A Sleepless Night (1)
‘Damn it.’
This time, I wasn’t startled the way I had been when I first met Kaiden. Unlike then, he was flaunting his presence without the slightest attempt to hide it. Still, even though I had known he was there, a chill raced down my spine.
‘What in the world is wrong with this man?’
My instincts kept screaming that the man standing behind me could take my life at any moment. I forced myself to stay calm and opened my mouth.
“…I greet Your Majesty the King.”
Keeping my eyes fixed straight ahead, I answered. A soft chuckle drifted from behind me. The presence that had been lingering by the wall near the door drew closer.
“Hmm.”
Kaiden, the King of Adamanth, came to stand right at my back. He was so close I could feel his breath.
“The door being open doesn’t mean you’re welcome to enter, does it?”
“My apologies. I thought something might have happened to Your Highness, so I came in without permission. For my rudeness……”
“Apologies are unnecessary.”
Kaiden cut me off and asked in a low voice, “Why were you looking for me?”
His tone was rather languid. He drew out the end of his sentence.
“I distinctly recall asking the head maid to come.”
He spoke with a hint of amusement in his voice, as if the situation entertained him.
“Yet I never expected the nanny herself to grace me with her presence.”
“There was something I needed to tell you.”
I continued in a steady tone. “The head maid suddenly felt unwell and couldn’t come. It seems like a cold.”
“A cold? She seemed perfectly fine just a moment ago.”
“…It appears to be acute. She said that if she were to serve Your Majesty and pass it on, it would be troublesome, so she thought it best to rest in her room for the time being.”
The excuse I had spun without pause came out smoothly, and I was rather pleased with it. At least during the founding festival, Catherine wouldn’t be dragged around by this man.
“Is that so.”
Kaiden clicked his tongue, sounding genuinely regretful.
“How unfortunate that she’s ill.”
“Therefore, if you require nighttime service, I can fetch another woman right away. If you would just wait a moment……”
My words caught in my throat. Suddenly, the man’s broad chest filled my vision.
“…Your Highness Kaiden?”
When I lifted my head, pretending nothing was amiss, Kaiden was looking down at me. His vividly colored golden eyes gleamed sharply in the darkness, like those of a beast.
“That would be rather inconvenient.”
Kaiden’s eyes sparkled with interest, as though he had found an amusing prey.
“You see, I need a woman by my side right this instant.”
Surely this bastard wasn’t about to spout that nonsense about being unable to sleep unless he did that every single day?
‘They say heroes are lechers. Is he one of that sort too?’
When I narrowed my eyes at him, Kaiden grinned playfully.
“I have a rather delicate side, more than it appears.”
Where exactly was he delicate? From the outside, it looked like his brain and spine were packed full of muscle.
“I can’t sleep unless there’s someone beside me.”
It was an extremely ambiguous statement. Depending on interpretation, it could mean he was a lecher who needed a woman in his bed every night, or simply someone who suffered from insomnia without another person’s warmth. Either way, it had nothing to do with me.
“I’ll bring you some tea that’s good for insomnia. So……”
“Are you offering to take the head maid’s place?”
Kaiden was staring at me intently. Uncomfortably so.
“Of course not. I only came to deliver a message.”
“…A pity.”
So he had finally given up. Kaiden, who had been leaning against the door, slowly straightened up. Relieved that I could finally escape this awkward space, I reached for the doorknob.
“Can’t be helped, then.”
At that moment, Kaiden lowered his head and whispered near my ear, as if talking to himself.
“In that case, I’ll have no choice but to tell His Imperial Majesty that the hospitality at the Third Prince’s Palace left much to be desired.”
His sharply upturned eyes curved like willow branches. As if he were teasing me.
“…Are you threatening me right now?”
“Well. However you choose to take it is up to you.”
What an utterly shameless man. He openly threatened me and then claimed it was my freedom to interpret it however I liked. I stared at him in silence.
“If you wish to leave,”
Kaiden smiled and stepped aside, even going so far as to open the door for me with exaggerated courtesy.
“You’re free to go anytime.”
“……”
“I suppose I’ll have to greet His Imperial Majesty tomorrow with a haggard face from suffering insomnia.”
There was a limit to how much one could mock a person. With a stiff expression, I kept my gaze forward. Kaiden shrugged as if he found it boring. He stretched once, then walked toward the bed with slow steps.
“Don’t forget to close the door when you……”
Thud. Crash.
Before the arrogant young king could finish speaking, a dull noise echoed through the room.
“…What.”
Kaiden, now pinned beneath me on the bed, slowly opened his mouth. Half-reclined on the mattress, he looked up at me.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
There was no trace of anger in his voice. If anything, it carried a note of leisure. But I could tell.
‘He’s flustered.’
The young King of Adamanth was clearly taken aback by the prince’s nanny who had suddenly shoved him onto the bed. The slight tremor in his pupils was proof.
“I’m giving Your Highness what you wanted.”
I removed the pin holding my neatly tied hair in place. Long ash-brown strands cascaded down like silk.
“So I hope there won’t be any unpleasantness for His Imperial Majesty tomorrow morning.”
Thanks to my days as an assassin, I was used to seducing men in bed. Of course, the only time I ever seduced a man was when I intended to take his life.
Kaiden frowned and spoke.
“…Are you serious?”
He wasn’t a child, yet he was asking something like that. For a man who so casually claimed he needed a woman to sleep, he had a surprisingly innocent side.
“Well, does something like this require sincerity?”
There was no need for lengthy words. I just wanted to get this over with and return to my room. Without permission, I reached for the king’s waist sash.
Whoosh. Thud.
“If this was meant to startle me,”
In an instant, Kaiden grabbed my wrist and yanked me down on top of him. The tables had turned in the blink of an eye.
“It worked. Well done.”
Kaiden looked down at me, now trapped beneath him. A strong scent of jasmine wafted from him—so potent it seemed as though he had drenched himself from head to toe in jasmine oil.
“But I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”
Kaiden continued in an amused voice.
“I simply meant I needed a human pillow to lie beside me.”
…A human pillow? Did he have a hobby of making pillows out of people?
‘Then this man and Catherine……!’
It seemed the rumor that there were many perverts with strange fetishes among the nobility was indeed true.
‘It might be better for the world if I eliminated him while he’s off guard.’
If the man could only sleep after using a woman as a pillow, perhaps it would be kinder to let him sleep forever right here, before he could sacrifice any more women.
“Until dawn breaks, you just need to stay in this room. That’s all.”
But at his next explanation, my mind went blank.
‘Just stay in the room?’
So he really just needed something like a worry doll by his bedside?
Catherine was one thing, but to think I had also jumped to the wrong conclusion.
“……”
My face grew hot. I had become the strange woman who had gotten worked up all by herself. If possible, I wanted to jump out the window right then and there.
Meanwhile, Kaiden took one look at my expression and burst out laughing.
“You’re amusing.”
His unusual golden eyes gleamed strangely in the darkness.
“Not only did you barge into the king’s bedroom without permission, you even laid hands on the king’s body without consent.”
“That’s……”
“At this point, isn’t it you who wants nighttime service?”
Shut up, you insolent brat. I barely swallowed the words that nearly escaped my tongue. Forcing myself to remain composed, I spoke.
“…Then why did you specifically ask a woman to enter your bedroom?”
“If I sleep with my subordinates, strange rumors tend to spread.”
“Strange rumors?”
“Like the rumor that the King of Adamanth enjoys men and is a pervert.”
Kaiden frowned, looking genuinely troubled.
“My subordinates would rather sleep with monsters than beside me, which causes all sorts of problems. That’s why I asked the head maid.”
“And the head maid is acceptable?”
“Since she’s married, I thought no strange rumors would circulate.”
Keeping a married woman in his bedroom…
‘…Wouldn’t that cause even stranger rumors?’
Instead of voicing my thoughts, I chose to correct his misinformation.
“The head maid is unmarried.”
At my answer, Kaiden’s eyes widened slightly. He raised one eyebrow as if he hadn’t known.
“Ah, my apologies.”
“In any case, it seems I also misunderstood quite a bit.”
A true adult was someone who could admit their mistakes, no matter how embarrassing. I lowered my eyes slightly and added in a small voice, “My apologies, Your Highness.”
“No, it was also my fault for causing the misunderstanding. I should have explained properly to the head maid as well.”
Even though he clearly had no intention of doing so. Kaiden’s eyes still held a playful glint. After gazing down at me in silence for a moment, he slowly rose. The mattress, which had been deeply sunken, sprang back up.
“Then you may return now. I’ve been terribly rude to the prince’s nanny.”
Kaiden had already picked up the water bottle on the bedside table with complete nonchalance, as if he had lost all interest in me.