Chapter 6

“You are too persistent. That’s a disease. Think whatever you like. I am planning to attend Count Carbondieu’s hunting eve banquet today.”

“You say everything Count Carbondieu hosts is boring, so why do you go every time?”

“Because the beautiful women dress even more beautifully for that count’s events, of course. It is not a gentleman’s duty to refuse to look at such women.”

With that, Zakahari turned his gaze and looked out the window. Enoch looked anew at his handsome master.

After he appeared, the Empire overflowed with noble ladies who admired and adored him.

Not only the daughters of noble houses in the capital who had come of marriageable age—even older married women writhed with the desire to share intimacy with him. There was more than one or two madwomen who sent letters begging to become his mistress.

His sharp face—handsome and seemingly burdened with some hidden sorrow—played a part in fueling his popularity. And he was kind to most women.

But that was all. In the past year, he had not had a single one of those common scandals that any young, popular nobleman would scatter three or four of.

“Ah! I changed my name.”

“Pardon? Suddenly?”

“Yes. Zakahari Ivan Sonnier is too grand.”

“And… so?”

“I am simply Jacques now. Jacques Sonnier. You should call me that as well.”

Enoch swallowed the fury boiling up from his core and gritted his teeth.

“Changing a noble’s name is not such a simple matter. Please use it merely as a stage name or a nickname.”

“No. And you are capable, aren’t you?”

“But still!”

“What does it matter? I don’t even have an estate to govern, so I can just change the small things one by one.”

It was not that he had no estate. As a member of the Hessenia imperial family, he had been promised two things in exchange for being held captive in the barbarian kingdom for ten years.

One was the life of his younger sibling, his own blood born just before he left, and the other was the rank of duke. The duke’s title had been documented and proven so that he could obtain it even after his death.

Nobles of this country were granted territory of a size fixed by law. So he, too, had an estate amounting to fifteen thousand square sers. It was the same size as the land where Ivan the Great, the first emperor of Hessenia, had first begun the nation.

But when the location of the estate first became known to the nobles, they were surprised and at the same time sneered. His estate was land directly adjacent to Lake Seronne at the very edge of Hessenia’s border.

Barren land—if it had merely been barren, people might have been able to eke out a living there. But the very small amount of farmland in that harsh land had to receive the flooding waters of Lake Seronne every year.

Before the crops could even ripen, they were swept away by water.

Moreover, when it became known that the one who had requested that land was none other than Zakahari, people judged that he had completely abandoned his hostility toward the imperial house and lowered himself.

“Don’t make that face. Nothing comes out of it, so there are no taxes to pay either. What’s wrong with that?”

Enoch gritted his teeth for a different reason than before.

“As you know, I can live well enough on the maintenance allowance from the imperial house alone. So you just manage the mansion well and make the money I earn multiply.”

Zakahari, whose eye for beauty was superior to others—no, now Jacques Sonnier—participated in auctions, collected paintings, and resold them for great profit.

In the year since his return, auction houses and casinos had sprung up like mushrooms in the capital’s central districts.

Moreover, he was earning enormous sums every time even at the notorious casino where others were said to squander their entire fortunes within half a year.

The money earned that way became food for the few estate residents living on his land. Even the aid provided at the national level on the grounds that the land was barren had been completely cut off since Jacques took over the estate.

At that moment, the carriage slowed and announced that they had arrived before the imperial palace.

“Let’s go.”

“Yes, Your Grace, Duke.”

“Stop calling me ‘Your Grace.’”

“‘Your Grace’ is an honorific for high-ranking officials.”

“I’m sure it is.”

Enoch hid deep in his chest the thirst of curiosity that still would not fade, and merely clutched in both hands the “I like them” and “I don’t like them” booklets in his pocket.

* * *

The mild winter of the Herbron estate passed, and Adel was now twenty years old.

Though Adel was not his mistress, several months had already passed since she began a strange cohabitation with the woman who had borne her husband’s child.

Whether she wanted to hear it or not, the story of Ethan and his first love flew into her room endlessly through the maids. Being human herself, she could not help listening, miserable as she was, curious about their story.

From tales of the count beginning to teach his child letters, to his gift of a splendid horse to Annaston that was hard to find even in the capital, to how often he walked to her residence—everything reached Adel’s ears in detail.

The story that all the furniture in the annex where she stayed had been replaced, and that the most famous dressmaker in the estate had visited, was also enough to claw at Adel’s heart.

But what hurt her most was not that.

Adel had thrown herself into the waterway project for the past several months. As if it alone were her lifeline, she dug into that work day and night.

She met renowned blacksmiths, made water pipes from various materials and broke them, buried and dug up pipes repeatedly, and endured each day.

When she returned to the mansion after such a day and sought Ethan to announce her return, he was invariably with those two.

Whenever a light resembling the warmth of a warm family leaked from the first-floor drawing room of the main house—a room she had never once used together with him since coming here—Adel had no choice but to stop once before the door.

But even so, she could not leave this house.

The reason Adel could be formally registered as a daughter of House Millium despite being illegitimate was that special quality possessed only by Millium. Successive emperors had even issued a special decree that any woman born with the Millium name would become a noble regardless of anything. But that was a special law solely for Millium.

So Annaston, a commoner, could not become Ethan’s wife.

Since someone would inevitably have to become the mistress of House Devryan even if Adel left, she rationalized her position by telling herself it was reasonable for her to remain here.

Adel hurried to go out from the morning to inspect the unwed mothers’ facility she had not been able to look after. Then the head butler Ben came to find her.

“The Count is looking for you.”

“What is the matter?”

Adel asked, bewildered. The last time she had been alone with him was the day after Annaston entered the mansion. Recalling the conversation they had shared then made revulsion at meeting him rise automatically.

That day, Ethan had not been able to look her straight in the eye. That sight was so unfamiliar that Adel had been seized by the feeling of meeting a stranger for the first time.

But Adel steadied her heart. If he explained the situation, she intended to discuss Annaston’s living arrangements maturely. Currently Adel and Ethan’s bedrooms were on the same floor of the main house, but Adel stayed in the annex.

So she intended to discuss whether Annaston and her son might stay in the two-story annex prepared behind the main house.

〈As for Annaston’s residence….〉

〈Ah, I have already settled Anna in the annex on the right side of the main house.〉

It was customary for the mistress to decide all matters concerning the servants of the household and matters concerning her husband’s women. But he had already decided matters concerning Annaston on his own.

The annex on the right side of the main house was built in the form of a townhouse. It was called an annex, but it was a building attached side by side with the main house, sharing a wall.

That building was the place given to the former count—who was now staying in the capital—when he visited the estate, or to important guests. No matter that she had borne a son, to give that annex to a maid who had worked for the family was unheard of.

Which meant, quite literally, that Annaston was now staying in a better place than Adel.

“I do not know the details.”

At Ben’s words, Adel escaped her thoughts.

“However, a messenger from the imperial palace visited today.”

At the word imperial palace that followed, Adel’s heart began to pound violently. Could it be news from her sister? Still dressed to go out, Adel went to Ethan’s office.

When Adel entered, Ethan was reading a letter from the imperial palace.

“Were you about to leave?”

“Yes, I was planning to visit the unwed mothers’ facility today. Three women are giving birth this month, so I thought I would look in on them….”

“I see. I won’t take much of your time. It will only be a moment.”

“What is the matter?”

Adel, her heart urgent, asked him without even fully taking a seat.

But contrary to his words that he would not take much time, Ethan could not easily begin speaking. Adel could not help but grow tense. Whatever would come from his mouth could wound her even with a sigh.

“I heard a messenger from the imperial palace visited today.”

“Yes.”

“What was the letter?”

Adel asked again, but he still could not answer.

“Count?”

For a moment, Adel thought his blue eyes flashed and took on a cold light. That sight made her tense all over.

“Could it be… news of my sister?”

“No, it is not that.”

At the words that it was not the news of her sister she had been waiting for, she made a visibly disappointed expression.

“Then what…?”

Ethan rubbed the handle of an innocent teacup with his thumb and kept avoiding the words. Sensing he was about to say something difficult, a dry swallow passed down Adel’s throat.

“The imperial palace… says they will bestow a medal of merit upon our family.”