Transmigrated Into The Body Of The Cursed Prince Wife
Chapter 102: Be friends

Chapter 102: Be friends

"What the hell do you think you are doing?" Ave demanded as she felt him pull her to the floor, where she sat between his legs with his fingers already moving into her hair, drying it for her with the cloth while he massaged her scalp with his long fingers. It felt so good that Ave subconsciously closed her eyes and let out a moan.

"The weather is cold. Leaving your hair wet will make you end up falling sick," she heard him say as he continued to wipe her hair for her.

"Well, duh, I wouldn’t have left it like that if you hadn’t entered my room through the window or taken my maidservant away from me," she muttered in reply as she leaned back against him and allowed him to continue doing whatever he was doing to her hair. It felt so good she didn’t want him to stop.

The room fell silent after that, with only the sound of the cloth he was using to wipe her hair and the occasional howling breeze outside the window. He was indeed right—the weather was cold today, and the room she was given had no fireplace despite being on the top floor of the huge palace. If she were to live here for long, she might end up sick from the cold and lack of warmth in the room.

"Lucian..." She called his name softly, and she felt him pause briefly from wiping her hair.

"Mm?" he hummed in response as he resumed wiping it again. The way she always said his name had caught him off guard lately, and though he had warned her to stop addressing him like that, he liked the sound of it in her mouth as it distinguished her from Selene or anybody else who would call him names.

"Just because I am no longer married to you, does that mean you can’t treat me as a friend? I mean, I don’t like how you ignored me for the whole of today like you don’t know me. It’s frustrating," she remarked. Even though she didn’t want to be his wife, she didn’t want to be on bad terms with him. Being friends wouldn’t harm anyone.

"A male and female can’t be friends in this world," he told her in a serious voice. He had ignored her for a reason the whole day. One thing was for certain: with the guests here, if he were to show the slightest interest in her, he would be risking not just her life but his. She was his weakness and could kill him with a stab without him healing. If anyone were to know, they would use her against him, which was why he had come in through the window to avoid being seen by any of the Empress’s spies.

Even if she’d agreed to marry him when he’d asked her, he wouldn’t have done it. He had just asked her earlier to know her thoughts. If someone were to know that she possessed any powers, she would be killed before she knew it. From now on, until they went back to his palace_which he intended to take her back to after the ceremony, regardless of her being his wife or not_he would have to keep treating her like she was invisible while they were outside.

"Why can’t they be friends?" Ave frowned upon that. "Why do you have so many stupid rules in this world?"

"To keep the balance of life. A man and a woman being just friends... it doesn’t fit within the order of this world," Lucian said, his voice calm but firm. He gently ran the cloth through her thick hair, his fingers following the motion and moving through the strands and liking the feel of it in his hands.

"In our society, the closeness between a man and a woman is always seen as something more. Even if there’s no ill intent, people will assume otherwise. It’s not just about personal feelings but the perception of others. A friendship between the opposite genders threatens that balance, bringing rumors, complications... and worse, dishonor." He paused for a moment. "So, to avoid those risks, it’s simply not done."

"Then we can be friends without anyone knowing," Ave muttered softly. She understood that in ancient times, many things were seen as scandalous and forbidden, but she would rather have some sort of relationship with him than nothing at all. Friendship was the only kind of relationship she could agree to with him.

"I don’t want you as my friend," came Lucian’s indifferent reply. He would rather she became his woman.

Ave scoffed, "Yeah, right. If you don’t want me as your friend, then perhaps I should be your enemy." She joked with a laugh; however, the man behind her took her joke literally. His hands stopped moving in her hair, and she felt him grab her shoulders and turn her around in a way that had her sitting on the floor between his legs but now facing him. He used his finger to lift her chin so she was looking at his hardened dark gaze.

"Don’t you even think about that Aveline. I am not so nice to my enemies, and you wouldn’t want to be one of them. Understood?" he demanded coolly, one thick dark brow arched.

Though Ave had only been joking, his eyes at this moment made a cold shiver run down her spine and made her gulp nervously. The thought of being on the other side of the wall as his enemy had never crossed her mind—perhaps subconsciously when he annoyed her, but she had no intentions of being his enemy.

Thus, to lighten up the mood (as she didn’t like the look in his eyes at this moment), she slapped his finger away from her chin and said, "I was only joking. Why do you always have to be so serious all the time?" She glared at him and turned her back to him so he could continue drying her hair for her. But to her disappointment, he didn’t—he stood up from behind her and instead tucked his hands inside his coat pocket.

"Your hair is dry enough. Get more clothes on or else the cold will be unbearable by midnight up here," he advised, his back turned to her. But she saw him retrieve something from his coat pocket, then turn toward her and hold it out.

Ave looked down at the white sheets of papers and the few colorful inks in small bottles, then looked up at his face in question.

"For the drawings you promised me yesterday in town—about the skycreeper and everything else you mentioned from your time used for transportation. You can draw them in your spare time and show me," he said indifferently, though he was so curious to see how the future looked, he tried not to show it.

"It’s ’skyscraper,’ by the way," she corrected as she took the papers and inks from him. She had completely forgotten that she’d even promised him a drawing until now, as her mind had been occupied with him the whole day and the turn of events she hadn’t expected this morning.

She was about to stand up and get some clothes on, as he’d advised, when she heard him say, "With the drawing of a vampire—the creature you spoke of this morning, the one that feeds on blood."

Lucian had thought about it this morning. It was high time he knew what he was and why he was suddenly craving blood. If she could draw a vampire for him, perhaps he could see if it looked anything like him on the nights of the full moon. He needed a name for what he was instead of "the cursed prince" or "the beast" that spoke to him in his head, which, thanks to Ave’s presence in his life, he had learned to block out.

Ave gulped as he reminded her of how he had bitten her thigh last night and also her lips this morning to draw blood. Her heart skipped a beat at the thought of it, and she felt her legs sway slightly as she stood to her feet.

"I... I will do that tomorrow when I have the time," she replied, masking the panic she felt that he was in her room now—what if he bit her again? But then, was he really a vampire? she thought as she put the papers away on the nightstand and cautiously walked around him to go change behind the wooden divider.

Lucian, who stood to the side, noticed how she had suddenly seemed guarded at the mention of the creature she had spoken of this morning. He had noticed the fear on her face when he told her he didn’t know if he was that creature. He preferred the defiant Ave over the one who feared him. He didn’t want her to fear him.

"Are you scared of vampires?"

Ave, who was now behind the wooden divider, heard his question and paused in her actions of taking off the robe. She had never seen one in real life, only in movies—and even in movies, she didn’t know how she felt about them. However, one thing was certain: she would rather die than choose to be one of them. The thought of drinking blood made her shudder.

"I haven’t seen one before to know how I feel about vampires," she said and took off the robe before she put on a nightdress that was provided for her in the closet-like place. She had forgotten to take back that magical dress from the other room, and if she had, she would have really turned it into a cozy sweater, as the nightdress looked too fragile to keep her warm from the cold up here.

"Then how did you know about them when you’ve never seen one?" came Lucian’s question. How was she going to draw one for him when she had never seen one before?

"I watched them in movies," Ave chuckled softly.

"Movies? The thing you do in the future where you play with another man to create entertainment for people?" he questioned, as she’d told him about her career before that night. "Can you draw the movies for me as well?" He wanted to learn everything there was to know about her time, including her career as an actress.

Ave walked out from behind the wooden divider, laughing as she strode towards him and stood in front of him. "I can’t draw a movie—I can only draw the vampire I see in the movies." She turned her back to him and moved her hair to one shoulder, exposing her bare back to him. "Can you help me do the buttons? I can’t reach them."

Lucian looked down at the milky flesh of her exposed back where her nightdress buttons were undone. He hesitated for a second before raising his hands and slowly buttoning them up for her.

Ave felt a shiver down her spine as his cold fingers occasionally grazed her bare skin. She couldn’t help the heat that rushed to her face. She would never have asked him to do this for her if Lydia were here. To distract herself from his touch, she asked,

"So, did you get the girl after the fight?"

She felt his hands pause briefly before he asked in confusion, "What girl?"

"Duh, I heard you requested to marry the Princess of Nazia and got challenged by her brother to spar. Did he approve of your marriage to her?" she asked, despite the slight discomfort she felt in her chest at the thought of him marrying another woman while she was still in this era.

"I didn’t spar with him because I want to marry Princess Nani," came his bored, displeased voice from behind her.