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Chapter 20
“Guildmaster.”
Shion’s voice was cautious.
Rosalyn, sprawled in her chair with both feet propped on the desk, answered without opening her eyes, lips barely moving.
“Why.”
“…Aren’t you going to work?”
“I did.”
She jabbed her finger toward the floor.
She had, technically, shown up—at her own guild.
Shion kept his tone steady.
“Today is the day you’re supposed to visit the Black Iron Knights, isn’t it?”
For days she had gone diligently, determined to dig up information about Cassis and the Black Iron Order. Two days ago she had gone again. By rights, she should go today as well.
But ever since returning from Cassis’s residence, Rosalyn had been sunk in a stormy mood.
“No one’s going to scold me if I skip.”
Her sullen tone made it obvious—something had happened.
Shion thought back to yesterday.
“Didn’t you say you achieved your goal?”
She had gone there determined to glimpse the necklace Cassis kept hidden beneath his clothes.
If she reached her goal but still looks like this… did they fight?
Before he could speculate further, the guildmaster’s office door burst open.
“Guildmaster!”
“What is it?”
Shion asked in Rosalyn’s place; she was still slumped like a rag doll.
“News just came in regarding the Black Iron Commander.”
Rosalyn had ordered even the smallest movements of Cassis to be reported immediately.
It would probably be another dry update—where he had gone, who he had met.
“He just headed to the Duke’s estate.”
Rosalyn’s fingers twitched.
Shion asked,
“The Duke of Ainderte summoned him?”
“Yes. The duke returned to the capital this morning and seems to have called him.”
“Then it must be a family matter.”
It wasn’t strange for the family head to summon the young duke.
But Rosalyn thought otherwise.
“No. Not that.”
She had lowered her feet from the desk and was now sitting upright, her face pale with shock.
“What is it, Guildmaster?”
Shion’s eyes narrowed at her intensity.
Rosalyn asked gravely,
“What time is it now?”
“Ten in the morning.”
“At ten o’clock, he should be reading reports from across the Empire.”
She knew Cassis’s daily routine by heart.
Her expression darkened.
“For a man like him to abandon work just because his father summoned him…?”
Shion felt the realization strike. After all, he served an extreme workaholic himself.
“That is unusual.”
“Suspiciously unusual.”
The tension thickened. Rosalyn gave her order.
“Keep watch on the Ainderte estate.”
Something reeked of trouble.
The next morning, news arrived from the estate.
“He… didn’t report to work?”
Rosalyn’s eyes went wide with disbelief.
She herself could shirk the Knights, but Cassis?
That inflexible workaholic? Skipping duty?
“They say he entered the Duke’s residence yesterday morning and hasn’t come out since.”
“…Nor returned to his own manor?”
Snow, the kitten, was waiting there—Rosalyn’s kitten.
The staff would take care of it, of course, but…
For Cassis to neither show up to work nor return home, where responsibility awaited him?
Highly suspicious.
“Fine. Keep digging.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The reporting guildsman had barely left when another came running in, breathless.
“Guildmaster!”
“What, did Cassis show up after all?”
The sudden question made the guildsman blink. Everyone in Hyde knew these days their Guildmaster was living for scraps of news about the Black Iron Commander.
But the news was not what she wanted. The guildsman faltered.
“Uh… it’s from the Black Iron Knights, yes, but…”
“From them?”
Rosalyn was puzzled.
Without Cassis, who there would contact me?
The only one she’d struck up any rapport with was Jimmy. And he wouldn’t send something official.
“The order is: by command of the Acting Commander, the Hyde Guildmaster must report to duty immediately.”
“…The Acting what?”
Her brows shot down in a fierce scowl.
The guildsman swallowed hard and explained.
“Acting Commander, ma’am. Hugh Dillon has assumed the role.”
“That bastard?”
Shion, who had overheard, added cautiously,
“He is technically the vice-commander, after all.”
Even a thug had rank.
Rosalyn’s face turned to ice.
“So he’s calling me in to serve as his assistant now?”
Of course. It all went back to what Cassis had said days ago—that the commander alone had the authority to oversee the assistant.
She gave a derisive laugh.
“Petty little man.”
Her mood had been foul already, and now someone had volunteered to be her punching bag.
“What kind of knight has a heart that small!”
Shion asked carefully,
“Should I cancel today’s schedule?”
It had been planned on the assumption she wouldn’t be going to the Knights.
But Rosalyn snapped her head around.
“What? Why? Of course not.”
“You’re not going?”
Arms crossed, she declared,
“I’m the Commander’s assistant, not the Acting Commander’s. Cassis would agree with me.”
Deciding on Cassis’s behalf, she looked fierce and resolute.
“Ignore them.”
The wisdom of the twenty-first century had taught people one thing:
Which is worse—being left on read, or not even being read at all?
Either way, silence was the sharpest weapon.
By midday, the Black Iron Commander’s office.
Hugh Dillon, basking in his newfound “authority,” sat waiting for a certain visitor.
“…Why hasn’t she come?”
That visitor was Rosalyn Hayes.
He had long itched for the chance to put her in her place. And now, with the commander absent, his chance had come.
Why Cassis hadn’t reported in today was of no concern to Hugh.
All he cared about was not wasting this perfect opportunity.
“You there! Anyone outside?”
He shouted toward the hall. No one answered.
Frowning, he hauled his bulk from the chair and opened the door himself.
“Hey, you!”
A knight at the far end of the corridor flinched like a man struck by lightning. Wrong place, wrong time. He had no choice but to approach.
“You called, Vice-Commander?”
“Acting Commander,” Hugh corrected, puffing out his chest.
“…Ah, yes. Acting Commander.”
When the tiger is gone, the rabbit pretends to rule the forest, the knight cursed silently.
Hugh crossed his arms and rumbled in his deepest, most pompous tone.
“Why hasn’t Rosalyn Hayes reported in?”
“You mean the head of Hyde Guild?”
“Do you know another Rosalyn Hayes?”
His irritable snap made the knight hurry.
“Perhaps she chose not to come since the Commander himself is absent today.”
“Of course I know that! But as Acting Commander, she ought to assist me. I even sent men to fetch her this morning. And yet, it’s past noon—still nothing!”
The knight recalled a colleague who had drawn the short straw this morning.
“Guard the commander’s office like a statue, why don’t you, instead of making us run errands…”
In cases like this, there were two explanations:
One, the messenger had been lazy and shirked his task. Impossible. The Black Iron Knights were no back-alley guild—no knight would dare slack on orders.
Two, the Hyde Guildmaster had deliberately ignored the summons.
It must be the second one.
Looking at Hugh’s fuming face, the knight decided Rosalyn had been wise. Why would anyone walk willingly into that trap?
But Hugh’s conclusion was very different.
“Daring to ignore the summons of the Acting Commander? Unforgivable! I’ll go to Hyde Guild myself and confirm her excuse with my own eyes!”
