“It’s too late.”
The wife quietly answered her husband who wanted to know everything.
“It’s too late for such words. If you wanted to hear what I had to say, you should have listened when I was desperately trying to speak.”
You should have listened when I was screaming until my throat bled from the injustice.
“Must I answer just because Your Highness asks me to?”
You never answered my words. Her blue eyes, carrying unspoken words, stared directly into the dragon’s eyes. The lady who dared to look straight into the dragon’s eyes – which even the most accomplished individuals couldn’t face – resembled a fragile light. She appeared as a weak and harmless being that might dissolve into the air if one watched quietly. She would disappear even faster if grabbed.
“No.”
That’s not right.
“I’m glad Your Highness has so many questions. I did too. I nearly went mad wondering why you treated me so badly, why you ignored me, why you didn’t treat me like a person, what I had done wrong.”
It might have been better to go mad. Kaela recalled those painful times without crying. She had even forgotten how to cry.
“No one would answer me. So I learned just one thing.”
His bloodshot purple eyes remained fixed on her. Though every word she spoke was like a knife stabbing and piercing through him, he didn’t even blink, as if determined not to miss a single word.
“To live as a human being, one must ignore and mock others like this.”
And she, who was ignored and mocked by them, wasn’t human. She was less than human.
“Since I’m forced to live anyway, I should at least try to live like a proper person.”
She quietly thrust the knife into him with an emotionless voice.
“Don’t worry. Though I was too incompetent to figure anything out until the end, Your Highness is capable. You’ll figure it out on your own.”
If necessary, he might even crack open this useless head of hers. It didn’t matter.
“I hope Your Highness becomes as desperately curious as I was.”
To live each day withering away, assigning meaning to every little thing, analyzing every glance and gesture, wondering if this means that or that means this.
Kaela fell silent before the man who was dying of curiosity, just as she had been. Silence was the only weapon she had found. Somehow, she felt like she might cry.
****
Kaela walked as quietly as possible through the Craine Imperial Palace, where her father had once died. Due to recent events, she wanted to avoid drawing people’s attention if possible.
However, the palace was always full of people, and her husband was always there to escort her and pick her up. Moreover, the Marchioness of Schroz, whom she needed to meet now, tended to keep many attendants.
People crowded the pathway leading to where the Marchioness of Schroz was.
“It’s the Princess of Ostein. Are you well?”
“The Grand Duke of Lusenford is here too?”
The gazes that flickered toward them were piercing, as they were here to sort out the engagement ceremony that the Marchioness of Schroz and her inner circle had arranged excessively, summoned by the Emperor. This was her first visit to the palace in four days, as promised to the Emperor.
“Go ahead.”
Kaela turned to Peon and spoke softly.
“I can go alone from here. You’re busy.”
“I’ll take you just to that entrance.”
Peon, who had declared he would keep his mouth shut for four days and actually did so, didn’t ask his wife anything more or force her to answer. He just followed her with his ever-intense gaze, as he always had, merely checking if she was breathing properly.
“How long do you think it will take?”
When he offered to pick her up, Kaela shook her head. No matter what, she’d finish earlier than Peon who was handling political affairs.
“I think I’ll return first.”
“Well, considering the Marchioness of Schroz has apparently turned even the Foreign Affairs Department upside down, you might finish later than me.”
What a strange person, Kaela thought, watching Peon smile and respond kindly. He really is strange.
Why be so kind to a wife who cursed him to live miserably and mockingly? He seemed angry, but she couldn’t tell if he was hiding it or if his anger had subsided. Then again, there was always much Kaela didn’t know.
“Don’t work too hard. The credit will go to the Marchioness of Schroz anyway, no matter how much effort you put in.”
“If it fails, I’ll be the one getting criticized.”
“Who would dare?”
His smile as he looked down was cold. Right. Her husband wasn’t in his right mind and wasn’t human. While he seemed somewhat lenient with Kaela specifically, he wasn’t with others. Hadn’t she barely stopped him from doing something to the Emperor in the audience chamber four days ago?
“I won’t mind the criticism and will work moderately.”
“Good. That’s a good idea.”
The entrance was suddenly before them. The door was wide open, with representatives from all departments desperately awaiting Kaela. They were probably half in tears.
“I’ll come pick you up.”
“I told you I don’t know when I’ll finish.”
“I know.”
“Then why did you ask how long it would take?”
“Gentlemanly courtesy.”
He murmured while bending down to kiss her cheek.
“Work moderately and eat well. The food smells are strong.”
Perhaps today was for deciding the engagement ceremony menu, as the smell of grilling meat mixed with spices wafted through the air.
“Taste everything and eat plenty.”
After leaving another kiss, he gently pushed his wife through the entrance. Behind her, Cecile and Sir Renard followed quietly at an appropriate distance.
They were both attendant and guard, as well as observers placed by Peon. Their role was to prevent Kaela from harming herself in Peon’s absence and to ensure she ate properly.
Kaela turned back while walking inside. Peon was still standing there, watching her. He gave a small nod as if telling her to go ahead.
Suddenly, the image of the grown man standing quietly and nodding overlapped with that of a fifteen or sixteen-year-old boy whose features were just beginning to mature. When she was eight or nine, learning to ride for the first time, he had encouraged her frightened self to try riding the pony alone along the path, just like now.
It’s okay now, try going there by yourself. I’ll be watching.
Back then too, when she looked back, Peon had nodded just like this.
‘That happened once, didn’t it?’
It was a forgotten memory. No, it was a memory she had discarded after learning it meant nothing to Peon.
He had watched over her horse riding too. She had started riding late because she was so afraid of horses. There was such a time once. He remained unchanged.
Kaela stopped walking. Unchanged? He forgot in between. When something pitch black started filling his eyes, he acted as if those times had never existed.
‘Haven’t you still come to your senses?’
Then, does that black shadow in his eyes even blur memories? He had said he was ‘forcibly suppressed.’ Could that be what he meant?
‘Stop being curious! You decided to keep quiet! What will you do once you know? Are you going to sympathize again? Are you going to betray me like that?’
Me, who was confined without any crime.
‘Don’t care about him and don’t forgive him! That’s enough! That’s what that person did!’
Peon, who had confined her, calling her a dangerous woman.
“Oh my, you’re finally here!”
The one who shattered her thoughts was the Marchioness of Schroz with her notably high-pitched voice. In her early forties, she was extravagantly decorated, buried in feathers, pearls, and gleaming silver silk.
Though beautiful, her face might have stood out more with a slightly toned-down appearance. Besides, such attire was completely impractical for work.
“Hello. It’s been a while.”
“Come in, come in. We’ve been waiting. I just can’t handle all this…”
Sir Renard suppressed a groan while looking at the enormous hall. Cecile’s eyes widened in surprise.
Papers were scattered across the floor, new shoes and fabrics were strewn in the left corner presumably for selecting outfits, various untouched etiquette books and records of past events were piled in the right corner, and between the right and left sides lay stacks of tiara designs.
Amid all this, a table near the entrance was laden with all sorts of delicacies. Everyone seemed to have been sampling the food. In short, the hall looked as if it had been hit by a bomb. The staff sat exhausted, at least getting to eat, while the Marchioness of Schroz surveyed the hall and said:
“I don’t know what to do. There’s so much to do, I wonder how we’ll manage it all.”
Though excited about her first major responsibility and role as the Crown Prince’s mother, she seemed to realize it was beyond her capabilities.
“It seems that way because it was decided so suddenly.”
No, that wasn’t it. All the staff present were saying with their expressions that wasn’t the case.
“Have you eaten? Come here, let’s choose the menu first. Try this. Everything’s so delicious, I can’t decide what to choose.”
As Kaela accepted the plate and new fork from the Marchioness of Schroz and began selecting the engagement ceremony dinner menu, she soon realized the Marchioness’s biggest problem.
“Which is better?”
“You’ll want to incorporate meaning into the menu too. Do you have a theme in mind for the engagement ceremony?”
“Well, I haven’t decided yet. I’m thinking of using roses as a theme, but I also want to use lily of the valley, though they say that wouldn’t match. But if we use lily of the valley, the ceremony would have to change…”
She had too many things she wanted to do.
“Since there’s the wedding later, you could change the theme then.”
“But I heard that since the wedding will definitely be grand, we need to do well with the engagement ceremony…”
Moreover, she was fatally susceptible to others’ opinions. Instead of sighing, Kaela looked at the staff who had been dragged along by the indecisive Marchioness of Schroz. Everyone’s eyes seemed to say, “Welcome, welcome to hell.”
“Since Gregory will be welcoming his future empress, I want to do it perfectly. The Grand Duchess was recently married, so you must know well?”
Above all, the Marchioness of Schroz had one dangerous aspect.
“It must be a grand, splendid engagement ceremony that will be remembered in history.”
She seemed intent on using this opportunity to resolve the grievances she’d suffered as the Emperor’s mistress. Kaela, long familiar with social circles, searched through her hazy memories from four years ago and beyond.
Marchioness of Schroz, Dorothea Angelique Finois, though of low birth, was a good singer, beautiful, and came from a wealthy family.
Her family’s wealth allowed her to work her way into court, and her beauty caught the eye of the Emperor, who was known for pursuing various women, and she even bore him a son. That much was possible in an era if one had money and beauty.
However, she couldn’t maintain her position as the Crown Prince’s birth mother while wielding power. Even so, the Marchioness of Schroz merely received the presentable title of Marchioness of Schroz to save face.
Even that wasn’t directly bestowed upon her – she had hastily married the dying Marquis of Schroz, and after his death, she had never been officially connected to the Emperor in marriage.
This was natural in a country where monogamy was law, but the fact that she was made a married woman and given the title of a noble without heirs clearly revealed the Marchioness’s position.
“I want to do everything I can for my son.”
The Marchioness of Schroz was lost in her own dreams. As the Crown Prince’s birth mother, and with the Empress conveniently in a coma, she thought she could step up as an acting Empress while organizing this engagement ceremony.
“I’m counting on you, Grand Duchess.”
The fact that a mere marchioness casually addressed her as ‘Grand Duchess’ already showed she was hopeless. The foundation of all social circles was maintaining strict etiquette in person, regardless of what was said behind closed doors.
“Yes. I’m counting on you too.”
However, Kaela chose to overlook the etiquette issue with the Marchioness, who was old enough to be her mother, as there was already too much work to be done.
****
Within just 30 minutes, the staff scattered throughout the hall developed a deep respect for the Grand Duchess of Lusenford.
With a smile, she seated the Marchioness of Schroz in the center of the hall, gave her snacks and her pet dog to hold, and had only two staff members stand before her at a time.
She had her choose just one from pairs of items the staff held: roses or lily of the valley, emeralds or sapphires, pink satin or blue satin, and so on.
“Hmm, blue. No, is pink better?”
When the Marchioness couldn’t decide, Kaela would give a formal smile and say the magical words:
“Then we can decide this later.”
The Marchioness made decisions without even realizing what she was deciding.
Overwhelmed by etiquette and formalities she couldn’t comprehend, the massive scale of the event, people’s scrutiny, and rumors, she found it much easier when she only had to choose between two options.
And if she couldn’t decide, it could be done later. How comfortable!
Though it was obvious the Marchioness of Schroz would get the credit if the engagement ceremony went well, Kaela didn’t mind at all. The priority was to create at least a presentable framework. She received the etiquette books and historical event records from the Marchioness and hid them away before she could look through them.
Just one day was finally over. The staff would now have to work again based on what had been decided.
“Your Highness.”
When she stepped outside, she was greeted not by Peon as promised, but by an attendant from the Soleil Palace.
“His Majesty the Emperor is currently in the Sacred Forest with His Highness the Grand Duke of Lusenford.”
Everyone except the Emperor called that place the Monster’s Garden.
“His Highness asked me to tell Your Highness that he apologizes for not being able to come pick you up.”
“Is that so.”
“And… this is a separate instruction from His Majesty, given after His Highness’s message.”
