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WHILE the hotel the Golden Helm were staying in rented out suites containing everything their guests would need for their day-to-day lives, it also had an area with shops selling various items of general need, providing clothes washing services, and serving food in a café. That café offered somewhat large portions of food and even served alcohol depending on the time.
They must have hired a dwarf with a modern styling sense to design the place, because the tables and chairs were all sleek and undecorated, creating a pure white and uncomplicated space. One wall was fully glass, overlooking a garden and water feature meant to resemble the royal gardens. Even Lushera thought it looked like an accurate representation, and she had just come back not long ago from seeing the real thing, nearly ten times the size.
“Good evening, and my apologies for disturbing you,” said Julian. He was a gallant-looking man in his mid-twenties, and he brought only one guard with him to this café, though there were few other customers.
He was tall, and his brisk movements implied that he was a warrior. His top was a white so pure it could nearly blind you, accented with an abundance of decorative buttons. Lushera was aware this was the current popular fashion with Martgarz’s upper class. Despite the hot and humid weather of Setrayu at this time of year, he wore a scarf-like cloak wrapped around his neck.
He greeted her casually. “You must be Lushera. I am Julian Angus.” He gave her a soft smile.
This was the son of the marquess who attacked Mount Kugus with Gemmel as his guide.
Ivar guessed Julian had come to Setrayu to apologize, but it seemed impossible for Lushera not to be wary of him. Though, she doubted he would try anything in a place like this, and Lushera had no intention of causing a scene.
“How do you know who I am?” she asked.
“Is there something odd about that?”
“Well…”
“The adventurers my father hired spoke of you.”
Those bastards… thought Lushera. The faces of her once-upon-a-time companions flitted through her mind, along with emotions she couldn’t hold back.
“I have heard you are the adopted daughter of the red dragon of Mount Kugus. Is that true?” asked Julian.
“…It is.” She didn’t feel any need to deny something he already knew, when he clearly said it like he was just confirming.
Julian let out a sigh, a look of sorrow on his face. “Then I must apologize to you.”
“Uh, what? Oh.”
“I am ashamed of my father’s actions. I hope that you can forgive me for his mistakes,” he said, then placed a hand on his chest and lowered his head.
It was a pure apology, no excuses, simply offering himself up. Lushera both expected an apology like that and was completely surprised by it.
Reputation was the tool of trade for a royal or noble. Their apologies carried weight, but he seemed to have nothing against making this gesture. There was no hesitation. It was like he cared nothing for what he gave up in doing so, or…perhaps he had nothing left to give up.
“You came all the way here just to say that?” asked Lushera.
“Yes. I know words are not enough to compensate for what was done, but, even so, I wanted to say them. I want an everlasting peace. I hope that we can be good neighbors for eternity to Setrayu and Mount Kugus.”
“That…is exactly what I pray for.”
Julian smiled and held out his hand. His attitude felt as sincere as his words.
Lushera reflexively took his hand and shook it.
That handshake… Something felt wrong.
Julian shook his hand entirely at his own rate, making no effort to adjust for Lushera.
That was it. It was a tiny thing, but not something Lushera overlooked. Lushera did look like a child, but she didn’t sense any consideration for that fact from Julian, even on an unconscious level.
Perhaps it was the intuition of a manager used to negotiating with requesters, but Lushera couldn’t help thinking that this man was thinking of no one but himself.
That gentle demeanor, the heartfelt apology… If that was all just the façade, an act, then what was the emptiness that filled him?
“I’d rather not draw too much attention, so if you would excuse me, I believe I should be going,” he said. “I hope we may meet again.”
With that classy display of etiquette, he departed, Lushera left watching him go in half shock.
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JULIAN smiled quietly to himself in the carriage on the way back from the hotel, no one seeing.
“How do you know who I am?” Hah. She knows nothing. How could she? If she did, she would have told the king of Setrayu long ago.
Even with the route over Mount Kugus closed, the Angus Marquessate was responsible for guarding against Setrayu.
There were those in Setrayu who cooperated with the Marquess, and he had spies in place. Even if he didn’t see everything that happened in the kingdom, he had a general idea of what the court was doing.
Plans had already been laid for Monica’s jaunt out a week in advance, and Julian got his hands on that information. He planned his own travels in tandem with her trip.
Her guard was exactly as the information he obtained in advance implied, a limited retinue at best. She wasn’t given any particularly large guard despite being the daughter of a high-ranking public figure and carrying the blood of the dracovitae users, since Setrayu was safe inside the country (it was more common for dracovitae users to be targeted by internal threats than external ones).
Actually, there would be many who felt relieved if Monica, the cause of the scandal, were to disappear.
And yet, Julian’s plan to use a golem to capture Monica failed. The Golden Helm, which Lushera was a member of, was supposed to travel directly south from Kugut’hulm to Alhyura, but she at some point circled around to the northeast side of the capital and prevented his attack (he later learned that she ran there on foot, as hard to believe as that method of transportation was).
He suspected someone leaked the information, but he’d only informed a scarce few people in his circle of the plan.
When planning a secret plot, information was less likely to slip out the fewer people you had involved. He used items and a golem that he personally had on hand and didn’t even feel the need to consult others about his plan. And he was the one who carried out the attack himself. Where could the information possibly leak from?
The moment his plan failed, he set about gathering information, at which point he learned that the royal court only prepared a guard to meet Lushera once they received a report from the Guild. He confirmed just now that, not only did the court know nothing about this plan, Lushera herself didn’t seem to either. If she had, she likely would have contacted the court directly, and they would have acted faster, so it wasn’t unexpected that she knew nothing.
Which meant Lushera hadn’t planned to interfere with his attack. It was unfortunate, but he could continue with his plan since it hadn’t been revealed. He just had to change it slightly.
Everything will fall into my hands. There will not be another misfortune like that one.
Julian even knew Lushera would be staying in this hotel before she arrived in the capital. There was little he didn’t see, and little he didn’t believe to be out of his control.
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THOUGH, to be entirely accurate, it wasn’t a complete coincidence that Lushera happened to be there at the scene of Julian’s attack.
Ivar chose to stay in the same inn that Julian had during his travels so that he could gather information on Julian. He asked Lushera to meet him there, and then they traveled on to Alhyura, so it was only natural they would take the same path as Julian. However, it remained true that neither Lushera nor Ivar had any intentions of running into the attack.
There was no questioning the fact that Julian was extraordinary, but he had several personality flaws. One of those was that he was convinced he was the smartest person in the world, and he never considered the possibility that there was someone who could be equally or more intelligent than him.