Don't Keep a Dog in the Garden - Chapter 7

In the depths of darkness, the Grand Duke’s carriage stopped in front of the Inspection Bureau built of black brick.

Among the splendid and beautiful buildings of the imperial palace, it was the most desolate, located in the farthest corner. Outwardly, it was nothing more than a modest single-story building, but underground, there were three levels with countless rooms.

Cassia descended the spiraling staircase and stopped on the second basement level, where she had been dragged the day before.

One level further down lay a space that officially didn’t exist.

The pitch-black void without a single light was like the maw of a guard dog keeping watch over hell.

Cassia turned her gaze from the stairs below and stepped into the corridor of the second basement level.

One of the inspectors went to announce her arrival, and from the interrogation room at the far end of the corridor, Whisker emerged with a pleased expression.

“Your Grace, you’ve arrived?”

The scratch left by a rose thorn still marked his smiling cheek.

Cassia ignored him and entered the interrogation room he had come out of.

Inside, with nothing but a small table placed in the middle, sat Captain of the Guard Mikhail, his head hung low.

“Captain of the Guard.”

At Cassia’s voice, Mikhail lifted his head.

Despite her worry that he might have been tortured, though his face was pale, he appeared unscathed.

“Y-Your Grace the Grand Duke. Please spare me.”

Mikhail rose from his seat and fell to his knees on the floor. The Captain of the Guard, who shouldn’t kneel before no one but the Emperor.

As though that were not enough, he lowered his head all the way to the ground before Cassia and begged.

“Please spare me!”

Relieved for a moment that his body was unharmed, she realized at once that he was far from fine.

Looking down at the weeping captain, Cassia was taken aback, and behind her, Whisker let out a small laugh.

“A wise choice, Captain. Her Grace is a merciful one.”

At Whisker’s voice, Mikhail pressed his forehead to the floor and began to plead even more desperately.

The Captain of the Guard, entrusted with the palace’s security, was favored by the Emperor nearly as much as Whisker himself.

He was not only from a high noble family, but his very position as Captain was an honor.

And yet in barely half a day, he had been reduced to this.

Suppressing a sigh, Cassia asked Whisker, “What in the world have you done?”

“As you can see, nothing at all.”

With a face as if he were on an outing, Whisker pulled out a chair for her.

He removed his outer coat and spread it over the hard wooden chair.

“Your Grace, please sit. Tonight will be a long one as well.”

Looking down at the crumpled green jacket that resembled crushed grass, Cassia reached out and set it aside.

She placed it on the table and sat.

From the start, she had no thought of spending another long night with him.

Cassia addressed Mikhail directly, still prostrate on the floor.

“Captain, did you kill Prince Mesus?”

“No…!”

Mikhail leapt up as if struck by lightning and shouted, then fell silent.

He rolled his eyes toward Whisker standing behind Cassia, and failed to finish his words.

Even just from his shaking eyes, she could guess what he was thinking.

Would he live if he denied it, or should he confess and die quickly?

Cassia tapped the table lightly with her fingertips to draw his attention back to her.

“Speak the truth, Captain. Only then will you live.”

As Mikhail glanced between her and Whisker, hesitating to open his mouth, an urgent knock came at the interrogation room door.

Whisker opened it, and an inspector, panting as if he had run, whispered something with a grave expression.

Even after the inspector bowed and left, Whisker didn’t move.

“What is it?” Cassia asked, watching his back.

He slowly turned around. His pale face betrayed no expression, while his red eyes glimmered strangely.

He turned his gaze toward Cassia, met her golden eyes, and smiled faintly.

“The Crown Prince has been found dead.”

Whisker had been right.

The long night was coming.

***

Cassia and Whisker rushed at once to the place where the Crown Prince’s corpse had been found.

Not far from the Inspection Bureau, beneath the northern spire of the castle wall, figures holding torches had gathered.

When Whisker approached, the Captain of the Guard’s adjutant blocked his path with a grim face.

“Where is our captain?”

“Step aside.”

“Where did you drag our captain off to?!”

The adjutant, who had failed to protect his superior, cried out with a face full of grief.

The Inspection Bureau, with Whisker at its head, and the Guard overlapped in several areas of duty.

More accurately, it was that the Inspection Bureau, which had begun as a temporary institution, had come to trespass into the Guard’s exclusive domain with the Emperor’s full confidence.

The Guard, a formal institution, was being pushed back by the rolling stone that was the Inspection Bureau. And so, the two institutions had long been on poor terms.

What’s more, with the Captain of the Guard dragged off to the Inspection Bureau today, the Guard was like a stirred hornet’s nest.

Of course, Whisker was not the sort of man to concern himself with such things.

Whisker, with a chilling smile, said to the adjutant of the Captain of the Guard, “You already know where your captain is, don’t you? If you’re that worried, why not go see him? The Inspection Bureau is always open.”

Whisker shoved past the adjutant, who couldn’t answer, and moved on.

Cassia glanced briefly at the adjutant trembling with a pale face, but she too had no time to spare.

The moment she saw the Crown Prince’s corpse, she had no room left for any other thoughts.

Though she prided herself on not being shaken by most things, it was a sight almost unbearable to behold.

They said he had fallen from the spire.

It was fortunate that it was a dark night. Had it been beneath the sun in broad daylight, she might have collapsed and retched.

“He didn’t miss his step during a nighttime stroll, I suppose.”

Whisker, examining the body, spoke in a bland voice and stretched out his hand.

At the sight of him probing the severed section where the Crown Prince Dion’s head was half detached from his body, Cassia stifled her nausea and turned her head away.

After looking back and forth between the spire above and the Crown Prince’s corpse, Whisker gave a signal with his chin to one of the inspectors guarding the area.

Though he had rolled long at the Inspection Bureau alongside Whisker, even he seemed shocked at the state of the Crown Prince’s body, his face pale as he began his report.

“The body was discovered thirty minutes ago. It took some time to confirm the identity. Other than that, he fell from the spire; nothing else has been revealed yet.”

“His neck was cut. The Crown Prince was assassinated,” Whisker announced firmly.

Just moments earlier, he had examined the cut wound on the Crown Prince Dion’s neck.

Though the body had been heavily damaged from the fall, the wound was clearly made by a blade.

The inspector immediately agreed with Whisker’s declaration.

Though the coroner would later announce the official cause of death, the Bureau Chief’s predictions had never been wrong.

“Then it seems he was assassinated and thrown from the spire afterward.”

“The northern spire should have been restricted, should it not?”

“That’s correct. But the lock was missing.”

“Witnesses?”

“As of now, none.”

“The Crown Prince’s last movements?”

“According to His Highness’s attendants, after dinner, he went out for a walk. After that, no one saw His Highness again.”

Whisker let out a hum and looked up at the spire. Then he took a lamp from the inspector’s hand and asked, “His Majesty?”

“He should have received the report by now.”

“He must be greatly shocked.”

As he spoke the last words, a mischievous smile briefly crossed his face.

The inspector bowed his head without a word, and Whisker turned to Cassia.

“Shall we go see together?”

Cassia let out a sigh and nodded.

Following the Second Prince, now the Crown Prince as well.

The Emperor would be enraged. His wrath would in some way or another fall upon Cassia, and at this moment, she had to act.

When Whisker pulled the handle of the rusty iron door, the lockless door creaked open.

Beyond the iron door, where no sunlight reached, was pitch-black darkness that even reeked of rejection.

With a provocative smile, Whisker looked back at Cassia.

As if asking whether she truly could go on, and Cassia was the first to place her foot on the stairway leading upward.