That being said, I still could not bring myself to look him in the eyes, and my conversational replies amounted almost entirely to variations of “Yes,” “Is that so,” and “I see.” It’s true that I wanted nothing more than to throw myself at his feet, but I had much bigger, more pressing concerns: namely, my current circumstances and the fact that my actions were going to bring shame upon both Reinald and Margrave Rodenwald. That said, I had no intentions of giving up on what I wanted either, which made looking at Reinald all the more difficult.
All I could do was apologize internally for the fact that he would soon be known as a man whose fiancée ran out on him.
“Miss Karen, are you feeling unwell?” Reinald asked. “Your mind appears to be elsewhere.”
“Oh, erm, yes, I apologize. So much has happened of late, and it has left me rather exhausted.”
Since my return to the Kirsten family, life had actually been easy and casual, but that was neither here nor there. In the end, we shared little in the way of meaningful conversation, making our private rendezvous anything but interesting.
Gerda must have sent word to my family in advance, because my father and brother were ready and waiting for us upon our arrival. They introduced themselves to Reinald. At a glance, I could tell that while Arno maintained his composure valiantly, there was a raging storm within his person.
“Sir Reinald,” I said, bowing respectfully when it was time to part. “I apologize for offering little in the way of conversation even though you were so gracious as to escort me home.”
“Think nothing of it,” he replied. “There will still be many chances yet for us to better get to know one another.”
Ordinarily, yes. Ordinarily.
“My apologies...” I uttered.
And so we bid farewell to my beautiful (if ultimately temporary) fiancé and his terrifying guards. Arno flashed me a hopeful look, as if asking “How’d it go?” but I had nothing to tell him. I went straight to my room and took my pen in hand immediately. I knew now that if I sat back and did nothing, then my temporary fiancé would soon become my actual husband.
And that is trouble for me. Big trouble.
I moved swiftly. Once my letter was written, I put it in an envelope along with one of the earrings Gerda had given me and addressed it to the concerned party. I prepared a few things, then went out into the garden to see the flowers at sunrise. I told the staff I was taking a brief stroll, but it was actually something more akin to a race against the clock. I took a ladder from the garden shed and used it to scale the fence around our property. I twisted my ankle climbing down the other side, but I didn’t have time to complain; I jumped into the nearest hansom cab, and headed straight for the only person I could trust.
“What?!” cried Ernesta. “No! I don’t want to be a part of this!”
“Then tell them I tricked you! You can tell them straightaway, but please! I beg of you!”
I begged Ernesta for a small sum of money, and with it I headed for the outskirts of the capital, to the abode of my maternal grandparents. Naturally, they were shocked to see me. But if Gerda had been telling the truth, I knew that they would want to help me. I clung to my grandmother with tears in my eyes and I begged her to help me. It was like a scene straight out of a famous manga.
In this way, the first hurdle was cleared.
“I simply cannot marry that person,” I said. “I will wed the frontier margrave!”
My grandparents could not hide their surprise at the fact that their granddaughter had chosen a sixty-year-old man over a literal Adonis, but my grandmother sympathized with the idea that Reinald was simply far too beautiful a specimen. My grandfather was less convinced, but being that this request came from the grandchild he felt they had neglected, he too acquiesced. My grandparents sent word to my family.
That was the second hurdle cleared.
That left only the letter I had prepared at the very beginning of this plan of mine. The letter had gone to the sixty-year-old margrave, and its contents said that all the preparations for our marriage were complete. The addition of my sister’s earring was to indicate that Lady Saburova herself had given her consent. In essence, I had Gerda trapped in a fait accompli. Admittedly, it pains me to admit as such in writing.
I must say, when I look back on these times in my life, I think it a miracle that I wasn’t promptly beheaded for my actions.
A reply then arrived from the margrave, which sent the Kirstens into a panic. They did their best to scold me once they understood what was going on, but I remained steadfast in my decision to leave for the frontier. The Kirsten family was indebted to the margrave and could not simply refuse or cancel the marriage, so it was thus made definitive.
Mission accomplished.
That said, the idea of returning to the Kirsten home was now terrifying for any number of reasons. I assumed that the house and its gardens at sunrise were the last I would ever see of the place.
My grandmother saw my grandfather and me off with something of an awkward smile, and I returned it with a beaming, satisfied smile of my own. I was off to the countryside to get married to the Margrave of Conrad. At sixteen years of age, I was to become the wife of Kamil of the Conrad region.
When I arrived, he welcomed me with a smile.
“Welcome, Miss Karen,” he said. “I am grateful for you coming all this way.”
“Margrave Conrad, it is a pleasure to meet you,” I replied.
Everyone who was there, including the servants, could not hide their confusion. Which I suppose was only natural. It was unheard of for a daughter of the nobility to willingly, of their own volition, choose to move to the countryside.
So, why would a sixteen-year-old girl choose a man over sixty (sixty-three, to be exact) as her husband? I’d be lying if I said that it wasn’t, in some small way, an act of rebellion against the Kirstens. But I wouldn’t dare give away my whole life for such a trivial act of revenge. My reasoning was simple at heart—it was all about my ultimate life goal. And while I did feel a touch bad about it, as soon as my grandpa hubby died, I intended to leave the country. That was what had driven me to my choice.
At the age of fourteen, I had been forgotten by my mother and banished by the people I called my family. Could anyone have guessed that everything that happened after I was brought back was, in fact, just the tutorial section of it all?
For you see, it is here where the curtains were raised on a life filled to the brim with ups, downs, and all manner of trouble.