Acidity of Regret Ch 93
- Feb 12
- 6 min read
Spring, summer, autumn, winter.
The cycle repeated, again and again. The seasons turned until they required ten fingers to count. Each rotation altered the colors of the world at the edge of the horizon, and Evarn County was no exception.
Snow had not yet fallen, but the biting wind suggested it would arrive any moment.
Slender fingers traced the frame of a window clouded with frost. Beyond the glass, waves crashed against the shore with rhythmic violence. Sunlight, now more lukewarm than scorching, spilled over the grey-yellow sand, while cobalt ripples retreated and surged in an endless loop.
A woman paced the shoreline. The man's long, bony fingers twitched, following her silhouette as she moved.
[Carter] "My Lord."
The movement stopped at the sound of the voice over his shoulder.
Declan withdrew his hand from the frigid glass. He did not turn. His gaze remained pinned to the scene outside. The woman walking along the coast merged with the landscape, a solitary element of a desolate masterpiece.
The shifting colors of the world served as the only reminder that time continued to flow. Yet, he remained trapped in a singular moment of the past. Whenever he closed his eyes, her voice echoed in his ears with haunting clarity.
[Vanessa] “I hope we never cross paths again, even by chance.”
The memory of that moment required no effort to summon. It was far more devastating than his previous sentence—the agony of silently watching her marry Hayden. Now, she had revoked even his right to observe.
How could she impose such a cruel punishment?
Any other penance would have been easier. Had she ordered him to drive a blade through his wrists or pierce his own abdomen, he would have obeyed without hesitation.
But Vanessa knew his pressure points. Physical agony meant nothing compared to the terror of a life lived without her.
A single question had haunted him since that day: Is it possible? Could he exist without her?
Already, his vision darkened, and his lungs constricted at the mere thought. His heart burned with a phantom fire. The realization of his feelings had caused them to swell into a monstrous weight. Her act of pushing him away—casting him out as something less than a stranger—filled him with a primal horror.
Amidst that terror, one sentence drifted through his mind like a curse.
[Vanessa] “When I am with you, I always want to die.”
That was the incantation that rendered him powerless.
In the depths of his despair, he decided that if his disappearance was the only path to her happiness, he would vanish. Even if it meant enduring terminal agony, it was the weight of the atonement he owed.
He had to stop being selfish. He had to follow her wishes so that she would never suffer another wound. It was the only way to pay off the mountain of sins he had accumulated.
“I see. Fine, then.”
His voice had sounded pathetic even to his own ears.
“I will do as you say.”
He wiped a hand over his weary face, reflecting on that day.
Fine, then? What a joke. What a fool.
What did he mean by "Fine, then"?
What "I will do as you say"?
He had no business answering with such confidence when he had spent the last three years creeping around this county like a common stalker, stealing glimpses of her.
Had he known his own weakness, he would have knelt and begged her not to discard him. Yet, he knew that even if he returned to that moment, he would give the same answer.
[Carter] "My Lord?"
He finally turned to acknowledge Carter. His dull, bloodshot eyes made the aide flinch. Carter hurriedly held out a stack of documents.
He gestured toward the desk without a word.
Carter moved tentatively, watching his superior out of the corner of his eye. Declan ignored him, returning his attention to the window.
The Grand Duke of Vinkart had maintained this bizarre existence for nearly three years. He had abandoned his duchy, his home, and his birthplace to linger in this insignificant county.
The Duchy was rife with rumors and speculation, but Carter knew the truth: it was all for Vanessa. Every day was a cycle of surveillance—or rather, a cycle of "theft."
Three years ago, Declan purchased this villa, a place that was little more than a derelict estate, and began alternating between the Duchy and Evarn. Unless urgent business demanded his presence at home, he stayed here for weeks, sometimes months.
Yet, he did nothing. During the day, he stood before this window—the only one with a view of the beach—and watched.
And when the night grew silent......
Carter suppressed a sigh and forced himself to speak.
[Carter] "Have you seen a physician yet?"
Declan did not answer. While silence usually implies consent, in this room, it signaled a hard refusal.
[Carter] "My Lord, this condition won't improve if you ignore it. You need a proper examination and......"
Carter stopped mid-sentence.
Declan turned away from the window, his pupils blown wide and burning with a savage light.
[Declan] "Why?"
[Carter] "......"
[Declan] "Do you also think I am a madman?"
His voice, already deep, dropped to a floor-rattling bass.
The sheer intimidation made Carter swallow hard. He shook his head vigorously, his nerves stretched taut.
Declan scrutinized him for a moment before letting out a dry, jagged laugh.
[Declan] "No?"
[Carter] "......"
[Declan] "Your eyes say otherwise."
Carter wanted to ask what kind of eyes he was supposed to have. His gaze drifted toward Declan's collar. It wasn't difficult to guess the state of the skin beneath.
Declan had once sustained catastrophic injuries during the war with the monsters. Even so, he had raged like a lunatic to see Lady Rohawk the moment he woke up, causing his stitches to burst. It was an event that had terrified everyone in his service.
Though his wounds had technically healed over time, a fresh white bandage still wrapped around his neck. This was the source of the anxiety shared by his subordinates.
Declan’s nights were unstable.
It started with a minor scar. But over time, the marks became horrific. He clawed at his own throat in his sleep. His insomnia worsened, and his consumption of alcohol skyrocketed. By the time morning arrived, his neck was usually a shredded mess.
The symptoms showed no sign of receding. Beneath those bandages lay a landscape of jagged scabs and fresh, raw lines from the night before.
A habit of self-mutilation while intoxicated—it was something Carter had never encountered.
It wasn't just a personal quirk; if Declan’s hand strayed too close to a major artery during his drunken fits, the result would be fatal.
[Carter] "Did you take the sleeping draught?"
[Declan] "It doesn't work."
[Carter] "......Then you must see a physician."
[Declan] "What could they possibly do?"
Declan bit down on a cigar out of habit and leaned against a nearby table.
Outside, the silhouette on the beach turned around.
He forgot to light his cigar; his eyes locked on her. Her blonde hair, now cut short to her shoulders, danced in the wind. Even from this distance, her pale, slender neck appeared etched into his vision. Unlike his own mangled throat, her skin was pristine and untouched.
It made the fragments of the past feel like a dream.
He stared obsessively at that elegant neck. A parching thirst rose in his throat. He swallowed hard, the unlit cigar dangling from his fingers.
From afar, Vanessa looked peaceful, as if the shadows of the past had finally vanished. She was slowly reclaiming her life, glowing with an increasing radiance.
As if her recovery required his ruin.
He lowered his eyelids. His frayed nerves, sharpened by another night without sleep, felt like needles.
[Carter] "I will order a new prescription for the sleeping aid."
[Declan] "......"
[Carter] "If you change your mind, please tell me......"
[Declan] "Have you ever imagined it?"
He had never confessed the details of his nights to anyone. Carter and the others assumed it was a simple drunken habit that medication could fix.
But his nights were not simple.
[Declan] "Imagining that someone desires your death."
[Carter] "......Pardon?"
Perhaps it was the yoke of guilt, but for a long time, Declan had dreamed of his mother.
The dream was always the same. A bedroom where the cold seeped in like mist. An overturned chair. Two feet dangling in the air. A body so withered and thin that he feared touching it would turn it to dust.
His mother’s tragic end, the spark of her life long extinguished.
But the ghost in the room had changed. Now, whenever he closed his eyes, it wasn't his mother he saw. It was Vanessa, hanging in that same cold room, wearing that same lifeless expression.
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