“You’ve arrived, Lady Eva. Please sit here.”

The next morning. When Eva, who had finished preparing for mealtime, entered the dining room with her eyes covered by a black cloth, Eileen came running. Eileen took Eva’s hand from Hannah who had brought Eva this far, like passing a baton, and led Eva’s hand toward the table.

“You’re late. I wouldn’t think you’re someone who can’t see the clock.”

Despite it being a relatively early time for breakfast, Divlik, seated at the head of the large table, and Finn, seated to Divlik’s left, had already cleared away their salad plates.

“I apologize, Lord Divlik. Since this is the first time I’m sitting down to a meal with you, I wanted to dress properly, but I lost track of time trying to find a suitable dress for the current season.”

“Please sit down first.”

With Divlik’s permission, Eva placed her hands in front of her chest, gave a polite greeting, and sat in the chair to Divlik’s right, directly across from Finn. As Eva took her seat, Divlik’s eyes briefly scanned her dress up and down.

“So after all that. This is the dress you found to properly dress up for your first meeting with me?”

He meant how could the dress she had carefully chosen be so terrible.

The dress Eva wore was made of a deep red fabric reminiscent of red roses, with a layer of lace over it, but the gaps were so wide they looked like holes—a dress that showed too many traces of age for a woman who had been an Empress just a few days ago.

There was plenty of room for misunderstanding that she had deliberately worn such a tattered dress while claiming to have dressed properly, trying to mock Divlik, so Eva smiled her best.

“I didn’t expect the weather to suddenly become so warm. The only dresses in good condition are winter ones, and there was neither time nor circumstances to prepare new dresses for spring. If this appearance has been disrespectful to you, Lord Divlik, please forgive me.”

“It certainly lacks visual appeal, but if it wasn’t intentional, there’s no disrespect to me.”

“I still have clean summer dresses, so I’ll wear those from tomorrow.”

“Why? Are you trying to catch a cold and buy yourself time by staying in bed?”

Divlik sneered while cutting his steak that had been served as the main course. Eva wanted to laugh this off too, not wanting to reveal how she had been treated by Fabian before Divlik took over the castle, but Eileen, who was serving the salad, muttered to herself.

“That’s why you shouldn’t have burned all those expensive dresses just because you were angry……”

Though it was a private comment, Divlik, who had clearly heard about burning dresses, asked Eileen what she meant.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never burned the Empress’s dresses.”

Eileen answered curtly, even though Divlik wasn’t the target of her resentment.

“Who said it was you, Lord Divlik? The Emperor…… I mean, the former Emperor Fabian.”

“Fabian?”

“Before autumn came, Lord Fabian burned all of Lady Eva’s autumn dresses. Since autumn and spring dresses are often worn interchangeably. That’s why there aren’t many suitable ones left.”

Divlik looked at Eva with his right eye slightly furrowed.

“Fabian burned…… dresses?”

“I wondered how she was doing so well in that tower where she was first confined. She had been staying in that tower for months before we arrived.”

After breakfast, when the only sounds were the clinking of cutlery on plates and barely audible breathing, Divlik’s expression gradually became more serious as he listened to Finn’s report in the office.

The small room in the tower was made for guards to take short breaks. It was certainly not a place for someone to stay for a long time, let alone a place suitable for an Empress of an empire. Yet Eva had been confined there for quite some time until a week before the Blue Wolf took over the castle.

—It’s a place called Florin at the southern end of the Empire.

It must have been a difficult time for Eva, who came from Florin where warm sunlight shines year-round. The tower was at the northern end of Hael, which was already famous for its cold winters, in a place where the sun rarely shone.

“Anyway, I hear it wasn’t the first time Fabian did such an unconscionable thing to the former Empress. After becoming Emperor, there were several servants who saw him kneeling before the former Empress without dignity and licking her feet.”

So this was why she had shown that strange expression, neither confirming nor denying when asked if Fabian had loved her too. In some sense, Fabian was certainly obsessed with the former Empress. They say he would bring jewels or dresses to lay at the former Empress’s feet, taking care with even his footsteps as if she were so delicate she might fly away if blown upon or break if squeezed, and would pretend to die at her command.

Then suddenly, becoming furious about something, he would burn dresses, lock her in the tower, or starve her for days, acting like someone desperate to devour the Empress.

“No wonder a woman of empress status who should have been living in luxury didn’t even blink when locked in a tower and starved for days. That’s why Lord Divlik’s methods haven’t been very effective.”

Finn looked relieved, as if he finally understood why Eva had endured so well until now, but Divlik’s expression had darkened even more after hearing Finn’s report.

“Why?”

“Pardon? Oh, they say nobody really knows the reason. There was no special trigger.”

Finn answered without hesitation, but Divlik’s expression didn’t improve at all with that answer.

Wasn’t she supposed to have been living enjoying all the privileges an Empress could have? Wasn’t that why she could bestow excessive grace on the castle servants and even the people outside?

“This is a rather delicate story I was hesitating to share. After tormenting her like that, he would climb into her bed every night without fail. Completely insane, isn’t he? When you think about it, the former Empress must be even more insane than Fabian. To say she would die for her loyalty to her lord despite suffering such abuse.”

Divlik laughed. Out of disbelief.

“Lord Divlik? Why…… are you laughing?”

Even as Finn looked puzzled, Divlik couldn’t stop his laughter from escaping.

He wasn’t laughing at Eva who claimed to love her lord despite such treatment. He was laughing at himself for being so pathetic as to believe, even for a moment, that Eva was truly trying to die for such a reason as loyalty to her lord.

—You have no…… right to speak of tradition, Lord Divlik.

How dare someone like you try to possess me, an Empress, I would rather die than give myself to someone without even a proper family name—why did I think those words might be false? That she might be making it up thinking I would get angry and kill her if she said she wanted to at least protect her body before an inevitable death. Why did I think that?

—That’s…… You don’t need to find anyone new.

—Your Majesty the Empress. Please take care of your health first. That’s the most important thing.

Was it because Eva was such a good Empress that servants risked their lives to stay by her side, and people from outside the castle came to pray for her well-being?

—It’s a mistake committed out of habit as one who served! As one who served! Please spare my life!

Was I impressed by Eva’s willingness to risk her life to protect her people? Did I think she must be making up those words about killing class distinctions because she was a good woman who genuinely treated people as people, regardless of whether they were nobles or commoners?

Why didn’t I consider the possibility that it could all be an act? ……Was her plea to kill her that impressive?

Didn’t I know? That nowhere in the world is there a woman who would stake everything to love someone?

“Finn.”

“Yes, Lord Divlik.”

“Call for a tailor.”

“A tailor? Why…… Could it be……”

From the beginning, I was the one who brought up loyalty to her lord. Eva had never once said with her own mouth that she was doing this because she loved Fabian. Loyalty to her lord was just a plausible excuse for someone who wanted to die as an Empress until the end.

“Don’t we need clothes to prepare for the coronation?”

“What? Oh. That’s right? With less than a month left, we should hurry to have good uniforms made.”

I hadn’t fully considered whether she could be that sincere, to the point of risking her life for the title of empress.

“While we’re at it, I want to have several dresses made for the former Empress as well.”

“Why the former Empress’s dresses……”

“Why that expression?”

Finn looked strangely at Divlik, who kept letting out incredulous laughs. Despite being given the opportunity to speak, Finn hesitated, and Divlik urged him to ask.

“What. Are you afraid I might be pitying the former Empress?”

“It would be strange if you weren’t pitying her.”

“What?”

Only then did Finn reveal his true thoughts.

It seemed like Divlik wasn’t pitying her, and that’s what made it stranger. At this point when it had become clearly revealed that the former Empress hadn’t been living in luxury, Finn couldn’t understand the anger that seemed to have intensified, so he gathered his courage, feeling he might never get another chance to ask.

“On our way here, I thought there was meaning in your desire to bed a woman from conquered territory whom you had never taken before, as the former Empress is like a symbol of Yarden. I also thought your delay in taking the former Empress immediately was because you wanted her proper submission and humiliation, a fitting fate for an Empress who had lived in luxury without knowing the people’s suffering. But now……”

“But now?”

“Do you still see the former Empress as someone who needs to be broken?”