The following night, Licht came to Diana’s bedchamber out of habit.

As Empress, Diana could not order the Emperor out of her own room. Yet she lacked the courage to face him and sleep beside him. By instinct, she cradled the place where the child had once been and turned her back to him.

It did not seem that Licht had come with any intention of sharing her body. He did nothing of the sort.

Instead, he held her from behind.

When he first wrapped his arms around her as if embracing her, Diana startled visibly, her body flinching.

However he interpreted that movement, Licht only pulled her closer, tightening his hold.

Diana’s broken well of tears burst open once more.

Holding her as she cried, Licht passed the night in silence.

The words they had used to wound each other had already scattered somewhere beyond reach. More comforting than any spoken sentence was the warmth of that embrace.

From that day on, Licht came to Diana’s chamber every night.

After one hundred days, rumors of the Empress’s scandal were overtaken by tales of the Emperor’s devotion, spreading throughout the empire upon rumors layered atop rumors.

After two hundred days, the days Diana cried finally began to lessen. After a year had passed, even the nobles’ extreme demands that the Empress be expelled gradually faded away.

As despair faded from Diana’s face, Licht, who had been plagued by nightmares of killing his own brother, was finally able to sleep peacefully as well.

Diana was still tormented by guilt and violent impulses, but she tried to bury her more extreme thoughts. Letting go of her resentment toward Enoch, she chose instead to endure this suffocating imperial palace, to remain by the side of the man who had protected her, and to hope that someday she and Licht would meet their child again.

“Your Majesty, your expression improves with each passing day. I’m truly relieved.”

As always, Maria smiled warmly after finishing her examination.

Diana lifted her lips to return the smile. Not as well as before, but as Maria said, she was much better now.

“You’re worried the child hasn’t returned yet, aren’t you?”

“…It seems I still haven’t properly sent my baby off.”

“It will be all right. With how close the two of you are, it’s only a matter of time before another imperial grandchild comes.”

Looking down at the confident Maria, Diana nodded.

Though she and Licht had not resumed relations since the rebellion, that was not important for now. Diana was making an effort, enough to present composure and ease in her manner and speech, because she understood that such appearances were what secured her position.

She felt sorry toward her physician, but the one who had saved her was not a palace doctor, it was Licht, who had held her.

“Um, Your Majesty… there’s something I need to tell you.”

Just as the examination ended, Lily approached Diana carefully.

“The Duke has come to see you. He’s waiting in the reception room. What would you like to do?”

Henry Schuettmann, Duke Schuettmann.

After hearing of Wilhelm’s death, he had come to Diana, shouting at her to bear a son, only to be barred from the Empress’s palace.

The order had come from Diana herself.

Already cursing her father, Diana had driven Henry away both to sever ties with a treasonous house and to isolate herself from it.

Under ordinary circumstances, she would have refused his visit without hesitation.

But what she had heard of the Duke’s recent actions gave her pause.

“Maria, thank you for today. You may go.”

“Yes. I’ll see you next time.”

She had heard that the Schuettmann duchy’s debts were increasing by the day.

The sudden death of the young duke in the aftermath of the rebellion, and the imperial family’s cold shoulder toward the Duke, had destroyed the duchy’s credit.

Wilhelm, who had attracted investments across multiple ventures during his lifetime, was gone. Investors were now moving to reclaim their funds.

Even so, it was House Schuettmann. Diana had believed they would recover their finances without major incident.

But recently, she had heard that the Duke was borrowing money while parading Licht’s favor toward Diana as though it were his own.

“…Let’s go.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“There’s no need to bring tea.”

Diana moved with heavy steps. It had been a long time since she had last seen her father.

She considered entering the reception room with Lily, but decided against it. Seeing Henry’s true state was something she could do alone.

“I’ll go in by myself. And… go to the main palace now and inform His Majesty that the Duke has arrived.”

“Yes. Understood.”

Someone had likely already rushed to inform Licht.

Still, there was a difference between a palace servant secretly reporting and a message sent at Diana’s request.

Casting one last sharp glance at Lily, Diana opened the reception room door.

The moment she spotted Henry seated at the place of honor, she took in his abnormal condition and quickly locked the door.

“Father.”

“My child. My daughter.”

Henry staggered to his feet with unfocused eyes and approached her. The stench of alcohol wafted from him.

Coming to the Empress’s palace after drinking.

Was this a mockery of her, or had he truly fallen this far?

The thought that the palace staff might have seen him like this made Diana’s face burn.

“Have you been well?”

“Please, sit— Father?”

Without warning, Henry placed his hand on Diana’s abdomen.

She slapped his hand away instinctively, her vision swimming.

She was about to lash out at this unforgivable breach, but he beat her to it.

“The child. Not yet?”

“Father!”

“Where do you think you’re raising your voice? I asked if it’s not time yet, Diana.”

“Do you have any idea how rude what you just said was?”

“Rude?”

Henry widened his eyes and repeatedly tapped Diana’s abdomen with his finger.

She shoved his hand away and stepped back, but the more she retreated, the more Henry closed the distance.

“You think it’s rude? Do you even know whose favor put you in that position? How dare you say rude to me?”

Henry grabbed Diana by the hair and shoved her. Before she knew it, she was cornered.

She wanted to lift her head and tell him to stop, boldly, firmly, but old memories surged up without fail, and her vision swam.

“Diana.”

Henry staggered toward the fallen Diana, then folded his knees and sat in front of her.

A hand reeking of something acrid slapped roughly against her cheek. Her head rocked with each shove.

“You need to give birth to a boy. That’s your lifeline.”

Ah. That again.

A powerless laugh slipped from between Diana’s lips as she struggled to hold her head up.

At the unmistakable mockery, Henry yanked her hair and forced her head up.

The blond hair that three attendants had carefully arranged earlier that morning was ruined in his thick grip.

To cause this kind of havoc in the Empress’s palace, there was no telling how drunk he was.

No, was it only alcohol?

That sickening smell… it felt familiar. As if she’d smelled it somewhere before.

“You little b*tch—are you laughing at your own father?”

“It wouldn’t be my lifeline, It would be yours.”

“What?”

“You didn’t think I wouldn’t know, did you? That you borrowed money by selling my name and His Majesty’s—by even selling a child of mine who hasn’t been born yet?”

Still clutching her hair, Diana met the identical blue eyes staring back at her.

Henry looked startled for a moment, then, as if relieved, he shook the hair in his hand and spoke in a coaxing tone.

“Ah. So you’ve already heard. That makes this easier. Diana, my child, our family’s finances aren’t good. You know whose fault that is, don’t you? That bastard son-in-law who openly disrespected his father-in-law.”

“What did you spend the money on? You didn’t return the investments, did you?”

Diana couldn’t afford to speak at length. Still held by the hair, she had to straighten up as Henry rose.

Leisurely by comparison, Henry gripped and shook her hair as he rambled on.

“People keep asking what happened to that Wilhelm brat. Why there was no funeral. I told you already, didn’t I? That it was because of that damned son-in-law that we couldn’t even hold your brother’s funeral. With the palace blocking it, everyone whispers, says you dirtied yourself between brothers. Do you know how hard that’s been on me?”

“So, what did you spend the money on? I’m asking how you used the money you borrowed by selling your child’s name—!”

“Drank. Met women. Gambled.”

“…Was there anything else?”

Even as she faced his already ruined eyes, she hoped there wasn’t. Henry grinned crookedly and asked back.

“Oh? Is it that obvious?”

“…Father. How did you fall this far?”

“Fall? I fell?”

He had fallen, far beyond repair. Addicted to a powder that induced hallucinations through magic, how could he be normal?

“Father!”

Diana shoved Henry with all her strength.

So much force went into it that she lost her own balance and toppled over him.

The chair and table they collided with crashed loudly, echoing through the reception room.

“Diana! You crazy b*tch!”

Henry slapped the cheek of Diana sprawled over him.

“To buy the drugs…I need your child! Is that really something to make such a fuss over? Who taught you to act like this!”

Diana’s head snapped to the side, then again.

At some point, sensation had dulled. All that filled her mind was contempt for the man who saw an unborn grandchild as a source of money.

Was that really a father?

Were fathers supposed to be like that?

No.

If Licht became a father, he would never be like this.

“How dare you raise your voice at me?”

Henry shoved Diana off him and stood, grabbing a fallen chair.

“Give me a child within the month.”

“Without me—or my child—House Schuettmann is nothing now.”

Sitting on the floor, Diana wiped at her bloodied lip, split from the slap.

It would bruise.
How was she supposed to explain this to Licht?

The moment she sighed at the thought, Henry flew into a rage.

“You wretched b*tch! Who says that? I am Schuettmann! I am Schuettmann!”

As if struck squarely at his core, his eyes turned bloodshot.

In a single year, House Schuettmann had become a duchy in name only, no different from a fallen house.

It was a humiliation Henry could neither accept nor endure. And Diana had touched it.

At that moment, Licht’s voice came from beyond the door.

“Open the door.”