I Don't Need the Grand Duke's Regret - Chapter 129
Armillia’s voice was always weak and trembling, often so faint that you had to listen carefully to catch her words.
In contrast, the princess’s voice was both soft and firm, with an underlying authority that unmistakably marked it as royal.
‘Was it the Segolinde accent?’
Nasir furrowed his brows, dismissing the doubt easily. He placed his hands on his knees and prepared to continue on his way now that he had safely delivered the prince. Rising to his feet, he bowed his head to the princess and began to speak. Or rather, he intended to.
“Luce, actually, Charles went to see the red place! I’m okay, Luce!”
If not for Prince Charles’s words…
“…red place?”
The princess turned her head toward the prince, who was sneezing and had his nose wiped by his mother. The prince nodded vigorously and said,
“Yes! But shh! It’s a secret. A secret from Uncle Wolf.”
The prince held up his little finger to the princess’s lips, making a gesture to keep the secret, and looked at Nasir.
“Right, a secret!”
“Ah… yes.”
Caught off guard by the unexpected little revelation, Nasir stammered a response. The prince’s ability to keep a secret was hardly reliable, given he was only three years old.
With no other children of Charles’s age around, Nasir found himself at a loss. The unpredictable topics and speech patterns were difficult for him to adjust to.
“Where did the prince say he went?”
The princess’s gaze, which had been focused on keeping the secret from the prince, now fixed on Nasir. He bit his lip, looking distressed.
The princess was an outsider. He couldn’t recklessly divulge the deep tragedy of the Vitoore family to someone not closely involved.
Yet, since Prince Charles had seen ‘that place’, Nasir could not simply ignore it.
As Nasir hesitated, Luce, standing beside him, began to fidget nervously. Her agitation increased Nasir’s anxiety. He had to explain before Luce blurted out anything about ‘that place’.
“There’s a room in the Grand Duke’s residence that has been abandoned. It’s a storage room no longer in use, and the prince happened to find it by chance and visited briefly.”
“I see.”
The princess nodded in understanding at Nasir’s carefully phrased explanation. However, before Nasir could relax, she posed a sharp question.
“Why did he insist on keeping it a secret?”
“That’s…”
“If it were merely a storage room, there wouldn’t be a need for secrecy. What kind of place is it that requires keeping the prince silent? I need a detailed explanation of what Charles saw and where he went.”
“…I’m sorry. That’s all I can say.”
The princess stared at Nasir in silence. After a heavy pause, she instructed Luce.
“Luce, go inside and help Sophie feed Charles his lunch. I need to speak with the aide.”
“Yes, Prince!”
Luce, who had been anxiously watching the exchange, responded promptly. As Luce closed the door behind her, the princess turned her back to it and looked at Nasir.
Standing like a guardian of the room where Prince Charles was, the princess spoke with a firm tone.
“Charles is a curious child. When he becomes interested in something, he never forgets it until his curiosity fades and he turns his attention elsewhere. Therefore, I need to know exactly what the aide showed him and what he saw.”
The princess spoke not as a royal but as a mother concerned about her child’s well-being. Nasir sighed, understanding her worry.
However, the princess was a member of the Segolinde royal family. Revealing the Vitoore family’s secrets to someone outside the Empire was problematic.
Nasir furrowed his brows and struggled to find the right words.
“I’m sorry, but…”
“No matter what, I will keep the secret as well. I promise as the princess of Segolinde.”
Nasir finally let out a deep sigh. With the princess pressing so hard, it was difficult to keep secrets any longer. He whispered in a voice low enough not to be heard by the knights in the corridor.
“You’ll have to listen and then forget what I say.”
“Understood.”
The princess solemnly nodded in response to Nasir’s request. Nasir then guided her to an empty room, where he looked at her with a troubled expression. He carefully chose his words and began to explain slowly.
“The place Prince Charles discovered isn’t a storage room; it’s the late Grand Duchess’s room. Just as your room is decorated in green, that room is decorated in red. That’s why the prince referred to it as the ‘red place.’ The reason I asked for it to be kept a secret is that it holds memories of the late Grand Duchess and the late Grand Duke. The head of the family still deeply misses the late Grand Duchess… Princess?”
As Nasir explained, the princess suddenly grabbed the doorframe. Her knuckles turned white, and she seemed to stagger as if she had been deeply shocked.
“Princess, are you all right?”
Nasir, taken aback by the princess’s reaction, tried to support her. The veil she wore fluttered, and her blonde hair spilled out. Her chin, exposed beneath the veil, trembled uncontrollably.
“The red room…”
Nasir’s eyes widened in shock at the princess’s fragmented words.
He had never mentioned that ‘place’ was the ‘red room.’ How did she know?
As Nasir’s grip faltered in surprise, the princess, who had been leaning on him, began to collapse. The fluttering veil slipped away, and the princess sank to the floor.
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