IMHMF 14

Chapter 14

“Excuse me, are you alright?”

He could not help but be on guard at the appearance of this unfamiliar woman.

“I did not mean to startle you. It looks as though you are badly injured, so please do not push yourself to move. I will leave.”

Who is she. Could she be someone sent by the marchioness. Just as that thought crossed his mind, he decided to trust the look in the woman’s eyes as she watched him.

“…Help me a little.”

At first, seeing her handle a bow with such skill, he had assumed she was a young lady who had trained in archery, but her hands were white and smooth without a single callus. With that level of skill with a bow, she would have had to train for several years.

After parting from her in the forest, he observed her until his people arrived. At first he did not know who she was, but upon seeing the badge worn by her servants, he learned she was from Count Rumania.

Upon hearing the news, Siobhan returned to the ducal residence immediately after his visit to the imperial palace was over. And the information received through Alb revealed that there was no one named Luca in the Imperial Second Knighthood. Furthermore, there had recently been a knight murdered within the Second Knighthood.

Since he needed to conceal the fact that he had been ambushed from the outside world, he continued to attend official duties as usual.

It was said that the daughter of Marquis Tepe would be holding a hunting competition to socialize with young ladies following her social debut. In that case, would the daughter of Count Rumania also come?

He was curious.

How a young lady raised in refinement could shoot a bow so well. That was why he had offered his patronage, and the hunting competition was also held on his own territory.

Many people said that Marquis Tepe had made a good connection, but that was their interpretation. Eden had simply been curious about Lady Rumania. The hunting competition, which had originally been intended only for daughters of marquis families, was expanded through his patronage to allow daughters of count families to attend as well.

Upon seeing Rumania appear at the hunting competition, he was certain she was the one who had saved him in the forest. Perhaps because he owed her his life. His gaze kept drifting toward her.

At first, seeing her unable to ride a horse properly, he had wondered how she had managed to save him, and the sight of her barely maintaining her balance on horseback and rejoicing over it made him laugh.

Contrary to his expectations, Rumania took first place, surpassing the daughters of the marquis families who had reportedly trained quite diligently. To think that someone who could not even ride a horse properly could shoot a bow flawlessly. She was a woman interesting enough to keep close and observe.

A few days later.

When he visited the imperial palace to see the emperor as he usually did, a social party was in full swing.

The endlessly tedious party remained the same as always.

Yet in one corner of the party hall, the daughters of noble families had gathered in a crowd. And at the center of it all was Rumania. He had sensed it since the hunting competition, but Rumania had a talent for drawing people to her. She herself did not seem to be aware of it.

The sight of her treating the young ladies in quite a gentlemanly manner made him laugh.

She carries herself like a middle-aged knight who has grown old and retired.

After making her way through the crowd of young ladies, she came face to face with Marquis Ter Giuo and fled with everything she had.

He thought it was impressive how well she ran in high heels.

The place she had fled to was the greenhouse. From the moment she entered that path, the only place it led to was the greenhouse.

It was an impulse. He was curious what kind of reaction she would show if she saw him. Using a shortcut through the imperial palace that only he knew, he was able to arrive at the greenhouse before her. He did not know where she would come from inside the greenhouse, but if she came here, it seemed it would be entertaining.

And as though to meet his expectations, she came without hesitation to where he was, and sure enough, just as he had been concerned, her high heel caught on a stone and she lost her balance.

No sooner had he caught her than she pressed her lips to him.

The sight of her smiling bashfully and answering hand kiss in response to his question of what that was had been quite a sight to behold. When Marquis Ter Giuo followed in behind them, the way she flinched and widened her already large eyes in wariness made him inexplicably want to laugh.

Ah, perhaps he had been captivated from the very first moment he saw those eyes.

‘It is your fault for bewitching me.’

And so he had kissed her.

Watching her turn red and fumble over her words at a mere peck, he found himself wanting to put her in a difficult spot. That was why he had brought up the kiss in front of Marquis Ter Giuo. Of course, his scenario had not included Ter Giuo running a newspaper story, nor her coming to find him, but it was all the better for it.

‘Hurry up and use me to get rid of Ter Giuo. If you are going to use me, I will let you use me to your heart’s content.’

When he teased her a little more, the sight of her standing her ground and arguing back boldly was quite a sight. So she knows how to push back as well.

The answer he wanted never came from her lips, so he ended up being the one to bring up marriage. The lips that boldly declared that breaking off the engagement with the marquis was her own responsibility to handle came together firmly before parting.

‘Shall I kiss her? She would run away if I did.’

“And what does Your Grace stand to gain from this?”

‘What do I gain…’

‘What can I say so that you will not run away.’

“…Let us call it a bit of amusement.”

She had brought up divorce, but that was alright. For now he would give her a suitably fitting answer, and when the time for divorce came, he could put it off again then.

The marriage had also been something that came from an impulsive place, of course. The human heart was truly fickle. What had begun as curiosity had somewhere along the way made the other person look endearing, and because of that, it had led him to do things he would not ordinarily have done.

Using the communication stone as a pretext, he had gone to see her face. And then he had spent the whole night staring at the communication stone that never rang. He thought himself pathetic, but he could not stop waiting for the communication stone to ring.

In the end, the moment daylight came, he visited the count’s residence under the pretext of the engagement ceremony. He had intended to convey that he wanted to hold the engagement ceremony sooner, but then she had collapsed.

Not knowing the cause, and hearing the physician’s words that she might never wake up, an indescribable emotion began to churn within him. From that day on, every night, he concealed his presence with magic and went to check on her.

‘Wake up soon. Wake up and argue back boldly. I do not dislike that boldness of yours.’

And then, on the fifth night since she had collapsed.

She woke up.

Rising roughly as though from a nightmare, the moment she saw his face she spoke of the first time they had met in the forest. Was this really the time for someone who had just been unconscious and collapsed to be worrying about him?

Perhaps because it had been five days since he had last seen her with her eyes open, his true feelings slipped out before he knew it.

“Your eye color is just as pretty as your hair color.”

“Whatever you say.”

“Oh my, is Your Grace actually admitting it right now?”

“Whatever could compare to you.”