Worried about the horses left outside for days, Ezekiel had gone out at first light and encountered the knights on the other side of the river.
They greeted him with faces on the verge of tears.
“Your Highness!”
Their eyes were sunken, hollowed out from three sleepless days of searching.
After some effort, the knights managed to fell a large tree and lay it across the collapsed bridge.
With so many strong men, a makeshift path was quickly formed.
Sir Laugar, the knight who served Ezekiel most closely, was the first to scramble across.
“Where is Prince Etienne?
Is he unharmed?”
“I am fine.
My brother… is not doing so well.”
The knights’ faces turned ashen.
Ezekiel calmly recounted the events of the past few days.
They breathed a collective sigh of relief upon learning the princes had found shelter at the Quillucsia estate.
“That’s a relief, at least.”
“And Lady Arbois?”
“About that…” The knights exchanged uneasy glances.
The story was simple.
“…Lady Arbois was injured?”
“We are deeply sorry…”
Apparently, Felicia had thrown a royal fit when they lost the princes in the storm.
As she screamed at them to find the princes at once, the knights had scattered in all directions.
The accident happened when she was returning to a nearby village to rest.
While alighting from her carriage, Felicia Arbois had slipped in the mud.
She and her escorting knight had tumbled to the ground, and her arm had been pinned beneath his armor.
Now it was Ezekiel’s face that turned pale.
A duke’s daughter getting injured during an official tour with the crown prince—this was a disaster.
“Does the Duke know?”
“Not yet.
You see…”
Felicia Arbois, for all her faults, had some sense.
She knew nothing good would come from making an issue of her injury.
The Duke doted on her and was already displeased that Etienne kept postponing their marriage.
He would never let this slide.
He would demand an apology at the very least, which would inevitably sour relations between the imperial family and the ducal house.
But Felicia was deeply in love with Etienne, the future crown prince, and did not want to cause the slightest bit of trouble.
It was, one had to admit, a heart-wrenching devotion.
“She wishes to keep her injury a secret from the Duke for the time being.”
Of course, that meant she could not return to the ducal territory for a while.
Ezekiel pressed his fingers to his forehead.
The problem was that Etienne’s fever still had not broken.
Consequently, Felicia Arbois was coming to Quillucsia.
For Ezekiel, it was a catastrophe.
“What is this pathetic excuse for a bridge?
You expect me to cross ‘that’?!”
There was, however, one small silver lining.
The moment Felicia laid eyes on the makeshift bridge, she shrieked from the other side.
She was aghast at the log the knights had laid across the chasm.
“Unbelievable!
Are you certain Prince Etienne is over there?”
She threw a tantrum, declaring she could not possibly cross such a bridge with an injured arm.
A knight who suggested, “Perhaps I could carry you across?” earned a sharp slap for his trouble.
She would not suffer such an indignity.
In the end, it was Felicia’s wealth that saved the day.
Even in the drizzling rain, she summoned laborers from the village where she had been staying and had them rebuild the bridge from scratch.
They finished in half a day.
Felicia Arbois’s four-horse carriage crossed the new bridge without a hitch.
Ezekiel, waiting on the other side, sighed.
She was, as ever, a force of nature.
“Welcome, Lady Arbois.”
“Prince Ezekiel!
Honestly, how could you…?” Felicia began, ready to unleash her fury, but the words died on her lips when she took in his appearance.
He was still wearing Baron Quillucsia’s threadbare clothes.
At the sight of him, she feigned a swoon.
“Good heavens, what is this state you’re in?
Did you and the prince take up begging while I wasn’t looking?”
“Begging, Lady Arbois?” Ezekiel managed a bitter smile.
At this rate, she would truly faint when she saw the castle.
And she behaved exactly as he had predicted.
Her jaw dropped at the sight of the shabby estate.
“What is that building?
It looks like it will collapse tomorrow!
Prince Etienne was staying in a place like ‘that’?!”
“Lady Arbois, you are being rude.”
Only then did she notice the small group from the Quillucsia household standing before the castle.
News of the ducal lady’s arrival had spread like wildfire during the half-day of construction.
Naturally, Iris, Henry, and Mrs.
Babin had heard.
The color had drained from their faces when they learned the two young men they had sheltered were not squires, but princes.
Ezekiel wanted to explain, but Felicia was faster.
“You there, maid!
Where is the lord of this estate?”
“Pardon?”
‘I knew it.’ Ezekiel stepped in front of her.
“I said you are being rude, Lady Arbois.
This is Lady Iris Quillucsia, daughter of Baron Quillucsia.”
“What?
Not a maid?
You’re lying!
You’re trying to trick me again!”
Felicia’s most infuriating trait—and the one for which she could not entirely be blamed—was that years of exposure to Etienne’s pranks had made her deeply skeptical of anything Ezekiel said.
Her eyes, wide with genuine disbelief, scanned Iris from head to toe.
Ezekiel gritted his teeth.
How could he possibly silence her?
As he pondered, a familiar voice cut through the tension.
“My, my, Felicia.”
It was Etienne, leaning against the doorframe, a sheen of sweat on his brow.
Tears welled in Felicia’s eyes.
“Good heavens, Your Highness!” She rushed forward and threw her arms around him.
Etienne clicked his tongue but returned the embrace.
Under normal circumstances, it would have been a scandalous breach of decorum, but considering how worried she had been, no one could fault her.
“You have a fever!
Look at the state of you, Your Highness!
This is so upsetting…”
‘Isn’t the person with the broken arm the greater concern?’ Ezekiel thought, but he silently averted his gaze.
His eyes met Iris’s.
He opened his mouth to speak, but she smiled first.
‘I’m all right,’ her expression seemed to say.
Somehow, that only made Ezekiel feel more ashamed.
Felicia Arbois insisted they take Etienne to a larger town immediately, but he waved her off, claiming his fever had mostly subsided.
Ezekiel, too, dissuaded her.
Felicia was skeptical that Etienne could have rested comfortably in such a place, but she had no better alternative.
It was a small mercy that her personal physician had accompanied her.
In the end, it was a foregone conclusion that Lady Felicia Arbois would also be staying at Quillucsia Castle.
The forty knights pitched tents in the castle courtyard and the village square.
Curious villagers who came to gawk were promptly rounded up by Mrs.
Babin and put to work cooking stew for fifty.
Tragically, the estate’s few chickens were all sacrificed to the cause.
As Lady Arbois paid a handsome—perhaps even exorbitant—price for them, no one complained.
In fact, Mrs.
Babin was wreathed in smiles.
It was late that night when Ezekiel encountered Iris in a castle corridor.
More precisely, he met her as she was leaving the room he had occupied, having just tidied it.
Naturally, once Mrs.
Babin learned their true identities, she could not bear the thought of cramming two princes into a single guest room.
Baron Quillucsia’s vacant chamber was given to Etienne.
Felicia, with an air of entitlement, took Iris’s room—though not before exclaiming, “This is Lady Quillucsia’s room?!
Are you sure it’s not the lavatory?” which had earned her a bitter smile from Iris.
“Ez… I mean, Your Highness.” Iris, holding a folded blanket, dropped into a panicked curtsy.
Ezekiel waved his hand.
“Please, do not do that.
It is uncomfortable.
Just call me Ez.”
“Oh, should I?”
Ezekiel blinked.
A small, tinkling laugh escaped her lips.
In the end, he could not help but chuckle as well.