“How was it?”

The Duke asked as the carriage began to move, and Rieta thought for a moment.

She wasn’t sure of how much she should reveal.

“It was okay.”

She decided to go with a moderate answer.

She would hate to upset the Duke with a useless story and besides, she did not believe that this would happen again, since she had expressed her opinion.

‘If I had been a princess who was a little more lovely, or if I couldn’t speak my mind, would I have received my father’s attention…’

Rieta was a little sad that she wasn’t brave enough to say, “You must be very interested in the education of the royal family.”

She could’ve shut their mouths at once.

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t be of much help, Duke.’

Rieta glanced at the Duke sitting across from her.

Even now, he only looked out of the window with a blunt expression.

‘A person who hasn’t changed.’

Rieta suddenly had that thought about him.

It wasn’t just about his facial expressions.

It would be nice if the people in the capital could respect his ‘lack of change’.

It would be nice if they could also think that she’s lovely.

“Princess.”

The Duke spoke in Kingdom language this time.

Since she had been speaking in Imperial recently, Rieta replied with surprise.

“Yes?”

“As I have said before, you are different from the nobility of the capital. It’s not something you can ignore based on your age.”

“But.”

“It doesn’t matter what King Liz thinks of you. I’m going to grab him by the neck— Ah, I’m sorry. This is not all of the Empire’s opinion. It’s just an example.”

The Duke felt slightly exalted.

He can’t believe he’s talking about wringing out that man’s neck in front of a child.

“…..if he fails to open his eyes again, according to the rules of succession, the throne will belong to the Princess.”

“B-but what if my father has made a will to hand over the throne to one of my brothers?”

“I don’t think he’s one to do that until he reaches the end of his life.”

Ah. He guessed correctly.

In fact, King Liz wasn’t as interested in Rieta as he was about her two younger siblings.

The last letter mentioned the two brothers because their upbringing was still dependent on the Kingdom’s money.

He is going to be thinking only of himself all the way until the end of his life.

Maybe, he will ask them to build him a big statue.

“So, you don’t have to be generous to those who don’t respect your dignity, Princess.”

“……well, in any case.”

Rieta held both of her hands together and asked carefully.

“Did you hear about what happened?”

“I don’t need to have heard of it.”

What he saw in her face and what he felt when he picked her up was enough.

How their mindless chatter had upset his protegee.

“I’m sorry to have made you go through that.”

He was grateful for the little girl who had rejected their offers with sharp words.

She’s a sweet kid, so it couldn’t have been easy for her to draw a line with someone she had never met before.

The Duke believed that it was probably a choice she made after thinking very hard about it.

“That’s not for the Duke to apologize for.”

“…But…”

“I think it’s good that the Duke hasn’t changed. It’s not a flaw.”

“It would have changed.”

He murmured, unconfident. In fact, he had been afraid of this very thing for a long time.

Perhaps it was because it was a foreign language.

It was something the world around him didn’t understand.

“The time wasn’t right.”

His expression became desperate, most likely from reminiscence.

“But you shared all of that time with one person, right?”

This time, Rieta asked in Imperial, and he nodded. ‘You’ve learned a difficult word,’ he thought.

“Darrell said it’s very… romantic.”

“That’s what the child would say.”

“The Duke is romantic.”

“There’s a lot of people who know better about romance, Princess.”

The carriage arrived at the Duke’s mansion just in time.

Rieta mustered her courage to reach out to the Duke first. He seemed to not want to start something himself.

“The Duke shouldn’t walk alone.”

He looked at the girl, who had placed her small hand on his, and chuckled a little.

The two returned holding each other’s hands.

Just as Darrell came back, the family gathered together to eat and drink tea.

******