Content Warning

  SpoilerPotential dubious consent

  [colpse]Yuuto swallowed as he stared down at the cover of the book in his hand, his grip tightening slightly from nervousness. The Withered Red Spider Lily, supposedly an infamously scandalous novel that became popur during his childhood in Nijiyama.

  He remembered the sharp crack of his mother’s fan across his knuckles when she’d caught him curiously reaching for it in the Kanayama estate library years ago. Now, having found it again in the Royal Sorium, curiosity got the best of him, and he couldn’t help but take it to his chambers.

  It should be fine… right? If it’s here, it can’t be truly forbidden. I am simply… expanding my literary horizons. If anything, he could feign ignorance and cim he didn’t know anything about the story before taking it, just that he was intrigued by the title.

  With a steadying breath, he retreated to the privacy of his chambers, sank onto his sleeping mat, and turned to the first page.

  —{}—

  The story followed a noblewoman named Hiroki Shimizu, a general whose military brilliance was matched only by her ruthless ambition. Her recent victory, a brutal suppression of the Cornaul border rebellion, had swelled her power until it cast a long, unsettling shadow over the Queen’s own throne. As a prize for her exceptional achievement, the Queen bestowed upon her a gift: a beautiful young man from the conquered territory named Misbah to be her concubine.

  On their wedding night, just as they exchanged their ceremonial wine, the diligent and cautious Hiroki had sensed a foreign scent, so faint it was near imperceptible, in her cup. She knew then that the wine was undrinkable.

  When she called him out, he pulled out his sharpened hairpin and aimed for her throat, a st, desperate attempt to take her life. But as a masterful warrior, Hiroki easily caught his wrist, and with a twist, the beauty dropped the pin to the ground. In the blink of an eye, she bound his hands behind his back with the scarlet silk sash from her own robe. Then, she retrieved her ceremonial sword from its stand beside the bed and rested the ft of the bde against his shoulder, a mere hair’s breadth away from cutting into his neck.

  “Why?” she had asked.

  Bound and at her mercy, Misbah’s composure didn’t shatter, but all the coy facade of a new groom from earlier had vanished, repced by a contemptuous, cold grin. He confessed all: his wife and children, farmers who had tilled nd on the contested border, had been caught in the brutal warfare among the countless, nameless dead. Driven by grief and rage, he had poisoned both of their wine cups to enact revenge on his family’s murderer and end his own life, for he had nothing else to live for.

  A long silence stretched between them. Normally, any other general, especially one with Hiroki's reputation for ruthlessness, would have delivered his head to the Queen in a silk-wrapped box. Instead, only a slow, fascinated smile spread across her lips.

  “I know the Queen even better than herself,” Hiroki said. “That woman is many things, but a fool is not one of them. She knew better than to carelessly give me a man whose heart had not been thoroughly vetted.”

  She delightfully drank in the pure, unadulterated hatred burning in his eyes, contorting his ethereal, exotic features. “My dear, did you truly think I would not know? How much Her Majesty wants me dead?”

  Misbah gave no reply, merely keeping that venomous gre.

  Hiroki’s smile only grew. “A man with such fire in his belly,” she mused thoughtfully. “Such passion. It would be a shame to extinguish it.”

  She reached out, pinched his chin, and tilted his head up, forcing him to meet her gaze. “How about this,” she said. “Here is my proposition, Misbah of Cornaul. You will stay. You will be my consort, in truth as well as in name. Stay by my side as I rise to power in this court, and, yes, above even the Queen’s reach. In exchange, I will give you wealth, status, and the power to ensure no other family suffers the fate of yours. What say you?”

  Misbah’s brows tightened. “And why would Your Ladyship ever keep such a dangerous, treacherous man like me in your own bosom?”

  At that, Hiroki chuckled, as if amused by his confusion. “Why, nothing more than for your extraordinary beauty, of course!”

  The mirth and honesty in her eyes sent tremors through Misbah’s body. This woman was taunting him. She was daring him to hate her, to plot against her, to match her ambition with his own. This was not mere arrogance—this was an unwavering confidence that he could do nothing to her, a clear, unspoken message that he was as powerless as an ant before her.

  This realization was a cold spsh of water that doused the fmes of his rage. Then, a smirk of his own that mirrored hers slowly curved his pretty lips. If she wanted to invite a wolf to her chambers, then a wolf she shall have.

  “If my dy wishes to keep me at her side,” he purred, “then who is this lowly man to refuse?”

  Hiroki’s eyes widened slightly, surprise flickering across her expression. Then, it was instantly repced by intrigue. She threw her head back and roared with ughter, loud enough to fill the chambers.

  “Splendid answer!” Hiroki boomed. “You and I shall have a wonderful married life together!”

  She walked behind him and lifted her sword. Then, she brought the bde down and cleanly sliced through the silk binding Misbah’s pale, bruised wrists.

  Before he could react, in one effortless motion, she grabbed him by the front of his ornate robe, yanked him to his feet, and captured him into a deep, hot, and consuming kiss. Misbah made a muffled gasp of surprise, but before he could resist, she had already invaded his mouth with her tongue, ciming his mouth thoroughly.

  He tried to pull apart, but her grip was inescapable.

  So, instead of pushing her away, he closed his eyes and responded to it with equal, fervent intensity, jaw opening wider to invite Hiroki’s tongue deeper. His hands came up to fist in the fabric of her robe, pulling her closer.

  A low growl of excitement rumbled in her chest. With an impatient hand, she swept the wedding cups from the low table and pushed him back onto the cushioned ptform of the bed. She cshed her mouth against his again and practically tore off both of their wedding robes. Once she felt his lower half stir to life, like an eager beast, she took him into her body without a warning.

  His eyes flew wide from the sudden sheathing, stealing his breath away. He bit his lip hard to swallow his moans, but she only moved rougher and rougher, with no goal in mind other than to make him succumb. She gripped his chin and pressed her thumb against his swollen lips, which were now marred by bloodied bite marks.

  “Little flower,” Hiroki murmured, “do not hold back your voice. I want your screams to be heard by the stars.”

  He gritted his teeth, but before he could protest, she captured his lips again, her tongue tangling with his so he could not bite down. Finally, when she released him, his voice escaped before he could swallow it, and soon, the room was filled by nothing but his sweet cries and the creaking of the bed.

  Something about seeing this man, this beautiful vixen who had gred at her with such potent vow to murder her earlier, now arching and shattering beneath her, was utterly intoxicating. The way he looked up at her with a brightly flushed face, streaked by tears of pleasure he could no longer hide, his hands clutching at her with desperate need… it was all dizzying.

  This deadly little flower had made her aware of an animalistic hunger that she never knew she possessed, and that hunger fueled her throughout the rest of the night as she took him over and over until they both surrendered to exhaustion.

  —{}—

  Yuuto smmed the book shut, pressing his palm ft against the cover like a seal. His other hand flew to his mouth, but it could not stop the heat flooding his cheeks, the dizzying rush of blood that made his ears ring.

  He knew the book’s reputation of being scandalous. But to have read it himself… to have the scenes painted so vividly, so… viscerally in his mind…

  He gulped, suddenly aware of how tightly his legs were pressed together, how they were unconsciously squirming while he was immersed in the story. He gnced down briefly… and immediately looked away, embarrassment scalding his face. He adjusted the book on his p with as much dignity as he could muster to cover his reaction a bit more.

  Decorum yelled at him to put down the book. A concubine of the Queen herself, reading such sacious material? It was unbecoming. It was improper. And what if Moriya found out?

  And yet, curiosity, that sly thing, kept its hold on him. He sighed to himself—whether it was resignation or shame, he didn’t know—and opened the book again.

  pangmida