"Best to think about all this tomorrow..." he murmured, his voice already heavy with exhaustion. "Right now my head can’t take any more."
The exhaustion of an impossibly long day, first the journey, then the Demon Lord’s visit, then Luna, and now all this business with the pregnancy, had finally taken its toll.
His thoughts began to slow and blur as sleep gradually pulled him toward unconsciousness.
’Emilia...’ he thought, before finally drifting off.
The following morning, the group resumed their journey toward the beastman capital.
And while Mark had tried to talk to Princess Luna before they set off, wanting to clear up the matter of Emilia’s pregnancy and ask all the questions that had been stuck in his head the night before, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t manage it.
She found a way to avoid him at every turn.
That she had to give instructions to the servants, that she needed to check the supplies, that she had to talk with Emi about the route... she always found an excuse not to be left alone with him.
And he suspected, with considerable certainty, that she was doing it on purpose.
So when the time came to depart and everyone climbed back into the carriage, he hadn’t managed to exchange more than a couple of empty phrases with her.
By the time the carriage started moving again, the atmosphere was no longer the same.
The carefree mood from the start of the journey was long gone. Now the carriage was wrapped in a tension that was hard to ignore, and it wasn’t coming from just one thing.
On one hand, there was Luna, who was unusually quiet.
The same princess who at the start of the journey hadn’t stopped eating, joking, and provoking now stared out the window with her head resting on one hand, saying practically nothing.
It was such a drastic change that even Emi, her own assistant, had shot her a couple of confused sideways glances.
And on the other hand, there was Mark, who also hadn’t opened his mouth since morning.
Because he couldn’t stop turning over the events of the night before, over and over, without reaching any new conclusion.
Everything kept spinning in his head like a stuck wheel.
’Master...’ Ely’s voice suddenly resonated in his mind through the mental link. ’Are you alright? You’ve had that look on your face all morning... It isn’t like you to be so quiet.’
Mark quickly snapped to at hearing Ely’s worried voice.
’I’m fine...’ he replied. ’Just a bit tired, that’s all.’
’Tired?’ Ely asked curiously. ’Did you not sleep well last night?’
’Something like that...’
There was a brief pause, and then Mark could almost feel Ely’s smile through the link.
’Well, if that was the problem, master, you should have called me,’ she said in a clearly suggestive tone. ’Me, Yuki, or both of us. We’d be more than happy to help you... get to sleep. Isn’t that right, Yuki?’
There was a small silence until the assassin replied.
’Yeah...’ Yuki’s flat voice answered, as brief as always, but without denying Ely’s insinuation.
Mark, despite the weight he was carrying in his head, couldn’t help laughing inwardly.
’Noted,’ he replied, quite amused, feeling a bit more cheerful. ’I’ll definitely call on you both next time... I won’t make the mistake of trying to sleep alone again.’
’You’d better, Master,’ Ely said, and Mark could feel the satisfaction in her voice.
The exchange drew a small smile from him and lightened his mood a little.
But even so, when the mental conversation faded, Mark turned back to look out the carriage window, watching the landscape slowly rolling past.
’I just want this to be over...’ he thought, letting out a quiet sigh. ’I just hope things don’t get any more complicated than they need to... and that we can get back home soon.’
The carriage kept moving, venturing deeper and deeper into the beastman lands.
...
Meanwhile, very far from there, in a luxurious mansion in the heart of the beastman capital, things were anything but peaceful.
Prince Jack was sitting on his sofa, drinking desperately straight from a wine bottle.
Gulp after gulp, without pause, as if trying to find something at the bottom.
The room around him was dim, and several empty bottles were already rolling across the floor at his feet.
When suddenly the door opened, and the tall man with bear ears and scars on his face came into the room.
"Brother, we searched everywhere, just as you ordered," he said in a tired tone. "We checked every room, every corridor, the gardens, and the storerooms, but there’s no trace of her anywhere."
"..."
"Your ’special guest’... she’s simply not here."
Jack stayed still for barely a second before hurling, without warning, the bottle he was holding.
The projectile crossed the room and smashed full into his brother’s face, shattering in an explosion of glass and wine that soaked him completely.
"THEN SEARCH AGAIN, DAMN IT!" Jack roared, getting to his feet. "She can’t have just vanished! Check again, every fucking corner, even under the goddamn rocks if you have to!"
The scarred man didn’t even flinch at the blow.
He simply closed his eyes for a moment while the liquid dripped down his face.
"Brother... haven’t you considered that maybe she simply decided to leave?" he said calmly. "Maybe she got tired of all this and went off on her own... In fact, that would be the best thing that could happen to us, if you ask me."
"That’s impossible!" Jack screamed, slamming the table with his fists. "My beloved would never abandon me! She would never leave without telling me! Something must have happened to her! Someone must have done something to her, someone took her from me!"
The scarred man watched him in silence and let out a heavy sigh.
It was clear that the alcohol and the obsession had completely clouded his brother’s judgment.
Prince Jack was no longer reasoning.
He was raving.
"Brother..." he said in a softer tone, trying to calm him. "You’ve had too much to drink today... Maybe you should lie down for a while, rest your head, and tomorrow, with a clearer mind, we can—"
"I already know who it was..."
"Huh?"
Jack raised his eyes, and they had a manic gleam in them.
"It was that fucking bitch... Luna," he said, his voice heavy with hatred. "It had to be her... Just the other day I found out about her plans, and now my beloved disappears, just like that."
"...Brother."
"It’s not a coincidence... that fucking bastard took her from me."
The scarred man frowned.
"But that doesn’t make sense," he said, trying to make his brother see reason. "Our sister isn’t even in the capital... She’s been away for days and nobody knows where she went."
"..."
"She couldn’t have had anything to do with this."
But the words didn’t reach Jack’s ears.
Instead, the prince drove his fist into the side table with such force that it split in two, sending the pieces and the bottles on top scattering across the floor.
"THEN I WANT HER BROUGHT BEFORE ME!" he screamed, furious. "The moment that slut sets foot back in the capital, I want her dragged here! That idiot is going to tell me where my beloved is, even if I have to force it out of her!"
And to emphasize his point, he grabbed another bottle from the floor and threw it at his brother, who this time dodged it by tilting his head slightly, letting it smash against the wall behind him.
The scarred brother let out a long, resigned sigh.
He ran a hand across his face, wiping off the wine still dripping down it as if it were no big deal, with the calm of someone long accustomed to these kinds of outbursts.
"...Alright," he finally agreed. "As soon as Luna returns, she’ll be brought before you."
And without another word, he turned and left the room, closing the door behind him and leaving Prince Jack completely alone.
Once alone, Prince Jack dropped back onto the sofa.
The fury from a moment ago faded little by little, replaced by something darker and more twisted.
He picked up another bottle from the floor, one of the few still intact, and stared at it under the room’s faint light.
"My love..." he murmured in a voice that had none of the earlier rage, but rather a kind of warped tenderness. "Why did you leave? Did I do something that upset you?"
Prince Jack took a long drink from the bottle.
"Don’t worry, my love," he whispered, staring into nothing. "I’m going to find you... It doesn’t matter where you are, it doesn’t matter who took you away from me... I’m going to bring you back to where you belong."
His fingers tightened around the neck of the bottle.
"And I’m going to make sure that bitch wishes she’d never been born..."