Maybe I just misheard that.
“Might you repeat what you just said?” I asked, just in case.
“Yes, Princess!” the guard barked clearly, his hands clasped behind his back. “Hugh Roberts was relocated—he is no longer in the underground cell.”
Huh…?
He’s not here…?
I froze behind Blackfeather, which was open in front of my face.
The morning after Hugh was arrested for plotting an assassination, I went to the underground dungeon to visit him.
And looking back, I was hella fired up about it! Thanks to me chanting “I’m seeing Hugh first thing tomorrow!” as I fell asleep, my eyes shot wide open this morning!
But though my own feelings were quite clear to me, I was still completely in the dark about how Hugh was being treated. Rather, his future looked anything but bright to me.
What hurts the most, though…has gotta be the fact that Hugh really was guilty.
On that fact alone, it would be impossible to avoid a guilty verdict. The only angle I thought might work was Hugh’s motive. Like, “Your Honor, it was totally a deceive-your-enemy-by-deceiving-your-friend scenario orchestrated by Prince Sirius!”
There was Sil’s runaway carriage before the junior ball. Then there was the attack on me and Sirius during our survey of the castle town—though the real target of that was also Sil.
Everything was connected, and Sirius’s secret command to Hugh was the root of it all.
His command had been, “If I try to take a same-sex partner like the former kings, stop me.”
All of Hugh’s actions were an effort to carry out that edict.
And yet Sirius doesn’t remember giving that command. That’s the crux of it.
It was the main reason I figured Sirius wouldn’t be able to get Hugh pardoned for his crimes. Though if he actually remembered giving the order, things could change…
No, wait a minute… Nothing’s set in stone yet.
I didn’t know how Sirius kept his cool when he visited Hugh and learned his true motives.
I could only imagine.
As somebody who’s lived sixteen years as a princess (in a manner of speaking), I didn’t feel right keeping Hugh’s motive secret…but I knew I couldn’t just take the direct approach and unilaterally let him go free.
There’s nothing I can do… I just have to accept it… When I returned to my room from the dungeon, I was leaning more toward defeat.
However!
Even if he was just convicted as a mastermind…and even if Hugh accepted his fate—hoped for it, even—it still felt like it was wrong for him to be executed, you know?!
He may be cool with it, but I’m not!
I know what’s done is done. And Hugh can’t take back what he did.
But what about the future?
Isn’t there anything I can do for him?
So anyway, after tossing and turning and agonizing over all that last night, I had an epiphany!
The first step was a “deceive-your-enemy-by-deceiving-your-friend scenario orchestrated by Prince Sirius” defense.
Then, what if you replaced “orchestrated by Prince Sirius” with “orchestrated by Princess Octavia”? That’s how I reached my epiphany!
Hugh was only obeying orders from his superior and everything was a strategy to bring the anti-royalist traitors in the castle out of hiding!
I could use the latter for Hugh’s motive. Parts of our stories lined up, so it wouldn’t be a total lie. Also, if you think about it, with Sil as the target, if the order came from me (a third party) instead of my brother, the whole story would sound more natural.
Sil and my brother were lovers, and I was the little princess who disapproved of their union. Going with the “deceive-your-enemy-by-deceiving-your-friend scenario orchestrated by Princess Octavia” defense, this would paint a picture in which disregarding the potential harm to Sil wouldn’t be weird at all.
A truly riveting plot.
I had faith in my fabrication!
But I had to stop and take a breath.
Because I knew where this could lead.
I knew the dangers of hyped-up late-night brainstorming sessions…
There’s always the possibility that when you wake up, you go, “That idea is crap! There’s gotta be a better way!” so you always give it another mulling over first thing in the morning!
With that resolve burning in my heart, I fell soundly asleep that night. Then when I jolted awake the next morning, I mulled it over again for a good fifteen minutes.
And as luck would have it, my plan didn’t need to change.
So I was off to the dungeon!
After getting myself ready at supersonic speed, Klifford came to my room for his morning rounds, and I flew out of there. Hugh first, breakfast later!
I mean, as solid as my strategy was, I still had the minor issue of getting Hugh’s cooperation! (He’d probably need some convincing!)
So that’s how I found myself in a spirited charge toward the dungeon for the third time…
Hmmm.
“……”
I gave the guards posted at the dungeon entrance another glance. Though it was a different lineup from the day before, there were still three of them. One was the guard I had used as an intermediary to get a message to Sirius. He was in his late twenties and had shiny brown hair. I recognized him, given that I had just seen him the night before.
He was also the man who answered my question at the beginning of this chapter.
I closed Blackfeather. Then I asked again, just to make sure. “Hugh Roberts…was he relocated last night?”
I had arrived at the dungeon entrance brimming with enthusiasm. Everything was going perfectly until that point.
But just after I arrived, that’s the news I received. Hugh—the man my strategy was hinging on—wasn’t there!
“Yes, Princess! I was present when he was relocated,” the brunette guard answered crisply with a bow.
I guess it should have been obvious to me, but asking the same question multiple times will yield the same answer.