Follow Your Heart [EN]: Chapter 20

#5. I Miss You So Much

#20.

Loderick began visiting Ijae several times a day. He still spoke disparagingly of Duke Duncan and sometimes looked at her with suspicious eyes.

He couldn’t shake the feeling that Ijae was hiding something from him.

He had been shrouded in darkness for a long time, but he was actually a clear-headed and perceptive person.

However, whenever Ijae sensed his distrust and tried to distance herself, he would forget his suspicions and look extremely annoyed.

Ijae felt uneasy whenever she saw Loderick like that.

It was because he was being completely swayed in that direction when she only wanted him to be slightly influenced.

But the King didn’t stop there. He often occupied Ijae’s bed and even started taking naps.

He had already visited once during the day, and he came to Ijae’s residence again in the evening.

“I heard that Hailey Duncan is quite interested in fashion.”

To be precise, Loderick hadn’t heard it; he had read it.

He looked at the bracelet Ijae was carving and then looked at Ijae herself.

He was subtly questioning the credibility of the report.

Ijae avoided his gaze, as she couldn’t help but agree with the King’s assessment that she possessed a sense that the current era couldn’t possibly have.

“I’m not doing this because it’s pretty.”

“Right, focus.”

“Discipline, discipline.”

Ijae, who added this with a casual smile, finished trimming one last bumpy wooden bead.

She actually had no choice but to make a new prayer bead bracelet.

This was because the existing bracelet was starting to crack from being scorched too much.

It was an inevitable result of constantly fending off the vengeful spirits that were chasing after Loderick.

She had been thinking of using the five-hundred-year-old boy ghost as a shield, but a ghost was still a ghost.

Perhaps sensing Ijae’s dark intentions, he didn’t even show his face when he was with Loderick.

She now had to admit that there was a limit to just temporarily chasing away the vengeful spirits. What she needed was ascension to Nirvana [a state of perfect peace and enlightenment] and exorcism.

However, she was also aware that it was something that was severely beyond her capabilities.

She sighed softly and began to carve something into the wooden beads one by one.

Axe, distant, participate, wave – all sorts of brutal Chinese characters were carved by dissecting them. Her eyes were different from usual. Her sharp eyes, focused on concentrating, gleamed.

And Loderick was carefully watching Ijae’s face and the graffiti-like patterns. He wanted to ask what it was, but he kept silent.

This was because he could feel that Ijae was much more focused than usual right now. She seemed to be so focused that she didn’t even realize she was slightly biting her lower lip.

And when Ijae finally finished carving and stored the finished product in the cracked box, Loderick stood up.

The King’s attendants hesitated, about to prepare to leave.

This was because the King, who they thought was going out, lay down on the Queen’s bed as it was.

It wasn’t quite night yet, but it was still the time when night was approaching.

As the attendants hesitated, Deborah glared at the head court lady as if she was going to kill her again.

*What are you guys doing?! Please be aware of the situation.*

The Queen’s palace maids had already slipped out.

When even the remaining attendants all left, only Loderick and Ijae were in the room.

Ijae stared blankly at Loderick, who was occupying the bed with his eyes covered by the back of his hand.

She was the only one who knew why Loderick kept taking her bed.

He knew instinctively that this place was a safe haven and a place where he could sleep comfortably.

However, it wasn’t time for a nap of just one or two hours, so she was trying to guess his intentions.

*Is he going to sleep here tonight too? Is he asking to sleep together? Does he mean to do that?*

The couple, who were not yet like a married couple, did not communicate well in these areas.

And perhaps because Ijae took too long, the King got up without a word.

He stood Ijae up, who was sitting on the chair, and pulled her straight to the bed to sit down.

“Sleep comfortably in bed.”

He seemed like he was about to leave, but he went to the sofa a little further away and lay down at length.

She hesitated a little while fiddling with the blanket.

There was always an irony for her that she couldn’t chase him away, telling him to go to his bed and sleep comfortably.

Even though the guardian spirit friends would be glaring with their eyes wide open, that place was a haunted house.

“Your Majesty.”

“…Why.”

“If you called me, say something.”

“Please sleep comfortably in bed.”

“Come here and lie down with me.”

He got up right away. He looked like he had been waiting for those words.

However, his eyes as he walked to the bed were not those of someone who was sleepy and trying to sleep.

Neither Ijae nor Loderick himself fully realized that fact.

It was the third time they had laid side by side on the bed, but Ijae was still a little awkward.

He looked at Ijae like that with his chin propped up and said bluntly,

“I thought you were a daring person who would make the King sleep on the sofa. Do you know how much of an act of disloyalty that is?”

“This is my room, though. And my bed, though. …You say strange things sometimes.”

“I mean, I’m glad you don’t seem to be such a heartless wife.”

*I don’t like my father-in-law, but I think I like you more and more.*

*But it’s strange. Why do I sometimes think you’re lying? What on earth are you hiding?*

Loderick continued to watch Ijae, who was starting to prepare to sleep, pulling up the blanket.

Then he said a little more mischievously.

“Do you know what you have to do when you start sleeping in the same bed as me?”

“Isn’t it about time we did it once?”

However, when Ijae’s pupils, which had been flinching, darted here and there, he quickly added.

“Hailey. I was kidding. No, honestly, I wasn’t kidding, but you don’t have to feel pressured to refuse.”

Then Ijae’s expression became even more complicated.

She wanted to try it too.

In fact, she had a belief that others couldn’t understand: that she had to try it before she died.

Even so, she felt strangely that a positive signal was not coming out.

*Does Your Majesty know why I’m acting so foolish even after getting married?*

*I know a lot about ghosts, but I guess I’m a fool who doesn’t know much about my own heart.*

Meanwhile, Loderick chuckled at Ijae’s even more complicated expression.

He just thought she wasn’t ready yet.

The Queen had someone she liked so much that she threw herself into the river.

So, even if he was her husband, he had some emotional understanding that she would be reluctant to mix bodies right away.

Of course, it was a subtly wrong understanding.

He changed the subject in another direction for Ijae, who was troubled.

“Are you really going to give me the handkerchief?”

“…Are you really going hunting?”

“I don’t have the patience to watch your father’s sarcastic face.”

That was also true, but in fact, the hunting competition held by the King and nobles was largely aimed at showing off the strength of the royal family.

Last year, there was an excuse that the royal marriage had gone wrong, but this year it wasn’t. Loderick had already decided to hold the hunting competition.

Politics was about giving up one thing when you get one thing.

Loderick didn’t want to give up anything just because of a hunting competition.

“Did my saying I’d give you the handkerchief sound like a lie?”

“Well.”

Loderick mumbled vaguely.

Ijae’s words didn’t sound like a lie.

But suddenly, he wondered if Laurence would try to participate.

“But what are you going to use my handkerchief for? It’s useless.”

That was probably a Cayenne custom to wish for luck and safety.

But in Ijae’s opinion, what Loderick needed was not a handkerchief but an amulet.

Perhaps reading the negative nuance in her words, Loderick frowned slightly.

“Are you saying you don’t want to give it to me in that way so you feel less sorry? And this is a bit petty to say, but you were the one who said you’d give it to me first.”

“I think this is a bit petty to say too, but Your Majesty was actually the first one to bring it up.”

Then he lay down straight and covered his eyes with his arm.

And he muttered, dissatisfiedly.

“How can you not give in even a single word when you’re as small as a bean?”

Ijae was so dumbfounded that she burst out laughing.

It was true that she wasn’t that big. Hailey’s height was barely one meter sixty [approximately 5 feet 3 inches].

On the other hand, Loderick seemed to be close to one meter ninety [approximately 6 feet 3 inches].

However, he had broad shoulders and a good natural frame, so he looked bigger than his actual height.

As expected, he would have become a general if he hadn’t been born as the heir to the throne.

“It’s not that I’m small, it’s that Your Majesty is big.”

“I know, so just go to sleep. For your information, it was a conversation that only left scars.”

Rather than being sorry, Ijae was laughing, so she buried her face in the pillow.

This was because she thought he would be embarrassed if she showed a smiling face in this situation.

And when she turned her head again, he had his eyes closed.

Ijae, who was faintly smiling, said.

“Your Majesty.”

“Why.”

“I’ll give it to you. So please don’t… suspect me too much.”

“…………”

“Then good night. Have good dreams today.”

Loderick was silent for a long time. He felt like the Queen had just spoken with a double meaning. *Don’t suspect me.*

Strangely, he often thought that she was quick-witted compared to her age or social experience.

*Did the Duncan family feed her too much to be aware of others?*

*She keeps gauging other people’s temperatures and quickly notices.*

But in fact, Loderick was slowly liking even that point.

He was dumbfounded that he might even like that she was a Duncan later on.

He laughed as if sighing and belatedly said hello.

“Sleep well, too.”

It was a peaceful night.