The Forgotten Field - Chapter 69

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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 69
Barcas stepped up onto the carriage, his narrow eyes methodically sweeping over her form.
A faint crease appeared between his sharp brows.
Before she could even comprehend the reason, he climbed onto the carriage with a long stride, retrieved the cloak that had fallen to the floor, and draped it across her shoulders. Then, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, he moved to lift her into his arms.
Talia startled and shoved his shoulder forcefully.
“I can walk on my own feet!”
The medicine’s effects were fading, and pain was beginning to radiate from her knees again, but a short walk should pose no real problem.
She cast aside the cumbersome cloak and carefully stepped down, taking pains to keep her scars hidden.
At that moment, a firm hand grasped her shoulder.
“You intend to go out dressed like that?”
A wedge-like gaze pierced down at her.
Talia hunched her shoulders and lowered her eyes to examine her own appearance.
The dress laces had come undone while she slept, leaving her thin shoulders and forearms completely exposed. That was not all. The deeply cut neckline had slipped down to her cleavage.
Talia’s face flushed crimson as she hurriedly pulled her dress back up.
Barcas watched her undignified state in silence, then sighed softly and draped his own coat across her shoulders once more. This time, Talia did not refuse.
After he fastened the buttons all the way to her neck with meticulous care, he lifted her effortlessly into his arms and stepped outside.
She felt like a carefully wrapped doll.
No. It was nothing so endearing. He was merely taking pity on a cripple who could not walk properly.
Talia deliberately drove cruel words like daggers through her own heart.
Rather than have him steal away every fragment of her heart, it seemed it would hurt far less to puncture the wound herself.
“My lord, what shall we do with the messenger who arrived from the Eastern Territories?”
Just as he reached the threshold, one of the men stationed near the entrance spoke to him.
Talia stole a glimpse of his face through the folds of the cloak. The bear-like man with sharp, eagle-eyed gaze was also glancing at her.
“Must I give instructions for every trifle?”
He pulled the cloak up over her head and spoke coldly.
“Provide him with suitable lodgings and assign someone to attend to him. Have me meet with him tomorrow at first light.”
Without waiting for the man’s response, he strode into the building.
As he crossed the vast hall and climbed the stairs, Talia assembled the fragments of information she had gathered in her mind.
It seemed many feared this marriage would strain the relationship between the Crown Prince and House Sierkan.
Likely, while Senevir prepared for the wedding, he had been occupied with damage control.
He would have had to soothe Gareth’s sense of betrayal and convince the Conservative Faction nobles, including Marquis Orisstein, that he had not turned his back on them.
Despite such efforts, people seemed unable to accept the sudden change of bride.
In a way, it was only natural. After all, even she harbored suspicions that this entire situation might be someone’s malicious prank.
“I shall summon someone to attend to you.”
Barcas entered the chamber and set her down upon a long velvet chair as he spoke.
Talia surveyed the cozily appointed bedroom, then shifted her gaze back to him.
Barcas was unfastening the buttons of his formal coat with one hand while pulling the bell cord that hung beside the bed to summon a servant. At the sight of this, her insides twisted tightly.
She cried out in a sharp voice.
“I don’t need an attendant!”
Barcas glanced back at her over his shoulder, his brows drawing together.
Talia averted her gaze, lowering her eyes to escape his stare.
“Call my Nursemaid.”
“It is late. I will bring her at first light tomorrow. Please endure just one more day.”
She immediately shot him a fierce glare.
“I won’t let anyone but my Nursemaid attend to me. You dragged me out here on your own—take responsibility and bring her!”
His blue eyes gleamed with a cold light.
Talia clenched her fists so hard her knuckles cracked.
He was a man who rationed his patience for her by the day. She thought he might simply walk out in disgust.
Yet it seemed his daily allowance of forbearance had not been exhausted, for he walked to the door and summoned a servant.
“Send someone to the Separate Palace at once. Bring back the Quarter Dwarf.”
“Pardon? Right now?”
“Yes. Send the fastest person you have.”
Barcas closed the door again before the bewildered servant and turned back with a sharp gaze as if asking whether she was satisfied.
Talia avoided his eyes.
Barcas exhaled a long breath and retrieved a robe from the shelf, offering it to her.
“Wear this until someone arrives to attend to you.”
Talia immediately accepted it, draping it over her dress, and demanded in a voice that trembled and fractured.
“Leave now. I want to be alone until my Nursemaid arrives.”
“This is my chamber as well.”
The room suddenly spun, and her palms grew clammy with cold sweat.
She gripped the front of the robe tightly closed and moistened her parched lips.
“Then… then I’ll leave. Take me to another room.”
“Your Highness.”
He placed one hand on her shoulder.
She barely managed to lift her head, and saw his blue eyes shadowed with profound darkness.
“You were the one who agreed to this marriage.”
She looked up at his expressionless face with widened eyes.
So he was saying he would stay here? With me?
Terror coiled her stomach tight.
She stared down at her throbbing knees.
The memory of Senevir’s gaze upon her scars surfaced—her mother’s dark eyes regarding something repulsive—only to be replaced by Barcas’s silvery-blue ones.
Before she could control herself, desperate, tangled words spilled from her lips.
“Then… then I’ll just cancel it. How can we share a room? I only married you to torment you. You only married me because the Emperor ordered it. You don’t want to be with me either. So let’s just pretend none of this happened…”
“Talia.”
He knelt before her, cupped her cheeks in his hands, and drew his face close to hers.
Talia found herself trapped, unable to look away from his eyes.
In those beautiful eyes scattered with silver fragments, her own pale, sweat-dampened face was reflected. His voice emerged as if scraped raw.
“I won’t do anything to you.”
“…”
“Just one night. I’ve already bribed the High Priest, but I cannot silence every servant’s tongue. At least for the first night, we must share the same bedroom.”
His composed demeanor gradually steadied the frantic rhythm of my heart, which had been thrashing uncomfortably.
Talia bit her lip and nodded.
Barcas, confirming that she had calmed, slowly rose to his feet.
Talia tracked his movements with eyes still tinged with wariness.
He peeled away his rain-soaked shirt and draped it aside, then settled into a chair by the window in nothing but a thin undershirt. His ordinarily taut, disciplined frame now sagged with exhaustion.
A heavy sigh stretched long through the chamber.
Shortly after, servants arrived bearing trays laden with wine and food.
Talia mechanically forced down a single piece of bread, then drank a glass of potent moonshine instead of the sleeping draught.
As the alcohol took hold, the rigid muscles loosened and the pain dulled.
She poured herself more wine into the golden goblet.
After emptying several more glasses, Barcas—who had been letting her do as she wished—seized the wine bottle from her hands.
“That is enough.”
Talia bolted upright from her chair, desperate to reclaim the bottle.
But her already weakened legs had turned to jelly beneath the alcohol’s influence.
She swayed like a boneless creature. Barcas caught her wavering form and laid her straight upon the bed.
Even half-conscious from intoxication, Talia’s first concern was to check her skirts.
Barcas, gazing down at her with shadowed eyes, drew the quilt up over her shoulders, then walked to the window and drew back the curtains.
The sunset, deepening from crimson to violet, flooded over him.
Watching his broad shoulders glow copper-red in that radiant light, Talia’s eyes closed slowly.
Even beneath that blazing sunlight, he appeared hauntingly cold.

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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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