“What?”

“Nothing, never mind.”

Blair shook her head briskly at the thought that at this rate, she might be the one doing the eating.

“What are all those documents?”

Blair pointed to the papers on the nightstand beside the bed.

“A proposed tariff agreement to present to the Armos Islands.”

“Armos?”

Kalintz nodded and settled on the edge of the bed. He picked up the documents and gestured with his eyes for her to come look.

“We opened a new trade route last year and commerce has been quite active. I thought the tariffs might need some adjustment, so I prepared this in advance.”

“When did you find time for all this.”

Blair sat down beside him and looked over the proposal with a murmur.

“From the moment I heard the young duke of Armos was coming.”

She had known he was more diligent than he appeared, but the proposal was remarkably detailed, accounting for even the smallest considerations.

“Some of these terms are quite aggressive. This clause in particular, I don’t think the other side will accept it.”

“What makes you say that?”

“The risk Armos would have to absorb is significant. And what they’d gain in return isn’t particularly practical.”

At that, Kalintz smiled faintly.

“You’re right. Armos would never accept it.”

“Then why include it…… Oh! You put it in deliberately, to make the other clauses look less risky by comparison?”

Kalintz gave a satisfied nod at Blair’s quick reasoning.

“You have a talent for negotiation. Far better than the people who call themselves diplomatic envoys and just take up space.”

Then, just as quickly, he muttered with a displeased look.

“And on top of that, you’ve earned special gratitude from the young duke of Armos.”

“That wasn’t intentional. I didn’t help him knowing who he was.”

“Which is exactly why it made such an impression. That slippery man.”

Kalintz finished the rest of the water in his glass.

“……Either way, it’s a good thing it didn’t turn into a diplomatic dispute. Thank you, Blair.”

Kalintz met her eyes, and Blair felt oddly flustered and pressed her lips together.

“You put a great deal of effort into the relationship with Armos.”

“It’s the more advantageous position in the long run. Eiron is too closely tied to the Valia Duchy right now. Given that Willer Brienne is behind that relationship, building a new power base is necessary.”

“For Princess Lina’s sake?”

Kalintz nodded.

“That, and more. Lina must not become queen through Brienne’s hands. That would be handing the entire Kingdom of Eiron over to him.”

Blair thought back to the conversation between Count Roman and Duke Brienne she had overheard in the garden. The duke was terrifyingly greedy, that much was certain.

“Well, removing Brienne was always part of the plan, so not much changes.”

Kalintz said it as though it were a minor matter.

“So you don’t need to look so worried.”

“……Yes.”

Blair nodded and glanced at Kalintz.

Is he all right.

His left cheek, where Vivian had struck him, still held a faint redness.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

Kalintz caught the look with uncanny precision and asked. Blair hesitated for a moment, then spoke.

“Are you…… all right? Earlier.”

At the question, Kalintz dropped his gaze briefly, then answered in a low voice.

“I’m used to it. Though I was a little surprised she still hits that hard at her age.”

He said it with a self-deprecating smile.

“……Did she use violence often.”

“Too many times to count.”

The ease with which he said it made Blair’s nose sting.

“You said it got worse after Princess Lina was born?”

“Her nerves were at their peak. Brienne was constantly sending assassins after me, and then Lina was born on top of that. She believed my position as heir was in danger.”

He continued with an expressionless face.

“When I was young, I didn’t even know it was *buse. I thought all education was like that.”

“That…… that wasn’t education.”

Force-feeding a child ten plates of meat. Wrapping a child’s wrist in bandages in the name of correcting how they held a knife. None of that was education.

“Even so, I believed she loved me. I had to. There was no other way to endure it.”

At Kalintz’s bitter smile, Blair felt a dull ache in her chest. What must that child have felt, having to believe even that was a mother’s love.

“It was after that incident that I realized something had gone terribly wrong.”

Blair instinctively recalled what Kalintz had said to Vivian earlier.

‘Are you planning to strangle Lina again. Like you did before.’

Had something like that actually happened.

Kalintz looked at Blair’s wavering eyes and slowly opened his mouth.

“I must have been around twelve. My father was taking a walk in the rear garden with Queen Rhea and Lina. I happened to be passing nearby and held Lina for a while, playing with her. My mother must have seen.”

The story was already unsettling.

“I don’t know how long she had been following behind. I simply went into the trees at the back of the garden with Lina, saying we were going to look for freesia flowers. My father must have thought it was fine since I was there.”

“Don’t tell me……”

“There was no time to greet my mother when she appeared. She shoved me aside and lunged at Lina.”

Blair held her breath and listened.

“When I came to my senses, Lina was lying on the ground, struggling. And my mother was there. Her hands around the throat of a five-year-old girl.”

His voice sank lower and lower.

“That wasn’t my mother. She looked like…… a demon.”

The gold of Kalintz’s eyes went dim as he recalled that day.

“I threw myself at her with everything I had to pull her away from Lina. It came to a physical struggle. We were rolling around and I was stabbed in the side by a branch. I think it was the first time in my life I came close to bleeding out.”

“……Good heavens.”

“It was only seeing that blood that brought her back to herself.”

The palace was thrown into chaos, but since Kalintz had long been plagued by assassins, his injury was made to look like an attack by a hired killer.

“That was also when my father learned of my mother’s *buse. After that, her quarters were moved to the most remote northern annex of the palace. She was placed under surveillance and forbidden from going out freely.”

Kalintz paused and closed his eyes. The weight of the pain came through plainly.

“That was the day I decided I needed to leave the palace.”

He continued in a calm voice.

“My reason for going to such lengths as faking my own death to leave this place is partly because I am exhausted by it. But it is also for my mother.”

“You want to free her.”

If Kalintz, the very embodiment of the love and hatred and obsession that bound her, were to disappear, she too might find freedom.

“Who knows. If I’m gone, she may be released from the pain that has been strangling her.”

Blair felt something rise sharply in her eyes at the sight of his bitter smile.

What that twelve-year-old must have endured. The fear, the pain. It was too much to bear thinking about.

“Was my story that tragic.”

Kalintz noticed Blair’s glistening eyes and murmured with a faint smile.

The quiet voice only made it worse. The grief that had been welling up finally slipped free and fell down her cheek.

“I didn’t tell you this to make you cry—!”

Kalintz could not finish the sentence.

“……Blair.”

His voice was startled by the sudden embrace.

“I just…… wanted to comfort you.”

Blair herself was a little surprised. The moment she thought she wanted to hold him, she had already pulled him into her arms before she knew it.

But one thing was clear.

“Someone told me this is what helps when things are hard.”

She wanted to comfort him. If this could ease even a little of the pain from those years.

The firelight flickered quietly over the two of them.

Kalintz sat rigid, unable to move in either direction.

It was, without question, a great comfort. The problem was simply that the advice was being carried out on a bed.

I had just managed to settle down.

Having barely slept the night before, still feeling the memory of the deep kiss in the garden, Kalintz let out a quiet internal sigh.

He debated whether to pull her into his arms properly, and in the end let his awkwardly suspended arms fall.

“Blair.”

Something in his voice sounded stiff. Blair pulled back slightly and looked up. Kalintz’s expression was oddly tense.

“I’m all right now.”

“Pardon?”

“The comfort is…… enough.”

He said it while frowning like someone in mild discomfort.

Did pulling him into a hug out of nowhere put him off. Enough to make him frown like that.

Blair felt embarrassed, and quietly a little hurt.