By the time we had finished talking, or rather I had finished talking, an hour had passed. Edith had simply listened. At first, she behaved as though she had several questions to ask, but as my story progressed she fell further into disbelief until finally arriving at acceptance.

“Well, there you have it. This isn’t my first life, in actuality I’m technically the oldest person in our friend group. Both physically, and mentally.”

She was quiet for a little while longer before nodding once in resolution, “I see. Does Sarala know?”

“No, though she probably suspects I have secrets, given her own circumstances. I will need to tell her the first chance I get though; please let me be the one?”

“…Right, yea something like this… Just do not wait too long; I do not want to carry a secret this big on my own. Not from her…”

“Thank you, Edith. As for other people; Prince Rupert and Gustav know. Jacqueline and Felicity as well, though I doubt Felicity really understands the full ramifications of it. My parents are non the wiser, and I intend to keep it that way. Rather than burden them with more shenanigans, I would prefer to continue being just their gifted daughter.”

My friend pursed her lips but did not say anything. She did not have to, I knew already that it was rather selfish of me to keep such a thing from my parents. Hell, given how they had reacted to me suddenly becoming sixteen and Felicity growing a second tail they would probably have pretty much no issues with this. I did not want to change things. Perhaps one day my parents would learn the whole truth but for now, I simply did not want them to.

“Well, we should probably get out of here before anyone questions things… spending an hour in a bathroom is already pushing it.”

A look of realization flashed over Edith’s face and she nodded vigorously, “Yes, we should… What are you planning to do now?”

“Find either Prince Rupert or Gustav and convey my apologies, as well as offer an explanation for my behavior. You?”

“I shall be writing a letter to my father informing him that the wedding went off without any major issues… Since you left after it was over, I can say that without worry.”

She gave me a mischievous smile and a wink before bowing and taking her leave.

Right, time to find Gustav or Rupert. Then, I still need to arrange a meeting with Sieg… I could just summon him, but I would rather not. There’s also what Adroni said in that email… About heading to the peak of the mountain after my wedding. I wasn’t expecting it to happen so soon, but I may as well look into that. I should have a few days longer before making my public return anyways.

Thankfully, Gustav had instructed Sasha to bring me to him once I was recovered, so it did not take very long for me to find him.

“My apologies regarding that display, I will attempt to prevent something similar happening again.”

Gustav narrowed his eyes at me and shook his head.

“Princess, do you take me for a fool?”

“I do not?” My eyebrow raised questioningly at this statement.

“Lady Stahlia, even his highness recognized that something was very wrong; that display was completely unlike you.”

‘Even his highness’? Just because he doesn’t feel emotion himself doesn’t mean he can’t recognize it… Of course he would be able to tell something was wrong.

“What do you mean? Say it clearly.”

“…Very well. His highness has more or less determined the root of your breakdown; the incident with the late Lord Dominic. He has instructed Ferdinand and myself to assist you in dealing with it as best we can, but to remind you that he cannot delay things any longer than they already have been.”

The way Gustav was still dancing around with his words was really starting to piss me off.

“Gustav, the ‘incident’ was Dominic trying to rape me. My ‘breakdown’ was the events at the ‘wedding’ bringing back some memories of that. And Prince Rupert wants you to tell me that I am still expected to produce an heir, so I need to come to terms with things. Does that sum it up?”

“…Yes, that is more or less all accurate.”

“Good. In regards to that last point, he does not need to worry; I will be capable of fulfilling my duties when the time comes. Though, I wish he would say some things himself, using you as a messenger is not fair to either of us.”

“With all due respect, you know why he sends me; it is not just because of how busy he is.”

Yea, because he’s worried that his lack of empathy will lead to a lack of tact. He doesn’t have any issues being tactful with politics though!

“…Moving on. Now that the wedding is over with, I would know what I will be doing. I take it that I am still to be kept away from the battlefield?”

“…Are you truly alright?”

Gustav’s voice betrayed concern for me, and not the kind of concern over an integral component malfunctioning. Rather, it was genuine concern as a teacher or perhaps a friend. He could very well be acting, but somehow I doubted that. In any case, his tone of actual care took away a lot of the anger that had built up.

“…No, I am not. Even now, if I think about it, my stomach twists up in knots. I had been using everything as a distraction, but the wedding dragged things back into the front. I am not alright, but, I will be.”

Clenching my fists, my words were as much for myself as they were for Gustav and by extension Rupert.

“I have people I can talk to. Edith knows about my past now, and she intends to help me overcome.”

If not for the peanut gallery of guard knights and servants, my statement could be more specific. Gustav was smart though, he should be able to figure out what I meant by ‘Edith knows about my past.’

“Very well. I will let his highness know that we should trust you in this. Now, as for your immediate task; his highness would like you to rebuild what you destroyed. Lord Ferdinand has been instructed to assist.”

What I destroyed…? Rupert wants me to rebuild the Order of Shadows!?

“To keep an eye on me? Or to advise?”

Gustav grinned, “No, he is being given to you as a subordinate in this. I am quite excited to see how things turn out.

Placing Ferdinand on this project makes sense, as the former ‘One’ he is one of the few people qualified for it. But why make me the ‘spymaster’? No, I know why. It’s Rupert attempting to forestall future problems again. The kingdom needs an intelligence organization, but if they went and rebuilt the order without telling me and I found out later I would probably be quite cross.

“Please convey my gratitude, as well as my desire to have more of these meetings in person. Not that you make a bad messenger Gustav, but this really is rather silly.”

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Gustav chuckled lightly, “I will tell him, but do not get your hopes up.”

My eyes rolled, but I did not pursue the topic; I had other issues to discuss.

“Thank you. Now, regarding Sieg; I would like to speak with him, but I do not want to make it sound like I am ordering his presence.”

Gustav frowned, “That would be rather difficult… Given your position, pretty much anything you do indicating that you wish to meet with him, would be interpreted as an order, vague or not.”

“Difficult, but not impossible? I want to apologize for dragging him into this, as well as discuss a business inquiry I made some time ago.”

“About the ingredient for a Goddess’ Draught? I would recommend that you simply summon him, but if you are dead set against doing so then the best method would be to approach him through a proxy and handle the correspondence with a letter. Even if you attempt to convey a wish to meet through the letter, there is a strong chance he would view it as an order.”

Yea, as much as I want to say that he knows me, he really doesn’t. I was never as close to Sieg as I was to Sven, and I left the village over a year ago.

“Thank you for the advice… I suppose I will proceed along those lines.”

Gustav gave me a somewhat pitying look, “I wish I could tell you this will get easier, but I am afraid you will only find the distance continues to grow.”

Thanks… After what we just talked about, that’s exactly what I wanted to hear… Are we sure Rupert is the only one here who lacks empathy? Haa… Whatever. Let’s see, I need to know when my meeting with Ferdinand is, I’m sure it has already been scheduled. Then, I should ask about visiting the peak.

“When will I meet with Ferdinand? I will need to discuss things before coming up with a preliminary plan for the new intelligence agency.”

“Lord Ferdinand is going to be visiting Duke Claurence along our defense line; he will not return until after your return to public society. That being said, there are several documents and a few resources he has already prepared that I will arrange to be sent to you.”

Right, well that’s something. The biggest question is where to get agents from though… I won’t let them use the same method, and even if I was alright with that, we don’t have the time for it anyways… I’ll think about it after I review those documents.

“Then, would it be possible for me to visit the mountain peak?”

Gustav’s expression became guarded, but his tone wasn’t all that wary, “Why?”

Hmm, if I didn’t already know you, I don’t think I would have noticed that you became a bit defensive just now. Interesting…

There was no point in beating around the bush, so I decided to simply be honest about it.

“God told me to go there after my wedding.”

Gustav blinked in surprise at my candor, “God told you? Which one?”

“…The same one who let me come back?”

“The so called sibling of the Goddess of Light and God of Darkness… Interesting, very interesting.”

Gustav’s eyes flashed and he got that grin that I knew meant he was intrigued and fighting off the urge to go mad scientist or crazed researcher.

“There is nothing preventing you from going up there, now that you are married in to the royal family; I was simply a bit surprised you would ask about it so suddenly. I will let Rupert know, and he will take you up himself.”

“Really? After seemingly having no desire to meet me in person, always sending messengers, this is enough?”

Gustav grinned like a schoolboy whose prank had been found out, “Not at all; you can go by yourself, but I though I might use this as an opportunity to force his hand somewhat.”

Well, I have no idea what it is that I’m supposed to do up there… It could very well be that Rupert coming with is what Adroni was getting at… Well, it wouldn’t hurt anything to have him come along. …Though it might trigger another episode of anxiety for me… Well, I won’t get anywhere if I don’t face my trauma.

“Very well, if you think you can get him to come along, then by all means; I would be ever so grateful.”

“I shall do so with pleasure.”

Based on the somewhat evil grin he now had, it was plainly obvious that Gustav was getting a bit fed up playing messenger for us.

He probably means to try and force Rupert to interact with me more himself. Though, I’m not sure what he hopes to accomplish; we are both fully aware that love played no part in this marriage, Rupert and I are simply using each other.

“Well, I have ascertained the reason for your incident, so my purpose for this meeting is resolved. Is there anything else you wish to discuss or ask?”

My future, Sieg, the mountain top… I don’t think I have any pressing issues, at least none that Gustav could help with… Not using [Eidetic Memory] really is troublesome. I was already trying not to depend on it too much, but to think it was still that bad.

“No… Not at this time. It is getting late” If this room had any windows, we would be able to see the sun setting.

Felicity and Rosial would be waiting for me to come back, and I also needed to apologise to my mother and father for fleeing my own wedding like that.

They don’t know about D-Dominic. My back shivered as though something gross was crawling on me, but I did my best to ignore it. From their point of view, it probably looks like I ran off because of nerves… Do I tell them the truth? …This is difficult.

Obviously telling my parents the truth was the correct choice, but if they knew then they would certainly blame themselves. My father had already apologized about the engagement with that guy, and even gone so far as to offer to take a rather treasonous course of action to make amends. If I told him what had happened, he would definitally feel responsible.

Actually, I don’t really know how he’s feeling about my marriage… We sort of just treated it as a thing that was already established, because it was, but I didn’t ask him specifically. Hell, his friend is his son-in-law now, he must have at least some thoughts on the matter. Mother as well, she was always kind of big on noble etiquette, now her daughter is ascending to the throne… This is a really big deal, and I’ve kind of just rolled with it.

I would need to see about having some quality time with my family, at the very least we needed to have some long conversations.

By the time my entourage made it back to my bedroom, it was already dark. While I had hoped to be able to say goodnight to Felicity and Rosial, they were surely asleep by now.

“Stahlia.”

Well, Felicity is asleep at least.

Once the knights had left me alone in my chambers, Claire had opened her eyes and said my name.

“…You nearly gave me a heart attack!” My voice came out in a hoarse whisper; Claire’s existence was not common knowledge to my guards, and it would be preferable for it to stay that way.

“…How are they?” Rosial was fast asleep, hugging Clairicity like some kind of large teddy bear. The fact that she was able to sleep like this had to be a good sign. The sight put a stupid grin on my face, though her nightgown was askew. Bending over to adjust it, my hand brushed over a pale white scar on her neck from where her own parasite had been removed.

…Gustav won’t say anything about it, and Rosial doesn’t want to talk either… I can only imagine that removing it while it was still alive must have been painful… I understand why they had to move quickly and not wait for me to wake up… but if only I had been able to help…

Such things were best not dwelt on; shaking my head to clear the bad thoughts, I pulled her nightshirt up to hide the scar. Apparently, it did not matter what spells were tried, no amount of healing magic seemed to work to remove it.

“The two of them are doing fine. They missed you, but after spending the whole day running around with Rosin, were exhausted. Rosial asked me to say goodnight for her.”

“Wait, Rosial knows about you?”

Clairicity seemed to shrug in the darkness, “She has her own imaginary friend, Felicity spilled the news about me almost immediately after learning about ‘Stali.’”

“Well, I suppose that’s fine then. It gives the two of them something to bond over.”

“My thoughts exactly. I couldn’t help but overhear that you ran out from your wedding?”

My heart skipped a beat.

“No, I am properly married. There was… were, is. There is another reason why I left.”

“Dominic?”

“…Yes.”

“Stahlia, what happened?”

I turned my head away from her. Telling Claire and getting her counsel would definitely help me get over the incident, or at least move past it. But that would risk involving Felicity. Did I really want to involve my six-year-old sister in this? Even if it was only a chance? No, the answer was no.

“Jacqueline didn’t tell you?”

“I did not ask her. Based on the way she looked at your unconscious body, I could tell it was something terrible. Something that I should hear directly from you.”

Man, she really wants to help… But no. I won’t risk Felicity finding out.

“Caire, if I told you, you would have to promise me not to let Felicity find out. Given that you live in each other’s head, you two shouldn’t be keeping secrets from each other… As much as I would love to talk about it, to get your input and hear you tell me everything is fine… No, Edith is already there for me in this. She will have to be enough.”

After a moment, Clairicty nodded her head.

“Well, I can’t force you to tell me. As long as you have someone to talk to… I think I know what happened, but I won’t make that guess.”

We sat in silence for a bit. It was late, but I did not want to go back to my own bed just yet; it had been a while since I spoke with Claire so openly.

“Well, what was it like?” Her voice broke the silence.

“Hmm? What was what like?”

“Don’t play dumb, the wedding! You’re a married woman now.”

She had a bit of a twinkle in her eye, but I couldn’t figure out what was so amusing, “Honestly? It was not what I was expecting… I thought a royal wedding would be a bit more… special? I get that it was a small secret thing, and I know we’ll have a proper ceremony in a few years… I just wish it had been less methodical. We essentially just did exactly what was required and no more, like a courtroom wedding almost.”

By the time I had finished talking, my voice had gone from unsure, to a bit frigid.

Jeez, I didn’t realize how much I cared.

“Huh… You really grew up didn’t you, George?”

What does she mean by that…? I thought I told her not to use that name anymore?

Though I tried to get Claire to explain herself she refused adamantly, claiming it was something that should be obvious to me. When I woke up, it was to discover that I had never actually gone back to my own bed.