IMLC 16

Chapter 16

“Two hours?”

Kaillen looked as if he was already used to this kind of mistreatment.

They really come up with all kinds of ways to torment people. Damn it. I wore high heels today too. I’m doomed.

To be honest, ever since we left the townhouse, my feet had been screaming from the unusually high heels. I quietly stepped back a few paces and moved closer to the wall.

Kaillen, who had been silently watching me slip backward, lowered his gaze slightly.

“What are you doing right now—”
“I just took off my shoes for a moment. You can’t tell, right?”

I lifted my dress a little. Kaillen’s face twisted into a deep frown when he saw the shoes placed beside my bare feet.

Come on, it’s not like you need to make that kind of face.

I lowered my dress again, covering my bare feet and shoes, and leaned my back against one of the hallway pillars.

“Have you ever worn high heels?”
“Why would I wear something like that?”
“Because I’m short, that’s why! Do you know how painful high heels are?”

As if he didn’t want to continue the conversation any further, Kaillen turned his head away. I narrowed my eyes at the back of his head.

Tch.

The cold marble floor sent a chill straight through the soles of my bare feet. I wiggled my toes for a bit, then rested my left foot over the top of my right and looked at Kaillen’s back as he stood there perfectly composed.

No matter how much I looked to the left or right, there was no sign of anyone approaching. Unlike me, fidgeting around, Kaillen stood there as if someone were always watching him, leaving no opening at all. Watching him, I stepped back into my shoes.

“You grew taller all of a sudden.”
“Yes. I’m still at the age where I’m growing, you know.”

I heard a small snort of laughter.

There was no one in the lavish corridor of the Empress’s palace except Kaillen and me. I hadn’t laughed, so it had to have been Kaillen—but the sound had been so faint that I couldn’t be sure whether he had actually laughed or not.

I quickly craned my neck forward to see his face, but his lips were pressed into a straight line.

The reason we had become close enough to exchange even light jokes like this was probably because a tiny sense of camaraderie had formed between us.

What kind of insane wedding preparation was this, anyway?

Even if it was being done “simply,” it was still a royal wedding. From early morning until late at night, right before collapsing into bed, it was choice after choice after choice. Clothes were just the beginning—even a single hair ornament had to be selected by me.

There were things I had to prepare on my own, but there were also things I absolutely had to discuss with him. Every time we met twice a week, Kaillen’s jawline seemed to grow sharper.

We had met just yesterday to try on the wedding dress and formal attire for the ceremony, and both of us had lost a little weight.

With the designer busily sticking pins into the fabric to alter the size, Kaillen and I had briefly met each other’s eyes across the room.

And in that moment, I was certain we were thinking the exact same thing.

‘I wish this damned wedding would just be over already.’

And more than anything, I had never expected Kaillen to actually grant my request.

“Thank you.”

Kaillen, who had been standing rigidly while staring straight ahead, turned his head slightly.

“For coming to the tea party.”

Kaillen turned his head forward again and looked impassively at the door that showed no sign of opening.

“It was the first time I’d ever received such a desperate letter.”

After replying to Florence’s tea party invitation saying that I would attend, I had immediately sent a letter to Kaillen as well.

Once my marriage to Kaillen had been decided, the flood of tea party invitations I received came in all kinds of forms.

There were crumpled letters stained with tear marks, demanding to know how someone like me could dare marry a prince. There was even one seven-page letter covered in something that looked like either blood or paint, rambling on and on about the sender’s sense of betrayal.

That one had given me the creeps so badly that I asked the butler to burn it.

Even so, the most frightening invitation of all had been Florence’s—written in an entirely normal tone, praising the weather and politely asking after my well-being—because hers was the one invitation I absolutely could not ignore.

[I know you must be terribly busy, but if by any chance, juuuuuust by any chance, you happen to have some free time, would you perhaps be willing to attend the tea party at the Herennia Ducal House?]

So I had written Kaillen a very long and very earnest letter asking him to come.

We weren’t married yet, and it wouldn’t be easy for the daughter of an insignificant baron family to deal with a ducal princess.

I asked him to make a dramatic appearance in the middle of that weaponless battlefield and rescue a poor little lamb.

To be honest, even while writing the letter, I hadn’t really expected him to come.

Even after returning home, Florence’s expression and the sight of her back as she left kept floating through my mind.

It bothered me, but starting the next day, wedding preparations became so overwhelming that I decided to set my worries about her aside for the time being.

“It would’ve been even better if you’d sent word beforehand that you were coming, but still—I’ll never forget the favor.”

As expected, Kaillen gave no reply.

“Ahem.”

I tugged lightly on Kaillen’s sleeve and cleared my throat. He turned his head toward me.

“Back then… why were you so angry?”

Florence was the only daughter of the Herennia Ducal House, and she clearly had feelings for him. Did he really need to speak to her that harshly?

Of course, I was grateful, but if Florence ended up holding a grudge, that would be a troublesome problem in its own right.

Well, that was one thing. And honestly, it wasn’t just worry and concern. Deep down, I had been happy—.

“I wasn’t angry for your sake.”

Before I could even finish the thought, that single sentence from him made every bit of gratitude evaporate instantly. The corners of my mouth, which had been loosening into a smile, stiffened at once.

Kaillen glanced at my expression and let out a small laugh before facing forward again.

Startled by his laugh, I stood there for a while with my mouth hanging open like an idiot, then quickly snapped it shut. I pouted and shot him a sideways glare just as the firmly closed drawing room doors opened.

“Her Majesty the Empress invites you to enter.”

The Empress’s aide bowed and delivered the long-awaited announcement.

Kaillen straightened his clothes and turned to look at me. When I nodded, he walked past the large white doors trimmed in gold and stepped inside.

The first thing that caught my eye was the incredibly extravagant interior, decorated in a dazzling harmony of red and gold. I instinctively swallowed.

And what greeted Kaillen and me in that lavish drawing room was…

A puppy?

A small white dog was sleeping on a plush cushion of red velvet embroidered with gold.

At the sight of Kaillen and me entering, the dog perked up its ears, lifted its head with a deeply displeased expression, and lazily wagged its tail as if it were the true owner of the place.

The actual owner of the drawing room—the most important person—was nowhere to be seen. Flustered, I looked around.

The Empress’s aide who had opened the door simply stood politely by the entrance with both hands clasped in front of him, offering no explanation whatsoever.

I turned my head toward Kaillen, who stood beside me.

Ah. So this, too, was something he was used to.

I was glancing at Kaillen, who looked completely unbothered, when the dog—who had been eyeing us warily—lifted its head and pricked up its ears.

The place the dog was staring at.

The door tucked away in the far right corner of the drawing room suddenly swung open.

“My apologies. Did you wait long?”

The Empress entered the drawing room in nothing but her nightclothes with a robe thrown over them, speaking in a voice that didn’t sound sorry at all.

She didn’t spare Kaillen or me so much as a glance, even though we were standing in the middle of the room. Dragging her slippers across the floor, she yawned and adjusted the belt of her robe before collapsing onto an expensive red velvet sofa.

It looked as if she had just rolled out of bed. The Empress’s black hair was tousled, and with no makeup on, the traces of age were plain on her bare face.

As soon as the Empress sat down on the sofa, she snapped her fingers. The aide standing by the door immediately brought over a cigarette from the console table. The way he slipped it into her hand and lit it for her was so smooth it seemed second nature.

“Fuuu.”

Harsh, hazy cigarette smoke poured from both her mouth and nose.

Seriously, this was too much.

My nervousness vanished, replaced by sheer disbelief. The Empress lounged across the long sofa in the drawing room as if lying down, receiving a shoulder massage with her eyes closed.

Without saying a single word, she smoked two cigarettes back-to-back and then started getting a massage, while Kaillen and I remained standing there for a full twenty minutes.

The Empress acted as if Kaillen and I didn’t exist. As she was massaged, she occasionally let out small humming noises—“Mm,” “Hmm”—but nothing more.

The faint smell of alcohol pricking at my nose was unmistakably coming from the Empress’s breath.

Back when I lived as Seoha in South Korea, it wasn’t as if I had only seen one or two cases of superiors behaving badly. And yet the reason anger kept boiling inside me now was because Kaillen looked so utterly accustomed to the Empress’s behavior.

The Empress was wearing sleepwear that exposed her calves and even her thighs, enough to make me feel embarrassed on her behalf, but there was not the slightest reaction visible on Kaillen’s face.

Even the way he carefully avoided looking at her immodestly seemed natural and practiced.

I had known from reading the original novel that Kaillen had never been treated well by the Empress, but there was a world of difference between reading about it in words and seeing it with my own eyes—living through it in person.

“You look better in person than in your portrait.”

The Empress, her eyes half-lidded, looked at me. It was the first proper thing I’d heard her say since she started receiving her massage.

“This is exactly why I asked for a photograph instead of a portrait…”

The Empress waved her hand dismissively at the man giving her the massage, indicating that he could stop now. The masseur bowed politely and left the drawing room.

The Empress watched his retreating figure with a rather suggestive gaze, then pulled her slipping robe closed and lifted a glass of liquor filled with ice.