"I have three faults, Your Majesty."
A calm voice echoed through the solemn courtroom. Below the King, who sat upon a high dais, the people filling the seats were fixated on the man standing at the center as a prisoner.
Curtis Russell, the Marquess of the Border.
Jet-black hair like a raven and eyes tinged with gray. A tall stature with broad shoulders. A sharp jawline and a spirit that overwhelmed all those present.
The man was once a Marquess whose power was second only to the King. At the same time, he was the leader of a mercenary organization that had sent the entire nation into a state of terror. The man, who was both the culprit of the century and the subject of the century’s greatest incident, stood before the King as a traitor.
The noblewomen who finally saw him in the flesh let out sighs of pity, and the knights who had once revered his reputation remained silent. The lords seated on the lower tiers of the dais glared at him with piercing eyes. In a courtroom where various gazes and emotions were intertwined, only the King maintained his composure.
"What is the first?"
"Do you remember? We once spoke of revenge, Your Majesty."
"I did."
"I said that revenge is returning exactly what one has received. Humiliation, shame, betrayal, and even rage."
Even while wearing a tattered tunic with his hands and feet bound in iron chains, the man was dignified. He had been the same even when he had nothing to his name. A man who was not just bold, but insolent. The King’s lips curled upward.
"So, is that what you did?"
"No. I destroyed the House of Dalton, but I spared the daughter, thereby deceiving myself. That is my first fault."
"Then what is your second fault?"
"The second is."
Curtis tilted his head and scanned the room. When his eyes met those of the woman sitting to the King’s left who was glaring at him, he did not look away and spat out:
"Honestly, the Princess’s one-sided pursuit was bothersome. Therefore, being disloyal to the King—that is my second sin."
The courtroom was instantly engulfed in shock at his arrogant words. The Princess, her face turning bright red, fainted. As she was carried out of the courtroom on the back of an attendant, fierce condemnation poured down upon him.
"Look at that! That impudent wretch!"
"We must behead him at once!"
"Silence!"
It was the King who stopped the courtroom that had turned noisy in an instant. The King, veins bulging in his neck, lowered the hand he had raised. As the surroundings fell quiet, Curtis calmly finished his sentence.
The King shut his mouth, though he had been on the verge of ordering an immediate execution. If he allowed himself to be consumed by emotion, he would lose this battle. He would watch with his own two eyes as this man met a miserable end.
"……Yes. That is true. I granted you the title of Marquess again, even though you were nothing but a wandering leader of a mercenary band, yet you brought disgrace upon my Princess."
The highest honor of being able to marry the Princess. But Curtis Russell had eloped with the daughter of a traitor. He had openly challenged the King’s authority. The King felt a sense of crisis. It was a time when the authority of the King, once called the Sun God, was weakening, and the power of the lords was growing stronger. Therefore, this incident could never be overlooked. Even if he had to trample upon the petitions of the knights, he had to execute the man before him as an example.
"There is no way to save your life anyway. But in light of your past contributions, I will hear the rest. What is your third fault?"
"The third fault is."
Curtis, who had taken the full brunt of the King’s rage, poured out a shocking statement.
"It is the fact that I am holding Viscount Otis, or rather, your illegitimate son."
"……What?"
He was a boy he had assumed was lying around somewhere, drunk on gambling and liquor.
"You, you bastard!"
At the unexpected remark, the King jumped to his feet. The knights reacted swiftly, roughly pulling Curtis down by his shoulders. The gallery erupted in a sudden commotion.
With his cheek pressed against the witness stand, Curtis looked up at the dais, where the King was red with fury. Through the torn tunic, his prominent Adam’s apple and collarbone were exposed. Strands of disheveled hair clung to his forehead. The eyes looking up at the dais were a deep, ash-gray.
"Your liver has grown so large it has burst out of your belly. You dare kidnap my illegitimate son? Is this the pathetic scheme you’ve concocted to save your own life?"
"No. How could I do such a thing? The only reason I committed the fault of kidnapping the King’s illegitimate son is."
"Only?"
"To rectify what is wrong and offer my final loyalty to Your Majesty."
The meaning contained in those words was clear. The King’s face turned pale in an instant. It was a message only he could understand, but it felt as though all the blood had drained from his body.
At the cryptic words of a prisoner facing execution, the gallery began to murmur once more.
"Everyone, shut up!"
At the King’s sharp, icy shout, the courtroom fell silent at once. In a situation that was beyond absurd, Curtis burst into laughter.
The King, grinding his teeth, signaled the knights to step back. Curtis, who rose to his feet with composure, loosened his neck.
"You’ve finally made up your mind, haven't you?"
Viscount Otis was a thorn in the King’s side. The King’s eldest son, yet a man of a status that could never allow him to become King. It was the King’s fault for turning a blind eye even when the boy went astray. Even without this, there was already fierce opposition in the Council of Nobles due to the fact that he had impregnated and abandoned several unmarried noble ladies.
Until now, it had been smoothed over because they were daughters of minor lords, but murder was a different case. The person Derek had killed while fighting over a high-class prostitute was none other than the son of the Grand Duke, the second-in-command of the Council of Nobles.
He had thought he had disposed of the evidence well. If this fact were discovered, he would have to execute Derek to appease the Grand Duke’s faction.
"Marquess."
The King, who had risen from his seat, descended the dais and stood directly in front of the prisoner. A fierce fist slammed into Curtis’s face.
Curtis spat the blood that had pooled in his mouth onto the floor, accompanied by a stinging pain. His sweat-drenched hair clung to his neck, feeling stifling.
"So, you mean to say that in exchange for sparing Viscount Otis, I am not to look for Roxana Dalton."
"You are perceptive."
Curtis, his eyes narrowed, complimented him. The King’s face hardened at his increasingly insolent behavior.
"And what of begging for your own life? I intend to tear you limb from limb this very moment and mount your head on the castle ramparts."
"As you wish."
"It is already too late."
The King, his lips twitching, shoved him away by the collar. Then, he shouted toward the firmly closed doors.
"Bring her in."
At the same time, the heavy doors opened, and a woman appeared. Simultaneously, time flowed as slowly as eternity. Curtis’s eyes, upon recognizing the woman, wavered for the first time.
"Roxana."
She was a woman who should not be here.
His life, his light, his love. His everything.
For a brief moment, their gazes met. Her violet eyes passed over him indifferently and turned toward the King. Even in the midst of the shock, he mournfully scanned her bare feet, which were covered in wounds beneath her shabby, tattered white chemise.
Her steps stopped, and the King had the soldiers who had escorted her force Roxana to her knees. Even in her bound state, her straight back and eyes looking steadily ahead exuded a nobility that could not be easily approached.
"I heard you came here of your own volition this dawn."
"Yes."
"Why?"
Her chapped lips parted.
"Because it is for revenge. That man is the enemy who destroyed my family."
The air in the courtroom, which had been heated to the limit, froze coldly.
"Revenge? How does it become revenge for you to stand here, throwing away even your own life?"
Instead of answering, Roxana shifted her gaze. The ash-gray eyes were glaring at her as if they would burn her at any moment.
"Because that man loves me."
Roxana smiled brightly one last time and scanned the countless gazes that were fixed upon her like daggers.
"A lover’s death—what could be a more perfect revenge than that in this world?"
At the same time, a wave of shock swept through the room. Traitor. Betrayer. Witch. Even the few sympathetic gazes toward the poignant lovers changed in an instant.
"We must kill her!"
"Execute her at once!"
"Burn that witch at the stake!"
Amidst the hatred and anger that had burst forth like a flood, Roxana stared at Curtis, who was silently glaring at her.
Within the eyes that had been prepared for death, a pitch-black fire began to burn fiercely. Eyes that asked if she had lost her mind. Toward the flame that would consume her and eventually swallow the entire courtroom, Roxana whispered without a sound.
‘You must find the way.’
It was something he had once said to her. Curtis, who understood the implication, burst into cold, raucous laughter. With eyes that looked as if he would strangle her with his own two hands and cover her lips at any moment.
At that laughter, Roxana slowly closed her eyes. The past she had buried in a corner of her heart flashed by like a revolving lantern. In an instant, she returned to the remote island where the sound of crashing waves could be heard.
To the place where it all began.
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