Chapter 61
The rain kept pouring. The deep forest air was growing colder.
“Damn it.”
Tebet roughly ran his hand through his hair.
Eslyn’s trembling wasn’t stopping at all.
Drip. Drop. Water droplets fell on the wooden floor. When he looked down, he noticed blood spreading out in a dark stain.
Tebet quickly tried to stop the bleeding from his shoulder as he climbed back onto the bed.
‘It’s worse than I thought…’
Eslyn’s pale lips were trembling as she groaned in pain. For some reason, his heart sank.
He hugged her, wrapping the blanket around her tightly.
‘I must be exhausted too.’
Poison was spreading from the wound on his shoulder, the one torn by the monster. He hadn’t realized it, but his body was already at its limit.
Through her thin clothes, he felt her feverish body heat. He gently touched her forehead.
“…”
Suddenly, he frowned.
Had he nursed her like this before? Was it just his imagination?
The cold rain beat endlessly on the wooden roof.
Sharing his warmth seemed to help—Eslyn’s trembling slowly began to ease. Her scent mixed with the damp smell of the rain, filling his senses.
‘Just a little longer…’
He breathed in her scent like someone breathing fresh air for the first time.
Suddenly, overwhelming fatigue hit him. In his blurry vision, Tebet thought,
‘Just like this… for a while…’
They couldn’t light a fire, so there was no other choice.
Even on the battlefield, the only way to survive the cold without fire was to rely on each other’s body heat.
He used that excuse to justify his actions.
Slowly, his eyelids closed.
‘You’re more of a coward than I thought.’
A clear, gentle voice spread in his ears like ripples on a lake.
‘Fine. When I return from beyond the Shulden continent, I’ll tell you.’
‘Tell me what?’
‘How easy it was to cross the sea.’
Tebet remembered how flustered he’d been back then.
But… she had been so bright.
‘What’s your name?’
The dream was strange. He couldn’t see her face clearly—like it had been scribbled out. Only her light violet hair blowing in the wind stood out.
‘I…’
Even though he couldn’t see her face, he knew—at that moment, she had smiled like a fully bloomed flower.
What expression had he worn back then?
What was that feeling he’d felt…?
“…”
Tebet’s eyes suddenly opened.
He felt a faint movement in his arms.
“…Lord Tebet?”
The voice was hoarse and low, almost drowned out by the sound of the rain hitting the window, but Tebet heard it sharply.
Eslyn’s flushed face was bright red with fever. He looked down into her blue eyes.
“Rosevel.”
“…What?”
“The name you told me… it was Rosevel.”
Tebet’s deep voice echoed.
Eslyn’s eyes widened in surprise for a moment, then lowered again. Her long eyelashes fluttered against his chest.
“Yes,” Eslyn whispered softly.
“My name is… Eslyn Rosevel.”
“Eslyn… Rosevel?”
“Yes.”
“You…”
Tebet’s throat moved heavily as he swallowed. Eslyn lifted her eyes to look at him.
“What were you to me?”
“I… don’t know what you mean.”
“Have we met before?”
Eslyn looked at him. His face blurred into two, four, then dozens.
She shut her eyes tightly with a long breath. Her fever was too high to think clearly.
“…Yes.”
Her weak voice touched his chest, and Tebet’s entire body tensed.
“You were usually the one… who came to find me…”
Her voice was fading like it would disappear any moment. She didn’t even know if she had answered properly. Her eyelids were too heavy.
“I see.”
After a long pause, he spoke quietly. His tired, hazy gaze was fixed on her.
“So that’s how it was.”
“…Lord Tebet?”
“You weren’t just… a maid to me.”
He held her tighter, a heavy sigh falling from his lips.
“Now it makes sense…”
His large hand carefully cradled the back of her head as he muttered nonsense, his eyes closing.
Eslyn tried to understand his words, but her exhausted body refused to think anymore.
In the end, she simply let herself stay in his arms. Sleep, deep as death, claimed her in an instant.
“Now it makes sense…”
What nonsense.
“Ha.”
Tebet threw down the sword he had been cleaning.
Through the fireplace that had dried overnight, flames blazed red and high.
Crack! The wood split loudly, making him spin around instinctively.
“…”
Eslyn was sleeping peacefully on the bed.
“I’m going crazy.”
His brow furrowed tightly. The warm air in the cabin didn’t matter—around Tebet, it was cold.
“Why the hell did I do that?”
He grabbed his head in frustration.
Suddenly, pain surged from his shoulder. The wound had reopened when he had carried Eslyn.
When he’d changed clothes earlier, he’d seen the state of his body—it was a mess.
There were many wounds, but the gash across his upper body was the worst. It looked recent.
‘Where did I get hurt like this?’
The shoulder wound, the upper body wound…
‘It’s definitely from a monster attack.’
But it was strange. He had been fighting since he was ten. Fighting monsters was easier than breathing, and once he’d grown up, he hardly ever got injured.
Then what was this broken body?
‘The shoulder wound especially… it’s almost like I let it happen on purpose.’
Or maybe… he’d gotten hurt to protect something.
“…”
He slowly turned his head.
Eslyn’s face, bathed in soft sunlight, came into view.
“Could it be…?”
Could even this injury be related to her?
His expression hardened dangerously.
“…”
Tebet slowly stood up. His solid body cast a large shadow on the wall.
The shadow stopped by the bed.
‘Is everything because of this maid?’
Her pale face was still as if she had fainted. The cold sweat on her skin showed her fever was finally going down.
He remembered feeding her herbs for fever and pain relief after the rain had stopped. He’d done it half-unconsciously.
‘What was she to me?’
His eyes grew darker.
‘And those memories…’
That wasn’t just a dream.
‘What were they?’
His jaw tightened.
‘My name is Rosevel.’
The woman who had smiled brightly in the warm sunlight.
That smile had made his heart tremble and his mouth go dry—feelings he had never experienced before.
Tebet felt a sharp sense of danger.
‘This is insane.’
He looked down at Eslyn with shaking eyes.
‘This is really insane.’
He couldn’t help but reach out a hand over her sleeping face.
His large hand hovered in the air, tracing her features slowly.
Her round forehead, her slightly furrowed brow, her straight eyebrows, the thin eyelids with veins visible beneath, her small pointed nose, her soft lips, her delicate jawline…
The big hand finally stopped at her slender neck.
“…”
Thump, thump.
He could see her pulse beating weakly like a dying deer.
If he just squeezed, it would stop immediately.
‘Should I kill her here?’
He thought to himself,
‘I refuse to be swayed any further.’
Thump, thump, thump.
But this time it was his own heart pounding wildly.
‘Is she really just a maid?’
Tebet Ripherius had good instincts. He had always sensed and eliminated threats first—that’s how he’d survived.
Those instincts were speaking now.
‘This woman is dangerous.’
In the dream, the maid had been wearing the royal palace maid uniform. But she had introduced herself as a maid of the duchy.
She had lied about her identity.
That alone was reason enough to eliminate her. He should have decided long ago.
Thump-thump-thump-thump.
His heart was racing like he had been running at full speed.
“Why…?”
His calm expression crumbled.
The tips of his fingers trembled in the air. The tremor spread through his entire body.
Why couldn’t he kill her?
He was in a panic.
Just then, her eyelids—ones he thought would never move—fluttered open. Her long lashes trembled as her clear blue eyes slowly appeared.
“…Lord Tebet?”
The moment their eyes met—her eyes like a still lake—Tebet froze as if struck by an arrow.
Eslyn was silent for a moment, as if trying to understand the situation. Then she saw his hand hovering over her neck.
“Do you… want to kill me?”
Her voice was low and calm.
She didn’t look shocked or scared. That unsettled Tebet even more.
“…Yes.”
The voice was locked tight. Even though it was his hand hovering there, he felt like his own throat was being gripped.
“Why did you hide who you really are?”
“What?”
“You were a royal palace maid.”
Eslyn made a short sound, “Ah.”
“So you’ve recovered some of your memory?”
She smiled awkwardly.
Tebet took a deep breath and leaned closer. His cold gaze was so close it could devour her.
“Who sent you from the palace? The First Prince? The Second?”
“Can you move your hand first…?”
“What order did you receive? To find my weakness? Or was it… assassination?”
“Assassination? Me?”
Eslyn let out a soft laugh.
Was there even anyone who could dare kill Tebet Ripherius?
Looking at the current situation, it was hard to tell who was really trying to kill whom.
“Calm down. Surprisingly, none of your guesses are correct.”
“Then what is it?”
Tebet’s voice was harsh and low. He was trying to appear calm but was clearly failing.
His strong arm rested on the bed beside her pillow. His face was close—too close.
“Lord Tebet?”
Their eyes locked. At a distance where their breaths touched, Tebet whispered,
“Why did I lose my memory? And why can’t I kill you, even though you lied to me? Why?”
Up close, Eslyn could see his eyes were in complete chaos.
“Did you ask if my memory came back?”
“…”
“Yes. The memory was of you—when you were a royal palace maid.”
Eslyn held back a sigh. She could feel his confusion.
‘He’s even more shaken because only part of his memory returned.’
She should have reassured him more.
Eslyn bit her lip in regret. Even that small motion made his deep red eyes follow her sharply.
Tebet let out a soft, bitter laugh.
“Do you know what’s even worse?”
He whispered low,
“Because of those damn memories… I can’t take my eyes off you.”
