#Chapter 23. Two Knights

“……We need to change the plan. Sir Charles, please pretend to be the knight who betrayed us.”

“My lady……”

Charles called the lady, knelt down and tried to meet Lucy’s eyes, but Lucy quickly turned her gaze to Daniel’s wound and hardened her face.

Then she untied the scarf she was wearing and placed it on the tutor’s shoulder.

“The bleeding is deep. Teacher, you need to see a physician first.”

“But Sir Charles doesn’t know the way at all. Rather, I should……”

“The knight tried to kill Teacher. It might not be better for Teacher to go instead. It means their thoughts have changed. The worst case would be that information from our side leaked, and the best case would be that they just tried to eliminate Teacher Daniel.”

“……What does that mean?”

Charles listened to the story and asked.

The tutor he thought was an accomplice was being attacked by the knight, and beyond that, he seemed to be on the same side as the lady.

Wasn’t this the complete opposite of the situation the duke had described?

“Someone tried to kidnap me using Teacher Daniel.”

“Kidnap……”

Charles flinched at the word kidnapping, calmly assessed the situation and nodded.

If it was kidnapping, it made sense. The tutor had been on the other side from the beginning.

Thinking that way, he could understand why the knight’s blade was directed at the tutor first.

As the lady said, they might have known about the tutor’s betrayal, or he might have been a card to discard from the start.

They probably planned to clean up the scene like that and kidnap the lady immediately.

While Charles was lost in thought, Lucy glanced at the corpse fallen on the hill, then turned her gaze back to Charles.

“We need to extract as much information as possible. Until Father comes…… Sir Charles, Mother is fine, right?”

“The butler is by her side. More than that, my lady……”

The moment Charles tried to speak, Daniel grabbed his bleeding shoulder and raised his upper body.

“Ugh…… First, this isn’t the time to have a conversation here. If you go behind here, you’ll find a large cathedral. We were originally supposed to meet behind the cathedral that’s built like castle walls. But since the knight tried to eliminate me, there’s a possibility they taught me differently from the beginning.”

“That’s possible, but we have no choice, so let’s go there for now. Sir Charles.”

Lucy spoke firmly, but Charles witnessed the situation and opposed.

“That won’t do. It could be a place where they’ve set a trap and it’s even enemy territory. Moreover, if they’re just hiding and watching us, it would rather be bad.”

“If murder was the purpose, they would have tried to eliminate me first, not Teacher Daniel, here. There’s probably a clear purpose for the kidnapping. I was confident they originally planned to kidnap me and extort something, but seeing how things are turning out……”

Lucy paused her story for a moment, then looked up at Charles again.

“It seems they plan to use it to discard the cards they held.”

“The cards they…… held?”

Charles met Lucy’s gaze and frowned.

“I don’t know the reason, but the lady also wants the opponent to discard those cards.”

“Yes…… Completely. If possible, it would be better to frame me as the criminal who kidnapped me and eliminate me. Even if we don’t get information about those forces this time.”

“……Understood.”

Charles suddenly agreed with Lucy’s story, approached the corpse and began searching it.

“Let’s investigate this guy first. There might be something else.”

While Charles searched the knight, Lucy tightly tied her scarf that had soaked Daniel’s shoulder and laid him down.

Then she whispered in a very small voice.

“Daniel. The ducal residence will probably send people. At that time, don’t immediately tell them about the story behind the cathedral.”

Daniel startled at the lady’s words and flinched, and Lucy put her finger to her lips and shushed, as if it was a secret from Charles.

“What are you thinking?”

At Daniel’s question, her gently folded green eyes winked and smiled.

He didn’t know what it was about, but since the lady was so smart, there must be a reason.

Daniel slightly nodded and made a promise with the lady secretly from Charles.

*

“Madam……! Madam!!”

Not long after moving the collapsed Ariel to her room, she quickly regained consciousness.

Ariel’s face, which opened her eyes wide, showed anger that seemed like it would bring down lightning from a clear sky.

Ariel got up with the maid’s support and approached Bella who came to deliver the news.

“Where was the kidnapping?”

“As, as soon as we climbed the hill.”

“……Butler, call the coachman immediately.”

Ariel’s sharp voice rang out, and the maid standing beside the butler went to call the coachman.

Meanwhile, Ariel grabbed Bella’s shoulders.

“Bella. You must answer the questions well. ……There were knights and you were there too, so how exactly was Lucy kidnapped?”

Even scolding wouldn’t be scarier than this.

Ariel’s long, pale fingers gripped Bella’s shoulders firmly, while her low voice seemed to claw into them like hooks.

“That……”

Bella swallowed her saliva and recalled Lucy’s words.

“The knight…… wasn’t from the ducal residence.”

Bella calmly conveyed what Lucy had told her.

“What…… did you say?”

“The knight wasn’t from the ducal residence. He drew his sword and tried to harm the tutor.”

The strength in Ariel’s fingers gripping Bella’s shoulders suddenly released.

Bella was suddenly freed and slowly raised her gaze that had been cast down.

The madam, who was much taller than Bella, was looking straight ahead with her lips slightly parted.

It felt like looking at a beautifully carved plaster statue.

There was no color at all in her face, which had completely lost its soul. It was just pale white.

Silence came to the ducal residence for a while. Bella couldn’t say anything in front of that face. Would a goddess make such a face when angry?

The maids who had come out alone due to the commotion also kept the silence that had suddenly arrived.

Everyone instinctively froze as if facing a massive approaching tsunami.

“……”

What broke the brief silence was the coachman’s arrival.

While the coachman realized the situation looked serious and couldn’t speak, just opening his eyes wide, Ariel moved only her pupils to look down at Bella.

The sight of her moving only her pupils and nothing else was extremely eerie, but Bella couldn’t even let out a surprised exclamation.

It was an atmosphere that made her realize what it felt like to be suffocated.

“Then what happened to the tutor?”

“He was severely injured by the traitorous knight and is on the hill.”

“I see. Did Lizzy, who went together, go to Damian to deliver this news?”

“……Yes.”

With that answer, Ariel’s head turned.

“All personnel of the ducal residence will go out to find traces of Lucy. Bella, you depart to inform the capital guard about this matter.”

Ariel’s footsteps moved.

“Butler! Let’s depart for the hill.”

*

“Huff, huff…… Your Grace.”

At the same time, Lizzy climbed onto the deck haphazardly, saying she had to see the duke regardless of the surrounding situation.

“A maid?”

Just as Damian came down from the deck and met Lizzy, Lizzy immediately shouted.

“Your Grace! The lady has been kidnapped!!”

And beside her, Bruno flinched his shoulders as soon as he saw Lizzy and quickly grabbed Damian’s forearm.

“What? Brother! You should go to the capital guard immediately to tell them about this!”

However, Damian stood firmly in that spot and pulled down the tie that was tightly choking his neck.

He closed his eyes tightly and took a deep breath for a moment.

His jaw muscles tensed as if he was clenching his molars tightly, then his blue eyes opened.

“Brother……! You must think carefully. If it’s kidnapping, search comes first, and to search, personnel is absolutely necessary. No matter how excellent your military power is, search comes first.”

“……Then you can go.”

“What?”

Damian roughly struck away Bruno’s hand gripping his forearm and immediately came down from the deck.

“Maid! I sent two knights, so what happened?”

“One was defeated, and the other kidnapped Lady Lucy.”

“Defeated……? One was defeated, and another kidnapped Lucy!”

“Yes……”

Bruno grabbed Damian once more as he hesitated at the maid’s words.

“If you go on horseback, can’t you reach the capital guard before me, who arrived by carriage? So……”

Damian’s forearm was grabbed by Bruno, and he slowly turned his head.

“Shut up.”

“……Brother.”

“If anything happens to Lucy…… even if there comes a day when this Empire falls, I won’t forgive today’s events.”

Damian lowered his voice, thrust his head toward Bruno’s face and then moved away with a whoosh.

At the same time, Bruno’s hand that had been gripping Damian’s forearm also fell away powerlessly.

“Brother…… Surely you don’t…… suspect me? For what reason……!”

However, Damian mounted his horse as if he didn’t care about Bruno’s following protests.

Bruno frowned and watched Damian move away.

“Sigh…… No. Rather, this worked out well.”

Bruno didn’t realize what kind of warning Damian’s was, rather smiled and wiggled his fingers. No dark clouds could be seen on his grinning face.

Bruno thought he might be able to completely put his brother in the palm of his hand with this opportunity.

His brother owed him a debt of the heart.

If he went to save his daughter with such confidence, but the culprit turned out to be the tutor…… He would feel even more guilt.

“Oh, this is right.”

Then Bruno immediately turned his head toward Lizzy, who was watching his mood.

After the kidnapping, seeing that she came to tell his brother about this, this maid also didn’t seem to think about betrayal or anything. Well, the money he gave was substantial.

Moreover, the lives of her siblings back home were also in Bruno’s hands.

It would be hard to betray.

……No.

“Heh.”

Bruno let out a chuckle and cast his gaze toward the path where Damian had disappeared.

The other side probably couldn’t even guess about the things happening now.

Because his brother was that kind of person.

“……You came earlier than expected. Did you kidnap faster?”

Lizzy bowed her head like that. She bent her waist sharply in case she couldn’t manage her expression well.

Bruno looked down at such Lizzy and nodded contentedly.

“……Yes. But it was different from what I was told, so I was a bit confused.”

Bruno’s eyebrow twitched up.

“Different from what you were told? What exactly?”

“The knight tried to…… kill the tutor.”

Bruno’s face rapidly turned pale upon hearing Lizzy’s words.

“He tried to kill the tutor, what…… does that mean……?”

A red alert began ringing in Bruno’s head.

The tutor was the only suspect to pin this on, but now the tutor was almost eliminated.

“The knight tried to kill the tutor. But he couldn’t kill the tutor in the end and kidnapped the lady.”

“What…… does that even mean! The tutor was supposed to be the culprit from the beginning!!”

Bruno’s voice grew louder as he approached Lizzy.

“……Wasn’t this something Lord Bruno knew about?”

At Lizzy’s question, Bruno frowned deeply, inhaled and clenched his fist tightly.

His face turned red as if it would burst, unable to contain his rising anger.

“These bastards dare…… dare to…… betray me?”

Bruno panted and let out a scream.