The White Messenger

In the drawing room, silent as stone, the only sound to be heard from time to time was the soft click of a teacup being set down. The hush was so unnerving that more than a few of the maids, crushed under the weight of it, could barely manage to breathe.

Only two people in that room were at ease. One was Grand Duchess Julia Frihosen, and the other was Mia, the close-attendant maid who had served her since long before her marriage.

Mia's expression darkened as she watched the maids struggle even to draw breath. The Grand Duchess shot her a sidelong glance.

"You seem angry, Mia."

"Not at all, Your Grace. It's merely that these newly trained girls are so hopeless I can hardly bear to look at them. I apologize if they offended you."

At that, the Grand Duchess set down her teacup and looked over the line of maids standing shoulder to shoulder. They had already been struggling to breathe under the pressure she exuded, and now a few of them began to visibly tremble. The Grand Duchess looked away, as if they were no longer worth her attention. Mia, reading her mistress's expressionless face, caught her mood at once.

"I don't know who trained them, but they'll need to be trained again. Speak to the head maid."

"Yes, Your Grace. I'll see to it."

Seeing that the Grand Duchess had nothing more to say, Mia waved her hand and ushered the maids out. Once they had all gone and the door closed behind them, Mia noticed the empty teacup and promptly refilled it.

"And Eleanor?"

"She has not yet returned home."

The Grand Duchess glanced toward the window. The rain that had been pouring down had stopped at some point. As she gazed at the cleared sky, she felt an involuntary wave of relief.

Mia knew the woman she had served for so many years down to the smallest gesture, the faintest expression, the subtlest turn of phrase — so she understood perfectly that the Grand Duchess was thinking, thank goodness the rain has stopped. Mia smiled with her eyes. Unfortunately, the Grand Duchess caught her doing it. She hastily composed herself, but it was already too late.

"What are you smiling at?"

"Oh, it's nothing, Your Grace. It's just... it seems you're worried about the young lady."

"And so my worrying amused you, did it?"

It sounded like a sharp rebuke on the surface, but Mia simply shook her head with a light laugh. The Grand Duchess was merely a little embarrassed at having her heart laid bare.

"Of course not, Your Grace."

"Hmph. I can see it plain as day on your face, so what's the point of pretending otherwise?"

"You're quite right, Your Grace. I apologize. I'll be more careful in the future."

"All talk, as always. You're very quick with your answers, though."

The Grand Duchess pursed her lips and turned her head away. When she was alone with Mia, who had been by her side since childhood, she sometimes slipped back into the person she used to be. As a girl she had been a fussy, perpetually dissatisfied little troublemaker — a picture utterly unrecognizable from the woman she was now.

And she had always had two friends at her side, even bigger troublemakers than herself. One of them was already... The Grand Duchess stopped herself there and shook her head. She did not wish to think about it any further.

Mia, watching her, swallowed a sigh. She knew exactly what her mistress had been thinking.

Mia turned her head toward the corner of the room. There sat a gilded birdcage, and inside it a pure white dove perched with its head raised, placid and still. Following Mia's gaze, the Grand Duchess looked at the messenger bird as well. Her expression shifted at once.

"There was word from Sasha?"

Mia unconsciously glanced at the door before nodding.

"Yes."

With a nod, Mia drew a tightly rolled white paper from her breast and handed it to the Grand Duchess, who unfolded the note with a trembling heart. She read it through in an instant, then furrowed her brow in astonishment. Mia asked urgently:

"Is it bad news, Your Grace?"

The Grand Duchess collected herself and shook her head.

"No. It's good news. Charles is returning to the capital soon."

"Truly?"

"Yes."

The Grand Duchess was nodding along pleasantly when her face clouded over and she let out a long sigh.

"What is the matter?"

"His Majesty the Emperor will never easily permit House Berihmen to enter the capital. He hates even to hear the family mentioned. And a command to return, of all things... Could His Majesty have had a change of heart?"

Mia considered this for a moment, then smiled lightly and began kneading the Grand Duchess's shoulders. Her hands were skilled indeed, and the worry slowly drained from the Grand Duchess's face.

"Don't worry yourself over that. You know how the young master is, don't you? If it weren't something he could manage, he would never have sent word to His Majesty at all."

Thinking of her nephew brought a natural smile to the Grand Duchess's face. The moment that perpetually blank countenance brightened, the whole room seemed to grow lighter with it.

"I suppose you're right. If it's Sasha, he'll surely have anticipated everything and planned this out already."

"Yes, he will. But I wonder — why would the young master suddenly decide to come home?"

At that, the Grand Duchess faltered and fell deep into thought. After the incident, Charles had sworn he would never return until he uncovered the secret surrounding their grandfather's death. She had tried to persuade him time and again, but his resolve had never wavered. And now that same man had changed his mind. Truthfully, she couldn't fathom why her nephew had turned so abruptly.

"Yes. You know as well as I do — that boy had no intention of coming back until he uncovered the secret of grandfather's death. So why, of all times, would he harden his resolve to return now? Mia. Does anything come to mind?"

Mia, too, thought the Grand Duchess had a point and turned the question over carefully, but nothing in particular surfaced for her either.

"Hmm. I really couldn't say. Ah—"

"What? Did something come to you?"

At Mia's sudden cry of realization, the Grand Duchess stared at her with breathless anticipation. But Mia decided the idea was absurd even to her own ears and quickly let out an amused laugh instead.

"No, it's nothing, Your Grace. Now that I think it over, it's an impossible guess. Surely not. It couldn't be."

"What on earth is it? Even if you're wrong, don't keep it to yourself — share it with me. Must there really be secrets between the two of us?"

"My, Your Grace, it's nothing grand enough to be called a secret. Just a fanciful notion, nothing more."

"Then tell me what this fanciful notion is, will you?"

Mia bit her lip in embarrassment and hesitated again and again. When the Grand Duchess grew so exasperated she was nearly out of breath, Mia reluctantly opened her mouth. They were the only two in the drawing room, yet Mia lowered her voice as if afraid someone might overhear.

"When they were children, the young lady and the young master were close, were they not?"

The Grand Duchess, caught off guard by the out-of-nowhere remark, blinked blankly for a moment before belatedly nodding.

"They were. Why bring that up all of a sudden?"

"The young master was terribly fond of the young lady back then, wasn't he? Perhaps... perhaps he still is."

The Grand Duchess's eyes went round.

"Well, that was... they were children. It's only natural for a child to be fond of a playmate their own age. Surely you don't mean... Mia, are you saying Charles is in love with Elle?"

"That is what I think, Your Grace."

"Ridiculous. Impossible."

Even as she laughed and shook her head in disbelief, the smile slowly faded from the Grand Duchess's face. The two children had often played together and been close — but that was more than a decade past. Surely Charles couldn't have feelings for Eleanor. Of course it was nonsense, she told herself. But if it were true, why had Charles never breathed a word of it to her all this time?

Though, come to think of it, there would have been nothing she could do for him even had he confided in her. In over ten years, Charles and Eleanor had never once exchanged so much as an ordinary letter of greeting.

Besides, Eleanor already had a betrothed — one arranged for her when she was still a child. Eleanor did not love her betrothed, but she seemed to have no great objection to the match either. The Grand Duke Prihoson doted on his daughter, and unless Eleanor herself asked to dissolve the arrangement, the marriage would proceed.

Even if Mia's guess were true — even if Charles truly did love Eleanor — neither Eleanor nor the Grand Duke Prihoson would ever consent.

The Grand Duchess privately believed that if the two were joined, no finer match could be made. She knew Charles's character better than anyone, and she had watched her stepdaughter Eleanor grow up with her own eyes. Were they to marry, they would make wonderful partners for one another. But that had only ever been her own one-sided wish.

"...What a shame. What a pity."

Mia carefully studied the Grand Duchess's complexion. When her mistress's lips quivered with unspoken regret, Mia's kneading hands grew all the more tender. She wanted nothing more than for the Grand Duchess not to worry herself too much — and so she thought hard about how she might ease her mistress's heart, if only a little.