strictlysupreme Chapter 216: Ashes of Revenge
Chapter 216: Ashes of Revenge
"What is your Lordship doing here?"
Olivia’s voice pierced the silence of the room like an icy blade. She stared directly at Matthias, who was sitting right across from her—a stranger in her own home, yet painfully familiar. At the mere sound of his voice, "Black" jumped from her lap, wagging his tail in a clumsy frenzy as he rushed toward him.
Matthias leaned down, lifting the cat to his chest, and pressed a light kiss onto his forehead. "You’ve grown, you little troublemaker. It seems you’ve received a treatment fit for kings in my absence."
His eyes shifted slowly, letting go of the cat to lock onto Olivia’s. His gaze was testing boundaries, while her eyes were an impenetrable fortress of coldness and alertness—two pools of blue refusing to back down.
"Is a man not allowed to visit his own property?" Matthias asked, his voice soft, carrying the rasp of the old game he played so well.
Olivia let out a heavy, weary sigh, rolling her eyes in distaste. "I believe a graveyard would be a property better suited for you, my dear."
"Really?" His familiar, crooked smile tugged at the corner of his lips, gleaming with a dangerous edge. "I could always put an end to this torment and make it my permanent residence. You know I am a man of action, don’t you?"
He knew exactly which strings to pull. He knew that the mere thought of his actual death, despite her coldness, shook the deepest core of her consciousness. He wanted to provoke her; he wanted to see that fierce fire he so longed to burn his fingers on.
But something broke this time. Olivia didn’t take the bait. She didn’t scream.
Instead, her eyes betrayed her. A single, heavy tear rebelled, carving its way down her pale cheek, leaving behind a glistening trail of humiliating vulnerability.
Ever since that secret had settled inside her womb, her body had turned into an enemy. Her resilience had withered away, and an overwhelming hypersensitivity was eating at her pride. No matter how hard she tried to tighten her mask of indifference, the mention of death or loss was enough to completely shatter the glass of her defenses.
The smugness vanished from Matthias’s face in the blink of an eye, replaced by genuine, shocking panic. He tossed Black onto the sofa and rushed to kneel at her feet, utterly distraught.
"Olivia... it was just a dark joke. What’s wrong?"
She raised her small hand in a swift defensive motion, wiping away the trace of the tear, and slapped away his hand as it reached for her face before it could touch her.
"Go back to your seat," she commanded, her voice trembling despite the stern, raspy tone she tried to feign. "Wasn’t our agreement clear? I allowed you to see me on the condition that you do not cross boundaries. Go. Now."
He didn’t move an inch. Instead, he drew closer, ignoring the distance she was desperately trying to enforce.
"Olivia... just this once. Let me hold you, please," he whispered, his voice cracking, stripped of all his usual mockery. "The longing is slaughtering me, ripping my chest apart. Let me breathe your air just once. I was wrong, and I admit my ignorance... but being exiled from you like this is hell itself. Have mercy on me, Olivia."
Deep down, the truth was bitter; she was starving for him just as he was for her. The pain in her chest was so suffocating that she couldn’t bear to look into his eyes for fear of exposure. Yet her pride stood like an ancient tower, refusing to bow.
Gathering what little strength she had left, she pressed her palms against his chest. "Please... go back to your seat. I am asking you nicely."
"I don’t want to."
"What? Matthias, I—"
His lips gave her no chance to refuse. He lunged forward, devouring her words in a fierce, breathless kiss that carried the bitter taste of the barren days they had spent apart. She resisted him for the first few seconds, her fingers digging into his shoulders to push him away, clinging to the last stronghold of her logic. But his arms wrapped around her waist, locking her in, pulling her body flush against his in a bruising embrace, as if he were trying to pull her back inside him.
Every time she tried to pull back to catch her breath, he pursued her lips with a renewed hunger, violently erasing every single night he had spent away from her.
Finally, after an eternity of mingled breaths, his pace slowed. Their lips parted, but their foreheads remained pressed together, their eyes heavy with unspoken promises.
"I love you," he whispered in a raspy, choked voice, burying his face in the crook of her neck. He inhaled her scent deeply before planting a harsh kiss that left a dark mark on her soft skin.
A violent shiver ran down her spine. The word wasn’t like before; it was like a heavy dose of opium, numbing her limbs and paralyzing her thoughts, leaving her in a state of euphoria mixed with a terrifying happiness—one she had to fight with every cell in her body to keep from showing on her face.
"I truly love you, Olivia," Matthias murmured against her skin. "I may be reckless, clumsy in my actions, but everything I did... was for you. So don’t push me away. Forgive my madness."
She didn’t answer him. She let the silence stretch between them, but her silence was no longer a wall of rejection; it was a fragile, negotiable truce. Sensing this shift, Matthias stopped talking. He rested his head on her shoulder, seeking the safety he had missed for months.
"Matthias... go to your seat now," she said in a quiet tone, but one that left no room for bargaining.
Catching the slight softening in her sharp features, Matthias smiled with relief and said, "I’ll sit next to you then. I promise I won’t do anything else."
"Matthias..."
"A real promise, I swear."
"You are an expert at breaking your promises. I don’t believe a word."
He let out a low, dark laugh. Reaching into the inner pocket of his coat, he pulled out a silk handkerchief, unfolding it slowly and carefully to reveal a clean, silver lock of hair, neatly severed from what remained of Elysea.
"Stop frowning," he murmured, his eyes gleaming with a strange, twisted light as he placed the keepsake before her. "I brought you what will truly quench your thirst for revenge. Tell me now... am I not a good husband?"
Olivia stepped back, her eyes narrowing. "What is this? Is this... my hair?"
Matthias scoffed, his voice laced with a dark, defensive sharpness. "Never insult your hair by comparing it to the strands of that filth."
"Filth...?" Olivia’s voice faltered, her heart dropping into her stomach as she stared at the gleaming silver. "Matthias, whose hair is this?"
A cold, wide smile stretched across his lips, but he remained silent, leaving her mind to connect the dots. The rumors had already reached her ears; whispers about the Emperor stripping Elysea of everything and exiling her as a commoner to serve in a remote monastery.
When his silence stretched, Olivia lost her composure. She stepped forward, gripping the collar of his coat tightly, shaking him as her eyes widened in horror. "Did you do something?! Have you lost your mind, Matthias, to sabotage the Emperor’s exile and interfere?!"
"No," he whispered coldly, looking down at her hands gripping him without a shred of regret. "It wasn’t me."
"Who then?"
"Let’s just say... your former father finally decided to dispose of one of his defective puppets."
Olivia’s hands froze on his chest. Her breath caught. "She’s... dead?"
"I guarantee you that," Matthias replied, his eyes brimming with a cold ecstasy as he watched her reaction, brushing her strands away from her face to see her clearly. "She met the exact end she deserved, my dear wife."
"How?"
"She became a hearty meal for his favorite hunting hounds."
Olivia’s mouth fell open in a shock that paralyzed her limbs. Overthrowing Elvira had been an exhausting battle on the edge of a cliff; but bringing down an Empress? That was supposed to be damn near impossible.
"Oh my God..." A faint laugh escaped her, sharp and steeped in darkness. "In the end, she died like the lowest livestock. Oh my God... I couldn’t have imagined a better end. To have her arrogant nose dragged through the dirt as she drew her final breath."
She reached out, picking up the silver lock of hair wrapped in the handkerchief to marvel at her victory. But as the silk neared her face, a pungent, metallic stench pierced her nostrils—the smell of dried blood mixed with the foul saliva of hounds, which the handkerchief hadn’t entirely washed away.
The scent acted like a trigger, setting off something explosive in her gut. Her stomach turned with sudden, violent brutality.
Olivia gasped, clapping her palm over her mouth to suppress the surge of vomit that rushed up her throat without warning. She threw the lock away, turning and bolted with her trembling body toward the adjoining bathroom.
She couldn’t fight it. She fell to her knees before the toilet, vomiting violently, her entire body wracking and shaking with every heave that emptied her stomach.
Matthias bolted after her, sheer terror twisting his stern features upon witnessing the sudden collapse of her cold facade. He knelt beside her, his trembling hands rubbing her back frantically, while he quickly filled a glass of water for her to rinse her pale face, which was now slick with cold sweat.
"Olivia! What is happening to you?! Oh my God, are you sick?!" Matthias shouted, his voice cracked with panic as his eyes searched her face for an answer. "Olivia, answer me! What is this?!"
Olivia leaned her back against the cold stone wall of the bathroom, her chest heaving wildly as she tried to pull herself together. She raised her eyes, heavy with tears of physical exhaustion, and saw his face—the face of a man who would burn an entire empire to the ground for her, yet now stood defenseless, terrified, and helpless before her sickness.
In that moment, the desire to fight dissolved. Her defenses failed her in the face of his pure, unadulterated fear.
She looked at him, and her hand moved slowly, in a cautious, instinctive motion, coming to rest tenderly over her lower abdomen.
"Matthias... I... We..."