#113

“Actually, my youngest always used to say something to me. That I only knew that one woman…. She would click her tongue and call me that. I used to hate hearing it, as if she wasn’t considering my situation…. But now it seems like the right thing to say.”

“……”

“I guess I’m just a person who’s never satisfied. At the same time, I can’t let go of even one thing, even though I know it’s impossible to achieve both at once. That’s why I’m in such pain.”

Suddenly, Henrik’s hand came under my chin like a gentle rake. I had been looking down without focus, but as I felt the tips of his thumbs caressing my cheeks, I raised my eyes. Henrik was half-lidding his eyes at a distance where our foreheads could touch at any moment. Though his expression showed no emotion, it wasn’t his usual mask-like appearance.

“Well, first we need to live and see. To think the day would come when I’d see you crying so quietly instead of cursing and yelling at me.”

Just hearing the content, it sounded like a joke. But seeing Henrik’s attitude, muttering lowly without even meeting my gaze, it didn’t seem like he was just joking around.

I stared blankly at the tips of his bangs, which looked almost black in the darkness. This silence now is the tension before contact. This man is going to kiss me. While I was thinking this without much excitement, Henrik’s lips finally descended on me.

First was my forehead.

Next was the temple where his long fingertips were touching. The edge of my ear between his fingers. And then the earlobe. Only when I felt the moist membrane enveloping and rolling my ear did I startle and shudder.

Henrik, perhaps wanting to soothe me, slowly rubbed the tip of my ear that touched his lips. In that moment, I caught my breath and muttered while pushing his chest away.

“…Let go.”

But Henrik didn’t budge at all. I pushed his chest away more forcefully.

“I needed your help, but I didn’t want this situation…. So… don’t do this.”

“……”

“Don’t do this. I don’t like it.”

Despite my firm refusal, Henrik’s grip on the back of my head suddenly tightened. Just as I was about to call out to him in frustration, the next moment.

“Hen….”

My head was flipped back.

A moist, unfamiliar sensation pushed between my parted lips. Henrik’s movements as he wrapped around my waist and rubbed my lower lip were surprisingly gentle, even seeming somewhat polite. However, the sensation of a tongue and lips that weren’t Johannes’ caressing and biting inside my mouth was unimaginably uncomfortable and chilling. An unpleasant shiver ran through me, and I pushed him away.

“I said I don’t like it. Are you fearless? What makes you think you can do this?”

“Let’s leave, Giovinetta.”

“What?”

Henrik, who had briefly pulled away, urgently whispered as if trying to change positions, twisting his chin.

“Don’t you understand yet? I’m the answer you’re looking for.”

“Wait…!”

There was no time to answer. Because Henrik immediately covered my lips again. Answer? What answer? I couldn’t immediately grasp the meaning of Henrik’s words. I only seemed to shudder as I braced my palms against his shoulders pushing me backwards. So if it weren’t for the next commotion, I might have gotten up and fled with all my might.

Some kind of disturbance began to come through the closed window.

A commotion murmuring from very far away. It was like a jumble of various noises clumped together, frantically knocking on the window as if fleeing from pursuers and begging us to save them. It was the sound of something heavy breaking, along with high and low screams of unknown men and women. Perhaps near the main entrance. Screams like nails being torn off in the silence of the night.

Johannes.

I immediately thought of my person’s face. There was no one else I could think of. My mind, which had been soaked all day, dried up as if by a lie. What should I do? He’s looking for me. He’s struggling, worried about me. He’s losing himself.

For fear of losing me.

Crack. It felt like my breastbone was dislocating. It was as if the sharp edge of that broken bone was piercing me. At the same time, an indescribably eerie thrill instantly climbed up my spine, and finally, all strength left my body, and even my head, which I had barely been keeping afloat, crashed to the floor with a thud.

At that moment, I witnessed at a glance the transparently black water filling my mind. Because that incomprehensible and uncontrollable thrill was a flash of light that perfectly reflected the circle I had been hoping for. It felt like my eyes would burn from that light.

Maybe, from the beginning, I hadn’t wished for his physical death.

Maybe, I just wanted to hurt him. Why did it have to be Johannes? Although I don’t know the exact reason yet, at least there’s me here who trembles just imagining him crumbling because of me. Such an unbearably sweet and cruel ecstasy…. Ah.

This must have been the ‘answer’ Henrik spoke of….

I witnessed with my own eyes my pure cruelty that I had well wrapped in the guise of hatred. I couldn’t ignore the fact that this rootless black fruit tasted so sweet on my tongue. I admitted it. However, as I tried to follow the answer I had barely obtained, there was a major flaw within me.

The fact that I love him.

The fact that, as such, I could never just let him go. The fact that I couldn’t deny that his wounds would become my wounds. I am a person who cannot turn away from him. My love drives me into this dead end. What… what am I supposed to do?

Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. It seemed there was no way to avoid ruin if I tried to quench my thirst. It seemed I had no other path left. Therefore, at that moment, I had to make up my mind.

If I couldn’t achieve either, I would bind him to me permanently. I would constantly hurt him, bound to me, to fill the cruel hunger within me. I would moisten this burning throat with salt water. Because that’s the only thing possible for me.

I know. At first glance, it might look like self-harm faithful to instinct. You might think it’s the foolish choice of a greedy demon.

But in reality, I want to say that it was the only way I could love him and simultaneously feel his love in our relationship that had gone wrong from the first button. Cursed, that was the destination of our love, which had been heading towards pain from the very first step.

Kretzman.

I want to ask. Even without my mother’s ‘last wish’, even if we weren’t fake siblings sharing the same boat, would this disaster have happened? Perhaps we could have shared gentle love with each other like other ordinary couples….

Your blood-curdling curse has hung us on this cliff edge.

“Don’t avoid it, Giovinetta.”

Henrik muttered urgently. He seemed to have misheard the screams from outside. Or perhaps he judged it to be a commotion unrelated to him. So, without even glancing at the window, he pursued my lips. It was a disgusting, merciless kiss.

However, the unpleasant impression didn’t last long. Because my hesitation, which had already been resolved, wasn’t as long as before.

I faithfully parted my lips to Henrik’s rough breathing. I turned my head so that Henrik could penetrate me without forcing, and held a lot of strange and lumpy foreign matter in my mouth. And I wrapped my arms around Henrik’s nape. With the same gesture as when clinging to Johannes. Ah, Henrik swallowed his breath.

Yes. The weapon to butcher Johannes was embedded in my belly from the beginning. This body alone is the weapon to make him taste a living death. How can I be so stupid. Because I didn’t have the courage to admit the evil within me, I’ve been walking in vain all night looking for someone else’s knife….

Johannes, Johannes. May the grave where we two are buried be one. I bit Henrik’s tongue and prayed with all my heart.

The external commotion, which seemed like it would become more intense, rather subsided. The initial uproar must have been from armed knights, and now they must have scattered and fled because there was no one left to confront?

As if to prove my guess, the sound of a man fading away like a lone meteor, leaving a long scream behind, was faintly heard. In the end, only the hideous sound of moistening lips with unfamiliar saliva remained in the inner room.

“…Looks like you’ve changed your mind.”

Henrik suddenly detached his face and asked, perhaps because I had easily surrendered my body. I could feel his gaze examining me as he lightly licked his lips at a distance where our noses could almost touch.

However, I didn’t want to pay attention to either his voice or his gaze. I only wanted to focus all my nerves on Johannes’ presence as he would be searching for me. In other words, on the noise in the corridor that could break out at any moment.

Probably due to the structure of the building, I couldn’t hear any commotion like before. Because of that, my knees kept tensing up every moment. Where are you, Johannes? Please hurry. Come quickly and see me. Come here and see me stabbing a knife into your chest.

I closed my eyes, imagining Johannes trembling with anger. I might have been panting a little too. I grabbed the back of Henrik’s head and clung to his mouth. It was an attempt at a deep kiss, like someone truly making love.

However.

“Regrettably…. Giovinetta.”

Henrik, who had lightly sucked on my lips, quickly whispered while catching his excited breath.

“It seems your brother has returned, doesn’t it?”

So what? I questioned with my eyes.

“If I had known you would allow it, I would have carried you off and fled long ago…. I hesitated too long. Anyway, it seems it’s too late to escape together now, so I should leave now. It’s a pity, really.”

It was like a bolt from the blue. My mind snapped to attention. I quickly got up following Henrik as he withdrew his upper body and clung to his waist.

“What are you saying now? No, don’t go. Stay just a little longer.”

“Who knows when Johannes will barge in.”

“Ah, you’re an incorrigible coward. So what if he comes?”

Suddenly, Henrik closed his mouth tightly. For a moment, his blank gaze landed on the bridge of my nose as I reacted almost accusingly.

“I know what you want.”

Henrik, who had briefly flashed a bitter smile, muttered while lowering his eyes.