Luke, now formally engaged to Princess Pamela, was brought back to that same convent once more, this time to report the engagement.
His memories of the convent had grown hazy over the years, but as he walked through its grounds, they gradually sharpened and returned.
The corridor where the cleric had taken his hand and walked with him for rehabilitation.
The bath where, despite his frantic attempts to escape in embarrassment, the cleric had seized him firmly, stripped him without mercy, and dropped him into the water.
The garden where he had sat on the ground, using the dexterity he had been born with to weave flowers into a crown, hoping it might serve as some small token of thanks.
The gate he had looked back at again and again on the day he left.
And then, beneath the summer sunlight filtering into the gazebo, Luke reunited with her for the first time in five years.
The woman who waited there with Pamela was none other than the princess Luke had admired all this time.
Camilla, the first princess and a cleric of the convent, offered her blessings for her younger sister’s engagement to Luke. By then, Luke and Pamela had grown close enough to trade lighthearted banter like friends, and the cleric watched the two of them with gentle eyes.
From the way she spoke, it seemed she did not remember what had happened five years ago.
She looked at Pamela with deep affection, and she spoke kindly to Luke as well, asking him to take good care of her sister.
…That was enough.
If Luke treasured Pamela as his wife, then the cleric would be pleased. Surely that was what she had meant back then, when she spoke of repaying treatment through helping others.
“After all, your first love really was my sister.”
Pamela said this in the carriage on the way back, and Luke nodded.
“She hasn’t changed at all. She’s still very beautiful.”
“Oh my, how shameless. But I understand. My sister isn’t the sort of beauty that dazzles at first glance, but she has a presence that makes you want to draw closer, someone you can’t stop looking at.”
Coming from her sister, the assessment was spot on.
If one were to speak purely of beauty, Pamela herself likely surpassed her. But the cleric possessed a quiet charm that made one want to stay beside her, to watch her forever.
If Luke could protect a Lapladia Kingdom where she could always smile, that alone would be enough.
The king’s death. The accession of the new king. And then, the moment the mourning period ended, the order to dissolve his engagement to Pamela and instead become engaged to Princess Camilla.
It felt as though he had been cast into a raging current of events, yet even so, the happiness in Luke’s chest outweighed his shock and confusion.
He had no intention of rejoicing at the king’s death, nor did he feel gratitude toward the new king, who was said to be disliked by the princesses.
But thanks to King Gerald’s favoritism toward his younger daughter, Pamela was free to enjoy the relaxed life of the imperial harem she had long desired, and Luke was finally able to marry the cleric he had admired.
When Camilla was summoned to the castle, her face was pale.
Luke could sense her unease, and he steeled himself, telling himself that at least he must remain composed.
…When the king downgraded the title he would grant Luke from count to baron, Luke very nearly let his anger show.
Camilla was a princess, even if she had spent many years in a convent. To force her into the position of a baroness, no better than a wealthy commoner, was cruel beyond measure.
Worse still, Camilla seemed to feel guilty about becoming Luke’s wife.
For Luke, it was a dream come true, yet Camilla kept apologizing, perhaps because she was the child of a concubine and eight years his senior.
“At the very least, I will make sure you lack for nothing, so please don’t worry.”
As he tried to reassure her, Luke cursed his own inadequacy.
For a princess to marry into a baron’s house was nothing but an insult. And yet, a countship handed down by bowing one’s head to that king was not worthy of Camilla either.
Luke would have to work relentlessly and climb to the rank of high nobility by his own strength.
So that the pure princess could live freely, always smiling, Luke resolved to devote himself entirely.
Pamela departed for the Ashshar Empire in high spirits, and Luke and Camilla’s married life began.
But whether it was another act of harassment by the king or simply cruel timing, there was no time at all. By the day Camilla arrived at the estate, Luke could barely manage to prepare the furniture and recruit his former comrades as servants.
He regretted it endlessly, thinking he should have hired maids first.
Even so, Camilla never complained.
“This is more than enough,” she said, worrying instead about Luke.
That kindness only made him feel more miserable, his chest aching with his own lack of means.
Even their first night together, something that would make an ordinary couple’s hearts race, was not something Luke could force upon her without regard for her feelings or condition.
In fact, it was Camilla who cautiously said that if she ought to share his bed, she would enter the marital bedroom, as though gauging his mood.
It felt as though she were watching his expression, frightened, when it should have been Luke who put her at ease. He could not bring himself to touch her like that.
In truth, he wanted to share a bed with Camilla immediately.
But if that made her cry, if she were to say that this was not what she had wanted, everything would be ruined. If he ever made Camilla cry, Luke felt he might very well disembowel himself on the spot.
He was barely an adult, lacking both the status and the ability to support her properly.
Fortunately, the rewards forced upon him by the late king were plentiful. Luke resolved to give every last one of them to Camilla, to work himself to the bone, and to devote everything he had to her sake alone.
