I had no reason whatsoever to get on her good side.
And personally, I think Hilda is prettier.
"You are the first noble to ever treat me this way."
"Anton, escort the princess!"
I cut her off before she could say anything else useless. Anton panicked visibly at being called by name. He couldn’t even look the Bavarian princess properly in the face and seemed utterly overwhelmed. The same went for the rest of my men.
"Sir Streit, only one of noble rank is fit to attend me."
"You will be treated with the courtesy due a princess, but you are a prisoner. Do not forget that."
Despite the threat, the Bavarian princess just snorted. On an ordinary day I might have found that crinkle-eyed smile genuinely charming, but at that moment it only grated on me and stoked my anger.
The princess seemed to be enjoying this situation.
"I shall grant you the special privilege of a pet name. You may call me Liz."
"I will attend to Lady Liz. Brother-in-law, lend me some soldiers."
Reading my mood, Margareta stepped in between the Bavarian princess and me at just the right moment. That’s Hilda’s sister for you. What a relief. If not for her, I might have gone down as the knight who struck a princess.
As Margareta requested, I assigned her one squad of the Gale Knights. The Bavarian princess seemed to find Margareta, so similar to her in temperament, uncomfortable to deal with, but to me Margareta was worth an entire army.
I steadied my emotions.
I still have a long way to go.
"You’ve been a great help, brother-in-law. You have my sincere thanks."
"Isn’t helping family only natural? I can only apologize for arriving so late."
"No need to be so stiff. Just call me Ulrich."
Michael is easygoing and an easy target for teasing, but Ulrich is taciturn, stern-faced, and utterly unreadable. That’s what makes him hard to deal with.
"What became of the marquis?"
"...The marquis has passed away."
"...I see."
At the mention of Grandfather, the mood turned solemn. Ulrich asked nothing more about the marquis. The more I think of that man, the heavier my heart grows.
"Let’s head back."
I didn’t want to stay in this foul, stinking passage a moment longer.
Raaaaah!
Radensdorf was brought fully under allied control, and the crown prince and the lords made their entrance. Soldiers filled the streets, celebrating the fall of Radensdorf and chanting the crown prince’s name.
They rejoiced that the war was over.
It wasn’t over yet, but everyone accepted it as a done deal.
At the palace, the crown prince received the formal surrender of the Duchess of Radensdorf. Sporadic looting broke out in the city, but fortunately the unrest didn’t last long.
The nobles seemed to be looking forward to a victory banquet. But the crown prince placated them, promising to hold a grand banquet when the grand duke entered Radensdorf.
The war’s end hadn’t been officially declared, but with the enemy’s stronghold occupied, the Duke of Radensdorf’s surrender was only a matter of time. It made sense to hold all the celebrations upon the grand duke’s arrival.
"...What did you say? Marquis Bertheim?"
The crown prince accepted my request for an audience in the midst of cleaning up the aftermath. He was more than a little flustered by my demeanor, so unlike my usual self, and the death of Marquis Bertheim came as a shock to him as well.
And when he heard the full story, he sank into even deeper shock.
The world of intrigue lies hidden in a deep, deep, dark abyss. It is a terrifying place; dip so much as a toe in, and it becomes nearly impossible to climb back out. The crown prince spoke as if hollowed out.
"So Father and the marquis made fools of the nobles who are drunk on victory."
The nobles no doubt believed they had achieved this victory through their own abilities. But it was a victory made possible only by the schemes of the grand duke and the marquis. The truth hidden behind the victory, you could say.
"Do whatever it takes to win. That is the heart of intrigue."
Even with both eyes gouged out, Grandfather succeeded in deceiving the duke to the very end. And Ulrich, who had been tortured alongside him, was being treated at the hospital. He might well suffer lasting effects from the torture.
The crown prince shuddered at this terrifying world of intrigue. So did I. But for us, the days of facing this deep, deep darkness stretched far into the future.
Sometimes that frightened me.
Klaus delivered the deceased’s final order to me: disguise his death thoroughly, and never let this scheme come to light. It was a demand utterly befitting the former head of Hoenir.
Hearing the circumstances, the crown prince was despondent.
"To think we must hide the truth, even though his sacrifice won us this victory."
It pained me that Grandfather’s sacrifice would be consigned to the footnotes of history, but if Hoenir’s operation ever became known to the world, it could trigger catastrophic political fallout, so there was no choice but to keep it quiet.
After much deliberation, the crown prince also agreed to conceal it.
Even if it rested on a cover story, we agreed that his funeral, at least, would be held in grand style. Grandfather hated pomp and empty formality, but surely he would understand his grandchildren’s feelings.
Dooong... Dooong...
Grandfather’s funeral was held at Radensdorf Cathedral. The crown prince poured an enormous sum into the funeral expenses. Most of it was money squeezed out of the monopoly merchant, Wenzenberg, in taxes.
I had to pay no small amount to secure a good seat, but I didn’t begrudge a single coin. Many nobles attended Grandfather’s funeral. Most of the lords came as well.
"Straining himself to travel east to mediate the royal family’s dispute, only to be killed. It’s absurd. He should have stayed quietly at his mansion and rested. What was he thinking, dying so pointlessly at his age?"
Count Essenbach clicked his tongue at the death of the marquis he had known for so long.
But his face looked deeply sorrowful. He seemed to feel a sense of loss as the nobles of his generation, those who had shared the past with him, disappeared one by one.
"Were you close with the deceased, Count?"
"We saw each other’s faces for many long years. It would be nonsense to say we weren’t close. And just like that, I’ve become the eldest of the nobles."
Count Essenbach was himself an old man past seventy, who could pass away at any time. What made him restless was Strasbourg, which he had never fully gotten his hands on. It was his lifelong wish, after all.
Perhaps Grandfather had played some role in Essenbach’s maneuvering in Strasbourg. Could that be why the count mourned his death so keenly?
Of course, it’s only conjecture.
But my conjectures have mostly been right.
Grandfather’s death was made known to the world in an entirely different form, just as the deceased intended. The story went that he had striven to mediate the feud between the two brothers, but in the end he failed to stop it and was killed by the Duke of Radensdorf.
The duke will protest when he learns of this, but the grand duke will silence him. The duke is a defeated man anyway, and no noble listens to his opinions anymore.
"Is this the fate of those who work in the shadows?"
"You worked in the shadows as well, didn’t you?"
"...I did. But I don’t want to die in the shadows."
"Will you return to the Military Department?"
"No. His Highness made me a promise."
I wanted to ask what that promise was, but Ulrich said nothing more. Grandfather passed away without ever being repaid, but Ulrich seemed to be expecting a reward.
Part of it was that, as a second son, his standing in the Military Department wasn’t strong. After my father-in-law’s passing, the Military Department would be reorganized around Michael, so perhaps Ulrich felt there was no place left for him.
Fortunately, Margareta didn’t know the full story.
"The marquis adored us siblings, but he rarely showed what was in his heart."
Attending the funeral in black mourning dress, Margareta seemed composed in the face of the marquis’s death, but she was grieving more than anyone. She said the horrific state she had seen him in at that prison was still vivid in her mind.
"He was not a man who deserved to die in agony in a place like that."
In the end, tears fell from Margareta’s eyes too. Still, it was a comfort that so many people were there to shed tears for Grandfather as they saw him off.
As for me, I had already cried all my tears, and no more would come.