Chapter 34
She had already thought his voice was pleasant enough, but when he sang, that low, clear tone spread softly through the room like velvet. Kiara, who’d been sitting at a safe distance, found herself inching closer without realizing it. His voice was so lovely, she wanted to keep hearing it.
When he finished the short verse, he smoothly picked up the conversation again.
“Anyway, according to legend, only a Grandilgale can break the witch’s curse. And only the Red Witch can wipe out the Grandilgale bloodline. Apparently, there were other parts to the contract too, but no one knows all the details.”
His voice trailed off with a soft smile. Only then did Kiara realize just how close she’d gotten and began to awkwardly inch back.
“Ah, r-right… huh—!”
But before she could escape, Ael grabbed her. He drew her into his arms and curled his lips into a mischievous smile.
“Told you I can sing a little.”
Wasn’t there a sea monster somewhere that lured sailors with its voice and drowned them?
Kiara scowled at the thought. Unbothered, Ael only pulled her closer and held her tight, showing her the scar on his palm once again.
“In any case, healing fast is convenient. Not sure exactly how it works, though.”
“…I see…”
Whether from embarrassment or actual understanding, Kiara lowered her head and nodded.
Ael buried his face in her thick black hair, gently patting her shoulder as he drifted into thought.
‘…So this is what a soulmate is supposed to be…’
Honestly, half of him just found it inconvenient. An unwelcome complication. But the other half — well, the other half found it tolerable enough. Which meant there was no helping it. A soulmate, after all, was something the gods decided. Accepting it with quiet resignation might be the best course. Just as Kiara had.
Ael closed his eyes with her still in his arms.
Falling asleep like this didn’t sound so bad.
And Kiara, for her part, felt the same.
‘So…sleepy…’
Her eyes slid shut. She hadn’t meant to fall into his arms, but it wasn’t unpleasant. She had, admittedly, overexerted herself. Ael’s embrace was warm. His hand, gently patting her back, made her limbs grow drowsy and light.
‘It’s like… he’s tapping in time with a heartbeat…’
But whose heartbeat was it? Was it his, the steady rhythm echoing in the chest her ear now rested against? Or was it hers, the frantic pounding that had been hammering away since earlier?
Trying to match her breath to the beat, whoever it belonged to, Kiara’s eyelids drooped.
And just like that, she slipped into sleep too.
[Captain!]
So deep was their slumber that even the voice calling from outside the door didn’t stir her at first.
Ael, however, was already moving the moment he heard it. He sat up and stepped away from the bed without a word.
Kiara finally blinked her eyes open, just as he was heading toward the door, now fully armed.
“A-Ael…?”
A nervous Kiara called out to him, still dazed, but Ael didn’t so much as glance back. Whatever was happening beyond that door must have been urgent. He opened it without hesitation.
Only when he was about to step out, almost as an afterthought, did he pause to speak again.
“Stay here. Don’t go out. Lock the door.”
Unlike earlier, when his voice had held something like concern, this time it sounded more like a warning. Maybe even a veiled threat.
Still stunned, Kiara nodded obediently. But Ael had already turned away.
The door closed behind him with a heavy thud, the sound of solid wood echoing through the northern spire.
Kiara, still blinking sleep from her eyes, stared at the firmly shut door.
‘…The curse is broken now, isn’t it?’
And not only that — someone actually worried for her safety now. A soulmate, no less.
So why did that door look even thicker, even heavier than before? Why did it seem more like a wall?
Unsettled by her own thoughts, Kiara looked away. The curtains were still drawn across the window, just as thick and impenetrable as before.
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