Chapter 30

 Because he was Larque’s son, it was natural. That’s what the queen seemed to want to say. But she no longer smiled. No, she seemed unable to smile. When the queen trailed off, the king laughed even more cheerfully. Suddenly, she wondered if the king knew about the queen’s love. The queen doesn’t love the king. This beautiful king was the same. His two young sons were also not the queen’s children. The queen had loved Larque since she left her home country. It was still the same now. Only her gaze toward Larque was extremely affectionate, while her gaze toward Eselmund and Ella was extremely harsh. It was a pitiful love. Ella looked at Larque while patting the back of the child who had started to whimper. What about this man? What did he think of the queen?

 When she was in Roman, Ella thought of the queen while looking at Lady Roenel. More precisely, it was Larque with the queen. Since he was the king’s knight, he was courteous to the queen as well. When attending a ball held by the king, he would kiss the queen’s hand and bring her a glass of wine at her request.

 Ella shook her head. She didn’t want to think about the queen. Just facing her was already overwhelming. She was a woman Ella didn’t want to be close to. After much thought, she came to hate Larque for leading her to the royal palace. He said it was the occasion to show Eselmund for the first time. He said it was the occasion to show the birth of his successor, which had only been announced in writing, to the royal couple and the nobles. Ella didn’t want to do that. Would it be a happy thing even if Larque made her child the future Duke? She wasn’t sure. She thought so at first. But she was a lowly servant girl.

 Could the child avoid sidelong glances even if his father’s status was high and noble, when his birth was lowly? She wasn’t sure. Now, it didn’t seem good for Eselmund to become a Duke. When she was carrying him in her womb, she cried every day because she was so afraid of his future. She wasn’t happy to be pregnant, but just thought she had become more unhappy.

 What if the child she was carrying didn’t receive proper love from Larque? What should she do if he lived in the castle eating sidelong glances as a half-illegitimate child? Ella burrowed into his embrace every day to secure the child’s future. She felt like she could do anything if she could change the child’s future even a little.

 But now, she hated even nobles looking at the child. From the time the midwife wrapped the child in swaddling clothes and placed him in Larque’s arms, she felt that something was wrong. But unlike her, Larque informed the royal palace three days after the child was born that the Duke’s successor had been born. The letter was stamped with the dragon symbolizing Durac, and the black ink spelled out the noble name of the successor.

 ‘Eselmund Monte Irrantal von Durac.’

 That was the name. Noble and dignified. Regardless of his mother’s lowliness. Eselmund was noble. Because Larque, the child’s father, said he was noble. The king issued a decree permitting the successor before a day had passed.

 So her mind should have been at ease. But it wasn’t at ease at all. The man’s eyes, which showed no growth of affection for his son, persistently grew anxious. Couldn’t the decree permitting the successor be changed at any time? If the Duke changed his mind and took a legal wife and then announced that the legitimate child would be the successor, what meaning would the current decree have? Larque was the kind of person who could do that and more.

 There was no need to say more. Ella rather wanted to run away somewhere with the child. She wanted to leave the castle and forget Larque. In fact, she had tried to do so once. But she failed……

 “May I hold him?”

 The king asked. Ella looked at him with a bit of tension. The man was smiling faintly even though a lowly woman was looking at him. Despite it being unexpected, Larque took the child from Ella’s arms and handed him to the king without showing any clear reaction. Ella frowned at the careless action, as if handing over an object.

 “How cute. Pavel and Elliot also had times like this. This child really resembles only the Duke. Seeing him up close, they’re eerily similar.”

 The king murmured while soothing the child. At that low resonance, Eselmund stopped whimpering and looked at him. The child, who had been almost pulled from his mother’s arms, stirred slightly, but the king was a man who was good at soothing little ones. Above all, he had watched his two sons in that way.

 “The Duke seems to need to learn how to hold a child.”

 “Is that so?”

 Larque responded indifferently. The king chuckled at that insincere response. The queen was examining the child again, who was now at a closer distance than before. The look as if she was seeing something terrible had subsided a bit, but she was still tense.

 Did she want to erase Larque’s traces from Eselmund? Or did she wish he wasn’t his child? Ella also disliked people who liked to talk about others, but nevertheless, stories about the queen often circulated in San Parvale. It was because the queen was a foreigner, and more so because she was a princess from an enemy country.

 They said the queen cried madly after the child was born in San Parvale. She heard that when Ella became pregnant, the queen secluded herself and refused to eat, and before the child was born, she believed the story that the Duke’s servant girl might have conceived by committing an improper act. It might not be true, but Anna said it must be true because the queen’s lady-in-waiting said so.

 Although the truth was uncertain, seeing the queen’s reaction, Ella thought that the story that had flowed to San Parvale might be true. Her eyes looking at her young son. Ella wanted to pluck out the woman’s amber eyes every time they blinked.

 “Father!”

 It was when the king was holding Eselmund. A small boy’s voice was heard from across the hall. A boy with beautiful silver hair like the king’s, disheveled at will, came running across the vast banquet hall. The king immediately handed the child to Larque and then picked up the boy.

 “Pavel!”

 *** 

 Sirena looked at Guinevere. The woman glanced at her with no expression and then threw her gaze to the corridor. Sirena paid her respects properly even though the queen barely acknowledged her greeting. She didn’t dislike the queen. She thought the queen didn’t dislike her either. The two had no reason to hate each other.

If anyone was receiving the queen’s hatred, it would be that small woman standing beside the Duke. Sirena walked to her husband, unable to catch her running son. The king smiled at her and looked at her with an impatient expression, unable to approach. She went to the group standing in the middle of the banquet hall, neither hastening nor slowing her steps. Pavel, who had burrowed into the king’s arms, looked at the young child in the Duke’s arms.

 “Whose baby is this?”

 “It’s my baby, Your Highness the Prince.”

 “Oh, how cute. It’s smaller than Elliot.”

 When Pavel asked innocently, the Duke answered. Sirena was worried that her son might make a mistake with the Duke. The man was accustomed to hiding his emotions, and his young son and that son’s mother were an untouchable sore spot for him.

 “Right, Father? It’s smaller than Elliot. Elliot is walking now. This baby doesn’t seem like it can walk yet.”

 “That’s right, Pavel. This baby is smaller than Elliot. Because it was born later than Elliot. But have you greeted the Duke and the queen?”

 The king replied quietly to his son. The child made an “oops” expression at his father’s words. The boy greeted the queen and the Duke in order and then smiled brightly. The queen barely acknowledged the prince as well. Unlike when looking at Eselmund, there was neither hostility nor curiosity. Just the king and his lover the royal consort’s son. Eyes looking at some couple’s mischievous son whom she knew a little. Therefore, she was completely apart from them and defined herself as an outsider, not mixing with Kylaq.

 The only thing she was interested in was the Duke. The Duke, and everything related to the Duke. As with unrequited love, the queen hated and envied everything that her beloved loved, and ultimately wanted to destroy it.

 “Welcome, royal consort.”

 The king kissed Sirena’s cheek, slightly separating from his son. Ella stared at the king’s royal consort. The royal consort’s gaze was clearer than the queen’s and sparkled with goodwill and favor. Since the royal consort and her son had come out, it seemed the banquet would start soon. Ella turned her head and looked at the nobles wandering around to greet the king. Sir Endymion, who was Marquis Gwendel, and Kirion, who was Count Clegar, caught her eye.

 “I’ll go to the back.”

 She had done her duty and needed to exit. She couldn’t join the nobles’ banquet because she wasn’t a noble. She turned around, leaving Eselmund and Larque behind. No words came from Larque.

 ***