“Mother!”

“Riel!”

“Princess!”

Tears welled in everyone’s eyes. I beamed from within my mother’s embrace.

“My power is finally starting to awaken!”

“So it seems, my dear! Oh, goodness! What was I thinking!”

“What is it?”

“If I had known this would happen, I never would have sent your father off to go fishing!”

“That sounds rather like you expected me to fail again today.”

I glanced sideways at my mother, and she laughed awkwardly and changed the subject.

“Now, never mind that. Let’s hurry and get ready to welcome your father and Dusik. We’ll have a special dinner tonight. Dusik loves meat, so a course meal made from the wild boar we caught last time would be perfect.”

The saying that a mother-in-law’s love for her son-in-law knows no bounds held true even in this world.

“Dusik will be so pleased.”

While walking side by side with my mother out of the greenhouse, a knight burst in, gasping for breath, and cried out.

“P, Princess Riel! Something terrible has happened!”

“What? Tell me quickly.”

“Dusik has lost consciousness!”

***

‘Of course, of course things were going too smoothly today! That’s always how it goes for Lee Hana!’

Gripping my dress skirts in both hands, I sprinted to the marital bedroom in no time at all, and thanks to an attendant who quickly threw open the door, I was able to rush inside.

There before me stood my father, pacing guiltily like a man awaiting sentencing, and Aiden lying asleep in the large bed.

‘I never should have let him go fishing in the first place……’

Even if Aiden was a descendant of the Kastua Empire’s wolf bloodline, he was the ill-fated male lead who could not transform into a wolf. On top of that, he had once nearly drowned. Why hadn’t I thought of that?

“Dusik……”

My eyes filled with tears. My father had said they would fish not from a boat but from in front of the villa, and despite my worry, Aiden had stepped forward without hesitation. I should have stopped him then.

‘Dusik. How terrible it must have been, flailing in the water……’

But it was already too late. Seeing Aiden’s face drained of all color, my heart caved in. I looked at my father through tear-blurred eyes, full of reproach.

“Father…… what exactly happened?”

My father hesitated, then drew a long breath. He looked at me with an expression that said he simply could not make sense of it, and spoke.

“I truly cannot understand that husband of yours!”

I stared at him with a tear-streaked face, eyes wide.

“What do you mean?”

What my father said next was entirely unexpected.

“Dusik hooked a prize catch and lost his footing, and then he just fainted on the spot!”

“……Pardon?”

He didn’t fall into the water?

“Good heavens, in all my years I have never seen a man collapse from tripping in ankle-deep water! Weak as a kitten.”

The whole situation was so baffling and absurd that my father clicked his tongue, turned sharply on his heel, and walked out of the bedroom. I was equally bewildered.

Wait, he wasn’t that afraid of water, was he? He got into the bath just fine……

But then, since when had Dusik become such a delicate creature……?

***

“Dusik has simply fallen into a very deep sleep. As you know, my healing power isn’t suited for interfering with sleep. Don’t worry, Riel. He’ll wake up soon.”

Two hours had passed since my mother came and went from the bedroom.

The sky had already darkened to a deep, shadowy violet.

Changed into a thin white chemise, I sat gazing at him as he slept soundly, turning the question over in my mind. Had Aiden really collapsed because of a large fish?

The more I thought about it, the less that seemed right. Which left only one answer.

To summarize Aiden’s past briefly, he was the firstborn son of Balton, the sixth emperor of the Kastua Empire, and his consort, Empress Margaret.

But Empress Margaret had been frail by nature, and the strain of giving birth to Aiden left her bedridden.

All she could do was barely lift her eyes to look at those around her.

Perhaps because of that, Aiden was born with a smaller-than-average frame and a delicate constitution. Even past his hundredth day, he failed to awaken as a wolf.

On top of that, instead of the ‘red eyes’ that symbolized Kastua blood, he was born with the ‘violet eyes’ of Empress Margaret, and everyone had been deeply disappointed.

Over this matter, the vassals began pressing the Emperor to take a new imperial consort and produce an heir, citing the question of succession.

The Kastua Empire had a tradition of taking only a single mate, passed down through generations of the wolf bloodline, but Empress Margaret was unable to fulfill her duties, and there was no one to carry out the obligations in her place.

Moreover, as the vassals pointed out, if Aiden, the only heir, were to die without inheriting the wolf bloodline’s ability, the fate of the Kastua Empire was plain to see.

Left with no choice, Emperor Balton agreed to take an imperial consort. From her, he would have four children.

‘The outcome was obvious……’

Recalling the dark past of Empress Margaret and Aiden, I bit down on my lower lip.

Aiden’s standing within the imperial family was pushed to the very back, and he was subjected to every form of cold neglect. Then, in the year he turned eight, a rumor spread that he might not carry Kastua blood at all, calling his birth into question.

[Cut out the tongues of every last one of those who speak such nonsense!]

The first time Emperor Balton heard that rumor, he did not deny Aiden’s existence, the son of the woman he had loved so dearly.

But as time passed, his heart began to change. His affection for Empress Margaret faded, little by little.

[Your Majesty, what is to become of my mother and me?]

[Aiden.]

[You need not concern yourself with me. But for my mother—]

[I no longer know whether you are truly my son. Not a single trace of my great ability shows in you.]

[Your Majesty…… Father!]

[You are of no use to me now. Live quietly, like a mouse. That is the only way you will survive.]

After the Emperor lost interest, the pressure from the imperial consort’s side against Aiden grew harsher with each passing day. There was no one to protect him. Empress Margaret’s own family was steadily losing its influence as well.

The Emperor eventually turned his back on her and Aiden, and Empress Margaret was murdered one cold night beneath a full moon, by an assassin sent by the imperial consort.

And so Aiden became the ill-fated prince, and the second prince born of the imperial consort was named Crown Prince of the Empire. But the Crown Prince kept a wary eye on the first prince Aiden, because his own mother had not been the Emperor’s true mate.

‘And the reason Aiden was swept away by the current was that the Crown Prince, transformed into a wolf, had hunted Aiden through the forest and driven him to the edge of a cliff.’

I quietly steadied the surge of anger rising inside me and turned back to the situation at hand.

‘But in the original story, the male lead never once showed this kind of fragile, collapsing behavior……’

That was what made no sense. Could it be that the original story had twisted because I had married Aiden?

Following the original, he should have been recovering his memories through the female lead by now, and before long, obtaining the demonic sword and succeeding in his revenge.

Gazing quietly at Aiden’s troubled face, a sigh came on its own.

“Why did it have to be me, of all people……”

There were more than enough extras in this world. It stung like a needle pressed into the heart.

‘Even so, he really is devastatingly handsome. Well, it was this perfect subject that made me fall for him at first sight.’

I let out a small laugh and reached out to smooth his disheveled bangs, and in that instant.

“!”

Heaven and earth flipped upside down.

It was all so abrupt. When I came to my senses, Aiden’s eyes were open and he was already on top of me.

“Du, Dusik……?”

“……”

The pale blue moonlight falling on his body scattered and broke apart without mercy.

Aiden stared down at me in silence, his face set hard, unresponsive to my call. Come to think of it, the atmosphere felt different from usual……

I managed to ask.

“Are you…… okay?”

After a long silence, he spoke in the imperial language.

“……Riel.”

And it was my name.

“Y, yes. It’s me, Riel. Your wife.”

“Riel……”

“Mm-hm.”

Before my words had even finished, he slowly lowered his lips toward my face.

Startled, I blinked up at him, and at a distance of barely a finger’s width, his violet irises met my gaze.

I swallowed hard, tension coiling tight. Then Aiden spoke in a voice that sounded like he was holding his breath, strained with something painful.

“Do you know…… your scent is unbearably sweet.”

“Hm?”

What did I just hear?

“If I could…… I’d want to chew you up and swallow you whole, from head to toe……”