Chapter 236
[Miss Bella Appenz, I’ve heard you’ve not been feeling well, but I think it’s about time to honor our arrangement. I hope you’ll come without delay. Ideally, after receiving this letter, I’d like you to reply within three days so we can set a date.]
The tone, surprisingly light for the Second Prince of the empire, surprisingly wasn’t rude. The phrasing shed the usual weight of royal formality, giving it a strangely personal touch.
Sebelia couldn’t hide her curiosity. Shateian Belkram, with his cloud-white hair and rabbit-like red eyes—she had had no prior contact with him before the exhibition.
Is he more easygoing than I thought?
Yet she couldn’t fully believe that. She remembered the cold, composed red eyes he had kept even amidst the chaos.
No ordinary person could maintain such an icy gaze. Something about him seemed off. Sebelia kept her guard up as she continued reading the letter.
“Hmm.”
The tone remained consistent throughout, which made Sebelia uneasy. No matter how she read it, she couldn’t trace the source of this subtle favor woven into the text.
But when she reached the postscript, she felt a bit relieved.
[Ah, one more thing. Besides you and me, there will be one more person attending. Don’t be surprised—they’ll be someone who will be helpful to you, so no need to worry.]
So all the overly familiar, almost brash remarks in the letter were just a prelude to this. Sebelia felt the unease that had built up in her vanish in an instant.
“What’s in the letter that makes your expression change every second?”
“Oh.”
Claude, eyes full of curiosity, looked at her. Sebelia thought about giving him the letter but stopped.
With how protective he’d been lately, she wasn’t sure how he would interpret the Second Prince’s familiar tone.
“It asked me to reply within three days and set a day to report to the palace,” Sebelia said, folding the letter back into its envelope.
“Bella, if you’re going to lie, you need to be more shameless about it.”
“…Did I give it away?”
“Your hands were shaking. You might even cut yourself on the paper.”
Sebelia let out a sigh and set the envelope down. Claude, perceptive as ever, noticed her every little tell—almost like having two Denisas for observation, which gave her the chills.
“They said one more guest will attend the meeting, and that this person will be helpful to me—but they didn’t explain why. That’s all.”
“A guest who will be helpful, you say? Hmm…”
Claude, who was looking surprisingly calm, pondered deeply with his hand resting on his cheek. Sebelia’s eyes widened. She had expected him to flare up, insisting on attending the palace himself.
Lately, both Claude and Dehart had been extremely sensitive about her safety.
[Do not step outside the estate alone. Or if you must, one of us must accompany you.]
The way he treated her was almost like handling a three-year-old. It was absurd, yet she understood his concern. No one could have predicted the First Queen’s faction would use sorcerers to set up a double trap. And yet, the men’s guilt only deepened.
Just last night, when her fever suddenly spiked, Dehart had been so frantic that he had nearly carried Watts with him. She had been too overwhelmed by his panicking to explain that it was due to her overusing her powers.
Come to think of it… where is Dehart?
A sudden unease made Sebelia frown. She tried to recall his whereabouts. After breakfast, they had crossed paths briefly in the garden in the morning, and she hadn’t seen him since. Neither Claude nor Watts had mentioned his whereabouts.
Did he leave without telling anyone again?
Her mind drifted to that moment in the dawn hallway when she had encountered him. She couldn’t calm down.
Even in ordinary clothes, his presence was impossible to ignore—brazen, shameless, overwhelmingly commanding. Even buried under stacks of documents, his aura pierced through. That strange combination exuded an intoxicating force.
How could someone like that blend into a crowd?
He had apprehended Roden in that striking manner in the back alleys crowded with taverns at night.
But now it was broad daylight. The sun shone high, the streets were filled with people on a bright weekend afternoon.
“…No.”
She couldn’t let him roam the streets like that—it would be like setting a trap in motion. Sebelia got up, hoping her suspicions were wrong.
At that moment, Claude spoke.
“I think I know who the guest is.”
“Yes?”
Sebelia, intent on finding Dehart, barely registered Claude’s words. When she asked him to repeat, he inclined his head and began to explain.
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