MB Chapter 13

"I'll give you Balverdi."

A woman who appeared to be in her mid-thirties sat with her legs crossed on the sofa.

The lips of the one looking down at fifteen-year-old Entzi Bethelgius were painted that deep, vivid red — and they suited her extravagant dress perfectly, as if they could not have suited anything better.

Chloe. Entzi murmured her name to himself, quietly.

Chloe paid him no attention and continued.

"If you don't want it, you needn't take it. There are people in this world who would refuse even gold that controls nations — they find it too heavy a burden to accept."

A slender finger twirled, winding slowly through golden hair.

"But the Entzi I know doesn't seem the type. You have no intention of relinquishing any of it — not force, not power, not wealth — and it is remarkable, truly, that you have the talent to possess all three. The only thing you don't covet is love, isn't it?"

Well — love isn't an emotion that originates from greed, after all.

She murmured it to herself, barely audible. Entzi watched her without a word. Because he was not smiling, his sharp eyes made the grey irises within them appear colder than anything else in the room.

"Greedy Entzi. Take Balverdi. And in return — destroy Rubiette."

And then—

Chloe bent forward at the waist and whispered something at Entzi's ear.

'Did I fall asleep.'

Surfacing from shallow sleep, Entzi pressed his fingers to the corners of his eyes and let his blurred vision clear.

The ship's deck. He looked up at the dawn sky, still deeply blue, and understood that he had dozed off.

Out of instinct, his gaze swept the surrounding space — and came to rest on Goiyo, across the table.

Her back rose and fell in steady rhythm where she slept, covered by his coat. The two of them had been sitting opposite each other at the deck table, and had both, with remarkable companionability, fallen asleep face-down across their arms.

And beneath all of that: several empty wine bottles. Taking in everything before him, Entzi let out a hollow laugh.

He was not a person who fell asleep in the presence of others unless they were his own — which made this entirely unfamiliar territory.

It seemed he had gotten properly drunk on the few glasses of champagne consumed at the wedding reception.

Perhaps his tolerance had deteriorated from going so long without drinking, or perhaps the champagne had been stronger than he'd assumed. Or else—

Entzi, vaguely avoiding the obvious conclusion, finally exhaled.

Right. The champagne was not the problem.

He had not been in his right mind since the kiss.

In terms of the marriage they had just entered into, a kiss was hardly extraordinary — but there was a considerable difference between possessing one's reason and being without it entirely.

'What was that.'

Entzi bowed his head and covered his mouth with one hand. It was almost absurd — he had called himself impulsive not long before drifting off, only to be immediately swept up by exactly that impulse.

This is bad. The sound that escaped him was low, involuntary.

Whether she heard it or not, the brow of the sleeping Goiyo gave a small flinch. Entzi's body stopped entirely.

Holding even his breath, moving only his eyes, he watched her — and then the rhythm of her breathing evened out once more. He swallowed a sigh of relief, and found himself laughing at nothing again. What on earth was he doing.

Entzi slowly straightened from the table and turned back over everything that had happened. Fortunately, after the kiss there had been nothing else — only wine and conversation, until they had fallen asleep without realizing it.

Whether that alone was sufficient grounds to dismiss the matter as simply that — was an entirely separate question.

"Entzi...?"

The voice was thick with sleep. Startled, Entzi turned sharply. Goiyo had barely opened her eyes — she had not fully surfaced — and she was looking at him.

"Is it — cold? Why have you woken?"

"You speak as though something had been put into the wine. Am I not allowed to wake...?"

"Put into the wine — good Lord, just how far has my reputation fallen — Goiyo!"

She had been trying to rise, wobbling, when her foot caught the leg of the chair and her body lurched — and Entzi moved quickly to catch her.

She pressed her face into his chest instead of the deck floor, and wrinkled her eyes shut.

"Are you hurt anywhere?"

"My head aches."

"...That's the hangover."

"I feel dizzy, and I can't quite manage my body..."

"It's the hangover, I said."

"Is this a dream?"

"It's the wine."

You're not listening to a word I say. Through the sigh in the man's voice, Goiyo laughed without sound.

"It feels like a dream. If it isn't — I can't quite imagine you being this kind."

Looking back at the life she had lived — in the brief, passing encounters she'd had with him, and in what she had known of Entzi Bethelgius by reputation — he had been so entirely different from this.

In the past, he had been a cruel and cold-blooded wielder of power; now, though given to playfulness, he was perceptive and considerate.

Of course, Goiyo was not so foolish as to believe she understood a person fully from a handful of meetings. She was simply relieved, at least in outward appearances, that he seemed willing to treat her with respect.

How long would this gentlemanly façade last?

Goiyo had grown rather fond of his performance, and so she hoped — as much as possible — that it would continue for as long as possible. Perhaps even until the very moment she was killed, staged as an accident.

"Entzi."

"Yes."

"You said you had never loved anyone. And that you would never love me."

"...Yes."

I'll trust you. Your word. Leaning still against Entzi Bethelgius's chest, Goiyo's voice was low and murmuring. Sleep was finding its way back into her.

"I have no wish to trust anyone beyond this — but even so, without even that contradictory kind of trust, I don't think I could bear it."

"Goiyo."

"I'll trust you. Please..."

The rest of the words never came. Goiyo fell asleep again. Entzi looked down at the woman sleeping against his chest with a complicated expression. To trust him not to love her — what a strange kind of faith that was.

By any measure of life's storms, Entzi Bethelgius had lived a life that yielded to no one.

Goiyo Rubiette, on the other hand — now Goiyo Bethelgius, his wife — was, by his reckoning, no different from a flower raised in a hothouse.

Born and raised as the child of a distinguished family, she had spent her life in material abundance. She had never been spoken to harshly, never been dismissed or ignored. She had never curled up in the guilt of having taken a life, tormented by nightmares.

And yet — for someone who could not be said to have lived a genuinely smooth life — there was an old, weathered melancholy settled into Goiyo.

At the pinnacle of the aristocracy — when he had first laid eyes on her, daughter of the Rubiette Duke — Entzi had thought Goiyo entirely typical of her class. She did not easily show her feelings, and in any situation, she tried not to let herself come undone.

Then — whether Goiyo had grown accustomed to him or he to her over the course of their few encounters — he began to catch, in brief flashes, what lay beneath her composure. That interior of hers. Exhausted and distorted.

Was it truly so painful, the absence of love? Having never been one to fixate on love, Entzi found it difficult to understand — but he had no wish to dismiss it as a trivial reason.

Everyone carried their own suffering, after all. Something that no one else could truly comprehend.

Entzi gathered Goiyo Bethelgius into one arm. He retrieved his coat, which had fallen when she rose, and draped it back over her thin slip.

When she had stirred briefly, she had complained of her head — by morning it would be worse.

He swept the fringe from Goiyo's sleeping face and pressed his lips to her rounded forehead.

That too was an impulse — but given that he had already committed worse, one more impulsive act was not going to cost him anything.

The current that passed in the brief moment his lips touched her would unravel the headache and bring her a comfortable morning.

Just as he had made her cold disappear at the ballroom.

As he carried Goiyo in his arms and stepped off the deck, someone appeared before him. The black-haired man in sailor's clothing was one who had been in Entzi's service for a long time — his bondsman, Ekser Prebesk.

Ekser, who had been about to say something, found his gaze drawn to Goiyo.

"Why is Lady Goiyo—"

"She fell asleep. It seems she grew tired, talking and drinking as we were."

"I see. Allow me to carry her to her room."

"No. That won't be necessary. More to the point, Ekser — you'd do well to address her properly."

"Pardon?"

Entzi's eyebrow lifted slightly. To claim noble birth and yet possess so little discernment.

"It reflects rather poorly on the Bethelgius household when someone in its employ addresses the mistress of the house by her given name as they please."

"I apologize, my lord. I'll correct it."

Letting Ekser's words pass him by, Entzi settled Goiyo more securely in his arms. An apology was one of the words he liked least. It was a word that followed wrongdoing — always trailing behind, after the fact.

Having confirmed once more that Goiyo was sleeping deeply, Entzi spoke. His voice was cool.

"Look into Therio Alte."

"Erasing Alte entirely will be difficult. No matter how much the Emperor lends his support, with both ducal houses—"

Entzi cut off his subordinate's objection and asked, his tone unchanged.

"Since when have I been such an admirably virtuous leader as to respect the opinions of those beneath me?"

It was not an expression of visible displeasure — but the unease behind those cold eyes was communicated without reserve.

Looking down at the man who had gone rigidly still, Entzi smiled. The smile was faintly chilling.

"Bear this in mind, Ekser. The reason I stand above you is not that my mind is inferior to yours. If what you have to offer is not a worthwhile opinion, I have no desire to trouble my ears with what is unnecessary."

"I apologize."

"I'd rather not hear that three times."

Entzi walked past Ekser. The sound of the door opening onto the ship's interior stretched out like a shadow behind him.

Ekser stood motionless, watching Entzi open the door, and called after him with a darkened expression. My lord.

"I ask only because the thought occurs to me — you haven't developed feelings for the mistress, have you."

"You and Kolave both — you really are tiresome. That goes beyond speculation into delusion."

"I see that it does."

"Everything proceeds as planned."

I will erase Rubiette. With his back to the wind, he said it in a voice that drifted.

"There will be no reversal."

Runabern, the capital of Solaris, was a prosperous city.

Those who moved through its streets were, almost without exception, aristocrats or wealthy merchants, or their attendants — impeccably dressed, the cloth of their garments of evident quality. It was said that copper coins were never used in Runabern's streets.

But today, by rare exception, someone who did not look impeccable was passing through Runabern.

His dress — which must once have been of good fabric and fine cut — had the look of something washed and dried, but was torn in several places and had changed color in patches.

The people walking past gave him sour looks and stepped aside.

They did not, however, say anything unpleasant to him. The reason was the man's eyes — blazing, ominous, inside a tall, powerfully built frame. The long sword at his hip contributed as well.

A knight's solid physique, a strongly handsome face beneath heavy brows — this was Therio Alte.

Having barely escaped the Avalanche Mountain Range and secured a portal, he had returned to Runabern considerably sooner than Entzi had anticipated. Therio Alte was a knight of more than twice the caliber he was known for.

He had no emergency funds on him, however, and had lacked the nerve to announce himself as the young lord of House Alte in his current state of dishevelment — so his appearance, at least, remained exactly as bad.

Therio Alte walked with heavy strides and arrived before the Rubiette ducal estate in no time at all. A guard moved to stop him, then caught sight of Therio's face and flinched, pulling his hand back.

His voice was low and saturated with barely-contained fury. Open the gate.

"Tell them Therio Alte has come."