Finding the ‘woman’ might not be the most accurate way to put it. The first thing that caught his eye was the bonnet she wore. Spotless white—so white it bordered on bluish—the bonnet was moving toward him.

The woman walking away from the lord’s castle was alone. Just like he was alone, riding his horse toward the castle. 

The two were on the same path, so they couldn’t avoid each other. 

Who is she? 

Reingart watched the woman approaching with her head bowed.

He could tell at a glance she was a maid from the lord’s castle. This was partly because Reingart had been born in that castle and lived there for twenty-three years, but truthfully, anyone with a decent eye could have figured it out.

That spotless white bonnet. No commoner wore a bonnet so white and clean. No one except the lord’s maids.

The bonnet completely hid the woman’s face. She’d pressed it down meticulously so not a single strand of hair showed. 

She must be doing this deliberately, seeing how she didn’t raise her head even once despite surely hearing the horse’s hooves.

The woman seemed determined not to meet his eyes, and her stubborn avoidance stirred even greater wariness in Reingart.

The war wasn’t over yet. The Emperor, having conquered the central and eastern regions, had sent an envoy to propose surrender, but the two Grand Lords hadn’t responded. 

If Alonso of the central-west and Glen of the north joined forces to resist, Trisen would have to continue the war, and Reingart, who’d returned home today, would have to head back to the battlefield.

A suspicious woman. A woman walking at the edge of the path, seemingly avoiding him. 

His eyes fixed on that spotless white bonnet, Reingart pushed aside the relief and fatigue of returning home for a moment.

“Stop.”

He spoke when the woman came within ten paces. She stopped abruptly but still didn’t raise her bowed head. That made her even more suspicious. 

Reingart didn’t lower his guard.

“Are you a maid from the castle?”

“……”

“Raise your head.”

“……”

“Are you deaf?”

The woman didn’t answer a word, like a mute. Judging by how her whole body trembled, she wasn’t deaf. So what game was she playing by keeping her mouth shut? 

Reingart looked down at the woman with sharp eyes, gauging the possibility she might be a spy.

But why would they send a spy here of all places? Count Rothe was the Emperor’s financial advisor and knew nothing about military matters. 

Even thinking it through quickly, the pieces didn’t quite fit, but he couldn’t just let a clearly suspicious woman go.

So Reingart dismounted. Though he wore plain clothes for the long journey, he never removed the longsword strapped to his back or the two daggers at his waist.

He approached the woman and stopped about three paces away. The woman who’d seemed small from horseback didn’t even reach his chin when they stood face to face. Her clasped hands were surprisingly white and slender.

“Raise your head. This is your last warning.”

When he spoke quietly, the woman began trembling violently. Yet seeing how she still refused to raise her head to the very end left Reingart dumbfounded. 

What was she trying to do? 

He’d been riding for over a month on a long journey and had just returned home after a year, right on the verge of reaching his house. He had no patience left to argue with a woman who ignored his words.

So without hesitation, he raised his hand and drew the sword from his back.

The moment he drew it, he laid the blade flat and aimed it at her head. When he used the sword’s tip to knock off her bonnet, the woman jerked her head up in shock. Reingart finally got what he wanted—a look at her face.

Blue eyes stared at him, filled with fear. The blonde hair she’d hidden under the bonnet spilled over her shoulders. 

Was it his imagination that the curling blonde hair carried a floral scent? 

Reingart found his gaze drawn to the woman’s lips—those full lips parted in surprise—before he could stop himself.

This all happened before the spotless white bonnet, launched into the air, could even fall back down.

The two locked eyes, staring at each other. The early summer sun brightly illuminated the fields. The woman’s eyes, half-transparent in that light, were pale blue. 

Reingart thought the color was beautiful, then immediately lowered his gaze, pushing away such thoughts. He noticed the freckles scattered across her white nose.

A face he’d never seen before. A newly hired maid, perhaps? 

Since he’d left the castle a year ago, there could be unfamiliar maids. Reingart spoke to the woman, who’d lowered her gaze to avoid his eyes.

“Identify yourself.”

She was young. Seventeen, eighteen at most. Fine hair glinted on her pale, delicate cheeks. And her lips. His gaze went to those lips again, wavering hesitantly.

“I am…”

When the woman barely managed to force out a single word, Reingart frowned. Though it was just one fragmented word, the pronunciation was clear. 

He recognized the soft enunciation characteristic of the Common Tongue and the way her lips rounded when pronouncing “I.”

Someone who spoke the Common Tongue in Rothe Castle. He couldn’t help but intuit who the woman before him was.

“You don’t speak Trisen?”

Even so, the reason he didn’t show her respect was perhaps because he hoped his intuition was wrong.

“You… you can speak the King’s language?”

When Reingart spoke in the same language, the woman’s eyes widened. He didn’t respond, just kept looking down at her face. A strange sense of relief and expectation rose in eyes that had been filled only with fear.

The King’s language, really? 

The language of a fallen kingdom, more like. 

Reingart quietly laughed as he thought this wasn’t because of the woman’s phrasing in mentioning the royal house that had fallen last year. It was because of those clasped hands—those surprisingly white and slender hands—held tight in fear.

I must be blind. To see that and still think she was a maid to the very end.

“What brings you here, my lady?”

Reingart had to change his tone now. This woman was the King’s daughter, after all.

“Countess.”

And now she was his lord’s wife.

He withdrew the sword in his hand and sheathed it behind his back. Though the princess seemed disappointed that he’d easily seen through her identity, she didn’t appear greatly surprised. 

In Rothe Castle, the only person who couldn’t speak Trisen was the newly arrived Countess.

She’d stolen a maid’s clothes and snuck out of the castle, and figuring out what kind of person the only man who’d witnessed this was would be more important.

Reingart maintained an expressionless face while guessing what was going through her mind. Now that the princess knew he could communicate with her, she seemed somewhat relieved.

“Are you from Rothe Castle?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve never seen your face before. If you were a noble living in the castle, I couldn’t possibly not know you.”

“Then it must be because I’m not a noble.”

“The commoners here can’t speak the King’s language.”

“Some commoners can.”

He maintained formality but wasn’t entirely respectful. It wasn’t just because she was a princess of a fallen kingdom or the daughter of a tyrant. It was because of a certain premonition. An intuition that this encounter would cause extremely troublesome problems.

“Where are you headed?”

In situations this absurd, he found it difficult to treat her with utmost courtesy, even if she were an Empress.

“It’s dangerous to leave the castle without an escort.”

“……”

“Let’s return. I’ll escort you.”

“I won’t go.”

The princess forced out the words and stubbornly pressed her lips together. Reingart looked down at the golden crown of the woman standing with her eyes on the ground. Her abundantly curling hair gleamed with luster.

“I’m… going to see my brother.”

This just keeps getting better. Reingart laughed silently.

From what he knew, the princess had three brothers. Two who’d been knights were dead, and the surviving second brother was imprisoned. He probably wouldn’t live out his natural lifespan either.

“Brother Frederick is at a monastery. Mother is at a convent. Before I die, just once… I want to see them…”

When Kingsburg fell last year and King Delmas died, three members of the royal family survived. 

The second prince, the queen, and the princess were confined to a monastery and convent respectively by the Emperor’s command. 

Annihilating the royal bloodline of a conquered nation was the natural course of action. In a woman’s case, the proper disposition would be to have her bear the seed of the Emperor himself or his vassals.

The princess marrying Count Rothe was also for that reason. Since she became a proper wife—the Countess—rather than a mistress, she was extremely fortunate. 

Reingart had heard the news while staying at Mendel Castle after the final battle ended. He’d also heard that the Emperor showed such great mercy because the Empress had asked.

So instead of being grateful for that favor, she’d pulled this absurd stunt. It was simply ridiculous.

“I see. Which monastery are you going to?”

Reingart no longer hid his cynical attitude.