“The problem is,” expressed Dino, “that Nina might mention this to someone. She might have mentioned that she received a valuable bottle, blue with gold lines in it. Many nobles will immediately make the connection to you with just that description. You’re fairly famous after all, the duke’s son secluded in a tower.”
“I see you can put more than just ladies in a tower,” joked Edmund, feeling a little frustrated, but it was true that he rarely made appearances at social events or even at the academy. You could argue that the metaphor suited him more than it did most real princesses, actually.
“Anyway,” continued Dino, “my point is, you know what this bottle means. And even though you know that, you still gave it to Nina. If that’s not a sign of your feelings for her, then what is it?”
“I was just giving her medicine because she caught a cold.”
“If that were the case, you didn’t have to put it in this bottle.”
That might be true, but the bottle was ideal for storing medicine, so it didn’t degrade. It didn’t seem all that odd to Edmund that he would give Nina the bottle.
“I’m guessing it was Nina that called me a prince, like you said earlier?” asked Dino.
“Good guess,” Edmund admitted surprisedly, and Dino grinned.
“When you said that, you looked very obviously jealous.”
“J-Jealous?!” Edmund jerked to a sitting-up position before he could stop himself, then sank back into bed as the vertigo hit him.
As he got his ragged breathing back under control, Dino looked at him with wide eyes. “You really have no idea how you feel, do you?”
“I’m telling you, I don’t…” he stammered. Nina was important to him as the heroine, which he needed to improve his constitution. She was nothing more or less to him than that.
He did admit that she was cute, and she sometimes did wild things that sent his heart racing, but that was because she was dealing with a cat. Nina wasn’t even aware of Edmund the human; he couldn’t possibly have strong feelings for her either way.
Dino narrowed his ochre eyes and declared, “If you insist you don’t have feelings for her, then you won’t mind if I court her, yeah?”
Edmund’s eyes snapped open wide, and he dragged himself upright when he saw Dino’s flirtatious smile. “You can’t!” he shouted.
With this contract with the god, Dino was going to end up with Clarissa—end of story. Edmund wasn’t sure how Nina felt about Dino, but he couldn’t stand by and watch her start a relationship he knew was doomed to fail.
He fought against his whirling head to glare at Dino, only to finally see Dino’s lips curled up in an amused smile, which then escalated into a burst of laughter.
“…Dino?”
While he couldn’t figure out what was happening, Dino was literally clutching at his sides, convulsing with laughter. Edmund waited, not knowing what to do. Eventually, Dino’s fit passed, and he looked at Edmund with tears in his eyes.
“Sorry, sorry. That was just the best reaction ever. Couldn’t hold it in,” he admitted between gasps, making a motion with his hand that Edmund interpreted as him trying to get Edmund to lie back down.
He rested his head on the pillow, still feeling light-headed because he’d pushed himself a little too hard, but that wasn’t important right now.
“You didn’t like the idea of me going after Nina, did you?” Dino inquired.
“What I meant by you can’t is that, considering the contract, that relationship would only end unhappily, and I wanted to stop that.”
“Meaning, it’s fine if it’s after the contract is over?”
The god’s contract was absolute. But it might not influence anything once the contract was finished.
“Dino… Are you saying you like Nina?” asked Edmund, his voice quivering.
“If I had to pick between like and not like, yeah, I’d say I like her.” Dino’s response was so immediate that it made Edmund’s heart ache.
The restraints were off once the contract was over—Edmund had no right to stop him then. He told himself that, but his heart felt heavy, like it was sinking into the depths of a murky bog.
“When I say I like her, I don’t mean romantically, as someone of the opposite sex,” Dino clarified. “She’s kind of like my comrade. My comrade in rice.”
“O-Oh.”
Dino had no romantic feelings for her? It was incredible how much lighter Edmund’s heart and body felt when he heard that. He was a little curious about Dino’s choice of vocabulary at the end, but he was going to pretend he didn’t hear that for the moment.
He let out a long sigh, and Dino gave a little troubled smile.
“It’s as clear as day… Well, you just come to terms with it on your own.” The prince stood up and waved goodbye.
Edmund let out another long sigh as he watched Dino leave. “I…like Nina?”
She was cute. He would admit he had positive feelings when he saw how hard she worked for her mother and how seriously she devoted herself to the heroine role.
He wasn’t Dino, but if he had to choose whether he liked Nina or not, he would absolutely say he liked her.
“But I’m a cat, and she’s a heroine,” he articulated.
From her perspective, Edmund was Ed, the white cat working for a god. They’d have no reason to interact once the contract was over, and she would go the rest of her life, never even knowing the human named Edmund Zelati existed. Even if she did learn about him, a commoner and the son of a duke couldn’t very well interact as friends. There was something sad, even frustrating, about that truth.
It did feel nice to be loved on like a stuffed animal—it had its perks—but he also felt like it wasn’t quite enough, which made things difficult for him.
He still wasn’t entirely sure what it was he felt, but his highest priority at the moment was fulfilling his duty as the god’s messenger. Then, if he got the opportunity, he might try appearing before her as a human.
Would she be surprised when she saw his true form? Angry? Or maybe…would she find it to her liking?
Edmund’s eyes slowly closed as he thought about a future yet to come.