Swan remained bedridden for three consecutive days, unable to regain consciousness. Naturally, the Empress’s royal doctors were in a state of utter panic. A pregnant empress collapsing and remaining unconscious for three days was a disaster. Even if her head were displayed on the city gates, they would be defenceless. 

But the Emperor did not use threats to wake the Empress. Instead, his sharp eyes alone conveyed his displeasure. 

The Empress’s foster father and the commoner who had raised her in her early years lingered anxiously outside her chamber. Meanwhile, the young princess cried when she heard that her mother was unconscious, clutching her baby squirrel and asking if her mother had caught a fever.

The Emperor comforted his sobbing daughter as he watched over the Empress’s bed. From time to time he dismissed the royal doctors to hold and stroke Swan himself.

Three days passed in this way. Unable to give her any medicine because of her pregnancy, the Emperor cooled her forehead and wiped her hands and feet with cold cloths. Hearing that there was little else that could be done, he personally tended to her body and gently poured water on her lips. Finally, her eyes opened.

“Swan…”

“Where are the Marquis and Tom?”

“They are outside your chamber.”

“Is the Marquis my father?” 

Not a foster father, but her biological father. Her mind felt empty. It was a reality she couldn’t accept. She had seen him several times, but she hadn’t felt anything to indicate that he was her father. So did Tom know? Why had he kept it from her? She gripped the water cup tightly, her breath coming out unevenly.

“You can meet him at any time, so just concentrate on getting better for now,” Atlion said.

“No, I need to meet him now…”

“Swan.”

“But…”

“Think of the child.”

His hand rested on her belly, which had just begun to swell. She looked at Atlion with tear swollen eyes, her breath ragged. She slowly opened and closed her eyes, trying to calm herself. The sight of his pale, sad face filled her vision.

“You’ve been unconscious for three days.” 

It was disorientating. The moment she opened her eyes after days of unconsciousness, her mind was consumed with thoughts of her biological father. Atlion, who had been kneeling before her and stroking her cheek, rose and sat down on the edge of the bed.

“How do you think I felt?”

The usually cold and determined man looked utterly fragile. His face betrayed a hidden fear. Was he afraid of losing her? Was he that afraid? Was it an overwhelming fear, so unbearable that it made him sick to his stomach? It was the first time Swan had ever seen Atlion like this. Even the night his throat had been cut and blood spurted out, his face hadn’t shown such vulnerability.

It was strange to see his flawless, perfect exterior seem to crack and splinter. His long fingers traced her eyes and lips, trembling slightly. Swan’s delicate lashes fluttered. Atlion tilted her chin up, his gaze soft but intense as he looked down at her.

Her small chin, soft and delicate, felt as if it held a fragment of the white moon. He pressed his lips to hers. Warm breaths flowed directly into his mouth, but he didn’t swallow. Instead, he savoured the rounded, lingering scent in those breaths, nibbling and pressing against her pale, flushed skin. A small whimper rang in his ears.

His hand gripped his wife’s br*ast tightly. Swan brushed her hands across his chest as if to push him away, though the touch was more like a caress. The sensation was electric. He devoured her with an almost ravenous intensity, but when he noticed her tear-filled eyes, he drew back his lips.

“Swan.”

The silent tears were heartbreaking. He didn’t brush her cheek, but held her gently in his arms. Swan buried her face in his shoulder, her body shaking slightly. She lifted her hand to stroke his slender back. A dull ache prickled the edges of his heart, a searing pain throbbing deep inside.

“It’s all right.”

Her trembling stopped for a moment as she gripped his shoulder tightly. Atlion whispered as if in prayer. At the sound of his calm, soothing voice, Swan lifted her head. He gently stroked her tear streaked face, his expression softening into a smile.

“Everything will be fine.”

“Your Majesty…”

“It doesn’t matter whose daughter you are. Only you matter. You are the only thing that matters to me.”

It didn’t matter who her father was or what bloodline she belonged to. It was enough for Swan to be herself. There was no fact more important to him. Nothing could be more important.

Perhaps it would have been better not to have found her biological father. He had never imagined that the Marquis of Clepassé had such a past. They had no obvious connection, not even a small one. Yet his decision had caused Swan so much pain. He bit his lip lightly.

“…I thought I was abandoned.”

Her subdued voice was heavy with grief. Atlion looked at her with calm eyes. As the heat began to rise within her, Swan leaned against his chest, slowly revealing the deeply buried thoughts she had kept locked away.

“I had never met him.”

It was devastating. What must Swan have thought as she stood before doors that never opened for her? How must it have felt to believe that she had been abandoned before birth, shunned by the villagers?

To finally meet the man she was told was her father, only to learn that her mother had long since died… Atlion looked down at her. He gently tucked her curling locks behind her ear and stroked her neck with a gentle touch.

“I vaguely remember hearing that he had gone to war. But I was all my mother had left. The only thing my father left her was me.”

Was that why Swan believed he had left her only Mirabella? It was as if lines had been etched deep into his skin. It wasn’t something he could deny or dismiss as a misunderstanding. He had been indifferent to Swan then. He had been unaware of her pregnancy and the birth of her child. That much was an undeniable truth.

What had he lost and how? How had he regained it? When he thought of the countless wounds he had inflicted on Swan – when he imagined that those wounds might never fully heal – it felt as if his lifespan was being chipped away.

It was only after losing Swan that he began to understand her pain. She was a woman who swallowed everything and buried it deep inside, making it seem easy. She had lived that way, gotten used to it.

It was almost laughable. Someone who had once found human emotions trivial and annoying now clung to them so fiercely. Yet all of it – every bit of it – was bound to Swan alone. Her pain, her wounds, her childhood of grief and abandonment, and the inescapable threads of the past they shared.

“I pity my mother.”

“Do you hate the Marquis of Clepassé?”

“I don’t know.”

Swan tried to stop herself from sobbing. She was always fighting to overcome everything that weighed on her. Atlion could only hold her tightly, leaving no space between them. And so, for a while, the couple remained locked in an embrace as if holding their breath.

“I hated my father. I thought he had abandoned us. But it wasn’t abandonment; he couldn’t come back. And my mother… she died without knowing. And I…”

Swan shivered slightly. Her nose sniffled as if she felt a chill. Atlion pulled the blanket over her shoulders and stroked her hair gently, as if comforting a child.

Swan looked up at him. Her look was innocent, clear and pure. There was no sharpness in her expression, just an unguarded, naive look. But he found himself wanting to taste her. To lick her ravenously, to kiss her deeply, to let his desire consume him. Strangely, Swan’s eyes did that to him.

Even in the early days, when he knew nothing – when he thought his dazed fascination with her was only because she was his first encounter with a woman’s body – he had felt desire for her.

The Prince’s voice was calm as he continued to hold Swan, his words both a comfort and a reminder of their bond. Despite the temptations of the noblewomen who had brazenly climbed into his bed in the hope of becoming the Crown Prince’s wife, he had never once been moved. He hadn’t even lifted a finger to these women, no matter how brazenly they presented themselves. And yet Swan alone stirred him, igniting a fire within him that he had refused to acknowledge for so long.

Only Swan stirred him. Not even imitations that resembled her could compare – they couldn’t come close. He adored everything about her. From her hair to her toes, he wanted to devour her. The moment he saw her eyes, he felt desire and burned with need. She was his absinthe – his madness and his love.

“And now you’ve come back.”

“But my mother is no longer here.”

“Her spirit promised to be with you always.”

“Yes.”

“And she left her tree behind.”

“That’s right. Mother’s tree.”

Swan confirmed, a small, bittersweet smile forming on her lips as she thought of the tree that symbolised her mother’s presence.

Swan nodded her head, her movements slow and deliberate. He patted her back gently, stifling the intermittent sobs that escaped her, and placed a soft kiss on her forehead.

“Shall we show him the tree?”

“When the Marquis is ready.”

“And ask him to forgive Uncle Tom.”

“Yes, let’s ask his forgiveness too.”

“He only did it to protect me.”

He nodded in agreement, mirroring her resolve. As he gazed at the faintly trembling outline of her chin, a slight smile played on his lips. As long as Swan was out of pain, nothing else mattered. Whether her parents were nobles, commoners or something else entirely, Swan was Swan. That was all there was to it. She belonged by his side, always. He couldn’t dream of a future without her.

Once lost, the clarity of its meaning was overwhelming. It became painfully clear. Not clinging to Swan, not begging for her love, had been his arrogance. Atlion gently laid her down on the bed, wrapping his arms around her as she nestled into his embrace.

***

Following the Emperor’s words to show the tree when the Marquis was ready, Swan led Marquis Clepassé to “Mother’s Tree”. This was the tree that had been fed with her mother’s cremated remains as fertiliser. Originally planted in the courtyard of the small cabin, it had been tended by Tom during Swan’s absence while she followed Atlion. Later, when she entered the palace, the tree had been carefully uprooted and relocated by stewards on Atlion’s orders.

“Mother has become the spirit of the plum tree.”

The Marquis turned to her, unable to speak. Swan met his gaze, noticing the faint glimmer of tears in his blue eyes. She knew then that she could never hate her father. She could never bring herself to despise him. If he had not abandoned her, but had simply not been able to return, then there was nothing left to hate.

Mother would feel the same. Or maybe she already knew from the moment she became a tree spirit. It was said that spirits knew everything. Maybe she became the tree to wait for Father’s return.

“The plum tree is my favourite, I love plums so much.”

There was nothing to stop the tears that began to flow. Neither a towel nor a warm cup of tea could stop the flow from the eyes. Let the tears flow as they will, Mother had always said.

So Swan didn’t give the Marquis a towel. She let him mourn Mother. Swan herself had cried all day yesterday and could not cry any more. She just looked at the tree that was her mother.