Homecoming (4)
Recently, the cadets enrolled at Rutra had become keenly aware of the small, almost trivial changes spreading around them.
'Sian has disappeared from Rutra.'
In truth, even the cadets could hardly say they hadn’t seen this coming.
After all, from the moment Sian had mercilessly crushed Ricardo in that duel, most of them had already been able to guess how things would end.
On paper, all cadets within Rutra were equal regardless of rank. But some cadets were more equal than others.
And Ricardo, the Empire’s crown prince, was practically the very face of that kind of “equality.”
Seen in that light, it wasn’t all that strange that Sian, after being framed for assaulting royalty, had eventually gone “missing.”
“He should’ve known his place before he stretched out and lay down. No matter how pissed off you are, who goes and charges a crown prince head-on?”
“You haven’t even heard the rumors about him? If even half of them were true, Sian’s seriously not right in the head. And if you’re that kind of lunatic, then maybe he really didn’t see a crown prince as anything special.”
“Honestly, I didn’t hate the guy that much. Unlike the rumors, he was quiet enough in how he acted, and I never once saw him causing trouble for anyone else.”
“Come to think of it, lately it’s not just Sian who’s been missing from Rutra. That imperial princess he was always glued to… no, Cartesia, hasn’t been around much either. Do you think something happened at the imperial palace?”
“Who knows? But if that were the case, Ricardo wouldn’t still be sitting here looking so damn fine.”
“Still, she’s an imperial princess. I’m sure there’s some reason we don’t know about. And if it’s important enough, news will reach us soon enough.”
And as if to support the cadets’ suspicions, word concerning the long-absent Cartesia soon began sweeping through all of Rutra.
The rumor was that the reason Cartesia had not been seen at Rutra lately was because she might soon be holding an engagement ceremony.
“Cartesia’s engagement… Well, she’s practically of age now, so in a way, I guess it’s only natural.”
“I wonder which lucky bastard gets to be engaged to Her Highness. I’m seriously jealous. If I were her fiancé, I’d have the confidence to serve the princess for the rest of my life.”
“With that face? Dream on. Even if you were a prince from another country, you still wouldn’t be able to marry Cartesia with a mug like that.”
“…I know that much, okay? Do I really not get to say anything?”
And just like that, the “minor” matter of Sian disappearing from Rutra was forgotten, swallowed whole by the huge uproar surrounding Cartesia’s engagement.
...No, to be precise, it was going to be forgotten.
At least, it would have been—if Cartesia, after returning to Rutra for the first time in ages, hadn’t started strolling around arm in arm with Sian for everyone to see.
“…W-what? What are those two doing?”
“Wasn’t Sian and Cartesia just friends? No way they’re like that, right? Did they seriously run off together in the name of love?”
“Maybe they’re just pretending? You know… like a joke or something?”
But the sight of Sian wearing an expression that looked like he was barely holding back a sigh, while Cartesia clung to him with an oddly satisfied face, made that theory seem utterly unbelievable.
As though she were openly flaunting their relationship to everyone, Sian and Cartesia walked down the street with their arms linked, and just then, while the other cadets stared at them in stunned silence, one person stepped into their path with a deeply furrowed expression.
“Cartesia? What exactly do you think you’re doing?”
It was Ricardo.
“Oh, brother. It’s been quite a long time. Let me see… since the day you collapsed like an idiot, your legs giving out under you and dropping you straight to the floor?”
“…Tch.”
At Cartesia’s blatant mockery, Ricardo’s face flushed a humiliating red.
For him, the day he’d been reduced to a trembling wreck by Sian’s killing intent and had crumpled to the floor had been one of the most shameful memories of his life.
But that wasn’t what mattered right now.
Compared to the insane stunt Cartesia was pulling in a place with so many eyes on them, that old humiliation was practically nothing.
“You… have you completely lost your mind?”
“My, my. And what rude things our dear brother says.”
Cartesia gave a little snort, looking exactly like someone who had already expected Ricardo to react this way.
“I thought you were a rather clever woman. At the very least, I assumed you knew how to separate public from private matters. And yet what are you doing now? At a time when rumors are already spreading that you’re engaged to someone else, you’re strolling about with your arm linked to that vulgar thing and disgracing the honor of the imperial family. Have you truly gone mad?”
Ricardo knew nothing more than the rumors going around. He had no idea whether Cartesia was actually engaged, and if so, to whom.
After that day, he had drawn the emperor’s wrath over the matter involving Arieta, and had been ordered not to come near the imperial palace for the time being.
But just because he didn’t know the details didn’t mean he was too stupid to make any guesses.
'At least one thing is certain, no matter what else I don’t know... that bastard Sian is not Cartesia’s fiancé.'
Maybe ordinary nobles could choose their own marriages, but not those who stood at the level of royalty.
For royals, marriage wasn’t about love. It was nothing more than a political union with someone else.
Ricardo was one of the people in the world who understood his father, the emperor, better than anyone else.
And the emperor he knew was absolutely not the sort of man who would sit quietly and allow his daughter Cartesia to marry some lowborn commoner.
Before even bringing up status, there was simply no “gain” to be had from a marriage between Sian and Cartesia.
So Ricardo could say it with confidence.
That bastard Sian was absolutely not Cartesia’s fiancé. No, he couldn’t be.
Just as Ricardo was gathering that certainty and preparing to say something to Cartesia, another voice cut in.
“Ricardo’s right. What the hell are you doing with that woman now, big brother?”
“…Eli?”
Eli, wearing an expression of utter disbelief, had walked up beside Ricardo.
Ricardo and Eli. To be honest, it was a completely mismatched combination, so Sian looked at the two of them with a puzzled stare.
But Eli’s expression as she looked at him now was a little different from usual.
Normally, Eli always wore a face that said she had no interest in anything at all, and even toward Sian she had never shown much concern. But now she was different.
At the moment, Eli was glaring at Sian with something close to contempt.
“I asked what you think you’re doing, walking around with a woman who clearly already has a fiancé. My big brother isn’t the kind of man who’d ever belong to a woman who already has someone. What, did she promise to back you up or something?”
“And if she did?”
Sian answered with a smile as cold as ice.
“This is all thanks to certain people who’ve been working day and night to kick me out of Rutra. What can I do? I don’t want to be tossed out so obediently, so I’ve got to struggle however I can, don’t I?”
“...And this ‘struggling’ means rolling around with that woman?”
“At the very least, it’s better than just sitting here and taking it with my eyes open. And since we’re already here, I might as well say this too—being next to Cartesia like this now makes me happier than I ever was with you lot.”
“...W-what?”
In that instant, Sian didn’t miss the way Eli’s body stiffened.
“Do I really have to spell it out? I mean, Cartesia is a much better woman than you people, who never did a damn thing for me in my whole life.”
“Big brother!”
“Honestly, comparing you at all to her is already an insult to Cartesia. Do you know what Cartesia did for me? Not only did she erase that cursed crime from me in one stroke, she even gave me gifts so expensive they were worth more than everything I’d earned in my entire life. Meanwhile, the so-called little sisters I had were always the ones begging me for handouts.”
Sian watched the emotion begin to gather in Eli’s eyes.
It was unmistakably inferiority.
The inferiority of seeing the man she had always assumed was hers go to a woman who was so far above her it wasn’t even funny.
“I suppose you’re doing all this thinking it’s some kind of revenge against us. But you’ll regret it later. No matter how you dress it up, what you’re doing now is nothing more than an affair. Maybe that woman likes you enough to lick your boots now, but to her, you’re just a toy she can throw away whenever she gets bored!”
And then it happened.
“My, my, your mouth is certainly working, but don’t you think you’re speaking a little too harshly? Eli, I don’t think it’s very classy to blab away like that when you don’t know a thing.”
Cartesia, who had remained silent through Sian and Eli’s entire exchange, now smiled brightly and began pushing back against Eli’s words.
“It’s true that I’m someone who likes to lick and be licked with Sian, yes... but everything else you said is wrong. Especially the part where you think I’d ever consider Sian a toy I could toss aside whenever I pleased. I absolutely can’t agree with that.”
“…What?”
Cartesia met Eli’s bewildered stare and spoke clearly, each word deliberate.
“I’m not going to deny that I have a fiancé, but even so, I consider the present Sian far more precious than some future fiancé. At the very least, I think that’s much better than the way you treat your own brother.”
As she said that, Cartesia clung even more tightly to Sian than before.
The sight of them was practically a declaration of mutual affection.
“Th-that’s—”
“Still not convinced? Then how about this?”
With that, Cartesia slipped an arm over Sian’s shoulder and pulled him close, then pressed her lips to his.
And Sian did not push her away.
Their tongues tangled together. Their shared saliva stretched between them in long, glistening threads.
It was such a seductive sight, like two serpents coiling around one another, that Eli forgot what she was even supposed to say. Cartesia let out a blatant sneer at her and spoke again.
“Now do you understand? I’m serious. Unlike you, who played at family and then dumped your own brother without a second thought, I mean every word I say.”
“Y-you…!”
“So stop hanging around in front of us like a pathetic stray and get lost already. You’re no longer a woman with any right to talk to Sian like this. Because from now on...”
Cartesia leaned close to Eli’s ear and whispered, low enough for only her to hear, but clearly enough to cut like a blade.
“The only family Sian has now is me. Not you bitches.”