Chapter 5
Chloe Langsher stared at the closed door for a moment before slowly turning around.
Luke Olfenster was quite different from what she had imagined. Though he hadn’t changed much in height or build since she last saw him three years ago as an adult, his aura and demeanor… no, more importantly…
“Why are you still dyeing your hair?”
Luke Olfenster was born a natural blond, resembling a bright golden prince, though there were patches of brown now. When he pretended to be her lover, he dyed his hair black to conceal his identity, but now there was no need to hide, and it was time to proudly display his blond hair resembling a prince. Yet he still had black hair.
“I’ve wanted to see that blond hair at least one more time.”
Tossing her oddly tinted hair over her shoulder, Chloe glanced back at the closed door at the end of the hallway. He seemed more dangerous, sharp, and ill-tempered than she had imagined.
Yeah. He looked precarious.
Would he still be like that even if he succeeded in his revenge, having lost so much already?
Still…
Chloe looked away from the closed door. She was reminded of golden wheat fields. Of a boy who once had the same color. Of Luke Olfenster, who had risen again despite losing everything.
…But it will get better. It had to. She hoped so.
“It’s truly over now.”
Suddenly, the whispered words brought a sense of reality crashing down. The life of “Marie Edant” was coming to an end. The deviation from the plan was manageable.
Originally, the plan was to wait a few months after creating her new identity to fake the death of “Marie Edant,” but it couldn’t be helped. Only Gideon knew her true identity, and to fake her death, she needed Gideon, so it had to be done while descending to the estate.
Buying time with a funeral in the estate and creating a new identity in the meantime…
Then it would truly be over.
What business could a common apothecary living in the countryside have with the noble elites of the capital?
Especially if she were an empress, she wouldn’t have to deal with them from a distance.
Chloe sat silently in her bedroom, lost in thought. For quite a long time.
Until the room, entered with the setting sun, was cloaked in the bluish dawn light.
“Madam.”
At the familiar touch and voice, Chloe looked up. Gideon, with eyes slackened as if intoxicated, slowly approached her.
Despite slowing his steps to avoid staggering, he seemed oddly more disheveled than usual.
“Has Her Majesty returned, Gideon?”
“No. Not yet… She’s… asleep.”
Even when alone, they strictly adhered to using formal titles between spouses. There was no room for conversation beyond what was appropriate for a married couple. Both agreed it was better not to create any opportunity for unconscious slips of different titles or words.
“Ah. Did you prepare the rooms on the second floor?”
“Yes. The large one, and next to it is the physician’s…”
His words trailed off. Gideon blinked his unfocused eyes and took Chloe’s hand. Then, he wrote letters with his fingers on her palm.
Maintaining a thorough facade of “Marie Edant” outwardly but conversing as “Chloe Langsher” through hand gestures.
Remembering the rule even in the midst of seeming intoxicated was proof that their efforts had not been in vain, yet the letters formed by his intoxicated gestures weren’t discernible.
“Gideon, you’re drunk. Let’s talk about it tomorrow.”
Chloe sighed, grabbing Gideon’s hand as he moved somewhat busily. His unfocused gaze contained faint dissatisfaction, as if he had something urgent to convey.
“Let’s go to bed. You need to rest for tomorrow…”
She tried to rise from her chair, but Gideon pressed down on her shoulder. No, it was more like he was collapsing. With a small thud, his knees hit the floor, and a sharp smell of alcohol wafted over.
“Gide…!”
Before her startled voice could finish, his hand covered her mouth. He leaned his forehead against her shoulder, chuckling.
“That man…”
With a start, he pulled her close by wrapping his arm around her neck with the hand that had covered her mouth, and he pulled her in. In an instant, his lips, moist and uncertain, touched her ear.
“…that man couldn’t recognize you…”
It was an excruciatingly low voice. Even with his lips pressed against her ear, it was difficult to make out.
Chloe hesitated to push him away. The exhilaration underlying those few words was so intense that it even reached her. It was unbelievable that such emotions existed within this rough, rock-like man.
His head fell back onto her shoulder. Instead of pushing him away, Chloe lightly kissed his lips. Why was he so pleased that Luke didn’t recognize her?
“Why do you help me this much?”
It was a question that had been asked relentlessly, directly or indirectly, over the past three years. Now it seemed she could hear the answer, unlike before when he was sober.
As if he had taken some kind of medicine…
“Because you’re Troy Lansgher’s daughter.”
What?
Gideon chuckled hoarsely. Before she could question further, his laughter mixed with coughs, and her shoulder became damp. A metallic smell mixed with a sour odor.
Clang!
Before understanding the situation, the door shattered.
“Your, your Majesty! You mustn’t move until the poison is completely neutralized!”
With the physician’s cry, a tall figure strode into the room. Chloe found herself instinctively holding Gideon tightly to her chest.
“…”
The approaching man halted upon seeing them. Their eyes met. Luke’s gray irises, strangely unfocused like Gideon’s, blinked at her a few times.
“I see.”
After a low growl that sounded like an acknowledgment, Luke spat out a short burst of blood. The last drink had been poisoned. It was a rather potent poison; he experienced momentary hallucinations.
He saw Chloe…
As the thought of occasionally indulging in such hallucinations crossed his mind, Luke’s body collapsed.
“Your Majesty!”
* * *
“First, stop the bleeding…”
“…I’d rather have him vomit out all the poison…”
“If his body can’t handle it…”
Whispers echoed in his head. Luke gathered the last remnants of his consciousness and recalled when he had ingested the poison. But that was all he could remember.
He remembered drinking the poison for the first time. The culprit was Chloe’s aunt, and the poison was in the milk. She cried. Did she just drink it because she didn’t want to see the face resembling Chloe cry?
What kind of poison was it? He didn’t die…
“Ugh!”
“…Well done.”
Luke opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was a bowl brimming with black blood. Then the woman who held the bowl swept his back. He spat out blood a few more times.
“Uh…”
As if swallowing fire, his painful throat cleared, and his mind was fairly intact. He pressed his temples firmly. His blurry vision sharpened.
“How long has it been?”
“Two and a half days since you drank the poison. Is your throat okay?”
“Completely.”
Luke shook his head. The white woman, with blood spattered all over, set down the blood bowl and lit a cigarette for him. Instinctively biting on the cigarette end that entered his mouth, she lit it.
“I’ve refined herbs with pain-relieving effects. Your Majesty. It’s best to ingest them orally, but since swallowing might be difficult for you…”
“What about your husband?”
As he deeply inhaled the smoke, he felt the pain dulling. As the excruciating pain in his mind eased slightly, he vaguely grasped the situation. Once this seemingly fragile woman learned that her husband and the emperor had been poisoned, she had somehow managed to push people aside and administer treatment.
She must have some useful skills.
Seeing the physician, who looked as if he had taken on the weight of the world, curled up in a corner, Luke thought that perhaps only she and this woman knew that he had ingested poison.
“I woke up this morning. Shall I call him?”
“How is he?”
“Similar to Your Majesty. His throat is sore, but his internal organs are intact. If he receives treatment for a few months, there will be almost no lingering effects… Yes, that’s what the physician said.”
As the calm diagnosis trailed off, she mentioned the physician crouched in the corner. Luke chuckled briefly and tapped the middle of the paper rolled with herbs in his mouth.
“Did the physician prepare this too?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. It’s an herb with almost no side effects other than dizziness or drowsiness…”
“The physician?”
“Yes.”
As the woman, who had been halfway bowing her head, nodded up and down, Luke wondered what expression she was wearing to tell such a lie.
As an emperor who had experienced various sedatives and stimulants and even a variety of emergency drugs, and who had been evaluated by one of the imperial court physicians as being likely to have the drugs flow through his body instead of blood, he was quite adept at identifying several of the herbs contained in what he was smoking.
Could the physician afford to stock and carry around herbs that even the imperial physicians would only prescribe with an increase in the budget? Did they even have the money for it?
Even if they did, if he had sent someone to fetch the necessary herbs on that strange night, he would have woken up somewhere in the palace, not in Edant’s villa like now.
“You should be able to eat soft food in a few hours if you smoke for a few hours. You’ll have to keep grinding. Your Majesty.”
The woman, who had shown him the bowl filled with medicine that could be smoked like tobacco before placing it back on the bedside table, had a slow and gentle tone, as if sleep was pouring down. Like a lullaby.
“If you’re resting, I’ll call your husband for a moment…”
He reluctantly closed his eyes, not bothering to resist the gradually heavy eyelids. He couldn’t remember the last time he fell asleep like this. It wasn’t like collapsing into unconsciousness from either a sedative or a drug, but rather a genuine drowsiness that washed over him.
With a short groan, a cautious hand retrieved what had been placed in his mouth. For a moment, a single finger brushed over his lips. Half-opening his eyes at the warmth, he saw a back covered with white hair that reached down to the waist.
Strangely, sugar came to mind.
Refined white sugar was expensive and difficult to store, and it was sweet.
Come to think of it, the term “human sugar” didn’t seem entirely wrong in terms of being expensive and difficult to store. But, well… judging by how Gideon stumbled over his words, he probably didn’t look at the price. Of course, Gideon didn’t like sweet things, and the one fixated on sugar was himself, but still.
After consuming dreadful-tasting medicines, it was inevitable to become obsessed with something sweet. With these bizarre thoughts following the flow of consciousness, he rationalized his taste buds and closed his eyes again.
“Ah… “
Suddenly, he remembered seeing a small and weak human sugar lifting a robust middle-aged man about twice his size with one hand before he closed his eyes. But he dismissed it as a dream.
