The Villain’s Aide Has Run Away - Chapter 57.2
But the moment he set his feet down from the bed, he simply collapsed where he was. It was not so much that his body broke down as that all his strength drained away.
His mind ordered him to rise, yet his body would not obey.
The insides of his thighs throbbed, and within, there lingered an indescribably strange sensation. The traces of pleasure built up through the night would not easily fade.
He managed to push himself up with his arms, but even his fingertips trembled faintly. Leslun lowered his head for a moment and drew in a deep breath. Cold sweat slid slowly down his back.
“I thought so.”
Kailos scoffed lightly as he rose from the bed. He stepped toward Leslun, bent one knee, and met his eyes.
“Even seeing yourself like this, you still intend to go?”
“Even if I must crawl… I will go.”
Leslun shook his head faintly, showing his determination to leave somehow. Kailos clicked his tongue.
“Yes, you were always like that.”
Since it was not the first time, Kailos acted as though it was nothing new. Yet suddenly, his eyes swept over Leslun. The slow, dragging weight of his gaze pressed into every part of his skin.
“And you mean to go looking like that?”
At the oddly laden question, Leslun looked down at himself at once. His loose shirt hung crooked, and his exposed skin was covered in red marks.
Leslun’s face flushed hot. Not only his face but every bare patch of skin burned red.
Reflexively, Leslun clutched at his hem. Just realizing that the Crown Prince had seen him in this state made his head spin.
“You can endure the pain in your body, perhaps. But you cannot possibly go out in that state.”
Kailos wrapped his arms around him. Before Leslun could refuse, he had lifted him and laid him back onto the bed.
Taking up the glass from the nightstand, Kailos drank, then pressed his lips to Leslun’s. Cool water flowed into his mouth and down his throat.
Realizing it was water, not wine, Leslun looked up at him.
“If you got drunk, that would be troublesome. And…”
Kailos cupped the back of his neck and kissed him again. This time it was not to drink water, but a deep, lingering kiss.
“I want you to know it was me, not the drug. I’ll take away anything that could confuse you, whether drug or wine, so you can know it in your right mind, and only that.”
***
A pale-faced young man fastened the buttons of his shirt before the mirror.
Washing and dressing were things he always did, but today it took him far longer. The brush of fabric across his skin still felt strange, as though heat lingered there.
His hands still trembled at the fingertips, refusing to hold steady. Just thinking of what had passed between him and the Crown Prince tangled his mind, and when he turned to look at his own state, only a hollow laugh escaped him.
The medical level of this world was poor compared to modern times, but illnesses were classified in their own organized way. There were pills for fevers, ointments for wounds, and the like.
But none of it ever seemed to work for Leslun. Medicine was expensive and hard to obtain, and even when he did, it had no effect, leaving him to suffer several days before a fever broke.
So even a mild sickness forced him to linger in it long. Yet now, things were different.
His body certainly lacked strength, but he was not ill.
The aching in his lower back and the heat still burning below could not be solved with medicine, so he chose to ignore it. Time alone could heal it, and for now, nothing else could be done.
Focusing all his effort just to avoid collapsing, Leslun went to the Crown Prince.
Kailos, who had been leaning against the window, came over at once when he saw him enter.
“I told you, I’ll have someone attend you. Are you sure you’re all right?”
Not only did he ask, but he studied Leslun’s face closely. Leslun could not meet his gaze. It felt awkward that the Crown Prince should be so concerned about him.
“Your face is white as a sheet. And your lips… swollen. That was me.”
Kailos’s low voice carried a gentleness different from usual.
“I am all right.”
For Leslun, that gentleness was more suffocating than kind.
“All right, you say…”
“I truly am. It is nothing.”
Even the medicine Kailos had handed him before sleep was more effective than any he had taken before. His body felt heavy, but it was nothing that should trouble the Crown Prince.
All the more did his face stiffen under the weight of the fact that they had shared a bed.
After studying him, Kailos asked quietly:
“Do you remember?”
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