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Chapter 5
Envoys from Her Mother’s Country (2)
I can persuade them.
The only thing that concerned Ana Rosa slightly was Count Molina’s attitude. He had been coming and going as Mun’s envoy all this time. His family was a vassal house belonging to the territory of the Duke of Trininad, the title Ana Rosa had received when she became Empress.
That made him a suitable choice for the annual diplomatic missions between Ausis and Mun. He was an intelligent man who had managed to learn to speak Mun’s language to some degree within a year, and he always had legitimate business to attend to in the Trininad territory.
More importantly, his mission had always been nothing more than checking on the current state of the alliance. It was a task even someone as inconspicuous as Count Molina could handle.
But that was no longer the case.
“You’ve met Her Highness the Princess every year, haven’t you, Count?”
At Count Menios’s question, Count Molina frowned.
“I think it would be better to say Her Majesty the Empress.”
“We’re among ourselves. She’s not even twenty. What Empress…?”
“You should be careful. This is the imperial palace of Mun. It isn’t Casas.”
Count Molina said this with a shrug.
He had given all the advice he could. If Menios still didn’t understand, that was his problem.
Count Menios glared at him. In Casas, Molina was a man who wouldn’t dare show off his knowledge in front of him. Yet here, simply because he was one of the Empress’s close attendants, he had become unbearably arrogant.
“Fine. How has Her Majesty the Empress been lately?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, her health. Her condition? Her mood?”
“She is perfectly well in every respect.”
Ah. This man really has no sense at all.
Just as Count Menios was about to lose his temper, Manuel La Repo, Count Casella, stepped in.
“We’ll know when we meet her. More importantly, Count Molina, is there anything we should be careful about in the Mun imperial court? This is my first time here.”
Count Molina glanced at Count Casella.
Casella seemed to think himself a much better man than Menios, but in Molina’s eyes, there was little difference between the two.
Yesterday, Count Casella had met his eldest daughter, Blanca La Repo, for the first time in seven years.
Yet rather than showing any joy at seeing her again, he hadn’t even offered her the most perfunctory question about whether she’d been well.
They’re exactly the same.
Count Molina was sick to death of men like them, but he didn’t let it show.
When they entered the Empress’s Palace, Count Molina naturally handed a small pouch to each of the palace guards.
The other two men looked at him strangely, but Molina paid them no mind.
Every year when he came to the Empress’s Palace, he showed kindness to countless people. It was at the Empress’s own instruction.
Each year, the Empress gave him a list of things he was to bring with him—items that were difficult to obtain in Mun, such as watches and spectacles.
She also had him bring small nuggets of gold instead of money. The pouches he distributed among the palace guards were filled with little pieces of gold.
Because Count Molina had brought such gifts every year and changed the atmosphere wherever he went, the entire imperial palace had developed a deep fondness for him.
“I pay my respects to Her Majesty the Empress.”
When Count Molina dropped to one knee, Counts Menios and Casella stared down at him in bewilderment.
Ana Rosa elegantly moved her fingertips, signaling for Molina to rise.
A court lady immediately approached and helped him to his feet.
“Sit.”
At the Empress’s invitation, Count Menios strode forward.
He naturally assumed that he would take the seat directly opposite the Empress.
He was mistaken.
As though it were the most obvious thing in the world, the court ladies blocked his path.
Those mere palace slaves…!
Count Menios’s eyes flashed viciously, but Ana Rosa didn’t even give a mocking laugh.
“Count Molina.”
She clearly indicated who was supposed to sit where.
Count Molina carefully walked over and took the seat opposite the Empress.
“Y-Your Majesty. You seem to have mistaken the representative of the delegation. You are still young, so naturally, you might make such a mistake.”
Count Menios managed to put something resembling a smile on his lips as he pointed out her supposed error.
Ana Rosa looked straight at him.
When she had first come here at the age of twelve, she had been quite afraid of Menios.
His eyes haven’t changed at all since then.
Ana Rosa smiled broadly, deliberately making sure he could see it.
“You seem to have forgotten who the mistress of this palace is.”
Count Menios’s eyes widened.
The Empress had answered him in Mun’s language.
Unable to understand what she had said, he reluctantly turned his gaze toward Count Molina, who was serving as interpreter.
“Her Majesty says you would do well to remember your own station.”
“How dare you.”
That little girl who was sent off to warm some old man’s bed dares…?
Count Menios’s eyes burned coldly.
Seeing his expression, Ana Rosa gave a small laugh.
“How dare you? Insolent fools have crossed the threshold of the Empress’s Palace while looking down upon the Great Mun imperial family! Guards.”
One word was enough.
The court ladies withdrew, and palace guards immediately took their places.
Guards also surrounded Count Casella, who had remained standing where he was.
Count Menios’s eyes darted from side to side, desperately searching for a way out.
But he couldn’t even understand the language of Mun.
In the end, his gaze settled on Count Molina, sitting comfortably in his assigned seat.
Before translating, Molina subtly glanced at the Empress.
Ana Rosa blinked once.
It was as good as a nod.
Just as he was about to open his mouth—
“Those who are rude to the Mun imperial family ought to be thrown out. As always, my Empress is a woman who knows right from wrong.”
“His Majesty the Emperor has arrived—!”
Everyone immediately prostrated themselves on the floor.
Ana Rosa, the Empress herself, folded her hands and bowed properly according to court etiquette. Molina likewise greeted the Emperor according to the etiquette appropriate for addressing the King of Ausis.
The only one standing there stupidly was Count Menios.
A moment late, Count Casella also followed Molina’s lead and respectfully greeted the Emperor.
“Hah.”
The Emperor clicked his tongue irritably.
“Get up. I’m seeing that stupid face again. Has it been seven years?”
As Count Molina backed away, a court lady swiftly removed his teacup.
Ana Rosa moved into Molina’s former seat, while the Emperor took the seat of honor.
The arrangement on the table was changed in an instant.
During that time, Ana Rosa extended her pale arm, white as though it had been made from freshly melted snow, and wrapped her hand coquettishly around the Emperor’s.
“You are truly wise and enlightened, Your Majesty.”
The Emperor frowned at the seductive gesture.
“What the hell are you doing again?”
“How many times have I told Your Majesty that you must not use such vulgar language, and that your wife is then forced to bear the brunt of your foul temper?”
“‘Bear the brunt of it’ is an awfully refined way of putting it. Ana, don’t. It’s giving me goosebumps when a child acts like this toward me.”
Court ladies could officially enter service at sixteen.
At nineteen, Ana Rosa was already an adult.
But the person she was flirting with was the Emperor, who was seventy-six years old that year and had already met every sort of beauty the empire had to offer.
The Emperor even preferred older women, and Ana Rosa had been far too young for his tastes from the moment they first met.
Now, after seven years of history between them, Ana Rosa was less like a woman to him and more like a granddaughter—or perhaps the first pupil he had ever personally raised.
Mun also had a strict tendency to equate the relationship between master and disciple with that between parent and child.
In other words, the relationship between teacher and student was regarded as akin to incest.
If a master and disciple actually became sexually involved, their relationship would be condemned as incestuous.
So whenever Ana Rosa behaved this way out of necessity, the Emperor simply had to endure the discomfort and hives that broke out all over his body.
“If you don’t put up with it, I’ll tell the physicians to leave the licorice out of your medicinal decoction starting today!”
The Emperor suffered from various ailments due to his advanced age, and therefore had to drink medicinal decoctions every day.
Naturally, the medicine was bitter, so licorice was often added to counteract the bitterness with its sweetness.
The moment Ana Rosa threatened to tell the Imperial Medical Bureau to remove the licorice from his medicine, the Emperor’s back straightened despite his deep dislike of the stuff.
Then, almost surreptitiously, he took her hand.
“Damn it, why have you never learned the meaning of filial piety? …Does Ausis not even have a word for filial piety?”
From the perspective of Counts Menios and Casella, it looked as though the Emperor doted upon his young Empress.
But to Count Molina, who understood Mun’s language, there could hardly have been a greater comedy.
The corner of Molina’s mouth twitched.
The Emperor noticed it with uncanny precision and immediately scolded him, blaming Ausis for sending the girl off to be married without teaching her the concept of filial piety.
Molina carefully replied.
“I humbly apologize. Just as Her Majesty was reaching the age when she would have learned filial piety, a great change occurred in her life, and her tutors were replaced. I ask Your Majesty for your generous understanding.”
The “great change” that had occurred in Ana Rosa’s life referred to her marriage.
In other words, the Emperor had essentially said:
She was in your country at the age when she should have learned this. You should have taught her.
And Molina had delivered the same message back to him, only wrapped in the most exquisitely polite language imaginable.
