Call Me Olivia
In the end, I never reached the palace in a finished gown. The Emperor could not wait for the dress to be done, and so he had sent a second imperial edict.
I put yesterday's clothes on again and climbed into the carriage. Seated across from Ian, I was watching the world slide past the window when he spoke.
"Is the House of Parnel poor?"
Only then did I turn from the window to look at him. There was nothing arrogant in his eyes, no trace of scorn—only what seemed to be plain curiosity. I shrugged.
"Why? Do you find this dress that offensive?"
"Yes."
"Hmph."
I worried the hem between my fingers, and the coarse weave left a scratchy feel against my skin. Once I held real power as a duchess, I would not have spared cloth of this quality so much as a glance; until then, however, everything I owned had been exactly this.
And even so, it was the finest dress I had.
For a moment the old miseries rushed in, quick as scenes on a spinning lantern. I let out a small sigh and shrugged again.
"Once we're married, you can keep me in luxury. Prove I didn't choose wrong."
Ian's lips remained closed. Silence settled through the carriage, and I turned back to the window.
I tried not to remember, but the memories kept rising one after another, until at last I gave in and let myself think through everything that had happened in the House of Parnel—as if, on the road to the imperial palace, I might set each piece of it down and leave it behind.
When we arrived at the palace, a middle-aged man in a red cloak came running out barefoot.
"Aigoo, sister-in-law!"
"Pardon?"
He lunged to sweep me into his arms, and I escaped only because Ian slipped neatly between us. Fighting to hide how flustered I was, I caught up my skirts and dropped into a deep kneel.
"Y-Your Imperial Majesty. I am honored to stand before you."
He had burst out like the friendly uncle from next door, and yet this was the Emperor who ruled the whole of the Empire.
"Why stand on ceremony like that? Rise."
If you were me, do you think you could relax?
Sour-faced, I carefully straightened my knees. My eyes, however, stayed fixed on the floor.
The Emperor beckoned to an aide beside him. The aide held out a rectangular board with an old-fashioned document clipped to it.
"Come. Before we talk, sign here."
The moment I saw it, words failed me. It was a marriage registration.
He truly is desperate to see this done.
I had seen that square of paper once before, Ian's name and mine already written along the bottom. What astonished me was that the lines for our signatures were still blank, while the Emperor's seal had already been stamped across the page, large and unmistakable.
Since when does an emperor set his seal beforehand?
The whole procedure was wildly out of order. Under his bright, eager gaze, I ventured carefully,
"Your Majesty, there is one thing I would ask."
"Speak freely. What is it?"
I had set this in motion knowing it would come to such a pass, yet watching it race ahead so smoothly left me uneasy all the same. I lowered my eyes and asked in a level voice,
"I fear the gossip that will follow if I break things off like this. Might we settle that first, and sign afterward?"
At that the Emperor broke into a booming laugh and beckoned again. Another aide came forward bearing a second document.
"What gossip could there be? The House of Parnel sent the annulment papers first."
"What?"
I could not help but start. What did he say?
They already sent the annulment?
Had it even been two days since I stormed out of the House of Parnel, or three?
How could they have sent the annulment this fast?
It was absurd, and yet there was no denying the seals on the document the aide held out: the seal of the House of Parnel, and the Emperor's own. He chuckled as he spoke.
"Someone from the ducal house came straight to me. I stamped it at once, in case they changed their minds. A copy will reach Duke James Parnel on the battlefield as well. Don't you fret."
"Ha ha."
I laughed because I was too dumbfounded for anything else. Laughter was all that would come.
True to form. Those nuisances never change.
They had disliked me from the start. Now that things had come to this, they meant to strike first and throw me out.
Good. No lingering attachment on their side.
At that, even the last handful of hesitation scattered like dust. I nodded.
"Yes. Very well."
The moment I agreed, the aide offered a pen heavy with ink, and I signed without a moment's pause. Out of habit I began to write Olivia Parnel, then changed it to Olivia Florence, and from the P onward the letters went crooked. I did not care.
When I had signed, the aide held the document out to Ian. Unexpectedly, he did not sign. He only stood there, staring at the page.
Excuse me? I already signed. Is he trying to back out?
It looked for all the world as if I were the one who had knocked this man flat and was marrying him by force. I jabbed an elbow into his side and whispered,
"What are you doing, Ian? Sign."
"Your Majesty."
Instead of signing, he raised his head and addressed the Emperor. Arms crossed and beaming, His Majesty answered in a voice sweet as honey.
"And why do you call me, cousin dearest in all the world?"
"Surely you don't mean to recognize a marriage on the strength of this single page."
"What? Of course there must be a wedding. This is only something I'm taking in advance, lest you or the young lady change your minds—a shack—ah. Merely administrative business."
Too late to take it back. I heard shackles, loud and clear!
That he would even ask... I didn't expect that.
In truth I had not given a wedding a single thought, so I stole a sidelong glance at Ian.
His face was frighteningly blank. Calmly, he said,
"Ian!"
I could not help crying his name in alarm.
Diamond Hall?
The imperial palace held any number of ballrooms, each shaped for a different purpose, but Diamond Hall was the most splendid of them all—a hall that opened once in several years, if it opened at all. Emperor Statis and Romeo had held their wedding and coronation there in a single ceremony.
And he wants that opened for my wedding?
However fond the Emperor might be of this man, that was impossible. I turned toward His Majesty. Sure enough, he was pointing at Ian with a trembling finger.
"You... you little—"
There. Appalled by the impudence. It had to be.
And yet, of all things, the Emperor—whom I had expected to start shouting at once—suddenly caught Ian in a crushing embrace.
It was fierce, and so brimming with affection that I could have believed he was Ian's father.
"Yes. I believed. Let every soul in the world call you impotent—I knew it could not be so. And now, at long last, such a magnificent specimen has appeared."
I beg your pardon.
A magnificent specimen.
Had the two of them been in the habit of showing each other their equipment?
"Ahem."
Realizing a moment too late that he had gushed in a fashion he should never have allowed himself in front of me, the Emperor cleared his throat and tried to claw back some semblance of authority. Far too late, of course.
Even closer than I thought.
I nodded to myself at the notion. Ian took the pen at last and signed. The Emperor looked immensely satisfied, and nodded.
"Good. I'll have it opened as early as next week. I'll ask the Empress, so look to her for help from now on."
"Thank you."
In truth, I knew little of Her Majesty the Empress. By the time I had properly begun to go about in society, illness had already shut her away from the world.
A chance, then, to learn what sort of person she is.
The audience that followed came to very little. Most of it was idle chatter, and one particular sentence was repeated a great many times.
"Take good care of my dear cousin."
He looked ready to find me adorable even if I had been picking my nose, and the whole affair left me rather dazed. On the way back, as we walked the neatly kept gardens of the imperial palace, I studied Ian through narrowed eyes.
"Your cousin seems to have suffered quite a lot."
"On my account?"
Ian frowned as though the idea were impossible. I laughed under my breath. What could the emperor of a nation possibly lack, that he would fuss over me so fondly—sister-in-law this, sister-in-law that?
All of it because of this man.
Even in my previous life he had gone on and on, my cousin, my cousin, like a tune stuck on a repeat, so I had already gathered that Ian was especially cherished. I had not imagined he would shatter a match he himself had arranged with the House of Parnel, stamp a marriage certificate, and thrust it into our hands.
He must have been desperate to see him married. And this man held out for twenty years. That was his own fault.
Still, what was obvious even to me seemed invisible to him. He gave a light shrug.
"His Majesty worries on his own. He has been lonely of late. Nothing to occupy him."
"For a man with nothing to do, he is far too kind to me."
Lonely? Nothing to do? Why would the Emperor be either? And if that truly were the reason, there was no need to be kind to me. A businesslike manner would have been quite enough.
"Setting that aside."
Neither the Emperor's manner nor the situation itself seemed to mean anything to Ian. Having let the subject drift off as if it were nothing, he brought up a matter with no connection to the moment at all.
"I think we ought to settle what we call each other."
What we call each other?
I tipped my head.
"Can't we just use our names?"
For a moment Ian said nothing. Then he inclined his head, just slightly, and spoke in a low, intimate voice.
"Wife."
The instant the word reached me, gooseflesh crept up my arms.
"Wife."
That was what James had called me. From a man of few words, that single word had always held far too many meanings, and I had always been left to puzzle over it.
Hearing it from Ian set my heart racing of its own accord, and James rose unbidden before me. I shook my head at once.
"N-not that."
"Then."
Ian's face drew close. His straight, finely shaped lips lingered at my ear and whispered, low.
My heart thudded. A shiver seemed to rise over my skin, and the tickle spread from the tip of my ear through my whole body. I hunched my shoulders and spun sharply away, my face burning scarlet as I rubbed at my ear. Infuriatingly, Ian was perfectly calm.
I pushed my lips into a pout and grumbled.