Come and Cry at My Funeral - Side Story 20 - (END)

Freesia stood once more in the very place where, long ago, she had signed her marriage vows, gazing down with clear eyes at those who now bowed their heads to her.

When her gaze happened to meet theirs, they looked so flustered and reverent that it felt almost ironic.

‘Life truly is strange and foolish sometimes.’

But beneath the lace veil strung with white jewels, there was no trace of cynicism in her eyes.

A sliver of disillusionment still lingered at their sudden change of attitude. Yet to dwell on malice forever… The new life she had been granted was hardly enough even to spend on loving.

At last, she blinked her pale brows softly as Riegel approached and went down on one knee to receive her blessing.

‘By now… you really have found the next High Priest, haven’t you, Brother?’

Freesia sent that quiet signal with her still gaze, but Riegel only smiled mischievously, on purpose.

Of course he had found someone, but teasing his younger sister a little was too fun to resist.

Meanwhile, the former Emperor, who had finally laid down the heavy crown, watched his granddaughter with eyes full of longing.

No matter how precious the great-granddaughter might be, the dearest was still, of course, the miraculously returned granddaughter herself.

But Freesia kept her gaze straight ahead and unflinching.

‘Later. I’ll face him later.’

If the Emperor—no, the former Emperor—would respect her enough not to press and simply wait… then perhaps, slowly, she might extend a hand of reconciliation.

‘After all, the sins of my past life weren’t done in this one.’

And she knew that after she and Riegel had died, and even Izar… the Empire left desolate, that old man must have remained alone.

How on earth had he endured after that?

‘Did there ever come a day when he learned I was his own blood…?’

Perhaps she would never know. But maybe, by some chance, he had found out through the method Viela Alpheratz invented.

‘If he did… did he truly regret what he’d done to me?’

Though the desire to resent him until her dying day still burned, imagining the old man despairing over a land turned to ash slowly loosened her stubborn anger.

So perhaps the day of perfect forgiveness was not so impossibly far off.

At last, when Riegel took the hand of the foreign bride and headed toward the grand doors, Freesia too stepped down from the altar behind them.

“Freesia.”

“Mama!”

Izar and the daughter cradled in his arms called out to her. Holding his child in one arm, Izar reached out with the other to draw his wife close by the waist.

Freesia naturally leaned her head against his broad shoulder.

As she watched her cousin and his bride walk forward, blessed and smiling, her vision blurred for reasons she could not name.

Unlike those newlyweds who would go on together from here… Izar had said nothing about hurrying back down to the duchy when this ceremony ended.

This time, he had said, there was no need to rush to overcome the pain because they would stay together until the day they died.

‘That seizure last time must have shaken him badly.’

And indeed, as he’d said, one cannot live straining and struggling every single day.

‘It’s exhausting and wearing to both body and spirit.’

To overcome fear. To attempt conversation and untangle long, hard misunderstandings. Even if important, to force oneself too quickly was to crush the tender parts of the heart.

‘Taking time, going slowly. That’s the right of the living.’

But Freesia knew better than anyone present here.

To relax and assume the one you love will still be here tomorrow is a foolish, luxurious thing.

“Izar.”

“Mm?”

“This time… let’s go home together.”

Freesia looked up at her startled husband and smiled brightly.

“I really am all right now.”

Not like before, when she had to trample fear just to pretend she was fine. Now, she was ready to set out with Izar and Nova, the three of them together.

At her words, Izar kissed her without a flicker of hesitation. The daughter in his arms let out a surprised squeal.

But when they parted, both were smiling. And there was no need to say it aloud.

They knew that their days ahead would be shared.

Until the day eternal rest finally came.

* * *

Freesia’s journey back to the duchy alongside Izar felt like a dream, like a bridal procession.

No longer sunken in cold neglect as before, this homecoming was sweetly alight, in the day with their child’s bright laughter, in the late nights with their quiet, tender breaths.

That spring that remained passed gently beneath starlit skies by the lakeshore, and sometimes as the couple strolled hand in hand by the brook.

And Freesia learned that after she had burned the land and left, the wild rose briars had been replanted almost at once.

White ribbons and silver bells fluttered in the soft breeze like smoke honoring the dead.

But the following year, the ribbons and bells vanished from the rose thickets.

Where death had left its scars, the cries of a living newborn now bloomed.

And the white wild roses were no longer remembered only for their sorrowful scent.

– [Come and Cry at My Funeral], Side Story End –

—Marmalade’s notes:

Oh, I really like this ending more than the main story’s ending… I’m so happy to see that they haven’t forgotten their lost child and continue to remember him even as they move forward together in the days to come ㅠㅠ (what’s his name tho… why didn’t u tell us author-nimmmm)

As painful as that journey was, I’m going to miss this novel and the characters who have endeared themselves to us. Izar needs more rolling to do, but as long as Freesia and Nova are happy, I’m happy too!

Thank you all so much for reaching until the end of Come and Cry at My Funeral~ Let’s meet again in other beautiful tales~