Chapter 81

"You've got a sharp eye, Edgar."

Harold explained, still holding Edgar. At some point Edwin had sidled up beside them.

"The late king's fiancée was a lady of House Reichnek. When the king died, the marriage never happened."

"I— I know that one!"

"Hm?"

Edwin tugged at Harold's clothes and stamped his feet.

"Uncle's friend! The one who came to visit before."

"Grisha?"

"I heard your friend's mother was a Reichnek. That's her?"

"That's right."

At Harold's confirmation, Edgar leaned forward, apparently wanting a closer look at the painting. Harold shifted his hold on him so he wouldn't slip.

"The current Duke of Lambert was in love with the duchess for a long time before they married — from a distance, for years."

"You can just tell us that?"

Edwin's eyes went wide with surprise.

They knew the Duke of Lambert had married the Reichnek lady, but they clearly hadn't heard the story behind it. Famous as it was, it had all played out long before Edgar and Edwin were born...

"The duke still tells the story himself. Next time you see him, ask him what the wedding day was like."

Not the sort of thing you'd expect boys to be curious about, but as it turned out, Edgar and Edwin's eyes were shining the same way they had over the greenhouse.

Maybe it was because they loved books. Apparently they liked this kind of story too.

But while Edgar quickly lost interest and started squirming to be put down, Edwin pressed his uncle carefully on what he'd said.

"But are we going to have the chance to see the duke, Uncle? He's a super super busy person!"

"Not quite that busy..."

Harold set Edgar down and knelt carefully.

Sensing the shift in his uncle's mood, Edwin stopped talking. Edgar blinked up at Harold.

He'd stayed up all night watching the boys and thinking. What to do, how to keep them safe. A hundred times over he'd wished his brother could just hand him the answer the way he used to.

His brother had told him he didn't need to worry about anything else... but even his brother couldn't have predicted a fire at the watch hospital and a bomb going off in the King's Woods.

They weren't after the boys, but that didn't mean the boys were safe. There'd been Dustin Glenn's abduction, and this time too there'd been a real chance of the boys getting hurt.

"Edgar, Edwin. Remember when Uncle talked about taking a trip a while back?"

"...A trip?"

Fortunately, this time Edgar and Edwin didn't refuse the way they had before.

Sending the boys far from the capital was something he'd considered. But he didn't like the idea of sending them off on their own, and even if this time hadn't targeted them, there was no guarantee the next time wouldn't. Whatever Count Albrecht Bertholdt had left behind, there were people out there who might come after it.

How about this, Harold.

Grisha had proposed it earlier.

What if you took your nephews and cleared out of the capital for a bit?

He didn't just mean run from all of this. If that was what he'd meant, Harold would have done it already.

Nothing grand. Just enough to hint we know something.

The plan to provoke Carlisle by taking over the Founding Day preparations was off the table. They couldn't push Carlisle any further, and just handling the fallout and the investigation had Grisha stretched thin already.

Well... if we could work the northern base into it, that'd make it more solid.

He wasn't opposed to Grisha's new plan.

But Harold couldn't answer right away. The permission he needed wasn't Grisha's to give.

"I don't mean leave the capital. Uncle's still sorting some things out with the house... just for a little while, until then, um."

Harold gathered his breath.

It was a plain enough word, but saying it out loud had him weirdly nervous.

"How would it be if we... took a family trip?"

Grisha had suggested it, but Harold meant it.

Wouldn't it be nice to get away from the stifling air of the capital? The boys could get out of moving between house and garden, and Harold could stop being on edge every minute.

"..."

Edgar and Edwin exchanged a look.

"That's..."

Edgar opened his mouth carefully.

"That's not bad — that doesn't sound bad, Uncle. But, uh..."

"Where would we go?"

Edwin narrowed his eyes and looked back at the painting that had been the whole focus a moment ago.

"The Lambert domain?"

Since they'd been talking about the Duke of Lambert, it was a fair guess.

But Harold shook his head.

"No, the Reichnek domain. The duchess suggested it."

And right now, Grisha's younger sister Adelheid was at the Reichnek estate. Meeting friends around their own age wouldn't hurt either.

"Uncle went once, a long time ago. The feel of it's a lot like the Bertholdt domain. Remember I said it was famous for horses?"

"It still is?"

"Of course. The biggest horse farm in Alharn is in the Reichnek domain."

"Can we ride?"

"Sure."

Watching Edwin's eyes light up, Harold felt a pang. He'd realized how badly the boys had been shaken, going by how frightened they'd been when he'd brought up a trip last time.

A trip wasn't going to be some absolute measure, but he was glad to think that, at least, he'd been not-such-a-bad uncle to them these past weeks.

"..."

Edwin, wearing a huge grin, jabbed Edgar in the side with his elbow. Edgar batted his arm away in annoyance, then poked him back. Then Edwin turned squarely toward Edgar and slapped at him with an open hand, and Edgar started flailing his arms.

"...Edgar? Edwin?"

"A trip!"

"Hm?"

"Going, um."

Edgar shoved Edwin away.

"Umm, that sounds good..."

"Really? If you don't want to go, you don't have to, Edgar."

"No, I... I want to go too."

Edgar's face went red.

"A family trip..."

"Me! Me too, Uncle!"

Edwin dashed over and hung off Edgar's back. He pressed down on top of Edgar's head as he looked at Harold, winking one eye.

The nephew who'd said before that they couldn't go anywhere until the bad man was punished was smiling knowingly, and speaking in his usual bright voice.

"Let's go, family trip!"

"You really mean that?"

"Yes. I want to go!"

His clever nephew might well be reading Harold's second offer of a trip as a step in catching the bad man. A small weight settled back into a heart that had just started to feel lighter — but even so, Edwin had to be doing better too, right?

"You do want to go too, right, Uncle?"

"What? Of course Uncle wants to go too."

"Then it's settled! When are we going? Where's the Reichnek domain? Was it in the east? Is it far? How long does it take?"

"Get off, Edwin!"

"Are we taking the train?"

"You're heavy!"

"I am not. I've only ever been on a train going down to our own domain! And that was ages ago! What about Grandma Linda? Isn't your friend coming? What else is the Reichnek domain famous for?"

Even so, Edwin's excitement was real.

Harold rescued Edgar from underneath Edwin and started telling him about the Reichnek domain.

"Well, the Reichnek domain has ocean too. Really beautiful sandy beaches."

---

Northern Commander Ricardo Hamilton arrived in the capital with a small retinue.

The northern commander's return didn't come with anything flashy under normal circumstances. That was Ricardo's own preference, and this year he'd come up to the capital earlier than usual on top of it.

"...?"

But even taking that into account, the atmosphere was off.

Ricardo looked at the royal guard, puzzled. It wasn't that he wanted special treatment, but when the usual procedures got skipped, it did make you wonder.

The northern commander wasn't some stray pebble in the street — normally the captain of the royal guard himself came out to greet him, not just a guardsman. That was the set protocol!

But there was no sign of the captain, and the guardsmen who had come were looking pretty...

"Something happen in the capital?"

Ricardo openly glared at the royal guard, then asked.

"Don't tell me His Majesty—"

"No, sir!"

The guardsman answered, alarmed.

"Apologies, Commander."

"No, no. I'm only asking because the mood's unsettled."

"Apologies, Commander."

The guardsman saluted with his face tight.

"A week ago, there was a fire at the watch hospital."

"A fire?"

"Arson."

"The... culprit?"

"Not yet caught. Search is ongoing."

If it was a week ago and still that was the case...

"Was the damage extensive?"

"Five dead, at least."

The wounded would be more.

Arson in the middle of the capital, of all places? The royal guard getting drawn into a watch matter was unexpected, but if the culprit hadn't been caught yet, that made sense.

"So Sir Lambert is on that too?"

"He's gone to the palace."

"The palace?"

Arson sounded serious enough, but was it something that warranted a report to the palace?

The northern commander's unease didn't ease easily, but the guardsman offered no further explanation.

"Apologies for keeping you at this late hour. I wish you a peaceful night."

"Thank you."

Only the northern commander and his retinue were left in the residence.

Ricardo looked at his men.

"Wasn't something off there?"

"I thought I was the only one who felt it."

"Political trouble? The capital's always tangled up in something."

"Ah, politics, I'm no good at that."

"Me either."

"Isn't that all of us in the service."

They started ribbing each other and burst out laughing. Ricardo clicked his tongue at his ridiculous men, making no effort to hide it.

The only one making any sense was the sergeant.

"Couldn't we just ask Sir Bertholdt?"

"Hm..."

"He's why we came down to the capital in the first place, isn't he."

One of the retinue tilted his head.

"Would that Harold Bertholdt really know what's going on in the capital?"

"His nephews are still young, I heard. Won't he be busy?"

"Even so, Sir Bertholdt has ears too. And he'll know people in the capital."

Ricardo looked at the sergeant.

The youngest of his retinue this time. Ricardo clapped Sergeant Doak on the shoulder.

"You don't have any official schedule until tomorrow anyway, while everyone recovers. Go on home."

"Sir?"

"You're from the capital, aren't you? I heard your family's here."

"Ah, yes, sir! That's right."

Doak answered with an awkward look. Seeing the reaction, Ricardo nodded uncertainly.

"Well, I'm not saying you have to. Just that you can stop by home if you want. I'll send a messenger to Harold tomor— hold on. I don't know where he's staying right now."

Doak shrugged.

"I asked a royal guardsman on the way to the residence."

"Ha. That academy training, all right."

"Ah, that's got nothing to do with it, sir."

"Stop picking on the sergeant, the rest of you go inside and rest."

Ricardo shooed his subordinates off himself. The whole raucous, laughing group headed into the residence, but only the sergeant lingered, standing there awkwardly.

"Doak?"

"I'll, um, be back by tomorrow evening."

He'd told him to go home for a visit and Doak had looked startled, so Ricardo had wondered if he was on bad terms with his family — but apparently not.

Ricardo nodded.

"Right. Safe travels."

The figure heading out into the street to hail a carriage had a spring in his step. Something about that showed there was still a boy in him yet, and Ricardo smiled contentedly.