Their relationship had not been off to a wrong start from the very first meeting.

Before Lyden’s appointment as Crown Prince, Aeril had just finished her grand debutante at the ducal manor and was stepping into social circles under Catherine Ronz’s wing.

Catherine Ronz, the wife of the Duke of Ronz, had disliked Aeril from the start, but never showed it outwardly. Instead, she raised Aeril as her own daughter to preserve her own reputation.

In private, she had slapped the Duke of Ronz across the face for dragging home a child he had fathered outside their marriage—but in front of the servants, she shed tears like a mother reunited with a long-lost daughter, stroking Aeril’s disheveled hair and treating her like the most precious treasure in the world.

The reason Catherine had supposedly abandoned such a cherished daughter until now circulated through society like this:

Before Catherine formally married the Duke of Ronz, she had conceived a child through a secret affair with him. Fearing the scandal would bring shame upon herself and her family, she had given birth in secret and entrusted the child to a maidservant.

That maidservant was Edelin. Upon learning of Edelin’s death, Catherine had asked the Duke to find Aeril.

The Duke, though the child was born before their marriage, had no doubt the child was his, and so he complied with Catherine’s request.

And so Aeril—once the illegitimate child of the Duke of Ronz and Edelin—had, without anyone quite noticing, become their true daughter.

She gained an older brother in the process: a young lord named Diovan Ronz.

When Aeril first set foot in the ducal household, she had wept at the warmth of Catherine’s embrace, which welcomed even someone as tainted as herself.

But after she washed up and entered Catherine’s room, she was struck across the face. Her head swung back and forth so many times she couldn’t count them on her small fingers, and only after that did Aeril collapse onto the wool carpet.

—Do not walk the corridors until your cheek heals. As long as you do not overstep yourself, you will not die like your mother did.

Catherine found Aeril’s very existence repulsive, yet she did not want others to know that her husband had gone to another woman’s womb.

The same applied to her close maidservants and attendants.

And so Aeril endured beatings whenever Catherine was in a foul mood, yet received the same fine food, clothing, and noble education as any other.

Ten years of this life had passed—and even those who had once doubted the story the ducal household spread began to lose track of what was real.

If you wrap someone like a daughter for that many years, she becomes your child, blood or not.

One noblewoman had remarked as much.

Depending on how you looked at it—a remarkable woman, a tenacious woman, or perhaps a woman with a truly warm heart.

At some point, Catherine had become exactly that kind of person.

And behind that public opinion stood the immense backing of the ducal house. House Ronz served as the central pillar of the noble faction.

Catherine also explained away suspicions about Aeril’s hair color by saying it was the result of mixing the Duke’s black hair with her own silver. She would lament that her daughter had grown up in poor conditions without proper nutrition, which had dulled the color so.

The water-blue hair that once held the blue of Tiahi had quietly become the product of an unhappy past. Aeril had been happier in the days when she wore a fraying white dress and threw herself into Tiahi’s embrace than she was now, draped in glittering jewels—but she could never let that show.

She had to live as though illness followed her always, speak little, and never grow close to anyone.

Catherine had said so, and Aeril had no choice but to obey.

“Did you have to come all this way just to wear that miserable face? Honestly. If you can’t manage your expression, you might as well go outside. I’ll let Her Majesty the Queen know that you’re feeling unwell and need some air.”

It was the day they came to pay their respects to Her Majesty the Queen after the debutante.

Catherine, who had just held Aeril in a sorrowful embrace, suddenly pinched her hard in the side.

“I’ll let it go this time, but don’t expect the same next time. Understood?”

Threats and rough hands had long since become routine. Aeril gave a small nod at the sound of Catherine’s venomous voice, which crawled into her ears and raised the hairs on her neck.

“Yes.”

Aeril turned away from the hateful hand patting her shoulder and slipped out of the corridor.

She wandered the palace gardens for a while, searching for a place where no one would find her.

Only after her heavy dress and pointed shoes had taken a beating on the untrimmed path did she stop walking.

A lone, worn wooden chair sat there by itself, and she settled into it.

“That’s my seat.”

At the sudden sound of an unfamiliar voice, Aeril spun around.

“I—I’m sorry……”

The man addressed her informally with such ease that she moved to show proper courtesy at once. But then a gentle pressure settled onto her shoulder.

“Just sit. I’ll lend it to you.”

The man’s gaze was cold as he spoke, but his actions carried a faint trace of goodwill.

Aeril stared up at him blankly for a moment, then snapped back to her senses and dipped her head.

“Thank you for your consideration.”

The quality education she had received from Catherine was paying off at this very moment.

Her mind was full of how breathtakingly beautiful he was—yet the motion of pressing her hand to her chest and bowing her head flowed without a single hitch. She was the picture of a lady raised with love.

“Your hair color is unusual.”

He accepted her greeting quietly, then spoke with what seemed like curiosity.

“You’re the illegitimate child of House Ronz, aren’t you?”

He brought up the ducal family’s shame without a shred of hesitation, his eyes fixed on her.

The first thing Aeril noticed when she faced him was a pair of vivid blue eyes—deep, like the waters of Tiahi poured into them.

Next came the brilliant golden hair, rich like honey melted and spread across it.

Just as the man had recognized her origins, Aeril was piecing together his identity from his appearance alone.

He was someone who wore a white formal uniform like it had been drawn onto him. The sharp, clean lines of his figure deepened the languid air about him. His confident, arrogant bearing felt natural rather than grating—simply part of who he was.

“That is correct, Your Highness.”

He bore such a striking resemblance to the Queen she had just met that there was no need to question his identity.

And so rather than feeling surprised that he was the first prince of the Kingdom of Tolaite, Aeril was busy turning over in her mind how she ought to correct the word “illegitimate child” attached to her name.

What would Catherine do in a moment like this? What would Catherine say to His Highness the Prince……

“You admit it quite readily.”

But before she could finish the thought, he spoke first.

“Ah. It is not that I admit it—only that such rumors do circulate in society……”

“Why bother defending yourself so hard. The way I see it, being a half-wit is at least better than being the real daughter of that couple.”

He bent at the waist and peered closely at Aeril’s face.

“You don’t look like either of them at all. Not the old fox, and not the raccoon pretending to be a bear cub. Ah. Though I suppose these eyes take a little after the Duke.”

His elegant fingers came to a stop just in front of her eyes.

Aeril carefully looked away from his gaze. Her sky-blue eyes, the same color as her hair, were dim and vacant compared to the sharp, clear sea of Lyden’s.

“They are…… my parents.”

“Right. That’s how it is now, I suppose. Fine, let’s say that’s the case.”

Aeril lowered her head further to hide her face, and Lyden straightened up at a leisurely pace.

“Just don’t turn out like the idiots in that ducal house. You have no choice but to follow their lead for now since you need them to survive—but still.”

He tossed out the words—neither comfort nor anything else—and gave an equally half-hearted farewell.

“Try not to cross paths with me next time, Lady Ronz. I happen to dislike House Ronz quite a lot.”

“……”

“And that’s my seat, so don’t sit there.”

She was in the middle of paying her respects to royalty, still looking down at the ground near his feet. She gathered her skirt and bent at the waist—and then Lyden spoke.

“If you say you’re not Lady Ronz, I might consider lending it to you one more time.”

The moment Aeril glanced up, their eyes met.

He turned away immediately after, so she couldn’t hold the gaze for long—but Lyden was unmistakably smiling.

That beautiful face paired with a smile made him feel, for just a brief moment, like something not quite human.

“Take care, Your Highness.”

As his retreating figure grew smaller, Aeril offered her farewell.

The reason her bowed cheeks had flushed red was because the dress was simply too heavy.

Aeril shook off the small joke and smile Lyden had left behind, and straightened up.

She stared at the worn chair he had called his own for a long moment, then walked away.

After that, true to his wish, we had no occasion to meet.

The next time Aeril met Lyden was at an onboard banquet held in celebration of his appointment as Crown Prince.