61.
“You get in first.”
The duke opened the carriage door and jerked his chin at me.
“Isi… Your Grace should get in first. You’re drunk.”
As I tried to stop him, I quickly reached out to get my shoes back from the duke.
But my hand merely flailed helplessly through empty air before returning with nothing.
Because he had lowered the hand he’d been holding behind his back to his side.
‘…Did he do that on purpose? Or without realizing?’
I wasn’t sure.
He was drunk, and I was… well, maybe not entirely sober either.
“You’re drunk too.”
I bristled.
“I’m saying Your Grace is drunker than I am.”
“I’m not drunk. You’re drunk.”
“That’s what I’m saying. I’m not drunk, and Your Grace is….”
When it seemed our utterly pointless argument was about to drag on, the aide and Daena each took charge of one of us and began shoving us into the carriage.
I was pushed inside without even managing to put up a fight, but
the aide had to retreat meekly at a single silent look from Isitan.
Daena stood half blocking the carriage door as if guarding it.
I stretched my head out over Daena’s shoulder and protested.
“I’m really not drunk, you know?”
“I’m not drunk either.”
The duke answered me every single time.
Daena pressed me firmly farther into the carriage and climbed in after me.
The aide slammed the carriage door shut with a bang.
I didn’t give up and stuck my head out through the small window in the door.
Isitan… the duke was standing right there.
Our eyes met.
“Your Grace is drunk.”
After looking at me for a moment, the duke nodded.
“…All right.”
And the carriage set off.
At last unable to bear it any longer, Daena—shocked for the fifth time—grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and stuffed me back inside the carriage.
“Honestly! You just had to…!”
Half thrown onto the sofa, I suddenly thought.
Come to think of it… how does Isitan know about Julie?
As expected… the duke must know everything.
I nodded.
* * *
“Your Grace, you should get into the carriage now as well.”
The aide, who had been standing behind the duke, stepped forward when he did not move for quite some time.
And then he saw it.
The duke, his head slightly lowered, was looking down at the small flower in his hand.
Even without asking, it was obvious.
The drunkard who had just been loaded into the carriage must have given it to him.
‘I knew she could hold her liquor, but is it really all right to be dead drunk with such a perfectly composed face and start acting like that?’
“Do you know the meaning of this flower?”
The aide, having missed the duke’s words, lifted his head.
“Pardon?”
The duke let out a faint laugh.
The aide stared at the duke with wide eyes.
At that gaze looking upon a single deep magenta flower, its beadlike stamens enclosed within its petals.
“It means hidden love.”
The duke climbed into the carriage.
“….”
The emotion that had flickered in that brief interval between smile and expressionlessness, that trace of color….
It was vivid enough that even he, watching from the side, could feel it.
After standing frozen for a moment, the aide sat down on the coachman’s seat.
With a rattle, the carriage wheels began to turn.
The pouring moonlight was unusually bright.
With a troubled expression, the aide thought.
‘Is His Grace… truly serious?’
But,
the aide had seen it too.
The woman wearing that bizarre mask as she danced with another man, looking very much delighted.
And the duke’s back as he stood behind her, endlessly gazing at a face he could not even see.
His heart pounded ominously.
* * *
“Julie!”
The last descendant of House Roxane, the one and only baron, and the master of this mansion leaped down from the carriage with a silly grin.
“Lady Asha, just where did you drink so much and come back from—”
“Juuulie!”
Not caring about the sound of something falling and rolling near her feet,
Anastasha Roxane flung herself at Julie and hugged her.
Then she abruptly lifted her head.
“Right, my shoes!”
“They’re right here.”
Daena, who had gotten down after her, smoothly held the shoes out before her eyes.
Asha quickly accepted the shoes politely with both hands and presented them to Julie just as they were.
“Julie, these are my shoes.”
“Pardon? Then what are you wearing now….”
“Mm-hm, I borrowed them. My feet hurt!”
Daena clicked her tongue when she confirmed that Asha’s tone had begun to take on a wheedling note.
‘Anyone would think they were family by blood. Is she that happy?’
Anastasha Roxane had countless flaws, but if one had to name one of them, it was that she had absolutely no sense of distance with her servants.
‘She’ll only come to her senses after she gets burned once….’
Because the difference in status could never be narrowed by anything.
What flashed through her mind was,
‘Be careful.’
That attendant who alone gave off an alien impression in this mansion.
“….”
Did she think nobles married among themselves and strengthened their bonds for no reason?
Daena, grumbling inwardly like that, was reaching out to climb back into the carriage when it happened.
At the force gently tugging on the hem of her dress, she turned her head.
“Daena.”
“…What?”
“Thank you for today.”
“….”
“You looked for me because you were worried, didn’t you?”
Daena irritably pulled free the hem of her dress that had been caught, then slipped into the carriage with a flushed face.
“Don’t misunderstand! Today, you were my niece, so….”
“Bye—.”
Asha waved lightly at the departing carriage, her clear voice utterly devoid of any aggression.
Then she nestled into Julie’s arms as if collapsing into them, hugging her and burying her head.
“Lady Asha? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing… I’m tired….”
“Lady Asha?”
Julie, who was staggering as she supported Asha, who now seemed on the verge of falling asleep standing up, lifted her head.
Zaka approached and naturally took Asha from her.
“Then may I leave her to you?”
“Of course.”
Looking down at Asha in his arms, Zaka nodded.
“I’ll take responsibility for her.”
At the strange answer, Julie frowned, then caught up beside Zaka as he began striding away.
“She’s your employer. You need to keep the proper boundaries.”
“….”
Whenever Asha was not around, it was hardly the first or second time that Julie Briant had nagged him, saying she would give him this useless moral education.
Zaka ignored her.
“Wouldn’t you be sorry if you caused trouble because of personal feelings?”
Zaka glanced at Julie for a moment.
‘Personal feelings’….
He had not bothered to pay it any mind until now, but at this point, he could be certain.
Anastasia Roxan had not told Julie Briant the truth.
Which meant, perhaps,
there was a high chance she had not been entirely honest with him, either.
If so…….
‘One day, out of nowhere, her father brought her home and said she was the woman he was going to marry, so everyone just accepted it.’
‘They said she had golden eyes, just like mine.’
‘It’s not a common color in the Empire.’
How much did Anastasia Roxan know about herself?
And about the true identity of the servant she had impulsively brought into the mansion?
What was her intention in so casually telling him about that necklace?
But…….
What if all of this truly was coincidence?
What if Anastasia Roxan knew nothing?
Jaka gently laid Asha, who had fallen asleep before long, down on the bed.
While Julie pulled up the blanket and covered her to the tip of her chin, Jaka checked the windows.
He carefully drew the curtains, then went around the room extinguishing each candle that had been lighting it.
Julie briefly left the room to fetch a towel to wipe Asha’s face.
Jaka circled around the bed and moved down to Asha’s feet.
He lifted the blanket slightly and carefully removed her shoes.
Then he tucked her bare feet, which had slipped out beyond the bed, back inside.
Her feet moved as Asha wriggled and turned onto her side.
After covering her meticulously with the blanket, Jaka straightened.
There was no sign of anyone beyond the half-open door.
One step, then another.
Approaching Asha’s bedside, Jaka stared as though tracing the contours of her face, shrouded in pitch-black shadow.
Then he reached out and quietly wrapped his hand around the nape of her neck, exposed outside the blanket.
It was too easy.
She was too easily reassured by the warmth that touched her, too easily relied on it, and fell asleep defenselessly.
That was why it was too easy.
To kill her.
“…….”
As he confirmed with his eyes the naturally slender frame of her bones, he put strength into his fingertips.
His thumb moved smoothly along the pulsing vein in her neck.
Thump, thump.
Feeling the heartbeat beneath his palm, Jaka let out a low groan.
‘Not now.’
Yes, not yet……. He could not act rashly.
Perhaps after she took the antidote.
He would keep pretending to be in love and lull her into carelessness.
When this woman finally came to love him, then he would be able to do whatever he wished with her.
The desire invading his mind felt like a plausible plan.
Yes, let’s do that.
Kill her then.
Then, and only then, he would grasp this frail neck in one hand, cover her mouth…….
And face those eyes that, even in that moment, would still trust him, blinking docilely in surprise…….
As he looked straight into them.
“…….”
She would be angry, wouldn’t she?
Sweat began to gather in his palm.
She had said she would trust him.
And if he broke that, if he broke that trust…….
She would never meet his eyes again.
His heart beat unpleasantly.
She would not properly answer anything he said.
He would never be able to touch her like this again.
He felt his fingertips growing cold at a terrifying speed.
It was as though his soul were being trampled beneath an unbearable, overwhelming fear.
“Mm…….”
Perhaps Jaka’s hand had tightened for an instant, because Anastasia furrowed her brow slightly and stirred.
Jaka withdrew his hand like a startled man. His fingertips trembled.
“…….”
“What are you doing over there?”
Just then, Julie was entering the room with a damp towel on a tray.
Jaka slowly turned around.
In his hand was Asha’s earring.
“Her jewelry looked uncomfortable.”
“Oh, right. I’ll take care of the rest, so you can go back now.”
Jaka rose to his feet.
Julie brushed past him.
“Lady Asha, please turn your head a little.”
It was a gentle, peaceful voice directed at another, without the slightest hint of any pitch-black inner thoughts.
Unlike him.
Jaka covered his lips with his hand.