Two simple words, like a key unlocking the final shackle.
Karl hesitated no longer. Lowering his head, he kissed Charlotte on the lips.
Charlotte let out a muffled whimper. She raised her arms around Karl's neck, her fingers slipping into his thick black hair as she returned his kiss—awkwardly, yet passionately.
All the longing, waiting, unease, even the hidden worries over the future, seemed to be crushed and melted away in that single kiss.
Neither knew who lost their balance first, or who had taken the lead, but locked in each other's arms, they slowly fell backward onto the broad, soft bed behind them. The mattress sank faintly beneath their overlapping weight.
At the instant they fell, an arm—Karl's or Charlotte's, no one knew—swept out by accident and precisely switched off the bedside lamp, the room's only remaining light.
"Click."
A soft sound.
Darkness instantly swallowed the whole room. Only the dying embers in the fireplace still stubbornly gave off a faint, dark-red glow, blurrily casting their silhouettes onto the walls and ceiling. They swayed gently with the flickering fire, like a silent, intimate shadow play.
With sight stripped away, every other sense became keen in an instant.
In the darkness, the soft rustle of fabric rubbing together was especially clear, carrying a rhythm that tugged at the heart.
Karl was moving. At this moment, the entire castle seemed to have fallen asleep. No footsteps echoed in the corridors, no wind stirred beyond the windows, and even the logs in the fireplace had burned to ash, leaving only that thin layer of embers glowing dark red. The world was so quiet that it seemed to contain only this bedroom, this bed, and these two people.
Though his emotions burned fiercely, Karl's movements were unexpectedly slow, even somewhat clumsy.
It had