But for someone like Cheshire to do something so conspicuous. Even the business of going out to the balcony was, uncharacteristically for him, rather indiscreet.
“Isn’t it really something? They may already have fallen for each other during the trip. She is, as Your Majesty said, beautiful and charming.”
Probably so, Pope said, narrowing his already narrow eyes even further.
“Why is that dress still around? I think I told them to burn it.”
“Pardon?”
“Why that jinxed dress, of all things?”
The Emperor rose, irritated.
“A jinxed dress? What are you saying.”
About to scold him for such words, Pope stopped. He had actually remembered which dress it was.
“…Right, you did order it burned. I recall now.”
“Ugh.”
Pressing his brow, the Emperor thought back forty years. All discord and ill will began that day. Whereas it usually took half a year from engagement to marriage, it took three years for the Empress and the Emperor. It had been three years of hell. He knew it was unreasonable to blame a dress, yet it wasn’t entirely unrelated.
It was because all misfortune began when the imperial Prince, his younger brother, stepped on the hem of her skirt.
“Will anything really come of it? No need to be so jumpy… They say yesterday the Prince disappeared before he even had a chance to step on anyone’s hem.”
“If it’s a groundless worry, all the better.”
As the Emperor trailed off, saying it still felt ominous, Pope firmed his cheeks and said.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself. They haven’t actually announced an engagement.”
“Isn’t the one getting ahead of himself the chancellor?”
“True, but my being rash and Your Majesty’s being rash are not the same thing.”
At Pope’s offhand remark that an Emperor mustn’t do that, the Emperor rolled his eyes. The fact that it somehow rang true only annoyed him more.
“Anyway, I ran here first thing to make you happy, and you’re only worrying? You might be able to bring in Countess Illoud you so wanted as the Crown Princess.”
He’d thought His Majesty would leap for joy the moment he heard; he’d hurried over, forgetting his breathlessness, but the reaction was nothing like he expected.
“Of course I’m pleased… but I can’t trust that brat Cheshire. And that dress is unlucky, too.”
The Emperor sat back down, leaned against the chair, and propped his chin.
“The dress must have suited her.”
“Rumor has it she was so beautiful she bowled over not only His Highness the Crown Prince, but other young men as well.”
At Pope’s report, the Emperor nodded as if that were only natural.
“If only she were a bit plain, I could have acted as though I couldn’t help it and foisted Cheshire on her.”
My precious vassal doesn’t have a single shortcoming anywhere. The Emperor muttered, half boast, half complaint.
“If it truly weighs on you, then don’t foist him off.”
“No, if the two of them truly like each other, I’ll have no choice but to yield.”
When Pope threw cold water on him, the Emperor promptly revealed his true feelings. He spoke gravely, as if after much thought.
“For now, make discreet preparations.”
“Discreet—how much, exactly?”
When Pope asked, the Emperor, instead of replying, feigned sinking back into thought. Seeing that His Majesty’s deliberations would drag on, Pope supplied the proper answer.
“You mean to have things ready so that if they bring up engagement or marriage, it can happen as soon as the very next day.”
As always, the chancellor was a clever, excellent vassal.
“At any rate, don’t fret too much. His Highness the Prince and the Countess didn’t even meet at yesterday’s party.”
“Then that’s a relief.”
Shaking his head as if to say he’d been oversensitive, the Emperor cast off his ominous thoughts.
“Shouldn’t we go ahead and order the wedding dress?”
“…Just don’t go overboard.”
Pope sighed as he watched the Emperor, who already looked ready to start preparing the layette for their future child.
§ § § § §
Clack. Sahara lifted her head at the sound of someone stepping on the scabbards she had spread on the floor. A long leg flicked, kicking a sword that had caught on her foot.
“Who threw swords around just anywhere like this?”
At the irritated voice, Sahara picked up the scabbards she had laid out. The mark of the man’s shoe was clearly imprinted on one, but she didn’t care much.
“I’m sorry.”
When she apologized and raised her head, she saw a slightly familiar face. It was Prince Eric, whom she had seen yesterday. She had thought his features a bit indistinct, but seeing him like this, not especially so. It must have been because the Crown Prince, the Princess, and His Majesty the Emperor were all so dazzling that he had seemed that way by comparison.
The rather handsome Prince frowned at Sahara. Sahara knelt on one knee and bowed her head.
“It is an honor to meet you. I am Sahara Illoud, Your Highness.”
He looked her up and down without telling her to rise.
“Why does a woman greet like a knight?”
“Because I am a knight, and because we are meeting on the training grounds.”
Had they met at a party, she would have greeted him as the Princess had taught her yesterday.
“…Shall I greet you again?”
When she asked carefully, he looked at her in annoyance. Sahara was slightly taken aback by his inexplicable hostility. The Prince was of the royal family and one of the people to whom she naturally owed loyalty.
“Are all these your swords?”
Eric flicked his foot again, kicking up one of Sahara’s swords that had touched his shoe and picking it up.
“Yes.”
“These four are all yours?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
Sahara nodded. She used seven kinds of swords, and as a rule carried three on her, one at the ankle, one on the thigh, and one across her back. Because she used standard-issue blades rather than treasured swords, they tended to break in combat. Since lacking a weapon while fighting for her life would be disastrous, she had taken to bringing extras, and it ended up like this.
Eric even took the swords Sahara had put away and checked inside. What was he doing? Normally, touching another knight’s sword at all would be rude, but since he was a Prince, Sahara simply watched what he did.
“These two have old scabbards, but the blades are new.”
It was true. One had broken while she was taking down an orc and had been replaced with a new blade, and one had been unused since leaving the Land of Snow, so it was new.
“Your disguise and acting are impressive, but even if you fooled Father, you won’t fool me.”
Eric tossed her swords back onto the floor with a flick as he spoke.
“…Pardon?”
“I’m saying I’m not fooled by the show you and my brother are putting on.”
…She had no idea what he was talking about.
For the first time in her life, Sahara had skipped morning training and slept in, in Cheshire’s arms. Even so, she got up around nine, ate breakfast, and went out to train. When Sahara dressed and rose, Cheshire, feigning reluctance, got up as well. Grumbling that he had finally fallen asleep for once, he showed her, as promised, the training grounds used by the imperial knights.
As expected, she rounded up her subordinates, who had been dead drunk and collapsed the night before, and took them out to train. She smacked the backs of the heads of those bawling that their captain had no mercy, and rubbed the backs of the ones throwing up. Still, not a single one skipped; every last one came out to train. Some even looked puzzled that it was later than usual.
As always, Sahara first ran about half a large lap around the vast imperial citadel and then entered the training grounds. It was near lunchtime, so the grounds were quiet. The outdoor grounds in a corner on the right side of the palace were spacious enough for hundreds to drill in formation together. They were facilities the Land of Snow, of course, could never have afforded. There were even contraptions and tools piled about whose use she couldn’t begin to guess.
While waiting for her subordinates, Sahara sat at one side of the grounds and did a short stretch. She really wasn’t in good shape; just that bit of running brought cold sweat to her brow. She thought she might even have a slight fever.
She had overdone it all night. In the morning, too. The last sex they’d had in the water had gone so deep that her belly still ached. —Breaking off in the middle of a leg stretch, Sahara wrapped her hands around her twinging abdomen. If she let her guard down for a moment, the sensations surfaced again, and she had forgotten she’d set her swords on the ground.
Until Eric kicked them.
“Whatever training you gave them, they act very well. Those so-called knights who followed you—what are they? Mercenaries?”
“…I do not understand what you mean, Your Highness.”
Mercenaries? Acting? She couldn’t tell why the Prince was ablaze with hostility, and what he was saying was even more nebulous.
Just then, Sahara’s subordinates, panting, came into the grounds. From the look of them, they had paused in front of the grounds to catch their breath before coming in, and now wore faces pretending to be terribly exhausted.
Is that the acting he means?
Eric turned that same contemptuous gaze on Sahara’s men as they entered.
“If they pull off this performance, you promised them knight positions in the capital, didn’t you? How many have actually been invested as knights? Do they know it’s the death penalty if they get caught?”
Seeing the Prince, the subordinates lined up behind Sahara, knelt, and bowed their heads; at his words they looked bewildered.
“What do you mean?”
“We… we are all properly invested knights, Your Highness.”
Buzz answered cautiously, testing the waters.
“Impossible.”
Eric denied it, standing at a slant and looking down at Sahara and her men. With more than twenty knights held kneeling and not allowed to rise, everyone present at the grounds and those entering turned to watch or drew near.
“It’s obvious if you use your head a little. There are more than a few things that don’t add up.”
She didn’t know what he meant, but Sahara kept her head bowed and listened.
“The sudden report of victory from a war no one even remembers. That you supposedly came all the way from the Land of Snow and yet arrived here implausibly fast. That my brother took it upon himself to go out and greet them for something that yielded little benefit.”
As he ticked things off one by one, as if for everyone else to hear, a murmur rose among them.
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