AFTER they went over all the fine details, the meeting concluded, and the members of the Security Bureau left with a clatter of footsteps. The office then fell silent.
Was it fine for them to allow the Security Bureau to investigate Cesia’s past? Chris, Marcus’s butler, wondered. He knew Cesia’s past, and while he was confident that there were no records of her having illicitly attended the Royal Academy in her cousin Selene’s place, there was no such thing as a safe bet. From how they were acting, they’ll frantically search for anything they can get their hands on. Chris felt a touch of uneasiness and then got irritated at himself. He didn’t have time to worry about that right now.
“Your Royal Highness, shouldn’t we also search for Cesia ourselves?” Keith asked.
Before Marcus could respond, Layne said, “We can’t afford to neglect to monitor Princess Juliette. The fact that she tricked Cesia, who was observing her, is itself evidence that she’s linked with the criminal syndicate. The only problem is that we don’t know how she did it.”
Felix and Roy, both close with Cesia, frowned at Layne’s severe response. Still, he wasn’t entirely wrong that it would be a waste of resources to expend personnel looking for Cesia when the Security Bureau was already searching for her. Even if the Second Division found her first, they would still have to make her turn herself in so she could explain the situation.
A heavy silence fell again. Then, there was a knock on the door. Their office was a document storage room half-heartedly turned into a workspace with the placement of desks and dividing walls in one corner of the room, so visitors were rare. As a faint nervousness spread among the members present, Roy opened the door.
When everyone saw the face of a certain unexpected visitor poke their head into the room, they widened their eyes, surprised.
“May,” Marcus said quietly.
She was wearing a plain dress, but her fiery red hair immediately caught their eyes. She was Second Princess Mavis, Marcus’s younger sister. She stood in the doorway holding something wrapped in cloth. “Marcus, I have something to talk to you about,” she said.
“Did you come all the way out here alone?” Marcus asked, prompting her to enter the office.
As a document storage room, the Second Division was in the corner of the castle. Marcus didn’t even want to consider the possibility that there might be someone in the castle who wished to harm Mavis, but many foreign visitors were staying there, to say nothing of the present state of emergency. Her coming alone was dangerous.
“Marcus. Even I know that something awful is going on in the castle right now,” Mavis said, looking straight up at her older brother. Then, she held out the bundle she was holding.
Chris took it momentarily, then unwrapped it for everyone to see, revealing an everyday, normal teapot inside. They all cocked their heads, puzzled.
Layne reached out to touch the teapot, saying, “Your Royal Highness, just what—”
“Don’t touch it!” Mavis shouted in a shrill voice, and Layne’s hand froze.
Marcus suddenly understood what it was. “Is this the teapot from when Princess Juliette was attacked?” he asked Mavis.
“Yes, it is,” she said, nodding. There was a serious look on her face.
“Didn’t it break?” Keith asked, surprised.
Mavis shook her head. “Before Cesia jumped from the balcony, she cast a rewind spell,” she explained, a gloomy, princesslike expression on her face. “I know it’s high-level magic, but being able to activate it within the drawing room because it was cast from the outside is quite a hole in our security.”
“Even so, you did well in taking it away, ma’am. It must have roused suspicion when shards of the teapot went missing,” Layne said.
Mavis apologetically lowered her gaze. “I pulled off the tablecloth, letting the matching teacups fall and break on the floor… When the whole truth comes out, I’ll make sure I undergo a punishment for hindering the investigation.”
“Your Royal Highness…” Layne said.
No reproach was in anyone’s eyes, but they were all wondering why the princess had done so much. If the guards had found the unbroken pot, they would’ve passed it along to the head of the investigation. There was no reason for her to have taken the teapot herself.
Mavis fixed her gaze on the still-silent Marcus. “I want to know the truth, Marcus.”
“Even if it hurts you?” he replied. He spoke with suppressed anger and squinted, upset and frustrated that his sister might be hurt.
However, Mavis resolutely nodded. “I’m a princess of this country. I have a duty to know what is happening.” With her small, elegant hand, Mavis grabbed Marcus’s hand. This small hand—he had always thought that, as her older brother, it was his duty to protect her. Now, though, he was astonished by her strength. “I’ll be fine. I’m stronger now because you’ve cherished and protected me all this time,” she said.
Her hand was warm. Marcus gazed into her eyes and made a decision. “Roy, find me any prints.”
Roy instantly stepped forward. “Yes, sir.”
Roy was extraordinarily talented in magic, and Marcus had recruited him, just as he had Cesia. Roy’s small build made him look unprepared for a physical fight, but his position in the Second Division showed how much stock Marcus placed in his magical aptitude.