Be Careful What You Wish For
I reached out and parted the curtain beside the window just enough to peer outside.
A crowd of people knelt before the main gates of the Lilac Palace, wailing at the top of their lungs.
Every single face was familiar. They were the maids of the Rose Palace—with the sole exception of Head Maid Natalie.
“Your Imperial Majesty!”
“Please, we beg of you, just tell us whether Her Imperial Highness Princess Titania is dead or alive!”
“How could lowly wretches who failed to protect their master dare wish to preserve our own lives? Before we die, all we ask is to know Her Highness’s condition…!”
Good grief, look at that acting talent…
It looked just like a scene straight out of a historical drama, where the ministers dropped to their knees before the king, bellowing, “Pleease have mercy, Your Maaaajesty!”
Though they certainly had been employed at the Rose Palace, they had brought along maids whose faces I could hardly recall seeing more than two or three times. Every last one of them made a grand show of their dirt-smeared, stained, and hopelessly wrinkled aprons and cuffs. Smeared with soot or ash around their swollen eyes, their hair wildly disheveled as they howled in sorrow, they looked for all the world like refugees fleeing a disaster zone.
Well… they were running from the natural disaster known as Consort Cleo, so perhaps the comparison wasn't entirely wrong.
Having undoubtedly guessed both their instigator and their true objective, Prince Adrian wore a wry, bitter smile. I simply shrugged.
“This must put Her Majesty the Empress in quite an awkward position.”
“……”
“If she drives them away on the grounds that my life hangs in the balance, she’ll be called cruel for casting out underlings who merely worry for their young master. But the moment she carelessly announces that barring the gates is my own doing, keeping the palace sealed off becomes impossible.”
How insolent, dismissive, and utterly negligent they had been in their daily duties was of little help here. In the end, my life had been in jeopardy, and holding those faults against ‘loyal’ servants who came rushing out of concern would only make the Empress appear shockingly petty.
This entire scheme bore Consort Cleo’s signature. Whatever the case, their real aim was to prod and poke. Regardless of the Empress's response, simply forcing an outcome was a victory for Cleo. After all, the Empress was currently the one responsible for me.
Right. Had I forgotten what kind of place the Imperial Palace was? Of course not. I knew better than anyone.
I revisited my thoughts with fresh perspective. Adrian spoke calmly.
“What would you have me do?”
This was the price the Empress had to pay for permitting me to lie in her palace—simply for turning a blind eye so the Castrein family could treat me in safety. Cleo was trying to inflict damage on either her dignity or her honor as Empress.
Whichever way it fell, it was a debt I owed. Which meant I had to find a way to resolve it.
“Have you uncovered all of Consort Cleo’s spies hiding within the Empress’s Palace?”
“Yes. At the very least, none of them can set foot anywhere near your chambers.”
“Even so, we can’t completely conceal the fact that members of the Castrein Duchy have been coming and going. The maids are pulling this stunt right now because they know no one currently here has the standing to drive them off.”
The Castrein family, having gained their ‘benefactor,’ had nothing to fear. They wouldn't hesitate to bark, ‘The patient needs rest! You’re too loud! Get lost!’ and drag them all away by their collars, fully prepared to face any friction with the imperial family. That was precisely why the maids had timed their theatrics for when the Castreins were absent.
If the Empress’s Palace took it upon itself to drag them away, malicious whispers would spread: ‘What are they doing to Princess Titania behind closed doors that even her personal attendants aren’t allowed to see her?’
We couldn't lay a hand on them directly.
We couldn't cast them out without proper justification, either. Yet letting them inside the palace was out of the question.
“Let’s say my breath is still hanging by a thread.”
“Will they believe that?”
“Whether they believe it or not, what can they possibly do? The High Priest will vouch for it.”
Remembering the High Priest lying limp as boiled greens in the adjacent room, Adrian looked at me with widening eyes. Could she mean…?
Indeed. The alpha and the omega of this entire plan was the High Priest himself.
He was a dignitary personally summoned by the Castrein family, meaning he would never bow to pressure from the imperial court. Entrusting him with a modest side gig like this would be perfectly fine.
“……”
“If they are so consumed with worry for my well-being that they can neither eat nor sleep…”
A wicked, merry grin stretched across my lips.
I would grant them the privilege of living a life where their deeds matched their words. I’d teach them what it truly meant to be careful what you wish for!
Honestly, had they simply stayed quiet, they would have been safe enough. But since they had swarmed here to cause an uproar just to save their own hides while someone was on the brink of death, without a shred of remorse, they had better be ready to bear the consequences.
Oh, absolutely.
Eat dirt!
Eat your fill until your bellies burst!
“…Then surely they will voluntarily undertake an ascetic penance worthy of the saints and pray for me? Most devoutly, just to prove the purity of their loyal devotion. Perhaps right beside the Empress’s Palace?”
“……!”
“Since the High Priest is already here, let’s ask him to oversee a temporary ‘Prayer Vigil for My Swift Recovery’ right alongside the Empress’s Palace. People will come and go around the clock, witnessing firsthand their burning affection for their true master. And naturally, it must carry on without a single moment of rest until I, their master, awaken.”
Reflected in Adrian’s stunned eyes, I smiled like an angel.
Mary felt as though she were on the verge of death.
H-How on earth did things turn out like this?
Consort Cleo had promised, so very clearly, that this would be nothing!
She had assured them that the Empress’s Palace had nothing to gain from letting the commotion drag out, so planting themselves there for two or three hours at most would settle the matter. They would most likely be driven off on charges of disturbing the peace outside the Empress's residence. The chances of being let inside to see Titania were slim, but if that miraculously happened, they merely had to cling to her, weeping over how worried they had been. And if they were chased away, they were to wander the palace grounds shedding sorrowful tears, spreading rumors while making an ostentatious display of their loyalty.
Cleo said that building such a reputation beforehand was the only way they would survive when the Emperor eventually sought to punish the ‘incompetent servants who failed to notice an incident befalling the princess within the imperial palace.’
She had insisted this was for their own good. Even if Titania did wake up, she was a wretched little girl starving for affection; if they made such a tearful show of their worry, she would surely soften and forgive them.
No matter how they weighed it, the logic had seemed sound. That was why they had banded together, desperate to find an escape route, and wailed before the gates of the Empress's palace. Drowned in tears and sorrowful cries of ‘Lady Titania! Your Imperial Highness, are you safe?’ they had made sure anyone passing by would feel sympathy for them.
And yet…
“Your utter devotion is required for the sake of Her Imperial Highness Princess Titania.”
Why? Why, in the sweltering heat of midsummer, were they swathed from head to toe in thick, stifling robes of coarse cloth? Starving day and night… forced to recite prayers under the stern direction of a priest?
“Ahem! You there, are your eyelids drooping already?!”
“……!”
An ascetic vigil? She had heard tales of devout believers enduring such trials in temples on behalf of sick kin. But this was the imperial court! It wasn't a temple! Why, in the heavens’ name, were they being subjected to this…?!
“Did you not swear you would gladly surrender your very lives for Her Highness Princess Titania’s recovery?! Was your loyalty so brittle that it shatters before mere physical hardship?!”
Beside Mary, Roland began trembling violently, unable to utter a single protest as she hastily straightened her posture.
Whenever someone looked ready to doze off, a bucket of cold water was dashed over their head. Whenever someone's back gave out and their posture crumpled, a slender switch came whistling down against the soles of their feet.
It was literal torture!
They claimed the vigil had to continue until Princess Titania regained consciousness, but how were they supposed to know when that would be?!
Two full days had already passed with nothing to sustain them except meager sips of water and a pinch of salt. Mary's vision spun dizzily.
Gritting her teeth, she forced out a weak, raspy voice. She couldn't endure another second!
“E-Excuse me, Priest…”
At first, the High Priest himself had issued the commands, but starting the following day, a stern-faced priest newly dispatched from the temple had taken over supervision. He looked so unyielding that a needle couldn't draw a single drop of blood from him, but surely a priest of the divine had mercy! If a person said they couldn't go on, he had to listen…
“I, the truth is, um…”
“No mortal hardship compares to death.”
The priest offered a profoundly benevolent smile.
“If you lose your resolve over something so insignificant while beseeching the heavens for your master's life… such shallow, worldly prayers might bring a curse upon Her Highness Princess Titania rather than a blessing.”
“……”
Mary swallowed dryly.
Only then did a cold, suffocating dread seize her entirely.
Ah. That was it. We should never have stepped foot into this mess to begin with.
Had they never started, it would have been one thing. But having launched this vigil before the eyes of the entire court, quitting on the grounds that it was ‘too hard’ was equivalent to committing high treason by publicly insulting the dying princess!
Unless they genuinely wished to be executed on the spot, they had no choice.
N-No, there’s no way… They wouldn't really starve this many people and keep us awake until she opens her eyes… would they…?
Yet how long would they have to endure this torment?
What if they kept it going endlessly, feeding them just enough crusts of bread and water to keep their hearts beating…?
“Come now, let us resume our prayers.”
The priest delivered the sentence with unfaltering benevolence.
“For the swift recovery of Her Imperial Highness Princess Titania.”
Mary stared into the looming abyss of a living hell.
And deep down, she knew that by her own power, she would never escape.