Beriel answered with difficulty, holding back her tears. The moment her answer ended, Raiden began heading toward the West Palace. Throughout the walk, he told Fenor to reschedule the main palace appointments, and Fenor quickly changed the schedule while following behind him. Beriel also followed Raiden, swallowing several times to suppress her urge to cry.

The fact that Raiden had caught her cowardly behavior made her feel like the sky was falling and the earth was splitting. This was the first time Raiden had ever looked at her with such eyes or gotten angry with such a voice. Biting her lower lip and blaming it all on Rihana, the rolling stone that had come from nowhere, was perhaps natural for her.

Fenor couldn’t help but sigh at the sight of Beriel, whose face had turned pale and whose eyes looked ready to cry as they walked. He wasn’t unaware that she had been watching Raiden for a long time, but interfering in these petty ways wouldn’t help her win Raiden. He could only hope she would realize this herself.

Then suddenly, Raiden’s quick steps stopped. When he stopped, his subordinates following behind him also halted simultaneously. Raiden let out an irritated sigh and turned around sharply to look at Beriel.

“Don’t tell me you’re still thinking about the position beside me?”

At his words, Beriel’s face crumpled slightly.

“So you pull this annoying sh*t…”

When Beriel’s body flinched weakly at Raiden’s angry voice, he didn’t continue his words. Instead, he spoke to her in a firm and resolute voice.

“I have no intention of keeping anyone beside me except Rihana. From now on, Rihana will be the only woman for me.”

“Your Highness, your succession is a very sensitive matter for the Kingdom of Tarecus. There are many listening ears.”

Fenor bowed his head and pointed out his words, meaning he shouldn’t speak so carelessly. Raiden raised one eyebrow and looked at Fenor, but then turned his gaze back to Beriel and continued.

“So don’t do pointless sh*t like this. Doing this will only make me more anxious about Rihana…”

“Your Highness, watch your language. There are many listening ears. Maintain your dignity.”

Fenor glanced around and pointed out Raiden’s crude language again.

“Dignity is the problem? When my wife is meeting with her ex-fiancé, I’m stuck here because of a subordinate who stabbed me in the back?”

“Your Highness, Lady Ariella is not yet your mate.”

Fenor pointed out Raiden’s words once more. Beriel fell into deep despair, realizing that Raiden’s feelings for Rihana were more solid than she had thought.

Rihana Ariella was originally a rolling stone. A d*mn stone from the Empire trying to easily take the position she had built through blood, sweat, and tears without any effort, pushing out herself who was already embedded there. 

From the moment Raiden said he would hide his identity and infiltrate the Empire, she had a bad feeling and opposed it so strongly—a fragment of her subconscious had been worried this would happen.

Beriel had worked hard to become someone who wouldn’t be lacking at all standing beside Raiden. For a very long time, she had been running toward the position beside him, and furthermore, toward the position of Queen of Tarecus. 

When it came to Raiden’s affairs, she tried to step forward and handle them even if it meant overextending her family’s capabilities. Although she had no power of her own, Raiden was always a great and flawless prince, but she worked tirelessly to be even the smallest help.

The reason she became his aide was also in this context. To help him, and furthermore, hoping he would become so dependent on her that work and life would be inconvenient without her. 

Of course, the most important thing was to become his aide and perform the kingdom’s duties to draw recognition that Beriel Taniaran was indeed the most suitable candidate for the next queen, but she also hoped Raiden would need her.

So all her hardships until now had been for one thing only—to become Raiden Tarecus’s wife—but Raiden had fallen completely for a black-haired woman he had briefly known in the Empire.

She didn’t know how that ominous black-haired woman had bewitched Raiden, but that calm and chillingly cold face was unpleasant enough to be considered a witch. 

Once she reached the point of thinking of Rihana as a witch, Beriel made a firm resolution to somehow save Raiden, who was thoroughly bewitched by that witch.

Instead of Raiden, who couldn’t come to his senses because he was bewitched by her, she thought it would be better to persuade the witch who had been forced to marry into the kingdom, because she had heard rumors about her broken engagement with her fiancé. 

Since the engagement was broken due to the Empire’s rebellion with a fiancé she had liked for so long, she might want to return to her fiancé’s arms.

Actually, the best thing would be if she ran away hand in hand with the fiancé who came today, but since that would involve the safety of their country and even their personal lives, she thought they probably wouldn’t go that far. 

So today they would just have a heartbreaking reunion and part ways, and she would just need to throw some stories that could shake her heart even more when it was already wavering from that painful reunion.

For example, how long-standing the bond between Raiden and herself was. Or how handling all the major and minor affairs of the kingdom would be much faster and more satisfying if she did it instead of Rihana. Or that she was Raiden’s first woman. There were plenty of words to provoke and stir her up.

To a woman who already had a man she loved, the longtime woman of the man who would become her husband through political marriage would surely be annoying, so it would be natural for her to leave.

Yes, she thought that would happen.

* * *

“The Marquis from the Empire?”

Raiden asked Felton as soon as he arrived at the West Palace.

“He has left.”

“Rihana.”

“She’s in the bedroom. She complained of a headache, so the physician has been by.”

At Felton’s report, Raiden’s steps toward Rihana quickened. Beriel and Fenor moved toward the office, and Felton still followed Raiden, reporting Rihana’s condition as diagnosed by the physician.

Rihana was standing on the balcony of Raiden’s bedroom, which had the best view of the garden, looking down at the garden. The words she had spoken directly to Casian with her own mouth had suddenly filled her heart completely with feelings for Raiden.

After saying the words “I love you” out loud, she felt even more in love. That strange and bewildering emotion transformed into boundless affection for Raiden, and when he opened the door and came in with a worried expression about her aching head, she reached the conclusion that she absolutely couldn’t do without this man now.

“Does it still hurt? You don’t have a fever though. The physician said it would be a passing headache, but is it light enough to pass? If it keeps hurting, tell me, I’ll cut down that quack b*stard.”

Though he wasn’t usually talkative, he was somehow rattling off things he wanted to say like a chatterbox. Rihana knew this was Raiden’s clumsy way of comforting her, and her lips curved up naturally at that warmth.

“But what did that b*stard say to give you a headache?”

Of course, he definitely had this childish side too.

“It’s not because of that person.”

“That person?”

Raiden’s expression immediately contorted. Rihana quickly corrected her form of address and shook her head once.

“It’s not because of His Grace.”

Only then did Raiden’s expression soften slightly as he embraced Rihana and let out a long sigh.

“Then why does it hurt?”

“Just… Did you finish your business at the main palace?”

“Yeah. The council meeting wasn’t originally scheduled for today. So the ministers who suddenly gathered were also unprepared for the meeting agenda. Anyway, we decided to hold the meeting again within a few days.”

“…Really?”

“Yeah. Let’s go to the main palace together then. I can’t stand being apart.”

Raiden rubbed his lips against Rihana’s forehead and muttered. Rihana laughed softly and said to him.

“How long were we apart anyway?”

“So why did he come?”

Raiden asked while lifting Rihana up in his arms and walking toward the sofa. At his sudden action, Rihana wrapped her arms around Raiden’s neck and hesitated for a moment before opening her mouth.

“He asked me to come back with him.”

Suddenly, Raiden’s brow furrowed frighteningly as he sat on the sofa still holding her. Rihana gently pressed his handsome brow with her index finger and continued.

“I told him that would absolutely never happen.”

“…”

“You wouldn’t want to marry Her Imperial Highness instead of me either, right?”

Raiden looked at Rihana with an expression that said she was stating the obvious.

“That’s right. I absolutely don’t want to see you marry another woman instead of me…”

Smooch, Raiden’s lips touched and pulled away.

“I love you.”