Chapter 64
“You really speak like one of the imperial concubines who bore the prince,” Odette said, frowning delicately. Each phrase she used sent a chill down Marien’s spine — they were uncannily evocative of the empresses and imperial consorts.
“My words were a little blunt. Please forgive me. This is too important a matter to me,” Marien replied.
“…So what if Blackwood courted you? I don’t find you hateful or detestable because of it.” A sharp intake of breath sounded; Marien hurriedly covered her mouth. The pink diamond necklace she had received — so dazzling it made her feel as if her neck would freeze — couldn’t compare to the thrill she felt now.
Odette stared at Marien with sky-blue eyes that rolled like waves, then spoke slowly. “On the contrary, I’ve just reaffirmed your usefulness. If I keep you in my grasp, then the alliance with Blackwood is secure.”
“Does it work that way…?” Marien murmured.
“A signed contract alone worried me. Alliances and political marriages are always like that — Blackwood doesn’t love me. Yet Blackwood shows interest in you? That means I can bind him doubly.” Odette continued in a bright tone. “It’s much easier to control you than to control Blackwood.”
“Ah, yes.” Marien swallowed a small bitterness hastily. There was something even more important than that.
Consolidation.
“Your Highness, perhaps you know: historically, the most enduring bonds are the friendships between women. Compared to that, a man’s love is as fleeting as morning dew.”
“…Friendship?” Odette asked quietly, looking down at Marien. Marien smiled brightly, then spoke again after giving her cheek a small pat. “So in my case, it’s loyalty. Yes — I, Marien Didi, pledge eternal loyalty to Her Highness the Fourth Princess.”
Tinkle-tinkle. She even mimed shaking a bell with both hands. Odette watched Marien for a long moment, then spat out, “You’re truly strange.”
“Yep.”
“Do men like girls like you?” Odette asked.
Marien slowly lowered her hands; the expression on Odette’s face was not ordinary. It wasn’t jealousy. It had the clinical curiosity of a researcher who’d discovered a new phenomenon. The important thing was: Odette was not a mere researcher. The princess in front of her looked at the world like a chessboard.
“Probably not?” Marien ventured.
“But after Beers, who admired me for so long, even my alliance partner Duke Blackwood has fallen for you.” Odette seemed to be thinking something over. “You know what people call those two?”
“The empire’s full moon and sun…” Marien answered.
“Both outstanding in their places, but with completely different dispositions. Now imagine both men like you,” Odette reached out; her slender fingers, almost without warmth, lifted Marien’s chin. “That means you’d appeal to many others as well.”
Her rose-colored eyes darkened like an abyss. It was the look of someone seeing unexpected potential in what she held. How to make use of this girl — Odette’s scheming seemed audible in the air.
Marien forced a laugh. “Your Highness, isn’t that a bit of a hasty generalization?”
“Are you saying I’m wrong?” Odette smiled, annoyingly bright. Marien’s expression fell. The word “test” conjured only bad thoughts.
“No need to be that nervous.” Odette hummed a tune. She seemed in the best mood of the day. “Who is as formidable as Beers and Blackwood? Anais the priest, perhaps.”
She framed it as a simple errand, then added that in two days’ time Marien should go to the temple where Lesley serves and request confession. “There was something in that person’s reaction that caught my attention,” Odette murmured. “If he can be used, we should use him…”
“Your Highness, that charlatan — ahem — you intend to work with Priest Anais?” Marien asked.
“Why?” Odette looked at her as if annoyed.
“They say love makes people alike. You’re making the exact face Beers does right now. Even the Chancellor pulls the same sour face whenever I mention Priest Anais.” Marien mumbled. Odette of course ignored that entirely.
“So is this test called a beauty trap?” Marien asked.
Odette laughed like she’d just heard the funniest joke. “A beauty trap. That’s a word reserved for people blessed with looks like mine. Hmm… in your case it will be a measure of how bizarre the tastes of imperial men have become.”
There was nothing but undeniable truth in every word Odette said.
Marien knew she might look like an innocent, rabbit-like creature, but that was all. Compared to Odette’s fragile, icy presence — a standout among the many beauties in the palace — Marien didn’t stand a chance.
She made one last, plaintive appeal. Marien had no real hope Odette would relent; she was asking only as someone worried. “Even if it’s Your Highness’s command, if I approach other men, won’t Lord Beers be displeased?”
“He won’t be comfortable,” Odette conceded coolly, twitching one corner of her mouth upward. “But Beers is used to pain — I’ve trained him for over ten years. Don’t worry too much.”
◇ ◆ ◇
Vailleon remembered his days at the Imperial Academy.
When people learned that he and Cain Blackwood were only a year apart in school, they would say in chorus: Vailleon Beers is indeed versatile, but if Cain Blackwood had been in the same year, he wouldn’t have taken top entrance and graduation honors. Because Cain’s talents were not mere versatility but rather god-given power.
Only his classmates who had attended the Academy with them ever argued otherwise. “We thought that too at first, but it wasn’t like that. What use is god-given power if you don’t attend classes?”
Indeed, a school is a place where attendance, listening to lectures, and exams determine grades. Cain was a pretty delinquent student in that regard. So even if Cain and Vailleon were in the same year, the top spots for entrance and graduation would still have been Vailleon Beers’s.
Vailleon took his studies seriously while also instructing Odette at the emperor’s behest. He acted as class representative and joined the student council. He was also a member of the art club and the volunteer club — participating in exhibitions and charity work each semester.
Diligent, faithful Vailleon. People would look at Count Beers and say proudly, “What a fine son.” “A fine son. A good man. Bright, meticulous, and humble.”
Hearing such praise didn’t make Vailleon secretly unhappy. So when Odette had once said, “I like you as a good person, so I refuse you,” he had honestly been taken aback. It felt like a long-held belief was being shattered. “Was I not supposed to live as a good person?”
Odette chose Cain Blackwood. Vailleon intellectually understood her choice but couldn’t erase the uneasy feelings lodged in his chest.
Over time, someone who liked Vailleon for who he was appeared: Marien. Hearing her say she liked him because he was a good person reassured him that he hadn’t been wrong. To have someone who loved you as you are, without trying to change you — that was great comfort.
But then Cain Blackwood started coveting Marien. Even if a political match, he had already taken Odette’s rightful fiancée place. He would later marry Odette and slip a Blackwood family ring onto her finger.
“He said he’d wait to hear me confess I liked him,” Vailleon muttered. Such a thing could be called an evil fate. Someone without respect for others repeatedly coveting what belonged to Vailleon was intolerable.
Why?
He didn’t want to be compensated for living a life of goodness; if any reward was due, he’d already received it: entrusted by the emperor, he had become Chancellor of the Empire at a young age. That was more than enough repayment.
Vailleon’s concern was simple: Was his way wrong?
“No… Marien must not be taken,” he thought. Cain treated Marien carelessly; Vailleon’s first worry was for the wounds Cain’s behavior might inflict on her. A lover should feel that way.
But Vailleon’s condition had become desperate; he could no longer play the good-man role.
Cain’s disregard for Marien’s presence beside Vailleon made him anxious. “How can I make Marien… like me more?”
From watching Marien at the Beers’ manor, Vailleon had noticed she cared little for jewels and dresses. She liked them, but worry — like whether she might ruin the dress — outweighed any impatience to wear pretty clothes. At first he’d thought it was because she’d borrowed Cloys’ dress, but even after she acquired her own gowns, nothing substantial changed.
She looked lovely in summery yellow dresses like dandelion fairies. He’d been proud to match them with hairpieces and a white-frilled parasol. Yet she wore such a dress only once, then gently put it away in the wardrobe.
Vailleon wanted, if he could, to give Marien as many seasonal outfits as her age — or even 365 new dresses so she could wear a different one each day if she wished. New jewels, a new parasol, new shoes, new carriage, a new mansion — all prepared for Marien alone.
Yet even ready to be robbed of such luxuries for her sake, Vailleon felt something unresolved.
