To send away a youngest child who had come to them so dearly, and to Téllez of all houses.
But is an imperial decree just an imperial decree? It is called an imperial decree precisely because there can be no disobedience.
So the excuse they found was a matter of traits. Since the Téllez heir was an alpha, if the child in the womb should happen to be an omega rather than a beta, they would have them marry.
It was not as if they could cut off the line of succession of the one and only Duke of Téllez, either. The Emperor consented, and from that day, prayers that no one knew of began, each holding its own private designs.
Duke Téllez likewise hoped that the betrothed of his only son, a splendid boy who had shown exceptional promise from childhood, would not be a child of de la Rosa. But in truth, looking at the lineage of noble houses, the match was bound to be made among the five ducal houses anyway, so it would be right to say he had resigned himself to it to some degree.
Thus, during that year when the Duchess was pregnant, the Archbishop of Toledo received enormous gifts from each of the Emperor, de la Rosa, and Téllez, and offered Masses.
And God raised the hand of the most earnest one. The Duke’s third child, born the following year, Rubio, was an omega.
His two hands gripping the railing trembled finely. Rubio could not accept this marriage. Everyone said they loved him, yet it felt as if they were pushing him onto a path that was not right.
Even after he had grown into an adult, his father, who still melted at the sight of him, his endlessly tender mother, his sister, stern but who would do anything for him, and his brother, who lived and died for his youngest sibling, all spoke with one mouth to say this marriage could not be undone.
‘Rubi, I know it feels unjust, but how could we defy His Majesty’s stern decree? Follow your father’s words.’
‘Your sister is right, Rubio. It was decided before you were even born; what can be done?’
The nanny, the head maid, the butler, and the servants were all the same. There was not one person who truly thought of him. Everyone only congratulated him on this nonsensical marriage.
Behind it all lay the fact that in the more than twenty years since the betrothal was made, the rift between the two houses had dulled; the de la Rosa had even come to feel sorrow for their old rival, Duke Téllez, who sickened and in the end passed away. On top of that were the dazzling achievements built up by the man who had newly inherited the title, Pedro Téllez. But Rubio did not know any of this.
Because he had lived a life unrelated to the outside world, ignorant of the things happening beyond the walls of the ducal estate.
So he did not accurately know the world’s assessment of his betrothed. To Rubio, Duke Téllez was simply an old man.
Besides, there was someone he secretly held in his heart. It was an unrequited love, a person it could absolutely never come to pass with, but still someone he did not want to part from. Miguel, the stablemaster’s son.
The more he thought of it, the more depressed he became, and a sigh escaped him. Considering the difference in station between Miguel and himself, he would someday have to marry someone anyway. But why did that someone have to be Duke Téllez?
He was much older than Rubio, ugly, and a ruffian who had earned the nickname of warmonger. Spending his whole life with such a man was unthinkable.
‘Marriage?’
It was only a year ago that gentle, naïve Rubio had learned of this betrothal. He would never forget the day he nearly fell over backward in shock at the Duke’s words, that now he had come of age it was time to set the date.
‘Yes. You are of age now too, aren’t you? Once one is an adult, one must know how to take responsibility for one’s place.’
‘B-but I have never once thought about such a thing. You’ve never said a word about it until now.’
That was because everyone had known and pretended not to, dragging the time out until now.
Rubio’s betrothal was, how should one put it, treated in his house for twenty years as a cursed thing whose existence was known but which no one dared name, as if it were not there.
But now, for Duke de la Rosa too, a time he could do nothing about had arrived.
The Duchess, seated beside the Duke, seconded her husband with a troubled face.
‘Rubi, my baby. Mother doesn’t like that you’re getting married either. But Father has no choice in this either. It was promised before you were even born.’
Rubio received a great shock at hearing that even his father could have no choice in a matter.
‘Then what am I supposed to do?’
‘What do you mean, what? You get married.’
Rubio’s head spun, and he grew tearful. The sky collapsed and the ground collapsed, and the world he had believed to be entirely on his side turned upside down.
‘I don’t want to! How can you spring this on me all of a sudden?’
‘Rubio!’
He defied his parents’ words for the first time in his life, threw the door open with a bang, and ran out. That day he was scolded for the first time ever. After that he tried running away from home and hunger strikes too, but every runaway attempt ended in capture before a single night had passed, and the hunger strike could not last two days for hunger. Still, his attempts were steady.
‘I won’t do it.’
Everyone thought he had resigned himself meekly to this marriage, but Rubio had not given up.
So, undaunted even in his white-gloved ceremonial dress, he climbed over the balcony. Like a flying squirrel he hung from the railing, dangling his two legs and steadying his breath, then found the protruding bits of wall with his toes and slowly climbed down.
When it came to climbing walls, he had been a practiced hand since childhood. Besides, this place was the front yard where he had been born and raised. He knew at a glance where the hiding places were, and where the dog hole was that the servant children had secretly dug in the garden.
His plan was to get down to the first floor, slip out of the garden, go to the stables, take his horse, and leave the residence. If he asked people the way to the imperial capital and hid there, no one would find him for the time being.
What did it matter to him whether Duke Téllez arrived or not? The person supposed to marry was gone.
It was heartbreaking to smear his parents’ faces with disgrace, but Rubio set his mind straight and resolved to live. No matter how he protested that he hated this marriage, no one listened to him, so he had to rebel at least this much for his parents to understand how he felt.
And so, as Rubio dangled alone, unseen by anyone, climbing down the wall toward the first floor…
There was someone watching that small body hang in midair, paddling away for quite a while as it descended.
“…”
Leaning askew against a tree, smoke from a cigar flowed slowly from the man’s lips. Through the dispersing smoke, the small figure vanished from his view for a moment, then entered it again.
Rubio had no way of knowing, but the man had been watching him with interested eyes for some time now.
The man in the tailcoat had arrived at the ducal residence quite a while ago, yet had not announced it. The attendants he had sent had already been there for several days, finished preparing to receive the bride, and he believed without a shred of doubt that his loyal adjutant would cover for his absence nicely on his own.
By custom, celebration banquets were scheduled before and after tomorrow’s nuptial Mass. The de la Rosa had held the banquet on such a grand scale that even as the night deepened, the sound of music never ceased inside or out.
He planned, once the celebration banquet had all ended, to receive the Emperor’s approval and take his bride back to his own territory. He had rushed the long road to León and was tired, and since the schedule stretched over several days, he had meant to catch his breath for a moment.
And so, in the garden below the banquet hall he had entered, he had happened to run into his own bride.
The man had recognized Rubio from the moment he slipped into the second-floor balcony. That the one up there was the de la Rosa youngest who was to marry him.
Setting aside the white ceremonial clothes he wore, his slender blond hair swayed and fluttered in the wind, and the face visible between it was so striking that he could not have failed to recognize him.
The man stood that way for a long while, smoking his cigar and savoring Rubio’s face.
An appearance as if he had just stepped out of a painting. The rumors that he was the greatest beauty in the world for loveliness, which he had scoffed at and passed over, were true.
Going around at home and abroad as an officer, the subordinates under his command were bound to bring back this story and that. He had seen many beauties they had fetched, calling them peerless, but a face like that was a first for him, and the feeling was new.
His white, tiny features were exactly like a porcelain doll’s. Over his peach-tinted cheeks, as if painted in watercolor, the moonlight poured down and gave them a smooth sheen. His eyes, gazing far into the distance, brimmed with moisture and sparkled.
The lips of the man in white ceremonial dress moved, murmuring something, and his face looked so gloomy that the man felt he ought to press something into his hands. Even that was lovely.
His name was Rubio, was it?
He was watching fixedly at what the boy was doing. The man’s two eyes flew wide.
His angel-faced young bride had suddenly climbed over the balcony railing.
“…!”
For a moment, in surprise, the man nearly dropped the cigar he was smoking and ran toward him.
Fortunately, Rubio was dangling deftly from the railing by his small hands. He had seemed much smaller than the man, and as much lighter, apparently.
He had something about him that made onlookers’ flesh tremble. Letting out a small sigh and looking him over, the man saw no sign of injury.
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