“I will go.”
Clatter.
The dining table was immense, large enough to seat dozens. Every member of House Hollin was present for the meal, yet a heavy silence had reigned until Kyla’s declaration. With the Duke remaining quiet, the family had simply watched Kyla, their own words held in check.
The moment she spoke, her brothers all chimed in at once, as if they had been waiting for their cue.
“Go where? To the battlefield?”
“Kyla, I was just about to speak on that matter.”
“You mean the Crown Prince’s conditions for an empress, I presume?”
“I believe he will soon retract them. Why don’t we wait a little longer? To make participation in a war a prerequisite for the title of empress is unheard of.”
“I agree with brother. Kyla, I know you are passionate, but a battlefield is far too dangerous. We should all put our heads together and find another way.”
“Sister, wouldn’t Kyla do well, though?” another sibling piped up. “She’s held a sword more often than most soldiers.”
“Holding a sword and cutting a man down with it are two different things. Be quiet.”
“Tch. You always pick on me.”
“Father, are you truly considering sending Kyla to war?”
“Second brother, you might want to wipe that smile off your face before you speak,” a younger sister retorted. “You’ll be the happiest of all if sister Kyla is gone. Or why don’t you go in her place? Ah, but I suppose the Crown Prince wouldn’t welcome that, would he? Our sister would be far more useful than you.”
Amidst the cacophony of his seven squabbling siblings, Kyla’s gaze remained fixed on the dull blade of the knife in her hand.
She disliked it intensely. Whether a grand longsword or a small piece of cutlery, a blade, in her mind, should always be honed to a razor’s edge.
With a subtle gesture, Kyla signaled for a servant to bring her a new knife. Just then, the Duke of Hollin moistened his lips with his wine, a clear sign he was about to speak. The siblings’ clamor instantly died down.
“Kyla, are you certain you will be alright?”
“Yes. I can handle a sword. And did His Highness not say that one does not necessarily have to fight on the front lines? There will be much I can do to help from the rear.”
“The rear or not, a battlefield is a battlefield. Life and death are decided in an instant.”
“Is it any different here?” she countered, her voice calm. “The rise and fall of our house is being decided in every passing moment. We have already lost our lands near the palace, and our business rights are in jeopardy. If I do not become empress now, will House Hollin not face a crisis of its very survival?”
At Kyla’s assertion, her second brother whispered to another sibling, “Is she talking about that mole tribe?”
“Yes. They said if we want to continue our conventional weapons business, we’ll have to compete with them on quality and win a new bid.”
“Tsk. How good could anything made by a bunch of moles possibly be?”
The younger brother pretended not to hear his elder’s derisive whisper and averted his gaze. Says the one with the face of a poisonous toad.
“But Kyla,” the Duke continued, his voice heavy with concern, “if a stray blade were to find you, to whom would I demand responsibility?”
“I am well aware of your fears.”
House Hollin had many enemies, and that was without even considering the Davions. The last ten years had been a mad dash, a feverish climb to power using the Burgos civil war as their ladder. The number of houses they had brought down in their ascent formed a veritable mountain, and the number of individuals whose lives they had ruined was too great to count. And then there were the other nobles, circling like vultures, waiting for any sign of weakness. Even among blood-bound siblings, they reflexively checked their necks for daggers out of habit. The danger outside their walls was infinitely greater.
If I go to the battlefield, there will undoubtedly be assassination attempts under the cover of chaos. The faces of her siblings, along with those of several external powers, flashed through her mind, but Kyla simply shook her head, clearing the thoughts away.
“Do not worry. Lady Davion will certainly not step forward. She is far too busy attending parties to find the time. And she is hardly in a position to offer up her family’s fortune.”
A few stifled laughs echoed around the table at Kyla’s sharp remark. What a pack of fools, she thought. They were no different, living lives of leisure, yet because they held some nominal title, they seemed to believe they were actually contributing to the family’s legacy.
A servant placed a new knife beside her plate. She inspected the blade; it was perfectly honed. Her mood lifted slightly. She began to slice her meat with it, her movements precise and clean.
“Father, do not worry about me. You would be better off worrying about which of the other families might dare to enter the fray.” Rather than be checked by some middling house, I will become the unrivaled candidate for Empress. At the very least, it will put an end to any clumsy assassination attempts.
Kyla chewed the perfectly cut piece of meat and dabbed her lips with a napkin.
“And brothers.”
“Huh?” The male siblings, who had been mindlessly gorging themselves on meat and wine, froze and turned to look at her.
“You will all go to Burgos and wait for me there.”
“What? Why?”
“Because I will be departing for Burgos to ‘participate in the war’. In case of any unforeseen circumstances, it would be best for us to be within the same borders. Besides,” she added, a chilling sweetness to her voice, “Mother misses you all terribly.”
“Ahem.” The brothers, looking deeply uncomfortable, glanced at the Duke, but he was already setting down his cutlery, signaling the end of his meal.
“The rest of you may continue your conversation,” he said, rising from his seat.
“Father!”
“Sit down, brother.”
Clatter. The second brother shot to his feet in protest, but Kyla didn’t even deign to look at him as she gave the ‘command’. Her tone was soft, yet everyone at the table felt the oppressive weight of her authority. The brother, who had been halfway out of his chair, reluctantly sat back down and drained his wine glass.
“A short while ago, just before we sold the land, I sent a carrier pigeon to Burgos.”
“Are you talking about when Ian Hielo visited the estate?”
“Yes, you are well-informed. I do not know the details of his reasoning, but Minister Ian Hielo seemed to be aware that we were planning to sell the land to a third party.”
“Hmph. As if that were such a brilliant strategy.”
“The problem,” Kyla continued, her voice dropping, “is that he also seemed to know that the third party was connected to Burgos.”
The brothers, who had been casually swirling their wine, now had a flicker of alarm in their eyes.
“The land has already been sold, and we have made no other overt moves, so for now, we have avoided any problems. But I am concerned about the future. If I am to become Empress, many things need to be… tidied up.”
“So, what do you want us to do in Burgos?”
“First, you will meet with Mother. She will give you the detailed plan.”
“No, I refuse. I’m not going. Do you have any idea what could happen to me if I cross that border?” one of the brothers blustered, slamming his glass down on the table. Kyla only smiled faintly, as if she couldn’t comprehend how someone could be so brazenly cowardly.
“I, too, will be crossing that border, brother.”
“You will be surrounded by a thousand eyes and ears! And with the Crown Prince himself by your side, you will of course be safe!”
“And you, brother, will have Mother by your side. What is there to be so afraid of?”
“Are you asking because you don’t know? She’s not even—!”
“Be silent.”
Screeeech.
Kyla dragged her knife across her plate, then tossed it down with a clatter.
“They say that in the Imperial Palace, even the portraits have ears. Do not think that the Hollin estate is any different.”
It was the small, dark secret of House Hollin. Publicly, all the children of the house were the legitimate offspring of the Duke. But the reality was a little different. For a very long time, the Duke had kept two women. The Duchess, the mistress of the house, who had borne him three children. And the secret woman, who had given birth to Kyla and the others.
Kyla smiled brightly as she slowly rose from her seat.
“I have known since we were children that you lacked caution, but lately, you have been far too careless, brother.”
“Father has spoiled you rotten. You have become far too arrogant.”
“It is because of your incompetence that Father places such high hopes in me. Let us be honest: if it were not for my mother, would we ever have been able to open a trade route with Burgos? Could you, with all your great talent, have sold a single blade? The Duchess knew this long ago, which is why she stepped aside. So that at the very least, a halfwit like you could be made to function like a man!”
“Kyla!”
One day, the Duchess had simply vanished. Officially, she had retired to her distant hometown for health reasons, and all contact had been lost. She seemed to send letters to her own children from time to time, but even those had grown infrequent, and years had passed since the last one.
“I’ll kill you!”
“Kyla, you’ve gone too far!”
CRASH! SMASH!
Wine glasses went flying, shattering against the far wall, but the other siblings, long accustomed to such scenes, simply continued to chew their meat.
“If it weren’t for your lowly mother, my mother never would have left! You, with your filthy blood!”
“If it is so filthy, then why don’t you run to the Imperial Palace at once and tell them all about it? Who would have the most to lose, I wonder? Me, of course, but also you, brother, who spends half his life being summoned to court.”
And so, the seat of the Duchess had become vacant, a festering wound in the Duke’s pride. House Hollin had hidden this blatant flaw behind a web of lies. It was during that time that the civil war in Burgos had erupted, and Kyla’s mother had recognized it as the family’s golden opportunity. She had personally ‘returned’ to Burgos and, in her capacity as the mistress of House Hollin, had single-handedly forged a weapons supply line to the warring nation.
Publicly, the mistress of the house had suddenly reappeared after a decade-long absence, a situation that required some… management. The Duke, plagued with the problem, soon devised a clever solution. He would bestow upon Kyla’s mother the identity of the reclusive Duchess. It was the birth of the ‘fake Duchess’.
“So, brother,” Kyla said, slowly approaching him. She reached out and took a firm grip of his shirt collar. It was a gesture that mimicked straightening his clothes, but to him, it felt like a public throttling. “While I am still speaking nicely, I suggest you go to Burgos. There is a limit to how useless one can be. Go, and wait for Mother’s instructions.”
If they could not protect their weapons business rights, they would have no choice but to pivot. The mana stones and rare ores that lay beneath the piles of corpses, the high-end goods that circulated during the chaos of war… there were other opportunities.
“And who knows?” she added, her voice a silken whisper. “Depending on the situation, you and the other brothers might even have the chance to save me and the Crown Prince during the war.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Use your imagination. If you need someone to spoon-feed you the answers, I suggest you ask the lady who has retired to the countryside.”
Thump.
Kyla gave her brother’s shoulder a light pat and strode out of the dining hall. One by one, the other siblings who shared her secret rose and followed her—all of them bearing either violet eyes or black hair.
CRASH—!
“Aah! Young master! Are you alright?”
“He’s—he’s bleeding!”
“Bring something to stop the bleeding! Quickly!”
The sound of shattering dishes and the frantic cries of the servants followed them, but Kyla ignored it, her steps never faltering. At the end of the hall, the butler approached her and whispered.
“My lady. A guest has arrived.”
“A guest for me? Who is it?”
“It is…”
As the butler whispered in her ear, Kyla’s brow furrowed. Chloe’s closest friends had come to visit? Their intentions were insultingly obvious. Surely, they cannot be that foolish?
“Let them in.”
“Yes, my lady.”
Kyla paused, smoothing her hair in the reflection of a window, before turning to greet her guests.
***
“Iaaaaan!”
CRASH!
Rip! Romandro, who had been in the middle of writing a document, startled so badly that his pen tore a long gash across the page. It was nearly finished! He just had to write the last line! Enraged, he crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it at Beric.
“You idiot, you scared me!”
But Beric simply tilted his head, easily dodging the projectile, and rummaged through his pockets.
“Ian, have you seen this?”
“What is it?”
“The invitation list from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I saw it on old man Jeirutt’s desk. It’s insane. Look!”
Beric rarely showed any interest in paper, so Ian’s curiosity was piqued. He set down his pen. Romandro, now thoroughly incensed, began to crumple every scrap of waste paper within reach and pelt Beric with them. Beric, in turn, dodged every single one, though they would have done no harm. Finally, at the end of his rope, Romandro shot to his feet and lunged at him.
Ignoring them completely, Ian took the paper from Beric and began to read. It was a list of foreign dignitaries to be invited to the coronation. It had likely been shared with the Royal Guard on a provisional basis, as they would be in charge of security for the Crown Prince. A copy would soon arrive at the Ministry as well.
“Astana… this part?”
“Yeah! Hasha is coming!”
“What is so surprising about that? It has been a long time, but it’s hardly something to make such a fuss over—” Romandro froze mid-lunge, a look of dawning realization on his face. He finally understood the reason for Beric’s excitement. In the small nation of Astana, there was only one person of sufficient rank to receive an invitation from the empire.
Ian’s voice was a soft murmur as he read the last line on the page.
“…The King of Astana, Hasharang Tokundaira.”