Volume 2 Chapter 2

Two meals laid out across a large table. Multiple plates carrying dishes where the meat, vegetables, seasoning, everything, looked expensive. One sat before me, the other before the black-haired, black-eyed prince.

The only people in the room were me and Kyos, along with our respective guards, Hector and Dalton, the man who had used the fake name Don when we met before. Since the guards would not be eating, I had no choice but to sit across from Kyos and endure this dinner.

(It’s probably delicious, but there’s no way I can enjoy it.)

A commoner dining together with royalty. Was there any other event this capable of making one’s stomach hurt? …Realizing that as long as I remained involved with Kyos there would likely be many more situations like this, I desperately swallowed back the sigh that threatened to escape.

The reason I had been summoned today was to fulfill Kyos’ desire to 「eat warm food once in a while.」 A prince constantly at risk of being poisoned could not eat until a food taster had finished checking the dishes. Apparently, the food brought before him was usually cold by the time he ate it. That was why he occasionally snuck out of the castle seeking warm meals among commoners, but after being poisoned there too, he could no longer use that method.

That was where my ability became necessary. If it was me, I could tell whether poison had been planted by looking at prediction lines. …Though Kyos did not fully understand my abilities. He probably believed it was merely 「sharp intuition.」

「Well then, my advisor. Is there poison in this meal?」

The many colors of misfortune above his head matched his amused expression perfectly. Yet all of them were short, with no sign of extending. I could predict that this was his normal state, that danger constantly surrounded him, but that the meal before us was not the cause.

「…I don’t think so, but may I perform a tasting just in case?」

「Very well. But finish before it cools.」

There was always the possibility of an exception. Most poisons could be identified once placed in the mouth, so I had small portions taken from Kyos’ dishes one bite at a time. Naturally, it was not the prince himself who did so, but his guard Dalton standing nearby. He handled it with remarkable familiarity, so he was likely the one who usually performed poison tasting whenever they were outside the castle without an official taster. In fact, when I encountered them in town, he had been the first about to put poisoned food into his mouth, which was how I became involved with Kyos in the first place.

「Thank you very much.」

「…No, rather, thank you.」

When I thanked Dalton for bringing over the small plates for tasting, he smiled vaguely. I could tell from the dark green color he carried that he felt guilty, but before I could think further about it, my attention was pulled toward the long line of worry at the edge of my vision.

Hector, unable to speak casually because he was on guard duty and others besides Kyos and me were present, was looking at me with tremendous concern. Even if something I tasted turned out to be poison, I would spit it out without hesitation, so he really didn’t need to worry. Besides, I had resistance to most poisons, so even swallowing some by mistake would not be a problem.

(Let’s finish the tasting quickly. It feels like Prince Kyos is glaring at me to hurry up.)

And shortly after I began tasting, I detected medicine mixed into the sauce on the meat and frowned. It had been hidden in something strongly flavored to make detection difficult, but there was definitely something there. However, it was different from a poison that harmed the body. I had only recently tasted it before, so I immediately knew what it was.

I sampled every dish, but nothing else had been tampered with. Only the meat sauce contained the drug.

「…Prince Kyos. There is one thing I would like to ask.」

「What is it? Speak freely.」

「There’s feferi in this. Is that common in the castle?」

A line of curiosity stretched long above Kyos’ head. Behind him, Dalton turned his face away and coughed. Pale yellow stretched above him, so apparently my question had startled him quite badly. I had no eyes in the back of my head, so I could not tell what reaction Hector was showing behind me.

Feferi had been in our food today, and in the soup earlier as well. Since Hector had apparently been drugged with it before too, I thought perhaps it was not uncommon in the castle, so I asked.

「It should have been blended in so the taste could not be distinguished… and yet you noticed. It is there because I require it, so pay it no mind.」

「…I see. Then there was no problem with this meal.」

「Good. Then let us eat.」

Kyos was royalty, the successor to the throne, and leaving behind heirs was an important duty, so… well, in other words, that was probably why he needed feferi. I decided not to think too deeply about it.

Kyos happily brought the still-hot food to his mouth. My role was probably finished now. After all, his wish to 「eat warm food」 had been granted.

Normally, poison tasting required waiting some time after the taster sampled the food, so by the time Kyos ate it, it had already gone cold. To someone constantly exposed to the danger of assassination, meals simply had to be that way. But still, wanting to eat something warm was perfectly understandable.

(…The food is delicious, but my stomach hurts.)

I too made an effort to try the dishes. I thought they were delicious. My sense of taste still worked properly, but the tension made it difficult to eat. As I forcibly stuffed down food because wasting it would be a shame, the prince across from me suddenly spoke in an amused voice.

「Now that I think about it, there was feferi mixed into your food as well, wasn’t there?」

「…………」

My hand stopped for a moment. The prince before me looked at me with an amused expression, the corners of his mouth lifted.

On my very first day in this castle, I had indeed been served soup laced with feferi. However, since the drug only affected men, it had no effect on me, and I noticed it before Hector drank any, so no real harm had been done. Therefore, whether she planted it herself or had merely been instructed to do so, I had told the servant who knew about it that I 「would not tell anyone.」

If ordered to speak, I had little choice since my opponent was royalty. But as I remained hesitant to speak, unsure what to do, those black eyes shifted behind me.

「You truly have a personality unsuited for keeping secrets. Hector, report.」

「Yes. It was mixed into the meal on the first day.」

「I see. Cyril, report such matters in the future.」

A faint trace of worry appeared above Kyos’ head. Somehow, I felt apologetic. He could seem overbearing at times, but once again I was reminded that fundamentally he was a good person.

「My apologies. Since no harm came of it, I did not think it serious enough to trouble Your Highness.」

「The feferi itself is not the issue. It is hardly a rare drug around here.」

Apparently aphrodisiacs made from feferi were not unusual in the royal capital. Among commoners, they were sometimes used as forceful love confession methods, and they were also commonly used by married couples to maintain harmonious relationships. However, dedicated antidotes were equally widespread to prevent unwanted incidents, so feferi aphrodisiacs rarely became serious problems. …Though people unfamiliar with such customs who came from elsewhere would probably fall victim quite easily. Since it was not even considered a rare incident, it did not sound particularly problematic.

「The issue is the fact that something has tampered with your food.」

「…I understand. I will keep that in mind.」

The problem was the situation where something could be mixed into my food at all. Because I was basically Kyos’ property and was not allowed to be harmed, that was likely what he meant.

This time it had only been feferi, so nothing happened, but that also meant lethal poison could have been introduced through the same method.

There would probably be investigations, removals of untrustworthy personnel, punishments, and various other consequences afterward. I decided not to think too much about those matters.

「You belong to me. If anything happens, report it immediately. Anyone who harms you is my enemy.」

I thought the wording sounded deliberately provocative, but I quickly understood his intention. From the yellow-green curiosity and yellow amusement stretching above his head, along with the glance he flicked toward my back, I could infer he was teasing Hector for fun.

Though I could not see him, Hector was probably stretching long pale blue-green lines behind me right now. I wished Kyos would stop.

「You keep a blank expression, but you are surprisingly easy to read. It is entertaining.」

「…………I would appreciate it if Your Highness would restrain such jokes.」

The long dark-blue sympathy above Dalton’s head gave me complicated feelings. This prince truly loved toying with people for his own amusement, and it was exhausting. On top of that, he was skilled enough at reading expressions to know exactly how far he could go without crossing the line into being hated, which made him impossible to deal with.

After finishing a dinner only Kyos had enjoyed, I returned to the Pharmacist Tower feeling an indescribable mental exhaustion. Hector walked beside me smiling, but the pale blue-green lingering above him made it obvious he was not in the best mood. …Though beside it there was also translucent orange joy. That was a future emotion, however. At present, there was not even the slightest trace of joy.

(He understands it was just his friend joking around, so he can’t really get angry, but the irritation still lingers… something like that.)

Watching the anger colors repeatedly try to stretch before shrinking again, I came to that conclusion. He looked easygoing, but in truth he was incredibly devoted, and because of that devotion, very jealous.

「Hector-san, that was only Prince Kyos trying to tease you.」

「Yeah, I know. Kyos is good at messing with people.」

Hector let out a small sigh, and the anger colors vanished cleanly. In their place, anxiety and joy began repeatedly stretching and shrinking. The joy was a long translucent orange; when anxiety stretched, joy shrank, and when joy stretched, anxiety shrank. This pattern meant he wanted to propose something and hoped for a positive answer, but was also anxious about it.

The long translucent orange still remained, and its base was repeatedly coloring and stretching, meaning it was not yet a present emotion. If this translucent color related to what he was about to propose, then I would likely give the answer he hoped for. But he himself did not know that, so he appeared to be seriously agonizing over it.

「What’s wrong?」

「You can see right through me, huh… Um, well… if I gave you earrings in my color, would you accept them?」

When someone gifted jewelry, each type carried meaning. Earrings especially were something given to lovers or spouses.

For lovers, one first gifted earrings or cuffs bearing stones matching one’s own hair or eye color. They were often given during confessions. During an engagement, the one who received the gift would return the favor with the jewelry of their own color, making it easy to identify the partner just by looking at both ears. After marriage, people pierced their ears and wore each other’s colors as earrings. That was the custom in this country.

It had all been so unrelated to my life that I had never thought about it. Jewelry was a gift exchanged between close people, and I had not had anyone close to me for a very long time. Had Hector not brought it up, I probably would have forgotten the custom forever.

「Then I’ll give you one too, Hector-san. Let’s go buy them in town sometime.」

「! Yeah, let’s do that.」

I made the suggestion because I remembered lovers exchanged one color each, but the way orange exploded vividly above Hector’s head made me want to laugh. Apparently, he was happy enough that the excitement would carry over into tomorrow.

(…It’s not like I don’t have worries, but he’s so happy that… I guess it’s fine.)

Colored earrings were proof someone had a lover. Hector had never worn them before. Since he had acted like a flirt and a womanizer, he sometimes wore colorless accessories, but those signified that he had no particular partner. …If people learned the Flower Knight had gotten a lover, what kind of uproar would it cause? I could not even imagine it.

(My colors are rare and easy to identify, which is a problem… though since I rarely appear in public, hopefully it’ll work out somehow.)

Colored earrings also identified one’s partner. If Hector wore colored ones, there would absolutely be people desperately searching for the woman matching those colors. And the colors I possessed were rare and easy to spot. I should probably be grateful I had a profession that kept me out of public view.

Hector had been tremendously popular even in the town where I originally lived, so there was no way that would change here in the royal capital. When Hector returned from the capital before, he had looked utterly exhausted, and the prediction lines made it obvious he had suffered unpleasant experiences involving women.

(…Being surrounded by noblewomen sounds mentally worse than being surrounded by village girls.)

I wished such a future would never come to pass, but for some reason, it felt like a useless wish.

「Actually, I have to participate in training too… and while I’m gone, another knight will guard you. Ahh, if only I could protect you myself all the time.」

「…Well, yes, that makes sense.」

Though Hector had become my guard knight, his original affiliation was with the Royal Guard, the force directly under the royal family, so naturally he could not simply stop training and remain by my side forever. It was obvious once I thought about it, but I had not considered it until now. Most likely, his training had simply been excused for the first few days while I adjusted to life here.

During the hours Hector attended training, another knight would apparently come guard me instead. And I thought Hector was worried about me being alone with another knight while he was absent.

(He did say the earrings could also act as a warning.)

The ones who used to talk about such things were the maidens who came for fortune-telling, though now it all felt nostalgic. Hector’s suggestion about earrings was surely not only because of lover customs, but also as a warning to other knights. …He often showed that pale blue-green possessiveness.

Naturally, my hand drifted toward my ear, and when I glanced up at the tall face beside me, our eyes met perfectly.

「I’d be happy if you wore my colors.」

「I’ll wear them properly.」

「…Thank you.」

Seeing his blissful smile almost made me stop walking. He usually tried not to show too much emotion on his face, but when we were alone together, he had started showing his expressions honestly far more often. That made me happy, and I found those sides of him precious too, but… it was a bit dangerous for my heart.

It was obvious how happy he was about the proof that we were lovers, and that straightforwardness made me feel oddly embarrassed. But once I wore Hector’s colors and Hector wore mine, since we spent so much time together, people would quickly figure out who the other person was even from just one color.

(But… maybe that’s fine now.)

I disliked standing out, and I certainly wanted to avoid causing a fuss whenever possible. Just moments ago I had been thinking about how to hide it all. …But we loved each other and had become lovers. We could not remain hidden forever.

(Someday… we’ll probably get married.)

At that point, there would be no hiding it anymore. So perhaps it was best to get used to it now. Looking at the long, high-reaching orange line of joy and the even longer line of love, I smiled a little to myself.

I was anxious. But I was also hopeful for the happiness waiting ahead. I might as well do everything I could to become as happy as possible.