Avilion would surely overlook this much. Just as Avilion had sent Aria Laird to save the man he loved so dearly, Isabella believed he would turn a blind eye to a lie of this scale told in the name of saving him.

“The prophecy is first conveyed to the priests…….”

Knock knock. The sound cut through Declen’s urgent words. It came so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that Isabella startled and drew back, and Declen shot to his feet and strode to the door, throwing it open.

“Y, Your Highness the Grand Duke. A guest has…….”

“You know very well that my only guest today is Lady Piper.”

The attendant who had come to announce the visitor trembled visibly under the weight of Declen’s low, unsettling voice. Isabella could see it clearly from where she sat. A flicker of sympathy rose in her at the sight, followed quickly by a question. Why had Declen’s mood turned so suddenly? The question had barely formed before the attendant spoke again.

“It is a priest from the temple, and he says he has something of great importance to say to Lady Piper.”

The attendant looked ready to burst into tears. Declen’s gaze shifted to Isabella. She was just as bewildered. A priest from the temple, and he has something to say to me?

“To Lady Piper?”

“Yes. He went to the barony first, but upon hearing that Lady Piper had come to the grand ducal estate, he made his way here.”

“Isabella. What would you like to do?”

She fixed him with a look for calling her Isabella so readily when they were nothing to each other yet. She did not know who it was, but she had to meet him. A priest from the temple, out of nowhere. How on earth was any of this unfolding the way it was? Even though this was her own life, Isabella felt suffocated by the endless chain of things she could not understand.

“I’ll meet him.”

The moment Isabella answered that she would, Declen’s face hardened and he gave the order for the priest to be shown into the drawing room. The invisible irritation packed into that order was not difficult for Isabella to sense. She would not have noticed it the first time she met him. But the memories of the brief time they had shared in the past, and all those years of reading his moods, made it easy enough to catch the hidden meaning.

“Your Highness?”

“Yes.”

“Would you mind stepping out for a moment?”

“No.”

“Pardon?”

The priest might have something to say to her alone. That was why she had asked him to step out, even though this was his own estate, but the answer that came back was a flat refusal.

“He is a priest from the temple. Whatever the temple has to say, I as captain of the Holy Knights have every right to hear as well.”

“…….”

Had Declen Clerc always been this willful? She wanted to push back somehow, but simply sitting across from Declen was already draining every last bit of her energy, so Isabella gave up on opening her mouth. She said nothing in reply and listlessly sipped at her lukewarm, cooling tea, and then came the sound again, knock knock.

Declen told whoever it was to enter, and when the door opened, a man in a snow-white vestment walked in.

“Good day. Grand Duke Declen Clerc. And.”

“…….”

“Lady Isabella Piper.”

Isabella could not take her eyes off the figure walking slowly into the drawing room, the teacup she had just set down still in her hand.

“Why have you come as a priest? Your Holiness.”

“There are far too many restrictions on moving about as the high priest, are there not? In any case.”

“…….”

“How have you been, Isabella?”

The man brushed past the grand duke’s question and drew slowly toward Isabella, who sat in a daze, and spoke. She could not answer. Your Holiness? The high priest? He had appeared out of nowhere and asked how she had been, and Isabella could not find a single proper response.

She had no idea how he had risen from a low-ranking priest to the position of high priest, but the moment Isabella looked into his eyes, she knew. It struck her like a bolt of lightning. That Reymon, a low-ranking priest of the Avilion temple and the one and only friend she had ever had, remembered everything that had happened in the past.

—Why are you crying here?

From the very first moment they had met,

—I believe you, Isabella. It’s all right. You’re going to be all right.

Reymon, now standing before her again, knew everything, all the way up to the moment she had taken her own life. The existence of this single person who knew all the things she could never speak of to anyone made tears spill down Isabella’s cheeks before she could stop them.

“Isabella!”

Declen rushed over the instant he saw those tears and swept them away with his large hand, but Isabella could barely see him. She could only see Reymon. Reymon, smiling that gentle smile of someone who knew everything.

“……Your Highness.”

“Yes, Isabella.”

“Would you please, just for a moment, step out?”

“…….”

“Just a moment is all I need. Just a brief moment…….”

Isabella spoke with her lips pressed tight together, not even thinking to wipe away the tears still falling, and Declen finally let out a breath and moved to nod. But the one who stopped him was Reymon, who had done nothing but smile.

“No. Your Highness the Grand Duke, there is no need to step out.”

“Reymon?”

“What I have to say concerns you as well. Understand, Isabella.”

Reymon stepped closer and patted Isabella’s shoulder as though telling her to calm down, and Declen’s face went rigid. Reymon watched Declen’s expression grow colder and colder until it turned to ice, then slowly opened his mouth.

“I, Reymon Liams, servant of the divine, hereby attest that all words spoken by Lady Isabella Piper of the Piper barony in the name of the divine are true.”

“What did you just say?”

“I attest that every word Lady Isabella Piper of the Piper barony speaks in the name of the divine is true.”

“…….”

Both Isabella and Declen fell silent. Neither knew how to respond, and into that silence Reymon spoke again.

“That is all I have to say. I apologize for interrupting your conversation. Please, continue.”

He bowed to take his leave and turned to go, just as suddenly as he had appeared, and Isabella grabbed him in a panic. Declen standing beside her ceased to exist. She needed to know. She had to know.

What was happening right now? How a man who had been a low-ranking priest had reappeared with the standing of a high priest. How he remembered everything. Why was he vouching for all the lies she had told in the name of the divine and calling them true? There was no end to the questions.

“Reymon!”

“Isabella. Finish your conversation first, then come.”

“What?”

“Come to the temple soon. I imagine we’ll have a great deal to talk about.”

Reymon took the hand Isabella had used to grab him and held it lightly, smiling brightly in a way that said he would be glad to answer every last question. Isabella had no choice but to release her grip on his collar. Right. She could see Reymon later. He had told her to come to the temple, and he would be waiting for her there.

First, finish the conversation with Declen. Even through the chaos, Isabella sorted her priorities quickly and settled on that conclusion. Reymon glanced back at the two of them, offered his farewell to both Declen and Isabella, opened the drawing room door, and was gone.

“…….”

“…….”

Cold silence settled over the room after Reymon left. Isabella was still trying to figure out how to pick up the thread of conversation when Declen’s voice reached her.

“Please, sit, Isabella. I’m worried you’ll tire your legs.”

“Thank you, Your Highness.”

Relieved that Declen had been the one to break the awkward silence, Isabella looked at the teacup that had gone completely cold. Declen must have caught the direction of her gaze, because he called for an attendant again and ordered fresh tea and desserts to be brought out.

“Excuse me.”

A different attendant from before came in, set down refreshments and a fresh cup of tea steaming with warmth, and withdrew. With everything restored to how it had been at the start, Declen spoke again.

“How do you know the high priest?”

“I’d prefer to set aside the matter of Reymon and return to the main subject, Your Highness.”

The moment she said she wanted to cut off that personal thread and get back to the point, she could see Declen’s shoulders go stiff. It was the first time she had seen him like that, and it was strange and unsettling, but Isabella held firm against the part of her that wanted to soften.

This was all for Declen. She could not afford to go soft when it was for the sake of saving him.

“As I said a moment ago, I would like the marriage to last one year.”

“You said the prophecy would be fulfilled within one year.”

“Yes.”

“I suppose I have no grounds to doubt that. You said Avilion told you so, and the high priest himself has confirmed it.”

One year. There was a reason Isabella had named one year. In one year’s time, the saint Aria would appear. When she did, the two of them would fall in love again, and Isabella could simply disappear. She had to leave before the woman who had turned everything back, furious that Isabella had broken her promise, told him everything and said the words: Isabella Piper is the reason you died so miserably.

“Then I’ll state the remaining conditions.”

“Yes.”

“When the year is up and the prophecy is fulfilled and we come to divorce…….”

“…….”

“Please don’t look for me.”

And if Isabella acted exactly as Declen had in the past, dying for her sake, then Declen, alive and well as he was now, would fulfill Avilion’s prophecy without any obstacle standing in his way.

* * *

The ball that no self-respecting noble in the Tenat Empire would dare miss was now just one week away. Commoners who could not attend would normally have paid it no mind or felt only a vague, distant longing, but this ball was different.

This ball was one that nobles who could attend and commoners who could not were alike counting down the days to.

“Is it really true that the baron’s daughter is coming with His Highness the Grand Duke? Surely not.”

“Surely not? My maid saw it with her own eyes, I tell you. Carriages filing one after another into that barony!”

“And how many times have those carriages gone to the barony now? She’ll have refused again, just like all the others.”

A noblewoman who had been listening with a bored expression looked at the speaker as though she could not stand the slowness, and cut into the conversation.