Chapter 141
It was a faint change from the outside, but because she was so thin, even the slight swelling could be clearly detected.
He slipped his hand inside her wool surcoat and slowly felt beneath her thin silk undergarment, from below her navel down to her pubic bone.
Through the thin fabric, the feel of her skin, which had grown tauter than before, came through even more clearly.
Fascinated by the way her once-flat stomach had begun to form a slight curve, he kept touching it, until the woman curled up on his lap wriggled her hips as if uncomfortable.
He peered into her face with worried eyes.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No, it’s not that...” Thalia stammered, her cheeks flushed red. “It’s... that under you...”
Before they learned of her pregnancy, they had shared a bed almost every day.
He could not understand why she was acting so awkward, but thinking she seemed uncomfortable with his body’s reaction, he slightly adjusted the way he held her.
“It will subside with time. Please do not mind it.”
“How am I supposed to not mind it?” she said, glaring at him in disbelief.
Did she know that every time she raised the corners of her eyes like that, her already alluring face became even more provocative?
As he suppressed the urge to swallow those pouting lips, the woman kept chattering.
“I heard that when a man ends up in that state, it’s quite painful. That... if it isn’t relieved for a long time, it can even start hurting...”
“Who?”
The woman flinched.
Only after seeing that did he realize his voice had sunk so low that it sounded threatening.
He had not meant to frighten her, so he consciously softened his tone.
“Who told you such a thing?”
“I don’t know. I just heard it somewhere a long time ago,” she stammered, visibly flustered.
It was not difficult for him to guess where she had gathered such information.
She must have heard it from some bastard when she used to attend the banquets regularly held at the Empress’s Palace.
The faces of the men who had clung to this woman and pestered her flashed quickly through his mind.
Just as he was narrowing down the most likely candidates among them, she hurriedly changed the subject.
“Anyway, isn’t it painful when your body gets like that?”
“...And if it is?”
Varkas replied crookedly.
“What are you planning to do if I say it is painful?”
A look of bewilderment appeared on her clear face.
After chewing on her lower lip, the woman mumbled in a voice that seemed to crawl into the floor.
“I heard there are ways to relieve it... even without sharing a bed...”
“......”
“Should I... tell you how?”
Varkas felt the back of his head throb and distorted his brow.
His throat swelled with the urge to interrogate her about who had taught her such a thing.
While he chewed back the harsh words that had risen to the tip of his tongue, a ticklish touch came to rest at his waist.
He watched with a heavy gaze as she lifted his shirt.
Perhaps frightened now that she was actually about to touch his body, her fingers lingered for a long while near his tightly drawn abdomen before stealthily slipping inside his belt.
For an instant, it felt as if his blood flowed backward.
Just the sight of those long, delicate fingers, like the finest work of craftsmanship, fumbling at his belt sent his arousal surging to a dangerous level.
He hurriedly caught her wrist.
“No.”
She flinched and looked up at him.
Her moist blue eyes and reddened eye rims were unbearably erotic.
He slowly closed his eyes and repeated inwardly that she was carrying a child.
“Please do not concern yourself with my body.”
“But... won’t it hurt if you leave it like this?”
“It does not hurt.”
“I heard it’s bad for your body if you keep holding back...”
A vein stood out on his forehead as he glared at her.
He wanted to seal those lips, which were spouting knowledge someone else had taught her, with his own mouth and torment them until they were swollen and raw.
Barely suppressing that violent impulse, he spoke in a calm voice.
“I don’t know who spouted such nonsense, but erase it from your mind. All of it is nothing more than a trick meant to stir a woman’s pity.”
“...Are you really not uncomfortable?”
“I am not uncomfortable in the slightest.”
He spoke calmly without batting an eye.
The woman, who had been giving him a doubtful look, soon seemed to accept it and leaned her head against his chest.
Because she believed his words without question and pressed her body closely against him, the lower part of his body was crushed hard.
Barely steadying his roughening breath, Varkas pretended to be calm and carefully stroked the round back of her head.
There was no need for her to worry about the slightest discomfort in his body.
After becoming pregnant, she had started eating better than before and was gaining weight in a pleasing way, but her body was still small and slender.
Hadn’t every healer repeatedly insisted that she must remain absolutely at rest?
He did not want to do anything that might place a burden on her.
“I am more worried about Your Highness’s condition than my body. Is there anywhere you feel uncomfortable?”
“No. Other than getting sleepy all the time and hungry quickly, I don’t think anything has changed much from before.”
She tilted her head and touched her own stomach.
He silently watched her, then carefully cupped her soft cheek.
He was sensing more changes than she was.
Her slightly higher body temperature, her skin tinged with a faint blush, her deepened scent, and her more pronounced curves...
“You... are you really all right? Down there, it’s getting more and more...”
He let out a heavy sigh.
If he kept holding her like this, he felt as if he would lose his self-control.
“The guests have arrived, so I must go out again. Please do not go anywhere and rest in the room.”
When he carefully set her down on the seat beside him and stood up, her bewildered gaze followed him.
“You’re going out like that?”
Her widened eyes slid toward his lower body.
He picked up the tunka hanging on the wall and spoke rather sharply.
“I will take care of it myself, so please stop paying attention to the state of my lower half.”
Her face turned purple-red.
“Who are you treating like a pervert! I was just worried you might end up embarrassing yourself!”
Roughly covering himself with a loose outer garment, Varkas looked back at her with a troubled gaze.
Even the way she panted in indignation, her chest rising and falling, looked provocative, and irritation stirred slightly in him.
He roughly swept his hair back and lowered himself in front of her.
Then, as if admonishing her, he said,
“The most important thing right now is Your Highness’s health. I would like you not to concern yourself with anything else.”
“...You don’t have to treat me like I’m gravely ill. Marisen also said my condition was better than she had worried.”
“Better than expected does not mean it is completely safe to relax.”
After speaking somewhat stiffly, he carefully brushed aside the hair that had fallen over her forehead.
Now she accepted his touch as a matter of course.
Seeing the eyes that had always looked at him warily now grow languid, a tingling heat flared from his waist to the nape of his neck.
Feeling his resolve to behave decently crumble in an instant, he pressed his lips against hers.
It was an act close to self-harm, but he could no longer endure it.
Varkas greedily sucked on the slick, wet flesh and the small tongue before finally lifting his head at the sound of a knock on the door.
The chamberlain’s voice immediately came through the door.
“Your Grace, the guests are asking when they might be able to see Your Grace. What shall I tell them?”
“Tell them I will come soon.”
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