IWJACM Chapter 18

One woman was trouble enough—and now two? Rezet cut across Noyre's words, sharp with irritation.

"That scheme feels rather low, coming from the master of Van Yela."

"Lower than the princess, though? She went into this fully braced to be treated this way too, I'd wager."

"With respect, I don't believe that."

"Why not. Don't tell me you've gone and lost your heart to her?"

"I simply have no wish to lie before God."

"Do I look like a man with the luxury to spare, at the moment? I'm allowing you this much precisely because I know how devout you are, Rezet."

Cornered again and again on his own words, Noyre finally snapped, irritated.

"Of all the women to touch, you had to go and touch the one who's about to die. Ughel's savage brothers are howling for the princess's head this very hour, and just picturing how I'm meant to calm those dogs down turns everything black in front of my eyes. Every woman I sent, you turned away—and the one woman you weren't to lay a single finger on, that's the one you dragged to bed. What are you, some contrary little frog that does the opposite of every last thing it's told?"

If I'd actually laid a hand on her, at least I wouldn't feel so wronged about it. Rezet rubbed at his brow, weary.

"What excuse will you give Ughel if I keep the princess as a secret mistress? There's no better justification to offer them than Kyrstan."

"That's… true enough."

"Invoke the covenant of the Northern Alliance, if you must. Prisoners and spoils belong to whoever first claimed them—so Rezet Kyrstan refuses to surrender the princess. It should serve well enough to claim I've simply been enthralled by her."

"…Truly?"

"Believe whatever you please. It makes no difference to me."

Noyre paused a moment, then nodded, slow.

"Your reasoning has merit. Then let's just square it away with a quick oath before the Archbishop. I won't force you to take a proper wife. And should something go wrong with the child in her womb, simply divorce, then."

"…….."

"Assuming she carries the full term, the child should be born sometime around late winter next year, yes? Then eight, perhaps nine months more. Endure that long, and once she's given birth, we look over how the princess and the child are holding up, then ship her off to Ughel—no rush, we've got the time——"

"…….."

"Why do you look at me like that again, Rezet. That stare of yours could kill a man or two on its own."

Rezet was staring straight at Noyre without so much as a blink. It was not a look any man had the nerve to aim at his own sovereign.

Even an emperor found it difficult to stay composed before such an oppressive presence. Noyre didn't doubt Rezet's loyalty, but he always kept in mind the faint possibility that the man might one day turn his back on Van Yela.

A man like this was better coaxed and soothed than trampled.

"Of course, matters would look different if you'd actually given her your heart. Don't look at me like that. Do you think I bear the princess some personal grudge?"

"No grudge—and yet you'd treat her as a brood mare."

"The princess brought this on herself. You imagine she seduced you out of some pure motive?"

"…….."

"It was surely a scheme to survive, plain and simple. A cunning little thing."

Rezet only listened, silent.

"Let's hope the princess doesn't die before then."

"…….."

"But… somehow, I have a good feeling about this."

In truth, Noyre had been in remarkably fine spirits these past several days. The great ambition he'd nursed for nearly twenty years might finally, this very year, come to fruition—small wonder he couldn't help feeling buoyant.

"Perhaps, Rezet, she'll be able to withstand your seed. She's Argan, after all."

"…….."

"Disciple of the Mad Dragon Semesitha. Descendant of the hero Ghallian. The only human lineage that ever succeeded in mastering a dragon. Surely she must be different from an ordinary woman."

"Different, certainly."

Rezet answered, grudging. In the sense that she was less than half as strong as an ordinary woman, perhaps. From where he stood, knowing exactly her constitution and the state of her health, he could hardly find the breath to answer.

Noyre burst into a cheerful, hearty laugh.

"You think so too, then? Ha, take good care with her, Rezet. A boy would be preferable, but a girl wouldn't be so bad either—so long as it inherits your strength properly."

Greed crawled thick across every inch of Noyre's face. Rezet swallowed down the revulsion rising in him like nausea and delivered a cold verdict.

"I don't think we'll need to wait until late winter, in my opinion. I expect Her Highness will be back here by around autumn."

"What?"

"It would be best not to dismantle the scaffold in the square."

"Wait—Rezet!"

"Do as you please, come autumn. I won't interfere."

Rezet bowed his head, then, and turned his back, cold, on the half-brother calling urgently after him.

"I still can't believe Your Grace is truly getting married."

They were on their way out of the audience chamber. Ruben, oddly buoyant, couldn't hold his tongue any longer.

"Rumors are already flying wild among the knights, sir. Did you know? Ugh, still—I never figured you'd take to it so easy. Weren't you the type to just about gag at the word marriage?"

"I loathe it now, too."

Ruben flinched under his superior's glare. It felt exactly like he could hear it: you wretch, isn't this whole mess your fault, blabbering nonsense in front of the Emperor like that?

Ruben broke into a cold sweat and blurted out whatever came to mind.

"L—Lothier does need a proper mistress of the house, after all, sir. Lady Phaetyson, more than anyone, will be delighted. And perhaps a young master or lady really will be born safely, one day——"

"That won't happen."

Rezet cut his subordinate off, merciless.

Huh? Ruben was baffled. He'd assumed His Grace had genuinely lost his heart somewhere along the way, given how readily he'd agreed to marry. So what was this icy look about, then?

Ruben was one of those firmly convinced that something had happened between the two of them.

To the eyes of the knights who'd spent years alongside the Grand Duke on campaign, Rezet Kyrstan had grown unusually soft where the princess was concerned. It could pass, perhaps, as a gesture of respect toward Argan—but surely personally attending to her bath wasn't exactly an expression of reverence?

And the Argan princess possessed a beauty striking enough to blind a man.

Would His Grace have done exactly the same, had she been a prince instead of a princess?

'Ah, that. Well, he probably would have done exactly the same regardless.'

The Emperor sent renowned beauties to Lothier once a month. And yet not once, even as word spread that Lothier housed no shortage of beautiful women, had His Grace so much as glanced their way. It seemed less that he avoided women, and more that he felt something close to revulsion at the act of keeping company with them at all.

Which, in fact, was only natural. Part of why yon'gyn were commonly regarded as closer to beasts than to men was precisely this—their notorious inability to master their own lust—rutting uncontrollably, raping men and women alike without any discrimination at all. Naturally, His Grace would never wish to become that sort of creature himself.

"It's all right, Your Grace. Aren't you fundamentally different from other yon'gyn?"

"Different how?"

"Aw, c'mon, there's no comparing you to them at all. Folks who don't know any better, or who're just choking on envy, go around yapping 'monster' this and 'savage' that—but you're a different breed clean down to how you look. You've never once lost your mind to it. Never once gone berserk."

"…….."

"So there's no reason Your Grace shouldn't love, and marry, and see children of your own, same as any ordinary man. Isn't that exactly the blessing God intends for you?"

Rezet shot his subordinate a look of pure exasperation. This idiot had spent over seven years matching blows with him on the battlefield, and still ran his mouth off about nonsense like this at his leisure.

"Enough foolish talk."

"It isn't foolish talk at all. The child that's born will surpass Van Yela's imperial line—and Argan's, for that matter. Naturally handsome, of course, and if it takes after Your Grace, its abilities as well——"

"That delusion of yours will hold up only until autumn, so save yourself the trouble of getting ahead of yourself over nothing."

"…Sir?"

Only until autumn?

The meaning landed on Ruben all at once, and the color drained from his face.

Surely—surely his lord didn't mean to prevent his own child from being born at all?

Or did he think the princess wouldn't even last the full six months before dying?

Ruben stammered.

"Your Grace. Surely you don't mean—you don't intend to end her life with your own hands?"

"In the worst case, I suppose I'll have to. Before there's greater bloodshed."

Rezet's expression barely shifted, from beginning to end. But Ruben looked at the man before him differently now.

Not a man unsettled by unlooked-for fortune and a sudden marriage—but a murder-fiend, sizing up his prey in the middle of a battlefield.

'Oh, God. Our lord is exactly the sort who does what he says he'll do……'

While Ruben crossed himself, silent, inwardly, a chilly order fell.

"Send word to Lothier. Tell them to prepare to receive Her Highness the Princess. Prepare without sparing anything—lavishly."

"…….."

"Seems she's still got plenty of attachment left to this life. So let her enjoy what little time she has, brief as this half a year may be."

Only then did Ruben understand, with total clarity. Argan's princess had not, in fact, escaped the crisis of death.

She might, in fact, have taken one step closer, with her own two feet, to the very worst death of all.

Before departing for Lothier, the two of them held an abbreviated wedding at the chapel of the Van Yela imperial palace.

The ceremony was held not in the main sanctuary, but in the small annex reserved for the priest's private use.

It was barely more than the formalities observed—in truth, an exceedingly meager wedding. No betrothal gifts, no ring, no bridal veil.

No one could possibly have imagined that the marriage between Argan's princess and Van Yela's Grand Duke would be conducted this hastily, this perfunctorily, struck together as quickly as a spark catching tinder.

Elise stood blankly before the officiant and thought:

'If Andrei had seen this—he'd have raised holy hell……'