The Morning After the Victory Banquet
The day after the victory banquet.
"Oh no! I've overslept!"
The moment Anastasia woke and saw the angle of the sunlight streaming through her window, she jolted upright in alarm. It was early enough that most people would still be lost in deep sleep, yet far later than her usual rising.
She normally began her day an hour or two earlier than this. She had no choice—loafing about meant death in an imperial palace where suffocating schemes lurked around every corner of every day.
Perhaps it was the accumulated exhaustion from the Demon King Subjugation finally catching up with her. No, more likely it was...
Logan was so wonderful yesterday...
She had most likely failed to sleep properly because she'd spent the whole night replaying the intoxicating hours she'd shared with him at the banquet hall. The instant his blue eyes had sparkled toward her, the feeling of his strong arm wrapping around her waist as they surrendered themselves to the waltz's melody—merely thinking of it made her cheeks burn.
"Ah... Logan..."
Anastasia could now understand, without a doubt, that the days she'd spent with Logan recently were not a dream but reality. And yet, because it was all so sweet and dazzling, a dreamlike afterglow kept tingling in her chest.
His low voice, the deep look in his eyes as he gazed at her, and... even the warmth of his body. It was all so overwhelming that it felt almost unreal.
"Goodness, look at me!"
Before she knew it, Anastasia found herself blushing all over again as she relived her time with Logan the moment she'd gotten out of bed. A thought struck her—if she kept lying there in a daze, thinking only of him, she might never start her day at all.
She hurriedly rose from the bed and began getting ready. She was no longer the powerless princess who had been persecuted and scorned in the palace of old. She was now the Crown Princess, risen to a position no one dared touch, with the Emperor having declared he would delegate practically all affairs of state to her. Still, having taken care of everything herself since childhood, she was accustomed to it, and so she didn't summon her ladies-in-waiting or maids for help. She had even prepared for the banquet entirely on her own, without relying on anyone.
Despite having finished her preparations alone, Anastasia's appearance was flawless. Her platinum blonde hair was neatly combed back, and her simple yet dignified attire detracted nothing from her nobility.
And yet she studied herself in the mirror with even more diligence than usual, carefully smoothing every detail of her appearance.
Because from now on, she would see Logan every day. She had requested him as her escort alongside Renate, which meant he would stand at her side all day, watching over her, gazing at her.
So she had to be that much more careful.
Hmm... there's nothing odd or lacking anywhere, right?
Anastasia resolved that from the next day onward, she would have maids like Lulu and Rala help her get ready. She wanted to look just a little more beautiful to him. She didn't want him to see even the tiniest flaw.
"Hah...!"
Having finished dressing and stepping out of her bedchamber, Anastasia couldn't help but gasp. And no wonder—instead of Renate standing guard at the door as always...
"L-Logan...!?"
"Ah... good morning, Anya."
"Wh-what are you... doing here...?"
"Just to be safe, I was keeping watch outside your door."
No one imagined there was a soul in this palace who would dare move against her. But when Emperor Valerius had declared yesterday that he would entrust all state affairs to Anastasia, several people had visibly stiffened with cold expressions or their eyes had glinted with sinister cunning—however hard they'd tried to hide it.
Logan hadn't missed it, and thinking anything was possible, he had kept vigil before her bedchamber. After all, the moment that seemed most peaceful and safe could prove more dangerous than any other.
But seeing Anastasia flustered and red-faced, Logan felt guilty. It felt as though he had intruded upon her private space, and he worried he might have made her uncomfortable.
"Anya, I... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you..."
"N-no, not at all! Not at all! I'm actually glad, Logan. The very first face I saw when I opened the door was yours..."
"Pardon?"
"N-nothing! Ahem..!"
Anastasia hastily cleared her throat, having let her true feelings slip out without meaning to. She simply could not understand why she turned into such a fool the moment she stood in front of this man. Above all, the thing she'd always been confident in was keeping herself under control. So why did she become such an utter simpleton...
She truly could not understand. But of course, it was only natural.
Anastasia had been crushed under the weight of her longing and love for Logan for a very, very long time. On top of that, she'd rotted herself from the inside out suppressing her fury at the way Irene treated him. If anything, swallowing her rage at Irene had been harder for her than slaying the Demon King's army.
It only made sense that all those emotions would now begin to erupt, slowly and very carefully, at last.
Anyway, once she collected herself, Anastasia asked Logan with a slightly awkward air, "S-so... where's Renate?"
Her personal guard, who should have been right there, was nowhere to be seen. Of course, having Logan guard her in Renate's place was more than welcome... but it was still surprising that the woman who never left her side for even an hour was absent.
"Ah, Lady Renate said she had some business to attend to..."
"Oh, did she now?"
Anastasia caught on immediately. Some business, indeed. She had clearly stepped aside out of consideration. Given how things had gone in the garden yesterday, it was obvious Renate was deliberately arranging opportunities for the two of them to be alone together.
Anastasia marveled at her guard knight's tact and resolved to praise her for her hard work with a smile.
"But more importantly, Logan..."
"Yes?"
Looking at Logan, who seemed somehow tense, Anastasia felt a sudden surge of mischief. Lady Renate, was it? Until just recently he'd called her Renate—had she given him a light lesson or two? It was only proper, really. If he wanted to be properly acknowledged in the palace from now on, he needed to get used to the right forms of address. After all, now that he'd suddenly become her guard, there would be no shortage of people picking fights with him over every little thing.
But she pushed such sober thoughts aside. With a playful smile, Anastasia decided to tease him.
"Do you like 'Logan'? Or do you prefer 'Sir Logan'?"
In truth, when he had knelt before her yesterday and sworn his fealty, she should have personally bestowed a knighthood and appointed him on the spot. But she'd been far too flustered—no, honestly speaking, so moved that she'd forgotten all about it. Still, the Emperor himself, Valerius—distant as he'd been all those years while she suffered Irene's torment and fought the Demon King Subjugation—had publicly declared it at the banquet, calling him "Sir" outright for all to hear.
Functionally speaking, it was now perfectly proper to call him a knight.
At her words, Logan turned red and fumbled for a response. "Th-that's... you're in quite a teasing mood this morning, Anya..."
"Oh, come on~ what's the matter~? I'm just asking. So—which do you like? Logan? Or Sir Logan?"
"......"
Watching his ears turn scarlet under her relentless teasing, she could barely hold back her laughter. Anastasia was just about to stop, thinking she might be going too far, when—
"Then, Anya... no... Her Highness the Crown Princess..."
The moment Logan turned serious and tried to change how he addressed her—
"I'm sorry, Logan! I'll stop teasing you!"
Anastasia clasped her hands together and made an exaggerated show of begging forgiveness. At the sight of her, Logan burst out laughing.
"Haha... I was teasing too, Anya."
"Oh, honestly, you—!"
Anastasia stuck out her lips in a show of anger, but she couldn't hide the way the corners of her mouth kept curling upward. She was so happy, right from the very start of the morning.
They hadn't even properly entered the early stages of romance yet, but merely trading silly little jokes like this made her overwhelmingly happy. Seeing his smile, hearing his voice—every single moment spent at his side was pure, unclouded joy to her.
Renate watched the two of them from a slight distance yet again. The atmosphere between them was so sweet and radiant that it almost felt as if flower petals were drifting through the air around them. Every time Logan's blue eyes met Anastasia's red ones, invisible sparks seemed to fly, and the smiles they exchanged felt warmer than the morning sun.
But Renate had a thought—if she let this go on, they might well repeat yesterday's performance of endlessly complimenting each other's appearance and dawdling on the way to the banquet hall. So, though she felt a little guilty toward them both... she decided it was time to intervene.
"Ahem... Good morning, Your Highness."
"Ah... Renate... hello. Good morning."
Your Highness... it hurts my feelings a little when you look at me like that.
Watching Anastasia's expression harden the instant she offered her greeting, Renate sighed inwardly. It was true that the princess, who maintained an immaculately composed face before everyone else, showed at least a somewhat honest side to her... but to shoot her such an openly accusing look—
Why are you interrupting when things were just getting good?
—it practically said as much. Renate forced herself to look away from that gaze and got to the point.
"W-well, as you're aware, there's an important meeting this morning, is there not? So I believe you should hurry and eat your breakfast."
"Ah, you're right. Goodness, where is my head..."
"Haah..."
"Renate?"
"No, it's nothing. Shall we head to the garden dining hall? You did say you wished to eat there rather than in your chambers. And that also..."
As Renate was about to add with Logan, Anastasia hastily cut her off. "Yes, yes, I got it! Renate! I said I was sorry, so stop right there!"
"I hardly see how Your Highness did anything wrong. I would never dare to—"
"I got it! I said I got it! Let's hurry to the garden!"
Anastasia's face had turned bright red. She'd assumed Renate was the one person incapable of sulking or holding grudges—yet here she was, teasing her with a prank the likes of which she'd never once pulled in her life.
"Come on, Logan, let's all go together!"
"...Yes, understood, Anya."
"You just laughed, didn't you?"
"No, I didn't. Pfft."
"See! You laughed!"
"I apologize. I—hah..."
"Oh, fine, I get it! I won't hold it against you! Both of you—it was my fault! There, happy?!"
And so the three of them made their way to the garden in high spirits, warm and cheerful from the earliest hours of the morning. Many across the land were racking their brains over the shifting political landscape after the Demon King Subjugation and the work of postwar reconstruction—but at least in this moment, these three leaned on one another and shared in a warm, gentle time.
Perhaps this small peace and happiness was, in truth, the most precious spoils of all—the reward they had fought so bitterly and so hard to win.