Chapter 45
The First Prince’s engagement ceremony was held quietly.
To put it nicely, it was modest. Frankly speaking, it was sparse.
In the vast main hall of the cathedral, only the Emperor, the Empress, and two guests from the fiancée’s side were present.
The Second Prince, Arendtert, had declined attendance, citing health issues. No one said it aloud, but it was obvious he was lying.
After all, just the day before, he’d come banging on the door of Sylaria’s bedchamber, shouting.
Sylaria felt relieved that Arendtert had taken himself out of the picture. She had no desire to see his face on a day like this, nor could she trust what kind of scene he might cause.
The guests from the fiancée’s side were her family, Elenia and Grizelle.
Grizelle had been keeping quiet ever since the rose garden incident. She busied herself solely with tending to Elenia, her presence nearly invisible.
No one knew what she was thinking, but at least one source of pre-engagement trouble had been neutralized, and for that, Sylaria was grateful.
An engagement ceremony was stressful enough as it was.
And this was not a mere engagement.
It was a ceremony that marked Sylaria’s complete departure from the path leading to Arendtert. A crossroads where her life would now take a completely different direction.
Sylaria had cast Arendtert aside and become engaged to Euclid.
With this, at least in this lifetime, she would never be betrayed by Arendtert or Grizelle again. All that remained ahead of her was revenge.
But before that, she had to complete the most important part of the engagement ceremony.
The first night.
Under the pretext of performing their first official purification, it was customary in the imperial family for the engaged couple to consummate their relationship on the night of their engagement.
Sylaria was now awaiting that stage.
The engagement ceremony consisted of a vow made in the cathedral, greetings to the Emperor and Empress, and then a banquet.
After the banquet, the fiancée would go ahead to wait in the imperial bedchamber. The fiancé would arrive later, blindfolded, and perform the first purification.
Like most traditions, the blindfold was symbolic. He would not be left to stumble around. Usually, an attendant would guide the blindfolded royal to the bedchamber.
It was meant to represent a process of significance, where the sacred power of the royal, surrounded by darkness, met the light of purification through his pair.
And so, Sylaria now waited to bestow that ‘light of purification’ upon Euclid.
In a room where only two candles barely pushed back the dark, the firewood in the hearth crackled and popped.
Standing alone in the dim chamber, she bit her lower lip in nervous anticipation.
If her past life’s memories were to count as experience, she wasn’t entirely ignorant when it came to intimacy. She had even done something resembling intercourse with the First Prince before.
And yet Sylaria’s hands and feet were trembling violently.
‘What’s wrong with me?’
She clutched her quivering hands beneath her silk robe. For some reason, her nerves were on edge, and her heart pounded wildly.
Almost as if she were about to share a first union… with someone she truly liked.
‘Calm down.’
Placing her hand on her chest, Sylaria took a deep breath. The undergarments she wore for the first night were made entirely of lace, so her bare skin was exposed to the touch.
Startled by the sensation of her own skin, she hastily tightened her robe. Truthfully, she was practically naked underneath.
Even the robe itself only reached to mid-thigh, embarrassingly short.
She was already overwhelmed at the thought of Euclid seeing her like this, but if he saw her undergarments as well, how would he react?
Would he just laugh it off playfully like he usually did? Or maybe…
“Sylaria.”
Sylaria, standing before the fireplace in the darkened room, flinched and turned around. She’d been so deep in thought, she hadn’t heard the door open.
As she turned, she saw a tall, dark figure against the faint candlelight. It was a man, large enough to swallow her whole just from the silhouette alone.
“Euclid…?”
“……”
The man reached for Sylaria’s face without a word. Then, as if to press his lips to hers, he lowered his head.
Their breaths touched, warming each other’s skin. Sylaria gently closed her eyes. But just before their lips met, her eyes snapped open.
“……!”
Sylaria recoiled in shock and pushed against the man’s chest. Then she backed away toward the bed and glared at him.
“Who are you?”
“……”
“I said, who are you!”
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