Winter Bud - Chapter 60

Of course, even if those children were born after such difficult pregnancies, they were raised by their masters, so even if they were their own, they couldn’t hold them or nurse them. They couldn’t even dare call their names. Even if they gave birth to them themselves, they had to bow their heads and call them ‘Young Lady’ or ‘Young Master,’ and Nanna thought their lives were pitiful too.

So compared to those women, her situation might be exceptionally good. At least for now…. Yes, at least for now, she could still hold her babies. She was still allowed to call their names.

“I’ll try to pay more attention to you.”

“….”

“Now that I think about it, I was too harsh. There was no reason to treat you that roughly.”

The Emperor murmured calmly as if confessing. Nanna looked at his face, now dulled of sharpness. His elegant features were refined and sharp. The harmonious curves of the gentle slope and smooth lines made his face stunningly handsome. But Nanna hardly felt his beauty anymore.

He said, “Nanna.” Now that she thought about it, she noticed a change. The Emperor rarely called her by name. He always said “you.” As if she had no name. When he didn’t call her that, he’d refer to her as “this” or “that,” and sometimes muttered “wench.” But now, he said, “Nanna.”

“Answer me.”

“…Yes.”

“I’ll treat you kindly now.”

He smiled faintly. Nanna parted her lips, her face on the verge of collapse. She wanted to ask, “Why…” What had changed in his heart? In the past, he considered the very idea of making Nanna his consort an insult. He thought holding Nanna in his arms was a betrayal of Thea and tormented her endlessly because of it. And now….

Nanna turned her head. She didn’t know what else to say. The Emperor gently pulled her into his arms and kissed her softly on the cheek.

***

The garden in the inner palace, where the Empress mainly stayed, was extremely romantic and elegant. The geometrically aligned green hedges and ornamental trees boasted a restrained beauty and a classic charm alongside refined structures.

It was the season when the harsh summer sunlight was slowly fading. She glanced up at the olive trees planted as landscape trees. Representing wisdom and mercy since ancient times, the olive trees planted all over the inner palace were lush with green leaves.

The inner palace where Nanna briefly stayed while Thea was “asleep” hadn’t changed much. In truth, even as a consort, she was just a puppet, so she probably couldn’t decorate the palace to her liking or indulge in luxury.

They said she hardly attended noblewomen’s salons or even managed the inner palace household due to repeated pregnancies and childbirth.

Her relationship with the Empress Dowager wasn’t particularly bad, but her relationship with the Emperor, her husband, was poor, and due to his one-sided distrust and ongoing torment, she had no chance to establish herself. And it’s not like she had strong backing either. Nanna was truly just the Emperor’s womb wearing Everhardt’s shell.

“What are you thinking about, Your Majesty the Empress?”

One of the noblewomen walking alongside her asked, looking at Thea. Thea lightly shook her head and slowly opened her lips.

“Nothing has been touched here.”

“Right? His Majesty cared for it with all his heart each season, thinking of Your Majesty.”

The noblewoman smiled softly as she spoke. Thea let out a chuckle. Perhaps thinking her laugh sounded quite cynical, the noblewoman hesitated with her red lips before turning her head. They headed not for the gazebo prepared in one corner of the garden, but under the shade made by the spruce trees.

Today, she simply wanted to feel a pastoral delight. The maids laid down soft cloth beneath the trees like a mat. Then they placed a picnic basket in the center and gathered around it. Thea looked down at young Alexis cradled in the nanny’s arms. The baby, as gentle as a lamb, gazed at Thea.

“How adorable.”

One of the noblewomen picked up the baby from the nanny in Thea’s stead. When she handed him a sugar cookie, he clutched it in his tiny hand and sucked on it with his little lips. It was an incredibly cute sight. His teeth hadn’t fully come in yet, so he couldn’t bite or chew, only suck at it. Thea’s lips curved as she saw her half-brother, unafraid of strangers, receiving the noblewomen’s caresses.

Her father said Alexis was his son. He didn’t bother to hide it from Thea, nor from Orestes. He even said he could show them proof verified by an alchemist if they demanded it. Proof that confirmed blood ties.

But Thea didn’t need such evidence to believe it. Alexis wasn’t her husband’s child. Even if it was difficult to tell by appearance, having taken after the mother, there was a stark difference compared to Orestes’s other children.

It was hard to pinpoint what the difference was, but even though the child wasn’t a year old yet, there was a subtle sense of strangeness. This baby who looked like a plush bear was her father’s only son, and perhaps that’s why.

Thea found it easier to be around Alexis than around Slan or Stella, who could already understand words. Her father’s illegitimate child felt more bearable than her husband’s children born of another woman. Besides, Alexis was gentler than his older siblings, who tended to be rather sensitive. Though it was a bit troublesome when he cried hard since he couldn’t speak properly yet, he seemed better than the others who stiffly called her “Empress Mother” and shrank back like strangers.

The Empress and the noblewomen gathered together under the shade of the spruce trees, enjoying the cool breeze. Dressed in transparent chiffon summer dresses, the ladies nibbled on mafrang berries and sipped cool iced tea sweetened with honey.

Suddenly, one noblewoman looked at Alexis and gave a faint smile. Though the child wasn’t born from the Empress’s womb, he was unmistakably the Emperor’s legitimate second son. The noblewoman who had been stroking the soft, lush silver hair lifted her head and asked:

“Isn’t the Second Prince turning one soon?”

Thea nodded. The noblewoman smiled sweetly. She had just recently married and said she was preparing for pregnancy. This was the age when children were at their cutest. Thea turned her gaze back to her half-brother.

Her father openly wanted this baby to be accepted. He seemed to want to declare the child as his own officially. She couldn’t understand his intentions. Even if he was the duke’s only son, Alexis was illegitimate. He couldn’t inherit the ducal title or live as part of the ducal family.

In that case, wouldn’t it be better to let the rumors rest and allow him to live as a prince? The Emperor, on the other hand, didn’t care to question the child’s lineage or dispute it. Probably because of Nanna.

If it came to that, they’d have to dig into the circumstances of how Nanna came to be pregnant with this child. It would be a scandal for the imperial family, and while punishing Nanna, they’d have to confront the duke as well. They’d have to determine whether it was an affair or rape.

Either way, Nanna would be held responsible for having borne an illegitimate child during her time as Empress Consort. The same would go for her father. But the Duke of Everhardt was a major figure with considerable standing in Falcomere’s political world. No one knew how the investigation would proceed, but the conclusion was already taking shape. And yet, in such a situation, to be so desperate to take back an illegitimate child was unthinkable.

“He is at his cutest time. Don’t you think so too, Your Majesty?”

One of the noblewomen said, holding the baby who was trying to squirm out of her arms. Thea looked at the baby, who had thrown away the sugar cookie and was now sucking on his fingers, whining, “Maah.” When their eyes met, the baby looked like he was smiling, but soon after, he began to fuss, calling out, “Mama.”

It seemed he was looking for his mother. Thea thought for a moment about soothing her half-brother, but gave up. Because there were times he often looked for his mother even while playing well before. At such times, Thea returned the baby to the nanny quickly.

But the nanny couldn’t calm him down easily either. When she realized he was hungry and tried to nurse him, the baby spat out the nipple with a pout and kept fussing. Alexis was more stubborn than expected.

It was only natural, but he really cried until he was satisfied. Even so, Orestes didn’t return the baby to Nanna. He was sending his own children to their mother, who was under confinement, but wouldn’t let his brother-in-law do the same.