Roselle’s Pov
Thack… Thack… Thack.
One of Silas’s men kept swinging the axe, methodically dismantling the body.
First the head.
Then the hands.
He worked with the calm precision of a butcher carving meat, not a man destroying a corpse.
Blood splattered the floor and walls; some of it had already streaked across Silas’s shoes and those of his men.
None of them flinched.
None of them spoke.
The only sound in the hallway was the wet, rhythmic crack of steel meeting flesh and bone.
I stared too long.
Something inside me finally recoiled.
Without thinking I stepped backward.
The soft scrape of my foot against the floor broke the spell.
Every head turned.
“Madam.” One of the men finally noticed me.
The others also had their faces turned in my direction, surprise evident on their faces.
Clearly, none of them had been aware of my presence until that moment.
My heartbeat quickened at the sudden attention.
Silas’s eyes widened slightly when he saw me standing there.
For a moment, he simply stared.
Then he immediately walked toward me.
When he was only a few feet away, he reached out to take my hand.
My body reacted before I could stop it.
My mind was still replaying what I had just witnessed, the way Silas had stood there calmly, watching everything unfold without the slightest hesitation.
As though this wasn’t the first time he had watched a man die.
As though it was nothing more than another ordinary night for him.
And now, the same hands that had held me so gently only moments ago were reaching for me again.
“My sweet Rose.” His affectionate voice reached me, almost as though nothing had happened.
He acted as if he hadn’t noticed the way I had flinched when he reached for me.
Instead, he stepped closer.
This time, I forced myself not to move.
I stared directly at him, fighting the urge to take another step backward.
Once he closed the remaining distance between us, he lifted his hand and gently brushed away a loose strand of hair that had fallen across my face.
“You need to get back to the room,” he said.
He looked at me as though what I had just witnessed was nothing more than an ordinary Wednesday night.
As though a man’s life hadn’t just ended right in front of us.
“It’s getting late. After I’m done wrapping this up, I’ll come back upstairs. Maybe we can cuddle until I fall asleep, okay?”
He looked at me expectantly.
Then, almost casually, he adjusted the scarf around my neck, making it more comfortable.
His gentleness only made everything more confusing.
“I… need to go,” I managed to say.
I quickly turned and walked away.
I didn’t agree to his suggestion.
I didn’t refuse it either.
I simply couldn’t find the words.
I retraced my steps through the estate, my mind refusing to let go of what I had just seen.
The scene kept replaying in my head. Follow the newest chapters on g.com.
The man’s body collapsing.
And then, worst of all, the brief movement of his fingers twitching after the axe struck his neck.
I shuddered.
I tried to push the image away, but it was already burned into my mind.
Every time I blinked, I could see it again as clearly as if I were still standing there.
I quickened my steps forward as my mind raced on.
I had taken countless lives as a general, yet the silent code we knights upheld remained absolute: never disrespect the body of a fallen soldier.
I did not know what had led to this moment, but I knew with certainty that what Silas and his men were doing to that corpse was a blatant desecration of a fellow comrade.
More than anger or disappointment toward Silas, I felt a deeper shame at myself.
Why could I not confront him?
Why could I not look him in the eye and declare that his actions were a clear violation of everything I once claimed to honor?
Why could I not tell him that killing the man, whoever he had been, was enough, and that he had no right to hack the body into pieces like a butcher carving meat?
As I reached the master bedroom door and rested my hand on the handle, ready to turn it, a thought struck me: if I could go back, to those final minutes, or even to the moment before his men brought the axe down on the dead man’s neck, would I still have found the courage to stop him?
Would I have spoken my truth?
Or would I have remained silent, frozen in fear?
The answer was painfully clear.
As I opened the door and stepped back into the room I had left earlier, I faced a bitter truth I had refused to acknowledge until now.
I had grown weak.
I had gone soft.
The Alice of old would have confronted him then and there.
But this Roselle had stood frozen, flinching at a mere touch.
Or perhaps I had never been as strong as I believed.
Perhaps since I was no longer shielded by the crown, or forced to live in constant fear, my mind had become that of a coward, no different from the men I once scorned.