#14. Fifteen (2)
In the end, the words that came from his mouth were a thanks he had already given several times before.
“…Thank you.”
Ophelia quickly replied to him.
“Thanking someone is only done when you’ve actually received help.”
Only after a long time did Idren learn that this was a polite way to draw a line. She hadn’t helped him, and likewise, there was nothing owed between them. In other words, there was nothing between them at all.
But at that time, Idren liked Ophelia so much that he didn’t care about the true meaning behind her words and pretended not to notice. Even though he knew she wouldn’t accept it, he threw himself on her anyway.
And back then, he wasn’t much different as a child.
At that time, it wasn’t that he deliberately ignored her words; it was simply that he truly didn’t understand what she meant.
“You helped me.”
“I told you, I didn’t help.”
“But thanks to you, I did get out of trouble…”
Idren fell silent. For some reason, his eyes stung. His face flushed and his voice trembled.
Ophelia must have noticed the change in him. She let out a small sigh and looked back at him.
Her dark eyes in the night seemed to hold the entire sky. Idren looked away, lowering his gaze a little.
He kept looking at her when she wasn’t looking, but when she actually looked at him, he felt so embarrassed.
Annoyed by his awkwardness, Ophelia asked,
“What’s your name?”
“Idren Sigrasil.”
To be honest, he was still not used to the family name that came after his first name.
Ophelia answered him.
“My name is Ophelia Mebasa.”
Idren didn’t tell her he already knew that. He didn’t say that every time he saw the dawn, he called out her name in his mind, or that he had come to this banquet just to see her.
Without saying a word, eyes lowered, Ophelia asked,
“How old are you?”
“Fifteen.”
“Same as me.”
Then she looked up at the sky again, resting her head on her arm that leaned on the balcony railing.
“I thought your family was mean to you.”
“……”
“I’m glad it seems to have gotten better now.”
Unlike the Princess of Egelbamoth, Ophelia seemed unaware that it was because he would be sent to the battlefield on their behalf.
While feeling relieved, Idren felt a bit sad. It was certainly a good thing that Ophelia thought he was okay, but the fact was, he was not really okay—and that hurt.
As if swallowing something, clenching his jaw and neck, Ophelia asked then,
“When your family treated you like that, didn’t you ever want to run away?”
Run away.
Hearing that, Idren was a little surprised.
From the moment he came into the castle until now, he had never once run away.
Of course, he had thought about it a few times. If this is how life is, wouldn’t it be better to just leave far away and live alone? Wouldn’t it be better to hide in some unknown countryside?
But he never dared try.
“I have thought about it.”
Hearing this, Ophelia tilted her head and blinked.
“Have you ever tried?”
“As you can see, my eye color is like this…”
Then Idren realized she wasn’t looking at his eyes.
Before he could be embarrassed by the contradiction of her words, Ophelia let out a hollow laugh. It was the first time Idren heard her laugh out loud, and he opened his eyes wide.
“Well, that’s true. Your eyes are golden. Anyone can tell you’re a descendant of Sigrasil.”
And Ophelia herself was clearly the princess of Reden at first glance.
Maybe that’s why. Without thinking, Idren asked her,
“Have you ever had that kind of thought?”
“You mean wanting to run away?”
Ophelia blinked again. Her long, thick silver lashes curved gently. Then she answered calmly.
“I have thought about it.”
“…Are you also not on good terms with your family?”
Ophelia closed her mouth for a moment. Idren carefully looked at her young, delicate face. She was fair, beautiful, soft, and fragile.
In other words, fundamentally different from him.
Just as he was about to think the growing silence was awkward, Ophelia spoke again.
“No. It’s just… frustrating.”
“……”
“You may not know this, but Reden is quite a small country.”
She added casually, especially the royal palace.
“I want to go to many places outside of Reden. I want to try everything that can only be done there.”
It was a wish commonly held by daughters of noble houses, but that day Ophelia looked strangely melancholic.
Before Idren could examine the sadness on her small face any further, Ophelia quickly changed the subject.
“But it’ll be different once I get married, so it’s okay.”
Then she stood up and adjusted the hem of her dress.
As she bent slightly, her silver hair spilled down, decorated with flowers and jewels. Idren couldn’t help but think he wished he had more to give.
If he had more, he could have granted her wishes immediately.
But at that time, he couldn’t even use his own body freely, so he could only remain silent.
While Idren stayed quiet, Ophelia finished fixing her appearance and looked at him. Her face now showed no trace of the earlier emotion as she said goodbye.
“I’ll go back now. I hope we can see each other again next year.”
But Idren could not live up to her words.
As soon as the next year began, he was sent to the border region. And in the cold air that felt like a limb was about to fall off, he endured five years.
After five years, when he turned twenty-one, Idren could no longer endure there.
It wasn’t just a mental problem; the situation was truly unbearable. Supplies on the front had run out for three months.
He thought there was nothing he could change by himself, but once he was pushed to the brink, things inevitably changed.
When he came to his senses, Idren was already stabbing a knife into his father’s neck. He was at peace with Ragall, with whom he had fought fiercely for five years.
Idren killed the Duke and hanged the three princes. It wasn’t because of personal grudge but because they couldn’t be allowed to live. If he left them alive, his own neck would be hanged.
After killing his family, he took the throne. He didn’t want to sit on it, but he didn’t know how else to resolve the situation, so he chose it.
People often mistakenly thought a child killing their parent king did it for the throne, but when he did it himself, he realized that such filicide was done more with the heart than the head. It was something forced by circumstances, not a firm purpose like the throne.
Politics that began in a life that changed its fabric all at once felt like walking on thin ice. There was much to do, more things that must not be done, and even more that could not be done.
Idren handled the tasks in front of him without knowing what he was doing. The more he learned politics, the more he was glad he wasn’t a scholar. If he had made study his profession, he might have died young.
When he had work left from day to night and couldn’t sleep, he sometimes wondered if killing the late king was a mistake.
Whether it was the neck of Ragall’s soldiers or that of his family, a head was a head. But after he killed the latter, everyone around became his enemy.
The council, Tesendot — his late king’s maternal family — and Brinwell, the queen’s home country, all sharpened their knives against him.
“Isn’t it better to have more now?”
When he said he would die like this, Salode said so. Then Idren looked silently at the financial advisor who appeared at the right time to guide him toward the best choice.
In fact, Salode was right. Though every day he worried about who would invade next, Idren thought that now, with his family dead, was better than when they were alive.
And that thought became stronger after meeting Prince Mahanas of Reden.
After the prince’s rebellion, the talks had effectively stopped. Rune Talis and the previous dynasty Aglante had been close anyway.
Egelbamoth, who had killed all the Sigrasil royals except himself, would never look kindly upon him.
But the dead are dead, and a living person sits on the throne. The peaceful Crown Prince of Egelbamoth invited him back to the talks.
So Idren went to Egelbamoth’s summer palace for the first time in seven years.
Maybe because a lot of time had passed, Ophelia was not there. The only Reden royal there was Prince Mahanas.
Idren asked the prince about Ophelia. The prince said, as if waiting for that question, that she was still unmarried and had no fiancé.
His heart raced so much hearing that.
Idren remembered Ophelia’s words on the last night spent at the summer palace. He had never forgotten anything from that moment.
“But it’ll be different once I get married, so it’s okay.”
Now, he had enough to bring about that change for her.
