Roderick now visited Lee-Jae several times a day. He still spoke ill of Duke Duncan and occasionally looked at her with suspicious eyes.
He couldn’t let go of his intuition that Lee-Jae was hiding something from him.
Though darkness had obscured him for a long time, he was actually a bright and sharp person.
However, when Lee-Jae felt his distrust and tried to distance herself, he forgot about his doubts and looked very annoyed.
Every time he saw Roderick like that, Jade was in a terrible mood. He had been trying to wrap her around Roderick’s finger, but Roderick was completely entangled with the other side.
But the King didn’t stop at just that. He often occupied Lee-Jae’s bed and even began to take naps there.
Today, after visiting once during the day, he had come to Lee-Jae’s quarters again in the evening.
“I’ve heard that Hailey Duncan is quite interested in fashion.”
To be precise, Roderick read, not heard. He looked at the bracelet Lee-Jae was sharpening, and this time looked at Jade.
He was asking about the credibility of the report.
Jade, who couldn’t help but agree with the King’s sentiment that the current era couldn’t accommodate such sensibilities, avoided his gaze.
“I’m not doing this because it’s pretty.”
“Right, for concentration of the mind.”
“Cultivating, the word is ‘cultivating’.”
Lee-Jae, who added with a casual smile, finishing the last of the rough wooden beads.
In fact, she had no choice but to make a new prayer bead bracelet. This was because the existing bracelet started to crack from the usage.
She had been driving away the spirits that followed Roderick whenever she saw them, which inevitably led to this result.
She had planned to use the 500-year-old foreign spirit as a useful shield, but the spirit was just a spirit.
It seemed the spirit knew Lee-Jae’s ulterior motive and never showed up when Roderick was around.
Lee-Jae now had to admit that merely driving away the spirits temporarily had its limits. What she needed was exorcism and banishment.
But she also realized that this was far beyond her abilities.
With a small sigh, she began carving something onto the wooden beads one by one.
She carved various fierce Chinese characters, and her eyes were different from usual—they looked sharp and focused, with a gleaming light.
Roderick watched Lee-Jae’s face and the patterns she was carving intently. He wanted to ask what they were, but he remained silent.
He could feel that Lee-Jae was in a state of deep concentration, so much so that she didn’t even realize she was slightly biting her lower lip.
Finally, when Lee-Jae finished the carving and stored the completed piece in a cracked cabinet, Roderick stood up.
The King’s attendants paused in their preparations to leave, as the King, whom they thought was leaving, laid down on the Queen’s bed instead.
It was getting close to nighttime.
The attendants hesitated, and Deborah glared at the chief attendant as if she were about to kill him.
‘What are you guys doing?! Please, learn to read the room.’
The Queen’s palace maids had already left. When the remaining attendants also left, only Roderick and Lee-Jae were left in the room.
“…”
Lee-Jae stared at Roderick, who was occupying the bed with his eyes covered with the back of his hand.
She was the only one who knew why Roderick kept stealing her bed.
He knew by instinct that this was a safe place, a place to sleep comfortably.
However, it was not the time to end with just a short nap, so she was trying to guess his intentions.
Was he going to sleep here at night too? Did he want to sleep together? Did he mean to do ‘that’?
The couple, who were not yet like a couple, had poor communication in this regard.
And perhaps because Lee-Jae took too long, the King silently got up.
He stood Lee-Jae up from the chair and pulled her to sit on the bed.
“Sleep comfortably in bed.”
Just as she thought he might leave, he laid down on the sofa a short distance away. Fiddling with the blanket, she was a little worried.
“…”
She always faced the irony of not being able to chase him away and tell him to go sleep comfortably in his own bed.
The protective spirits would be wide-eyed, but the palace was a haunted house.
“Your Majesty.”
“…What is it?”
“…”
“If you called me, say something.”
“Please sleep comfortably in bed.”
“…”
“Come here and lie down with me.”
He got up immediately, as if he had been waiting for those words.
However, his eyes as he walked to the bed were not those of someone who wanted to sleep because he was sleepy. Neither Lee-Jae nor Roderick himself realized this fact.
As Lee-Jae went to the window side and made space, Roderick climbed into the spot she had given him.
It was already the third time they had been in bed side by side, but Lee-Jae still was a little awkward.
With his chin propped up, he looked at Lee-Jae and then bluntly said.
“I thought you were a mature human being but to let the King sleep on the sofa, do you know how disloyal that would be?”
“This is my room, and my bed. …Sometimes you say the strangest things.”
“It means I’m glad you’re not that heartless of a wife.”
He didn’t like her father, but she was becoming more and more likable.
But it’s strange. Why did he sometimes feel like she was lying? What exactly was she hiding?
Roderick continued to look at Lee-Jae as she pulled up the blanket and prepared to sleep.
Then he said, a little more mischievously.
“Do you know what you have to do when you start sleeping in the same bed as me?”
“…”
“Isn’t it time for us to do it?”
However, when Lee-Jae’s flinched face with wide pupils wandered here and there, he quickly added.
“Hailey. I was joking. Well, honestly, it wasn’t entirely a joke, but you don’t need to feel pressured to accept.”
Then Lee-Jae’s expression became more complicated.
She wanted to do it, too. In fact, she had a strong, almost inexplicable conviction that she needed to experience it before she died.
Yet, she found it strange that she couldn’t readily give a positive signal.
‘Your Majesty, do you know why I’m being so hesitant even though we’re married?’
‘I know a lot about spirits, but I’m a fool when it comes to understanding my own heart.’
On the other hand, Roderick chuckled at Lee-Jae’s more complicated expression.
It’s because he just thought that her mind wasn’t ready.
The Queen had once been so in love with someone that she threw herself into a river. So, it was understandable that she might feel resistant to being intimate, even with her husband.
Of course, it was a slightly wrong understanding.
To help the struggling Lee-Jae, he changed the subject.
“Are you really going to give me your handkerchief?”
“…Are you really going to go hunting?”
“I don’t have the patience to listen to your father’s sarcasm.”
That was true, but the real purpose of the royal hunting event was to display the royal family’s strength.
Last year, they had the excuse of the disrupted royal wedding, but not this year. Roderick had already decided to hold the hunting event.
In politics, gaining something often meant giving something up. Roderick didn’t want to give anything up just for a hunting event.
“Did you think it was a lie that I would give you a handkerchief?”
“Well.”
Roderick muttered ambiguously. He didn’t think Lee-Jae’s offer was a lie. But suddenly, he thought Lawrence might participate.
“But what are you going to do with my handkerchief? It’s useless.”
It was probably a Cayenne tradition to pray for good luck and safety. However, in her opinion, what Roderick needed was not a handkerchief, but a talisman.
Perhaps reading the negative nuances of her words, Roderick frowned slightly.
“If you don’t want to give it, just say so. It’s a bit less guilt-inducing that way. And, though it’s a bit petty to say, you were the one who offered it first.”
“This might sound petty too, but actually, Your Majesty was the first one to bring it up.”
Roderick lay down straight and covered his eyes with his arm. He grumbled in discontent.
“How can someone so small be so argumentative?”
Lee-Jae laughed in disbelief.
He was right that she wasn’t that tall. Hailey was less than 160cm* tall.
[*T/N: 5’3”]
Roderick, on the other hand, seemed close to being 190cm*. With his broad shoulders and strong build, he looked even taller than his actual height.
[*T/N: 6’3”]
If he had not been born as heir to the throne, he would have become a general.
“It’s not that I’m small, but it’s that Your Majesty is big.”
“Fine, just go to sleep. For your information, this was a hurtful conversation.”
Feeling more amused than sorry, Lee-Jae buried her face in the pillow. She didn’t want him to see her laughing in this situation.
When she looked back at him, he had his eyes closed.
Lee Jae, who smiled faintly, said.
“Your Majesty.”
“What?”
“I’ll give it to you. So please… don’t doubt me.”
“…”
“Good night, then. Sweet dreams tonight.”
Roderick was silent for a while. He felt like the Queen had just spoken with a double meaning. It was as if she was saying, ‘Don’t doubt me.’
Strangely, he often thought she was quite perceptive despite her young age and lack of social experience.
He wondered if the Duke’s family had been very hard on her. She was always gauging others’ feelings and quickly catching on.
Roderick, in fact, was starting to like that about her. He was also dumbfounded that he might like a Duncan in the future.
He chuckled, as if in resignation, and finally responded.
“Good night to you, too.”
It was a peaceful night.
