[CHAPTER 103]
“We both know we didn’t marry for love.”
How could she not know.
She had been a bride assigned like compensation from the very beginning. ‘Assigned.’
It was a harsh term for a person, but Lincia thought there was nothing more fitting for her situation.
The royal family in the north, unwilling to give even a single bean, had given away a princess worth less than one.
“But there should be at least some minimum, right?”
Lincia’s breath grew uneven. Harvich reached out a hand to her shoulder.
“Lincia.”
“What changes if I accept you now?”
Lincia shrank away from his hand. Confronted with such clear refusal, the man stopped mid-air.
She turned her head to avoid the red gaze that seemed to pierce her cheek.
“The reason you feel guilty, the reason you don’t know what to do, it’s all because that child is yours.”
Harvich could not respond to her words, thrown out so desperately as if there were no other chance.
Lincia inhaled sharply.
To Harvich, her words felt like frost on his heart.
Though born on snow-covered land, the chill was foreign. Harvich blinked, frozen by a single phrase, while she frowned, unaware of the effect.
“If I live with you, every similar incident in the future will force me to prove myself over and over.”
Her low voice carried regret. Feeling unworthy, Harvich wanted to ask her—did she regret it?
Meeting him.
Their marriage.
…Loving him.
He already knew the answer.
So did Lincia.
“I don’t want to do that.”
Lincia clenched her fists to hold back tears.
She no longer wanted to prove her innocence while falling apart.
Of course, even another man would not have believed her in the same situation. Lincia understood that.
But understanding someone doesn’t mean accepting them.
If no one would believe her, she preferred to be alone.
As she struggled to release the pent-up emotions she had held while carrying the child, Harvich spoke.
“You don’t need to prove anything.”
“…”
“From now on, I will believe whatever you say. So, Lincia, please…”
Before he could finish, Lincia cried out, her thin shoulders trembling. Harvich paused.
He felt he should hold her before she collapsed, yet feared his touch might shatter her further.
Yes, he was afraid.
Too late.
Ah, Harvich wished he could go back and ask his past self why he had trusted himself and doubted her so recklessly. Evidence, proof, what was it worth?
Lincia had been left in shambles.
Even as he felt foolish and bewildered, Lincia’s words continued.
“That isn’t believing, it’s enduring.”
“…”
“Because you think you were wrong this time, you want to compensate me, pretending to believe even if my words seem false…”
That was not true. Harvich quickly denied it.
“No.”
She looked up at him immediately. Her moist, purple eyes shone with certainty that she could not believe his words. Harvich remembered someone who had looked like that months ago—a fool reflected in a mirror.
“Can you prove it?”
A question Lincia had once asked now cut sharply back at him.
Just as they both knew the answer to whether he regretted loving her, they both knew this one too.
There was none.
Until the child was born, until the child resembled Harvich, neither Lincia could prove her innocence nor could Harvich prove that he truly believed her, or was only pretending because he had to.
They were trapped in an inescapable contradiction.
The woman, fed up with this endless paradox, trembled.
“Look, it will always be the same for us.”
“…”
“Forever, we will never be on each other’s side…”
Harvich, unwilling to let go of her even within the contradiction, could not speak and only looked at her.
Lincia, unwilling even to meet his gaze, curled up further. After blinking away tears, she buried her face in her hands. The new mother wept more sorrowfully than for the child.
“I don’t want to live like that.”
Harvich read the truth in her words, without any proof needed.
* * *
Three weeks had passed since Harvich had left, intending to return to Lincia.
It had been a week since Cassius Territory was proclaimed a duchy.
During that time, Hyu had stayed in the imperial capital, now a different country, handling countless affairs on Harvich’s behalf.
Most of these required Harvich’s confirmation, yet he had made no contact for some time.
Unable to understand the silence, Hyu was struck dumb when he finally received a letter.
[“Lincia has given birth to my child.”]
In reality, such a thing should not have existed.
Hyu and Harvich had both believed Lincia’s child was a result of the royal conspiracy.
Harvich, believing that, still wanted to be the father, but if the child was indeed his, the situation changed.
A benevolent bastard.
In Lincia’s eyes, Harvich would be nothing more or less than that.
Though irreverent to the lord he had served for half a lifetime, Hyu could think of no better term.
Then, what had I done?
“Would you like to leave this place? I will assist you.”
Hyu grabbed his head, recalling what he had said.
Even knowing Lincia was pregnant, he had urged her to leave the city, to leave the north.
He regretted it later, but not because he felt sorry for her.
It was because his lord loved her.
Could Lincia not know? Hyu was not naive enough to hope so. She surely understood that all of Hyu’s respect came solely from Harvich’s feelings.
Yet she did not show it…
Hyu sighed.
The end of long-forbearing patience was always cold.
Harvich’s lack of contact was obvious. Even if Lincia had needed only physical care, he would not have wanted her near a husband whose heart had turned away several times.
The fact that Lincia wished for a divorce must not reach the emperor’s ears.
Even thinking he had been wrong, Hyu selfishly entertained such thoughts.
If the emperor learned that his sister’s heart had changed… he would intervene, even stirring up the stabilized north to fulfill Lincia’s wish.
It was then that the knock on the door came, along with a voice from an imperial servant.
“His Majesty the Emperor requests your presence.”
