Lady to Queen

Petronilla had already returned from the kitchen. Petronilla asked them with a smile on her mouth.

“Is there something fun going on? ‘That day’ you say…”

“Ah…”

Mirya had a flustered expression on her face. Petronilla was the only one out of the three of them who didn’t know about that event. In such a case, to be stuck in a moment like this. Mirya rolled the wheels in her head and finally decided to tell her. Anyways, she was not just anyone, but Her Majesty’s sister. There was no reason to hide it from her.

“It’s not a big deal. There was actually a small disturbance a few days ago.”

“What disturbance?”

Petronilla asked with an amused facial expression. If it was something she didn’t know about, it had probably happened after she had ended work. She returned home no matter what, once it was around dinnertime. She asked while taking a guess.

“Did something happen in the middle of the night?”

“Her Majesty is very sensitive to hearing, and she always wakes up easily with the small sounds, and this happened even a few days ago. But while she was looking for the cause of the noise and she encountered His Majesty.”

“… in the Empress Palace?”

“Yes.”

“That is quite… a strange matter.”

Petronilla muttered with a voice that expressed how strange it was. Then Rafaella, who had been still until now, joined in.

“My words exactly. Why was His Majesty there at that time… actually, this is content that the maids of the Central Palace begged us to keep quiet about. There might be a problem with His Majesty’s authority. I am not sure why they were saying that though…”

“… well, there must be a reason. Something we should not be wondering about.”

“Is that surely it?”

“By the way, was Lizzy with His Majesty that night, Ella?”

“Yes. His Majesty commanded that Her Majesty be taken to her own quarters when it was nearly dawn.”

“…”

Petronilla made a brief expression showing that she was thinking, and Rafaella, who was curious about this asked her.

“Why, Nil? Do you know something?”

“No way. Only… I just think it is weird. But as it appears, nobody seems to know.”

“Her Majesty also did not seem to know it. It is better not to mention this topic.”

“Okay. There is no point in scratching to make it swell up.”

After smoothly finishing the conversation, Petronilla smiled and lifted the tart dish in her hand, as if nothing was wrong.

“The chef made a new one, and the taste is awesome. Everyone, have a taste.”

“After Her Majesty eats, then we will eat the rest, Lady Petronilla.”

“Of course.”

Petronilla laughed, revealing her teeth. Her distinctive, innocent smile was refreshing like a tart. She casually walked up to her sister’s room and opened the door. Patrizia, who identified who she was, welcomed her.

“Nil.”

“You are working hard, Sister Majesty.”

“There is nothing to be working hard about.”

Petronilla approached Patrizia, whose face was red as if she was embarrassed. She asked a question after laying down a plate of tarts on the table.

“Are you busy? If you’re not busy, eat, and then work. The chef baked something new, and it tastes out of this world.”

“Yeah?”

Patrizia rose from her seat with a smile. The work was not all that urgent, so there was plenty of time to enjoy the tart. She walked slowly and sat at the table with Petronilla. After tasting one of the tarts, she soon smiled happily. It was sweet.

“Ah, delicious. The chef’s skills are truly great.”

“I think so too.”

After saying that, Petronilla, who had been looking for an opportunity during that time, soon brought up the topic from earlier.

“Lizzy.”

“Hm?”

“I heard you met with His Majesty a few nights ago?”

“Ah… how does Nilla…”

“That’s not important, Lizzy.”

Petronila attempted to smile and moved her lips.

“Was there something… that happened?”

“Was there… something?”

Patrizia was nervous at the moment. What? Did Nilla know something to talk like that? Patrizia did not lose her cool and calmly asked.

“Was there something… what are you talking about?”

“Just anything at all. What I don’t know.”

“… Nothing happened.”

The sisters had no secrets between them. However, that principle was only broken today. Patrizia told a lie. This was not an act of distrust in her twin sister. She was just cautious about speaking on that.

If it was related to her, then her sister would take off on her feet to help her. She was a sister that cared even if it was regarding the smallest things. That was why she didn’t want to say anything to Nilla. She didn’t want her to worry, and most importantly, she didn’t remember exactly what happened that night. All she remembered exactly was the frenzy that he had caused that night. Of course, Petronilla had asked with that kind of thing in mind, but Patrizia had no idea that was the case.

“Really. I just fell asleep right away before I could tell about something that had happened.”

“… right. I just… thought something was going on. What a relief.”

“Nil, really. You worry about me too much. Do I really seem like a child brought out to the shore of water?”

When it was actually Nil that sometimes seemed like a child. When Patrizia laughed and muttered to herself, Petronila also just laughed. Yeah… saying nothing happened, that was enough. Petronilla changed the topic, erasing away her silly worries.

Lucio hasn’t had one psychotic episode occur after that one night. Fortunately, unlike the nightmares, the episodes were not very frequent. If this had happened constantly, rumors would have spread immediately. That ‘the emperor is crazy.’

He wanted to prevent any danger of the collapse of his Imperial authority, so unless he died, he thought there was no other way than to crack down on the mouths of the nearby servants. Thanks to his thorough management, few were aware of his condition, including the maids of the Central Palace who were serving him.

He had intermittent migraine headaches for a few days since the day that he had an episode. This was a disease that didn’t show much improvement even with medication, so he took a quiet nap during the day, and took a walk alone at night. His head felt a little refreshed when he felt the cool night air. Sometimes the stark white moonlight solved what medicine could not solve.

The place he most often visited as a walking spot, ironically, was the very place in the garden that Patrizia loved in her past life, and even loved in the present life. Naturally, Patrizia didn’t know this fact, and Lucio also just thought that the encounter between the two of them had just been a coincidence.

Patrizia liked the garden for aesthetic reasons, but for Lucio, it wasn’t for that reason that he frequented it. It was a deeper, and more mental reason, than that of Patrizia’s. Patrizia could go anywhere, even if it wasn’t that place, but Lucio only went to that garden. There could only be one place of solace, not two.

Anyways, the two of them always headed to the same place when they remembered it, so it was honestly natural for the two to run into each other.

“…”

“…”

The two people met, they were silent. Lucio was taken aback, and so was Patrizia. This garden, whenever she came here, she met him. Patrizia did not reveal her flustered expression, but she was taken aback internally.

What should she do now? Should she avoid him? Should she leave this place first? Patrizia paused with her gaze, and slowly stepped away. It was best to just pass by him. Patrizia stepped slowly away, very slowly. Just like this, it was not bad to pass everything by.

“Are you avoiding me?”

“…”

He had talked to her first. She wanted to avoid it, but the question itself was about evasion. If this happened, she couldn’t leave. She replied after closing her eyes.

“… I am, at least, not the one to do the avoiding.”

“Then should it be me?”

“…”

Well, if he asked like that, then it was not. If so, should she do the avoiding? While hesitating at his cryptic answer, his words came back to her.

“Or should both of us?”

“I thought Your Majesty’s desire to avoid might not be pleasant, because it could damage your Imperial dignity.”

Patrizia, who spit out that long sentence, slowly looked to the side. She could see his side profile. There was not even a handful of moonlight in the night. Even a piece of starlight. His face only looked dark.

“So that was why I had avoided first.”

“You guessed wildly. Or just passed over the responsibility.”

“…”

Patrizia thought that it might be the case. But if she avoided him, what could be the reason for that? She wasn’t disgusted by him. It was just a sense of discomfort. Disgust and discomfort were different, and with only one syllable, but they had very different meanings. At the very least, she was not offended by him. It was just a little awkward and uncomfortable. If she was ‘disgusted’ by him, that would then be a big deal.

Anyways, their bodies had to come together to give birth to a child in the future.

So it was okay to say that it was just unfamiliarity. The feeling that one felt while in a space with a stranger. It was not unpleasant, but it was also not pleasant. Just a little foreign feeling. Or an uncanny feeling.

“Is it not.”

So she just asked him back like this. ‘My feelings for you are like this. But are your feelings not like this?’

“… I thought it wasn’t enough for both of us to avoid each other, at least.”

“…”

“Is it not?”

“Well… that may be so.”

She finally turned around fully and looked at him, and he also turned his body and looked at her. The night was dark, and there was no moon in the sky, so they barely saw each other’s eyes, nose, and lips. Patrizia opened her lips and soon tried to say something, but he was faster.

“That time…”

“…”

“Do you remember?”

“…”

She instinctively realized that ‘that time’ was the night of that day a few days ago, and then held her breath. Patrizia nodded quietly. He asked again.

“You, are you scared of me?”

“What… do you mean?”

Patrizia was slightly puzzled by the unexpected question, and he continued to ask the question without being shaken.

“I showed everything to you, from my lowest. It is not a dream, what you saw.”

“…”

“I am asking if after having seen me gone crazy, are you not scared now?”

“You speak as if you were hoping I would be afraid of Your Majesty.”

“… what?”

Patrizia stood still and spoke further.

“Because… you looked like that. You seem to want me to be scared of Your Majesty, speak about this fear, and to react like that.”

“…”

“I guess I am the strange one, after all?”

It couldn’t be. For ordinary people. Patrizia quietly asked that, and he said nothing for a while. Intuitively, she realized that he was confused internally. So she also waited for him to clear up his mind, and opened her mouth again after a certain amount of time.

“There is no one that would not be afraid and remain in fear after witnessing such a scene.”

“…”

“However, strangely to my ears, Your Majesty’s question does not seem to mean entirely just that.”

“…”

“My words, are they wrong?”