In that instant, Alicia hastily put on a polite front.
“Ah… I caused her some trouble, so I wished to apologize.”
“I understand. She is waiting in the salon. I will go and call her. I have official duties to attend to, so I shall take my leave.”
For a brief moment, Joshua’s brows knit together, but his face quickly returned to its usual impassive calm.
After Joshua and Mariabelle left the room, Fran arrived almost at once.
“Lady Alicia, I’m so sorry. I dragged you into something so strange.”
“So… going to the clock tower together was not a dream, then?” Alicia asked, seeking confirmation.
“It wasn’t. What kind of future did you see, Lady Alicia?”
“No… it was only a nightmare.”
Alicia shook her head.
“Then how about this?” Fran suggested gently. “We tell each other. I’ve already told you mine, so now it’s your turn.”
Given the circumstances, Alicia hesitated.
Even if they had shared a secret, Fran had been acting as the queen’s observer. She could not speak freely.
“What I saw was a bad dream, perhaps three years into the future.”
“Lady Alicia, what I saw concerned events immediately after my graduation. I believe I told you everything last night. Shall we compare them—see whether they align?”
“Compare…?”
“The future might be changeable. And since yours lies several years ahead, all the more so.”
As though to comfort her, Fran clasped Alicia’s cold, damp hand.
Alicia could not bring herself to respond.
It was only natural to dismiss it as a nightmare. Yet it had been far too vivid for a dream.
It felt as though she had truly lived through it and then returned.
(What is this cold shock at my neck… and that searing pain?)
“Oh, that’s right. Alicia, since I’ll be graduating soon, I want to give you this.”
Fran pressed a silver key into Alicia’s palm.
“Lady Fran, this is…?”
“The key to the dormitory’s back entrance. A spare I had made. Think of it as a parting gift.”
Alicia stared blankly at the key.
“I wish you good fortune.”
With that, Fran left Alicia’s room.
Afterward, Alicia was examined by a physician sent from the palace and ordered to rest for a full week.
During that time, no one came to visit her room.
On the day she returned to the dormitory, Alicia murmured softly,
“His Highness did not even send a single flower…”
(Is the future shown in the mirror… truly real?)
Alicia shuddered and wrapped her arms around herself.
As summer recess drew near, a messenger from the palace delivered a letter to the dormitory.
As the crown prince’s fiancée, Alicia was to participate in an official duty: a visit to an orphanage.
Because formal attire was required, Alicia had no choice but to return to her family home.
The reception she received from her family, after so long, was sharp and cold. She wore the same dress that had been made the year before.
Apparently, Mariabelle’s participation had been proposed as well, but the royal family had refused. That decision had left the entire estate tense and irritable.
Even hearing that, Alicia’s heart found no peace, burdened as it was by the memory of the magic mirror.
Joshua took her hand and led her into the carriage sent from the palace.
Not long ago, even such a small gesture would have filled her with joy, as though she were floating on air. Now, that feeling had been replaced by unease and suspicion.
She wanted to believe it was only a dream… yet the thought of being condemned in the future made Joshua himself terrifying.
(To believe something so unreal… there must be something wrong with me.)
Even without peering into the mirror, she had always known that Joshua’s heart was not with her.
That must be why she had seen such a future in her dream.
Alicia quietly gazed out the carriage window, lost in thought.
(Yes. It must have been a dream.)
Her heart wavered, caught between dream and reality.
Somewhere within her, she wondered whether, unless she yielded Joshua to Mariabelle, she would one day be executed for a crime she did not commit.
(But… what am I supposed to do?)
She had no parents she could confide in, no friends she could rely upon.
“Alicia.”
The sudden address startled her. It had been a long time since Joshua had spoken to her of his own accord.
“Yes… what is it?”
“There have been concerns regarding your health for quite some time.”
“What?”
“It has been rumored at the palace that you may be concealing a chronic illness. For that reason, when you collapsed recently, the palace physicians examined you.”
He spoke plainly, without expression.
“The results showed that you are in good health.”
If that was the case, she thought faintly, he could have asked her himself.
The realization that they had never built such a bond of trust left Alicia reeling.
