Chapter 144
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As winter deepened, her belly swelled noticeably.
The change that had seemed only fascinating and satisfying soon transformed into a disaster.
As the baby grew, the burden placed on her body increased.
Groaning from pain that felt as if her waist would snap, Thalia carefully tried changing her position.
But no matter what angle she lay at, there was no way to escape the pain.
“Would you like to turn onto this side? I will massage your waist.”
Marisen, who had been looking at her with pity as she groaned, carefully suggested it.
Thalia immediately nodded.
She hated other people touching her body, but this was no time to be picky.
“Could you lift your legs just a little? If I place a cushion between them, it should make you somewhat more comfortable.”
“Like this...?”
When she slightly lifted her knees, the woman slid a pillow between them.
Thalia let out a long breath.
It was not much help with the waist pain itself, but at least the tingling sensation running down her legs seemed to ease a little.
“Please tell me if it hurts.”
The woman bent over the bed and began pressing her waist with exquisite pressure.
Thalia groaned deeply and stretched out her aching legs.
The woman lowered her hands over them, carefully examining the contracted muscles, then asked cautiously,
“How is the pain in your legs?”
“Why ask? Of course, it hurts terribly.”
“If it is too difficult, shall I burn a little sleeping herb for you?”
Thalia narrowed her eyes and quietly studied the woman’s face.
Her calm face was full only of concern for her.
“That... won’t harm the baby?”
“You have entered the stable period now, so it should not cause any serious problems.”
Thalia looked down at her belly with conflicted eyes.
She desperately wanted to escape the pain, even for a short while, but she was afraid it might somehow have a bad effect on the child.
While she was still deep in thought, Tiuran, who had been prodding the firewood in front of the fireplace, abruptly joined the conversation.
“It is better to avoid using medicine whenever possible. It still has not been clearly determined what effect sleeping herb has on a fetus.”
Marisen glared at her in displeasure.
“Do you think I would prescribe something harmful to Her Highness? I have prescribed painkillers to pregnant women before, and there has never once been a problem.”
“But there are always exceptional situations...”
“Enough.”
Thalia cut off their argument at once.
She was in no mood to put up with the subtle war of nerves between the two women.
“Even if I use medicine, it will hurt again once I wake up anyway. I’ll just endure it.”
“But because of the pain, you cannot sleep properly. At this rate, if you collapse from exhaustion...”
“I said enough! If you’re going to nag, go away.”
Thalia rather roughly pushed away her hand and pulled the blanket all the way up over her head.
She had no energy left for pointless squabbling.
As her swollen uterus pressed against the nerves in her twisted pelvis, her already painful legs tingled terribly, and she got cramps in her calves more often as well.
The stabbing pain in her waist also worsened with each passing day.
The thought that she had to endure this state until summer felt overwhelming.
Thalia lightly pressed down on her bulging lower abdomen with both hands.
When faint fetal movement came through beneath her taut skin, the resentment that had almost begun to rise toward the baby melted away in an instant.
Still, once this child was born, she intended to complain a little.
You made me hurt terribly.
Even so, I endured it all.
So you have to listen to me well.
And you have to like me more than anyone else in the world.
I’ll do the same for you.
She was blankly thinking such thoughts when, at some point, she seemed to doze off.
Thalia opened her eyes at the touch stroking her forehead and found Varkas’s shadowed face looking down at her, then sleepily raised her upper body.
“When did you come?”
“I have just finished my official duties and returned. Please lie down.”
“I don’t want to. My waist hurts from lying down all the time.”
She pushed away the hand that tried to lay her back down, placed a cushion against the headboard, and sat up, slowly looking over him in his formal uniform.
Wearing a reddish-brown doublet embroidered with the East’s distinctive ornate patterns and black leather boots, he looked like a noble of dignity and elegance itself.
“Was there some event?”
Thalia carefully studied his attire, which seemed more formal than usual, and asked in a suspicious tone.
Varkas calmly replied while undoing the buttons of his doublet.
“I merely attended a meeting of the Noble Alliance.”
“There have been a lot of meetings lately. Did some problem come up?”
“There is no problem at all. More importantly, why did you move rooms?”
Varkas suddenly revealed a displeased look and changed the subject.
Thalia clasped her knees with both hands and awkwardly lowered her eyes.
“Because of me, you can’t sleep either. I thought it would be better for us to use separate rooms until I give birth.”
“Stop with that useless consideration.”
Varkas spoke rather sharply and leaned over the bed.
Thalia realized that he was trying to lift her into his arms and moved away toward the corner of the bed.
“I’m doing it because it’s more comfortable for me.”
His eyes narrowed.
Varkas quietly looked down at her face, then sat on the edge of the bed and refuted her in a cool voice.
“Did you not say before that it was inconvenient if I did not stay beside you and attend to you?”
“That was then... but it’s different now.”
“What is different?”
Thalia looked at Varkas’s strong and beautiful outline with the firelight behind him, then lowered her gaze to her own body wrapped in a thin nightgown.
Her breasts, which had grown like a milk cow’s, and her belly, which bulged like a toad’s, came into view.
Her bony, thin body had also been unsightly, but this swollen body that seemed ready to burst was even more hateful to look at.
Separate from the joy of having a baby, the sight of herself, neither elegant like Ayla nor sensual like Senevier, gradually made her feel miserable.
She pulled the blanket up over her shoulders and spoke rather irritably.
“I wasn’t in this much pain back then.”
“That is exactly why I should stay beside you and care for you even more.”
Varkas frowned and reached his arms toward her again.
Thalia was startled and twisted her body aside.
But before she could escape, his long arms wrapped around her back.
In an instant, Thalia was pulled onto his lap, and she hurriedly tugged the hem of her skirt down to her toes.
But Varkas’s attention seemed fixed solely on her waist.
As he gently rubbed the muscles near her spine with his firm palm, Varkas frowned when he saw her tearful face.
“Does it hurt that much?”
Thalia glared at him with tear-filled eyes.
This man would not understand even a little of her desire not to show him her ruined body.
She knew well that it was a foolish emotion.
But ever since she was nine years old, Thalia had wanted to look like the prettiest person in the world to him.
So much so that the fact she could not made her despair.
“Yes, it hurts enough to kill me.”
Instead of honestly confessing that truth, Thalia threw a pointless fit.
“I’m so resentful I could die. Why am I the only one who has to suffer like this? I wish you hurt at least half as much as I do.”
“Then you should torment me beside you. Why try to use separate rooms?”
Varkas rubbed her back and whispered as if coaxing her.
Just as her heart was about to soften at that gentle voice, his hand settled on her swollen belly, and she quickly raised her knees and curled her body into a ball.
“No. Don’t touch me.”
“Why not?”
A slight edge appeared on the face of the man who had been patiently soothing her all along.
It seemed his patience had finally reached its limit.
Varkas drew in a long breath and asked in a much lower voice,
“It is my child. Why will you not even let me touch it lately?”
“It’s not your child.”
At the words she spat out like a tantrum, his face froze coldly.
For an instant, her heart chilled, but Thalia continued speaking as if calm.
“Until it comes out into the world, it is wholly my child alone. I’m carrying it while enduring this much pain, so it’s only fair that I have exclusive rights.”
At the words that were no different from stubborn insistence, the furrow in Varkas’s brow deepened.
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