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“NICE to see you both. Come, sit down.”
They sat down on the sofa as prompted, and tea was quickly prepared for them.
Cesar had more color in his cheeks than the last time Agnes had seen him. Good, that meant Agnes’s kidnapping hadn’t affected his condition too much.
“How are you feeling?” Agnes asked. “I was so worried because I couldn’t give you the last supply.”
“You gave me quite a lot of pills before you left for the Barthet territory, Agnes, so it’s all right. Anyway, it sounds like you had quite a tough time over there.”
Agnes’s kidnapping was a big deal. Trying to sell a royal fiancée to a foreign country was no small matter. Notwithstanding, from the viewpoint of the royal family, someone had kidnapped an actual Dragonmate.
No wonder Cesar had heard about it. But Agnes felt bad for causing him concern.
“I apologize for all the fuss—”
“You don’t have to, Lady Agnes! You’re the one who was wronged here!” interrupted Charles. He was all puffed up with anger on her behalf, and it was sort of adorable. Agnes and Cesar exchanged glances and laughed.
“Oh, come on, you two. I’m just stating the facts, here,” Charles pouted.
“Oh, no, I only laughed because what you said made me happy,” Agnes assured him.
No doubt Charles had thought he was being mocked. He glanced at Agnes with a slightly sullen look on his face.
“You remind me of my younger brother Kevin when he gets mad,” she said. “It’s a sign that he’s worried about me. It makes me happy to know someone cares about me like that.”
“Man, that’s a killer smile. I don’t want Claude to kill me, so I’m going to just pretend I didn’t see it.” Charles’s cheeks reddened as he looked away. In this, too, he resembled Kevin. But Agnes decided not to mention that.
She felt a little sorry for Ciel, as Charles tugged on the cat’s tail a little. But for a few minutes at least, she’d have the kitty provide a distraction for her.
“Actually, I wanted to give you some more pills today, but I still haven’t had time to make them,” Agnes said. “I did get some more blessings from the spirits though, so I thought I’d use them to make tea!”
Agnes made the pills by harvesting, drying, and turning medicinal herbs into powder. Luckily, the herbs in her garden had been fine since Kevin and Therese had kept watering them in her absence, but Agnes hadn’t had enough time to make the supplements before her visit.
Still, she didn’t want Cesar’s condition to deteriorate. So, she’d brought something special along. Agnes removed some herbs from her basket with a good deal of enthusiasm.
At first glance, the color of the herbs seemed unusual. The stems went from white to green, the leaves were vivid colors that went from green to a yellow hue, and oddly the roots were pink. Anyone could see that these were no normal plants. Both Cesar and Charles paused to study them.
“Th-They’re not poisonous, are they?” Cesar pressed a hand to his chest, anxiety making him sound blunt.
“The colors look deadly…but they’re sort of sparkling. They should be fine. Maybe.”
The room was filled with the sound of a pop, as if to punctuate Charles’s attempt to reassure Cesar.
A glistening blue cap that looked like the delicate glasswork of a Pixie’s Parasol appeared alongside a Coprinellus micaceus, which sported a yellowish-brownish cap with small, glittering scales. The mushrooms’ glistening caps undulated atop the table. Perhaps they were reacting to Charles’s use of the word sparkling.
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“…So, they should be all right?” Cesar murmured as Charles smiled sheepishly.
“I’ll prepare some tea, but first, please have these.” Agnes took a small paper bag out of the basket.
Charles emptied the contents onto a plate provided by a servant, and his gray eyes sparkled when he saw what it was. “Cookies today! Score!”
“Some have dried fruits, and some have chocolate,” Agnes explained as she prepared the teapot with the medicinal herbs. But before she could finish speaking, Charles was already on his second cookie. Charles seemed to have a real sweet tooth—maybe because he was still young.
“Mmm, these are luscious! So crumbly, and they melt in your mouth!” he exclaimed.
“Delicious, for sure,” Cesar agreed. “Now these are sure to perk me up.”
Seeing Cesar chomp on a cookie with childish enthusiasm tickled Agnes, but for some reason, Charles looked quizzical.
“These cookies don’t really sparkle, though. Maybe they only sparkle when Lady Agnes makes them?” he wondered.
Charles did not have a Dragon Crest but claimed to have a special ability to “see” magic. He had been the one to feed Cesar the cake Agnes had made, after noting that it was sparkling. After that, Cesar’s condition had improved.
No doubt Charles’s sight was true. Possibly there were still positive effects, even without any sparkling?
“Today I didn’t make the cookies, but I did wrap them and bring them here. I wonder if that will work,” Agnes mused.
She tipped the pot and poured a greenish-brown liquid out—a sight that usually wouldn’t please most people. Even after being brewed, the poisonous-looking hue of the medicinal herbs was apparent. However, it smelled all right; something drunk with eyes closed.
“Wow, despite the awful color, this tea seriously sparkles! No doubt it’ll work wonders.” Charles studied the tea with interest, providing an evaluation that was both complimentary and sort of a slight at the same time. Not really a normal way to describe a drink.
“Yes, I can feel it working! Not only is she a Dragonmate, but now she has a sacred beast as a companion! No wonder Agnes’s power has grown stronger!” Cesar slurped his tea with gusto, like a freezing man being handed a hot drink, and Charles watched with interest.
He tilted his own teacup, his expression determined. “…It smells and tastes all right. As long as I don’t focus on the color, it should be drinkable.”
Charles kept his eyes fixed on a spot on the ceiling as he drank. No doubt he was just being polite, but there was no need to force himself to drink it.
Cesar finished the poisonous-looking herbal tea in one final gulp, took a deep satisfied breath, then lowered his teacup. “Now, then. Why don’t you tell me more about the incident in Oreille?”