Don't Keep a Dog in the Garden - Chapter 3

When the sun rose, the rain stopped.

It was a morning when the heavy air full of moisture weighed down on the imperial palace.

The palace servants preparing for the funeral of the Second Prince busily came and went, but none dared even breathe loudly.

In that grim tension, Grand Duke Diorent, who had been interrogated all night, was summoned before the Emperor.

She was accompanied by Whisker Mastiff, the Duke infamous as the head of the Inspection Bureau who could fabricate crimes out of nothing.

Emperor Giiern listened to Whisker’s brief report and turned his indifferent gaze on Cassia.

He enjoyed flaunting his authority, being the only one in the Empire who could force her to kneel.

Without permission to rise, Cassia remained kneeling on one knee, her right hand pressed to her left breast in a gesture of respect.

Giiern stared down at Cassia’s flawless posture, then asked Whisker, “There is no evidence, you say?”

His eyes indifferent, his voice indifferent.

Whisker, bowing his head, curled only one corner of his mouth where no one could see, mocking the Emperor.

For the past six years, he had rolled at the Emperor’s side.

Giiern liked to appear detached from all things, but Whisker could see it clearly.

He was deeply displeased now.

Whisker barely restrained his expression and lifted his head. “Yes, Your Majesty. There was no blood spatter on the Grand Duke’s clothes consistent with inflicting a stab wound, the Second Prince’s attendants testified that the Grand Duke carried no sword, and also the Grand Duke…”

“There is no need to repeat yourself, Bureau Chief. So the Grand Duke is not guilty?”

Cutting him off and repeating the same question, Giiern’s voice carried impatient irritation.

Whisker tightened his lips and controlled his expression. “Yes. More than anything, the Grand Duke had no motive to harm His Highness the Prince.”

“Then who killed Mesus? Was it you, Bureau Chief?”

Giiern’s tone was as if joking, yet his eyes glimmered with gloomy suspicion.

The Emperor’s son had been murdered inside the palace.

The realization that even he might not be safe enraged him.

Who killed Mesus?

Before him knelt one he wished were the culprit and one who could be the culprit.

Meeting the Emperor’s eyes, where long-harbored desires dripped into suspicion, Whisker answered calmly, “Of course not. The motive must be one of two things: either a grudge against His Highness Prince Mesus, or an attempt to frame the Grand Duke. I will find the culprit, Your Majesty.”

The two motives Whisker mentioned did not apply to Cassia.

Cassia, indifferent to all, would never have borne a grudge against Mesus.

If she ever resolved to kill someone, it certainly wouldn’t have been Mesus.

Nor would she frame herself, so the second possibility was excluded as well.

Giiern clicked his tongue with regret.

After a brief thought, he conceived of a way not to waste the opportunity his son’s death had given him.

“Could it not be that the Bureau Chief and the Grand Duke are colluding and lying together?”

Pretending to aim at Cassia while testing him, Giiern’s scheme made Whisker unable to suppress a smile.

Turning the corner of his eyes gently toward Cassia seated beside him, he answered, “That is a most thrilling thought, Your Majesty. But the Grand Duke does not take my hand.”

“Who knows if, to escape the crime of murdering the prince, she might have even clutched a dog’s paw.”

At the Emperor’s words, Cassia, who had shown no movement until now, lifted her head.

Meeting the golden eyes that symbolized glory, Giiern’s ashen eyes filled with both inferiority and superiority at once.

The direct descendant of the Golden Dawn. One who shone brighter than the Emperor himself.

Though countless schemes to drag her down had been avoided over the years, in the end, the Emperor of Fedemillon was Giiern.

This incident was the perfect opportunity to eliminate Cassia.

It was also a chance to correct the insolent habits of the hound whose eyes had grown too fierce.

Giiern said in a solemn voice like a sentence, “If the two of you did not join hands to kill Mesus, then join hands to find the culprit. I grant you one month. If in that time you fail to bring me the one who killed the prince, I will deem you conspirators in the prince’s murder.”

It was an obvious absurdity, but the one forcing it was the Emperor. Neither Cassia nor Whisker could say otherwise.

Both bowed their heads at once, accepting the Emperor’s order, and withdrew.

The Emperor’s true intent was clearer than the morning sky, yet in any case, they had bought a month’s time.

As Cassia hastened her steps down the stairs leading to the main palace garden, Whisker, following behind her, said, “I didn’t expect His Majesty to come after you in this way.”

Though his tone sounded as if worried, he couldn’t hide the laughter in his voice.

“You seem to be enjoying this situation.”

Cassia shot back without even glancing at him.

Despite her rebuke, Whisker couldn’t hold back his laughter.

Just as Cassia said, he found the entire situation entertaining.

The Emperor had shown some wit at last.

And now he had the perfect opportunity to linger by Cassia’s side under the pretext of cooperation.

“Yes, Your Grace. I am enjoying it.”

At Whisker’s cheerful reply, Cassia stared at him in disbelief.

Seeing his face alight like a dog about to be taken for a walk, she was even more exasperated.

Then she thought of someone who had been just as delighted but had tried hard to conceal it, and let out a sigh.

“His Majesty seemed to be enjoying himself as well.”

“It must be a good opportunity for him too.”

An opportunity to condemn Cassia.

Even as he solemnly spouted nonsense, Giiern had looked pleased.

Cassia stopped walking and turned her body toward Whisker. “Just hours ago, someone died unjustly. And you find that amusing?”

For once, Cassia’s face revealed an expression.

She had witnessed a life end and been drenched in that person’s blood.

Though she could never call her relationship with Mesus a good one, his miserable corpse remained an uncomfortable memory.

Watching her displeased face, Whisker searched for an answer, but what could he do?

He was in far too good a mood.

Before the piercing golden eyes, Whisker, poor at masking his feelings, deflected with his master’s example.

“Even his own father didn’t grieve his death.”

“And that means you may delight in it?”

“Dogs take after their masters.”

Whisker shrugged, and Cassia fixed him with her sharp gaze for a long moment.

Just before that unreadable look faded, what flashed for an instant was unmistakably disgust.

Cassia turned away from him and resumed descending the stairs.

Taking two steps at a time, Whisker leapt ahead to block her path, tilting his head as he asked, “Did you not suffer many troubles because of Prince Mesus? Yet you pity him?”

“Yes, I pity him. The fact that he troubled me is no reason not to.”

Whisker’s eyes widened slightly at her reply.

A look of doubt as if questioning her sincerity, a flicker of surprise at her tolerance, and finally a smile that spread across his face.

“I want to become your dog, and resemble you.”

Whether jest or sincerity, Cassia didn’t wish to know. She clicked her tongue. “I told you, I have no hobby of keeping beasts.”

She left only that curt answer and tried to pass by his side.

But again, Whisker blocked her as she started down the stairs, this time holding out his hand.

“Still, for now you have no choice but to take my hand, don’t you?”

Cassia looked down at his hand, her eyes reflecting complicated feelings.

It was an order given directly by the Emperor.

To cooperate and find the culprit—whether she liked it or not, she had to play along.

When she lifted her head to look at Whisker’s face, he was smiling like a sociable dog.

What on earth were they plotting?

Had the Emperor laid a trap to ensnare her in his schemes?

And had this man walked into the flames, laughing?

Perhaps the Emperor and Whisker had planned all of this together.

If she took that hand now, wouldn’t it be like thrusting her own neck into the noose, unable to escape Whisker’s snare?”

Her mind whirled with confusion as Cassia looked back at the imperial palace.

The splendid and beautiful palace of Fedemillon.

At the end of the portico supported by Doric columns stood massive gilded doors, and beyond them lurked the most powerful man in the Empire, his gloomy eyes gleaming.

Perhaps the moment she couldn’t avoid had already arrived.