The Forgotten Field

Measured footsteps echoed through the darkness.

Gareth, seated on a bench in the garden while staring into the pond, turned his head toward the corridor.

Varkas, dressed impeccably in the formal uniform of the Imperial Knights, was walking down the long arcade connected to the garden. The sight of him resembled a serpent slowly gliding through deep, black water.

Gareth sometimes wondered why that was.

Pale blond hair the color of faded flax, blue eyes tinged with silver, skin like plaster...

Why did a man composed entirely of colors as dim and faded as old parchment give off such an ominous presence?

Whenever Gareth faced him, a chill always crept down his spine for no reason.

“Your Highness the Crown Prince.”

The man placed a hand over his chest in greeting. Gareth waved a hand irritably.

“Drop the useless formalities.”

Though he belonged to the Imperial Guard, the man would soon inherit the title of Grand Duke Siorcan and govern the eastern territories. He was not someone Gareth could truly treat carelessly.

Yet Gareth jerked his chin at him as if addressing some insignificant subordinate.

“How long are you going to make me look up at you? Sit.”

Despite the rudeness, the man’s expression did not change in the slightest. Neither displeased nor servile, he simply wore the same indifferent face as he sat down upon the marble bench.

The Crown Prince studied those perfectly sculpted features devoid of all humanity.

At first glance, he looked no different from usual, but it was not difficult to tell that he was in a rather foul mood.

Had things not gone well?

Narrowing his eyes, Gareth questioned him sharply.

“What happened with the interrogation? Don’t tell me you failed [N O V E L I G H T] to uncover the people behind it.”

“We learned everything that could be learned.”

The man answered in a flat voice as he loosened the tightly fastened top of his coat with one hand.

“But it will not be the answer Your Highness wishes to hear.”

One of Gareth’s brows arched upward.

“Explain.”

“The substance placed in Her Highness’s wine did not come from the Empress’s Palace.”

“Then where?”

“It was prescribed by an imperial apothecary to a maid serving in the main palace. Apparently, it is not even classified as a poison to begin with. Its only side effects are vomiting and stomach pain if consumed in large quantities at once, so it is not kept under especially strict supervision.”

“So you’re telling me some maid in the main palace suddenly lost her mind and drugged my sister’s goblet?”

The Crown Prince burst into a disbelieving laugh.

But the thick tendons in his neck stood taut. It was a clear sign that Gareth was furious to the core.

Yet Varkas’s gaze upon the flushed and enraged prince remained endlessly dry.

“The maid did not put the drug into the wine herself.”

“Then who the hell did?”

Losing patience, Gareth raised his voice.

“Stop dragging it out and give me the conclusion! If it wasn’t the Empress scheming and it wasn’t a maid acting alone, then who dared tamper with my sister’s drink?”

“The Second Imperial Princess did it.”

At the calm reply, Gareth abruptly fell silent.

“That bitch?”

The Crown Prince’s face twisted savagely.

Whenever he spoke of the Empress, Gareth resembled boiling lava. But whenever he mentioned the bastard daughter the woman had brought into the palace, he looked like a man forced to hold the filthiest thing in the world between his teeth.

A grinding sound escaped his clenched jaw.

“If it’s that lunatic bitch, then of course she’d do something like this. The moment it concerns my sister, jealousy drives her completely insane...”

Even at the vulgar curses fit for gutter thugs, Varkas showed no reaction whatsoever.

Staring hard at the man, Gareth still refused to let go of his suspicions toward the Empress.

“Even so, isn’t it too early to conclude that Senevier... that woman had nothing to do with this? There’s every possibility she incited her daughter...”

“If she had, she would have used a proper deadly poison instead of a childish drug like this.”

Varkas spoke coldly. His pale eyes gleamed faintly in the darkness.

“And if it had been the Empress, she would not have handled the aftermath so sloppily that she got caught.”

Unable to refute him, Gareth shut his mouth.

Having his words interrupted irritated him, but the contempt woven into Varkas’s voice pleased him immensely.

This young man who remained indifferent to everything sharpened his hostility only when it came to the disgrace of the imperial family—Talia Roem Gwirta.

It made Gareth feel reassured once again that this man was on his... on their side.

“Indeed... if it were Senevier, she wouldn’t jeopardize her own position with something so stupid.”

His mood somewhat improved, Gareth spoke in a lighter tone.

“So Talia ended up stabbing herself in the foot. I always knew that bitch would cause trouble someday.”

He smiled like the troublemaker who once terrorized the Academy halls.

“She must’ve lost her mind after having you stolen away by my sister. How arrogantly that bastard brat lorded over everyone while treating the heir of the grand ducal house like her personal servant. Now the knight she treated like a toy is about to become the consort of a ‘real’ Imperial Princess. With that rotten temper of hers, she must’ve finally snapped.”

The man said nothing.

Varkas Laedgo Siorcan was not someone who spoke more than necessary. His silence itself was not unusual.

But at times, Gareth found that silence unbearably irritating.

Like now.

Staring at him intently as though demanding an answer, Gareth continued.

“Either way, she won’t escape punishment this time. If we play this right, we might even frame it as attempted poisoning—”

“It will not go as Your Highness wishes.”

For the second time, he interrupted the Crown Prince.

Gareth’s eyes instantly sharpened. But the man gazing at the future emperor remained utterly calm.

“First, there is only circumstantial evidence. There is no decisive proof. If she decides to deny everything, it will not be easy to prove she was behind this.”

“We can simply use the maid who supplied the drug as a witness—!”

“Do you truly believe the testimony of a mere maid is enough to place Senevier’s eldest daughter before a tribunal?”

As Gareth searched for a rebuttal, Varkas continued evenly.

“Second, even if it becomes undeniably clear that the Second Imperial Princess was responsible, it will be difficult to impose severe punishment over nothing more than a drug that causes stomach pain. If she insists it was merely a harmless prank, at most she will receive a period of confinement.”

“A harmless prank?”

Having listened quietly until now, Gareth finally exploded.

He leapt to his feet and seized the future grand duke by the collar.

“Do you know what kind of humiliation the woman who’s supposed to become your wife suffered in front of everyone? Aila, who has never once shown herself in disarray, collapsed vomiting in the middle of a banquet hall! Do you have any idea how much pain she was in? And you call that a harmless prank...!”

As though reliving that day, the Crown Prince’s bronze face flushed red enough to be visible even in the darkness.

Grinding his teeth, he snarled,

“That day, everything happened so suddenly I overlooked it at first, but when Aila collapsed, I saw Talia standing far away smiling. That filthy bastard bitch deserves to be torn limb from limb for daring to do that to my sister—!”

“Your Highness.”

Gareth flinched and released him.

Varkas had not even raised his voice, yet cold sweat suddenly gathered along Gareth’s spine.

The Crown Prince stepped back cautiously while studying him.

With calm movements, the man straightened his disordered clothes.

“That woman is not worth this much of Your Highness’s attention.”

His voice was as matter-of-fact as saying night follows sunset.

“All she does is torment people with petty and malicious tricks like this. Should the future ruler of the Empire truly become so enraged over such trivial games?”

He spoke as though soothing a child.

Ordinarily, Gareth would have exploded at the audacity of being lectured. But he knew perfectly well that he had crossed the line first, so he remained silent.

The man slowly rose from his seat.

Though he was committing the discourtesy of leaving without the Crown Prince’s permission, his actions flowed as naturally as water.

“I have already sent medicinal herbs to calm Her Highness’s stomach. From now on, all food and drink served to Her Highness will also be strictly supervised.”

“So you’re telling me to bury the matter?”

“If Your Highness insists on uncovering the truth and punishing the Second Imperial Princess, I will not stop you. But I would prefer not to involve myself further.”

At the indifferent reply, Gareth’s face reddened.

Varkas seemed intent on dismissing the entire affair as nothing more than the malicious prank of a jealous, immature girl.

And perhaps he was right. If the Crown Prince and the heir to the eastern grand duchy became too invested in such a ridiculous incident, only their dignity would suffer.

But Gareth felt a strong sense of resistance toward the man’s coldness.

It was not merely his indifferent attitude toward Aila.

Gareth narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

“You’re not protecting that bitch, are you?”

The man, who had turned to leave, suddenly stopped and cast a frigid glance back over his shoulder.

At that moment, wind from the lakeside softly disturbed his ash-blond hair.

But it did nothing to soften the impression he gave off.

A smile sharp as a honed blade spread across his lips.

It was the first expression to appear on that face, which had remained as still as a mask.

“Me? Protect her?”

Varkas let out a low laugh as though he had heard something amusing.

But a razor-edged fury flashed within his blue eyes.

For a moment, Gareth lost the ability to speak.

He had known that this man despised Talia. But he had never imagined the hostility ran this deep.

Was he not a man whose emotions had been thoroughly carved away by priests?

In all the years Gareth had known him, he had never once seen Varkas openly display emotion.

What in the world had she done to make a man like this bare his teeth?

With naked curiosity, Gareth stared at him.

He had heard rumors that while serving as Talia Roem Gwirta’s guard knight, the man had endured endless humiliation from her. Yet Gareth had never believed someone like Varkas would actually be affected by the hysterics of a spoiled girl.

The man had always seemed too lofty, too untouchable for that.

To him, Talia Roem Gwirta should have been nothing more than an irritating nuisance.

But apparently that was not the case.

Varkas’s blue eyes, devoid of even the faintest warmth, gleamed coldly as he bit out the words,

“I simply never wish to become entangled with that woman again.”

Then, as though he had nothing further to say, he turned and walked back the way he had come.

Gareth silently watched him retreat soundlessly like a water serpent gliding across the lake.

Slowly, a vicious smile spread across his lips.

‘Whatever Talia did to him, it works in my favor.’

The man who should become his strongest supporter despised his enemy.

Would that not make their alliance all the stronger?

With a satisfied expression, Gareth rose from his seat.