Chapter 4
Romian’s already exhausted body swayed helplessly.
If Emma, who had followed her inside, had not caught her, she would have collapsed onto the floor.
Yet instead of apologizing to her daughter, the Countess shouted at the top of her lungs.
“Then does that mean His Highness the Crown Prince is going to take a sword without any ornament to this hunting festival as well? Good heavens! How much will everyone laugh at us?! Doesn’t that hurt your pride?!”
“……”
It did hurt her pride.
Romian was human too. How could she remain calm while listening to everyone ridicule her?
What do you want me to do when he refuses to accept it?
But Sihab hated Romian.
There was nothing she could do when he regarded everything she gave him as something detestable.
Romian was the one whose chest felt so painfully constricted that she wanted to cry.
But the Countess did not even try to understand her daughter’s feelings.
Instead, she pressed her daughter even harder, this time in an almost pleading tone.
“Romian, my dear. If things continue like this, you’re finished the day His Majesty the King passes away. And so are we. You understand that, don’t you? You have to win His Highness the Crown Prince’s favor somehow. It breaks my heart every time people call you the fiancée of a Crown Prince who is practically an empty shell.”
Who exactly are you worried about when you say it breaks your heart, Mother?
Romian genuinely wanted to ask her that.
Did the Countess even realize that her daughter was on the verge of collapsing right in front of her?
Or was she simply worried about her own reputation in high society?
“Please, try harder. Just like you did when you won His Majesty over!”
“……Yes.”
Romian had been only nine years old when she caught the King’s attention.
Who exactly did I supposedly win over?
She wanted to argue, but she was far too exhausted to quibble over every word.
In the end, Romian answered in a dispirited voice.
Satisfied with her obedient response, the Countess suddenly disappeared as quickly as she had appeared.
Having used up the last of her remaining strength dealing with her mother, Romian staggered back to her room.
She took off only the heavy dress and collapsed onto the bed.
I wish I could just die…
Her eyes felt dry and gritty, but her tears had long since dried up.
She fell asleep as though she had fainted.
Poor young lady.
Emma watched Romian with a deeply pitying expression for a long time before sighing and gathering the dress Romian had worn that day.
Since the dress had been bestowed by the King himself, there was a separate room in the house where such dresses were stored.
It’s already late. I’ll wash it tomorrow.
Because the dress was so valuable, it could not simply be washed carelessly.
Emma was exhausted from their trip to the palace as well, so she made the perfectly reasonable decision to put today’s work off until tomorrow.
She had just dressed the gown onto a mannequin to keep it from losing its shape and was leaving the room when she found Dukein standing in the hallway.
Emma opened her eyes wide.
“Oh my, Young Master Dukein. What brings you here?”
At the Veldegart estate, Dukein’s and Romian’s rooms were located at opposite ends of the house.
And, honestly, it would have been difficult to call the relationship between the siblings even remotely good.
So seeing Dukein lingering near Romian’s room naturally surprised Emma.
Dukein gave an awkward smile and answered,
“I just came to see if my little sister is all right.”
“I see. The young lady just fell asleep.”
“R-right. But I’ll just take a look at her face before I go.”
“Pardon? Will you? Then I’ll head downstairs first.”
“Go on.”
Emma tilted her head as she looked at Dukein treating Romian with unusual affection.
But there was no particular reason to stop an older brother from visiting his younger sister, so she obediently returned to her own quarters.
Dukein watched Emma disappear down the hallway and let out a deep sigh of relief.
“Phew.”
Of course, people did not change that easily.
Dukein had not suddenly developed a touching concern for his younger sister.
There was a very obvious reason he had come this far.
Click.
The door to the dressing room opened with a small sound.
Romian had a separate dressing room, while this particular room was, quite literally, filled with items bestowed upon her by His Majesty the King.
They included possessions once used by the late Queen, as well as precious goods supplied to the royal family.
Not only were they extremely high-quality, but they also possessed considerable historical value.
To Dukein, however, they looked like nothing more than an untouched gold mine.
Why are they just leaving all this stuff sitting here? Even gemstones are nothing more than lumps of rock if you don’t do anything with them.
Thinking that, Dukein walked around the dressing room with his hands clasped behind his back.
His footsteps finally stopped in front of the dark green bustle dress Romian had worn home that day.
The dress, lavishly decorated with gold and jewels, shone proudly even in the darkness.
He was just placing his hands on its shoulders to remove it from the mannequin when Romian’s warning from earlier flashed through his mind.
—Don’t be foolish, Brother.
“You’re the one being foolish.”
Dukein snorted.
As he casually undid the buttons along the back, he muttered in a low voice,
“What good does it do to keep all this piled up here? It’ll only lose value.”
The dress was going out of fashion with every passing moment.
In truth, the fact that it had belonged to the late Queen already made its fashion and age irrelevant.
But there was no way someone as ignorant and simple-minded as Dukein could understand that.
“And if you’re worried about getting caught, can’t I just remove the jewels attached to it and sell those?”
He hurriedly gathered one thing after another.
The dark green dress, a tiara and necklace she had received previously, and the wine-colored dress Romian had worn during the previous Harvest Festival.
By the time he had gathered those items, his arms were so full and heavy that he could carry no more.
Dukein staggered downstairs, struggling under the weight of everything he had taken.
He climbed into a carriage he had prepared beforehand.
Then he boldly glared at the nervous coachman and ordered,
“Get going, Mark.”
“But, Young Master… Those things belong to the young lady…”
“I already have Romian’s permission, so stop arguing and get moving.”
The eldest young master of the family was insisting on it.
What could a mere coachman possibly say in opposition?
In the end, no one stopped Dukein, and the carriage left the estate.
With his arms full of stolen treasures, he headed toward none other than the most bustling gambling house in the capital.
Alfredo Linhardt was the eldest son of House Linhardt.
His mother was Princess Julieta, the elder sister of Henri IV.
Upon reaching adulthood, he had been granted a viscountcy, so rather than being called Young Master Linhardt, he was generally known as Viscount Linhardt.
The greatest benefit House Linhardt had obtained through its political marriage with the royal family was a legal gambling business.
Though I have no idea how long we’ll be allowed to keep it legal, considering how much Sihab hates things like this.
After leaving the royal palace, Alfredo had stopped by one of the gambling houses operated by his family before returning to the Linhardt ducal estate.
Since the person he had just been with was Sihab, the Crown Prince naturally came to mind.
Sihab is ridiculously puritanical.
Henri IV possessed excellent political instincts, but more than anything, he had a flexible way of thinking.
He was particularly skilled at finding clever solutions to problems, willingly sacrificing a little of his own interests in order to secure a greater advantage.
Perhaps as a reaction against his father, Sihab had developed an excessively rigid and righteous personality.
His attitude toward his fiancée is probably rooted in the same thing.
Although they were now the Count’s family of Veldegart, before catching the King’s attention, House Veldegart had been nothing more than a minor baronial family serving one of the rural dukes.
The family had been elevated into the current House of Counts precisely so that it would be worthy of the Crown Prince’s fiancée.
There was no way someone as puritanical as Sihab could look favorably upon that.
Still, I don’t think he needs to be so vicious toward his fiancée.
When Alfredo entered the gambling house, the manager, who had been informed beforehand that Young Master Linhardt was visiting, came rushing out barefoot and bowed obsequiously before him.
“Welcome, Young Master.”
Outside, people called him Viscount Linhardt.
But the retainers of House Linhardt still called him Young Master.
The title of viscount was merely a temporary rank, while the form of address carried the expectation that he would ultimately inherit the Linhardt dukedom.
“I just came to look around today, so make yourselves comfortable.”
“Yes, yes.”
Those words might have been reassuring, but there was no way a subordinate could actually relax in front of him.
The manager stuck closely to Alfredo’s side and eagerly reported all sorts of unnecessary details about the gambling house.
Alfredo nodded casually as he listened.
Then someone caught his eye.
“Is something wrong, Young Master?”
“Who is that man?”
Alfredo gestured with his chin toward a man who was enthusiastically throwing dice while gulping down beer.
Even in the gambling house filled with dazzling lights, his brilliant golden hair stood out.
“Ah.”
The manager slapped his fist into his palm.
Thousands of people passed through the gambling house, so normally it would have been difficult to answer immediately when asked about someone.
But he recognized that man at once.
“He’s Young Master Dukein of House Veldegart. He’s a regular here. He lost a considerable amount of money yesterday, so I thought he wouldn’t come back for a while. But here he is again today.”
“House Veldegart? The Crown Prince’s fiancée?”
“That’s right. He’s her older brother.”
