Mihail

“What? You want me to go back?”

Katya asked her husband with wide eyes.

They were now at the inn where Boris and the knights were staying.

Everyone else had left the room in favor of the couple’s conversation.

Their honeymoon had originally been planned for three days and four nights.

The first night had been ruined by a murder, and now she was being told to give up on the remaining three.

For a moment, Katya wondered if this was really coming out of Nikolai’s mouth.

After all, he was the one who had been most excited about this honeymoon.

“I forgot that it’s dangerous out here. I don’t know when something like yesterday will happen again. There are too many dangers out there.”

“You’re telling me the obvious now?”

“Even the most obvious things don’t seem obvious. I don’t want even the smallest chance of danger to affect you.”

“I mean, it’s not every day you get caught up in a murder.”

“There are some people who follow a murder everywhere they go.”

The protagonist of a mystery novel is supposed to solve the case, so there are always incidents and accidents that follow him wherever he goes.

He was jokingly nicknamed the ‘messenger of death.’

“That’s me? You’re calling me the Grim Reaper because I did a little detective work?”

Katya, who was only an aspiring detective, spoke up.

“I didn’t say that. I just wanted you to be in the safest place possible until you are crowned.”

“Isn’t the safest place next to the Grand Duke?”

“Next to me, with assassination threats coming at you from all sides?”

“You’ll protect me no matter what happens.”

“That.”

Nikolai leaned over the table and squeezed his wife’s small hand.

“Of course I’ll save you, even if it means throwing my life away.”

“We both need to survive! If you’re so determined, why are you asking me to go anyway?”

“For now, just in case it’s not possible.”

“Is it impossible to stay for three more days?”

He couldn’t help himself as she looked up at him, her eyes as clear and bright as a rabbit’s.

He realized that he hadn’t spent a day away from her.

It was only natural that he had entered the residence of Duke Smirnov to fulfill his dream of living in his wife’s family, and had come all this way after getting married that way.

He really didn’t know how he was going to live without Katya anymore.

Nikolai dried his face with one hand.

“I’m the one who’s sad that it’s been canceled. I’ve been looking forward to it so much.”

“But you’re blowing it like this? You said that once we enter the palace, the chances of traveling together decrease.”

“Your safety is more important than my dreams.”

“Was that even a dream?”

Katya asked with a wry smile.

“Of course. I’ve always dreamed of this moment, preparing for it. We would go to Vasnetsov’s famous restaurant, eat delicious food with you, go to a concert, see an exhibition, get out of the carriage for a walk, walk down the street together, and then a carriage would pass by and we would spontaneously hold hands, pretending to be in danger.”

It was a simple, yet special dream.

It may not seem like much, but it was special because it was in Vasnetsov. Special because it was our honeymoon. And special because it was with Katya.

The biggest disappointment was Nikolai.

“You’re just going to tell me all these secrets up front?”

“It doesn’t seem possible, so I voluntarily pay my dues and come clean.”

“And we haven’t done any of that yet.”

“That’s how much I worry about you. I’m sending you off, holding onto my torn heart.”

Holding onto my torn heart. Who says that in a nurturing way?

Her husband was quite serious, but Katya couldn’t stop a smile from escaping her lips.

But his blatant expression made it easier to understand what he was feeling.

“I see what you mean. Then I’ll go ahead and wait for you.”

Katya eventually agreed to his suggestion.

It was hard to argue with a man who wanted to send his beloved away.

Nikolai felt even more disappointed when she meekly agreed to do as he asked.

But he couldn’t help it. He had to let her go before his heart begged him not to go on a whim.

“Boris!”

The Grand Duke’s call brought Boris, who had been waiting in the hallway, to the door.

“You called for me?”

“The Grand Duchess has decided to leave now. Prepare the knights to escort her to the Duke’s house safely.”

“We are already ready to leave.”

The knights behind Boris bowed to the Grand Duchess.

Katya left the room in a daze.

In the hallway, she glanced back for a moment to see Nikolai, with a smile on his face, giving her an eye salute before the door closed behind her.

Boris had closed the door for a debriefing.

Katya followed the knights down the stairs, feeling the bitterness in her stomach grow stronger with each step.

She expected Nikolai would at least walk her to the carriage.

She’d thought he’d at least allow her a parting hug, but he’d been so cruel as to send her on her way.

‘Is my heart breaking because you let me go first?’

Did she expect to see him clinging to her with tears streaming down his face?

It wasn’t exactly the picture I had in mind.

In fact, that’s not what Katya was expecting.

‘I can’t guarantee this won’t happen again, but don’t worry. Anyone who touches a hair on your head will die at my hands.’

In fact, she expected him to say that he’d make a bloodbath of it, that he’d eliminate any danger.

What she didn’t know was that when you have something to protect, you become more cowardly.

As she climbed into the carriage, she turned wistfully to look up at the second floor of the inn, and stopped dead in her tracks.

“Excuse me…….”

She didn’t have to say more than that before the bright-eared knights responded.

“Just give me any orders.”

“I just wanted to ask you something.”

“Yes. Go ahead, Your Highness.”

“What happened to the assassin who caused the carriage accident that day?”

They dropped Katya and Nikolai off at the hotel and watched Boris and the knights leave.

The knights exchanged wordless glances.

They seemed to pass the answer back and forth.

“That…….”

“Tell me without hiding it. I’m technically the one who caught him, and I think I have every right to know what’s going on.”

“He died last night.”

“……What?”

Katya stepped down from the carriage footboard, a shocked look on her face.

“What do you mean, he died?”

“He was offered two choices. Either become a double agent, or, with the condition of never again targeting the lives of the two superiors, we informed them that we would simply set him free. After a long persuasion, it seemed like they were inclined to choose the latter. So, we loosened the gag to let them have a meal, but suddenly they bit their tongue and stopped…”

It was the same this time.

He had taken his own life, just like the assassin who had attacked Nikolai at the lake.

“We already know who’s behind this. He doesn’t have any more information to give, so why is he dead?”

“It’s usually because they’re holding the lives of their family and friends in their hands. From the beginning, they were told to turn themselves in if they were caught, or their family and friends would be harmed.”

In effect, for those who decided to hire a killer, there was no hope other than a successful assassination.

They knew that even if they returned to the arms of their families, one day, if the commissioner realized they had been captured by the Grand Duke’s forces and survived, they would accuse them of treachery and reach out to their families.

Before that happened, it was best to sever all ties with the people he cared about.

Standing there, biting her lower lip, Katya spoke up.

“What did you do with the body……?”

The knights took her back to where they had buried the assassin.

Katya laid the bouquet she’d bought on the way down to the grave.

She pitied the fates who were pushed to such a precipice, even though she knew it was unlikely they would succeed.

Unless in the midst of battle, boyanins never got blood on their hands.

They left the dirty work to the commoners and serfs. And when they did commit crimes, they always managed to get away with it.

Whether they died as a result of a boyanin’s crimes or from curiously thrown stones, it was the lowest class that suffered.

They were powerless to defend themselves against the boyanins.

Even if they took revenge, like Judith, they had to live with their sentences, and most chose to kill themselves, like her friend.

The assassin’s sin was a great one, and Katya was not the kind of person to forgive someone who tried to kill her.

Not all those in dire circumstances committed crimes.

‘But if they had been born as boyanins…….’

Worrying about their livelihood would not have been a factor. At least in their judgment and decisions about right and wrong.

With a different starting line, their futures would have been vastly different.

Unless the discrimination caused by the caste system is addressed, this will happen again and again.

The abolition of the boyanins, who are eating away at the Grand Duchy of Hersen.

It was to root it out that Nikolai had traveled south in the first place.

Katya realized that this tragedy would not end unless the cause of it all, Oksana and her forces, were stopped.

Meanwhile, after sending Katya on her way, Boris was reporting to Nikolai on his investigation into the Molniski Ladies’ Academy.

It was consistent with what Judith had said. The headmistress, Viscountess Borodin, had been running a network to arrange meetings between students who were coming of age and nobles.

The demand for educated commoner lovers who could be talked to but easily discarded was enormous.

It centered around current and former members of the Hersian National Academy’s Despot Club.

“It’s called the Despot Club…….”

Nikolai tried to pronounce the name.

Despot is the Hersian word for tyrant.

“The real tyrant is here, and they created something like that without any fear?”

“His Highness Mihail is said to be from there.”

Nikolai’s face hardened for a moment at that.

Mihail de Vasily.

Oksana’s son, Nikolai’s half-brother.