“I know. A lady’s duty is to respect her husband’s private life and pretend not to know even when she does. But with two eyes, how can I not see? Everything is visible.”

“How much.”

Reizen’s brow furrowed deeply. He brought his finger to his lips thoughtfully.

“Tell me how much you know, Melissa.”

Though his eyes were on Melissa, weren’t their thoughts both elsewhere?

“Are you worried about what I might have discovered?”

Melissa’s chest heaved heavily.

“You want to hear everything to the end, don’t you?”

Whether from anger or excitement, her heart was pumping like a seizure, making it difficult to continue a normal conversation.

“But like Your Highness, I’ll only tell half.”

Melissa stood up first.

“I’ll see you in the room later, Your Highness.”

“Ha.”

Reizen laughed cynically. Not wanting to see that expression with her own eyes, Melissa left the restaurant without looking back.

* * *

Small lies grow in volume until they shatter trust. And suspicion starts from the tiniest things.

Whilton’s words.

“Is that all because of the seal’s effect too?”

“I know it’s because of that damn seal!”

The maid’s words.

“My lady. His Highness won’t return until late afternoon, shall we go see the ocean together?”

“No, with Miss Florence…”

Reizen’s words.

“It’s not because of a woman.”

“There’s really nothing between Florence and me.”

Unfortunately, the soundproofing at the Glinford Hotel wasn’t very good.

While her nerves were on edge from the seal’s manifestation making her sensitive to surrounding sounds, strangely, conversations she didn’t want to hear reached her ears.

As this continued, her suspicions only deepened.

Melissa had been curious about him and felt attraction even before the seal manifested. She wanted to stay with him constantly and trusted Reizen.

‘But did he feel the same?’

Without the seal, would this marriage have been maintained in the first place?

Would Reizen have even suggested having dinner with her?

Would he have come to rescue her when she was kidnapped?

Even after coming, it was the same. Though he was a kind person, even if he had come to rescue her, would he have truly empathized with her pain and embraced her?

All of this assuming there was no seal.

With each question mark Melissa added, her chest grew tighter and more anxious.

If she fulfilled her usefulness by having a child as the Emperor wished, and when the seal’s effects became minimal then, would Reizen abandon her too?

Melissa sat in the hotel room staring at an open book for a long while.

Though she was looking at something, she was too lost in thought to do anything.

Knock knock.

“My lady.”

Laila came with a letter.

“A letter arrived at the hotel for you, my lady. The staff delivered it, but there’s no sender written. Should I just handle it?”

It seemed she came to get Melissa’s permission about handling the letter, feeling uneasy about just throwing it away.

Melissa nodded with a blank face.

“Please handle it.”

“Yes!”

Laila cheerfully answered and grabbed the doorknob to leave. At the creaking sound of the closing door, Melissa’s eyes snapped open and she stopped her.

“Wait.”

No sender but a letter addressed to Melissa meant that someone had discovered where Reizen had hidden her in this forest hotel.

Some anonymous person.

“I’ll look at it and handle it myself.”

“Oh, yes. Here you go.”

Laila came back and handed the letter to Melissa.

The letter’s appearance wasn’t very neat to begin with. She opened the letter with its ragged envelope edges and casual seal without any stamp.

Though it felt like she hadn’t seen the sender in ten years, they had been together just 3 months ago. So there was no way Melissa wouldn’t recognize it.

It was Rael’s handwriting.

* * *

Rael sat at the desk.

In the quiet dark night with just one gas lamp lit, she picked up a carelessly placed quill, dipped it in ink, and began writing the introduction.

With her left hand wrapped in a round bandage, she had to repeatedly put down and pick up the quill to smoke her cigar.

Smoke rose and wreathed Rael’s face. As it did, Rael’s face grew younger until she was holding hands with ten-year-old Melissa.

It was autumn, the season of harvest.

Before puberty, the twins were each other’s best friends. Their grandfather was a gruff man who wasn’t affectionate with the young twins. Perhaps that’s why they realized early on that they only had each other to rely on in life.

“Mel! Mel, over here!”

Rael was a tomboy. Though she knew they’d get scolded if caught, she would pull Melissa along to play by the river.

Rael lifted a rock as big as herself with a grunt, then urgently called Melissa.

The fish hiding under the rock couldn’t get far before being caught in Melissa’s hands.

“Got it!”

“Ahaha!”

The palm-sized fish in the container twisted and thrashed its whole body.

“Sister, I think we have a talent for hunting. Isn’t this a gift? I might become a hunter.”

Rael put her hand on Melissa’s shoulder and spoke like a macho while holding the fish container. Melissa’s face turned bright red as she shook her head, splashing water.

“Grandfather would be furious if he knew.”

“Coward. What, we can’t even talk about it?”

Rael glanced at Melissa with clouded eyes and pushed her. With a yelp! Melissa fell backward, flailing in the river water before getting up.

“Hey!”

When an angry Melissa chased after Rael to catch her, she would run away quickly.

Those were our good memories. The mischief we made together as children.

Like putting a frog on sleeping Mrs. Miellin’s head. Or hiding in corners giggling secretly from the maids until we got caught and ran away. Or when the nanny told us to go to sleep but we stubbornly turned on the gas lamp under the blanket to tell scary stories until we ended up burning the blanket…

Ah, after burning the blanket, our side hair stood up like lightning for a while and we were completely banned from social activities.

‘We were so close back then.’

Looking back, the twins were more than just sisters or friends – they were soulmates.

Even with different dress tastes, if Melissa wore something, Rael would wear the same, and when shopping for shoes, if Rael was uncertain, Melissa would choose for her.

On scary nights with lightning, they would comfort each other sleeping tightly embraced in one bed.

As they grew up, they would tell each other first when worried and think of solutions together. The relatives who came up from the provinces for social season events were always the biggest headache for the twins.

When nasty people like Marita bothered them, they would put their heads together to make plans or quickly go tattle to Selheim.

Back then, everything they grasped together seemed natural. They shared everything without hesitation, and being identical, they considered each other half of one soul.

The problem was… from the moment Melissa was ‘chosen’ by grandfather.

“Melissa, from now on you must receive Crown Princess education. You can’t go play by the river with Rael anymore. Running around barefoot in front of others is something commoners do.”

The education schedules that had always been together became different. The time they could play together decreased, and at some point Melissa acted like a different person, treating Rael as an annoying child who lacked maturity.

“Elly, I told you. I have to wake up early. I’m tired. I can’t play right now.”

That’s when I learned that relationships hurt more the closer you are. Though the other person may not have intended to hurt, Melissa’s rejection came as a shock to Rael.

Before they knew it, even their social circle friends became different.

Melissa often went to the palace with grandfather and made new friends she brought home. Now she would giggle and tell scary stories under the blanket with that friend instead of Rael.

Rael, who had snuck out with a lamp to play together, saw this scene and carefully closed the door again.

From then on, a sense of alienation began creeping up and rising like smoke around Rael’s entire body.

‘Sister has many people besides me…’

Being twins of the same age, same face, raised in the same household, people naturally compared the two children.

How Melissa was, and how Rael was.

But the one who always claimed the victory flag between the two was Melissa.

“Oh my, Lady Grey is so graceful and beautiful. As expected of the future Crown Princess. Compared to her…”