“You called me.”
Aeliana met his gaze, her amber eyes unwavering, unflinching. She did not bow her head, did not look away. If anything, she was waiting—measuring him as much as he had measured her.
Thaddeus held that gaze for a long moment before he gave a slow, deliberate nod.
“Indeed, I have called you here.”
Aeliana let out a quiet exhale, her lips parting—not in relief, not in acknowledgment, but in something far sharper.
“Ah,” she murmured, tilting her head slightly. “So now that I’m cured, you can finally bear to see my face?”
The words weren’t loud. They weren’t even biting. But the weight behind them—the challenge laced within each syllable—landed with precision.
Thaddeus did not react. His expression remained as composed as ever, his fingers still resting against the polished surface of his desk. He had expected hostility. Resentment.
She had always hated being locked away.
But he was not the one who had refused this meeting.
His golden eyes met hers, steady.
“It was not I who refused to bring you here,” he reminded her, his voice even, absolute. “It was you who refused to step out.”
A sharp breath. A flicker of something behind her gaze—something almost like offense—before she let out a quiet, humorless chuckle.
“Oh,” she mused, lifting her chin. “So I was the one who was scared?”
The question was barbed, laced with accusation, meant to provoke.
Thaddeus saw it immediately.
She wanted a fight.
Not a conversation.
Not an understanding.
A fight.
And he…
He would not give it to her.
‘Sigh…..This girl…’
Not this time.
His fingers curled slightly against the desk, then relaxed. He inhaled, slow, controlled, before shifting back in his chair.
“If that is how you wish to see it,” he said simply.
The words were calm, but the meaning behind them was clear.
Aeliana’s lips parted slightly, as if she had expected more—wanted more. She had come armed for a battle of words, had prepared her blade to cut as deeply as possible, only to find that he had refused to draw his own.
Aeliana opened her mouth.
Then—she hesitated.
For just a fraction of a second, just long enough for uncertainty to flicker across her face before she caught herself. Her jaw tightened, and without another word, she closed her mouth again, forcing her expression back into something cool. Composed.
She exhaled through her nose, shifting her weight slightly as she crossed her arms.
“If that’s all, then get to the point,” she said, her tone clipped, as if she had already decided she wouldn’t care for whatever he was about to say.
Thaddeus watched her.
Carefully.
Not with the sharp, assessing gaze he often wore on the battlefield, nor with the cold calculation he reserved for those who stood before him as adversaries.
No, this was different.
This was the gaze of a man looking at something he should understand. Something familiar, yet foreign.
Aeliana had always been strong-willed. Always been sharp. But this? This version of her—standing tall, standing against him rather than simply bracing herself in his presence—was something entirely new.
And he wasn’t sure what to make of it.
Still, he did not delay.
“You are aware of the changes in your body,” he said at last.
Not a question.
A statement.
Aeliana’s amber eyes flickered slightly, but she did not look away.
“You mean the part where I’m no longer dying?” she asked dryly.
Thaddeus did not react to the sarcasm.
“You did not simply recover,” he continued. “Your mana core has not only stabilized—it has strengthened. Grown beyond what should have been possible.”
Aeliana inhaled slowly, but her face remained unreadable.
“The method by which this occurred remains unverified,” Thaddeus went on, his voice calm, steady, absolute. “And that is unacceptable.”
A beat of silence.
Aeliana’s lips pressed together, her fingers twitching against the fabric of her sleeve.
“Unacceptable,” she echoed, voice quieter now, yet still carrying the weight of something unspoken.
Thaddeus nodded once.
“You understand why this must be examined further.”
Another pause.
Then—
Aeliana’s eyes narrowed.
Aeliana’s arms remained crossed, her amber gaze locked onto him. There was no hesitation in her stance, no faltering in her voice as she spoke.
“Do you wish to know because the same illness might occur once again,” she asked, her tone steady, sharp, “or do you wish to control me once again?”
Thaddeus exhaled slowly.
“I have never intended to control you.”
Aeliana let out a quiet, humorless chuckle. “No? Then what was it?”
“Whatever I did, it was for your sake,” he stated, his voice calm—unshaken.
Aeliana’s expression did not shift. She did not laugh this time. Instead, she held his gaze, the silence between them stretching like a blade waiting to be drawn.
“For my sake?” she repeated, voice quieter now, but no less cutting.
Her fingers twitched against her sleeve before she stepped forward, not breaking eye contact.
“Was it for my sake,” she began, “to engage me to someone I had never met? Someone who only saw me as a name on a contract?”
Thaddeus remained silent.
“Was it for my sake,” she continued, her voice hardening, “when you locked me away like I was some fragile artifact that would shatter at the slightest touch?”
The words landed—sharp, precise.
“Was it for my sake,” she pressed on, “when you refused to listen? When every time I spoke, you dismissed my words because you believed you knew better?”
She inhaled sharply, her hands clenching at her sides.
“Tell me, Father,” she said, voice laced with bitter challenge. “Was it really all for me?”
Thaddeus said nothing for a long moment.
Because the truth was not simple.
Because she was not entirely wrong.
Not everything had been for her.
Not every decision, every action, every calculated move had been for her alone.
There had been the family name to consider. The reputation of the Thaddeus Duchy. The necessity of ensuring that his only daughter—his only heir—would be protected, secured, and placed where she would never be touched by the harshness of the world.
Not all of it had been selfless.
And yet—
She was wrong, too.
Because if she truly believed he had not thought of her, she did not know how deeply she had burrowed into his thoughts.
Every day.
Nearly every hour.
For years, he had woken with her name lingering in his mind. Every time he received reports from physicians, every time he found a lead—no matter how desperate—on a possible cure, every time he returned to an empty estate and felt the silence where she should have been.
She had never left his thoughts.
But he would not say this.
It was pointless.
His feelings, his regrets, his explanations—none of them would reach her. Not now.
So instead, he simply exhaled.
His golden eyes met hers, steady, unreadable. Continue reading at My Virtual Library Empire
“I will not argue with you,” he said.
Aeliana scoffed. “Of course not.”
His expression did not change. “Because it would accomplish nothing.”
Aeliana’s lips pressed into a thin line.
She had expected denial.
Expected justification.
She had not expected restraint.
That unsettled her more than anything else.
Thaddeus straightened slightly, his presence shifting—not as a father caught in the weight of old wounds, but as a Duke who had no patience for meaningless battles.
“I called here to ask you what happened there.”