havrich refused to take it.
“I hate it! When you gave me that ring, you said those things…!
You made me hope… with that talk about being a father to the child.”
The ring slipped from her hand.
It hit the wooden floor with a light metallic clink and rolled away.
Silence fell, as if someone had poured cold water into the room.
“I wasn’t trying to force you.”
Havrich stared at the fallen ring, then walked over and bent down to pick it up.
“I’ll keep it.”
He wrapped it in a handkerchief.
“If the day comes when you need it, just tell me.”
* * *
Harvich arrived at the castle for the first time in a long while.
The gray stone walls were as dreary as ever.
But when Lincia had lived here, the place had seemed a little brighter.
Without stopping anywhere else, Havrich headed straight to the prison.
The prisoner was bound with shackles on both wrists and ankles, and even had a gag in his mouth.
He had been tortured several times, judging by the lack of uninjured spots on his body.
A guard hurried to Havrich and whispered quietly.
“They say he’s the one who stole the letters.”
“Why?”
“It seems he feared the evidence of the executed prisoners would be found, so he intercepted all the mail.”
So after desperately erasing evidence, why did he get caught so easily now?
Havrich let out a long sigh.
“Tell Huw I’m here.”
Before long, Huw arrived.
He panted, clearly having rushed, and handed Havrich documents Julius had prepared.
Havrich flipped through the pages.
“Interrogation?”
“He says he won’t speak until the Grand Duke arrives.”
Havrich tried to focus on the situation before him, but he couldn’t shake thoughts of the fight with Lincia before coming here.
If she had accepted the ring, would anything have changed?
He bit the inside of his cheek as he thought about the ring he had failed to give her.
If she wants to leave before the nine months are up?
If she runs away?
Should I have brought Tereo?
At that moment, Ethan, bound and gagged until now, let out a hoarse laugh from his cracked lips.
A dry, broken sound rattled out, and the look in his gray eyes held no regret or guilt, only disgusted bitterness.
Havrich gestured, and the gag was removed.
“I knew I wasn’t wrong.”
Ignoring Ethan’s laugh, Havrich asked,
“Why did you do this?”
“Would you do anything differently if you knew?”
Ethan looked completely different now.
His speech was not clumsy, and he stood straight, shoulders back, taller than Havrich remembered.
“Speak.
Why?
If you resented me, you should have taken it out on me alone.”
Just from the documents, it was clear Ethan had something to do with Lincia’s pregnancy.
Ethan’s gray eyes dimmed slightly.
“I wanted the blood of the Durande imperial line.”
“…”
“I wanted to make that child a puppet emperor.”
Because he hated this land to the point of sickness.
“Can you understand how I feel?”
