Chapter 53

Harold shoved the tangled adult business aside and spent the whole morning playing with the boys. At some point the vest he'd left draped over the bench ended up on the ground, caked in dirt, but he didn't care.

He pushed Edwin on the swing as long as he wanted, and when Edgar said he wanted a turn on the horse, Harold put him up on the mare too.

"No horsing around."

"Yes!"

The twins answered vigorously from the mare's back. Neither Edgar nor Edwin was afraid of the horse. Once they were up on her back they were beside themselves, laughing.

Once he was sure both boys had a good grip on the reins, Harold started the mare at a slow walk. They loved books so much he'd figured they might take after his brother, but the flushed faces up there said otherwise.

And by now Harold was certain. These boys had ridden before. And not just been set on a horse — someone had actually taught them.

He'd have expected his brother to hold off on it until they were old enough for the academy. Apparently even a man like that turned into someone else once he became a father.

"When did you learn to ride?"

"...Uh, um."

Edgar's eyes went round.

Was it all right now to bring up their father with the boys? Harold asked it slowly, in the softest possible tone.

"Did your father teach you?"

Harold watched Edgar and Edwin carefully. The boys did bring their father up now and then, but that was a different kind of thing.

The funeral... or a gift their father had given them, or wanting one of his books.

Linda had said it wasn't good to never bring up Albrecht at all. Harold agreed. Sometimes just remembering, a little at a time, was how a wound started to heal. It wasn't good to make them forget a father who had left their side so suddenly.

"Yes!"

Edwin nodded emphatically as he answered.

"Dad taught us. Right, Edgar?"

"Uh, yeah. Yeah..."

"He hated riding so much — but I guess with you two, he wanted to teach you himself."

Harold let out a small laugh. He understood how his brother had felt.

Edgar screwed up his mouth.

"Dad didn't really like riding, though."

"But you'd said you wanted to learn."

"Mm. That's right."

"Really. Do you like riding? Have you ever gone by yourselves?"

Edgar and Edwin shook their heads hard.

"Uncle, are you a good rider?"

"I'm a good rider."

"Then, Uncle, teach us to ride on our own."

Edwin said it with a determined face.

"To be a knight, you have to be good at riding too."

"Right, you do."

"Dad said you were the strongest knight in the whole kingdom, Uncle! So I'm going to get strong like you!"

Edgar seemed to find Edwin's voice ringing behind his back a bit much, but he didn't dismiss his twin's dream either.

"Good luck."

"Edgar, you're not going to be a knight?"

"No, thanks..."

At Edwin's question Edgar recoiled. That was so exactly like his brother that Harold couldn't help laughing.

"Uncle, can't we go a little faster?"

Edwin, who'd been beaming along with Harold, blinked up at him innocently.

Harold thought it over for a moment and nodded.

"All right. Let's ride together. Not both of you at the same time — one at a time, with me."

"Yes!"

It was a crawl for Harold, but plenty fast for the boys — just going up and down the road in front of the house had them shrieking with laughter.

Listening to those bright voices, he figured the rest of the tangled business could wait a little longer. These boys were what mattered most to him.

"All right, that's enough for today."

At Harold's words, Edgar and Edwin stuck their lips out.

"I want to go more!"

"We'll ride again next time."

"But, Uncle..."

"No."

Harold made a show of sternness, but his face was so plainly smiling it didn't land.

Harold pointed at the kitchen window.

"We need to eat. Aren't you hungry?"

"..."

Edgar and Edwin looked at each other.

They both chirped like little birds.

"We're starving!"

"All right, let's go eat."

The moment food came up, Edgar and Edwin bolted for the kitchen as if they had no more use for their uncle.

Harold shook his head, patted the mare, and led her back to the stable. Only after making sure she had enough hay and water did he go into the house himself.

He picked up the vest on the ground and the book Edgar had left behind.

"Sitting there a long time doesn't make the thinking any better."

The boys weren't in the kitchen. Linda snorted and spoke to Harold.

"To think properly, first you have to clear your head."

"..."

"Go wash your hands. The young masters have already washed up."

Small footsteps pattered in. Whatever the boys had been up to in the bathroom, Edgar and Edwin were soaked through. The wet sleeves didn't seem to bother them; they took plates and cutlery from Linda, set them on the table, and sat down.

Linda raised her eyebrows at Harold. The meaning was clear.

Harold gave a sheepish smile and headed for the bathroom.

---

Harold took Linda's advice.

There was nothing he could do about any of it right now anyway. He couldn't exactly sneak into Summerflower Palace, the First Prince's residence, and slit his throat. Whether he actually could was another question.

Harold waited. There had been Intelligence agents at the scene at dawn too. Grisha would have gotten a report on what Carlisle had pulled before sunrise.

There was no way he'd let that go. He'd find some way. Whether by landing a blow on Carlisle or by waiting for the right moment. Harold just had to trust him and wait.

"Sir Bertholdt."

Sure enough — that night, once the boys were asleep, a royal guardsman came by quietly with a note for Harold.

"This is all I was given to deliver."

"...Thanks."

"Have a good evening, sir."

Harold read the note but didn't move right away.

The boys being asleep wasn't enough. A little more. Until most of the city was asleep.

Only when even the insects in the grass had begun to quiet down did Harold slip out into the city. The destination was obvious. Grisha was still in the same hospital room.

"Grisha."

Grisha Lambert was reading, as before.

"This is a rough hour to visit a patient, Harold."

"You weren't sleeping anyway."

"Even so."

Grisha didn't so much as start when Harold spoke. As always, he made a point of taking his glasses off and setting them on the table.

"I'm the one who told you to be careful coming, so I can't very well complain."

Harold thought about saying something about the glasses and dropped it. If Grisha were going to listen, he'd have listened years ago.

Instead Harold dropped into the empty chair and went straight to it.

"What are you going to do?"

"Hm."

Even setting the hour aside, exhaustion was written plain on Grisha's face.

Harold glanced at what Grisha had set down. Not a book — a stack of papers. They were turned face down, but the mark showing faintly through was the Intelligence seal.

Without his glasses, Grisha couldn't tell exactly what Harold had picked up on. But the mood was clearly different from their last conversation, when he'd been hedging and telling Harold he didn't need to get involved.

He still wasn't in a hurry to talk... but at least he understood Harold's anger now.

"We've confirmed Adrien Renard stopped in at Summerflower Palace and then moved on. We're tailing him now. He's harder to touch now, but flip it around and it could be an opening."

Grisha spoke evenly.

"I didn't expect Adrien Renard and Carlisle to know each other. That's a new lead. It might look like frustratingly slow work from where you're sitting, but I don't intend to let him slip."

"I know. If you need my help, say the word."

Harold said it firmly. Grisha lifted his exhausted face.

"Harold."

Was he about to try to talk him down again? Harold wasn't hesitating anymore.

"Just so we're clear — I'm not letting this go."

"I know. That's why I called you here."

"Carlisle, that man..."

Harold sighed and raked a rough hand through his hair. He hadn't paid it any attention since getting to the capital, and it had grown out quite a bit.

"When he... took Adrien Renard away..."

"Harold. I know."

"He threatened the safety of my nephews. Honestly? I don't care what happens to the throne."

At the very least, it wasn't Harold's top priority.

"But if we leave him alone, my nephews—"

"I know, I said."

"My nephews are in danger. Adrien Renard could have locked them up on Carlisle's orders!"

"Harold."

Grisha opened his mouth, his face drawn.

"Why do you think Adelheid went to Marquis Reichnek's domain?"

"...Adelheid?"

Grisha's younger sister.

For a second Harold couldn't work out why that name had come up. But looking at Grisha's sunken expression, it clicked.

"There's a harbor in the Reichnek domain. And a fleet my grandfather runs. If anything happens—"

Grisha didn't finish the sentence. What he meant was clear enough.

Getting a young girl out would be simple enough. Marquis Reichnek would see to it.

"Carlisle hates Adelheid."

"Is there anyone he does like? Gerald? He treats his own brother like he's not there — did that change while I was gone?"

"No. Same as ever. Gerald still lets Carlisle drag him around... The reason Carlisle hates Adelheid—"

Grisha's voice was thick with irritation as he went on.

"—purely because he hates me."

A reason that petty was Carlisle Adler through and through.

So Harold just nodded. If a grown man had had some grander reason to hate a ten-year-old girl, that would have been its own kind of problem.

Harold asked it flat out.

"Can't you just go to His Majesty and say you'll take the crown prince title?"

Grisha stared at him.

"Why? His Majesty would recognize you as royalty on the spot and name you crown prince — he's been waiting for it."

And waiting was exactly what he'd been doing.

That Carlisle, the King's eldest son, still hadn't been named crown prince because of Grisha was something any noble worth the name knew.

"So there was... some reason you had to cook up something this convoluted with my brother?"

"I told you."

"Told me what?"

"...That Carlisle brought Barun in."

The exhaustion on Grisha's face wasn't lifting.

"If he hadn't done that, Albrecht wouldn't have come to me saying I had to be the one to take the throne."

"My brother brought it up first?"

"If me becoming crown prince would have solved it, we'd have stopped there. But there's no telling what a man who deliberately brought in a foreign power might do. If he thought he was out of options and marched an army in, we'd be in real trouble."

"...So you were trying to find evidence?"

"Yes. If you don't cut off his escape route, you can't rest easy even after he's out."

Alharn still had a good number of laws on the books left over from the wartime era. Collusion with a foreign power to interfere in domestic politics was a capital offense, rank irrelevant. Grisha didn't say it aloud, and Harold didn't point it out.

Grisha narrowed his eyes at Harold. Without his glasses he couldn't see Harold's face clearly, but he stubbornly refused to put them on.

"Listen, Harold. Things have gotten this far, and there's no way for you to walk away either, so I'll tell you. You wouldn't work it out on your own."

"..."

"Right now this kingdom has no crown prince. But it does have princes. In a situation like this, for a prince to become king cleanly — what do you think would have to happen?"

"Still, His Majesty isn't going to name that man crown prince."

"No, Harold. As the King's son, there's a way to become king without being named crown prince first."

Harold blinked.

Grisha smiled.

"When the King dies, of course the eldest son inherits the throne."