Chapter 18
Karl silently pointed to a specific section of the budget proposal and handed the documents over. After checking them, Dian jumped to her feet and stamped in agitation.
“What should we do, Your Majesty? Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry… I forgot. I thought I’d taken care of it, but it slipped my mind.”
In an instant, her eyes reddened, and she looked utterly panicked, as though she didn’t know what to do.
“I’m sorry, Your Majesty. I’m so sorry.”
“That’s enough.”
When clear drops finally began to fall from her eyes, Karl let out a sigh and took out his own handkerchief, offering it to her.
“Stop crying. You have too many tears.”
“Yes, Your Majesty. I was careless. Her Majesty the Empress will be displeased. What should I do, Your Majesty?”
“We can resolve it with a supplementary budget.”
“But still…”
Karl watched the woman for a long while as she hunched her shoulders, trembling slightly as she wiped away her tears. He looked as though he were deep in thought. Sensing the Emperor’s strange gaze, Dian looked back at him with tear-filled eyes.
“Um… Your Majesty, is there something you wish to say?”
“……”
As the silence stretched on, Dian’s heart began to pound. Her damp eyelids and lips dried completely. Just as she blinked several times without realizing it, the Emperor finally spoke.
“The Empress’s inherent authority has already been transferred to the Empress’s Palace. In addition, I will be reclaiming the authority over the Inner Palace Affairs that I had delegated to you. It will be entrusted to the Empress in due course.”
It felt as though a heavy thud echoed from a distant place. Beneath the desk, Dian clenched the hem of her skirt tightly with her hidden hand.
This was something that would happen someday. Karl Ulrich was the kind of man who would eventually say these words. Even though she had anticipated it and prepared herself, her body still trembled.
But she could not let him see that. Just as she had practiced countless times, Dian lifted the corners of her lips into a smile and nodded.
“As a matter of fact, I was preparing for this myself. It would be presumptuous of me to instruct Her Majesty the Empress, of course… but she’ll surely be curious about last year’s data at some point. I was in the middle of preparing those materials.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, of course. However, the emergency supplementary budget needs to be handled immediately, so how about I take care of just this part?”
The Emperor slowly nodded at her words.
“Do so.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
She answered with a bright smile. And if she answered like this, Karl Ulrich would never simply let it pass.
“……I’m ordering you to give up what you have, and yet you can smile?”
Just as expected. Dian called out to the Emperor in a plaintive tone.
“Your Majesty.”
“Yes.”
“I only need you, Your Majesty. So it isn’t that I’m giving something up.”
Smiling with her eyes curved, Dian rose from her seat and approached him. Boldly, she placed her hand on the Emperor’s cheek and slowly stroked it.
Karl was a man like a sensitive wolf, so she had to be extremely careful. When he did not brush her hand away, Dian traced his lips with her fingers, then bent down and pressed her own lips against his.
“I only need you, Your Majesty.”
Whispering it like a spell as she caressed the Emperor’s hair, Dian straightened up at an appropriate moment. She lightly tidied her disheveled clothes, then looked at him as if something had just occurred to her.
“Oh, right! Your Majesty… I hear that Her Majesty the Empress has summoned Madam Giggs.”
Contrary to her expectation that displeasure would cross his face, the Emperor’s expression did not change.
“I know.”
“Pardon?”
It was not what she had expected to hear.
＊ ＊ ＊
Meanwhile, Madam Giggs welcomed Adel as she returned to the Empress’s Palace. The seasoned old lady grasped the Empress’s mood at a glance, even though it was their first meeting that day. She served both warm tea and cold water, and Adel drank the cold water first.
“It’s warm lemon tea. Please have a cup.”
When Madam Giggs personally poured and offered the tea, Adel accepted the teacup from her. The fresh, fragrant aroma seemed to slowly ease her tense muscles.
“Have you paid for the dresses?”
“Yes. However, there is something I need to discuss.”
“Why? Was the payment insufficient?”
“That can’t be.”
“Then what seems to be the problem?”
Madam Giggs looked steadily at the dress Adel was wearing—a red silk gown adorned with splendid gold embroidery.
“Did you choose the dress you’re wearing yourself?”
Following Madam Giggs’s gaze, Adel looked down at her dress.
Did I choose it? The maids asked whether I would wear this one.
“Rather than choosing it… I said it was fine.”
“Did you see the design of the dress you ordered?”
“I did.”
“And in that case as well, rather than choosing each detail yourself, you likely only gave your approval.”
Adel frowned slightly, then nodded.
“Ehmonte-style clothing is unfamiliar to me, and even in my homeland I didn’t pay much attention to dress designs.”
Madam Giggs nodded as she spoke.
“I will return the completed dresses and place a new order. For the time being, please wear ready-made clothing.”
“Is this design improper for formal occasions?”
At Adel’s question, Madam Giggs shook her head.
“No. It is a design that looks entirely befitting of Her Majesty the Empress.”
“Then why go so far?”
“Precisely because it looks entirely befitting of Her Majesty the Empress. The dress you are wearing is as if…”
“As if?”
“As if you had inherited the late Empress’s clothing 그대로.”
It was only natural that Adel did not immediately understand.
“And why would that be a problem?”
Indeed. Would that truly be a problem? They inherited the crowns of former Empresses—what did the design of a dress matter?
However—
“A dress that reminds one of the late Empress will provoke His Majesty the Emperor.”
“?”
“Please refrain from wearing it, Your Majesty the Empress. It will not be to your benefit.”
“Not to my benefit?”
“Yes. The late Empress and the current Emperor were not on good terms.”
Adel narrowed her eyes and looked intently at Madam Giggs.
Madam Giggs had been the late Empress’s right hand. She had been expelled by the Emperor, so at least in this matter, Adel could trust her. After a brief silence, Adel nodded without asking further questions.
And she thought that she would need more people she could trust.
＊ ＊ ＊
Upon returning to the Ivory Palace, Dian panted repeatedly. Seeing her sour mood, the maids quietly withdrew.
Biting her lip hard, Dian shut herself up in her room. She layered thick blackout curtains so that not a single ray of sunlight could enter, then crouched down like a larva curled inside a cocoon. As her abundant blonde hair spilled around her ears, she felt isolated, as if she were the only one left in the world. She squeezed her eyes shut and buried her face in her knees.
Her sobs welled up. Tears poured out, soaking her skirt, yet she had no idea how to stop them and simply kept crying.
She even forgot why she was crying. She cried and cried simply because the tears would not stop. After crying for a long while, she clutched her stomach with both hands.
“Why, why, why isn’t it happening? Why, for heaven’s sake…?”
It had to happen. She desperately needed a child. The position Dian stood in was precarious, one that could vanish at any moment—like an ice shelf drifting on the black polar sea. Look how easily her authority was taken away and handed to the Empress!
Adelaide. What had that woman even done?!
“Born a princess, she was given everything for free. Without any effort at all… It’s unfair.”
She sobbed and pounded her chest hard. Her beautiful face was stained and twisted with tears.
How long had she cried like that? Dian closed her eyes, drew in a long breath, and pressed her hand to her forehead. Then she rose, brushing away the hair stuck to her face with tears and sweat.
Wiping her face with the handkerchief the Emperor had given her, Dian bit her lip and pulled back the thick curtains. The light, falling straight down like prison bars, dazzled her eyes, but she did not close them. Turning to look at the now-bright room, a firm resolve showed on her face.
Even in the Ivory Palace, said to be the most beautiful in Ehmonte, this was the most beautiful room of all—thus, the most beautiful room in all of Ehmonte. A pearl-like marble floor gleaming translucently, golden moldings, a ceiling embroidered with a masterpiece of art, and a chandelier woven from thousands of crystals.
“I won’t let it be taken.”
She would not let it be taken. This was the sanctuary she had built, the fruit of effort she had earned with her own blood and hands.
“I won’t give up Karl Ulrich, or this place—either of them. I’ll never be pushed aside by some hollow Empress.”
Dian took a deep breath in, then exhaled, pressing firmly against her chest