Chapter 29 - Volume 2 (2/2)

「Edi?」

「Wait a bit.」

「But, but you have to wake up early tomorrow……」

I say that, implying ‘so you should go to bed right away.’ He looks over his shoulder and glares at me. Being glared at by that unparalleled beautiful face would make almost all humans except a small minority go pale. But I’m one of the ‘small minority’ so I’m just confused.

I can’t help feeling like it was absurd for him to glare at me like that when I didn’t mean to say anything odd. As if saying he didn’t give a damn about me being confused, he leaves the room. Left alone in that vast room, the only thing I can do is obediently wait, as he said.

He returns in less than a few minutes. In his hand are two cups with white steam rising from them.

I can’t help but tilt my head in puzzlement. He silently sits down beside me, holding out one of the cups to me. I reflexively take it, and the light fragrance with a hint of sweetness wafts up to my nose. Just why did he do this? I look at the beautiful amber liquid filling the cup and at his face, comparing the two countless times. He’s already started drinking his. Without looking here, he unconcernedly says:

「Hurry up, drink that and sleep.」

「Oh dear, did you really go to the trouble of making this for me?」

Its scent is softer than even the usual medicinal plants tea. Just the scent alone softly warms my body right from the core. It seems like I can hope it’ll make me very sleepy. Holding it with both hands and basking in its warmth, I ask him that but he silently drinks from his own cup. Silence is golden. In other words, it seems he did make it for me.

I bring the cup to my mouth. What spreads in my mouth is the unique flavor of medicinal leaves tea along with a flavor as if fruits have been chopped up in it. It’s still a bit too hot, so I take my time drinking it. As I do, my face naturally loosens up and relaxes. I sneak a sidelong glance at my husband; he pretends not to notice, sipping the same tea as me.

「Edi.」

「What?」

「Thank you.」

Sure enough, he doesn’t respond. I can’t help giggling at his predictable reaction. This man is supposed to be extremely smart, but at times like this he can’t say a single clever word.

But I’m probably also hopeless for liking even that part of him. If he actually finds out that I think it’s cute, I’m sure he’d get in an even worse mood.

And then, I finally drink the last sip. I put the cup on top of the table, somehow or another moving closer to the man beside me. The warmth inside me from the tea and the warmth beside me from this man finally make me sleepy. I start feeling like I’ll end up closing my eyes at the comfortable warmth. I cover my mouth, feeling like I’m about to let out a small yawn. Just then, having finished the same tea as me, he stood up.

I feel a bit upset at the warmth disappearing from beside me, but he picked me up again with such timing as if to say, ‘you didn’t think I’d let you stay upset like that, did you?’

‘No, I can walk by myself, so please pardon me from this.’ I look up at him with my gaze saying that, but as expected, he ignores my complaints and carries me to the bedroom again. Unable to oppose him, I’m lowered onto the bed. As I look up at him to say, ‘what are you doing?’ I realize his face is surprisingly close to me.

「Filmina.」

「Yes……—?!」

A soft feeling touches my lips. As I’m dumbfounded, he drags me into bed as if pushing me down, and holds me. With no margin to remove my gown, I have no options but to lie down on the bed with his arms around me, gown and all. He holds me tightly. I feel it’s like he’s saying, ‘I’m not going to let you go.’

It feels like heat is spreading from my lips that he kissed, to the rest of my face, filling it up. My cheeks feel hot. Looking at me as if content, he moves his mouth just a little to say:

「Goodnight.」

「……Goodnight.」

I just barely manage to reply with a small voice. Although we’re close to each other, I wonder if he actually heard it. But he says nothing more than that, closing his beautiful sunrise-colored eyes. With that face just like Sleeping Beauty close to me, I remain dumbfounded as I suddenly think of something.

Sleeping Beauty woke up from the prince’s kiss. There’s nothing about me that would make me a princess, and he’s not a prince but a wizard. So if you just look at it appearance-wise, he’s definitely the one that fits the name of Sleeping Beauty. But even so, I realize just how extraordinary the effect of his kiss was. The sleepiness that had finally come to me just flew away then.

It’s strange. We have done much more things than this many times since we got married, but I still haven’t been able to get used to it.

The sound of my heartbeat is irritating. Instead of covering my ears, I bring my face closer again to his chest as he hugs me, trying to sleep. The arm over my back tightened once again, but this time it made me happy.

In the end, I spent that night unable to fall asleep. Completely forgetting all about that nightmare. Looking back on that, that dream was the beginning of everything. But of course, there was no way for me to know that back then.