One month later.
At the Crown Prince’s invitation, they visited the Imperial Palace together.
“‘What?’ You said ‘pregnant?'”
She nearly spat her tea directly into Ian’s face.
Ian, face as red as a tomato, dissolved into a coughing fit.
“‘Cough, cough!'”
‘You’re the one who got her pregnant — why are you the one acting shocked?’ No contraception, apparently. You do everything and then act helpless.
“Are — are you all right? Here, there’s water.”
Princess Reina patted Ian’s back and handed him a glass.
His face looked ready to combust. He took the glass in both hands and sipped from it meekly.
“But how did it happen…?”
Reina was staying at the Imperial Palace with her kingdom’s delegation, that much was true. But Ian resided in the Crown Prince’s palace, and Reina would be in the guest quarters—
“In the g-garden of the guest wing. We both suddenly took our clothes off. He was the one who started it.”
“‘Cough, cough, cough!'”
“He completely devoured my lips. I was startled, but I liked it.”
Ivelina looked at Ian with the expression of someone observing something very unfortunate.
She knew one wasn’t supposed to look at the Crown Prince that way. But taking a visiting foreign princess out into the garden and—
Reina placed one hand gently over her still-flat stomach and flushed a delicate pink. It matched her hair remarkably well.
“In eight months, we will meet our child.”
“Eight months? Your due date is in eight months?”
She looked at Reina with eyes that were nearly rolling backward in her head.
‘Wait. That means before she received the tie pin — or just after—’
“Y-yes. That is right. It was that very day. The day I gave the gift.”
‘These two. Truly something.’
“Disappointing, Ian. What exactly do you think you were doing.”
Kael, who had been silent throughout, clicked his tongue and added one remark. The highest form of reproach available to him given the man’s rank, presumably.
‘Ahem, cough.’ Apparently capable of nothing but coughing, the suddenly guilty and criminal Crown Prince said nothing at all and simply coughed.
Then, apparently deciding to redirect the conversation, he turned it toward them.
“And — what about you two?”
“What about us?”
“Children. Any… plans for a second generation?”
“Don’t try to quietly shift this onto us.”
Ian’s bold attempt failed entirely against Kael.
“Then when is the national wedding?”
“One month from now. My mother says she needs at least that much time for the minimum preparations. You’ll come, won’t you?”
“Must I?”
“Must you. This man.”
And so on. The two of them fell at once into cheerful bickering.
Ivelina sat apart from it, absorbed in her own thoughts.
‘This is very different from what I knew.’
In the original story, these two had not moved toward marriage anything like this quickly — and there had certainly been no unplanned pregnancy.
‘Things really have changed quite a lot.’
She sat with the thought alone.
* * *
Kael and Ivelina were facing a temporary separation of two weeks.
The entire ducal household had come out to see him off.
“I’ll come back as quickly as I can.”
“I have a question, actually.”
“What is it?”
“Usually after a wedding, couples go directly to the estate, don’t they? And it’s common to hold the main ceremony there.”
Kael understood what she was asking immediately and answered.
“Your parents are here. And the duchy is far.”
“But you can’t simply not go, can you? There’s the estate management.”
He drew the back of his fingers along her cheek and tilted the corner of his mouth.
“Don’t worry. I have to go regardless. But I intend to spend about half the year in the capital.”
A myth surfaced in her mind.
The story of Persephone — taken by Hades, permitted to return to the surface only for part of the year.
Which would make her Persephone.
“Mother, Father — I leave my wife in your care while I’m away.”
“Don’t even think about it. She won’t be setting a foot outside the estate.”
“Of course not. Absolutely not.”
‘I really wish you wouldn’t go quite that far.’
“Kayrin — take care of your sister-in-law.”
Kael ruffled Kayrin’s hair as he said it. Kayrin patted his own chest twice and replied with crisp certainty.
“Don’t worry, Brother. I’ll keep a close watch on her while you’re gone.”
‘Watch.’ How fraternal of them.
Kael departed without incident.
‘I’ll finally be able to sleep properly at night.’
She felt the relief wash through her. With Kael launching himself at her every night — or at any interval the opportunity presented itself — she had been running on a chronic deficit of sleep. Just last night he had kept her awake until morning, claiming that since he wouldn’t see her for a while, he had to make the most of the time.
She was on the verge of allowing herself a nap when—
‘Knock knock.’ A tap at the door.
Emily came in.
“My lady.”
Since the wedding, the way Emily addressed her had changed. At first she’d mixed it — ‘miss’ and ‘my lady’ alternating when they were alone — but now she seemed to have settled entirely into ‘my lady’.
“Emily!”
She swung her feet down from where she’d been sitting on the bed. She readied herself mentally to change into outdoor clothes.
Lately, Emily and Ivelina had been combing the estate grounds at every opportunity, searching corner by corner. They had discovered that four-leaf clovers grew on the Hardeion estate, and the hunt had become a genuine pastime.
“My lady — you have a visitor.”
“For me? A visitor?”
“Yes.”
“Who is it?”
“Miss Camilla.”
* * *
When she entered the receiving room, she recognized the long, neat black hair immediately.
“Camilla!”
Camilla bowed with formal correctness.
“My lady, Duchess Hardeion.”
“Stop that! None of that when it’s just the two of us. Speak plainly — I’m still not used to that title either.”
She drew Camilla to the sofa and instructed a maid to bring warm tea.
Camilla had come all this way while pregnant. Tea first.
“What happened to you? No one at the Viscount’s estate could tell me where you’d gone — I had no way to reach you.”
“It was—”
“You didn’t come to my wedding! Kate and Dorothy were worried sick.”
“It wasn’t anything dramatic. Things just… happened, and I moved out on my own.”
For a viscount’s niece — even an unmarried young woman — to be living alone was practically unheard of among the nobility.
She had a sudden feeling she understood.
“Did they find out? About the pregnancy?”
“…Yes. More or less.”
“Where are you living now?”
“Near the five-way crossing on the square. I found a decent enough place.”
The five-way crossing wasn’t the worst part of the city, but it wasn’t particularly safe either.
“Are you living with the father?”
Based on what Camilla had told her before, she hadn’t thought the man would take responsibility.
“Yes. We’re together.”
“Really? He’s actually being responsible?”
“Actually — that’s part of why I came to see you.”
“Oh?”
“The father wants to meet you. Do you have a moment now, by any chance?”
“I suppose I do, but—”
Camilla glanced quickly behind Ivelina and leaned in to whisper.
“There are too many eyes here… you know how my situation is. Could we meet outside for a little while?”
* * *
