The Forgotten Field - Chapter 33

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 33
Once I dismissed my attendants and followed him out of the Cloister, a lush Garden came into view, thick with marigolds, daisies, and rosemary.
The plants, heavy with moisture, released a pungent herbal fragrance into the air. As I breathed in that sharp, verdant scent, I turned to look up at Barcas.
“Did something happen last night?”
The man, who had been walking quietly, turned his head toward me at my hesitant question.
I stared directly into his eyes. His pale blue gaze held nothing—it seemed to reflect everything back without holding anything of its own. As I met those colorless eyes, my chest tightened with an inexplicable ache.
Will there ever come a day when I take root in those eyes?
Lost in such thoughts, Barcas’s firmly pressed lips finally parted.
“There was nothing for Your Highness to concern herself with.”
“…So something did happen, then.”
Without responding, Barcas strode purposefully into the Garden, where rain was pouring down.
Heavy raindrops covered his broad shoulders and back in a sheet of white. As I watched his cold, retreating figure with displeasure, Barcas extended a hand toward me.
“The puddles are deep.”
Understanding his meaning, I flushed and cast him a sidelong glance.
I had no desire to surrender myself to this infuriating man. Yet I could not abandon my betrothed, who waited for me in the rain. After a moment of pretense, I relented and approached him.
Barcas bent slightly and slipped one arm beneath my knees, lifting me effortlessly.
Just as I had done since I was five years old, I rested my head against his shoulder.
“You know you have a cruel streak, don’t you?”
His eyebrows rose slightly at my senseless reproach. Rather than explain my complicated feelings at length, I held him more tightly.
Barcas wrapped his cloak around me without a gap and crossed the vast Garden. I buried one cheek against his collar.
From Barcas’s body came the sharp scent of herbs, the faint metallic smell that clung to his armor, and a distant fragrance like dried leaves or hay. Intoxicated by that cool, austere scent, my displeasure melted away like a lie. I let out a self-deprecating laugh.
I found myself ridiculous—trembling like a naive girl over an action that was merely an old habit for him.
His kindness toward me exists only to honor the vow he made to my mother. Kindness born of obligation. Nothing more, nothing less. Yet knowing this, I could not stop my heart from aching.
‘Cruel man. If only you would stop being kind. Then I could have been content with a purely political arrangement…’
I lowered my eyes sadly.
“I will have bathwater sent to your Chamber. Warm yourself and rest.”
Barcas, who had crossed the Garden in moments, stopped at the entrance to the Residence and spoke. I nodded.
As he ascended the stone steps lightly, Barcas bent slightly as if to set me down.
Then the sky flashed, and a thunderous boom split the air.
I reflexively clutched his neck.
The heavens seemed to shake with successive roars as golden lightning tore through the black clouds. Looking up over his shoulder at the apocalyptic scene, I suddenly noticed a pale figure perched at a second-floor window.
For a moment, I wondered if I were witnessing some terrible illusion. I stared, my mouth falling open.
The flashing light revealed a face of eerie beauty. The snow-white countenance above her fragile neck blazed with such seething hatred that it seemed to burn.
I was not ignorant of my half-sister’s exceptional beauty, yet why was I so shocked now?
In the storm, Talia’s eyes gleamed with such malice that she looked like an angel of death. At that ominous sight, I held my breath without thinking. The statue-like Talia suddenly seized a vase from the windowsill. A moment later, porcelain shattered against a pillar near where we stood.
I screamed.
Thanks to Barcas’s protection, I avoided being showered with glass shards, but a small cut appeared on his face. I hurriedly pulled out a handkerchief and pressed it to his cheek.
With his characteristic impassive expression, Barcas accepted it and wrapped it around his face, then glanced upward.
Following his gaze, I found Talia still glaring down at me, and my face hardened.
Without a trace of remorse for her actions, Talia twisted her lips into a sneer, her sharp eyes blazing. Her bloodied lips looked like a crushed rose.
A fear far greater than anger writhed within Aila’s chest. The half-sister she had always dismissed as nothing suddenly seemed like the most ominous and threatening presence in the world. It felt as though the malevolent spirit that had condemned her mother to misery would drag her too into the abyss of sorrow.
Aila shuddered at the chilling premonition.
* * *
The rain that had fallen throughout the night finally ceased as dawn broke.
Talia, who had spent the night with barely a moment’s sleep, gazed out at the Garden bathed in twilight with hollow eyes.
The verdant leaves that had gleamed so freshly lay half-submerged in muddy water, releasing a thick, grassy stench, while the flowers that had adorned the Flower Bed in vibrant colors lay scattered like corpses, their stems snapped.
Talia, her dark eyes surveying the devastation below, rose from her bed and approached a small table positioned before the fireplace.
On a silver plate, untouched food had hardened into brittle fragments. She swept her indifferent gaze across it, then seized a small knife resting beside the tray.
Though designed for cutting food, it appeared perfectly capable of slicing through human flesh.
Talia traced the sharp tip with her fingertip, then slipped it into the pocket of her gown and slipped from the chamber.
The Corridor was thick with damp moisture. She walked as though swimming through the viscous, heavy air, gripping the ice-cold knife tightly in her palm.
Her hand grew drenched with cold sweat. Whether from tension or excitement, she could not say. Perhaps both.
She moistened her parched lips and crept up the stairs like a cat burglar.
Aila occupied a chamber on the topmost floor. Reaching the landing, Talia pressed herself against the wall and surveyed the darkened Corridor ahead. Fortunately, no guard stood before the door.
Talia exhaled a quiet sigh of relief and carefully made her way toward the door at the end of the Corridor.
As she approached the wooden door bound with iron bands, a faint herbal scent pricked her nostrils—the aroma of incense burned to calm the nerves.
Talia’s lips twisted. So the previous night had not been entirely comfortable for Aila either. Recalling the ashen pallor that had drained from her face at the sight of her, Talia let out a stifled laugh. But the scene that followed in her mind sent her spirits plummeting.
Her face contorted savagely, Talia thrust her hand into her pocket and gripped the knife’s hilt.
Her entire body trembled. The moment she had witnessed Barcas walking out into the pouring rain with Aila cradled in his arms, something she had barely managed to hold together crumbled to dust.
She roughly wiped her blurring eyes with her gown’s sleeve.
It had been her only memory.
A recollection buried deep within her heart for so many years, one she had secretly retrieved time and again.
Did even that cherished memory have to become nothing?
Could we not have kept at least one thing sacred, something uniquely ours?
Her mind boiled with fury. She knew the emotion was irrational. Yet she could not forgive them, either of them.
She wanted to punish Aila for stealing even this last sanctuary. She wanted to return to that man the same agony she herself felt.
Talia fixed her burning gaze upon the firmly closed door. If she crossed this threshold, she would cross a river from which there was no return.
Perhaps history would record her as a wicked sorceress who had stolen the life of an innocent, pitiful princess. It mattered not. I was already regarded as the worst of villains. What more could I lose by falling further still?
With trembling hands, she grasped the door handle.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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