ALMSK 114

Chapter 114………………………………….

Without knowing who moved first, their trembling hands sought each other and clasped together.

The roughened fingertips, the hardened calluses—they spoke of the years that had passed.

A faint scent of pine resin, the smell of wet earth…

Though Saruin said it was spring, for some reason the air stung her nose like the onset of early winter.

Eryshi burrowed into his arms, searching for warmth. The heat that brushed her lips felt almost like being seared by a branding iron.

“Ah…”

Again and again, as if to confirm that she was truly there, the man’s kisses were desperate. That alone made her want to cry.

Eryshi moaned at the sensations tingling across her body, but still she tilted her head, clutching his hair tightly as if afraid he might disappear again.

His hair, much longer than she remembered, spilled messily into her arms.

The red eyes she glimpsed through the strands were beautiful. So was his pale, hollowed face.

The man she met again after two years—her husband—felt terribly unfamiliar.

Carefully, Eryshi reached out and caressed Rahan’s face.

Even under the harsh sunlight of Saruin, his pallor showed how much of himself he’d had to kill and hide to survive.

For two years, she’d believed him dead.

“Eryshi…”

Her name, spoken in disbelief, trembled too much. Eryshi’s throat tightened.

“How… how could you just go like that?”

Instead of saying I missed you, what spilled out was a childish reproach. Rahan’s eyes grew misty.

“I’m sorry…”

She knew. She knew he couldn’t have taken her with him back then.

How could Rahan have escaped the governor’s mansion in Girgaia, guarded by imperial knights, with her in tow? Especially as a Poldenbach—he’d have been recognized instantly.

And yet, she had wished he had tried.

More than the lonely years of waiting, it was the time after she learned he was alive that hurt the most.

If the two years she spent alone had been a cold winter, then the time since learning Rahan still lived had felt like being stranded in a blazing desert with no drop of water.

She had wanted to run to him, to hold him in her arms immediately…

“Didn’t you miss me?”

“I missed you…”

At her teary complaint, Rahan smiled softly and kissed her cheek. Why was it that a single kiss from him could melt her whole being? Her tears wouldn’t stop.

“Don’t cry.”

Rahan was at a loss before her tears. Eryshi laughed through her sobs, pulled his face close, and kissed him again and again.

The scrap of cloth around her shoulders had long since failed to do its job. Through the loosened fabric, his lips brushed down.

But his kisses weren’t filled with lust alone—they were searching, studying her.

Her sunken cheeks, the sharp lines of her collarbones, her thin waist, her hollow stomach—

As if pained by what he saw, he touched her gently, reverently, over and over.

“You’ve lost so much weight.”

“Whose fault do you think that is?”

Her petulant words made his eyes turn sorrowful again.

It had been meant playfully, but seeing how stricken he looked, she quickly stroked his cheek with her thumb.

“If you’re sorry, hold me.”

And as soon as she said it, Eryshi realized it had been a long, long time since she’d allowed herself to whine like this to anyone.

It felt strange—and achingly familiar.

Before she could even process that feeling, another tear slipped down her cheek.

“I really, truly missed you…”

Rahan’s face twisted—not with anger, nor sadness, but a pain born of years of the same lonely ache. She could see it in his expression.

Amazingly, the vast sorrow that had gathered between them was bridged by a single kiss. They clung to each other, desperately.

“Ah…”

They caressed each other with feverish hands; between the countless kisses, their tears dried.

Rahan’s touch on her body was cautious, tender.

Perhaps because of hardship, his body was harder and broader than before, but to Eryshi, it didn’t feel overwhelming at all.

His chest, twice the breadth of hers, yielded to her pull, and when she pushed, he swayed lightly back—as if handling her like something fragile and precious. That gentleness made her pout.

“Hold me tighter. I was lonely.”

At her childish plea, his arms finally tightened around her, full of regret, pity—and joy.

Unlike Eryshi, Rahan was still fully clothed.

When she stared up at him, he flushed red, stammering out an excuse.

“On my way in… I kept my eyes closed.”

She blinked in surprise. She hadn’t expected that!

Apparently, Sariati had told him it was fine to come in freely, but Rahan had been so flustered that he insisted on keeping his eyes shut.

“That’s ridiculous. How could you walk in with your eyes closed? Did Sariati lead you by hand?”

There was a faint trace of jealousy in her tone, and Rahan seemed to notice. He smiled bitterly, kissed her cheek again, and whispered:

“I came in alone.”

“Liar. How could you—”

“…Would you believe me if I said I lived all those days with my eyes closed?”

Eryshi’s lips parted slightly.

So that was it—he had lived pretending to be blind.

Rahan averted his gaze awkwardly.

“My eyes… they stand out too much.”

When I woke up, too much time had already passed.

In the meantime, he had become the “demon-worshipper” who had kidnapped and defiled the holy maiden, Eryshi Ahen. His red eyes were far too conspicuous.

He didn’t mind if people knew he was alive. He’d always lived as an outcast, hated and hunted.

But the thought of Eryshi suffering because of his existence terrified him.

Everywhere he went, he heard tales of “the pure Saint who had resisted the child of the devil.”

After performing her miracle, the saint had fallen into a long sleep—and those stories filled Rahan with endless fear.

Had she died because of him?

Or, if not dead, was she suffering so much she might as well be?

When news came that Eryshi had awakened, his thoughts became even more tangled.

The Emperor had declared that “the demon’s child, Rahan Norwich,” was alive, and vowed to hang him from the top of the Imperial City. He also announced that Saint Eryshi Ahen was under imperial protection.

They said the saint, moved by the Emperor’s heroism, prayed daily for the empire within the temple of the capital.

Rahan didn’t believe it all—not after what he’d seen of Elio’s cruelty. He had witnessed how Elio turned him into a devil-worshipper to bring down Duke Racheiz.

Still, time dulls love, and memories fade.

Though their time together had been sweet, filled only with love—

Even lovers who once adored each other could, upon parting, become bitter enemies in an instant.

Would she feel shame, remembering that she had once loved the devil’s son?

No—he didn’t believe Eryshi would ever think that way. She was too kind.

The problem was that he had never learned to forgive himself.

“A girl so devout she declared sanctuary, yet consorted with a demon-worshipper and betrayed the Church. The whole of the Erydrathan Order could burn, and it’d still not be enough.”

Elio’s words had haunted him ever since.

And it wasn’t only Eryshi.

“The Lord loves you, Sir Norwich.”

So had said Headmaster Wilbert, even after learning Rahan had bargained with a demon.
Wilbert was dead now—because of him.

If he hadn’t been there that day, the headmaster would never have overexerted himself. He might have lived a long, peaceful life.

“Your Highness! This is unjust! Since Headmaster Wilbert vouched for Rahan Norwich, the trial must be conducted properly!”

And what of Father Vera, who had once despised him but later defended him desperately?

Rahan had secretly inquired after Vera’s whereabouts from contacts in Poldenbach. The priest had returned to Vandel beneath the ruins of Windrock Monastery, working to rebuild it. Rahan could not bring himself to visit.