“…Sir Dian.”

A thick silence settled between them.

After taking a few steady breaths, Dian finally spoke. He was still facing away from her, his gaze fixed firmly on the floor.

To Anita, he resembled one of the stone statues perched on top of the palace roof: silent and steadfast, watching over everything below.

“Please return to your chambers, Your Highness. It’s too cold here for you to remain.”

His voice was stiffer than usual, bringing Anita back to her senses. Now he had seen her, it was only a matter of time before Cedric found out, too.

Fear prickled through her. What would he say this time? What would he do?

Anita murmured that she understood, began to rise, then hesitated.

If she was going to be scolded anyway, she wanted to stay a little longer.

After a moment, she finally spoke, her voice quiet but deliberate.

“Count.”

“…”

“…Please pretend you didn’t see me. I’ll only stay for a moment. Just a little while, then I’ll go back inside.”

Dian did not answer. With his back still turned and his face hidden in darkness, Anita could not see his expression at all. She stared at his faint silhouette in the shadows, waiting for a response that never came.

Then, after a long silence, he moved. Startled by the sudden movement of a man who had seemed as still as stone, Anita flinched.

Without a word, Dian touched her shoulder, fumbling for something. A faint clinking sound followed, and then he took a step back, holding the long piece of cloth that had been draped across his back in one hand.

“My apologies, Your Highness.”

Even as he approached her slowly and backwards, he did not seem threatening at all. Perhaps it was because he kept his eyes lowered the whole time, as if afraid to meet hers.

Stopping at a respectful distance, Dian held out his arm and placed the long, wide fabric at Anita’s feet in one smooth movement.

“I’ll leave this here. Please use it if you need, and leave it wherever you wish afterward.”

Was he suggesting that she should cover up if she was cold?

Anita gazed down at the black cloth lying loosely before her. It was fairly thick — not quite a blanket, but big enough to wrap around her whole body.

Unable to find the right words, she hesitated, then slowly reached out towards it.

“Then, I shall take my—”

Click.

Just as Anita was about to touch the fallen cloth, a chilling sound pierced the silence. The door to the bedchamber swung open.

She turned her head towards it instinctively and, in that instant, froze. A man was standing in the half-open doorway.

“What are you doing there?”

Who was he addressing?

At the sound of his lord’s voice, Dian turned around immediately and knelt down. A bead of cold sweat traced down the back of his neck as he bowed towards the floor.

Cedric’s eyes shifted from his silent retainer to Anita. His gaze swept over her face and then down to her outstretched hand and the piece of cloth lying at her feet.

He narrowed his eyes slightly as he examined the fabric, then turned back to her. Without raising his voice, Cedric spoke again, each word heavy with restrained threat.

“Did you not hear me? I asked what you’re doing.”

··· ✦ ···

Leaning against the wall beside the door, he cast a slanted shadow. Pale moonlight spilled from the open chamber, washing over him cold and sharp as steel.

His arms were crossed loosely, and his posture radiated calm composure. The silk robe draped over his frame was thinner than Anita’s nightdress and hung in effortless folds, barely concealing the symmetry of his body.

At first glance, Cedric resembled one of the ancient gods once worshipped by humankind — an embodiment of beauty so mesmerizing that it demanded reverence.

Yet the moment one’s eyes met what lay beneath the veil of his fallen hair, the illusion shattered. After all, a god is both beautiful and terrifying, to be adored and feared in equal measure.

“…Her Highness the Crown Princess found this room too cold, so I offered her my robe.”

Dian was the one who finally answered Cedric’s question. After casting a quick glance at Anita, who was frozen in fear and unable to speak, he tried to steady his voice as best he could.

“Silence.”

Cedric’s reply cut through the air like a blade. The chill in his voice was so intense that Anita could almost feel the blade he was holding.

“I wasn’t speaking to you, Dian. For a mere knight to interrupt when his lord is speaking with his wife—do you understand how insolent that is?”

“It is my fault, Your Highness. I beg your forgiveness.”

The question ‘What are you doing?’ had been meant for Anita. She knew it, yet even then, she couldn’t bring herself to part her lips.

“And furthermore.”

“….”

“I’m certain I ordered that no one was to enter this place.”

Dian could find no words with which to defend himself. His master was indeed right: ever since the princess started visiting the bedchamber, Cedric had forbidden men to enter the room or the adjoining quarters.

“I’m disappointed. I never expected you, of all people, to defy me.”

“I’ve disobeyed Your Highness’s command. I will accept whatever punishment you deem fit.”

Did he not realize that the faint presence in the room was not his lord?

No — Dian was well aware of the gravity of his sin.

“The punishment for your insolence will be decided after sunrise. For now, leave us.”

Cedric looked at his knight for a long moment before giving the order. Dian bowed deeply once more, then rose without a word.

He passed Anita, who was still standing paralyzed, quickly, and slipped out of the door without looking at her.

Almost unconsciously, Anita turned in the direction he had gone. Part of it was a simple reaction to the sound, but mostly it was a desperate instinct to escape the suffocating space she now shared with Cedric alone.

Yet that small movement only provoked Cedric further. He uncrossed his arms. In a few unhurried steps, he closed the distance between them.

The candlelight flickered as he moved, casting shifting shadows across his face. This interplay accentuated his features, and Anita held her breath.

Her body trembled of its own accord. Cedric looked down at her quivering shoulders, then his gaze dropped to the crumpled robe on the floor.

The sight of his subordinate’s garment brushing against her bare feet disgusted him. With a sharp thud, he kicked the cloth aside, sending it skidding across the floor.

Anita flinched at the sudden movement. Her eyes wide with fear, she glanced up and traced the lines of his face, stopping just below his chin.

The contours of his neck and the firm expanse of his chest, so different from her own fragile body, came into view.

She knew only too well how hard and unyielding his body could be, and the memory alone made her shrink back further.

“Tsk! How unbecoming for someone born a princess! No matter how many times I correct you, there’s always more to fix.”

His voice fell upon her like a sharp, cold blade, followed by the faint click of his tongue. Anita lowered her trembling gaze and clenched her hands together tightly.

“Stand up.”

The command struck like ice. Before she could respond, a large hand shot forward, gripping her wrist tightly and yanking her upwards.

Pain shot through her arm as she was dragged off the sofa. She managed to keep her balance, but then stumbled forward.

Her small hand brushed against his chest. The skin beneath the robe was warm to the touch. Without saying a word, Cedric’s arm snaked around her waist and pulled her close. Then he began to walk.

Anita was both dragged and lifted as he moved towards the bedchamber. Her toes scraped against the floor, stinging from the friction, but the air around him was so charged that she dared not speak.

Thud.

Cedric pushed her through the open doorway and closed the door behind them. He looked her over slowly from head to toe while she stood there, trembling with fear and unsure of what to do.

Moonlight filtered through the curtains, bright enough to make the thin, white fabric of her nightdress almost transparent.

Seeing the faint outline of her body, Cedric’s face twisted with barely restrained fury.

‘This sight…’

He could hardly contain the anger rising within him.

“…You must have been quite cold. Then again, back in Callithea, you spent your winters in the southern palace. I suppose you never truly learned what cold feels like.”

He had always spoken to her in a way that was designed to hurt her. But tonight, he lost all restraint.

“And what now? This year, that palace won’t be in use. The family that should have been staying there—your family—must be freezing far worse than you are.”

He spoke of her family in Callithea with cruel amusement. Compared to Laxion, Callithea’s winters were longer and harsher.

While the Laxion imperial family had no need for separate winter residences, the Callithean royals had always owned a property in the warmer southern region in which to see out the season. Yet even that refuge, deep in the south, was now unreachable.

As he mocked her family, who were still trapped under the rebels’ control, the last of Anita’s defiance withered completely. She bowed her head as if to say that her only duty was to endure his scorn silently.

His voice fell again, low and biting.

“Why did you go out there, trembling like this?”

Cedric stepped closer to the woman trembling in fear and cut through the silence with his voice.

Anita kept her eyes fixed on her toes, unable to admit that she had only wanted to escape the stifling atmosphere of their shared bed.“Ah… what is it then? Was one man not enough for you? Is that why you crept out like a filthy rat stealing crumbs?”

His words struck home, each one deliberately humiliating. A wave of unbearable shame washed over her, but she endured it in silence, biting the inside of her cheek. This wasn’t the first time he had degraded her.

“Well, I suppose you were rather disappointed that night, weren’t you?” The night I introduced you to those four men? After all, it was your wedding night. Hm?”

He couldn’t stop himself. He felt compelled to look at her and hurl words at her that would make her crumble.

Anita lifted her head, her face pale and stricken. That night — her first night — had been nothing short of torment. She had tried so hard to bury it and never remember it again, but Cedric had forced it back into the light with cruel precision.

Had he been capable of the slightest flicker of remorse, he would never have started.

Instead, he merely looked down at her with a mocking smile, seemingly amused by her pain.

‘Does she not know her place? Does she not understand why she is here?’

First his half-brother and now his most trusted knight. Of course, it may have been nothing more than the knight entering after hearing a noise and finding the Crown Princess shivering in the cold, offering her a cloak out of courtesy.

“But what now? Of all people, it was Dian. And I know him, he wouldn’t so much as look at you.”

“…”

“He despises those who chase after goddesses just as much as I do.”

Cedric knew Dian well enough to be certain that he would never forget his master’s orders. He was one of the finest knights in Callithea, a man whose instincts were too acute to mistake a suspicious presence or the rustle of a woman’s clothing for something else.

And yet, anger surged through Cedric’s chest — hot, irrational and violent. He couldn’t identify what enraged him most, only that the sight of Anita standing before him like this, after being alone with another man, had ignited something uncontrollable within him.

Anita, who had endured every cruel insult in silence, hesitated. Her eyes flickered faintly as she searched for words that might reach him somehow.

Cedric tilted his head slightly, his narrowed gaze a silent order: If you have something to say… speak.