Chapter 38
Madam Giggs announced the emperor’s visit in her characteristically calm tone, and Adele reflexively stiffened her gaze as she looked at her. The elderly woman who had been fastening the empress’s gown stepped aside.
“What shall we do?”
This was precisely why Adele liked Madam Giggs. No matter what happened, she reacted as if it were nothing of consequence, and she always asked for the empress’s wishes first.
She wanted to slip back under the blankets before the warmth faded, but that was no longer possible. The muscles that had gone slack from the hot bath tightened all at once. Striding out of the bathroom, the empress replied in a curt tone.
“Since Lionel Valdr has already been here, I imagine His Majesty has something he wishes to ask. Shouldn’t I hear what he’s curious about, what he wants to say to me?”
＊ ＊ ＊
Karl was waiting for her in the sitting room attached to the empress’s bedchamber.
Fortunately, Empress Adelaide was using a different bedchamber from that of the late empress. Had she been using the very room the former empress once occupied, he might not have been able to endure it and would have turned back.
A moment later, the bedroom door opened, and the empress emerged slowly, dressed in a light house dress.
“My apologies for the delay. It took some time to prepare, since you arrived while I was bathing.”
As the empress sat on the sofa opposite him, the fresh, soapy scent peculiar to someone just out of a bath wafted over. Her still-damp hair caught the light and shimmered. She was a truly curious person. Every time he saw her, she seemed like someone different.
“What brings you here, Your Majesty?”
Adele asked in a businesslike tone, feigning ignorance. Karl, who had been staring at her shining hair, finally met her eyes. A strange emotion began to consume him. He got straight to the point.
“Whom will you appoint as your aide?”
Any trace of consideration or understanding for others was clearly meaningless to the emperor. It felt as though he had never possessed such a sentiment to begin with.
Just then, Madam Giggs brought in tea, allowing Adele to lift her cup and hide her face. She feared a sneer might show. The emperor, on the other hand, did not even glance at the teacup, staring fixedly at the empress.
“Well. But, Your Majesty.”
After deliberately taking a sip of tea and setting the cup down, Adele looked straight at the emperor.
“Must I report that to you?”
“Whom will you choose?”
Karl’s attitude did not change. Faced with the emperor demanding an answer once more with an impudently cold expression, Adele no longer concealed her sneer.
“Did you receive my permission, Your Majesty? Whomever I choose is my decision. Do not ask.”
“Will you choose Lionel Valdr?”
When the emperor openly named Lionel, Adele narrowed her eyes and asked back,
“And if I do? Is that not allowed?”
“Choose someone else.”
“Why?”
“The House of Valdr is hostile to the imperial family. And you would take such a man in as your aide? There are limits to making light of the imperial house. Mind your duty.”
“…….”
Ah, shameless beyond belief. It wasn’t as if his body were too small to contain his conscience, or as if he had thrown it into the trash for lack of space. Was he always like this, or did he think I was someone who could be treated this way?
“Like a feather attached to a quill, like a flower placed in a vase. Is that how you want me to live?”
Adele’s voice was very low. As if resonating from near her heart, the empress asked softly. At her question, Karl narrowed his eyes and tilted his head.
“Why ask that all of a sudden?”
“Because it is important. I’ll ask again. Is that how you want me to live?”
The emperor, who had resolved to put a leash around the neck of a king who roamed the wilds, answered the empress’s question in a firm tone.
“Yes.”
Adelaide flared blue with fury. The emperor’s demand was something that the self called Adelaide, rooted deep within her, could never accept.
“A component. An accessory. Something that may as well exist or not, but if it does, looks a bit nicer—that much of a presence.”
At the raw, unfiltered words spilling from the empress’s mouth, Karl’s eyes narrowed.
“A passive existence that offers no opinion and accepts everything unconditionally. A convenient counterpart who comes when told and goes when dismissed. That is exactly what you want me to be.”
At her sharp words, the emperor fell silent for a moment. In that space, Adele steadied her heaving chest and caught her breath. Yet her flashing eyes remained locked onto him. In a desperate struggle, the one who looks away first loses. Seeing the fighting spirit surging in those golden eyes that had never once known submission, Karl became certain again: the empress before him had no intention whatsoever of retreating or losing this fight, no matter who her opponent was.
And he, too, had no intention of retreating. Karl spoke with resolve.
“Yes. That is exactly what I want.”
Adele swallowed another mouthful of tea, hot enough to steam. Her mouth tasted bitter, as if she had swallowed gall, her lips parched so badly she did not even feel the heat.
“You’re asking whom I will choose?”
“…….”
And toward him, who pressed her for an answer as if it were only natural, she smiled alluringly and replied in a whisper.
“Lionel Valdr. I will choose him.”
“Empress!”
“‘Do not concern yourself with my lover. I, too, will not concern myself with yours.’”
“…….”
“Those were your words, Your Majesty. Have you forgotten?”
Karl clenched his teeth and glared at Adele savagely, but she merely curved her eyes languidly and leaned back against the sofa.
“Do not concern yourself with my lover, just as you said, Your Majesty.”
“How much have you even seen to call him a lover? Is this not merely a provocation toward me? In the end, the arrow will only return to you—there is nothing to be gained by deliberately aiming it.”
“How much have I seen? What need is there to see long and deeply? One can recognize at a glance.”
She lifted her red lips into a smile, revealing pearl-white teeth. Her cheeks flushed with heat, the empress smiled brightly.
“And do not misunderstand, Your Majesty. A provocation? How could that be? I observed many over three days, yet he alone caught my eye.”
The air between them was like a midwinter north wind. Had the looks they hurled at each other been able to shatter, they would already have splintered into pieces and dug into each other’s flesh. Karl clenched his teeth harder and asked, growling with a dangerous look in his eyes,
“Will you not regret it?”
“Will you not regret it yourself, Your Majesty?”
“I told you to recognize your position.”
“I have no intention of becoming a mere component or accessory. You tell me to fulfill my duty? Should you not first acknowledge me as your equal partner?”
The two of them stood like parallel lines that would never intersect. No—they were exactly that. Instead of answering what was asked, each spoke only what they themselves wished to say. Neither could yield on what they wanted.
In the end, Karl kicked away his seat and stormed out of the sitting room. Then, just before crossing the threshold, he stopped abruptly and, as if driving in the final nail, left Adele with one last remark.
“Think wisely, Empress. Do not regret it later.”
The words that stabbed into her back were, surprisingly, not ones she was hearing for the first time. As the door slammed shut with a bang, Adele ran a hand through her hair and laughed darkly.
Think wisely, Adele. Don’t regret it later.
Mother. There is someone here who resembles you. I do not know whether it is my fate to encounter only such people, or whether only such people ascend to the highest seat.
Wisely…? How, exactly, does one do that?
＊ ＊ ＊
When Karl flung the door open roughly, the waiting maids hurriedly bowed their heads. Madam Giggs, standing with them, also bowed respectfully. Ignoring them as he passed, Karl suddenly stopped in front of Madam Giggs.
A formal dress with the collar raised to her throat, and silver-white hair twisted up without a single strand out of place.
“Is it a person you are loyal to, or a position?”
“……Your Majesty.”
Karl seized Madam Giggs’s bowed shoulders firmly, then tilted his head and spoke near her ear in a whisper.
“It must gall you that someone like me, born of a lowly maid’s womb, became emperor. Don’t you think I stole Princess Elisabetta’s place simply because I was born a man?”
“That is not so.”
“A lie. I know all of that. Which is why it surprised me. When the empress summoned you, I thought you wouldn’t come. Why? Because she is my empress. Yet you came. You, who refused so mercilessly when I asked you to help Dian, answered the call of an empress whose face you had never even seen.”
“…….”
“You practically came running.”
At his hatred-laced words, Madam Giggs squeezed her eyes shut tightly and let out a small sigh.
“So tell the empress this. If she wishes to live well in my empire, in my palace, she must curry favor with me, the master of this place. That way, you can remain at her side too, can’t you? Isn’t that right, nurse?”
