Chapter 2
Although both her eyes were unfocused, a rare light appeared in her misty golden irises.
"If what you're saying is true, then my father approved everything, and the chess piece he used to carry out his orders was Trinia. Ha."
A faint smile appeared on her lips, as though she had finally given up on everything.
It was a smile filled with self-mockery and bitter disbelief.
But that faint smile quickly crumbled into an expression of grief.
"What... What could you possibly have been so dissatisfied with?! Father, did you really have to kill your own wife and daughter with your own hands...?"
Her voice was so full of sorrow that tears threatened to spill from her eyes at any moment.
But her grief soon turned into anger.
Like a wild beast baring its fangs at its prey, she poured out all her resentment.
"That's because you're an Imperial Princess, Riena. Emperor Francio has always wanted a son."
Although Kanter's answer was filled with sympathy, Riena shook her head firmly.
"Even so, Trinia's sons could never become Imperial Princes. Just as a mistress could never become the Empress."
"Ha... That's precisely why they poisoned Her Majesty the Empress and tried to kill you, the Imperial Princess. Riena...."
With a heavy sigh, his emerald-green eyes gazed at her worriedly.
"But even after I lost my sight, Trinia never became the Empress."
When Riena raised her voice, Kanter carefully handed her a bundle of documents.
They were documents written in Braille.
Her impatient fingertips immediately began moving across the pages.
[To expand the range of eligible successors to the Imperial Throne...]
[As the Imperial Princess is no longer in a sound condition, the eldest of the two princes...]
[Trinia Rose, Baroness, shall be elevated to the position of Empress, and Prince Turio shall be appointed Crown Prince.]
The horrifying evidence made all the strength leave her hands.
Her fingertips trembled uncontrollably, and nausea rose in her throat.
"The announcement was scheduled for the day after our wedding. Those wretched bastards."
His low growl echoed heavily throughout the room.
With every new piece of the truth she discovered, Riena felt as though she were being buried deeper in the depths of hell.
"How disgusting.... What did I ever do to deserve something like this?!"
A large hand gently took Riena's hand and placed it against his cheek.
As though savoring the touch of her beautiful yet cold hand, Kanter closed his emerald-green eyes.
A suffocating silence settled over the room.
Then, like a crack spreading across a frozen lake, a cold snort shattered the silence.
"No. There's still someone alive."
Kanter's peacefully closed eyes snapped open.
What greeted his emerald-green gaze was a pair of clouded but fiercely burning eyes.
"He's right in front of me. The person who hurt me."
Her misty golden eyes seemed to pierce straight through his green ones.
The color drained from his wickedly handsome face.
As though mocking his reaction, Riena let out a faint, bitter laugh before parting her cracked lips.
"I wonder who all this revenge was really for."
His red lips moved, but no words came out.
"And if anyone was going to take revenge, shouldn't it have been me?"
Even though he knew she couldn't see him, an inexplicable chill ran down Kanter's spine.
He instinctively avoided her gaze.
"...Revenge was never what I wanted. I wanted happiness. Because being happy would have been the greatest revenge of all."
Happiness would have been the greatest revenge.
Kanter quietly repeated her words, his red lips moving faintly.
His empty eyes began to tremble.
"You were my hope. Whenever I was with you, I could even forget that I was blind."
Every word she spoke was like an icicle piercing straight through his heart.
His face twisted in pain, and he struggled to breathe.
But Riena had already suffered for so long that she had almost forgotten how to breathe at all.
All she had wanted was to live a happy little life with him and children who resembled the two of them.
That alone would have been more than enough.
"Where is the man who used to protect my everyday happiness?"
She reached out and moved her hand aimlessly through the endless darkness.
Where did everything go wrong?
Should she never have fed the rabbits in the garden where she first met Kanter?
Or had the mistake been her birth as an Imperial Princess in the first place?
But that wasn't my fault.
In the end, everything that had happened was the result of circumstances that no amount of effort on her part could have changed.
There was nothing I could have done differently.
With a bitter smile, she turned her tear-filled eyes toward Kanter.
"Kanter... you were my everyday life. And it was such a beautiful, wonderful life."
"Riena...."
Just as his bloodstained hand reached toward her, Riena's empty golden eyes curved into crescents.
She gave him an incredibly gentle smile, as though she were looking at someone she would never see again.
"Goodbye, Kanter."
At that moment, the blade she had concealed against her body flashed sharply.
"!"
It all happened in an instant.
Blood surged from the wound, and her small body collapsed helplessly onto the floor, as though she had been waiting for that very moment.
"R-Riena! Riena!"
A red diagonal wound had appeared across her slender, pale neck.
No matter how hard Kanter pressed against it, he couldn't stop the blood from pouring out.
It continued to gush endlessly, like water shooting from a fountain.
"Ah... No! No!! Riena!"
Kanter struggled to draw his next breath, as though his own life were slipping away.
He sobbed like a wounded beast, burying his face against her wound.
But her small body had already grown cold.
His anguished screams echoed throughout the room and down the corridors of the Imperial Palace.
Hearing the screams, the attendants finally rushed into the Emperor's bedchamber.
But by the time they arrived, it was already too late.
In the middle of the room, Kanter had taken his own life while holding Riena tightly in his arms.
"!"
A searing pain rose inside her, as though she had swallowed a ball of fire.
Riena's eyes flew open.
The warm sunlight shining down on her felt so unfamiliar that she narrowed her eyes and slowly looked around.
Is this... a dream?
But it was far too vivid to be a dream.
A cool breeze playfully stirred her ivory-colored hair, and the air was filled with the pleasant fragrance of flowers.
Her golden eyes, now clear and bright, carefully took in the beautiful garden as though she were afraid it might disappear if she looked at it too closely.
How long has it been since I last saw the Imperial Palace's garden?
"That's right. It really was this beautiful...."
With tears gathering in her eyes, Riena placed her two small hands against her chest.
Even if this was only a dream, she was grateful to have been given one so wonderfully vivid.
I wonder if the greenhouse is still there.
The Imperial Palace's greenhouse, made from exceptionally clear glass, had been a secret hideout for the Empress and the Imperial Princess.
It was the place where they used to drink fragrant tea and enjoy long, pleasant conversations together.
I miss Mother.
Trying to hold back her tears, Riena immediately ran toward the greenhouse.
As her small feet hurried forward, the short grass rustled pleasantly beneath her shoes.
It's still here!
The greenhouse looked clean and well-maintained.
After Empress Chernuier passed away, Emperor Francio had demolished it as though he had been waiting for an excuse to do so.
The young, blind princess had spent day and night inside the greenhouse, refusing to eat or drink.
To the Emperor, the greenhouse had probably become nothing more than a nuisance.
As a princess who had already been deprived of her right to inherit the throne, Riena's greatest priority should have been to avoid falling any further out of the Emperor's favor.
But she had been unable to overcome her grief.
"F-Father! Please, I beg you! Please don't touch the greenhouse! Please?"
"Then you should have behaved yourself before this, if only for the sake of my reputation."
"Yes! I will! I promise I'll behave, so please, please just leave the greenhouse alone...."
"You can't even see what's in front of you, yet you're making such a fuss over a worthless greenhouse? Guards! Remove that greenhouse from my sight immediately!"
An aching pain spread through her chest, and Riena squeezed her eyes shut.
It had been far too much grief for an eleven-year-old princess to bear.
Yet she had been forced to endure it simply to survive.
After all, if the Emperor had used her pitiful condition as an excuse to imprison her, she would probably have been killed without anyone ever knowing.
Riena carefully rested one cheek against the greenhouse glass and gently stroked it with a sorrowful expression.
"I miss Mother. But... I can't remember. I can't remember her...."
No matter how desperately she had struggled not to forget...
Was this some kind of punishment from the gods?
The faces of the people she had loved the most were the first things to disappear from her memories.
I have to see Mother before I wake up from this dream.
With determination written across her face, she turned toward the Empress's Palace.
At that moment, a gentle breeze carried a familiar voice toward her.
"Your Highness! Where are yooou?!"
Riena turned toward the desperate voice and saw a girl wearing the uniform of the Imperial Princess's personal maid.
"Oh my goodness! Your Highness! Do you have any idea how long I've been looking for you?"
The moment their eyes met, Riena felt as though a stone had become lodged in her throat.
"R-Romi...? Is that really you, Romi?"
Riena rubbed her eyes vigorously with her tiny hands before narrowing them to examine Romi's face.
No matter how many times she looked, there was no mistaking her.
It really was Romi, the maid who had disappeared all those years ago.
All the longing Riena had kept buried deep inside her suddenly burst forth.
Like a little child, she threw herself into Romi's arms and hugged her desperately.
"Y-Your Highness...?"
The sweet scent of desserts and the warm, buttery fragrance of cookies surrounded her.
They were scents that belonged to Romi alone.
Her entire body relaxed, and for a moment, it felt as though even her terrible memories were fading away.
"Your Highness, is something wrong?"
Riena shook her head without lifting her face from Romi's embrace.
Romi smiled softly and gently tidied the loose strands of hair framing the princess's face.
After that day, Romi had disappeared, and her younger sister had entered the Imperial Palace.
The girl had come with one purpose: to find her missing older sister.
But the Imperial Palace was far too corrupt a place for a young, powerless maid to find someone who had vanished within its walls.
"Y-Your Highness, are you crying?!"
Romi's brown eyes widened in confusion as she examined Riena's face.
Riena hurriedly wiped away her tears.
Then, with an awkward smile on her tear-stained face, she took Romi's hand.
"Romi, let's go to the Empress's Palace."
Her golden eyes sparkled with renewed hope.
If everything continued like this, perhaps she would be able to meet all the people she had missed so desperately.
"Your Highness, if you run all the way to the Empress's Palace from here, you'll collapse from exhaustion! And I'll get scolded, too."
"Then should I ride on your back?"
"If you'll allow me!"
"...?"
Riena furrowed her brows and tilted her head.
W-wait a minute.
She hurriedly lowered her head.
A pair of yellow shoes came into view.
They were the yellow shoes a skilled craftsman had specially made so that a pleasant floral fragrance would rise from them with every step.
Why am I wearing the shoes I wore when I was six years old...?
