Chapter 14
‘What on earth is going on? I’ve never seen Roa linger around a particular person before.’
It didn’t take long for Cerulean to realize that Edel was interested in Roa. The reason she had asked him for a contract marriage was obvious if one thought about it for even a moment. A woman who promised to divorce at the right time could not possibly truly desire the position of a duchess.
Knowing her heart, Cerulean had already planned to send her the most precious jewels of the ducal family, along with countless others from his personal fortune.
Because what she truly wanted was something he could never give her.
But if Roa was hovering around her, the story changed. That was why Cerulean had said he’d stay a little while, just in case Roa might be hiding in the house.
‘And yet this happened…’
At Edel’s suggestion, he found himself lying on her sofa. He blinked slowly. The sofa was far too small for him, but just as she’d said, it had a warmth that made some corner of his heart loosen.
Scratch, scratch.
The sound of Edel writing softly filled his ears. He stared blankly at her profile.
Her thick red hair tied up in a single knot, her face slightly frowning in concentration—
‘She hasn’t changed since she was a child.’
Cerulean bit his lip. He had never told her, but he had met Edel before.
Back when he was eight, before he was adopted by Duke Luke.
He had been a child living in an orphanage.
‘Come to think of it, even back then she was meddlesome.’
At the orphanage, Cerulean had always kept to himself, sitting in corners without joining in. Concerned about this, the nun once called in a visiting physician, who diagnosed him with a rare condition she had never heard of.
He had Apathy Syndrome, an illness that dulled both emotions and sensations.
It was around that time that Edel and her mother visited the orphanage.
“Why are you sitting here alone?”
Edel’s mother ran a flower shop, and sometimes she volunteered with the orphans, teaching them to make bouquets. Cerulean had never once joined in those activities.
One day, when all the children had run off to touch the flowers, he sat under a tree alone. Edel came over, holding a flower as red as her hair.
“Hold it close and look at it. When you really see the vibrant colors, the sweet fragrance rushes in.”
It was a strange sensation. The senses that had been slowly dulling over the years suddenly came alive in a burst. His heart pounded wildly, the scent of the rose and Edel’s bright smiling face mingling dizzyingly together.
He thought, she’s beautiful.
‘Though I forgot about it for a long time.’
Not long after, a stern-looking man visited the orphanage.
Duke Luke.
“I hear there’s a child here suffering from numbness syndrome.”
He pointed directly at Cerulean.
“I want to take this child as my adopted son.”
And so Cerulean became Cerulean Luke.
When he was adopted, many people, ignorant of the truth, envied him. Even his orphanage friends thought so.
“How lucky. You get parents now.”
Parents. Something he had never once had in his life.
He had been unlucky not to have them, and now, lucky to gain them.
‘But was that really a good thing?’
Even to young Cerulean, it was clear the Duke was not a good parent. He provided food, shelter, and necessities, but there was no warmth, no affection.
The Duke was like living ice. A man who gave his heart to nothing, unmoved by anything, existing in a frozen world of his own.
And because Cerulean was much the same, their life together had no friction.
Later, when the Duke married Princess Vanerinne by imperial decree, and she smilingly drove a dagger into Cerulean’s succession by insisting her five-year-old son Charles should inherit instead, Cerulean still felt nothing.
“In terms of marriage, both Cerulean and our Charles are still children, aren’t they? Surely one cannot pass on a title before marriage?”
It was an obvious ploy to block his succession until her son came of age.
‘Not that Charles will ever become a duke anyway.’
The head of House Luke was not chosen by blood. Only those who could hunt Roa could inherit.
Few knew this truth: Roa was a beast born from human fear, feeding on it, growing larger with every terror it devoured.
Only the emotionless could face it.
So even though the princess schemed, Cerulean remained calm. Charles Luke could never become a Roa hunter.
‘And yet here I am, in a contract marriage, lying on someone else’s sofa.’
His glass-like eyes lingered on Edel’s face as she wrote. He suddenly felt the urge to smooth out her furrowed brow.
It was an impulse he would never normally have. Perhaps he had been bewitched from the moment he agreed to this ridiculous marriage.
‘…I must be mad.’
This house was filled with Edel’s presence—sounds, tastes, smells, textures, all of it overwhelming him.
‘Come to think of it, even Father was different that day.’
He recalled the moment he had taken the marriage contract to the Duke’s study for approval.
The title that would come to him in due time, he had tried to claim earlier through marriage. The Duke stared at him with his usual coldness.
“Stop being noisy.”
A blunt refusal. Cerulean had expected as much and nodded. Why had he even brought it this far, just because of a woman’s words?
‘I must have been oddly excited. How unlike me.’
He had been reflecting wryly when—
“Wait.”
“Yes?”
As he reached for the contract again, the Duke suddenly seized it.
Though he seemed to read carefully, he grew restless, wiping his face repeatedly with his hand. Then he turned sharply and left.
“…It’s on the desk. Put your seal on it yourself.”
It was the first time, in all the years since Cerulean became his son, that the Duke had looked flustered or changed his mind.
Startled, Cerulean’s eyes had caught a book on the desk.
A gossip magazine.
‘Why would His Grace keep something like that?’
Everything about Edel Azian was strange.
Cerulean sat up just as I finished my draft.
I had been so absorbed in my writing that I’d forgotten he was there. When I looked up and saw him reading over my article, I screamed in surprise.
“Kyaa!”
“Careful.”
Startled, I lost my balance, and my chair tilted dangerously. Before I could fall, Cerulean caught me in his arms. My eyes went wide.
‘Wow, he’s strong. His arms are solid.’
I’d never had a father. So I could only vaguely imagine what it would be like—the strong arms of a dad who could lift a child with one hand.
‘Is this what it would feel like?’
But my heart was beating far too badly for it to be called fatherly. I hurriedly pushed at his chest and sat back at the table.
“Th-thank you.”
Pressing my palm against my chest, I realized it wasn’t my imagination—my heart was pounding wildly. I took a few deep breaths.
‘It’s just because I was shocked. How often does someone nearly fall backwards in a chair? That’s all it is.’
But if I opened my mouth, I felt like the sound of my heartbeat would come bursting out. So I clasped my hands tightly and kept my lips sealed. Cerulean spoke softly.
“My apologies for startling you. I didn’t want to disturb you, but my silence nearly caused you harm.”
I waved my hands quickly. Strictly speaking, it wasn’t his fault. It was mine, for not noticing a man that large approach me.
“N-no, I should be the one apologizing. I focused on my work while leaving a guest unattended.”
Blushing, I apologized. He shook his head.
“I enjoyed it. You don’t need to apologize for that. It’s rare to see someone writing an article. So this is how a draft is made.”
He said it so seriously that my face turned red like a ripe tomato.
“Ugh, it’s embarrassing.”
“Hm?”
His eyebrows lifted high, clearly not understanding why I’d be embarrassed.
‘But how can I not be!’
Drafts were messy, raw—like exposing an unpolished part of myself to someone else!
After studying me for a long moment, arms crossed, he shrugged.
“You don’t need to be embarrassed. It’s an excellent article, one that makes the reader even more curious about their fiancée. Even I, who already know you, feel intrigued. Especially this part: ‘Lord Cerulean Luke is said to prefer refined and elegant beauties—so is his fiancée truly such a beauty?’”
“W-wait a minute!”
How could he just read that aloud like that?!
The sudden attack nearly knocked me unconscious with shock.
‘How could he recite gossip about himself with such a straight face!’
And with that aristocratic accent of his, even raw gossip sounded elegant.
‘So embarrassing!’
I covered my face with both hands and twisted in my seat like a boiled squid. He tilted his head at me.
“What’s wrong?”
I stammered through my burning face.
“It’s just… no one has ever read my articles aloud to me before.”
He frowned, then sighed through his nose.
“For someone so easily embarrassed, I wonder how you became the pillar of the gossip columns.”
“I wonder that myself! Sometimes things just turn out to be your aptitude, that’s all!”
‘This man is as thoughtless as he looks!’
Inwardly, I deducted points from Cerulean.
