“Huh? Roche is that tiny dragon?! There’s no way.”
“It’s the truth.”
I picked up Van and approached the tiny red dragon, but it scurried away into the door’s shadow.
“Oh my, this dragon’s so cute!”
“L-Lady Dragon Duchess consort... Please have mercy on me!” Roche curled up into a ball to hide himself, but it only served to make him look more adorable.
“Come closer and talk with me.” I beckoned him.
“I-I-I must not set foot in the Dragon Duchess consort’s private quarters!” Roche stammered.
“I’m not the Dragon Duchess consort today. I am just another attendant,” I said.
“Well, it would be rude to enter the room of a lady, even if it is that of an attendant!”
Seeing Roche be this modest and reserved made the brash and belligerent Roche who had previously bickered with me feel like a distant and nostalgic memory.
While I was impressed with his upright character, his staying outside in this freezing weather might’ve ended up with him catching something more life-threatening than the common cold. Van resorted to a rough and violent method to deal with this—he carried the balled-up Roche and threw him into the room. After that, he picked Roche up once more and tossed him onto a nearby chair.
“I didn’t want to be seen like this by the Dragon Duke and Dragon Duchess consort...” Roche lamented.
“Oh, but it suits you very well,” I said.
“I think you look even better than you usually do,” Van added.
“H-How could this be...?”
Van and I were doting on the tiny Roche when we heard an energetic knock on the door. Before I could even say anything in response, the door burst open.
“Millefie! Are you well?!”
Lady Opera barged into the room. She brought with her a cart with a bowl of soup on top. Van, who had been sitting on my lap, looked shocked at the unexpected arrival of his sister. Lady Opera found him before he even had a chance to hide.
“Millefie, why is that small dragon sitting atop your lap?!”
“Oh, uh, th-this? Umm...”
Lady Opera bent over and examined Van in his tiny form. “This dragon looks completely identical to my brother!”
“He does, doesn’t he?”
“I’ve figured it out.” Lady Opera then pointed a finger at Van and announced her discovery. “This must be your child with my brother! I heard that you collapsed yesterday. Was it because you went into labor?!”
Lady Opera’s speculations left me speechless. I wondered just what exactly she had learned about pregnancy and childbirth to think that.
I lifted Van up and glared at him.
Perhaps feeling guilty, he averted his eyes. “Sorry,” he muttered.
“Whoa, it can talk?!” Lady Opera exclaimed.
“Aura, this is not my child with Van.”
“What?! But he looks exactly like him!”
“That’s because it is him,” I insisted.
“B-Brother?! Is that you?!” Lady Opera poked Van’s tummy to confirm my statement. “I could have sworn that my brother was not this squishy,” she said.
“He can change his size at will,” I explained.
“I see! How could I not have known this?” she said. Then, she quietly muttered, “I need to learn more about dragonkin...”
Forget learning about dragonkin—I think her sex education needs work, I thought.
The conversation could have ended there, but an unexpected party then weighed in on the topic.
“Only the Dragon Duke is able to change his size at will!” Roche proudly declared. Apparently, Van’s magic had let him change size too.
It seemed that Lady Opera only noticed Roche’s presence just then, and her eyes glittered as she looked at him.
“Oh, what an adorable little creature!” she said, approaching Roche with outstretched arms. She lifted him up and began rubbing him against her cheek. “This one is so squishy!” she exclaimed.
“Um! P-Please refrain from touching me! I am a proud knight of the Dragon Duke!” Roche protested.
“I did not know that there was such an adorable knight among my brother’s guards!”
Lady Opera seemed to love Roche’s tiny dragon form. She held him tightly and wouldn’t let go.
Perhaps I should tell her that it’s Roche. I glanced at Van, but he only snickered.
Oh, right. I then recalled that Van was going to introduce Lady Opera to the perfect partner. It appeared that Van had been trying to act as their matchmaker from the start.
Roche was from one of the Four Great Noble Families, so there would be no problem when it came to status. He adored Van, and he tended to become belligerent whenever anyone opposed the Dragon Duke. While he could be childish and sometimes stubborn to a fault, he had more than enough qualifications to be Lady Opera’s husband.
“In any case, Millefie, I have brought you some soup,” she told me.
On the way here, Lady Opera had encountered the maid who was supposed to bring me soup. She had volunteered to bring it to me instead and had to push a cart for the first time in her life. She pulled out the object reminiscent of a magnifying glass to check it for poison, and once she confirmed that it was safe, she handed me the bowl of soup.
“They said that this is carrot potage,” Lady Opera said.
“Thank you.”
Though I didn’t feel hungry, I decided to have some. The rich and sweet potage consisted of minced carrots, milk, cream, and bouillon, all mixed and boiled together. The moment I tasted it, I realized that my body had been wanting food all this time. It was very tasty, and I enjoyed it.
“Will you not have seconds?” Lady Opera asked.
“I’m already full, so I’ll pass. It was delicious,” I replied.
“That is good to hear.”
Van pulled on my sleeve, signaling that he wanted some too. It seemed that he couldn’t eat on his own while in this form. He could just return to his human shape, but he would be completely naked if he did. I would rather he didn’t do that now, so I had no choice but to feed him myself.
I put Van on my lap and spooned some soup into his mouth. “Say ‘ahh.’”
“Ahh.”
Van wagged his tail, seemingly having enjoyed the soup.
Seeing this, Lady Opera slammed a fist into her hand. “Oh, we should feed this little red dragon some soup too!”
Hearing that, Roche shook his head so hard that it might’ve fallen off. “No, no no no!!! I could never let a princess do such a thing!!!”
“Do not fret. Today, I am a mere attendant.”
“With all due respect, that is not the problem!!!” he cried out. “Besides, such an act should be limited to husband and wife, like the Dragon Duke and the Dragon Duchess consort!”
“Is that true?” Lady Opera asked me, and I only tilted my head in confusion.
If I had a child, I would certainly feed them like I had Van, and if Madeleine and Parfeil asked, I wouldn’t hesitate to feed them as well. But a man and woman of marriageable age normally would not do such a thing with each other. In that sense, Roche wasn’t wrong to refuse.
“Then perhaps we should get married,” offered Lady Opera.
“Huh?!”
Roche was shocked at the sudden proposal. And who could blame him when the one it had come from was none other than the royal Lady Opera? The small dragon was clearly agitated. His eyes were spinning, and his body trembled. His tail went limp and drooped over. I had thought Roche to be quite indomitable, but right now, he was completely defenseless.
Lady Opera had said that her ideal partner was someone strong, sincere, and loyal—and it would be even better if he had an adorable side. I felt like Roche’s inability to keep his cool in moments such as these would certainly count as an adorable side of him. Perhaps he truly was Lady Opera’s ideal partner.
“Do you have a partner whom you have promised your future to? Someone to be by your side at all times?” Lady Opera asked.
“No, I do not,” Roche replied.
“Then there is no problem, is there? If you are truly one of my brother’s knights, then you are no average man.”
“W-Well, yes, but...”
“We of the house of the Dragon Duke live longer lives than most dragonkin. I shall wait for you until you are of age. I am quite magnanimous, I’ll have you know.”
Lady Opera then took off the ring on her finger and slid it onto one of Roche’s claws.
He tried to remove it, but it wouldn’t budge. “Wh-What is this ring?!”
“It is a ring of protection that has been passed down in the Dragon Duke’s family for generations. It has been imbued with powerful magic to protect its bearer,” Lady Opera explained. According to her, it was a ring for the women of the house of the Dragon Duke that was made to be given to their future husbands.
Roche’s eyes went white as he listened to all that. “I-I-I-I could never accept such a gift!!! Lady Opera, you must be the one to wear this!!!”
“There is no need to worry. You, as my future husband, will be the one to protect me, will you not?”
Roche looked at Van awkwardly. Van gestured that everything was fine with him, and Roche let out a sigh. “Lady Opera, you must not decide your future husband by mere appearances,” he said.
“I am not only deciding by your appearance. By touching you, I can sense that the flow of mana within you is comforting to me. I can tell that we are quite compatible. I also liked the strong-willed glare you had when I barged into this room.”
Lady Opera then declared that she would not force Roche into marriage. She would give him time to think about his answer. Roche looked relieved.
“But in any case, I shall be feeding this soup to you by hand!”
“I see you haven’t forgotten...” Roche muttered.
“Of course not.”
Roche seemed to have given up on resisting. He let Lady Opera feed him while she carried him.
Watching this, Van whispered into my ear. “He might look like a baby dragon now, but it’s quite embarrassing to see a grown man being fed soup like this.”
“Don’t forget that we did this too.”
Van was quiet for a moment. “I’ll have some more,” he conceded, and I couldn’t help but laugh.