~CHAPTER 35~
“Miss Ortensa?”
Dianu flinched.
Neyron had approached without her noticing and was looking down at her with concern.
“Are you alright? You don’t look well.”
“A… I’m fine, really.
I was just a little startled.”
Neyron lowered his head as if embarrassed.
“My apologies.
His Majesty often speaks of how bright you are, but seeing it with my own eyes must have made me a little too eager.”
“…His Majesty spoke about me?”
The secretary’s eyebrows rose high.
Dianu avoided his gaze, feeling oddly self-conscious.
“In any case, please give it serious thought.
His Majesty may look like that right now, but I assure you his true feelings are…”
Muttering something unclear, Neyron suddenly gasped.
“Goodness, look at the time.”
His pocket watch pointed to four in the afternoon.
“If I let him sleep any longer, His Majesty will scold me for not waking him sooner.
Miss Ortensa, may I ask you for a favor?”
Dianu jumped as if burned.
It was the most absurd thing she had heard all day, and she had heard plenty.
“Me?!”
“Yes.
Just open that door and you’ll see him right away.”
“No, how could I, when His Majesty is asleep.”
A lady waking a sleeping gentleman.
That was something only people who shared a bed could do.
“It’s not even a bedroom, and he’s fully dressed.”
“Still…!”
“Miss Ortensa.”
Neyron gently gestured for her to calm down.
Dianu closed her mouth.
The imperial secretary looked straight into her eyes.
“If you are the first thing His Majesty sees when he wakes, it will gladden him.
That is why I ask you.
I have no other intentions.”
He glanced at his pocket watch again.
“For at least the next two hours, no one will enter this place.
I will be over there working.
Whatever happens in the next room, I will not see it, hear it, or remember it.”
Pointing toward his desk, he pressed his palms together and bowed.
“Please, have mercy on me.
His Majesty has been impossible lately.”
“Pardon…?”
“He’s always been picky about work, but never like this.
I’m losing my mind.
At this rate I’ll forget what my own daughter looks like.”
He looked at Dianu the way a man dying of thirst would look at a water spring.
His desperation was so sincere that she nodded before she understood why.
Neyron led her to the door of the Emperor’s office and even opened it for her.
He must have said “please take care of him” at least five times.
The door closed behind her with an ominous groan.
The office was dim with the curtains drawn.
The scent of wood, books, leather, and ink filled the air.
Come to think of it, he always carried this scent with him.
Rision was only a few steps ahead.
Dianu moved quietly, as if walking across thin ice.
When she no longer had the courage to take another step, she stopped.
She forgot to breathe as she took in the sight before her.
The long couch, more a work of art than furniture, was too short for his height.
His long legs stretched past the edge, yet he showed no sign of discomfort.
Two buttons of his shirt were undone and his chest rose and fell steadily.
A signet ring, which only he could wear and use, rested on the right hand placed over his stomach.
It looked a little loose, as though he had lost weight since it was fitted.
Dianu lifted her right hand and held it over his from a slight distance.
His hand was larger and rougher, but they had something in common.
The middle finger bore a callus where a quill would rest.
It’s the hand of a scholar.
Thinking that he might have been writing and studying in the palace every day while she was doing the same at Sirene Girls’ School made her feel strangely connected to him.
Someone she once imagined only vaguely was now asleep before her in the most defenseless way, undeniably real and physical.
His body, always so composed and strong, looked fragile now, like a porcelain figure that might shatter with one wrong touch.
For this moment, Dianu felt like she was the one protecting him.
Even if the only thing she could protect was a brief rest and a fragment of peace.
She crouched where she stood.
Their faces felt too close, but she couldn’t risk stepping back and making noise.
This might be the last chance she would ever get to look at him freely without interruption.
Resting her cheek on her knees, she sighed softly.
It had been a long time, and he was breathtakingly beautiful.
“Did you come to punish me?”
Dianu didn’t startle.
With this man, she might have lost the ability to feel surprise at all.
Still with eyes closed, Rision murmured,
“I have already been punished enough in my dreams.
Is that not sufficient?”
“What punishment did you receive in your dream?”
“In my dream, I…”
His voice sank.
He slowly raised his arm to cover his eyes.
“…was not a gentleman.”
Dianu let out a soft laugh.
“I can’t even imagine His Majesty being anything but a gentleman.”
He seemed like the kind of man who would have asked permission before crying when he was born.
But Rision did not laugh with her this time.
Dianu fell silent.
Suddenly she saw the scene objectively.
A dark room.
Rision lying with his clothes rumpled.
Her sitting in front of him, blankly staring.
Heat rushed to her face.
“I’m sorry for disturbing your rest.
Since you coughed, I should go…”
She tried to stand, but a hand gently closed around her wrist.
It was loose enough for her to escape if she wanted, but she froze as if struck by lightning.
“…Don’t go.”
His voice sounded like something long-restrained finally escaping.
“Just… stay there for a moment.”
Held by the wrist, Dianu slowly lowered herself back to the floor.
Rision, still covering his eyes with his other arm, moved his lips for a long time before speaking.
“Why did you come here?”
Dianu hesitated.
This wasn’t the moment for excuses.
So she spoke honestly.
“I wanted to see you.
I wrote a letter, but you never replied.”
“I thought that if I didn’t reply, you would eventually give up.”
He was unusually unkind.
His voice was slow and sounded as if he were suppressing something, almost like anger.
“But Miss Ortensa always finds a way to appear.”
Dianu tightened her grip on his hand.
What she felt was deep loss.
He wasn’t looking at her the way he always did.
His voice wasn’t warm or gentle.
It felt like discovering something precious only to have it snatched away at once.
Rision lowered the arm covering his eyes and slowly sat up, still holding her wrist.
For a brief moment, his green eyes looked almost black.
Dianu stared, legs tingling like her heartbeat.
Like a young creature unable to hold up its head, Rision murmured,
“I’m sorry.
I didn’t mean to hurt you.
Please don’t make that face.”
His voice carried a hint of resignation.
He looked so unbearably tired that Dianu forgot all her resentment.
She wanted to lie him back down and wrap him in a blanket until he slept for days.
“Your Majesty, I—”
Before she could finish, her numbed legs gave out.
She squeezed her eyes shut, expecting to fall at his feet.
But a firm hand caught her waist first.
Rision had risen before she noticed and held her steady.
His strength was startling, as if lifting her were effortless.
He gently placed her on the chair he had been sitting in, then knelt at her feet.
“Miss Ortensa.”
He held out both hands carefully.
Dianu let him take hers.
She realized she had missed this warmth for the past ten days.
“I enjoy the time I spend with you.”
She nodded.
It took courage to admit it.
“I enjoy it so much that I failed to consider the damage it might cause you.
And that is my fault entirely.”
“What do you mean?
How would Your Majesty harm me—”
“Please let me finish.”
His voice was gentle, but his eyes were firm, like a teacher keeping a child from arguing.
“Because you attended the Founding Day banquet, society is now watching you.
You won’t feel it while you stay in Oak Palace, but the closer you are to me, the more attention you will draw.”
It was true that gifts had been delivered to her since the banquet.
She had asked Viscountess Ornin to return them and forgot about it, assuming persistent suitors were to blame.
But Rision was suggesting something else entirely.
He drew a slow breath, as if gathering his resolve.
“If things continue like this, people will misunderstand our relationship.”
Dianu’s eyes widened.
Rision tightened his hold on her hands.
“Even if we deny it, even if nothing improper ever happens, they will believe what they want.
It will not cause any harm to me, but it will certainly harm you.”
His tone was dry, like reciting a theorem, but Dianu could hear the despair beneath it.
“You won’t be able to work as a tutor anymore.
A proper marriage—”
He paused, steadying his breath as though fighting down rising anger.
“—would no longer be possible.”
His lips trembled.
With nowhere else to look, Dianu stared only into his eyes.
“And the only compensation I could offer would be wealth and power.
But the Miss Ortensa I know would never trade her honor or her peace for those things.”
His fingers brushing the back of her hand were gentle.
Looking up at her with something close to pleading, he said,
“I know too well how these things work.
I will not throw you into that mess because of my selfishness.”
A hand rose slowly toward her ear.
Dianu realized he was touching the ribbon she had given him.
And she realized he wasn’t thinking about the ribbon at all.
“So please return to Oak Palace.
From now on, let us see each other only when necessary.”
He let go of her hands.
Not grabbing them again was the only choice she could make.
“And when the time comes, you will return to the place you belong.”
His green eyes held deep sorrow.
Dianu knew then that he meant every word.
She closed her eyes slowly.
The place where the knife had pierced her seemed to sting again.
