The Villainess Wants To Retire-Chapter 175: Contract

I drew in a breath, let it out slowly, and forced myself to speak before I lost the courage.

"This is beautiful," I said quietly, still watching the stream rather than looking at him. "Thank you for showing me."

"You’re welcome."

His voice was warm, pleased, utterly unaware of what was coming.

I steeled myself.

"But I think we need to discuss something," I continued, keeping my tone carefully neutral, practical, the voice I’d used in council meetings when delivering difficult decisions. "Something we should have addressed more thoroughly before now."

I felt him shift slightly beside me, his attention focusing with that same intensity he brought to everything he cared about.

"We have a contract," I said, still not looking at him, still watching light play across water as though it were the most fascinating thing I’d ever seen. "An arrangement. I came to Nevareth to help you remove Vetra’s influence, to assist in securing your authority as Emperor without her shadow hanging over everything you do."

A pause. Brief but weighted.

"That’s what this is," I pressed on, forcing the words out despite how wrong they felt in my mouth. "A political alliance. A strategic partnership. Nothing more."

The silence that followed felt heavier than it should have.

"You shouldn’t feel the need to spend time with me beyond what’s necessary for appearances," I continued, my voice taking on that brisk, businesslike quality I’d perfected over years of governance. "You don’t need to bring me to places like this, or carry me through the palace, or—" I gestured vaguely, encompassing everything that had happened since we left the feast, "—any of it. We maintain the fiction publicly, but privately, there’s no requirement for... attachment."

Still he said nothing, and his silence made my chest tighten with something I refused to name.

"And," I pushed forward, needing to finish this before I lost my nerve entirely, "I want to reiterate what I said before in the cave. If you find another woman you prefer, someone you actually want rather than someone you chose for strategic reasons, I’ll step aside. Gracefully. Quietly. You just need to give me advance notice so I can make appropriate arrangements. That’s all."

I was trying so hard to sound practical, reasonable, like this was simply a matter of clarifying terms in a business agreement.

But underneath that careful control, vulnerability bled through in the spaces between words, in the way my voice went slightly softer on certain phrases, in how I still couldn’t bring myself to look at him while saying any of this.

Because if I looked at him, I might see something that would make me take it all back.

Soren remained perfectly still beside me. His silence stretched on long enough that discomfort began crawling up my spine, making my shoulders tense, my breathing shallow.

"Are you listening?" I asked finally, unable to bear it anymore.

Nothing.

"Soren?"

His head was hung low, tilted forward so I couldn’t see his face, his pale hair falling forward to obscure his expression. His hands rested loosely on his knees, but I could see tension in the line of his shoulders, in the way his fingers had curled slightly against the fabric of his trousers.

And then he laughed.

Not the warm, genuine laughter I’d grown accustomed to. Not the amused chuckle that usually accompanied his teasing.

This was bitter. Sharp. The sound of something cracking under pressure.

"Do you really hate me that much Your Majesty?" he asked, his voice pitched low, still not looking up. "Is this what you think?"

I blinked, thrown by the question. "What?"

"Do you want to see me die?" He lifted his head slightly, just enough that I caught a glimpse of his profile in the glowing light. "Do you want to watch me suffer? Is that why you keep doing this?"

"I don’t understand—"

"Would it be easier for you," he continued, his tone taking on an edge I’d never heard before, sharp enough to draw blood, "if I just disappeared after Vetra’s gone? Pretended we never met? Would that make all of this more convenient for you?"

I opened my mouth to respond, to explain that wasn’t what I meant at all, but before I could form words, he raised his head fully.

And I forgot how to breathe.

His eyes were glowing.

Not figuratively. Not the metaphorical description poets used when they wanted to sound romantic. His eyes were glowing with ice magic responding to emotion, that pale blue brightening until it looked like winter lightning had been trapped behind his irises.

His expression held no trace of his usual playfulness, none of the warm amusement or gentle teasing I’d come to expect. This was something else entirely. Something darker. Heavier.

Dangerous.

When he spoke, his voice had lost every ounce of its characteristic lightness, becoming instead something that made my skin prickle with awareness and the faint edge of fear.

"I brought you here because I thought you’d like it," he said quietly, each word falling into the space between us with terrible precision. "I wanted to give you something beautiful after an evening of ugliness. I wanted to show you something that mattered to me. I never thought it would turn into... This."

The anger in his voice was controlled, banked like embers under ash, but I could feel its heat despite the ice magic radiating from him.

"I just thought it was a good time to discuss it!" I said, immediately defensive, my own voice rising slightly. "We never actually talked about the specifics since that night I agreed to come here. I was simply trying to clarify—"

"I know," he cut me off, his tone still carrying that dangerous calm.

A pause. Heavy. Charged.

"But—" He stopped, didn’t finish the thought, leaving it hanging incomplete between us.

Then, even more quietly, more coldly: "Fine. I’ve heard you."

His eyes, still glowing with that unnatural light, fixed on me with an intensity that made me want to either run or fight, though I couldn’t decide which impulse was stronger.

"If I find a woman to my liking," he said, and his voice had dropped several degrees colder, becoming something that felt like ice water poured directly down my spine, "I won’t hesitate to tell you. I’ll kick you off the throne. Replace you with someone who actually wants to be there. Since that’s apparently what you want."