#3. The Banquet, ‘Aidan’s’ Funeral

“Will you be able to move?”

Karina asked, swallowing a sigh.

“I think you’re taking this too lightly. It’s not just a casual tea party. It’s an imperial banquet hosted by the Empress. Not only will most of the nobles be there, but even royalty from neighboring countries will attend. We’ll have to greet them all and dance in front of them that day.”

The Empress’s faction would be looking for any opportunity to find fault with Aidan. In front of them, even the smallest mistake wouldn’t be tolerated. Even after reminding him of this reality, Aidan didn’t seem particularly tense.

“Then we just have to avoid making mistakes, right?”

His answer seemed not just relaxed, but almost out of touch with reality. Unfortunately, even if he had memorized all the nobles’ faces, dealing with them was another matter entirely. Moreover, the biggest problem was the dancing. According to him, he had lived somewhere completely different from the Griffith Empire. Could someone like that perform a dance suitable for imperial etiquette? Probably not.

“Do you know how to dance?”

“Depends on what kind of dance, doesn’t it?”

Her head was starting to ache at his flippant response.

“Surely you don’t think you can just dance any way you like at the banquet?”

“Of course not.”

What on earth was giving him such confidence?

“Then we should start dance practice right away.”

“Well…”

This time his answer was a bit vague. When she narrowed her eyes at him, Aidan smiled brightly.

“When is this banquet scheduled?”

“Five days from now.”

“Five days… That might just be enough time?”

Karina frowned at his ambiguous answer.

“It’s actually quite difficult to move right now, but in five days, I should be better than I am now.”

“It’s amazing that you think you can change so much in just five days.”

She hadn’t meant to be sarcastic. She just genuinely wondered if anything could really change in just a few days.

“The banquet being in five days means you need to learn the dance before then, but you said you can’t move right now, didn’t you? If you can’t dance properly at the banquet, we’ll only end up being criticized.”

Despite Karina’s concerns, Aidan didn’t seem to show any sense of crisis. There was even a gentle smile on his lips.

“What do you think the original Prince would have done in this situation?”

She hesitated at the sudden question. She remembered the same banquet from her previous life. She recalled how Aidan had acted then.

“You wouldn’t have attended at all.”

Her voice turned cold as she remembered that time. That’s right. In her previous life, before he changed, Aidan had not attended the banquet at all, using the excuse of being injured and unwell. Even then, the Empress and Lloyd seemed determined to embarrass Aidan, insisting on holding the banquet despite knowing he had been attacked and was bedridden.

‘I’ll just be a laughingstock if I go anyway. I don’t want to go.’

Aidan had adamantly refused to attend the banquet, and with the physician’s statement that he was not yet in a condition to move, he proudly skipped the event.

“Not attending, huh… If I don’t go, what about you?”

At Aidan’s question, Karina bit her lower lip before releasing it. This banquet arranged by the Empress was to celebrate the arrival of the new princess consort in the imperial palace. When she had reported that Aidan was absolutely unable to attend, the Empress had said that at least Karina should attend. In the end, Karina had attended the first banquet held at the imperial palace after their marriage alone, without Aidan.

However, with her dance partner absent, she had to sit through the entire banquet without dancing with anyone, enduring everyone’s whispers and sidelong glances. At that time, Aidan was in his bedroom, being nursed by Kate Spencer.

Remembering it made her feel choked up again. What kind of humiliation had she endured throughout the banquet because of that stupid, worthless bastard? Even knowing that the person in front of her had different insides, she felt like slapping this Aidan.

“Why did your expression suddenly turn scary?”

It seemed Karina’s expression had frozen more coldly than she thought. Aidan asked, seemingly unable to understand.

Right, this guy is different.

She reminded herself once again and took a long, quiet breath. Only after her churning insides had calmed a bit did she meet Aidan’s gaze.

“Even if Your Highness doesn’t attend, I’ll probably have to go. It’s an event arranged by Her Majesty the Empress to celebrate welcoming the new princess consort, after all.”

Whether she liked it or not, she had to attend and maintain her presence. That was Karina’s role as the ‘princess consort.’

“Then what’s there to worry about? Whatever my condition is in five days, of course I should attend such an event.”

Karina’s eyes widened at Aidan’s words. It was an answer she had never expected. The idea that it was natural for him, as her husband, to accompany her to an event celebrating her arrival was so unfamiliar and shocking. She had never received such consideration from Aidan in her past life. That’s why she was so surprised, even though it should have been obvious.

“Don’t tell me you were thinking of attending alone if I really couldn’t make it? That’s too much.”

The last ‘that’s too much’ seemed to be a joke, as a playful smile lingered on his lips.

“That definitely won’t happen, so don’t worry. But I do have a favor to ask.”

“What is it?”

“First, find me a dance partner to practice with you.”

A dance partner to practice with me? She wondered what he meant.

“I’ll manage somehow in five days, but it’s unreasonable for me to practice dancing right now. So, show me yourself dancing with someone else.”

Show him? Could it be…? As she was furrowing her brow, wondering if her thought was correct, Aidan answered first.

“I’ll memorize it, the whole thing.”

She almost blurted out ‘What?’ at his overly simple answer. His memorization skills had already been proven when he memorized the nobles’ portraits. Not only that, but he had accurately understood and memorized the vast amount of history and geography books he had read over the past few days.

However, putting written information into one’s head and moving one’s body were two different matters. Even Karina, when learning to dance as a child, thought she understood in her head but ended up stepping on her partner’s feet several times when actually moving.

“Seeing and doing are quite different, you know.”

Being good at studying didn’t mean one could apply everything they learned well. Dancing was something that had to be learned by actually moving the body.

“Don’t you trust your big brother?”

Big brother? She reflexively frowned at his playful words.

“You can trust me. I absolutely won’t make any mistakes, so don’t worry.”

She couldn’t keep up with Aidan, who was swinging between jokes and seriousness.

“If possible, it would be good to have someone who won’t spread rumors outside. How about Kai? He’s guarding that door all day anyway, so it would be good if he could spare some time to dance with you in front of me.”

Listening to him made her feel dizzy. Some time? Did he just say ‘some time’? He’s saying he’ll memorize and follow along without actually moving, just by watching for that short time? She couldn’t tell how much of it was sincere and how much was bluster.

The banquet was in five days, so excluding the day of the banquet and today, there were actually only about three days to prepare. Just three days. While thinking it was nonsense to claim he could memorize the dance just by watching in such a short period, part of her also had a vain hope that if it was him, it might be possible.

“If it really doesn’t work out, we can make some excuse on the day.”

There was no other option anyway. It was already praiseworthy that he was willing to attend the banquet, unlike the previous Aidan. If she judged on the day that he absolutely couldn’t dance, she could refuse to dance with him herself. If she, the official consort, didn’t dance with him, others couldn’t dance with Aidan either. Of course, the same applied to Karina, but whether she could dance or not didn’t really matter.

Refusing to dance with Aidan would probably spark rumors of discord, but it might be better than revealing that he was too injured to dance. Even so, if possible, to prevent the discord rumors from worsening, if she could show an affectionate appearance with him throughout the banquet…

“Karina.”

While she was considering all sorts of possibilities, Aidan called her.

“There’s one more thing I’d like you to do.”