🌷 🌷 🌷
“HUFF, huff… I can’t do this. I want to go home!”
“You’re the one who wanted to come here in the first place, Ophie!”
Ophelia’s older brother, Bernard, set her down on a bench in the vacant courtyard they’d fled to, and she slumped limply in her seat. She let her arms and legs droop and leaned back to rest her head atop the bench’s backrest, heaving a sigh as she attempted to get her breathing under control.
“Well, yeah! That’s because I heard it was the first ball Duke Stolarni would attend with his fiancée, Lady Stella. I just wanted to get close enough to be able to say I’d breathed the same air as them. I didn’t plan to stay long in the first place!”
“I told you that you wouldn’t be able to handle coming to a place this crowded.”
“Yes, I realize now how foolish I was. I won’t ever come to an event like this again!”
“Let’s go home once you’ve calmed down a bit. At least you achieved your goal of seeing the duke and Lady Stella up close.”
“…I never imagined when I heard about their engagement that they would be like that.”
“Well, yeah, a lot of marriages between nobles are like that; it’s just how things are… But I guess that has nothing to do with us. Do you think you can walk now, Ophie?”
“Yeah, thanks, Bernard.”
“You’re welcome. I’m used to it by now.”
Only the sound of leaves rustling disrupted the silence as a passing breeze made the trees sway gently back and forth as if dancing. Through the brightly lit window, ladies and gentlemen could be seen within the ballroom laughing and chatting together. Outside, brother and sister made their way through the dark garden, carefully minding their footing.
“I greatly prefer watching from out here,” Ophelia said, breaking the silence.
“If I could, I’d rather stay out here too.”
A simple flowerbed was tucked into a sliver of empty space in front of an open-air corridor elevated slightly above ground level, a good distance away from the ballroom. It appeared that the gardeners had planted some kind of short-stemmed flowers in an evenly spaced pattern in this unused space, but the dim lighting made it hard to see.
“Ahh!”
Ophelia crouched down to try to determine what color the flowers were, but her knees suddenly buckled, and she tumbled face-first into the flowerbed.
“Ophie?!”
Bernard reacted immediately to his sister’s scream, hurrying to her side.
Ophelia only had a moment to reflect on her good fortune in just barely avoiding crushing any of the flowers. She really wanted to brush away the dirt that had gotten all over her hands when she instinctively threw her arms out to break her fall, but her legs had begun shaking again, so badly this time that she couldn’t even climb to her feet. If she was shaking so badly that she couldn’t stand, it could only mean that something wrong was nearby.
“Here, Ophie, hold on to me.”
Unconcerned about getting dirt on his clothing, Bernard scooped Ophelia up from behind and helped her to stand.
Once she was stable on her feet, Ophelia turned to gaze up at the open-air corridor.
“Bernard, there’s something up there, I’m sure of it.”
“So it would seem. Let’s get out of here quickly.”
“No, wait! We can’t just leave like this.”
“…It’s fine. This is the Royal Palace, after all. I’m sure someone will…”
“No! I already know about it now. I can’t just leave knowing someone might get hurt…”
Ophelia grabbed onto Bernard’s jacket with both hands, desperately attempting to persuade him even as her knees wobbled. Her deep brown eyes were brimming with tears, threatening to overflow. Seeing that, Bernard’s eyebrows drew together, and he let out a defeated sigh.
“Okay, fine… Let’s go take a look.”
“I’m sorry, Bernard…”
Somehow Ophelia managed to take a step forward and hobbled back across the courtyard on trembling legs, holding onto Bernard’s arm for support.
Bernard’s shoulders drooped as he reluctantly pointed out, “I have a feeling that area is probably off limits… What are we going to do if someone catches us?”
“The usual—pretend to be lost.”
The two spoke in hushed whispers, their faces pressed close together so they could hear each other. Although there were no signs of other guests in the courtyard, guards were certain to be somewhere.
The siblings returned to the terrace from which they’d initially exited into the courtyard and entered the building through the door there. They stepped into a wide hallway that, to the left, led back into the ballroom and, to the right, continued toward the open-air corridor from earlier.
“There’s a break room set up for ball guests just before the open-air corridor. Let’s pretend we were trying to go there and got lost,” Bernard whispered, and Ophelia nodded.
“Oh, I was right. This is it, Bernard.”
“So it would seem.”
As they approached the open-air corridor, Ophelia’s hands began trembling as well. A moment later, they reached the corridor entrance and stopped to look around.
“There’s no doubt about it, this is the place… B-But where…?” Ophelia asked, her legs shaking so badly by this point that she was essentially hanging off of Bernard.
Bernard wrapped the arm Ophelia was clutching around her waist to prevent her from falling and narrowed his eyes as he searched the dimly lit area.
“Over there.”
“B-Bernard…!”
Bernard’s gaze fixated on a point a few steps ahead, at the closer end of the corridor, and Ophelia looked up at him beseechingly.
“I will make the arrangements first thing tomorrow for it to be repaired.”
“N-N-No, tomorrow’s not soon enough!”
The tremors wracking her body had rendered her hands almost unusable, but Ophelia forced power into them and tugged on her brother’s sleeve.
“As things stand, it’s already far too late. It’s already at its limit. I’m absolutely, positively sure, someone’s going to be injured soon.”
“Sigh… Not again… Fine, fine. I’ll go now…”
Ophelia released her brother and found a nearby pillar to cling to in his place, then called out words of encouragement to him, “P-Please, Bernard… Be careful!”
Bernard held onto the railing and slowly made his way out onto the open-air corridor, taking one ginger step at a time in a partially stooped position. He stopped when he got to the area that he’d been staring at suspiciously earlier. Ever so cautiously, he stepped forward with one leg, and the moment he transferred his entire body weight onto that leg, an alarming CRACK! cut through the quiet night.
“Oh, Bernard…!”
“Oops-a-daisy! Yup, this is the spot. Whoa!”
The board he’d stepped on was rotted through. It broke, making a much louder noise than one might expect based on the size of the hole. Since he’d anticipated it, he should’ve been able to pull his leg back in time, but Bernard moved just a bit slower than other people. As a result, his leg was sucked into the hole in the floor.
The moment Ophelia spotted the hole, her body stopped shaking, and she raced over to her brother’s side.
“Bernard! Are you okay?”
“Ow, ow, ow! Yeah, I’m fine. It’s probably just a few scrapes.”
“In that case, wait just a minute. I’ll call for help!”
With that, Ophelia sucked in a deep breath and screamed at the top of her lungs.
“Ahhh! Bernard! Oh, my brother! Somebody, anybody, heeelp!”
Not a moment later, heavy footsteps ran toward the pair, and a moment after that, two guards appeared. The guards pulled Bernard’s leg out of the hole and sat him down on the floor. Ophelia crouched down beside him.
“It seems the floor was rotted out. Are you injured anywhere, sir?” asked the guard who’d been examining Bernard’s leg.
“I’m fine. Please place something here to prevent anyone from falling in.”
“This passageway is only used by the servants. Forgive me, but what were you doing here?”
“My sister was feeling unwell, so I wanted to bring her to the break room, but I’m afraid we’re not very familiar with the Royal Palace and got a bit lost… Once I realized we’d gone too far and tried to turn around, the floor gave out and, well, you can see the result…”
As she sat silently listening to Bernard speak, Ophelia’s hands trembled. She clung to her brother’s back to hide her hands, but it also seemed to convince the guard questioning Bernard that he was telling the truth.
“Can you walk? I’ll show you to the infirmary,” the guard offered.
“That won’t be necessary; it’s merely a few scratches. Besides, my clothes have gotten dirty, and it would be terribly embarrassing for anyone to see me like this, so I’d like to return home right away. If you’d please lead the way to the carriage depot?”
“As you wish.”
The guards helped Bernard and Ophelia to their feet, and once the two of them had brushed the worst of the dirt from their clothing, the entire group set off in the direction of the carriage depot.