Chapter 19. Even If I’m Hated More Than This

At the back of the mansion, a side door used by the servants came into view.

He walked there as if entranced.

The servants, busy with their work, hadn’t even properly secured the door. Calyx easily entered the house through that door. Or more precisely, he trespassed without permission.

The maids coming toward him screamed at the sudden intruder. He didn’t stop.

Though it was his first time in this house, he felt like he knew exactly where everything was.

He went straight up to the second floor and headed for the innermost room.

Male servants who had been informed of the emergency immediately chased after him, but he paid them no mind. If they caught him, he would throw them down to the first floor and continue on his way.

He stood before a door at the end of the corridor, where a thin beam of light leaked through the gap.

Seized by a strange premonition, he opened that door.

The familiar scent was the first thing he noticed.

That indescribable floral or grassy fragrance he had smelled when he kissed Lottie.

Next came the air, muggy even for early summer. And then……

“What brings you here, cousin?”

Patrick, who had been sitting by the bed, stood up without showing any surprise.

Despite the evident mockery in those words, Calyx ignored Patrick and walked toward the bed as if drawn to it.

Lottie lay in the bed enclosed by a thin canopy. With her eyes closed as if dead, she was breathing rapidly and shallowly.

“I heard she’s been suffering from a severe fever for days. Groaning and sweating profusely, she would occasionally seem to regain consciousness only to collapse again soon after. The doctor who examined her said her fragile body has accumulated extreme fatigue and tension, making it difficult for her to recover quickly……”

Calyx, who had been blankly staring at Lottie’s fever-flushed face, finally turned to look at Patrick.

He couldn’t understand why or how his cousin was here. His head felt foggy, perhaps due to the heat filling the room.

“By the way, to fully enjoy the joy of meeting you again, how about answering my question?”

Patrick spoke first. His leisurely gray eyes asked him.

“What brings you here, to a place where Miss Ebenscher and I should be alone?”

“……You.”

“Ah, in case you’re wondering, let me tell you in advance that I was formally invited by the Duchess of Dunchester to visit Miss Ebenscher during her illness.”

Calyx’s eyes momentarily forgot to blink. A drawling voice followed.

“Even while unconscious with fever, Miss Ebenscher kept asking for me, I heard. With that small, delicate mouth, calling my name longingly.”

Patrick’s voice contained an undeniable certainty that couldn’t be refuted.

Though knowing those words were lies not worth listening to, Calyx’s gaze somehow turned toward Lottie.

Her mouth, slightly parted, irregularly exhaling fever-heated breaths.

Imagining that mouth desperately calling Patrick’s name made his throat constrict involuntarily.

“It seems the cold waters of the Contra River weren’t the only thing that caused Miss Ebenscher such suffering.”

Following Calyx’s gaze to glance at Lottie, Patrick swallowed his smile and spoke as if regretfully.

His tone suggested he had no idea what was going on, but Patrick, who had planted Luka Brown as a spy, couldn’t possibly be ignorant of the situation. His words contained subtle criticism directed at his cousin.

Calyx recalled the sadness and anger that the old lady couldn’t hide despite her years of experience.

The guilt that his desire had driven a small, fragile woman to the threshold of death made the ground beneath his feet give way.

In truth, he had been going mad with that thought since the first day he should have turned back from Blue Brick.

“Judging by the expressions of the servants outside, it seems you have ‘once again’ shamelessly set foot where you weren’t invited.”

Patrick, now certain he had the upper hand, spoke while swallowing a thrilling pleasure.

“Why don’t you leave now and stop causing trouble for everyone? I know it’s pointless to ask you to maintain your dignity anymore.”

Calyx stood quietly and glanced at the doorway.

Servants were huddled outside the open door with fearful expressions.

The fact that they couldn’t easily enter the room suggested they had been strictly ordered not to enter a room where the crown prince was present.

Once again, his gaze turned toward Lottie, as if drawn by strings like a puppet, helplessly.

He watched her gasping rapidly, having lost consciousness.

He looked once at her cheeks where a few strands of hair stuck to her sweat-dampened skin, once at her eyes that he wished would fully contain him again, and once at her parched lips.

‘Ah.’

I truly must be a demon.

Even knowing that I’m the one who made you sick, I don’t want to stop.

Even if I’m hated more than this, I want to keep you by my side where no one else can see you, and devour those lips that speak another man’s name.

Finally ceasing his thoughts, Calyx smiled at Patrick. It was a bleak and desolate smile, like that of a beast before its final struggle.

Just as Patrick was beginning to doubt his eyes, Calyx quickly approached the door.

With a bang, he closed it.

Only after firmly securing the latch did Calyx turn back to Patrick. Throughout all this, he still wore that inscrutable smile on his lips.

“You said Charlotte called for you longingly.”

Patrick’s eyebrows twitched at being addressed as “you” rather than “Your Highness the Crown Prince” as usual.

The intention behind Calyx’s different form of address when they were alone was crystal clear.

“I don’t believe it. It must be a lie.”

You are not the crown prince.

“Isn’t that so? You have the miraculous talent of turning a perfectly fine prince into a madman overnight, just twelve years ago.”

You who have taken a position that doesn’t belong to you.

“Fake Crown Prince.”

Had they been in the middle of the main street, such a statement would have warranted imprisonment for slander.

Knowing this, Calyx Valdea had locked the door in advance. He moved like a mouse to ensure no one could hear, then dared to speak as he pleased before the crown prince.

“……Do you realize what you’ve just said?”

Patrick, regretting having sent his attendants back to Denger Palace, struggled to maintain his composure.

“I cannot understand a single word of what you’re saying. If you’re harboring resentment over having your commissioning deferred after graduating from the military academy, lodge a formal protest. No matter that you’re my cousin, I cannot tolerate you insulting me and the royal family with such absurd words.”

“Ah, is that so? If you cannot tolerate it, what then? Are you saying you’ll finish me off this time?”

Meeting the wide-open gray eyes steadily, Calyx burst into laughter. He looked like a madman who had lost his mind.

Patrick felt a chill down his spine and unconsciously glanced at the closed door.

The stupid servants outside hadn’t even thought to break down the door despite the situation having escalated this far.

“But what can you do? Unlike some random passerby, Your Highness with the Redbreeze surname could never spill even a drop of my blood.”

“What……!”

“Didn’t you know? Why your mother has had no choice but to keep me alive for twelve years?”

After disparaging the crown prince as fake, now he refers to the queen as “your mother.”

It was a statement that made Patrick’s warning to stop the insulting remarks seem hollow, but Patrick couldn’t readily answer.

“……”

His silence in response to Calyx’s question seemed like an admission.

When Calyx Valdea, or rather, Calyx Redbreeze as he was known then, killed the former king, Patrick was only 10 years old.

It was a terrible incident too difficult for a child to comprehend, so his mother kept it from her son.

But there were rumors. Even with his young mind, he knew his cousin’s crime deserved death.

Yet Calyx survived disgracefully under the Valdea name.

Instead of paying for his crime with death, he completed a long military service at the border, was released as a free man, then voluntarily enrolled in the military academy but was denied commissioning, resulting in an indefinite deferment of his graduation.

— Why does Mother show such great leniency to my cousin? We never know when his mental illness might strike again. Is promoting the royal family’s recognition and dignity more important than ensuring the stability of the royal house?

Patrick recalled a time when he had asked his mother this question.

It was more of a protest than a question. Displaying weakness he could never show before his ministers, Patrick had waited for his mother’s answer.

Her answer then was:

— That’s something you don’t need to know yet.

“Isn’t it strange? A prince who was perfectly fine until just yesterday suddenly goes mad and kills his father, and in the middle of the royal palace at that.”

Calyx spoke in a sing-song voice. His slightly closed eyes were chilling. They resembled those of a fanatic expounding heretical doctrines after becoming engrossed in a cult.

“The noble councilmen positioned in parliament are not fools. The same goes for the Cream Party councilmen who care about and think of the new queen and her son more than anyone. Who do they think benefited most from the former king’s suspicious death?”

“……!”

“If I were to die here too, you and your mother would never be able to wash away the dishonor of being connected to the former king’s death. Since the dead cannot speak, the path to demanding an explanation from me, the perpetrator of the murder, would be forever lost.”

Calyx’s wandering gaze suddenly pierced through Patrick.

Despite knowing that the man had no weapon or anything else at the moment, a momentary fear swept over him.

He was like a wall. A massive wall that couldn’t be penetrated by anything and would eventually overwhelm him.

Before it, Crown Prince Patrick, who had everything, trembled slightly. It felt as though he, not the other man, was the royal in name only.

“So I ask you. Little brother.”

Calyx slowly walked toward Patrick. Those few steps felt like an eternity.

Calyx stood before Patrick.

Looking down at Patrick who looked up at him, as if regarding a child, he slowly lowered his head.

“Twelve years ago. Do you know what your mother and her minions did to me?”