Pherenike - Chapter 6

However, now Deucalion is dead. The only Pelagon bloodline that could kill Actor has also disappeared.

How wonderful it would be if I could kill you just like Deucalion. If I could silence your voice.

If I cannot kill you, at least I want to cut your wrist like Deucalion. I want to kill you. You, Actor…

“Step back.”

Actor’s command made his subordinates who were either protecting or guarding her step away at once.

His dry, gray eyes were scanning her face for a moment, as if the corpse he had just cut was not his brother, or as if he hadn’t killed someone just a moment ago.

After a while, Actor lowered his body in front of Pherenike. He gently took Deucalion’s hand from her.

“You did not keep your promise, Pherenike.”

“…”

“Why did you marry Deucalion?”

As Pherenike screamed silently she rushed towards him to get back Deucalion’s hand. Actor calmly blocked her and removed the ring from Deucalion’s finger. As if he had taken Deucalion’s hand just to do so.

Actor placed Deucalion’s hand neatly on his chest. Then, looking intently at Pherenike, who had hurt her hand with a knife, he spoke in a composed voice.

“There was only one condition to break our engagement. Even if you marry any man in the world, you do not marry Deucalion.”

“It was you who wanted to break off the engagement.”

They got engaged when Pherenike was thirteen and Actor was fifteen.

They met as if they were hostages, each tied to their own leash. The agreement was essentially the king’s coercion.

Pherenike had manifested Althea’s power at the age of nine, was talked to become the next Kybellaune. Yet, the king somehow managed to get him to his eldest son. Even though he knew from the moment of her birth that Pherenike was meant to be Deucalion’s partner.

Breaking one of Deucalion’s wings, dividing the families, and using it to make a new wing for Actor.

The real Kybellaune, who received the call of the goddess, would always become the king’s companion. Whether the king was an old man dying of old age or a baby covered in swaddles.

It was the nation where the rule was that the woman with the goddess’s mark could not be married to any other man except the king.

In fact, it was a story that was too old and outdated, and there were not many precedents. Besides, unlike those women, Pherenike had a father with the power to not give his daughter away so easily.

Therefore, instead of taking Pherenike as his own, the king wanted to give her to his son, who would inherit his throne.

That was the only story of their engagement. Actor didn’t appreciate the king’s coercion, nor did he celebrate the marriage he had taken from his brother, and he even abhorred her.

She hated him as well. They always loathed each other’s existence. So, it wasn’t surprising that Actor broke the engagement as soon as the king fell.

Certainly.

“I opened your cage, Pherenike.”

“…”

“With the condition that you won’t fly to Deucalion.”

Actor spoke indifferently, as if he was addressing his former young fiancée casually, dismissing the woman with whom he had parted and someone to the goddess. It was indeed a strange tone.

Pherenike twisted her lips. “Swear by the goddess’s lion and the ash tree. You said that.”

She did swear, and she laughed. What does it matter to him? Even as he seeks his own freedom. While he casually abandons the efforts the king made for him.

As if releasing her for his own sake.

She was originally Deucalion’s. What she wanted was Deucalion alone.

“In the end, I told you because it would come to this. I’ll eventually have to kill Deucalion, and I’ll have you, who is not anyone’s wife.”

“It makes me sick.”

“You are Kybellaune. It would have been more peaceful if you had broken off your engagement with me, married another man and tarnished your honor.”

“…”

“If you want to kill me, marry me instead. You know the way.”

It was a bizarre proposal, like an alternative punishment that would replace her lifetime of blindness.

At that moment, Pherenike saw something in Actor’s eyes she had never felt before. Eyes that always conveyed indifference and hatred.

He looked at her as a woman.

Actor was desiring her, and she couldn’t tell for how long he had been hiding it.

Pherenike wanted to mock it. He was asking her to become his wife if she wanted to kill him. To bear the son who would kill him.

She briefly glanced at Actor’s people, standing farther away than she last remembered. She was looking for any vulnerability in Actor.

Of course, she wanted revenge. She wanted to kill Actor Nikandros by any means necessary. She hoped his end would be even more brutal than Deucalion’s.

But above all, Deucalion’s life meant more to her than anything else.

Perenike decided to gain only a brief moment from Actor’s disgusting desire.

“…..I don’t care about my fate. Just give me time to send Deucalion off.”