There was one reason Anais left the capital for Solean.

The wedding of her former fiancé, Louis.

She was fine when the Rossetti family, Louis’s house, finally fell into ruin and the engagement was dissolved. She was fine even when she barely managed to bring Louis alone into her father’s employ.

She believed that once Louis stood on his own feet again, they could be together. Anais believed she could marry him and live happily.

But she was the only one who thought so. Her father, Viscount Bellini, couldn’t understand why she kept shielding a childhood fiancé who was now a commoner. Louis resented her too, and never let her close.

Even so, she was fine. She consoled herself with the thought that someday, the two of them would understand her heart.

But watching her beloved former fiancé marry another woman and smile, watching him leave with a happy smile directed at her and a parting wish for her to take care, was a terrible feeling unlike anything she ever knew.

When he asked if she was happy, she said she was. With those final words, wishing her a new happiness of her own, Louis left the Bellini estate in the capital with his wife.

Leaving Anais behind.

And so, as summer drew near, she impulsively set off for Solean in the south.

The most famous resort and tourist city in the kingdom of Fiorenza, the one everyone flocked to when summer came. They said Solean had an endless stretch of eye-stinging emerald sea. That the sight of exotic mansions and castles built in white marble lining the steep coastal cliffs left you breathless with wonder.

Unlike the capital, the heat from the blazing sun was fierce, and the warm, salt-tinged wind carried the scent of oranges and lemons.

It was a place she never once visited. She had Louis, after all.

The image of Louis and Emily smiling brightly at her floated up again like a phantom. At the same moment, a familiar ringing pierced her ears. Anais squeezed her eyes shut.

‘Anais, just go and let yourself have fun.’

‘Right, the way to forget a man is with another man. Go spend a hot summer there. Got it?’

‘Just not with Grand Duke Visconti. I can’t stand to watch you get hurt any more than you already are. Understand? Better yet, go find someone worth marrying while you’re there. Someone passionate and fiery.’

Nothing worked better for pushing through the throbbing than calling up her friends’ voices. A laugh that was almost a sigh slipped through Anais’s red lips.

Grand Duke Visconti.

The one and only brother of the king of Fiorenza, and the master of Solean. They said every shallow epithet in existence, libertine, scoundrel, playboy, existed for him alone.

Word was he never saw a woman twice after sleeping with her. And yet, knowing that, countless ladies still made their way to Solean for a chance to get close to Grand Duke Visconti. Resolved to be the one who finally brought that man to his knees and made him hers.

A completely pointless endeavor. A man like that would never be caught by any woman. He was born with everything already at his feet.

A self-deprecating laugh slipped through Anais’s teeth. Unlike what her friends feared, she would never get tangled up with a man like that. A man like him would never find plain, dull Anais interesting.

But another man…

Surely there was at least one. A man who would like someone like her. Most of the people who flocked to this open, southern resort city came precisely for free and easy connections.

Right, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. If she could just wipe away all the tangled, messy thoughts, she felt like she could do anything.

She would forget everything.

She would leave everything tied to Louis behind in Solean. She would lose herself in that free and easy atmosphere and erase every complicated, chaotic thought.

Anais steadied her breathing. Her eyelids fluttered open, and her pale blue eyes turned toward the carriage window. At that same moment, Lily, the maid sitting across from her, screamed.

“Kyaah!”

The carriage lurched sharply to one side. Anais nearly let out an undignified scream herself.

“Miss, they say the wheel’s gotten stuck in the mud. It seems you’ll need to step out for a moment. Oh, what do we do?”

The road was in poor condition from the rain that kept falling ever since they entered the south.

Anais let out a quiet sigh and stepped down from the carriage. She and Lily, who held an umbrella over her to keep the rain off, made their way around to the back. Both of them fell briefly silent at the sorry sight.

“…… Do you think it can be fixed?”

It was worse than Anais expected. She wasn’t sure it could be resolved at all. The flustered coachman came over and bowed his head. Rainwater streamed endlessly down his forehead.

“Miss, I’m terribly sorry.”

“I share some of the blame for pushing on through the rain, so enough of that.”

She said it, but she felt just as helpless. They still had a long way to go before reaching the town, and there seemed to be no solution out here on a road where no one passed.

She rushed to get south as quickly as possible, and now this had to happen. A dreadfully unlucky day. The throbbing in her head started up again, and the warning signs of tinnitus followed. Just as Anais closed her eyes, Lily clapped her hands together and said,

“Oh? There’s a carriage coming, way over there, Miss!”

Her eyes snapped open. She looked in the direction Lily pointed. A large, magnificent carriage in deep navy blue was making its way toward them. The navy carriage bore the sun, Solean’s emblem, intricately worked in pure gold, and from a distance it looked exactly like golden lightning striking a black night sky.

With its enormous wheels and high body, the carriage gave off an imposing air, seeming to bear down on everything below it. Every spoke of every wheel was gilded in gold, making it easy to guess at the extraordinary wealth of whoever owned it.

The carriage came to a slow stop in front of her, and its window opened. A low, soft voice fell down onto the top of Anais’s head.

“My, it seems a beautiful lady has found herself in a spot of trouble.”

Her gaze traveled up to the high window and landed on a strikingly handsome man. A man who seemed molded from the very spirit of the free and easy south.

His dark brown hair had a single strand falling across his forehead, and even the rest, swept back, didn’t look carefully arranged the way noblemen in the capital wore theirs. His hair, the color of rich dark chocolate, looked like it might catch the light and turn red or gold.

The man’s amethyst eyes were fixed directly on Anais. She was unmistakably a noblewoman down from the capital, so perhaps that was why he stared. She held his gaze steadily, and in the time it took to blink, the man in the window was gone.

He reappeared, stepping down from the carriage and walking toward her. The tall man tilted his umbrella over Anais in place of Lily, who stepped back.

“I believe I can be of assistance. How about climbing aboard, my lady?”

The man who approached carried a faint smell of alcohol. And it was still afternoon. On top of that, his manner of speaking felt a little improper. Climbing aboard, he said. Anais swallowed a laugh.

In other words, he was exactly the kind of person she was looking for. To run into a man like this the moment she arrived in Solean, perhaps today wasn’t such an unlucky day after all.

A shirt with several buttons undone, hair falling loose, a smooth smile on his lips, a height far above most men. The man standing close gave off a considerable air of intimidation. If not for that smile hanging on his face, she might have stumbled back a step.

A man who seemed strangely dangerous. The kind you couldn’t find in the capital. Anais smiled, purely and genuinely pleased.

“How kind of you not to ignore a lady in distress. How ever should I thank you, sir?”

The man laughed brightly at her answer. She didn’t expect him to laugh like that, and her pale blue eyes widened slightly.

“Consider it repayment enough that you board my carriage. Your name?”

“Anais. Anais Bellini.”

“Lovely to meet you, Anais.”