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Chapter – 35
I Will No Longer Cling
“Understood. You may withdraw.”
The palace attendant of the imperial palace bowed with proper decorum and left.
It was an unexpected situation.
Ever since taking Elizabeth as his mistress, Henryus had always slept with Elizabeth—yet tonight, he was coming here instead.
There was a sense of unease about this uncharacteristic behavior.
‘Because my behavior has changed, is Henryus changing as well?’
Whatever the reason, it was not welcome.
Josephine did not wish to live and breathe in the same space as Henryus for even a single moment.
‘But if I refuse again, claiming I’m ill, Henryus will probably start pressing me in earnest.’
Every tragedy of her previous life had begun with Henryus’s suspicion that she might betray him first.
And how had she acted each time?
She had been terrified that the household they had built together would fall apart, fretting endlessly.
To avoid being abandoned by him, she had pretended not to know the nature of his relationship with Elizabeth, even though she knew everything.
Never imagining that it would one day tighten around her neck.
All because the man who was her husband had never trusted her even once.
“Ha!”
Josephine let out a bitter scoff as she reflected on the foolishness of her former life.
‘Then this time, it’s my turn.’
But the Josephine of now was different.
She no longer trusted Henryus as her husband.
This time, she would be the one to cast suspicion back at him.
Along with the humiliation and disgrace that the two of them had inflicted on her across two lifetimes.
“Harriet, Harbor is out running errands again today, isn’t she?”
“Yes, she is.”
Josephine nodded in satisfaction.
For the past few weeks, Josephine had deliberately kept Harbor roaming outside the palace.
There were several reasons for this.
Among them was her intention to have Harbor, acting in her stead as Empress, make her presence known to the nobles who had misunderstood and looked down on her.
She also intended for Harbor—the one who had driven them out—to apologize to them directly.
“That works out well. Today, you’ll have to prepare the bedchamber in Harbor’s place. It doesn’t look like she’ll make it back in time.”
For that reason, Josephine casually assigned Harriet the tasks Harbor had always handled.
Harriet’s eyes widened as she firmly tried to decline.
“That would be improper. Hasn’t it always been Lady Harbor who prepared the bedchamber when His Majesty stayed the night?”
“Even if you are her junior, you are also a chief maid like Harbor. One I appointed personally.”
Josephine replied calmly, as if she truly didn’t see what the problem was.
“So you, too, have a duty to remain at my side and attend me closely. Do you understand what I mean?”
With a heavy heart, Harriet bowed her head.
“…I will do my best to prepare.”
This was another reason Josephine had deliberately sent Harbor out of the Empress’s palace.
Until now, Harbor had wielded immense authority as the sole chief maid of the Empress’s palace.
It was time to gradually transfer that power to Harriet as well.
“No. Don’t prepare anything.”
Josephine shook her head slightly and spoke firmly.
“Pardon?”
Harriet was visibly flustered.
“One clean blanket is enough. No food, no sleeping draughts—nothing else is necessary.”
She hadn’t misheard.
Josephine was instructing her to skip all the procedures for welcoming the Emperor into the bedchamber.
Surely, the Emperor would take this as disrespect and grow angry.
Harriet couldn’t understand why Josephine would issue such an order, but she nodded nonetheless.
“I will follow your command.”
“Yes. Just think of it as welcoming a guest—tidy the bedchamber and the bed. Ah, and there’s no need to press a new dress for me.”
Whenever Henryus came, on the rare occasions he slept with her, Josephine had always taken out a new dress.
As Empress, she felt pressured to present herself well before Henryus, the Emperor.
Under that pressure, she had always donned flashy, ill-suited dresses, waiting demurely for him to arrive.
There was no other reason.
Like Elizabeth, she too had wanted to be loved by her husband.
She believed that perhaps she could cling to even a little more of the affection that was given to Elizabeth.
‘How foolish. Henryus merely took it as his rightful due.’
At night, upon seeing Josephine overdressed, he had only ever mocked her.
—
‘You’re doing things you never do, Empress. With that scrawny body, are you planning to sleep with that gaudy dress as your blanket? You’re still young, yet your taste is already this poor.’
—
That was all he ever threw at her—ridicule.
It took dying twice for her to realize that none of it had ever been necessary.
“Just press one of my nightgowns. I won’t be putting on makeup, so just bring water for washing.”
Harriet was full of questions, but she had no choice but to obey.
“Understood. I will prepare as you’ve said.”
“Yes. You may go now.”
As Harriet left the inner chambers and walked down the corridor, she remained lost in thought.
An Empress who no longer cared about the Emperor’s gaze.
The unfamiliar curse known as Vidar’s Curse, and the prince afflicted by it.
And an imperial Empress striving to save a prince from an enemy nation.
It was truly a strange picture.
‘Does Her Majesty truly have some other feelings for Prince Siegfried?’
In truth, as Josephine had guessed, Harriet held back a fact she could not bring herself to reveal.
Siegfried had never intended to let her live that day.
He was that dangerous a man.
Yet, in the end, she could not bring herself to explain how she had survived.
—
‘You’re the strange one. You expect nothing from the Empress and want nothing from her—so why do you deliberately approach her and pledge your loyalty?’
—
The question Siegfried had asked her during their confrontation in the prison struck her again at its core.
—
‘Who are you, really? What are you hiding from the Empress?’
—
At the time, Harriet had been unable to answer.
No—more accurately, there had been nothing she could say.
—
‘I cannot tell you. But one thing is certain: Your Highness cannot kill me here.’
‘And what makes you so sure?’
‘I am already a chief maid trusted by Her Majesty the Empress. If you kill me here, Her Majesty will realize Your Highness’s cruel nature and abandon you.’
—
She had gambled—and fortunately, she had survived.
Even now, she could not forget that moment.
—
‘The Empress… would abandon me?’
—
The face of the black beast, shaken as if the thought had never once crossed his mind.
—
At dusk, as darkness settled heavily along the horizon beyond the imperial palace,
the Emperor’s carriage came to a stop before the main gate of the Empress’s palace.
Henryus stepped down from the carriage, looking uncharacteristically tense rather than his usual arrogant and imposing self.
“We greet the highest sun of the Empire.”
Led by Harriet and Harbor, the palace attendants lined up before the main building of the Empress’s palace and bowed in unison.
Impatient, Henryus waved his hand dismissively, as if even acknowledging the greeting was bothersome.
“Where is the Empress?”
“She is waiting for Your Majesty alone in the bedchamber.”
Harbor spoke in a cloying tone, as if hoping to catch the Emperor’s eye.
Naturally, Henryus did not spare her a glance.
Instead, his gaze briefly lingered on another chief maid—taller than Harbor.
‘I haven’t seen her before.’
With her poorly groomed hair and darkened wrists and hands, she did not appear to be of particularly high birth.
Seeing this, Harbor bit her lip in secret.
Already pushed aside by the Empress, and now even the Emperor’s attention was drawn to Harriet—her resentment flared.
But what truly caught Henryus’s attention was the subdued atmosphere of the Empress’s palace.
‘Even that overpowering rose-scented oil is gone.’
Henryus walked directly into the bedchamber where Josephine was waiting.
“Empress. What is the meaning of—”
He soon found himself unable to hide his confusion.
Before him was a barren room, devoid of attendants, decorations, or food—hardly believable as the bedchamber where Emperor and Empress were meant to sleep together.
The only thing awaiting Henryus was Josephine alone, wearing a simple chemise, her hair loose.
“For what reason have you come, Your Majesty?”
Josephine greeted Henryus calmly, her tone dry, as though addressing a stranger.
