“Shall we go out and take a look?”

At my words, Hanna grabbed a white cape made of light fabric, clearly having been waiting for exactly this, and Elren put on his top hat and readied himself to head out as well.

If they wanted to go that badly, they could have said so sooner. I dislike myself for being so oblivious at times like this.

I pulled the hood of the cape Hanna handed me down low and waited for Heliones at the edge of the crowd gathered for the parade.

“Your Majesty the Emperor!!”

“Long live the Frianc Empire!!”

The shouting grew louder and louder, and white petals, likely a mix of hydrangea and rose, began to drift through the air. To the sound of grand music, the magnificent carriage carrying Heliones slowly rounded the corner and came into the stretch of road where I stood.

“Ahh! Oh my goodness! It’s really His Majesty the Emperor!”

“He’s so much more handsome than in the newspapers!”

Just as the girls exclaimed, Heliones, the young Emperor who had now turned twenty-four, was breathtaking, the way someone might look if all the blessings of the world had been gathered and poured into a single form. His immaculate white uniform gleamed against his dark hair, and the gold epaulettes and the gold sash beneath them complemented his ash-gray eyes beautifully.

Just as I expected. I knew it would be like this. There he stood, looking so magnificent in so perfect a setting, and yet Heliones’s expression was exactly as I remembered.

A faint frown between his brows, a thin composed smile held only by his mouth. Whether maintaining that expression was simply difficult, or whether the crowd chanting his name was the cause, his lips seemed to twitch ever so slightly from time to time.

He was no longer someone with any connection to me, but I wanted things to go well for him. That gentle man who had stroked my back would be a good Emperor for his newly reborn empire.

Please, may your path ahead be full of blessings.

I looked up at Heliones with a smile full of sincerity. In that instant, something unbelievable happened. Heliones turned his head toward me, and our eyes met.

Thump. The crowd was so dense there was no room for even a needle, yet the noise around me fell quiet in an instant.

Thump. Heliones smiled at me, a bright, open smile unlike any I had ever seen from him.

Was this real? For a moment I felt the way one does in a dream, but the girls around me were jumping up and down and screaming, which brought me back to reality quickly enough.

“Ahhhhhh!”

“Did you see that? Did you see it?”

“Was he smiling at me?”

While I listened to the hopeful theories of the women around me, the carriage carrying Heliones passed by.

Surely not. No, surely not.

Right. It made no sense. How could he possibly recognize me at the very edge of the crowd, with my hood pulled down low on top of that? And even if he had, why would he smile like that, of all things?

Maybe there was a cat nearby. He was stingy with smiles for people but generous with them for animals, so if he had spotted a cat draped lazily in a window somewhere, napping in the sun, that would explain the smile.

Yes. That must have been it. It doesn’t even make sense that he could recognize me from that distance in the first place.

I pressed the hood down and did my best to calm my heart, which kept leaping about in the strangest way.

Whether it was the heat of the crowd around me or something else, a peculiar warmth kept rising to my face. And yet, strangely, I had no desire to take the hood off.

A deep, dark dusk settled over every street of the capital.

Through the gaps in the low-lying stratocumulus clouds, scattered shafts of light still carrying the brilliance of a sun not yet fully surrendered to the dark fell here and there upon the ground.

It was a beautiful sunset. A fantastic modulation of day into night, perfectly suited to the Emperor’s birthday.

I arrived at the imperial palace without even having time to properly take in that beautiful view through the carriage window.

I had known the imperial palace was nearby, but seeing it in person made it feel even closer. Had it not been for the trailing gown, I could have walked.

In front of the imperial palace, carriages that had arrived before mine formed a line, waiting their turn to enter. This was the Emperor’s birthday banquet, after all, and all those invited were nobility, so every carriage was magnificent without exception.

Including the one I was riding in, which Heliones had sent for me himself.

A short while later, my turn came. With a crisp knock, the carriage door opened.

The attendant handling arrivals that evening seemed to recognize Elren at a glance, but still went through the motion of checking my name against the guest list.

“Lucian is now entering.”

Ah, could you say that a little more quietly. I hadn’t come here to draw attention.

I lowered my eyes slightly and stepped out of the carriage with Elren’s support.

Hanna had been arranging my skirt until the very last moment, and she was pouting with obvious disappointment at not being able to accompany me into the banquet hall.

“It won’t take long.”

I stroked her thick golden hair once to comfort her, then took a deep breath.

Well then. Shall we?

I had thought I was already accustomed to the sting of scrutinizing gazes, but two years of easy living had apparently softened me considerably.

I had known it would be like this, the princess of an enemy nation attending the birthday banquet of the enemy’s Emperor, and I had steeled myself for it, but the gazes driving into me like arrows made my legs feel ready to give way.

Get a hold of yourself. My presence in the capital is already known, so I came here to be of help to Heliones. Don’t lose sight of the purpose. I did not come today as the Duchess of Gertil. I don’t need to concern myself with the music, the decorations, the food, or the staff.

I simply needed to serve as a reasonable buffer between Heliones and any women who approached him too aggressively.

I had come to the banquet to help him get through the evening without too much burden, and to try to get a sense of who his next partner might be.

In truth, what would I actually know from watching? My opinion would never factor into the selection of an Empress.

But as someone who simply wished him happiness, wasn’t it worth looking, on a personal level, for a woman who, unlike his former wife, had grown up without wounds, without scars, without broken pieces, someone wholly warm and wise?

Having spent my life being evaluated, I would reverse the position tonight and assess the prospective Empress candidates with sharp eyes.

The smooth, flowing sound of the orchestra filled the air naturally, and the grand ivory curtains decorating the large hall created quite a soft ensemble together.

True to the occasion of an imperial banquet, the flawlessly arranged setting was filled with guests who were themselves flawlessly turned out.

Among them, the unmarried young ladies in particular wore flowing pastel-toned gowns and dazzling jewels, and they looked so much like flower buds just beginning to bloom that I found a fond smile on my face before I knew it.

Have I ever looked like that? No, of course not.

In my late teens I had been surviving day by day through ab*se that never let up, and after marrying I had been living a false life beside a husband who deceived me.

A stem torn and snapped before it could even form a bud would have been doing nothing but struggling desperately just to survive.

The radiant eyes of the women before me, full of anticipation for tomorrow and dreams of love, that kind of brilliance was a distant dream and an unthinkable luxury for someone like me.

In that moment, the gazes of the young ladies, fairy-like as they were, turned as one toward a single point. At the end of those gazes, naturally, stood Heliones, the host of tonight’s banquet and master of the imperial palace.

The flowers parted on either side. The women bowing their heads one by one looked like wildflowers swaying in a cool breeze drifting from the forest.

I did not dare join that fragrant procession and stood a little further back, offering my bow to the Emperor from there.

Everyone wanted to catch Heliones’s eye, and everyone wanted to exchange words with him.

With a faint flutter in my chest, I tried to guess which lucky woman he would greet first.

A moment later, defying my expectation, and everyone else’s, Heliones came toward me.

“I greet His Majesty the Emperor.”

I was a little taken aback, but I thought it might actually be the wiser choice, selecting me, who held no political influence whatsoever, rather than appearing to favor anyone in particular, and I offered a polite bow.

“Thank you for coming, Lucian.”

Heliones received my greeting with composure. He did not use the extreme formality he usually did, nor did he call me his wife. It felt simply like an Emperor addressing a subject.

How strange. Not one of the things I had worried might happen had come to pass, and yet a dry wind blew through one corner of my heart again. Not tonight. I cannot manage the dust today.