Chapter 182

Julien clenched his teeth and dropped his head. With everything he had, he turned away from the scene unfolding across from him.

Now it was really over.

Mikhail's breathing was shifting into an inhale. He was about to swallow the drink in the glass.

【Julien.】

Julien shook his head to drive the voice ringing at his ear away.

In another moment, the pink liquid would slide down Mikhail's throat. The drug's effect would spread through his veins.

And then. Once that happened.

He would no longer be lone—

[Yeah. Let's meet again soon.]

Out of nowhere.

The thought breaking through cut everything else off short.

Stop.

What came next wasn't what had been coming before. A heavy silence settled like steady drizzle and bore down on both their shoulders.

"……"

It was the instant before the drink would have flowed into Mikhail's mouth.

Julien stretched his hand out and caught Mikhail's arm. Then, with the grip clenched around his fingertips, he crushed down hard.

"Ngh…."

A groan slipped from Julien as he swallowed an unsteady breath.

In the same instant he watched the dream that had been wavering before his eyes turn to tears, falling away drop by drop.

Dreams of family — the ones he now had to let go of.

The neatly rounded ideals struck the ground and broke apart into dark, ashen pieces.

Patter. Tap.

The dream broke, and broke again. But Julien made no move to gather the fragments scattered at his feet.

The memories he'd been forcing himself to look away from — the ones he'd kept at arm's length — overflowed and flooded his head.

Now he could see it. Only at the very end, in the last of the last, could he face it fully.

[I don't think any of the bad blood between our parents' generation needs to carry down to us. Not for a second.]

When he was worn down by long isolation without even noticing, every hidden hurt held under his tongue, rotting through….

[Julien. What am I going to do about you?]

[—I plan to help you.]

That single, unhesitating hand had reached out.

It had pulled his arm up out of a loneliness like deep mire.

[Because you're my friend.]

[See you again soon. Julien.]

The one with whom he'd shared secrets, trusted at his back, leaned on and helped in turn — somewhere along the way, that person had become someone he couldn't trade for any longing, no matter how long he'd carried it.

He could never… could never let go of the friend in front of him.

"Hh… ugh."

Julien barely managed to choke down the cry rising in his throat and lifted the head he'd dropped, unsteady and slow.

Then, wearing what had to be a wreck of an expression, he stammered out toward Mikhail.

"Don't drink it. Mikhail. Please. Don't drink it…."

---

Mikhail held the glass of pink cocktail at his lips and watched Julien.

In the instant before the liquid would have crossed into his mouth—

Without seeming to know what he was doing, Julien thrust his arm out and seized the wrist holding the glass.

Then he stopped the motion that had been about to follow.

"Don't drink it. Mikhail. Please. Don't drink it…."

Mikhail looked at Julien shaking his head, his face a mess of ruin.

The pink hair that was always so neatly kept had tangled like brush.

The tears coating his cheeks fell in heavy drops, like petals caught in a sudden shower.

"You can't. Mikhail…."

But Mikhail wasn't troubled by any of it.

His wrist still caught in Julien's grip, he just looked back at him with a steady expression.

"……"

Then, in a single moment.

A faint smile rose to Mikhail's face.

Thank you.

The trust they'd built up together hadn't broken.

At the last fork in the road, Julien had reached for his hand after all.

That one fact, more than anything else, made him glad.

So now….

It was his turn to answer the trust he'd been given.

I'll save you, Julien.

Mikhail drew a small breath. Then he held the cocktail out and spoke to Julien.

"This is from your brother, isn't it."

Julien's eyes went wide and he froze where he was.

"……"

Watching him, Mikhail smiled again. Then he slid his wrist out of Julien's grip and tipped the liquid in the glass down his throat.

The cloudy pink drained away.

Through the clear glass, Julien's reflection came into view.

"…What?"

Julien stared at the scene in front of him, blinking with a face that couldn't quite take in what was real. But soon a near-scream broke from him and he thrust both arms out.

"Mikhail!"

Crash!

The empty glass dropped and shattered into countless pieces. The birds resting in the trees beat their wings and lifted away.

Julien curled himself around Mikhail and held on.

In that posture, putting strength into arms that wouldn't stop trembling, he stumbled into words.

"Are… are you all right? You're all right, right? Ahh… you'll be all right. Nothing's going to be wrong. It's only once so far. They said once is fine. Right? So…."

Mikhail tightened his brow a little and pushed back against the nausea rising in him.

At the same time he turned over the pink cocktail he'd just swallowed.

In truth, the drug wasn't as lethal as Julien clearly believed.

Because.

Cassien Leventia didn't trust Julien Leventia.

In truth, Cassien wasn't the kind of man to hand a high-risk task to someone he wasn't sure of.

If Julien spilled what he'd been told to do, the fallout when it failed and the disgrace that would follow….

The chance that a clumsy attempt would turn the blade back on himself — Cassien would have weighed every one of those before making a move.

Whereas Julien, treating Cassien as family, would have taken the contents at face value with hardly a doubt.

Mikhail let out a small breath. Still held in Julien's arms, he lowered and lifted his eyelids.

Then, in a voice without rise or fall, he opened his mouth to ask.

"How many times did your brother tell you to give me the drug?"

Julien's upper body twitched and a small choked sound came out of him. The unexpected question seemed to have thrown him.

Mikhail glanced sideways at the pink hair quivering with unease, then smiled softly and shook his head.

"It's all right. Sorry. That was a hard one to answer, wasn't it. It involves your family…. You don't have to answer."

Julien said nothing. But the arms wrapped around Mikhail pulled him in tighter.

"……"

Mikhail stayed still and waited for him to settle.

When the breathing rising and falling at his ear had quieted enough, he pushed against the body leaning into him and eased Julien back.

"Julien."

Julien kept his head bowed and said nothing.

Caught in a heavy guilt, he couldn't bring himself to meet Mikhail's eyes.

Mikhail looked at the pink head tipping one way and then the other, then steadied his tone and spoke.

"Two more times."

"What?"

The question slipped out of Julien. Then he slowly lifted a face streaked with tears.

Plain across it was the look of someone entirely at a loss at the abruptness of what he'd heard.

"……"

Mikhail held Julien's eyes a moment, then curled the corners of his mouth and dropped his gaze to the ground.

Shards of glass lay scattered across it.

Mikhail looked at the edges glinting under the sun, then narrowed his eyes and said,

"Going forward, I'm going to drink whatever you bring me, two more times."

"What… are you saying right now…."

"It's not complicated. All you have to do is tell your brother the truth of what happened. As long as you do that, for the moment there won't be any—"

"—No. That can't be!"

Julien didn't let him finish. He burst out with the words and tilted his whole body forward.

Mikhail turned his eyes toward him. The purple eyes across from him pleaded with him to stop, lit with a fierce light.

"Don't. Mikhail. Not that. Absolutely not that! If you do that, you… you'll break. That can't…!"

"Julien."

Mikhail cut him off mid-sentence. Then he moved both his hands slowly and took hold of Julien's forearms.

He knew Julien was being eaten alive inside.

Even so, this had to be done. Because.

"This time, do it my way."

Before long.

"Really, nothing's going to happen."

Every last bit of suffering had to be cut off at the root.

"But… still…."

Faced with the flat assertion, Julien seemed to lose the will to push back. He stammered out a few more words, then slowly lowered his head and closed his mouth.

What followed was silence.

Julien didn't look like he meant to argue any further.

But the confusion he couldn't quite shake clung thick as early-morning mist over water. The worry stood out plainly across his sunken face.

"……"

Mikhail watched him, then turned his eyes toward the far sky.

He wanted badly to lay the whole situation out for Julien and let him understand everything that lay ahead.

But in reality… he couldn't talk through every single piece of what was going on and convince him that way.

And what he'd have to bring up included things Julien wasn't going to be able to accept right now.

So what he could do at the moment….

Was to give Julien a stretch of time to take in what was right in front of him.

Whooo—.

The blue sky stretched on without an end.

The wind crossing it brushed past the space, stirring both their hair as it went — three or four times in turn.

In time, Julien's expression eased a little.

Mikhail's eyes flicked over to confirm it. He relaxed his own face the same way and changed the subject.

"Now that I think about it — that cocktail you made? For a first try, it was actually pretty good."

"……"

"Not quite a perfect hundred, but enough to make me want to try a few more."

After a short quiet had passed, the sound of breath letting out came from Julien's side.

"I'm glad. That you liked it."

Julien took a moment. Then, looking down at the tips of his feet, he lowered his tone and asked.

"Mikhail. Really. Do you really have to drink that?"

"……"

"Don't do it. There's nothing good in it for you. I believe you when you say nothing will happen… but even so…. There's no reason for your body to take even a little strain…."

Mikhail reached his palm out. With it he covered the back of Julien's hand resting quietly on the bench.

Tap.

The trail of softly trembling speech cut off.

Julien held his lips half-parted where they were, and only turned his head to the side.

"……"

Julien's eyes were red and puffed from crying, but the resolve in the look he was sending across was firm.

A face hoping, more than anything, that Mikhail wouldn't put the drug in his mouth.

Mikhail held his eyes for a moment. Then, with the look of a mischievous boy, he said,

"You were going to turn your back on me."

"…What?"

Julien's eyes went round. His slightly parted lips were still hunting for what to say when Mikhail pressed in once more.

"So think of this as a punishment from me. Do as you're told."

Julien stared at Mikhail in a daze.

"……"

After a few breaths had passed like that.

Julien pulled the corners of his mouth down and let his head drop at an angle.

In the end, with an awkward smile fitted in place, he answered.

"Yeah. Got it. I'll do what you say."

"……"

"And… I'm really sorry. Mikhail."

Mikhail looked at Julien's profile without saying anything.

But soon he drew his gaze away and smiled with a face that had cleared of worry.

At the end of a grinding test… he had ended up confirming, in the end, a trust even greater than before.

So now he could walk toward the best of it. Even if, by some chance, the path ahead went wrong, he had the confidence to push through it all and turn the current.

"All right."

Mikhail soon stood up from where he'd been sitting, stretched, and opened his mouth in a noticeably brighter tone.

"On that note — for the second cocktail, I think we should try adding some lemon and apple wine—"