Chapter 137

How to Tame My Beastly Husband — Chapter 137. Raphael’s Mother (1)

“What do you mean, consolation money? Are you implying His Majesty is responsible for your sister’s death?”

Annette spoke calmly, but her heart was racing. Ben’s sister was Raphael’s mother. Fortunately, Celestine was still upstairs.

Ben smiled, resigned. Since he could not hide the ugly past, all that was left was to confess his sins. Railin was standing nearby, eying him in a way that suggested he was ready to provide appropriate correction.

One word at a time, the story Annette had never heard in her previous life emerged. And of course, Ben was also telling the story of Raphael’s past.

* * *

Raphael’s mother was named Bella.

Bella March was not from the capital of Deltium, but rather from its outskirts. She was born to a place where she should never have met the King, even if she lived in the capital her life.

Raised in the slums, she took to begging with her brother at an early age. Fortunately, with her brother at her side, she never suffered any serious harm, and when she reached adulthood, got a job at a low-class restaurant. It was too hard to survive on the pittance she scraped from begging.

Every day, she worked until her hands ached between the kitchen and the dining hall. Even working sixteen hours a day, it was still hard to earn enough for two meals. That was what life was like in such a poor neighborhood, but sometimes she ate so little, she even stopped menstruating.

Bella was very worried.

Should I just sell myself, instead?

So she changed jobs again, purely so that she could eat regular meals. A successful prostitute could have three meals a day, and even dessert.

It was a simple ambition. And so it was by merest chance that Bella, who had planned to sell her body to local laborers, met the King of Deltium.

Selgratis was born in a place that had been the capital of a kingdom called Letan some two hundred years before. After a long war, Letan was annexed into Deltium. But there were many who could not forget their Letan roots, a Letan resistance that flared sometimes into armed rebellions that Deltium had to suppress.

King Selgratis had just been crowned.

“Damn Letans, they don’t know how to surrender!”

At the time, King Selgratis was a young man, and bloodthirsty with it. He personally headed to the outskirts of the capital to crush the rebellion. Like his son, Selgratis was an excellent swordsman, but the responsibilities of the crown made it impossible to devote quite so much time to the blade.

He came close to defeating the Letan forces, who were not even properly trained, but the terrain was too unfavorable. The resistance forces knew the mountainous area well and carried out short guerilla attacks against the crown forces, then retreated. The King’s campaign turned into a much more protracted conflict than expected.

Fighting so close to death would turn even the most refined man into a beast. The violence of battle sometimes fed sexual impulses, and set the blood of a young man boiling. Selgratis, who could have anything he wanted, wanted a woman.

But he was not in the capital of his kingdom, and there were no high-class courtesans of the sort he could summon with ease. His options near a battlefield were limited.

“It can’t be helped. I’ll have to make do with a prostitute,” he told his subordinates. “Bring me a woman who is neat and free of disease.”

Of course, the woman his men brought to him was none other than Bella March.