Swallow What You Were Given

She risked being caught at any moment.

Servants always requested permission before entering, but the master of the bedchamber did not.

Perhaps it had only been a passing attendant, for the sound soon faded.

‘How long can I keep doing this?’

Chloe clenched the small pouch tightly in her hand.

It had only been a few days since she hid the medicine, yet she had no confidence she could keep it concealed for long.

Another worry weighed on her.

Though the separate residence for Imperatris Secunda had long been prepared, no order came allowing her to leave.

She remained confined to the Emperor’s chambers.

As afternoon approached, she moved toward the bed to hide the pouch beneath the mattress before the maid responsible for linens arrived.

She examined the mattress carefully.

‘Right… today’s dose.’

Before hiding the pouch, she took out one pill and placed it in her mouth.

The moment it dissolved, a fresh herbal scent spread across her tongue.

It was different from yesterday’s musty bitterness.

In her haste, she chewed slightly before she could stop herself.

The green fragrance intensified.

She tilted her head.

“The taste…”

“Why? Has the taste changed?”

She jolted violently at the unexpected voice.

She had believed herself alone.

Turning sharply, she saw Hector perched on the balcony railing.

The inner door had never opened.

It was impossible to tell whether he had descended from the sky or risen from the earth.

She had been caught.

He must have known she was taking an unauthorized drug.

The way he appeared so suddenly felt deliberate.

Her heart shrank at the sight of him stepping lightly along the marble border.

A strange herbal scent lingered.

She no longer knew what she had swallowed.

Instinctively, she spat the remaining fragments into her handkerchief.

“Oh dear. Spitting out what you were eating.”

He vaulted down from the railing and entered the room as if nothing were amiss.

Despite the tension thick in the air, his steps were unhurried.

His eyes gleamed sharply, amused.

“Give it to me.”

She could not meet his gaze.

She clasped her hands behind her back, unwilling to surrender the pouch.

Before she could form an excuse, his hand seized it.

A surge of humiliation rose in her throat.

What did he see her as?

Did he consider her human at all?

Perhaps only a vessel for desire.

His treatment made it clear he did not see her as equal.

Her empty hand trembled.

The contrast between this cold confiscation and the suffocating closeness of their nights was unbearable.

He withdrew a pill from the pouch and lifted it to his eye level.

He examined it with idle curiosity, like a child studying a captured insect.

He did not even seem aware of the cruelty in his gaze.

He approached her swiftly and seized her jaw.

Her despair thickened.

Her chin was forced open.

The pill was shoved into her mouth.

A large thumb pressed past her lips.

She could not shake him off.

The herbal taste mingled with the warmth of his skin.

“Finish what you started.”

His fingertip traced across her tongue, deliberate and invasive.

Her throat tightened as she fought not to swallow.

Veins rose in her neck from the strain.

His expression hardened.

“Swallow.”

Their noses brushed.

His breath was close.

He smiled faintly, then lowered his mouth to her cheek, to her jaw, pressing forward.

The gesture was almost gentle, yet devoid of tenderness.

“Do you need help?”

He bit into the curve of her neck.

The reflex came too fast.

She swallowed.

It was over.

The futility of resisting such a man crushed her vision into haze.

She coughed, trying in vain to expel it.

Only when her mouth was empty did he withdraw his hand.

“What exactly did you give me?”

He examined his damp fingers like a trophy.

Then, maintaining eye contact, he licked them clean.

His eyes curved elegantly.

Mocking.

“You should know better than I. Were you not taking it in secret?”

He feigned ignorance of the altered medicine.

But it was obvious who had switched it.

Beneath the beauty of his gaze lay a quiet anger.

He had not beaten her or punished her openly.

Instead, he found subtler ways to assert control.

He pinched her cheeks lightly, as if indulging something cute, and returned the pouch to her hand.

“Be sure to take it diligently.”

He smiled and left.

Chloe collapsed to the floor.

She wept silently, nails clawing into the carpet.

The problem was not only the drug.

It was her own reaction.

She had responded.

Though forced, though humiliated, her body had reacted.

He always enjoyed that—

the involuntary response.

Even when she despised him, even when her heart recoiled, her body betrayed her.

That betrayal hollowed her.

Pleasure forced upon her left only emptiness.

Each time he touched her, he was fire only in flesh.

Never in heart.

No matter how passionately he held her, his eyes remained cold.

She might have come to hate him across two lifetimes.

But to him, she was nothing more than ash beneath his heel.