Thunder at the Villa Door

"..."

"Mmph! Mmmph!"

When Cesare simply stood in place staring for a long while, the man bound to the chair squirmed all the more desperately, as if begging to have his limbs freed.

'...Hmm. I suppose I could at least take off the gag.' It wasn't as though he meant to undo the bindings entirely, and that much ought to pose no danger.

Cesare approached slowly and whisked the cloth away from the man's mouth.

"...Hah! Th-thank... you...!"

Gulping down ragged breaths, the man looked up at Cesare. Between clothes soaked through with sweat and tears, bloodstains and scars ran everywhere. He had clearly been put through brutal torture.

In a voice shaking like a leaf, the man spilled out his pleas.

"P-please... h-help me...! The Fourth Prince has lost his mind! I t-told him everything I knew, just like he demanded, but...!"

"..."

"The madman decided I was amusing, and he's kept me locked up in here for years...!"

Cesare listened in silence to the man's frantic stream of words, tilting his head to one side.

'Years?' Did this man hold some tremendous secret? 'Lysian is hardly the type to take such a sudden interest in just anything.' And above all, in the original novel as Cesare remembered it, no such character had ever appeared.

"Tell me more."

He had been about to hear the whole story in greater detail — and that was the exact moment it happened.

"My, my."

A low, soft voice brushed against his ear.

"...!"

Cesare's whole body went rigid in an instant. When had he approached? Lysian was standing right at his back, close enough to touch.

"I distinctly remember telling you this area was forbidden. And now you've gone and dragged the Duke in here with you."

Lysian narrowed his eyes as he looked at Caleb.

"...Well, I suppose Sir Teon might do something like that."

Then his slender gaze slid over to Cesare.

"The truly wicked one here, of course, would be the Duke of Valois, who led poor naive Sir Teon astray. Wouldn't you say?"

Lysian flashed a smile at Cesare.

Cesare did his best to hide the way his heart plummeted and parried with forced calm.

"...I hardly think that's something for you to say, Your Highness the Fourth Prince, having just caught us in such a suspicious scene."

"Haha..."

Lysian chuckled low and began to move. The steady tap of his shoes echoed through the silent chamber.

Before long he stood before the man bound to the chair, drenched in blood, and picked up the gag lying on the floor. Then, tying it carefully back over the man's mouth, he spoke as though nothing at all were out of place.

"If I claimed I did all this because I have somewhat... unusual tastes... you wouldn't believe me, would you?"

"Would anyone believe such an absurd excuse?"

Cesare shot back, incredulous.

"What a shame."

Having sealed the man's mouth perfectly, Lysian slowly straightened. In that instant, the air in the chamber turned cold and heavy.

"But even an absurd excuse would be in your interest to believe, Duke."

"..."

"My oath not to harm you holds, after all, only for as long as you remain inside this villa."

Lysian's eyes curved sweetly.

"Put another way, it means that the very moment you step even one foot beyond this villa, I am free to harm you. The same goes for that darling child of yours."

"...!"

Cesare's brow knotted fiercely. It was the very moment his fist clenched tight.

"Now, now, don't be so angry, Duke."

Lysian stepped one pace closer. Then, gently caressing Cesare's cheek with his large hand, he whispered.

"The very fact that I warn you in advance like this means, after all, that I would rather not harm you in such a way."

"And you claim that isn't a threat?"

"That depends entirely on how the listener chooses to interpret it. But I would prefer to call it a warning."

Lysian drove the nail home with a frosty smile.

"You have merely witnessed my unusual tastes. Isn't that so, Duke?"

"..."

And he called this not a threat?

Dumbfounded, Cesare twisted his lips into a crooked smile and stepped back a pace, out of reach of that hand.

"...It seems a rather shameful taste to be flaunting so brazenly."

If anything, it would almost have been better if he'd come across as suspicious instead.

With that perfectly respectable face of his, his taste ran to abducting men, locking them in a secret basement, and committing such sadistic acts upon them. Wasn't that rather hardcore?

"I would prefer you call it a somewhat distinctive taste."

But even that, Lysian brushed off with shameless aplomb, as though it were nothing at all.

Cesare pressed on, as though the very notion were beneath dignity.

"Men like you, Your Highness, are what the world commonly calls a 'pervert.'"

"Haha. I said distinctive."

"...Pervert."

"You really do make things difficult."

The murderous tension that had held his life hostage mere moments ago vanished without a trace, leaving behind a petty, childish war of words.

Drained, Cesare clicked his tongue and gently soothed the baby tucked in his arms.

"...In any case, let's go back to the bedroom. As far as I'm concerned, I saw nothing at all."

Cesare turned on his heel first and started toward the stairs.

"...A wise choice, Duke."

Listening to Lysian's voice fade behind him, Cesare climbed the dark stairs in silence.

His mind was spinning fast.

'Suspicious beyond all belief, certainly... but...' There was no such thing as kindness without a price in this world. Surely Lysian had his own reasons, his own purposes, for adopting so friendly a stance toward him.

'But even so, I mustn't break with him.' Cesare already had an enemy, after all.

Here and now, the most dangerous enemy in the world.

Leoneld.

To survive the original novel's protagonist, mad with revenge, it was right to take Lysian's hand for the moment, however murky the man's hidden side might be.

At least inside this villa, where the Circle Oath bound him, he was safe.

'Keep a healthy measure of wariness — but never break with him entirely.' With that resolution, Cesare walked out toward the light of the study pouring down the stairs.

And just like that, several more days slipped swiftly by.

Cesare was gradually settling into the villa's tranquility, and Lysian was... in a certain sense, enjoying that peace with tremendous enthusiasm.

"There now, little one. Say 'Papa.'"

Lysian crooned, softly poking the cheek of the child in his arms — all while concealing his sinister design.

"Oo, ooh...?"

There was no chance that a tiny scrap of a baby, still too young to manage even a proper babble, could see through his dark schemes.

The child merely blinked its enormous eyes, seemingly fascinated by the red gaze glittering before it.

Watching that peaceful, shameless tableau from behind, Cesare's brow furrowed without mercy.

Thwack!

"Ack!"

With a vicious crack, Lysian's head snapped forward.

Cesare had brought the thick document binder in his hand down on the back of his skull without the slightest mercy.

Snatching the child out of Lysian's arms, Cesare fixed him with a gaze cold enough to sting.

"Do have some restraint, Your Highness the Fourth Prince."

"Haha, why ever so? A child learning Papa's face is very important education, you know."

Even as he rubbed his throbbing head, Lysian grinned ear to ear as if something pleased him immensely.

It was a smile of unparalleled loathsomeness.

"That child is mine. And you are hardly the biological father."

"Then we shall simply make it so in the future, won't we? Think of it as practicing ahead of time."

"If you're going to spout nonsense, shut your mouth."

Genuinely revolted, Cesare gently covered the ears of the child in his arms.

He feared what influence that lunatic might have on the baby.

Lysian gazed upon even that sight as though it were desperately adorable, and shrugged his shoulders with leisurely ease.

It was the very moment their childish yet cutthroat sparring carried on —

Krrrumble—CRASH—!

With a savage peal of thunder, a towering deluge began to pour from the sky.

In an instant, darkness swallowed the world in every direction, and thick ropes of rain beat furiously against the windows.

And then —

Bang! Bang! Bang—!

Cutting through the roar of the downpour, the villa's great front door thundered as though it would be torn from its hinges.

It was a sound far too violent and oppressive to be a mere visitor calling.

At the door's splintering clamor, Cesare's body went rigid as stone. The fingertips that drew the child in his arms ever tighter trembled, ever so faintly.

The beaming smile Lysian had worn only moments before evaporated in a heartbeat.

A chill of killing intent swept across his darkened crimson eyes.

Bang—!

At last, the mansion's great door tore loose with a shriek.

Bursting inside, drenched with rain, came knights clad in armor black as night. The imperial crest engraved upon their breastplates gleamed stark and vivid between flashes of lightning.

They were the personal knight order of the new Emperor.

Their armor clashing, they had the parlor surrounded in moments — and from their midst, a man stepped forward.

The commander at the head of the detachment growled a warning at Cesare, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword.

"By order of His Majesty the Emperor."

His voice settled heavier than the roar of the storm itself.

"Duke of Valois. Come with us quietly."