Side Story 18
“I was going to choose a flower.”
“A flower…?”
“Yeah.”
Even though he hadn’t trusted her back then, in the end, the most precious and beautiful thing in his entire world had still been her.
So he’d thought he would name their first child after something like her.
But Freesia blinked her round eyes and tilted her head. She could guess why he’d chosen a flower’s name… and yet?
“But Izar. Back then, our baby was a boy…”
“…Ah.”
“Would that have been okay?”
For Nova, they’d chosen a name tied to stars so anyone could tell she was Izar’s daughter.
But for a boy to be given a flower’s name?
Wouldn’t he have been teased terribly if he’d lived and grown up?
‘Back then, people were even doubting who his real father was. Would it have been alright…?’
It was a baby who’d never even been born, but knowing he wouldn’t have had an easy life because of her still made her shoulders shrink a little.
But Izar frowned, as if she were the one mocking their child.
“And why wouldn’t it be okay.”
“Mm, but still. I feel like he might have been teased when he got older.”
“If the name came from something good, then teasing would make no sense.”
“Hm.”
Freesia’s lashes fluttered slow and soft, like the wings of a butterfly, as she watched the man awkwardly trying to hide his embarrassment with a scowl.
He was not someone who could sway hearts with polished words.
The ducal lands had been too rough for too long, and he’d lived a life of commanding hardened men.
‘And I guess he’ll stay that way, even for the rest of our lives.’
Even if he faced death itself, the nature etched into his bones wouldn’t disappear.
Yet somehow, those blunt words stirred a gentle breeze inside her chest.
If he thought of what was connected to her as ‘something good’ and wanted to pass that on to their child…
Freesia pressed a soft, smudging kiss to his lips and whispered,
“Izar, someday… another baby might come to us besides Nova, don’t you think?”
“……”
Izar’s breath caught for a moment at her quiet question. But as their legs tangled again, his answer came out low, thick with emotion.
“If you want that.”
“I do.”
Freesia laughed softly, intoxicated by the way his breath teased the nape of her neck, and whispered back.
This time she would live longer. It would be good to have a bigger family.
Children who would be proof that she and he had lived together, the fruit of their love, running around before their eyes.
And she would be there with him to take in that sight.
Then Izar scattered kisses along her jawline.
“I love you, Freesia.”
“Mm…”
Her vision turned hazy, as if dotted with petals.
No matter how blunt his words might be, ‘I love you’ alone filled her heart to the brim like water in a cup.
Izar gazed at the woman who trembled and panted with happiness, his own chest aching with thirsty delight.
Those fine trembling lashes, those pale green eyes shining like stars on water…
‘Ah, damn it.’
It felt like being thrown back to that stupid boy who’d panicked once at the sight of a drenched shepherd girl’s shoulders.
There had been a time when he’d clung to her like a demon, and a time when he’d held her late at night and fed her wild berries.
This moment now, meeting her eyes, felt eternal.
Izar once again cast his shadow over her.
“This time, I want to stay with you until I die.”
“Izar…”
“Do you want me too?”
“Yes… ah!”
His hips moved slowly, pushing into the space between her unresisting thighs.
She’d thought she’d already been spent to her limit, but heat quickly melted and swelled between her legs again.
“Nngh, mmph…!”
A sweet sound spilled out as the thick pressure found that place where pleasure rippled like a tide.
On the blanket dappled with starlight and moonlight, restless folds of fabric tangled.
Beneath the man who was determined to fill her to the last inch, the woman wept and pleaded all through the night.
…Later, looking back, Freesia would regret how happy she had been, so happy she’d failed to notice the look in Izar’s eyes.
There had been tenderness there now, yes, but also a clinging, heavy persistence she might never break free from.
Yet even if she had glimpsed the madness tucked beneath his love, she knew she could never have pushed him away.
Like a sandcastle before the sea’s scorching tide, no matter how sturdy, it would mean nothing.
* * *
Thanks to Nova’s great sacrifice, Mama and Papa had grown very close.
But that created a new problem.
‘Seems like Nova did the right thing, just like Uncle said…’
Nova had ended up becoming the adult, while Mama and Papa somehow turned into children!
Papa, whenever he went to the garden with Mama, would start playing with her hair.
He would undo her already neat braids, then rebraid them thick again and weave flowers in.
‘I was taught grown-ups shouldn’t mess with other people’s hair like that!’
Oh dear. It was certain Papa hadn’t learned proper manners as a boy, despite ruling so much land.
But Mama didn’t stop him either. She only blushed and let him toy with her hair.
‘Mmph… fine. I guess that’s okay…’
Mama was pretty with flowers anyway.
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