The only sounds inside the carriage were the clack of the horses’ hooves and the rolling wheels as they traveled over the cobblestone road. Elysia had just drifted off to sleep, using Zen’s lap as a pillow. Zen put a finger to his lips, and with a brimming smile, Mina nodded many times.
We’re on a trip and all, but there’s a limit to how much excitement one can handle. I do understand how she feels, though. Zen let out a stifled laugh. He found it so funny how his daughter had tired herself out and lost to her drowsiness.
No matter how mature she is, she’s still a fourteen-year-old girl. He peacefully watched her innocent sleeping face on his knees. He truly was glad he’d taken up Mina and Cummel’s kind offer and brought her along.
This was Elysia’s second time going on a trip. It’d taken about three weeks from the imperial capital to get to Todd Village. However, she probably hadn’t had the luxury of enjoying their travels back then. It had also been her first time leaving the imperial capital—not to mention how she’d had to spend the entire time with a man she’d just met. Even if he was a friend of her parents, it would’ve been impossible for her to completely relax.
This time, she could get excited and doze off like this precisely because she was so comfortable now. It meant the four months they’d spent living together hadn’t been for naught.
I’m also understanding more and more how fathers feel, Zen thought. His love for her grew deeper by the day as he discovered just how precious having a daughter was.
He felt the pleasant weight on top of his knees, affectionately stroked her hair, and let himself forget, just for this moment, that she was an imperial princess.
That was probably why a memory came to him suddenly, something that had happened fourteen years ago.
It was several months after Zen had passed the Advanced Civil Service Exam and started his court service. Aness and Heinri had invited him to the inner palace for a dinner party in front of the second gates, which even men were permitted to enter. Aness was pregnant, and her stomach had already grown significantly. It was the first time they’d seen each other since she’d entered her second trimester, and she was well into it by that point. Zen was so happy, but Aness seemed to feel differently.
With a dark expression, she made a self-deprecating confession. “I’m having this child solely because of my selfishness,” she said. “It’s to secure my position as empress by birthing an heir.” It might’ve been the maternity blues talking—a term that wouldn’t be used till the far-off future.
Zen had been surprised at the time. Aness was a woman with a strong backbone, yet she’d become timid during her pregnancy. She was probably dealing with an unfathomable amount of hardship and pressure from having suddenly moved up from a commoner to an empress.
She continued her confession. “I could never say that I wish for this child to be happy. I have no right to say that.”
Back then, they hadn’t known the gender of the child yet. However, as someone who would be the first in line to succeed the throne and eventually bear the responsibility of ruling Great Catalan, this child was likely destined for a tumultuous life. It wouldn’t be a peaceful one, at the very least.
“Aness is confiding in you because you’re you. We can’t say this to anyone else,” Heinri said, supporting her.
Zen nodded heavily. He understood. As the emperor and empress, they couldn’t allow other people to hear even their most mundane or idle complaints. Humans were far from infallible, but as if they were living gods, Aness and Heinri had to behave like they were. That was why, no matter how terrible the things Aness was saying might be, Zen didn’t raise his eyebrows. As their friend, he would take their secrets to the grave.
Knowing that, Zen asked, “There’s something you want to say to me, isn’t there?” He guessed that there was something else Aness really wanted to tell him.
And then she actually did say something nervously. “I’m sure this child won’t be happy. It’s because of my selfishness that I’ll birth it in spite of that. However, even so, that’s exactly why I swear I’ll raise it with as much love as I can.”
She made a vow in front of Zen that she couldn’t let anyone else hear. As she did, she stroked her large belly. Those tender strokes weren’t those of an empress. They were definitely of a mother. Zen could see the gesture no other way.
He said from the bottom of his heart, “If possible, I’d like to hold it one day.” The child of his closest friends.
That’ll probably be impossible, though... It was because, as just a government official, Zen had no right to touch the empress’s child.
When he swallowed back those words without saying them, Aness and Heinri smiled sadly.
Right now, Zen looked back on that memory from fourteen years ago.
Huh. It wasn’t impossible at all. It seems my wish was granted a long time ago.
As his chest suddenly ached remembering Aness’s and Heinri’s faces, he continued to stroke Elysia’s hair as she slept. For now, at the very least, he could do this much in place of her late mother.