19.
The duke explained with a sigh in his voice.
“You are free to think whatever you like, but to clarify one thing, no one but me has ever ridden in this carriage until now.”
“Ah, yes.”
I pressed my lips together, holding back the smile that was creeping up on me,
and the duke’s gaze briefly touched the corner of my mouth before disappearing.
I quickly thought of the next topic of conversation.
“And the reason I didn’t take your hand earlier was…”
“……”
“Because I was looking at your gloves.”
“My gloves?”
“You were wearing white gloves.”
“Do they not suit me?”
“Mm. Rather than that…”
I tilted my head slightly.
Even I found it difficult to explain this feeling I had.
“It was like cutting into a tart and finding sardines inside?”
For once, he let out something like a groan from deep in his throat before opening his mouth.
“So you mean they do not suit me.”
“That wasn’t what I meant.”
“But there is no particular need to put sardines inside a tart, is there?”
Having been hit where it hurt, I confessed the truth.
“Well, um, no.”
“……”
Unlike himself, he seemed a little disheartened.
“Then what color would… suit me?”
“Black.”
After saying it, I was belatedly a little surprised. I hadn’t expected the answer to come out at once, without even a moment’s hesitation.
He stared down at his navy-blue uniform, which looked almost black indoors, and then fell silent with eyes that seemed, at a glance, rather conflicted.
Like a boy who had failed the subject he had studied hard for, only to suddenly get a perfect score in a subject he hadn’t cared about.
“In any case, the reason I came to find Your Grace is that I have something to say.”
“Regarding the letter of appointment?”
“Yes.”
Having returned at once to his usual attitude, he looked at me as if telling me to speak.
I bowed my head with utmost courtesy.
“I apologize, but I must refuse.”
“……You must know very well what it means to defy a letter of appointment bearing His Majesty the Emperor’s seal, Baron.”
“It is because I have judged that this is not a position for which I was selected through an objective and standard process.”
“And the basis for that judgment?”
The duke asked in an unconcerned voice.
“Because I drank the potion?”
“Yes.”
“No matter what excuse I give, you would find it difficult to believe me, wouldn’t you?”
“……That is also correct.”
“But, Baron.”
“Therefore, Your Grace, I would like my post changed. Please persuade His Majesty.”
One of the duke’s eyebrows rose.
Then he crossed his arms and was silent for a moment.
At the very least, it didn’t feel as though he was going to outright deny what I had said.
“So what you mean, Baron, is…”
“……”
“You do not want to be directly under my command.”
That was exactly it.
Since I didn’t have the courage to anger the Emperor, having only my post changed to a suitable position was the best option for now.
“If you are looking for a use for me because you have a favorable opinion of my abilities, there is no need for me to enter Your Grace’s command, is there?”
“Baron. You do not know it yet, but we could become colleagues who work extremely well together.”
“I do not understand what you mean by that.”
“I mean it literally. To achieve one’s aims, nothing is as important as like-minded colleagues.”
“Does Your Grace not already have many like-minded colleagues?”
“Then what about you?”
“……”
Of course I didn’t.
There was no way I would have anything like that.
“I… believe an untrustworthy colleague is worse than none at all.”
Even after hearing me say to his face that I could not trust him, the duke did not look offended.
“Have you never considered it? Until I take the antidote, I am the one person who will not betray you no matter what happens.”
“……”
“Why do you not use me?”
“Then how would I be any different from the person who made Your Grace drink the potion?”
It was when I had said that much.
I realized that I had been missing an important point all this time.
“Why don’t you ask, Your Grace?”
“Ask what?”
“……Who made you drink the potion.”
“Are you asking why I do not suspect you?”
“……”
“If I suspected you, I would have no reason to reveal that suspicion to the other party. And if I did not suspect you, then that is precisely something I would have no need to ask.”
He was assessing the situation he was in with astonishing rationality.
It was strange to see that he did not seem even slightly buried in emotion, and yet, on the other hand, it also put me at ease.
I truly did not want to hurt anyone.
At least in that respect, the duke was a man I could feel at ease with.
Whatever ulterior motives I had, whatever claims I made, he seemed as though he would never lose his center.
“To be honest, are you not the one taking the loss?”
“The loss?”
It was a new perspective offered to me, who had been feeling indebted without quite realizing it.
“You have to suspect an appointment made with pure intentions, and you are kicking away an opportunity given to you with your own feet. If that is not a loss, what is?”
“……”
“Besides, being loved by me does not seem to be a very pleasant thing. After all, public opinion of me is not good.”
A blood-mad demon, was it? The duke added that and looked at me.
If he was going to put it that way, I had something to say as well.
“Your Grace cannot be particularly pleased to have fallen in love with me of all people, either. Public opinion of me is notoriously bad as well.”
The duke gave a short laugh.
Before I could slowly savor the strange sense of kinship, he moved on to another topic.
“Also, if others were to learn of this, they might use you as a hostage.”
“Pardon?”
“Known and unknown, I have quite a few political enemies. There are a fair number of factions trying to keep me in check as well.”
When I frowned, he spoke in a voice faintly tinged with amusement.
“If such a day comes, I will be counting on you, Baron.”
“You sound as though you are hoping I will kindly die quickly instead of adding to your unpleasant worries.”
“It is regrettable if it sounded that way, Baron.”
“You still won’t deny it to the end?”
“Shall I hook fingers with you and swear?”
“No, thank you.”
It was the moment the atmosphere had softened.
As if someone had cut in front of us, the carriage suddenly lurched, then came to an abrupt, steep stop.
Caught off guard, I could not stop myself from being flung forward and falling over.
Instinctively, I stretched out my hand. My palm braced against the carriage wall.
At the same time, beneath my body as it pitched forward, I felt firm legs.
“……”
“……”
The duke was right before my eyes.
I had arbitrarily closed the distance even he had never closed.
Black eyes, trapped between my arms, stared fixedly at me.
His lightly tanned skin was clear, without a single blemish.
The high bridge of his nose and the deep-set eyes beneath his thick brows were densely shadowed.
Overall, it was a face with sharply defined contours.
Without a word, I awkwardly climbed down from the duke’s lap.
Then I returned to my original seat and plopped down.
The duke’s posture was as neat as it had been before.
Only the part of his collar my hand had brushed against was slightly askew.
……Indeed, he looked exactly like someone who had not so much as blinked, had not lifted a finger against me, and had simply let me fall on him.
I cleared my throat and muttered.
“……I’m sorry.”
The duke glanced out the window for a moment before answering.
“You must have been startled. Are you all right? It seems someone cut in front of us.”
Considering there was someone brazen enough to cut in despite the ducal crest being stamped plainly on the carriage, maybe the size of the carriage really was the problem after all.
“We’ll arrive soon, so I hope you won’t worry too much.”
The duke looked completely unbothered.
I simply nodded.
To think I’d lost my balance for a moment and ended up sprawled across someone else’s lap.
My whole body burned with shame.
Aside from his glossy black eyes and neat lashes, I couldn’t recall a single thing, as if my memory had evaporated wholesale.
As I silently swallowed, the duke suddenly spoke.
“But doesn’t this thought occur to you, Baron?”
“Pardon?”
“Now that things have turned out this way, blindly avoiding it and trying to smooth it over may not be the best solution.”
“Unfortunately, that thought hasn’t occurred to me yet.”
“Why waste your strength? Sooner or later, we’ll meet again.”
“Why is that?”
I had no intention of cutting ties with him completely either, since I needed to flush out the pervert, but I asked because I was still curious.
He looked at me.
There was no sign that he was choosing his answer.
His eyes were simply shaping into words a truth that had existed for a long time.
“……Because I want that.”
In the duke’s voice as he said that, there was the faint scent of dawn.
* * *
“Is something the matter, Baron?”
I stared hard at the duke with eyes that had plenty to say.
Having come all the way to the duke’s destination in a daze, I realized it belatedly.
Today was the opening day of the Hunting Festival, hosted annually by the imperial family in honor of the founding day.
Only then did I understand why the roads had been blocked.
When I stepped down from the carriage, the northern forest, the imperial hunting grounds, stretched out vast and wide as far as the eye could see.
I was the only person standing there all alone in a dress.
And he was asking if something was the matter?
Of course there was.
How could there not be?
If he was on his way to the Hunting Festival, he should have let me off somewhere along the way!
The duke silently endured my accusatory gaze, then reached out toward the aide who had just entered the tent.
What the aide had brought was a hunting outfit.
Glancing at the hunting clothes that were handed right over to me, I asked.
“What’s this?”
“Ready-made clothes. I thought they would fit well enough, so I told him to bring them.”
“…….”
“If you’re going to participate in the Hunting Festival, that outfit will be inconvenient.”
“How did I end up attending the Hunting Festival?”
“Then, after coming all this way, is there something else you plan to do?”
“I should go back now!”
When the duke turned his head slightly, the aide quickly took the hint and withdrew from the tent.
In the meantime, it occurred to me that I still hadn’t persuaded him, swept along as I had been by the atmosphere.
Given my current situation, it would be right for me to stay here even against my will and persuade him, but,
even so, the reason this sudden attendance was so flustering was…….
“Why don’t you give people one last chance?”
“…….”
I flinched.
Because he had struck at a vital point within me that even I hadn’t known about.
“There was a way for you to turn away from all this and leave, yet you didn’t.”
“…….”
“If there are still people in the life you want.”
Yes, there once had been.
Even until fairly recently.
Because after suffering from illness for so long, I had missed people all the while.
The first lover I had ever had, the first friend I had ever made.
I had been glad and happy.
But those people abandoned me far too easily.
As time passed, I gradually realized.
That the time I had known them amounted to barely two years.
And that compared to the solid world of nobles built up through connections since early childhood, I had always been an outsider.
In their eyes, I had been Rohwinas’s lover, never once Anastasia Roxan.
So naturally, when I lost Rohwinas, I lost them as well.
“Do not let them forget who you are.”
The duke once again held the hunting outfit out before me.