Chapter 22
“You are a Lumines woman too. You must focus on reading the stars and dreaming.”
“Does the Saintess do that as well?”
“Of course.”
“Mother told me something. She said the Saintess believes she’ll lose her sacred power if she loses her virginity?”
“Marian has been running her mouth again.”
“But it’s such a ridiculous notion. If that were true, neither you nor Mother would be able to read the stars or dream.”
Yet Asteria firmly believed that losing her virginity would destroy her sacred power, but every shred of it was instilled by Olga’s teachings.
Olga had planted that belief, driven by fear of the special star under which Asteria had been born. But just as Lydia said, both Olga and Marian still read the stars and dreamed their dreams, which made the claim self-evidently absurd.
As long as she was a woman born of the Lumines clan never lost her mysterious gift.
“I thought the Saintess would be clever, but that’s a surprise.”
“Being clever is not everything.”
Lydia was, indeed, an exceptionally bright girl. Olga had always worried about that, and was afraid she might acquire the kind of worldly wisdom that ran counter to Lumines teachings.
“You’ll be marrying Peter soon, so you must apply yourself even harder to reading the stars and dreaming.”
“No, I don’t want to! That’s far too dull!”
Lydia stuck out her tongue and scurried away. The Elder could only watch her still-innocent granddaughter go, unable to say anything more.
* * *
His official duties concluded, Lucian strode from the audience chamber.
“Your Majesty, where are you going?”
“To the White Tower.”
Ezra’s expression turned uneasy.
“I have dealt with the wedding night matter as my mother wished. There is nowhere I cannot go.”
Ezra was one of the few people in the palace who knew the truth about that wedding night. That was precisely why the Empress Dowager’s concerns rang so true to him.
Since Lucian had begun frequenting the White Tower, he had grown increasingly fixated on the Saintess. For a man who had been indifferent to everything, the change was stark.
“Your Majesty…”
“You need not follow.”
With that, Lucian strode into the Sanctuary and climbed the stairs of the White Tower, the very thing he had longed to do for days.
The thought of Asteria waiting to receive him already set his heart racing. It was a feeling he had never once experienced with Rosalyn, his Empress.
“I greet His Majesty the Emperor.”
As he had expected, Asteria received him with serene composure. The handmaid at her side quietly withdrew.
“Did you know I would come again today?”
“No. I merely thought you would come soon.”
Lucian seated himself first. Asteria sat across from him. Every small movement she made was so graceful it naturally put his mind at ease.
“As you know, the imperial wedding has taken place.”
“Yes.”
“But I did not embrace the Empress.”
Asteria recalled the image of the Empress strangling her in that dream.
“To be precise, I suppose I should say that I could not rid my mind of you.”
The ominous dream had proven true. The Empress had accused Asteria of stealing what was hers. And now Lucian was telling her that thoughts of Asteria had kept him from embracing the Empress, confirming the dream exactly.
Whether she had wished it or not, she had stolen something that belonged to the Empress.
“You must not do that, Your Majesty.”
“Even I could not control my own heart.”
Lucian’s blue eyes gazed steadily at Asteria’s small, pale hand. Then he moved to sit beside her and seized that hand in his.
“…!”
“I have wanted to hold this hand all along.”
“Your Majesty, you must not do this. You already have the Empress…”
“I could not care less what becomes of a woman like her.”
Lucian’s obsession had already taken root.
“The only woman who matters to me now is you, Asteria.”
Asteria shook her head, her expression troubled.
“I exist to read the stars and dream for Your Majesty. Please, do not make me forsake my duty.”
“I have no intention of trampling your wishes.”
Lucian’s hand trailed along the delicate, unguarded line of Asteria’s neck, then gripped her chin.
“But so long as you do not lose your virginity, that should be fine, should it not?”
Asteria was too flustered to respond.
“Surely there is no harm in merely… indulging.”
The hand gripping her chin pried her lips apart. Then, without hesitation, he pressed his mouth to hers.
Asteria’s eyes went wide, but she could not push away the soft, searing heat of Lucian’s tongue as it invaded her mouth.
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