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A strange atmosphere hung over the audience hall.

Olivia had arrived first. She looked Blair up and down with a thin, unpleasant smile. Blair met the gaze and let her eyes say what she couldn’t put into words.

How utterly shameless.

Whether the message landed, Olivia’s smug expression soured for just a moment. But only a moment. She put her false smile back on and looked away.

“Miss Blair Mervish? Please come this way.”

The king’s chief chamberlain appeared and guided her to her seat with a businesslike manner. Since this was not a formal trial, the inquiry was being conducted informally in the audience hall.

Blair sat down and looked around the room.

Familiar faces caught her eye. Tilda, looking miserable with worry, and Selina, wearing an expression of clear displeasure.

“……Hm?”

From across the room, Selina mouthed something.

Don’t let her…… win?

She gave a prim little look and snapped her fan up to cover her mouth. It seemed that seeing Olivia’s true face had done nothing good for Selina’s opinion of her.

Tilda, beside her, raised a fist in a small show of support.

Blair answered their encouragement with a light smile.

“Quite composed for a murderer.”

A voice came from behind her, cold enough to raise the hairs on her neck.

“Smiling like that, after killing my daughter.”

She turned and found herself looking into a pair of flat, murky grey eyes.

Willer Brienne.

He was exactly as the rumors described. The dark grey hair swept back from his face was immaculate, not a strand out of place, and his jaw and mustache were trimmed with the same sharp precision, making him look utterly without weakness.

On top of that, despite being past fifty, he stood tall and unbent, and the sheer weight of his presence was crushing.

“Either you have no shame. Or something is wrong with your mind.”

And his character, as the rumors also described, was not good.

“……Duke of Brienne.”

Blair fought to keep the fear from showing and put force into her voice.

“I am, regrettably, a frons in perfectly sound mind and body.”

The duke’s eyebrow twitched. He looked genuinely affronted, both by having his words thrown back at him and by Blair introducing herself not by name and title but as a frons.

“Ah, a frons. That’s right. During their time at the palace, they are to be treated as befitting a princess consort, regardless of rank.”

The overbearing voice carried a note of mockery.

“And so.”

Duke Brienne stepped closer and looked down at Blair as he spoke.

“You expect that treatment from me as well?”

The duke’s threatening manner made Blair’s hands tremble without her meaning to, but she clasped them tightly together to hide it and opened her mouth.

“A man of your standing is looked up to by all. Naturally, you would uphold tradition and custom. Especially in a place with this many eyes watching.”

She glanced briefly around at the nobles gathered in the audience hall.

“……Ha. Impertinent.”

The answer had not been what he expected. Duke Brienne’s face twisted.

“I think you’re under a misapprehension, Blair Mervish.”

He stepped even closer, leaned down, and murmured low into her ear.

“Did you think I would concern myself with something like that.”

The voice was low and cruel enough to raise every hair on her body. The air froze in an instant, and she was still searching for the right words to say back when another sharp voice rang through the audience hall.

“It would be very unwise not to.”

The voice was familiar.

“……Your Highness?”

Kalintz crossed the room with quick, perfectly composed strides.

“H, His Highness the Prince has arrived.”

A flustered attendant rushed after him and announced his arrival belatedly. The assembled nobles bowed and paid their respects.

“……Your Highness the Prince.”

Duke Brienne inclined his head toward Kalintz, who had stepped in close in front of Blair.

But Blair couldn’t bring herself to greet him right away.

Kalintz looked nothing like his usual self. The easy smile that was always there had been replaced by something cold and still.

“Duke Brienne.”

The voice that came out was utterly cold and dry.

“Does the duke perhaps believe that His Majesty the King and this kingdom exist beneath your feet?”

The duke’s eyebrow twitched at that.

“What a preposterous thing to suggest.”

“The frons and the courtesies owed to them are set down in royal law and the law of this kingdom. Their history stretches back to the founding era.”

Kalintz’s amber eyes settled low and flat.

“I say this because the duke appears to be disregarding that.”

“……She is the woman accused of killing my daughter.”

“And if she isn’t?”

“I believe she is.”

“Ah. You must have something prepared. Given how certain you seem.”

The tension between them pulled the air taut.

Blair’s complexion was worsening by the moment in the suffocating atmosphere.

She was looking down at her hands, clasped so tightly together the blood had nearly stopped, when a large hand covered hers.

“……!”

“Blair. Ease up. You’re all right.”

A gentler voice reached her. He wrapped his hands around hers, where the knuckles had gone white from the strain.

Strangely, the fear that had been coiling tight inside her loosened a little.

And at the same moment, the murmuring of the nobles in the hall rose around them.

“Oh my, His Highness just took Miss Mervish’s hand—!”

“Goodness, he’s so bold, isn’t he.”

“So the rumors were true. I’m envious. When will I ever have a love like that.”

The nobles, now witnessing the prince’s rumored romance firsthand, whispered to each other with fascinated expressions.

To their eyes it was romance, of course. To the people actually involved, it was something else entirely.

“Um, Your Highness. This hand, could you perhaps……”

Blair herself felt like her face might actually burst from embarrassment.

Her fingers kept squirming, and Kalintz seemed to realize what he had done and flinched. But that was all. He let go with a studied air of nonchalance.

Blair was so exasperated by the shamelessness of it that she shot him a sideways glare.

Across the room, Olivia watched the scene and let out a quiet curse under her breath.

“Wretched woman.”

She found it strange that Duke Brienne was suddenly making such a scene, but she didn’t dwell on it. Her only goal was Blair’s downfall.

The chief chamberlain’s voice rang through the audience hall.

“His Majesty the King and Her Highness the Queen have arrived.”

Every eye in the room turned at once.

Duke Brienne shot a look at Kalintz and then Blair in turn, then moved quickly to his place.

Blair was about to bow in greeting to the king and queen when Kalintz’s voice reached her.

“Brave Miss Blair. You remember what I said yesterday?”

He had returned to his usual tone and manner.

“If you need my help, say the word. I’ll be somewhere very easy to see.”

He pointed to the ornate chair beside the throne and smiled.

“……Thank you, Your Highness.”

Blair felt reassured, and at the same time felt something strangely fluttery, and looked away from his eyes.

They bowed their heads with the others as the king and queen entered.

“All right, that’s enough.”

King Rubens dropped into the throne with an audible thud. He did not look pleased about any of this.

Queen Rhea and Kalintz took their places on either side of him, and the king spoke.

“As you all know, an unsavory rumor has been circulating within the palace of late.”

Unsavory rumor. The mild phrasing made Olivia’s face tighten slightly.

“This inquiry has been convened to determine the truth behind that rumor. This matter warrants a thorough investigation, but at Duke Brienne’s earnest request, we are proceeding informally. I ask for your understanding.”

The tone made his displeasure clear. He had been pressured into opening the inquiry quickly, and he wasn’t hiding how he felt about it.

He has that kind of power. Even over the king.

Blair felt the weight of Duke Brienne’s influence settle over her afresh.

“Then. Let us first hear what Olivia Lorentz has to say.”

King Rubens raised a hand to signal her to begin.

“Yes, Your Majesty. First, I am so grateful that you have taken the time to hear me and that you—”

“Get to the point. We can do without the pleasantries.”

The king, in no mood for it, cut off her practiced preamble. Olivia’s face flushed red, and she cleared her throat to push past the embarrassment before continuing.

“As everyone here knows, not long ago, Miss Anais Brienne lost her life in a tragic manner. It was a poisoning. By robetaine.”

Olivia closed her eyes slowly, as though overcome with grief. The nobles gathered in the hall sighed and murmured in sympathy.