Chapter 14……………..
That You Might Not Hate Me…
At the moment I secured the most important thing—blood—to make it look as if we had truly consummated the marriage, I was suddenly pushed back onto the bed by a powerful force.
Above me, he glared down with fury, clutching my bleeding hand tightly.
“I asked you—what the hell is this supposed to mean?!”
I tried to push him off, but he didn’t budge an inch.
“Ah—what a waste of blood!! Mick, wait a moment.”
Before the precious blood running down my wrist stained the wrong place, I had to get it onto the sheet quickly!
As I nervously twisted my wrist to press it against the sheet, he suddenly yanked my hand up high.
“So in the end, you were planning to leave me? Just like at the valley last time?”
What was he even talking about? I looked up at him, completely confused.
“Leave you? Where would I even go? I don’t have anywhere to go.”
At that, he looked down at me as though bewildered. Frustrated, I muttered at him:
“After you leave, the maids will come to clean this room in the morning, won’t they? I was just trying to make sure they’d see the mark of the wedding night.”
“The mark of the wedding night?”
His straight brows furrowed deeply.
“I once read in a book that there’s supposed to be such a mark after the first night… you know, proof that the bride was a virgin.”
“I’ve heard of barbarian tribes that hang bloodstained sheets out the window after the wedding night. But in Fritan, we have no such disgraceful custom.”
His dark blue eyes gleamed with distaste.
“Surely not—even in a great empire like Harun—surely they don’t still cling to such barbaric customs? Flaunting a bride’s virginity?”
“O-of course, we don’t hang sheets by the window or anything. But still…”
“But still?”
“Among the maids who clean the wedding chamber afterward… rumors spread. Whether there was a mark or not on the sheets…”
Gossip about the bridal chamber spread like wildfire. Even if they pretended not to, both the groom and society at large would prick their ears at any word about the bride’s mark.
If the bride left a mark, the groom became the subject of envious whispers among the nobility.
That was why brides who weren’t virgins would resort to every trick imaginable to create a false mark.
Mick sighed, glaring down at me sharply.
“If here in Fritan’s palace, there were ever fools who dared to spread irreverent rumors about the king and queen’s bed—!”
He growled low in his throat.
“I’d rip their tongues out on the spot and sear their eyeballs.”
The raw brutality of his words made me flinch. And then it struck me.
More cruel than his threat was Harun’s custom itself—this obsession with a bride’s virgin blood.
The hypocrisy of nobles, who indulged in debauchery in secret yet demanded their wives be untouched on their wedding night—that was the truly violent, barbaric thing.
“Haa…”
When I lowered my eyes and stayed silent, he let out a deep sigh.
“Forgive me. I didn’t mean to trouble you.”
“I can never seem to win against you.”
I tried to pull my hand free from his grip, embarrassed, but a thin line of blood trickled down from my palm, along my wrist, and to the crook of my arm.
He suddenly leaned down and licked it, tracing the trail back to my palm. The alien sensation made my eyes widen in shock.
“Mick!”
I tried to yank my arm back, but he held me firmly with one arm around my body and the other gripping my wrist.
“Be still, Leah.”
His lips crawled up slowly like a snail, finally reaching my palm, where the wound continued to bleed. He licked it, mumbling lowly.
My toes curled tightly from the strange, tingling heat.
“Stop it, Mick…”
I barely managed to speak, as if my throat were constricted. At that, his lips gradually lifted away from my palm.
He raised his gaze slowly to look at me.
“Do you truly want me to stop?”
For a moment, I was thrown into confusion. Did I really want him to stop?
Though my heart calmed once his lips left my palm, I suddenly longed for the searing, ticklish warmth that had spread through me.
Reaching out my other hand, I stroked his cheek, and this time, I didn’t look away.
“No. I want you to continue.”
The moment my words ended, his lips crashed into mine.
This kiss, pressing down with desperate force, was nothing like the one at our wedding—it was deep, fierce, and overwhelming.
His tongue invaded mercilessly, sucking until I thought mine would be torn out. I couldn’t even breathe. The dizzying sensation awoke every cell in my body, and my mind reeled.
Lost for what else to do, I clung to his neck, pulling him close.
“Haah… Leah…”
He buried his face against my neck, his hot breath tickling my skin. We panted together in that heated closeness.
“I only hope you won’t hate me. But now—I can’t stop.”
His lips trailed from my collarbone to my ear.
“Why… why would I ever hate you?”
The strange tingling at my ear made me tremble again.
“They say… it hurts terribly the first time…”
He pressed more desperately into me, murmuring.
“I couldn’t bear to go to war with your hatred in my heart. That’s why I wanted to leave quickly…”
His hesitant words—so unlike him—suddenly made him unbearably dear to me. I pulled his face so I could see him.
Only then did I notice his dark blue eyes trembling faintly. From the fearsome blood demon himself, to see such hesitation and unease—!
Smiling, I whispered:
“Do you know how hard it is to hate a husband with such a face? It’s impossible.”
I drew him down and kissed his lips deeply. Teasing his full lips, I felt his surprise, but soon his hot breath pressed in again.
Nothing could restrain him now. It was as if fire itself consumed us.
Mick’s lips touched every part of me. I flushed, but he seemed intent on leaving his mark everywhere, as if to declare that I was his woman.
My thoughts stopped, and only my senses remained sharp—until suddenly, a searing pain like being split in two crashed over me like lightning. I couldn’t breathe.
His lips brushed mine gently, while his hand soothed my back, caressing down my spine.
As I focused on the warmth of his lips and fingers, a sharper pleasure began to wash away the pain.
When my tension eased, I wrapped my arms around his back. At last, we became one.
Ten days after Leah departed with King Miklok to Fritan, Marquis Uzkahl requested an audience with the Harun Emperor.
He still had an important settlement to make with the emperor.
“I greet the radiant sun of the Empire.”
Standing before him, the marquis smiled obsequiously as he bowed.
“Well then—what urgent business do you bring?”
“My daughter Leah went with King Miklok to Fritan. Soon she will become his queen, no?”
“And?”
The emperor’s indifferent reply nearly made Marquis Uzkahl lose his temper, but he reined himself in and stated his purpose.
“She was once intended as Your Majesty’s empress. Please consider the heart of a father who had to send his cherished daughter to a frozen land.”
But the emperor stared down without a flicker.
“You cherished her? That’s news to me.”
The marquis stiffened. Hadn’t he once begged to send Leah to Fritan as a bride? Now the emperor dared to say this?
“That aside, thanks to Leah we avoided conflict with the fierce Fritan army. Surely Your Majesty will acknowledge this merit.”
“Your words insult the Empire’s brave army—as though we would cower before some barbarian host. They may be troublesome, but never so frightening.”
The same emperor who hadn’t dared breathe a word when his own brother, the Grand Duke, lost an arm to Fritan—now he puffed himself up before the marquis.
“And besides… I believe the price was already paid with my brother Jake’s left arm.”
The marquis nearly choked with rage, his head snapping up.
“Your Majesty! In fact, King Miklok cut the duke’s arm before you sent the marriage proposal. The arm was not a price for Leah!”
“Oh? Then tell me—what price do you want?”
Finally, seeing the talk go his way, the marquis regained his composure.
“The eighty thousand gold coins that were to be given when Leah became empress—and as consolation, the estate of Count Paoran, stripped of his title last month. If Your Majesty grants these, a father’s grief at sending his daughter to such a harsh land may be soothed.”
The emperor chuckled darkly.
“But tell me, Marquis Uzkahl—how shall my loss be soothed, when I was deprived of a beloved empress?”
At the ominous tone, the marquis swallowed hard.
“You have another cherished daughter, do you not? Haley, was it?”
“Y-yes, indeed.”
“If Haley enters my palace as empress next month, then perhaps your grief at losing a daughter and my sorrow at losing an empress will balance each other out. What you ask for shall be decided after that.”
With that, the emperor rose and departed, as though the matter were finished.
The marquis stood frozen, unable to move a step.
Outside King Miklok’s bedchamber, Milly paced nervously.
A tray of food from the royal kitchens had long since arrived, but she dared not bring it inside. Instead, she blocked the servants from entering.
“I’ll take the meal in myself later.”
“But it tastes best when eaten right away…”
“His Highness gave specific instructions.”
The kitchen servants frowned but left reluctantly. Of course, they couldn’t defy the king.
Still, they lingered, casting curious glances at the chamber door before departing.
Surely by now, Their Highnesses must be hungry. But the atmosphere inside was unmistakably strange.
Now and then, faint voices came from within—sometimes even King Miklok’s laughter echoed.
But at some point, all sound ceased. No matter how Milly strained to listen, nothing at all came from the room.
And yet the silence wasn’t ordinary—it carried a tension that made Milly uneasy as well.
Half the allotted wedding-night hours had already passed. If she didn’t bring the food soon, the king might march to war without eating.
Leah surely wouldn’t want that.
Gathering her courage, Milly knocked softly. Of course, no reply came.
She considered slipping in just to leave the food, but in the end, she crouched beside the tray.
For she could never dare disturb a king and queen… consummating their marriage.
