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Dan Se stepped quietly into her bedchamber a few minutes later.  He was alarmed to find her lying in the exact same position in which he had left her.  He approached her silently.  When he reached her side, he gazed down at her to discover that she was sleeping.

His heart bent in tenderness towards the poor girl.  He knelt on the floor next to her.  He leaned towards her and reached out to move the gleaming curtain of her hair out of her face.  As he slid those silken strands behind her ear, he gasped.  For that evil man’s handprint was still emblazoned across her cheek.  He stared down at the angry marks inflaming her soft skin, and he bent over and laid his head next to hers as tears began to slide down his cheeks.

His poor Mi Sook.  He had believed her safe.  He castigated himself now.  If he had simply stayed here with her, this would never have happened.  That man wouldn’t have dared to invade his sanctum.  It was only because he’d left her defenseless that she had been vulnerable to further attack.  This was all his fault.

But it would never happen again. 

He bent towards her face and caught a whiff of her scent.  He was surprised.  For this time, it wasn’t lavender but…lilacs.  And that sweet perfume invaded his head, filling it with visions from the past.  One burning moment in his grandfather’s garden…long ago.  A captivating image of such beauty that Dan Se had been frozen for a few blissful seconds.  Unable to shift his eyes away from the lovely picture that had instantly emblazoned itself upon his heart.  It had never let him go.

And now its enticing fragrance was haunting him again.  Clinging to her skin.  Making him yearn to touch it.  So he determined to do just that.

He leaned forward and brushed his lips across her forehead before once more heading out of the house.  This time he was going to visit Hwa Gong and the hwarang house.  He would be returning to her in a little while.  With his belongings.  From now on, he was going to occupy this room with her.  He would never leave her vulnerable to attack again. 

––

The king had granted him a leave of absence.  Hwa Gong had immediately gone to visit their royal ruler.  To inform him of the situation with Dan Se’s wife.  Concerned for both his hwarang and the man’s wife, Jin Heung had requested a meeting with Dan Se.  The two had spoken briefly, and Jin Heung had insisted that Dan Se spend the next month attending to his wife’s needs.  The gentle Jin Heung had been furious with Lord Man.  But he’d been slightly mollified when Dan Se had finally admitted to him how he had already dealt with that abusive man.

Less than two hours after he’d left her, Dan Se returned to Mi Sook’s side.  He found her sleeping still.  He opened a drawer in her room and found it still empty.  He nestled his few belongings inside it and set his sword on top of that chest before turning towards her.  He removed his outer robe and draped it over a chair.  Then he approached the bed.  Slowly.

He was going to have to make her his wife in earnest.  To protect her from shame.  He had no idea how her father had discovered that Dan Se had yet to share her bed.  But she had suffered today because of it.

He had just been trying to set her free.  Instead, she had found herself still confined within the same old cage.  Still being abused by that awful father of hers.

Dan Se found himself frozen as he stared down at her.  He wanted to bawl over her and draw her into his arms.  And never let her go again.  He longed to protect her from all the pain that had invaded Han Sung’s gentle soul and damaged it at the end of his life.  All the agony that Dan Se had seen burning in her eyes.

She had admitted that she had no love for any boys but Han Sung…because they were all brutal.  Of course, with a father like hers – and having witnessed the cruelty of a grandfather like his – what else could she believe?

She must be convinced that all men were vicious.

It was left to Dan Se to prove the truth to her.

But…how to go about it?

She was still lying across the bed at an angle.  Slowly, he lowered himself down next to her, his head filling up one corner of their bed, his feet stretched out toward its opposite corner.  He wanted to wrap his arm around her and draw her near to him.  But he didn’t dare.  He would not hurt her for the world.

And right now, giving in to his impulses would injure her further for he could not avoid brushing up against that bruised flesh.  So he sighed in dissatisfaction and lay still next to her.  Lending her his warmth alone since he couldn’t touch her. 

A moment after he had settled himself on the bed, she rolled towards him and groaned.  She moved her head, and he could see her face now.  The other cheek was on display.  He heaved a sigh of relief when he instantly recognized that this side of her face had not been damaged.  At least, not this time.

She moaned again.  And her eyes slowly opened.  And then they widened in shock as she drank in his countenance so close to hers.  She nearly recoiled.  But the agony burning through her body held her in check.

“Dan Se!” she gasped.  “What are you doing…on my bed?”

“This, my dear, is going to be our bed from now on.”

Those magnificent, obsidian eyes of hers grew even wider as she stared at him.  Aghast.

What did he mean?