The Opposite Of Indifference

“Has your injured leg gotten better?” Frederick asked.

It certainly seemed like a friendly tone yet it wasn’t.

“Yes, Your Majesty! It’s getting better day by day.” Adriana replied with a slightly bewildered expression.

Frederick looked down at Adriana’s legs which showed through under her gown.

It was not just a kind gaze, but interest was interest nonetheless. Adriana was touched.

“Earlier Count Arlan asked me if I knew an excellent pharmacist.” Frederick said. “He said he was worried about his only daughter.”

Jane Grant laughed, not in a rude tone, but involuntarily with her lips raised. She seemed to think that Adriana’s father, Count Arlan, was not the kind of person who was kind enough to worry about his daughter.

“So he made me realize in a roundabout way the shortcomings I have been committing.”

Even though he must have noticed, Frederick didn’t care and continued.

“You’re a lady who was injured in my royal court, and I have been inconsiderate.”

“That’s not true!”

Seeing a good sign, Adriana shook her head violently.

“The Count is going to call in the pharmacist I recommended. So you should finish your work early today.” Frederick said. “I have prepared a horse and a carriage to take you there myself.”

At least the good signs she saw were not off.

“Let’s go, Lady Adriana Beasley.”

By now everyone had caught on to the fact that Adriana’s initials were AB.

This was the purpose.

For this very moment, Frederick guided everything from sudden to cryptic conversations.

However, each of the women had a different interpretation. Jane Grant, who looked terribly indignant, but the rest were hard to grasp.

“It’s my payment.”

And Frederick generously paid for the card reading as if it was natural.

His fingertips touched Millicent’s small palm as he handed her a gold coin he had taken from his pocket.

Again she felt his skin. Even if she didn’t know what meaning to ascribe to it…The only thing that was certain was that despite the fact that the fraudulent card playing was over, the sense of foreboding was not going away.

“Then have a nice day, my queen.”

Frederick nodded his head at Jadalin.

“Your Majesty, please ride carefully.”

Jadalin said goodbye nonchalantly. However, she didn’t bother hiding her expression that she hoped that her husband, who humiliated her by dragging another woman’s hand, would fall off the horse and die.

“I’ll leave first, Your Majesty the Queen.”

Adriana bent her knees triumphantly. She had the look of a woman who was well aware of the fact that the king’s orders unconditionally preceded the queen’s will.

More than anything else, it put Jadalin in a bad mood.

“Lady Adriana.”

The queen parted her lips with a serious expression.

“Please pray that your injured leg will heal quickly.”

Still, she concluded with a blessing.

Well, this time too, she did not hide her expression that she hoped that the nasty maid would also fall off the horse and die along with her husband.

Adriana flinched slightly, but she then followed Frederick.

The atmosphere was more chilly than before.

Millicent decided to run away with an expression that reminded her of the dishes in the kitchen.

She quickly picked up the cooled teacups and teapot on a tray.

“I’ll have to do the sewing later.”

Jadalin, however, was one step quicker.

 “I’m tired after attending the funeral Mass and need to rest a bit.”

“Would you like me to bring you a blanket and slippers?”

Elizabeth asked kindly.

“No, the weather is sunny, Lady Elizabeth, let Tevi take a walk.”

The queen hugged the wolfhound, who had been sticking his tongue out and wiggling by her side for a while now.

“I think he’s had a lot of running around this morning, don’t you?”

Elizabeth asked, patting the puppy with an awkward hand.

 “Maybe it’s because he’s still a cub, but his activity level is really high. He whines, not satisfied with just one walk.”

Jadalin clicked her tongue.

“Lady Jane, find someone who can measure feet.”

Jane jealously glanced at the queen’s feet, already in her luxurious shoes.

“Do you need a new pair of shoes, Your Majesty?”

“Prince Philip needs a new pair of shoes. He’s growing up so fast these days, just like a child.”

Jadalin replied casually.

Millicent had no idea which prince the name Philip was referring to, but it wasn’t a good time to ask who he was.

“Lady Ophelia, go to Mrs. Galbraith and please tell her to send me only wine, no dessert for supper.”

The queen sent away her attendants with various orders.

“Millicent.”

Soon Jadalin caught the unfortunate maid who had failed to escape.

“How did it feel to have an audience with His Majesty in person?”

Jadalin brought up the seemingly forgotten subject.

“Um, he’s as wonderful as I’ve heard.” Millicent chose the most plain answer possible.

“Is he?” As expected, it was not an answer that would satisfy Jadalin.

“Why does His Majesty show interest in you?”

She barged in unannounced.

“Not particularly, I’m afraid.”

 “Yes, he does. He did at the banquet, and he did today.”

The Queen was not an opponent to be easily undermined. Her eyes were cold.

“I have dared to mistake His Majesty for a hunter and treated him with disrespect.”

Millicent decided to be half honest.

“Fortunately, he wasn’t angry, but he did seem a little amused.”

It wasn’t until the fact that Frederick showed an incomprehensible interest in the way he looked at her considering “removal” that she had the opportunity to confide. Pure honesty only made a client uneasy.

Even Millicent herself would be uneasy.

“He’s not the kind of person who would be involved in a fuss like that…” Jadalin grumbled disapprovingly. “Well, anyway, you now know.”

But she wasn’t confused for long.

“My relationship with His Majesty isn’t very good.”

From the looks of things, the queen, like Millicent, decided to be half as honest as she was.

“The person I really want to kill isn’t the ladies-in-waiting, but the King.”

All too easily, she even expressed her feelings of treason.

“But I cannot do that.”

Jadalin whispered.

“His Majesty the King was not even heir to the throne to begin with.”

“Why?”

Millicent asked in a roundabout way in response to the conversation that had suddenly changed direction.

“He was just the second son of King Frederick II. A prince who lived without any presence with a trivial title of Duke.”

After a moment of silence, the queen replied slowly.

“…and my mother made me the wife of a mere prince.”

A seeming anger rose in Jadalin’s voice, as when she recalled the Emperor* of the Valentina Empire had put a price on her.

(*women can be emperor in Jadalin’s empire)

“She didn’t even want to see me become queen, let alone emperor.”

“Why is that again?”

The queen was the first to say it, and Millicent decided to satisfy her curiosity.

“My mother…”

Jadalin hesitated for a moment.

“Have you ever seen the perfect man?”

“Um…no.”

Millicent scratched the back of her head, unsure of the question’s intent. In fact, she wasn’t even sure what the perfect man was referring to.

“I don’t either. But I’ve seen the perfect woman. Of all people, such a woman was my mother.”

Jadalin laughed bitterly.

“It’s really hard to deal with someone like that.”

She fiddled with the teacup she had finished drinking from.

“She always wonders why other women can’t be like her. Her standards are too high to be ever satisfied.”

From her expression, it looked like she needed wine, not tea.

“Also, why do such an emperor so easily suspect that her heirs are not as perfect as hers?” Jadalin shrugged. “My sister Elena seems to have managed so far. My mother didn’t kick her out when she made mistakes like I did. Well, not yet.”

Millicent was smart enough not to ask what mistakes she had made. She kept her mouth shut.

“So I ended up becoming a mere princess, not even a queen, let alone an emperor.”

Jadalyn said.

“But Prince Christopher, the original heir to the kingdom, was short-lived. He died before his father, King Frederick II.”

“So His Majesty, the current king, inherited the royal throne.” Millicent slowly understood and murmured.

“I was lucky. His Majesty became king and I became queen.”

Jadalin’s eyes shook with a complicated expression. Immediately she corrected her words.

“The word luck is misleading.”

She continued, “Because I am subservient to His Majesty. If His Majesty dies and the throne goes to another man, even my shabby throne will be taken away. I will just be a widow.”

Jadalin gripped her teacup as if to shatter it.

“If I return to my homeland in that state, perhaps…”

She seemed to have fallen into a terribly negative imagination.

“I can’t afford to lose even  that ill-fitting crown. That’s why I can’t kill His Majesty.”

Then she threw the cup against the wall.

 “But I can kill the maids, even with a minimum of self-respect. Women who are less perfect than my mother. Women who are more imperfect than I am.”

The teacup shattered.

“Kill them all.”

Jadalin said.

“Kill them and put them out of my sight.”

The order she gave seemed to calm her anger.

“I hope your next target will be the same as I predicted.”

Jadalin slowly rose from her throne. She disappeared, dragging the hem of the black gown she wore to shed crocodile tears.

Millicent remained, tidying up the room, which was strewn with pieces of broken china.

Thinking how much less messy it would have been if the Queen hadn’t broken the teacup, even though everything was fine.