Ch#87
2023.11.26.
"I'm sorry, but His Grace has ordered that Madam is not to go out."
Blair and Lina, who had been excitedly looking forward to going out after so long, could only blink in the face of this unexpected obstacle.
Lina, recovering a beat later, asked on Blair's behalf.
"Not allowed to go out? Why?"
"It's a measure to protect Madam, Lina."
"If that's the case, then the knights can go with her."
"His Grace has forbidden that as well."
"I've never resented protection like this. If the person involved doesn't want it, how is this any different from imprisonment? Madam isn't a criminal."
Even at Lina's somewhat impertinent words and behavior, Mason neither got angry nor scolded her.
"The members of Delmark simply obey when he commands."
He replied coolly in his usual flat tone, nothing more.
"And you are now a member of Delmark as well, Lina."
His face as he said that was that of the strict butler who perfectly controlled everything in this residence.
Though it wasn't much different from usual, it somehow felt unfamiliar.
"I...!"
Blair held back Lina, who tried to retort to Mason's words.
Blair quietly shook her head at Lina, who looked at her as if she were the one more wronged. Then she meekly withdrew.
"I understand. I'll speak to him directly."
As Blair turned and headed back to her room, her lips were firmly pressed together.
* * *
The moment Herdin boarded the carriage, he roughly untied and pulled off his cravat. Perhaps due to the warmer temperatures in recent days, the constricting strip of fabric felt suffocating around his neck.
After removing the cravat, Herdin spotted the letter placed on the seat opposite and hardened his expression.
Moments ago, Ivan had personally summoned and handed him an invitation to the Founding Festival banquet.
'You must attend this Founding Festival with Blair without fail.'
The demand that followed was entirely as he had anticipated.
'On the day when the entire empire ought to rejoice and give thanks to our ancestors who protected this land, we can't allow such unseemly rumors to spread.'
'......'
'As you know, the judge for that incident was Father. The more the rumors spread, the more it feels like an insult to him who conducted the trial, and it sours my mood.'
'......'
'It seems best if you attend the Founding Festival banquet that day and indirectly dispel these foolish rumors about rifts between us. What do you think, Duke?'
That was the gist of it, ultimately.
Direct denials of rumors could arouse suspicion, so attending the Founding Festival banquet to show that the discord between the Imperial Family and Delmark was untrue.
Ivan was finally shaking the leash he had seized to his own taste. The sight was quite irritating, but Herdin decided to comply for now.
The leash Ivan held was only temporary anyway. As long as he could find an excuse to keep Blair by his side, he could cast off this trivial leash anytime.
First, create an excuse to hold onto Blair, then clear Esmeralda's name. That came next.
For the sake of buying that time, he could endure it for a little while.
Before long, the carriage arrived at the ducal residence.
As always, Mason greeted Herdin as he alighted.
"Welcome back, Your Grace."
"No issues, I trust?"
Mason hesitated briefly, knowing that the 'issues' Herdin referred to concerned only one person: Blair.
He had blocked her outing on his master's orders, but he too felt Herdin's actions were excessive.
"Madam wished to go out. I informed her it was not possible."
Herdin's steps faltered for a moment as he entered the residence, but it was but an instant.
It was something he had expected they would clash over eventually.
"Is she in her room now?"
"Likely so."
Herdin headed to Blair's bedroom, leaving Mason behind.
'She must be quite angry.'
Dealing with her when angry was mentally exhausting. So fragile she seemed she might break at a touch, yet her stubbornness refused to yield.
If only she would obediently listen this once.
A languid sigh escaped between his teeth as he removed his leather gloves and stuffed them into his pocket.
Finally arriving before Blair's door, Herdin knocked and entered immediately.
Passing the reception room into the bedroom, he saw Blair's back as she gazed at the garden view from the balcony.
That figure seemed to embody her desire to go outside, looking quite pitiable.
Herdin approached from behind and lightly tapped the balcony glass door. Blair turned to look at him.
As expected, those pretty eyes were filled with resentment.
Pretending ignorance now would be pointless.
Herdin spoke first.
"I heard you wanted to go out. Where were you planning to go?"
But instead of an answer, a resentful question returned.
"......Why are you imprisoning me?"
Imprisoning.
It was quite displeasing to have his actions for her sake labeled thus, but he decided not to correct her. From her perspective, it was understandable.
Herdin replied in a nonchalant tone.
"I've taken measures to protect you."
"There are plenty of other ways besides this. Assign knights, restrict dangerous places."
"That's not enough."
What he truly wanted was to keep her within his sight all day, in his arms.
But since that wasn't feasible, this was his chosen next-best option.
Place her in what he deemed the safest location.
Yet Blair didn't seem to see it that way.
"So I should stay cooped up in this bedroom all day, quietly waiting for you?"
"This is to protect you, and you like doing it with me. Is it that hateful?"
There was no mockery in his tone, which only fueled Blair's anger further.
He truly, sincerely believed there was no issue with imprisoning her under the pretext of protection.
His face, which she thought she had grown accustomed to, suddenly felt unfamiliar.
Having lived as his wife across two lifetimes and believing she knew him well, this moment painfully drove home that it had been her own arrogance.
"I'm not your mistress. Don't speak to me that way."
After her trembling lips quivered for a long while, that was what Blair finally uttered.
Herdin sneered at that.
"You were the one who wanted that kind of relationship from the start."
"......"
"Giving your body as I desire, regardless of your own will."
With this innocent face, she had branded him a lust-maddened beast and ravaged him, too.
He had become that beast only because she wished it, so why did only contemptuous gazes return?
Why did she look the more hurt one?
"......There was no clause against going out in that. Let me go out."
"What will you do once out?"
"......"
"Get kidnapped again and give more fodder to the rumors?"
At his sarcasm, Blair's eyes twisted in pain.
Herdin gazed at Blair, who looked ready to cry at any moment, then rubbed his forehead with a sigh.
Making her cry here now was problematic.
With not even enough time to overlap their bodies as it was, he didn't want to fight with her anymore. Nor did he want to forcibly hold her when she rejected him.
After a brief think, Herdin changed tactics.
He approached the pitifully trembling Blair and pulled her into an embrace.
"No."
Blair pushed to escape his arms, but Herdin seized her hands and subdued her easily. She then turned her head to avoid his approaching lips.
Herdin grasped her chin to meet her gaze and whispered in a much softer voice.
"Fortnight."
At the sudden word from his lips, Blair's eyes blinked in confusion.
Herdin continued as if answering.
"Once the Founding Festival passes safely in a fortnight, I'll allow you to go out."
Mentioning a date with little time left would appropriately soothe her, and his naive, kind wife would believe his words unquestioningly and wait.
That would make achieving his goal much easier.
Herdin leaned down to the now-stilled Blair and pressed their lips together.
Blair's eyes, which had blinked slowly for a moment, soon closed in resignation.
* * *
The next day, when Blair opened her eyes, it was nearing noon.
Herdin, who had lingered by her side without leaving for a while, now had no choice but to delay his duties further, so he had been leaving the residence every morning lately.
Yet upon returning, he unfailingly held her through the night. His inhuman stamina was all the more real.
'Fortnight......'
Alone in the bath, Blair curled her languid body and mulled over the deadline he had mentioned yesterday.
Unable to win against him with her own power, she had pretended to accept his proposal, but in truth, she was anxious.
Blair gently caressed her lower abdomen, lost in thought.
'What if morning sickness starts in the meantime?'
Fooling not just Herdin, but Lina and Melli who attended her closest, for an extended time would surely be difficult.
After agonizing briefly, Blair sighed and rose. It was a problem with no solution in sight.
Upon exiting the bath, Melli, waiting outside the door, entered to dry her and help her into a robe.
"I've prepared meals in the room as ordered."
"Thank you."
The two headed straight to the bedroom.
The moment they passed the reception room into the bedroom, Blair's eyes began to shake violently at the smell of soup and savory bread.
'My stomach is churning......'
It could be dismissed as simple loss of appetite, but Blair, having experienced her previous life, knew exactly what this symptom meant.
This was morning sickness.
