The End of Your Arrogance - Chapter 2.1

“Can you… walk a bit slower?” Evelyn staggered as she was dragged through the rain by Ilya.

Ilya finally stopped as he entered the main door and looked behind him. Evelyn felt her heart miss a beat when she met his deep blue eyes that looked like a violent and stormy sea.

“I can’t… walk so fast in these heels.”

Evelyn was drenched in rainwater and couldn’t stand properly because one of her heels had broken off. The servants and maids looked at them in shock as they entered. Evelyn felt disgraced. She wished she could disappear.

But when she looked in the eyes of her sleepy husband, she saw nothing reflected there but herself. She was suddenly lifted off the ground. She clung to the man’s neck scared that she might fall as he carried her. “Y-your Highness, please calm yourself.”

Perhaps because he had no strength to carry her up to the second-floor bedroom, he kicked open the door to the nearest bedroom and entered. The door closed shut with a bang.

Evelyn had confidently told him that she would put him to sleep, but she felt doubtful. She had only used her power on two people so far: her son, Livell Ajauntice, and the late Archduke Ajauntice, her husband’s older brother. Insomnia seemed to be a common hereditary problem in the males of the Ajauntice family. So, Evelyn had assumed it might work as well for Ilya.

Her thoughts halted as she felt herself being lowered on the soft bed. He stared at her so intensely that she felt it would pierce her skin. She could hear her nervous breathing in the room. Everything else was quiet. The silence felt dangerous. A predator looking at his prey. As the silence stretched, her fear became worse.

Ilya sat at the edge of the bed and lifted her hands to his mouth. She felt his hot tongue on her thumb that she had bitten earlier.

That wasn’t enough blood, she thought. Maybe another cut would…

She tried to get up but he grabbed her shoulders and pressed her down on the bed. He crawled on top of her. It was hard for her to breathe under his weight. Her clothes were wet from the rain and his body was so hot it felt as though his skin would burn her.

“What happens next?” he asked. His usual low voice was slurred in a drunken stupor.

“I am not sure…”

“I think I know,” he said menacingly.

Evelyn felt scared at the wet voice in her ear. She couldn’t breathe properly. He wrapped his hand around her neck— so thin and delicate that he could probably snap it with minimal effort—and lifted it up slightly. His other hand moved past her ear, her cheek, her lips and came to rest on her collarbone.

Evelyn winced at his touch. The rising heat from her belly felt as though it would burst forth from her body. His stiff lips descended on her chin. When his cold lips touched her tender skin, Evelyn couldn’t bear it anymore. She let out a sob.

Perhaps Ilya was turned on by the sob, he kissed her cheek. The spot where his lips met her skin was scorching hot. Evelyn felt as though it would burn her.

She suddenly recalled her young son, who did something similar while going to sleep. Her fear abated slightly. She put her hand on the back of his neck and patted it gently as she had done countless times to her son.

It was then that his lips trailed down to her neck and he bit her violently. A fishy smell of blood permeated the air. Evelyn let out a shriek and fidgeted in pain. However, the weight pressing down on her was too much. She felt trapped.

She wondered if this was her end. Maybe dying like this was better than being sold to an old pervert. Evelyn gripped the sheets in pain as her neck tilted back.

A long night ensued.

***

Ilya, for the first time in his life, felt the satisfaction of waking up from a good night’s sleep. He blinked at the sunlight filtering through the window trying to brush the drowsiness away from his eyes. Something gold caught his vision.

A woman? he wondered.

His blue-gray eyes scanned the bed. A woman with blond hair was curled up in the corner of the bed. And spots of blood were scattered on the sheets.

Evelyn… God, no!

“Evelyn, are you alright?!” Without thinking, Ilya rose and wrapped the blanket around Evelyn’s limp body. “Wake up!” Her body was boiling hot. He shouted for a servant, cursing incessantly.

“For god’s sake, call a doctor!”

The chambermaid might have been waiting just outside because she burst in through the door at such short notice. The maids followed her inside and gasped at the horror. The chambermaid regained her composure. “Your Highness, please leave Lady Evelyn here with me. It would be good if you wash up as well.”

Ilya didn’t seem to register her words. He still held Evelyn in his arms. “Your Highness, please leave her here on the bed. Before the doctor arrives, I will have her changed and shifted to a different room,” she urged again.

Reluctantly, Ilya laid Evelyn down on the bed and left her with the maids. The well-rested feeling he had experienced when he woke up had disappeared long ago.