SN Chapter 15

But it did not take long for things to come to pass. The year Elpydion turned eleven, the Emperor took a new Imperial Consort. An Empress of mean birth from a rural viscount house—too poor to have ever been seen in society circles, a woman whose very name no one knew. Her only assets were a pretty face and beautiful hair that shone like moonlight.

The Emperor's appetite for beautiful women was public knowledge, so no one was particularly surprised. The problem was the two children she brought with her when she entered the capital. A ten-year-old boy with hair exactly matching the Empress's color, and a five-year-old girl—none other than the Emperor's own children. Supposedly born during the Emperor's border inspection, or so the story went. The imperial household turned completely upside down.

There are no bastards in the imperial house. Only princes and princesses of lesser rank. And yet the Emperor had concealed the children's existence. Why? Just as everyone's questions were mounting, the boy was formally recognized as a member of the imperial family and given a new name.

Rikardis Dareux Illavénia. The eternal land upon which divine sunlight shines. He was to be the Second Prince who would elevate that name.

The mystery of a prince who had appeared at ten was soon resolved. It was announced that Rikardis possessed holy power surpassing that of First Prince Elpydion. In a nation under divine protection, holy power was the greatest force of all. Whether Rikardis wished it or not, he was fated to have his name written among the candidates for Crown Prince. A mere viscountess turned Empress would have had no power to protect him. She must have delayed their entry into the capital simply to keep him alive. From that point on, the imperial household never knew a peaceful day. One more name had been added to what had been a list of one.

Unlike Elpydion, who received Crown Prince instruction at the palace as a matter of course, Rikardis had experienced war and politics firsthand. Those who found their path in his footsteps joined him one by one until, only by now, had a faction comparable to the First Prince's taken shape.

Assassination attempts had been a constant presence since Rikardis was formally recognized as a member of the imperial family, but in recent years they had begun coming with the desperate conviction that the two of them could not breathe the same air beneath Idelabheim's sky. Dragged into that struggle, Rikardis's only full-blooded younger sister lost her life. It was from that point that Rikardis threw himself into the succession struggle in earnest.

As if everything until then had been a joke—mere warming up—he expanded his faction and accumulated achievements with a new seriousness. Growing anxious from this, the First Prince had seized the convenient opportunity of the hunting competition to attempt yet another assassination. Going so far as to join hands with Balta, Illavénia's longstanding adversary.

Truly, it was stupidity so comprehensive that one did not even know where to begin pointing it out.

"Having failed, you must be quite eager now. My knights are exceptionally skilled, after all...... Should I have taken the trouble to tell you in person that that level of effort was not nearly enough to send me before Idelabheim, Count?"

"What frightening words, Your Highness."

Count Seacrag mopped continuously at his sweat as he answered. Rikardis let a cold smile settle on his lips.

"A jest. Indeed. This attempt was rather painful, I'll grant you that. My men are not the sort who should die so pointlessly in Vista."

Rikardis wiped all trace of amusement from his face. It had been a night like a nightmare. His life had been no comfortable thing, but among all its nights, that one had left a mark on his chest. Shallow groans forced through clenched teeth. The crack and shower of sparks from crossed blades. Torches burning through the air. Footsteps snapping through undergrowth.

'Protect His Highness the Prince! Defend Lord Rikardis! The enemy uses poison—watch for it! Your Highness! Please, get clear—!'

'WHITE NIGHT ORDER! As sworn beneath the radiance of Idelabheim—lay down your lives!'

He had thought it all empty ceremony once. But they had truly died protecting him, exactly as they had sworn. His mouth tasted bitter. Knights who had guarded his side for years, gone on account of something as paltry as poison. By the time he tried to use his holy power to heal them, it was already too late.

If only he hadn't fled. If only he'd fought alongside them——

Regret is always too late. No matter how swift.

He had to repay it somehow.

This fucking feeling. He had to make that bastard feel it too.

Rikardis's eyes settled into cold stillness.

In the months since the hunting competition, the faces of his senior knights had begun showing steadily mounting exhaustion. The assassination attempts hadn't dwindled after the failure—they had intensified. Poison during the day, daggers in the night; his escort was on constant alert with no adequate rotation to relieve them. Did that idiot Elpydion not know the meaning of strategic withdrawal? Rikardis cursed him internally, with considerable enthusiasm.

"Their deaths were not without meaning, Your Highness. They had the honor of giving their lives for you."

"What a ridiculous thing to say. I have no need for those who die for me."

"Even so, Your Highness requires an escort."

"I happen to have something to say regarding that matter."

Rikardis rested his chin in his hand and regarded Stas—Knight-Captain, Count of Autumngloam. Prickly but loyal; his vassal, tried and true. Rikardis waited, quietly, to hear what the man would say.

"I wish to add Dame Rosaline of Redwheel to the escort detail. Your Highness's judgment is required. May we proceed?"

Rikardis's expression went hard. The expressions of the surrounding vassals contorted in tandem.

"There can't be another Rosaline of Redwheel within the Illavénia Empire, I would think."

"Not to my knowledge."

Stas's expression was perfectly even. Rikardis ran a hand through his hair and laughed.

"You have quite a gift for jests, Count. Are you actually suggesting I place someone from Redwheel—a house that wipes Elpydion's boots—at my side?"

"Twelve recommendation letters from the new Vice-Captain, Sir Nathan, have accumulated on my desk. He is neither one to be swayed by flattery, nor one lacking in judgment. I have worked alongside him since his days as adjutant and know him well. That he should advocate with such force suggests there is sufficient reason for it. And in my own assessment—Dame Rosaline is a knight I could call capable, were it not for her house."

Stas passed Nathan's recommendation letters to Rikardis. Rikardis read through all twelve, one by one. In the meantime, Count Seacrag flushed red and argued against Stas's position. The business was truly preposterous. To assign a daughter of House Redwheel—faithful servants of the current Emperor, yes, but also throwing their support behind the First Prince—to an escort role requiring her to be attached to his side at all hours of the day?

"She may be capable enough if not for her house, but that house is precisely the greatest problem!"

"The assassination attempts will only increase, and escort personnel are thinner now than they have ever been. There are many skilled with a blade, but few of whom I am convinced they are wholly loyal to His Highness."

"Then are you saying she has given you that conviction? Even though she is Redwheel?"

"Even so. She has."

Rikardis read the letters with his eyes and heard the argument with his ears. Well. She was more resourceful than he had anticipated. To have caught the eye of a man like Stas—the sort you couldn’t slip a needle through—that was not nothing. From the vice-captain's twelve letters and the knight-captain's measured words, he read genuine conviction about her.

Over their argument, another voice was laid. It was Marquess Grandram, who had been listening quietly all along. He stroked his mustache and spoke in a low, pressed-down tone—in the manner of someone who found the whole matter distasteful but had no choice about it.

"My boy keeps that phrase practically glued to his tongue—that she's different from knights who are all talk. Trustworthy, loyal to the bone, talented as a commander, a good girl, hardworking, and so on and so forth. One might think she were his own granddaughter." A pause. "In short. She is qualified, or so he says......"

With the Marquess's support, the scales began slowly to tip. Even from Redwheel—someone who had recognized the Second Prince's true worth and given her life for it. Diligent. Sharp. Someone who understood what honor meant.

But Rikardis still didn't like her.

He hated her eyes—hated them until his teeth ached—always offering to die for him at any moment. If you lack the ability, don't push yourself forward. Fool. All of it was misfortune she brought upon herself.

"Well." Rikardis twisted his lips into something resembling a smile. "Perhaps she'll turn out to be the bluebird who brings me word from Elpydion's nest."

It was an expression that looked decidedly unpleasant.

"Let's see how she does."

Long service to the Order, or simply being a strong fighter—these were not the only conditions for becoming a senior knight. Each and every senior knight was versed in law, protocol, and politics, and held the authority of a commander capable of leading soldiers at any time. Perhaps for that reason, while lower-ranked knights counted commoners among their number, senior knights were drawn primarily from the children of high noble houses.

The current White Night Order had ten senior knights. Trainee knights would apply to whichever senior they most respected, and the senior knight would take on applicants after weighing a range of considerations—house, character, potential for growth, among others. The trainees followed their senior, learning swordsmanship and assisting with their duties.

Rosaline, now a senior knight herself, had both the right and the responsibility to take on trainees of her own. The problem was that not a single person had applied to serve under her.

Raymond had considered thrashing the trainees under him into going, but he could not force it on men who rebelled in the manner of men who'd rather have their heads cut off. If the trainees didn't follow her of their own genuine will, the only one who would suffer for it was Rosaline.

And then—what was this. Stacked before him were application letters from trainees who wished to receive Rosaline's instruction.

Raymond nodded.

Nestor of Seacrag.