Bitter Medicine
Thick water scent and sharp mint fragrance flooded into her lungs. Thalia looked up at him with trembling eyes. Barcas leaned his head toward her and poured a low voice into her ear.
“If Your Highness causes such a commotion, there’s little point in sharing the same room.”
The scolding tone snapped her back to her senses. She struck his hand away and jerked backward. As the distance opened, his smoothly gleaming, sculpture-like body came fully into view. Thalia hurriedly dropped her gaze.
“Put some clothes on! Have you no shame?”
She hissed the rebuke in a stifled voice. A faint crease appeared between his brows. Barcas shook his head as though the situation were absurd, rose to his feet, and replied dryly, “That is hardly something to be said by someone who once strolled the imperial palace half-naked.”
“I never—!”
Thalia lifted her chin in indignation, only to fall silent when she saw him pulling on a fresh shirt. As Barcas slid his arms into the sleeves, he added pointedly, “Ever since you neared your coming-of-age, you began aping the Empress in the most pathetic manner.”
Humiliation twisted Thalia’s face. Memories of those desperate days when she had clawed for even a scrap of his attention rose like bile, bringing a surge of bitter sorrow. She snatched the pillow beside her and struck his back with all her strength.
“Now that you can never dream of wearing those clothes again, you must feel wonderfully satisfied!”
Barcas, still fastening buttons, turned to regard her with icy eyes. Thalia’s huffing breath caught. After the accident he had silently endured every tantrum she threw, yet it seemed his patience was finally wearing thin.
The man who had been staring at her with merciless eyes climbed onto the bed. Thalia rolled instinctively toward the opposite side. As she tried to flee, a hard forearm locked around her waist. In an instant she was pinned flat again, staring up at him with rigid eyes.
He was the same man who had always used force to subdue her whenever she lost control. Though the roughness was not unfamiliar, her heart still plummeted.
Barcas brought his face close and spoke with quiet menace. “You would do well to correct that habit of yours.”
Thalia looked up at him, terrified. His expressionless gaze settled on her lips, raw and stinging from being bitten. He added slowly, “And the habit of self-harm as well.”
Her heart, already unsteady, began to slam against her ribs. She could not tell whether the pounding came from fear or from something else entirely. She squeezed her eyes shut.
“M-move aside.”
“……”
“Did you not hear me? Get off!”
Barcas did not budge. Under his relentless stare her lips grew parched. She hid the scabbed skin inside her mouth. He watched her with narrowed eyes, then released her wrist. Before she could make use of her freed hand, his fingers caught her chin.
Thalia drew a ragged breath. Callused fingertips pried her curled lips open. Moist pads brushed over the swollen flesh.
“Stop tormenting your lips.”
Thalia stared up at him, eyes clouded with confusion and unease. Had anyone else touched her this way, she would have read desire in it. During the days she haunted Senebier’s banquet halls she had known countless men who could not keep their hands from her body. Yet the utterly emotionless face before her muddled every judgment. To her the contact felt like a hand squeezing her heart; to him it seemed to mean nothing at all.
Thalia exhaled the breath she had been holding. “A-all right… just move away.”
At the pleading note, his silver-flecked eyes lifted. The fathomless dark pupils seemed to steal every shred of reason. Thalia’s tongue darted out by habit to wet her lips and brushed the pad of his thumb. Color flooded her face. Barcas observed the reaction with careful attention, as though testing whether her dislike was genuine.
Feeling as though every thought had been laid bare, cold sweat beaded on her brow. Unable to bear the silence any longer, she blurted, “M-my leg hurts.”
Barcas stilled.
She twisted her head aside and repeated in a strangled voice, “I woke because of the pain. C-call the healer.”
Only then did he finally draw back. Thalia scrambled to the far corner of the bed like a beast released from a snare. Barcas regarded her with thoughtful eyes, then sighed once and turned away.
“I already obtained the medicine.”
“I don’t need medicine. The sleeping herb works a hundred times better. If you summon my healer, she will—”
Another cold glance cut her short. Thalia let the words trail off and dragged the blanket up to her chin.
Barcas took a glass bottle from the shelf, uncapped it, and held it out. Thalia glared at it like an enemy before reluctantly accepting it. It was the same draught she had been forced to swallow on her first day in the east and had been pouring into flowerpots ever since. She closed her eyes tightly and forced down the bitter liquid that burned her tongue.
He took the empty bottle and laid her back against the pillows with the plain efficiency of someone tending a ten-year-old child. The gesture left her thoughts more tangled than before. What had that earlier moment been? Had he meant to frighten her? Or…
“Now sleep. You will need your strength for tomorrow’s schedule.”
His hands smoothing the blanket severed the thread of her thoughts. Thalia watched him warily, as though he were a viper that might strike without warning. Whether he noticed her suspicion or not, Barcas dimmed the lamp and walked to the corner of the tent. He sat at the table, opened what appeared to be a ledger, and began to examine the duchy’s financial records.
Thalia studied his impassive profile in silence, wondering when he would finally lie down beside her. Yet as the night deepened he never left the desk. In the end it was she who grew weary and slipped into sleep first.
Thalia woke the next morning alone in the empty tent. All the tension she had carried through the night, fearing they would share a bed, now felt absurd. Blinking away the last of her drowsiness, she looked around the dim canvas still soaked in morning light and let out a hollow sigh.
From the very beginning he had promised that nothing would happen. So why had she been so anxious?
“Miss, are you awake?”
While she was still peering at the empty space beside her, the nanny’s voice called from outside.
Thalia swung her legs off the bed and stood unsteadily. “I’m up.”
The plump woman entered at once, a large tray balanced on her head. She looked unusually cheerful, a bright smile on her round face. “Did you sleep well? I’ve brought breakfast. This time I think you’ll find it to your liking. The steward prepared a generous spread last night, and every dish was excellent.”
Thalia frowned down at the gold-rimmed bowls. Porridge thick with grains, coarse white bread, pungent cheese, and watery jam filled the tray. The sight alone turned her stomach. “Never mind. Just bring me mead.”
“I cannot. His Grace the Archduke scolded me thoroughly and ordered me to see that you eat properly. Are you content to have me punished on your account?”
Thalia had picked up a piece of bread and was inspecting it for flies. She shot the nanny a skeptical glance. The woman still clung to the belief that the Emperor secretly cherished his illegitimate daughter. Once again she was reading far too much into a casual remark.
Thalia spoke with deliberate sharpness. “And where has His Grace the Archduke gone so early this morning?”