The Weight of Ashes
Thalia’s face twisted with merciless rage as she struck his cheek with all her strength.
“You damned, persistent bastard! You just can’t stop interfering with me, can you?”
In the darkness, his blue eyes flickered faintly. Yet the face gazing down at her remained as coldly composed as ever. That unyielding calm was terrifying.
Thalia raked her nails down his cheek. Without so much as a flinch, Barcas seized her wrist and swept his gaze across the chaotic campsite.
His icy stare passed over the ashen faces of the maids, the bewildered knights, and the woman sobbing as she clutched her burned cheek.
A dry sigh escaped his lips.
“Take her to the healer.”
With a slight tilt of his chin toward the woman, Barcas turned away.
Thalia thrashed her limbs and screamed.
“How dare you! That woman is a criminal! She should be beheaded at once!”
Those who had rushed over at the commotion whispered among themselves at the sight of her, but she no longer possessed the strength to preserve any dignity. She shouted until the entire camp rang with her voice.
“You worthless bastard! What kind of knight are you?”
Barcas did not even blink.
Silently threading between the tents, he carried her straight into the barracks and laid her upon the wide bed.
Thalia, unaware even that she had been taken to his private quarters, was wholly consumed by the need to vent her boiling fury.
“You have never once protected me properly! Never! You always left me battered and broken! This time, too—you had no intention of saving me, did you? You wanted me dead. That’s why you abandoned me. That’s why you didn’t come for me at once. I know everything!”
Ignoring her shouts, he pinned her wrist to the bed and forced her hand open.
Blood and pus seeped from her burned-red palm. Frowning as he examined it, Barcas retrieved a small glass vial from the shelf.
She screamed the moment she saw him pour the unknown liquid over her wound.
“No! Don’t! Leave me alone!”
He applied the salve in silence, then wrapped her hand tightly in a white bandage.
Thalia, who had been pounding his shoulder with her free hand, soon exhausted every last shred of strength and let her limbs fall limp. Barcas regarded her with dry eyes before slowly rising.
“I will bring a sedative.”
Thalia, half-buried in the pillow and breathing raggedly, lifted her gaze to him.
Barcas moved calmly to the shelf on one side of the tent and examined a medicine bottle.
Over his straight back she saw the image of him running toward Aila superimposed. A searing pain lanced through her.
Thalia’s voice emerged twisted and broken.
“You must be disgusted that I’m still alive and breathing, aren’t you?”
His hand, searching the shelf, froze.
For a long moment he stood motionless, then turned his head with unnatural slowness.
When she met his refined, emotionless face—as though every feeling had been distilled away—something inside her shattered and crumbled to dust.
Thalia curved her lips into a bleak smile.
“How disappointing it must be. It was the perfect chance for the thorn in your eye to vanish from this world.”
Tears finally spilled over and traced down her cheeks. His cool features blurred as though submerged beneath a thin film of water.
He approached with heavy steps and bent over her. The cold glass vial touched her lower lip.
“Drink. It will bring you some relief.”
“I don’t need it.”
“……”
“I don’t need anything from you. Not anymore.”
Barcas set the vial down.
At that moment the lamp dimmed, casting a pitch-black shadow across his face.
It did not matter. She knew without looking what expression he wore. The same indifferent mask he always wore, or perhaps eyes tinged with a trace of fatigue and irritation.
She turned her back on him.
The man who had watched her in silence eventually left the tent.
Listening to his fading footsteps, Thalia lowered her hand and felt along her leg. The wooden, unyielding sensation sent a chill down her spine.
Cripple.
She drove the word from her mind at once.
It could not be true. It was only the idle talk of those who hated her.
The imperial palace was filled with skilled healers. Her mother would know any number of sorcerers who practiced forbidden magic.
They would restore her, by any means necessary.
And then, before all those who had mocked her, she would proudly display her perfect body once more.
Thalia clutched her throbbing knee, then let her eyelids fall.
The majestic pilgrimage that had departed the imperial palace had become a somber funeral procession.
The imperial attendants wore black robes instead of red surcoats, and the knights had draped dull sashes over their armor.
The wagons once laden with fine wines, silk, and jewels now carried thirty-four respectfully shrouded corpses, while musicians played low, mournful dirges at measured intervals.
Thalia listened blankly to the music inside her carriage, feeling the pain she had managed to dull flare back to life. She fumbled for the censer.
Only cold ashes remained inside the brass vessel.
She muttered a short curse, struggled upright on the cushions, and opened the box beneath the seat to retrieve a fresh incense cone.
It was a tightly packed blend of dried ice grass, evening primrose, mandrake leaves, and crimson shard flowers.
She set it inside the censer, lit it with a magic stone, and watched thick, hazy smoke rise.
Feeling her mind grow heavy beneath a sticky fog, she sank back onto the blankets.
Since the return journey began, Thalia had spent most of her time lost in the haze of painkillers. Immersed in the acrid smoke, tomorrow became today and today became yesterday.
Through the haze she vaguely registered a mage checking her condition or a royal guard bringing food, but their presence never penetrated beyond the surface of her consciousness.
Only Barcas ever pulled her back into painful reality.
When the carriage door opened and a shadow appeared, Thalia narrowed her blurred eyes.
Her carriage, once relegated to the very rear of the procession, had been moved forward and now traveled under the direct escort of the imperial knight commander. He must have decided she required closer supervision to prevent further incidents.
Barcas entered and bent over her, sprawled like seaweed across the seat.
She felt his cold fingers brush a few strands of hair from her damp forehead.
“Use the incense sparingly. At this rate you will build a tolerance far too quickly.”
“……”
She studied his face as though it were an overdue assignment.
The man who had waited in silence for her response let out a quiet sigh.
“We will camp here tonight.”
The sun had set and the carriage had stopped; of course they would spend the night here.
She could not fathom why he felt the need to state the obvious. He was the same man who remained silent even when words were required.