A strange rumor circulated through Valent Castle.

Count Fershtein’s concubine had collapsed, yet was left without so much as treatment.

“He said something like, what’s the big deal about one slave dying.”

“I don’t particularly like Adela, but I do feel a little sorry for her.”

The maids assumed Adela fell ill after being tormented by the Count all night, and was now cast aside.

The rumor soon warped into something darker.

“You think that’s all? They say some unidentified man comes and goes from the annex every night.”

People were certain he must be a t*rture specialist. A dread settled heavily over the castle that the Count might be subjecting Adela, the princess of a fallen kingdom, to unspeakable torments.

When Adela came back to her senses, she could not even tell how much time passed.

“Count, please, allow me to nurse my miss.”

Sofia’s tear-laced voice made Adela feel as though one side of her chest was being torn apart. She wanted to tell Sofia not to cry, but she could not make a single sound.

‘Then who has been looking after me all this time?’

The fever kept her from identifying who it was, but she clearly felt hands changing the wet cloth on her forehead and spooning medicine into her mouth.

Then a familiar voice reached her.

“What’s the big deal about one slave dying?”

“Count! Take this old woman’s life instead, and please, please save my miss. I beg of you.”

“Guard. Drag her out and lock her in her room. She’s insufferable.”

Even as she heard Sofia being dragged away, screaming and clinging, Adela could not move so much as a finger.

A short while later, an unfamiliar voice filled the room.

“Her constitution was poor to begin with.”

The physician let out a deep sigh.

“She kept moving without rest even after the wound split open. That was what caused this. She’s past the worst of it, but we need to watch her for another three or four days.”

“Cut the nonsense.”

“She is still in a critical condition, without question.”

“Do you think I brought you all the way from Urcheka to tell me that?”

Silence followed Leon’s threat-laced voice. At last, the physician took Adela’s wrist in his hands.

“She must be given the tonic regularly and her fever must be brought down. And the bandages should be changed as often as possible.”

As the unfamiliar footsteps faded away, Adela’s consciousness grew hazy again.

How many more days passed?

The headache eased enough that opening her eyes seemed manageable, but no matter how she tried, her body refused to move as she willed. Her lips were parched and stinging, her throat so dry it burned, and even swallowing a breath was difficult.

“Wa… water…”

Adela whispered faintly, and the figure beside her brought a cup to her lips. But she lacked even the strength to part them, and the water only trickled down her chin.

“…Hah.”

A small sigh reached her ears, and then a cool sensation touched her lips.

Drunk on the chill of it, Adela instinctively sought that sweet moisture. As the water wet her mouth and slid down her throat, the terrible thirst seemed to ease little by little.

With a sense of relief that she might survive, Adela let slip, from somewhere deep in her unconscious, the name buried deepest of all.

“…Leon.”

With that single word, Adela sank back into sleep, deep as a swamp.

Leon froze in that instant.

The warmth that desperately clung to his lips, trying to take in the water, pulled away.

He could not tell whether Adela just called his name, or whether he imagined it.

“…Hah.”

He released the breath he was holding, and the faint smell of blood mixed with the sharp scent of medicinal herbs washed over him.

Leon sank to his knees beside the bed.

Without even thinking to wipe his bruised lips, he looked down at the pale fingers clutching his sleeve like a lifeline.

Leon laid his hand over her fingers. Pressure gathered at every knuckle.

“After treating me like you wanted me dead.”

The low murmur trembled in his throat.

After all that, if she was going to cling to him like this, Adela Valent tested his patience for over ten days.

Adela’s condition was critical from the fever.

Several renowned physicians, sought out in secret, came and went, but every one of them gave up on her.

He threatened to kill them if they failed, and coaxed them with promises of a fortune if they saved her, yet not one could say they were able to cure her.

“Not a chance.”

Leon gripped those frail fingers clutching his sleeve as though he might crush them.

“Even if death itself came for you, I could not hand you over.”

It was none other than him who had his hand around Adela Valent’s throat.

“If anyone is going to kill you, it will be me.”

The sharp words left his mouth, yet a sigh escaped on their heels.

Why did the hand that cut down thousands on the battlefield without blinking tremble like this?

His rough hand lingered for a long time over the bandage wrapped around her slender foot.

In the past, it was always him who got hurt.

It was Adela who crept to him at night, hugging the medicine box.

After staring at Adela’s foot for a long while, he reached out with what seemed like resolve.

Just as his fingertips were about to touch the bandage, Adela’s dry lips moved.

“…Run, Leon.”

Leon’s hand stopped in midair. Her voice, submerged in fever, was so fragile it seemed ready to snap at any moment.

“Father is… going to hit you. So please… please…”

Leon stopped breathing.

He believed without a doubt that she was the watchdog who kept him bound to this castle on the king’s orders.

Yet now, delirious with fever, Adela was worrying about him. Just as she was in the past, when he trusted her completely.

“…I’m sorry… I’m sorry, I…”

Thud. Adela’s head lolled to the side. While she slipped back into deep sleep, Leon remained frozen in place.

For just a moment, a terrible possibility crossed his mind.

What if he misunderstood her all this time?

Leon shook his head at once.

The chasm of resentment between them was too deep to be explained away with a simple word like misunderstanding.

And right now, treating the wound came first.

He carefully unwound the bandage, and beneath the sharp smell of medicinal herbs, a raw, metallic odor burst free.

The scrap of cloth, stiff as leather from blood and discharge, clung grotesquely to the white sole of Adela’s foot.

Leon’s brow furrowed deeply.

Ten days ago, the day he wrapped it himself, he never found the courage to undo this bandage again. After that, changing the bandage fell to the physician. Every time the cloth was peeled away, Adela sobbed from the pain.

He brought a wet cloth and carefully soaked the hardened bloodstains.

“…Ah.”

A thin m*an slipped from Adela’s lips. Leon gripped her ankle roughly but with just enough restraint not to break it, as her body tried to curl inward even in unconsciousness.

“Stay still.”

The low command was directed at no one in particular.

Slowly, very slowly, he pulled at the end of the bandage, and the festering wound opened its mouth to expose raw flesh.

Leon’s eyes trembled at the sight of the scars left on her white foot.

Even when his own entrails spilled out on the battlefield, his vision never went this dim.

He wiped the discharge from her sole with the cloth soaked in his own sleeve. Each time a piece of swollen, split flesh came away, Leon swallowed dry against his teeth.

“Until it came to this.”

The voice that left his mouth was badly cracked.

“Just how much more do you need to drive me out of my mind before you’re satisfied, Adela?”

Leon’s forehead came to rest on her unresponsive ankle. The lips that once spat sharp threats lingered on the burning top of her foot.

A hot drop fell onto the cold skin.

Leon closed his eyes and pretended not to notice.

He drew Adela’s foot against his chest and held it there. The raw flesh stained his dress uniform, but he did not care. Even after the wound healed, she would not be leaving this room.

It was a life wrested from death itself, so its price, too, had to be entirely his.