Chapter 41
Episode 41. Just, Because It's Raining
2023.10.11.
“This concludes today’s meeting.”
The cabinet meeting ended.
Herdin rose leisurely from his seat and left the conference room with Russ. The first thing visible upon exiting was the corridor window.
The sky was overcast. Judging by the ominous clouds, rain would soon fall.
Noticing his gaze, Russ remarked,
“The weather seemed to be warming, but spring rain appears to be coming.”
Herdin gazed at the palace grounds beyond the window. Though obscured by trees, the Empress’s Palace lay there beyond. And Blair was likely there now.
‘Someone from the Lorellaine Countess family visited, and yesterday, someone from the palace went to the countess family. And today, Her Majesty the Empress Dowager summoned Madam.’
Before marriage, he had thought Katrina cherished her daughter dearly.
Her daughter always wore expensive clothes, adorned with costly jewels, smiling brightly amid those praising her.
He hadn’t known then that appearances weren’t everything.
The sight of Blair at the first post-marriage dinner with Ivan and Katrina, and at Katrina’s birthday banquet.
The mother-daughter reality seen up close differed from what he had imagined.
Only then did he realize the oddity in Katrina’s attitude toward her daughter. And Blair’s toward her mother.
He couldn’t judge everything from those brief glimpses, but their bond was far from ordinary.
Suddenly, Blair’s demeanor at the dinner resurfaced.
Her hands trembling under the table, yet speaking her piece calmly.
“…….”
Deep in thought as he walked the corridor, Herdin halted upon noticing something.
Rain had begun to fall before he knew it.
* * *
Having finished speaking with Katrina and exited the Empress’s Palace, Blair encountered an unexpected variable.
Spring rain.
Blair stopped before the sudden downpour. A palace maid spotted her and dashed through the rain to summon the carriage.
Having rushed out after the conversation without time to have the carriage wait, Blair stood awkwardly at the entrance awaiting it.
Watching her, an Empress’s Palace maid cautiously suggested,
“Madam, the temperature is still chilly. Please wait inside.”
“It’s fine. It’ll arrive soon anyway. The air feels refreshing, so I’ll stay here.”
Declining the maid’s offer, Blair stared blankly at the drizzling rain while waiting for the carriage.
‘What will digging into it now change? Will that dead woman come back to life?’
Katrina wasn’t just refusing to approach the truth of the incident ten years ago—she feared it.
If her words were the truth, she had nothing to fear.
The moment she saw her like that, Blair finally confronted the possibility she had ignored for a decade.
Perhaps her mother had used her.
That day’s accident, and perhaps even her life.
At the same time, her mother’s face—so like her own—turned chillingly eerie.
How could she?
How could Mother do that to me?
Of course, it was just a possibility. It might not be true. Perhaps mere suspicion.
But that too might be her rationalization, unwilling to be abandoned by her mother.
She thought Asiel alone sufficed. And that remained unchanged.
Yet what was this hollow ache in her heart?
This feeling of being left utterly alone in the world.
‘……Asiel.’
Recalling the child’s face beaming at her, Blair stroked her empty belly.
My baby.
No trace of that child remained anywhere in this regressed world, so she caressed the womb that had once held him.
But her slender belly, feeling nothing but her own body, only deepened the emptiness.
Meeting Asiel again, holding that sole family tied by her blood…… seemed it would fill this gaping void threatening to swallow her. Make these current emotions seem trivial.
Watching that child breathe trusting only her, smiling so brightly, she felt she could overcome anything.
Thus, without him now, she couldn’t remain unaffected.
At that moment, as Blair’s violet eyes brimmed with the rainy scene and hollowness, a carriage halted before the Empress’s Palace.
The family crest of Divine Beast’s Wings.
The del Mark Duke family crest, like the one she had ridden in, but not her carriage.
The door opened, and a familiar face alighted.
Herdin approached Blair under an umbrella. She stared blankly at him drawing near.
They had fought.
He suspected her. Because she was Katrina’s daughter.
He likely still did now. Wondering what she had discussed, if she had sided with her mother.
And he might have killed her past self.
Yet the moment he appeared, her world held two people once more.
Herdin stopped before Blair, his strides neither hurried nor slow.
She looked up at him in disbelief. Beneath the umbrella, ice-blue eyes gazed steadily at her.
After appraising her briefly, he extended his hand.
“Shall we go?”
Blair alternated glances between his large proffered hand and him, then placed hers atop it.
His large hand enveloped hers, gently drawing her under the umbrella. Simultaneously, it tilted toward her.
Blair boarded the carriage with him. Russ transferred to her original carriage. Soon, it departed.
Silence filled the carriage interior.
Blair stole sidelong glances at Herdin. He merely stared at the rain-streaked window, saying nothing.
‘I thought he’d ask about my conversation with Mother.’
She could have answered nonchalantly then. This silence unnerved her. Fearing he was silently nurturing suspicions.
In the end, Blair spoke first.
“Mother…… seems to have planted someone in the residence. She knew about my sessions with Lady Lorellaine.”
Only then did Herdin’s gaze shift from the window to Blair. No surprise showed on his face. As if he had anticipated it.
“And……”
Answering an unasked question, Blair fell silent before continuing.
Telling him Katrina had ordered her to stop recovering memories would reveal to him the possibility of her involvement in Esmeralda’s death.
What reaction would that evoke?
He already suspected his mother-in-law, but shifting mere hunch to near-certainty was another matter.
Yet Blair continued.
“……And she told me to stop recovering my memories.”
She had resolved to uncover the truth no matter what, and he was her partner in that.
“Of course, regardless of Mother’s wishes, I intend to definitely—”
“I know.”
His calm baritone cut her off. His eyes held no suspicion or interrogation as before.
“No need to explain further to me.”
Blair gazed at him in confusion.
“Then why……”
Not curiosity about that, but why come fetch her?
In lieu of answer, Herdin regarded her pale face quietly, then spotted a tiny raindrop clinging to her hair.
Seeing his hand approach, Blair reflexively closed her eyes.
He brushed away the raindrop near her temple with his index finger. His gaze returned from it to Blair, their eyes meeting.
Only then did Herdin reply in a dry voice.
“Just, because it’s raining.”
* * *
“You summoned me, Your Excellency.”
That night, Herdin called Kalligo to his office.
“Kalligo, track the Empress Dowager’s movements for the time being.”
The day of the accident.
Blair had gone secretly to the Empress’s Palace without telling Katrina, yet Katrina claimed to have learned from a maid planted in the Princess Palace that Blair had gone there. The maid testified likewise.
Katrina wielded that to dismiss suspicions against her.
Why would she orchestrate such a thing precisely when she knew her daughter was at the Empress’s Palace, if she truly intended to kill Esmeralda?
She had even visited the temple that night to save the gravely injured Blair.
Yet Herdin had never doubted Katrina as the culprit. He believed the maid’s testimony false, and Blair feigning amnesia to cover for her mother despite knowing her guilt.
However, one possibility all had overlooked, unable to defy natural bonds.
‘That she might have used even her daughter’s life.’
Blair likely hadn’t considered it either.
No, she hadn’t wanted to.
Unable to face it if true.
Realizing that possibility bred hesitation. About making her recover her memories.
Yet he had no intention of stopping.
Truth be what it may, he must know. Why his aunt had to die. Why del Mark bore such infamy.
Even if Blair suffered in the process, it was a truth she must accept.
‘Either way, we cannot rely solely on her memories.’
Having reached that conclusion, Herdin continued.
“I stirred her up thoroughly. If she’s the culprit, she’ll double-check once more. Anxious I might have missed something.”
“…….”
“Monitor all witnesses involved then too. Report anything suspicious.”
Kalligo’s eyes gleamed sharply, unlike usual, upon receiving the order.
He bowed gravely.
“Understood.”
