COARV Chapter 16

The townhouse in the capital where Seria had originally been staying was, at its foundation, a temple building. Which meant that decorating it lavishly had never been an option, and every meal—three times a day, without exception—came out of the temple's own kitchens. Which was another way of saying the food was genuinely terrible. Bad enough that I'd once suspected the original Seria's daily round of banquets wasn't really about socializing at all, but about hunting down something that actually tasted good.

Berke Castle's food was a new world to me. Every day, lavish dishes came up, and I ate every one without complaint.

Also, since I'd have to be trekking through the freezing glacier every day, I needed to eat enough to keep my strength up.

Now that I'd gone and told him I'd do my absolute best for Berke territory going forward, I needed to resume the glacier inspections starting tomorrow. There was still plenty of winter left, after all.

"Your Highness. Starting tomorrow, I'll make a full circuit of the glacier."

"You won't need to inspect it for a while."

"I'm sorry? Then what will I be doing?"

"Just take on being the castle's temporary lady of the house or something."

Lady of the house? I blinked.

"The High Priest is expected to arrive at Berke's main castle in four days."

"That fast? Ah—through the teleportation circle, I take it?"

"Correct."

Using something that precious just for this, when it wasn't even a death notification? But thinking it through, it made sense. From the Grand Temple's perspective, every piece of news to come out of Berke territory these past few days would have landed like a bolt from the sky.

Seria Stern, whose wedding to the Marquess of Haneton had been settled, had suddenly married Berke's Grand Duke instead.

And on top of that, the Saint—Lina—had abruptly married the Marquess of Haneton, too….

Wait. That's strange.

Did the temple know that Lina and Kallis had gotten married?

"Your Highness."

I asked carefully.

"Does everyone know that the Marquess of Haneton and the Saint exchanged marriage vows?"

"Yes."

"...How?"

"The Marquess requested a divorce the instant he returned."

"..."

"You'd have missed it, of course. You were unconscious."

Having said that much, Lesche's brow creased slightly.

"If you want the details, ask your knight."

At the sudden mention of Abigail, I looked up. Lesche said,

"Aren't you curious why your knight isn't here?"

"Dame Abigail?"

Honestly, I hadn't been particularly curious.

Because Abigail, true to her former-assassin nature, was always the type to be here one moment and gone the next. I figured she was off somewhere again, same as always….

Wait, though. I just came to after fainting.

Even for Abigail, being at my side was the norm. Her not being here meant what, exactly?

Where had Abigail gone?

Lesche, watching my expression shift by the second, spoke.

"Go see for yourself once your work is done. I'll send Elliot with you."

"...Understood. Thank you, Your Highness."

It couldn't be anything serious. Or Lesche wouldn't be this calm about it...

No. This is a man who'd be exactly this calm even if Abigail's neck were cut clean in half.

I needed to go find out, and fast. I bowed to Lesche once more and stepped out of the parlor.

He said Kallis requested the divorce the moment he got back.

But for someone who'd apparently just learned about a divorce, Lina had been calling out to Kallis brightly enough, back there.

For some reason, I had a feeling Lina didn't know about it at all. If everyone else knew, why not her? And if she found out—would it shock her?

And then… where would this all go from here?

3. The Reception, Curdled

I hadn't expected Abigail to be sitting in a jail cell. I pressed a hand to my forehead.

She threw handkerchiefs at ten of Kallis's knights, one by one….

I hadn't heard this from Abigail herself, either. She wasn't willing to give me the specifics, so I hadn't gotten the full picture of what had actually happened.

But Elliot—Angel, who'd tagged along with me—kept shaking his head the entire way, and pressing him for answers got me a fairly detailed account of the incident.

So, the story went like this.

The moment Kallis finally made it back from the glacier, Abigail was already furious to the point of no return.

But Kallis outranked her by too much to simply throw a handkerchief in his face. Abigail had summoned up the last of her patience. Instead of hurling it at Kallis's cheek, she'd taken the handkerchiefs she'd brought and flung them, one by one, at the ten knights serving under him.

A bulldozer, that Dame Bibi. I let out a long sigh.

That's slander against his rank, plain and simple.

Kallis governed Haneton, a marquessate in the western territories.

The west, of course, was largely under the thumb of the Kelidens, Seria's family—but the west itself was a thriving region in its own right. Which meant Kallis's own standing was high enough that the slander charge landed on Abigail all the harder.

Elliot—Angel—offered what comfort he could.

"Honestly, what Dame Abigail did wasn't so much a proper knightly duel as it was outright mayhem. Wouldn't she have been thrown out of a capital ball for something like this?"

"...You're right."

"She'll be out of the cell in a few days either way."

"But it's freezing in there. What if she freezes to death?"

"Dame Abigail—freeze to death? Are you—Lady Seria? Are you being serious right now?"

"..."

Elliot—Angel—looked so genuinely baffled asking that, that I actually felt reassured.

"The moment Abigail gets out, I'm going to bring her a hot beef soup right away, and wrap her in the thickest, warmest cloak we have."

"I'll carry it for you."

"Thank you. You're so kind. Just like an angel."

"'Angel'—for a knight—isn't exactly a compliment I want."

"Really? I already call you an angel in my head, every single day."

"…Please. I'm begging you to drop it."

In the end, I decided to simply call Elliot "Elliot." As we made our way out of the underground level where the cells were, walking briskly, a voice suddenly called out.

"Lady Seria! There you are!"

"Linon?"

Lesche's chief aide. He came scrambling over in a flustered rush, a thick sheaf of documents in hand.

"Are you all right?"

"Y—yes. Just—gah, huff—I'm fine."

"What are those documents? You're carrying them like they're for me."

"Yes. Huff... that's correct."

Once he'd finally caught his breath, Linon thrust the stack of papers into my hands. I took them without quite understanding why, and stared at him.

"This is the estimated time of the High Priest's arrival at the territory. Right before this time, no matter what else is happening, every single decoration from the year-end party has to come down, and—"

"...?"

I broke in, hearing this for the first time.

"What year-end party?"

"Huh? Did His Highness not tell you? There was originally supposed to be a reception, wasn't there?"

"That's right."

The reception that had been planned to follow my wedding to Kallis. The one that had fallen apart before it began.

"Wasting all the food and flowers we'd already ordered for that seemed like a shame, and since we already have so many outside nobles staying at the castle, the retainers suggested turning it into a year-end party instead—and His Highness agreed to it."

"When is this year-end party, exactly?"

"The day after tomorrow."

The day after tomorrow?

"And the High Priest arrives in four days?"

"Yes."

"Why are you telling me all this?"

"...You really weren't told, were you. This is all work you'll be doing, my lady."

"...?"

I felt, for a moment, entirely lost.

Any castle a High Priest visits must be, without exception, without compromise, absolutely solemn. It was custom. No banquets, full stop. Not even a small gathering. The number of dishes served couldn't exceed three.

Which meant that after decorating the castle for a proper year-end party, right before the High Priest arrived, every last decoration would have to come down, replaced with plain, clean cloth, every trace of the celebration wiped away completely. And needless to say, we'd also need to prepare clean, fresh, minimal meals to serve the High Priest's party.

And I was supposed to do all this in four days? Who was? Me?

Linon went on.

"His Highness said you'd be happy to take charge of everything, as temporary lady of the house..."

"..."

"There's, ah, quite a lot to do, isn't there? But His Highness did say you'd told him you'd take it all on willingly..."

Linon's voice shrank to a mumble, crawling away into nothing, and over it—like a ghost—Lesche's earlier words layered themselves in.

'Just take on being the castle's temporary lady of the house or something.'

Right. I'd almost forgotten Lesche was the scheming male lead. So this was how he'd doled out my work—down to the last penny's worth, not a scrap wasted.

Honestly, I preferred this kind of clean, transactional arrangement. Getting his first-marriage price for free would have sat badly with me anyway. If Lesche Berke started doling out kindness for no reason at all, that would have been—in its own way—rather frightening.

Suddenly my mind was racing. Repayment. Right, repayment was never the easy option. I scanned the thick stack of documents with my eyes and, God help me, the castle was so large that there was far more to handle than I'd expected. I found myself all but stamping my feet, and moved quickly.

God, this is exhausting.

The work didn't wrap up until well into the evening. I'd spent the day confirming the food for the year-end party, checking the wine and silverware stored in the cellar, and inspecting the white tablecloths. The flowers for the long table, the curtains, and more.

The chair and sofa fabrics also needed replacing, which had meant an expedition through the castle's basement storerooms.

By the end I was practically being carried around on Elliot's back.

I'd meant to run myself, but Linon and Elliot, who'd stuck with me the whole time, had absolutely refused to let me.

Fair enough, honestly.

If someone had collapsed at their own wedding with blood gushing out of them and then, the moment she woke, went and overworked herself like this—even I would have felt sorry for her. Being carried on Elliot's back had actually let me get through more work than I'd expected.

If I did a final check tomorrow, I'd probably be able to pull together something that at least passed for a proper year-end reception. Hopefully nothing was missing.

Once I'd finally made it back to my bedroom and collapsed, the maids brought in a warm dinner.

"My lady. Please, eat."

"You must be exhausted. We've prepared something simple, but filling."

I cut off pieces of steaming gingerbread, hot mushroom stew, and goose meat topped with apple sauce, chewing them slowly and deliberately, and after a few bites I could feel some strength returning to my drained body.

By the time I'd finished off a pie piled high with sugared fruit, my mind had cleared as well. People really are shameless creatures—eat one good meal and suddenly tomorrow's problems don't seem so bad.

Well, if it gets me motivated, that works in my favor.

Motivated or not, whatever His Highness the Grand Duke had ordered, I had to get done regardless.

Chewing over a faint pang of sorrow, I drank my tea after the meal. I sent back word to Begonia agreeing to have her alter the dress I'd wear to the reception, and opened the two letters that had come for me.

One was from Kallis, and one was from Lina. Kallis made sense, but I hadn't expected Lina to send a letter at all. The contents were even more unexpected. An apology—and something about how she'd genuinely wanted to be my friend.

Friend?

It really was an idealistic thing to say. So idealistic it startled a hollow laugh right out of me. Even being asked to be friends with my ex-boyfriend's girlfriend would be hard enough to swallow by my standards—let alone friends with the current wife of the man who'd nearly become my husband?

There wasn't much time to dwell on it.

I could barely keep my eyes open.

I'd expected to lie awake tonight, restless with everything churning in my head, but after my bath I was so exhausted that sleep hit me like a wave. I'd thought it might be the kind of sleepless night where I'd end up going to murder Kallis instead—maybe it was for the best that it wasn't, in the end.

I buried my face in the pillow and passed out on the spot.