A person's heart and their political acumen bear no relation to each other whatsoever. I had been Grand Duke of the North for nearly twenty years, and it had been quite some time since the North had become a place worth living in. Yet this particular hardship was something I had never faced before. You know how it is.
When someone suddenly begins to matter to you enormously — what is a person supposed to do? Should you keep it hidden? Or should you come out and say it honestly?
I've been going on too long.
"I'm fine with anything."
"I found something fun, and I wanted to try it."
She said she'd found an interesting game. Wait — was there a game for lovers in the third volume of Atlas? I couldn't remember. I was fairly certain the third volume of Atlas was entirely about politics.
A game for lovers. Daniela drew closer. She was holding something in her hand. A small stick — a little piece of a broken pen.
Daniela sat down across from me. It was like a scene from a popular novel. But there was something I needed to do first. I couldn't let this opportunity slip by.
"Is anyone outside?"
The moment I turned toward the door and spoke, someone knocked. I told them to come in, and one of the guards cracked the door open and bowed his head. Just as I thought.
"Whatever sounds come from inside this room, whatever happens — I can handle it myself. Stand well clear. Don't let anyone near."
"B-but if any threat were to come upon Your Grace—"
Daniela turned her head away, looking embarrassed. I said nothing and simply stared — steadily — at the guard. No sense of the situation whatsoever. But he quickly closed the door and disappeared. From outside came his voice, announcing: By order of His Grace the Grand Duke — no one is to enter this room.
"H-how embarrassing..."
"It's fine. Just in case."
All obstacles removed. I turned back to face Daniela. A game for lovers. For some reason, my thoughts kept drifting somewhere indecent. But we hadn't progressed that far yet. Let's take this slowly, just a little.
"So what kind of game is it?"
"Oh — ah. It's just that I feel like there's a lot the Grand Duke and I don't know about each other."
Hmm. I stroked my chin. We don't know much about each other, do we. Come to think of it, I didn't know much about Daniela at all. When I'd read about her in the book, she had been nothing more than a common defeated heroine, and the Grand Duke of the North had barely appeared for a single chapter.
"We take turns asking each other questions."
"That sounds good."
"But you can't tell any lies. If you lie—"
Daniela demonstrated the penalty with the stick, pulling back one end and letting it snap against the back of her hand with a sharp little crack. But how would she know if I was lying? Suddenly I recalled something Alfredo had said as a joke — that it was easy to tell the intentions of a man who had fallen in love.
"But how would you know if I'm lying?"
"That's exactly why it's a game for lovers."
"Hmm. Fair enough. All right."
There was no reason to lie anyway. Daniela was the first to want to ask a question. I wondered what she would ask. Surely nothing strange.
"What is your name?"
"Theodor. Ah — my full name is Theodor von Ardrno Ifela Wintergard."
"Good."
After Daniela's word of approval, the stick passed to me. Our pale hands touched. For some reason, indecent thoughts kept surfacing. There's no one outside, right? But not yet — not yet. It's still a little too soon.
"Hmm, now that I think about it, I don't know much at all. How old is Daniela?"
"I turned twenty-one this year."
"Good."
I passed the stick back. There's quite an age gap, isn't there. Nearly ten years between us. Come to think of it, I'm no better than a scoundrel.
"Then how old is the Grand Duke?"
"Twen— twenty-nine?"
"That's a lie. Give me your hand."
At least let me shave a little off. I held out my hand to Daniela. The stick fell lightly — just enough to make a soft tap against the back of my hand. How dare she lay a hand on the Grand Duke's person. Outrageous! — if I said that, it would ruin the mood entirely.
"If you lie, you get one more chance."
"Is that so? All right, then. What's the question?"
"Why did the Grand Duke want to make me his Grand Duchess?"
The question caught me off guard. Meeting Daniela's eyes, I found them full of sincerity. The reason I had made Daniela my Grand Duchess. I could answer honestly, or I could add a lie, or I could do both.
"I have to give only honest answers, right?"
"Yes. I won't be hurt."
"Really?"
"No. Actually, I will be. Quite a lot..."
Hmm. That makes it harder. Then I needed an answer that was direct, yet kept my feelings appropriately concealed.
"Originally, part of it was pity. Whether you had done something wrong or not — the fact that you ended up here wasn't what you had intended. Isn't that right?"
Daniela nodded. That sounds like I'm talking around it a bit.
"I thought perhaps you could become a channel of communication with the South. But thinking about it, that turned out to be impossible, didn't it?"
"That's true..."
Going any further now would hurt her. That much is certain. The truth is, there were political reasons behind making Daniela my Grand Duchess. The North's economy was at risk of stagnation, and I had judged that her connections in the South could be leveraged to expand our influence. But for that to work—
"Honestly, if that were the only goal, it would have made more sense to take a different noblewoman as Grand Duchess. If it were purely a political marriage."
"..."
"But I couldn't do that. The thought that came to me the first time I saw Daniela in the Hall of Winter — that thought has stayed with me until now."
"W-what thought was that?"
"That she was beautiful. Lovely. And this next part is a little embarrassing."
Daniela said nothing, only watching me. It was I who looked away first. That was a first. I had thought that since becoming Grand Duke, I had never looked away from anyone's gaze directly.
"Just — just. Well."
"You have to be honest."
"I wanted to have you. That was the thought."
It was strange. The Daniela I had first seen had been nothing more than a broken woman. Not by her own will, she had been cast out to the far North. Had she not been left to wander, stripped of her family?
Among all those who had prostrated themselves in the Hall of Winter, had she not been the most pitiable? And had she not been the most beautiful?
But the Daniela I had seen afterward was a woman who was beautiful and intelligent both. Though she sometimes failed to understand the ways of the North, admittedly.
And so I had wanted to have her. That kind of thought — anyone could have it.
"Now it's my turn."
"Oh — ah, not yet!"
"No, it's my turn now. I didn't lie."
I had no stick in hand, but I claimed my turn by force. I looked into Daniela's eyes. Her blue irises were strikingly beautiful.
"What about you? You could have refused the position of Grand Duchess. If you had said you wanted to stay with House Barth, I would have allowed it."
Daniela nodded. Of course, it wouldn't have been easy with the Crown Prince and that young southerner involved, but it could have been managed. Yet it was Daniela who had not refused. Come to think of it, she had also been the first to say she liked me. And she had been the one to suggest we become lovers.
"I'm always the same."
"In what way?"
"My answer. Because I like the Grand Duke — no, because I like the person called Theodor."
A few seconds of silence. Perhaps I had been waiting all along to hear that answer. I had heard somewhere that human communication is not made of words alone. That sometimes a person's heart can be felt in the smallest gesture, the smallest movement of the body. Perhaps I was feeling something like that now.
At least for the Grand Duke of the North, it could not have been otherwise. And yet — receiving this kind of feeling, this kind of heart, had been rare. Someone's heart.
Not the loyalty that the people of the North offered me, but the feeling of someone genuinely caring for me.
"I-it's my turn."
"What do you want to know?"
I placed my hand on Daniela's waist. I drew her toward me, slowly, bringing her closer. Not quite at the waist — she startled slightly, but Daniela did not pull away entirely. If she had recoiled, I would have let her go at once.
"You said I was beautiful."
"Yes."
I could barely hear the question. Daniela was now within my arms. Her hands rested against my chest, and my face drew slowly closer.
"Where did you find me so beautiful?"
"All of you?"
"Not like that... The part you found most beautiful."
"Let me think..."
The answer didn't matter. I brought my finger to Daniela's forehead with a gentle tap. Slowly, my finger traced downward. Along the bridge of her nose, pausing to indicate her eyes, then her nose. The finger descending further grazed her lips. I cupped her cheek in my hand.
While I was with Daniela, the room felt unusually warm. There had been moments I had even felt hot. Right now it was neither hot nor cold, and yet my body trembled.
And there was a lovely scent. Violets. Yes — a fragrance like purple violets filled the room entirely.
Daniela's lips were the same.
There was no sound. Only the quiet, soft press of lips parting at the end — that alone filled the silence.
Daniela must have heard it too. That fleeting sound against my ear, lingering — a soft, gentle kiss that seemed to echo.
"Grand Duke..."
"Surprisingly embarrassing."
My face had gone crimson. I touched Daniela's lips with my fingertip. The place where my lips had met hers.