“Good morning, Your Majesty.”
You know how, on mornings when you absolutely cannot afford to be late, you sometimes wake up just before your alarm goes off?
You look at the clock on your bedside table, and sure enough, there's exactly one minute left before the alarm.
That's been happening to me for almost a week now.
“Ah, good morning, Lady Braune, Lady Mary.”
Let's say I need to wake up at eight. They're usually already somewhere in my bedroom about thirty minutes before that.
Granted, my bedroom is easily the size of a school classroom, so if they're standing quietly in a corner, I can barely tell they're there. But I can sense their presence.
I wonder if it's always been like this.
At some point, the older gentlemen who used to attend me disappeared, and now there are two noble young ladies in their place.
If I hadn't experienced it myself, I probably would have thought, What a lucky bastard.
The reality is an incredible amount of pressure.
Having several women who aren't your family or your lovers watching you closely when you're at your most defenseless in the morning—women you really don't want to embarrass yourself in front of.
I did ask the chief attendant once to put the older gentlemen back in charge. Gently, of course. If I sound too forceful, all sorts of things start happening again.
I put it delicately. “Lady Braune and Lady Mary are both distinguished ladies, so perhaps we should treat them as honored guests instead.”
Well, the answer was basically a simple “No.”
Apparently, the regulations require things to be this way.
What regulations?
The employee handbook? Then put it somewhere all your employees can read it. That's required by law, you know.
When I persisted, I was told the matter would be referred to his superior.
His superior is Lady Braune's father, right? And her father's superior is me.
But nobody listens to what I say.
Is this the military?
Apparently, in the military, orders from your immediate superior take precedence over everything else, and orders that skip a level in the chain of command simply don't get through. I only read that in a book somewhere, though, so I don't know whether it's actually true.
Anyway, since I wasn't getting anywhere, I decided to speak to the ladies themselves.
And here we are, a full week later, and I still haven't managed to bring it up.
Can you understand my predicament?
What I want to say is, “Having you two in my bedroom in the morning is mentally exhausting, so please stop coming in.”
I want to communicate that with absolute clarity, leaving no room for the slightest misunderstanding, while also ensuring that neither of them gets hurt in the least.
Impossible, right?
I'd only just committed a monumental blunder the other day.
If I'd kept my composure, there were any number of ways I could have handled things. Instead, I lost my temper and said whatever came into my head, and this is where it got me.
I'm not exaggerating in the slightest when I say I have no idea where a single word of mine might travel, how it might be interpreted along the way, or what consequences it might set in motion.
Lady Braune might just barely be all right.
Lady Mary definitely wouldn't.
One wrong choice of words could lead to someone's death.
In fact, things were genuinely touch and go that day.
I haven't asked for the details (because I'm scared!), but apparently, by the time Mary's father, the Inspector General of the Royal Guard, arrived home, Mary had already been tied up and gagged.
She'd tried to kill herself with a pistol.
That was quick.
But speaking as someone with firsthand experience, that's precisely the kind of situation that's really dangerous.
There's no hesitation. It all happens in one smooth motion.
Anyway, apparently her family brought her to Palais Lumiere that night.
I'd fallen asleep.
The attendants supposedly stayed up all night watching her to make sure she didn't try again.
I spoke to her the following day, but I wasn't exactly in the best state of mind myself.
Why?
Because Lady Braune had shown up first thing that morning.
Looking as though she'd finally made up her mind about something.
◆
“I apologize for my lack of consideration in leaving you unattended. Thanks to your prompt action in stopping the bleeding, Lady Mary, the injury was not serious. Once the wounds have closed, my fingers should regain their full movement.”
“Your Majesty, I humbly request that you impose the severest punishment upon the guilty party.”
That was how our conversation began.
At first, I thought she was asking me to punish the woman who'd stabbed me.
“That is not within my jurisdiction. The Lord of the Interior and the laws of Santeneri will determine the appropriate punishment.”
“I humbly request death by sovereign order.”
Her words were as clear as ever.
But her lips were deathly pale, and more than anything, her eyes frightened me.
The eyes of someone who'd made up her mind.
There were still dark bloodstains on the sleeves and chest of her Royal Guard uniform. It didn't look as though she'd even changed since the previous day.
This was definitely a case for a counselor, but unfortunately, Santeneri didn't have that profession.
“That is a possibility.”
“When will it be carried out?”
“I cannot say. Not until the investigation is complete—”
“Is an investigation necessary?”
“Of course it is. We must investigate whether anyone else was involved.”
I wondered why she was asking such an obvious question.
This wasn't ancient history, when people had neither laws nor proper legal procedures. Of course there had to be an investigation.
“No one else was involved.”
By this point, I had no idea what she was talking about.
“How can you be so certain?”
“Because I am speaking of myself. No one else was involved in my actions. I humbly request death by sovereign order.”
“You? Lady Mary? What do you have to do with the person who tried to stab me?”
Mary stood perfectly still, her hair still disheveled.
“I failed in my duty to protect Your Majesty, and your sacred person was harmed. I humbly request death by sovereign order.”
This might be beyond me.
That was what I thought.
Watching someone you'd been happily chatting with just the day before fall apart before your eyes is genuinely painful.
I desperately searched for something to say.
It wasn't that I wanted to save her or comfort her or anything like that.
I just felt that I had to say something in response.
I suppose I'd reached my limit, too.
“…I see. Then I shall die as well. Shall we die together?”
“…Your Majesty?”
I stretched out on the sofa.
My body felt as though it were melting, becoming one with the cushions.
This wasn't like the explosion of anger I'd had the night before.
It was more like… well, perhaps I'd had enough.
Imagine being trapped in a room with no exit.
The ceiling begins descending from above, like the press of an industrial machine.
At first, you struggle desperately to resist. You brace yourself against it with all your strength, like a supporting pillar. Or you try your hardest to push it back.
If this continues, you'll be crushed.
You'll die.
But the ceiling doesn't budge.
The space you have left to survive in keeps getting smaller and smaller.
And at the very last moment, you think, Ah, there's nothing I can do anymore.
All the strength drains out of you.
That's what it felt like.
“Lady Mary, enough. If I must sentence you to death over something as trivial as a cut to my palms, then I am a blight upon this world. I would have to execute my barber every time he cuts my hair. The whole thing has become absurd. You must be a wicked person, Lady Mary. My very existence is evil. Let us both disappear.”
“…Your Majesty's sacred person is Santeneri itself.”
“I see. Then let Santeneri perish with me.”
If you're going to die, then so am I.
The fact that I could say something so underhanded to her probably meant I'd grown comfortable enough with Lady Mary to let my guard down.
I could never have said anything like that to those important older gentlemen.
Perhaps it was because I'd been imagining that descending ceiling, but I suddenly found it difficult to breathe.
I tried to loosen the large-cloth necktie around my throat, but my fingers still wouldn't move properly.
Mary watched me struggle.
“Lady Mary, I cannot breathe. …This large-cloth karul is too tight. …Please, loosen it. I cannot… breathe.”
I wasn't acting.
I really couldn't breathe.
I couldn't draw air into my lungs. There were flashes of light behind my eyes.
Looking back, I wonder if that was hyperventilation.
I'd never experienced it before, so I can't say for certain.
The closest sensation I can compare it to is that feeling you get just before you throw up.
“…Mary…”
She sprang toward me as though a spring wound to its absolute limit had suddenly been released.
At least, that was how it looked to me.
Bloodshot eyes.
A woman's hands reaching for my throat.
If someone had seen us at that moment, the scene would have looked extremely bad.
A woman clinging to a man sprawled on a chaise longue, reaching both hands toward his neck.
A wife strangling her unfaithful husband after putting sleeping pills in his drink, perhaps?
In reality, she wasn't tightening anything around my neck.
She was loosening it for me.
“Your Majesty! Your Majesty!”
Tears splashed onto my face.
With the same trembling hands she'd had the day before, Mary loosened the large cloth around my neck.
“…Ahh. …Thank you. I'll… I'll be all right soon. Just a little longer…”
There was no answer.
Mary was still trembling all over, making a low, groaning sound.
No matter what situation we find ourselves in, there's always some part of us that's conscious of how other people see us.
For example, when I was at the hospital watching my father die, I wept aloud.
I was genuinely heartbroken.
But there was one isolated corner of my mind that remained perfectly clear.
I was calmly observing myself, aware of how I must have looked to the people around me.
Mary had let go of even that.
Tears and snot were streaming down her face.
This wasn't one of those beautiful crying scenes from a television drama.
This was probably the sort of face she'd never want anyone else to see.
Even as a man, I'd feel that way, so I imagine it would be worse for a woman.
Mary buried her face against my chest, rubbing it into my clothes.
Every so often, she let out another low groan.
I let her stay like that.
Once someone reaches this point, reason has nothing to do with it anymore.
I wonder how much time passed.
I'd ordered everyone else out, so there were only the two of us in the room.
Mary hadn't moved at all.
Perhaps the tension had finally left her body and she'd fallen asleep.
So I whispered as quietly as I possibly could, careful not to wake her.
“Lady Mary, you have saved me twice… Yesterday, you stopped my bleeding. Today, you gave me back my breath.”
A woman's golden hair filled most of my field of vision.
I suddenly felt the urge to stroke it.
Actually, this is something I've thought for a while, but Mary has a distinctly golden-retriever-like quality about her.
But if I did that, the Labor Standards Inspection Office would come knocking.
The situation we're already in is dangerously close to crossing the line.
It would be sexual harassment, you know.
◆
And so, the two of them are currently working in a newly established department.
I consulted the Steward and had it created specifically for them.
Number of staff: two.
That's it.
After all, they're both overflowing with enthusiasm.
Their social standing is vastly higher than that of the other ladies-in-waiting, so I'm the only person who can correct them or give them instructions.
I once caught a glimpse of them asking one of the more experienced senior attendants for instructions.
The poor man was standing rigidly at attention.
I'm sure Lady Braune and Lady Mary were simply asking him a perfectly polite question.
But, well, that's what happens.
One is the daughter of the chancellor, and the other is the daughter of the commander of the Royal Guard.
Their noble ranks are impressive enough, but the sheer amount of power their families wield is something else entirely.
Of course people find them intimidating.
I understand.
I don't know about a small or medium-sized company like ours, but imagine working at a major corporation and having the daughter of one of its executives assigned to your department.
You wouldn't like that, would you?
And if you were put in charge of training her, the stress would be unbearable.
I really feel for the attendants and ladies-in-waiting here.
If the executive's daughter had a nasty personality and treated everyone with contempt, at least you could let off some steam by complaining about her behind her back.
But if she were a serious, conscientious, genuinely nice girl, then…
Well.
Hence the new department.
It doesn't have a particular name.
If I had to give it one, I suppose I'd call it the King's Personal Attendants.
The job of the King's Personal Attendants is basically something vaguely resembling secretarial work, but the experienced staff still handle appointments as before, and all the paperwork remains in their hands as well.
Previously, the veteran attendants and ladies-in-waiting would carry out their duties and report directly to me.
Now, the reporting process goes from the veteran staff to the King's Personal Attendants, and then from the King's Personal Attendants to me.
See what I mean?
You know how some workplaces occasionally find themselves in a situation where they have an employee with nothing to do, but they can't exactly dismiss them, so they invent a job just to keep them occupied?
That.
Oh, and the actual business of attending to my personal needs—helping me get dressed, shaving my beard, and so on—is still handled by the professional older gentlemen.
I bathe myself.
Lady Braune seemed a little interested in that sort of thing, but neither of them can even take care of their own personal needs to begin with.
They're practically princesses.
Their ladies-in-waiting do everything for them.
How are they supposed to look after someone else when they can't even look after themselves?
Besides, being a king means that everything you do, from the moment you wake up until the moment you go to sleep, is work in one sense or another.
If they took their duties as the King's Personal Attendants seriously, they'd never get any time off.
Completely unacceptable.
They wouldn't be able to meet the legally mandated minimum number of annual paid-leave days.
That's a matter for the Labor Standards Inspection Office.
So I designated the relatively quiet period from lunchtime through the afternoon as their break, including their lunch hour.
I'm sure they both have hobbies and other things they enjoy, so I wanted them to use that time however they pleased.
A request from the company.
And as a result, they've started taking their breaks and relaxing.
In the sitting room of my private apartments.
I want to tell them to go back to their own rooms.
Deciding where to house them was a bit of a nuisance, too.
They both insisted that rooms in the ladies-in-waiting's quarters would be perfectly fine.
Of course they wouldn't.
Not for their sake.
For the sake of the people already living there.
The stress would be unimaginable.
Ladies-in-waiting are generally daughters of noble families, so some come from count's families of the same rank as Mary's.
But those ladies don't use the residential quarters.
They commute from their family estates.
The higher their rank, the closer their estates tend to be to the royal palace. And even if they live farther away, they have enough money to use a carriage whenever they please.
Consequently, the women who actually live in the ladies-in-waiting's quarters tend to be wealthy commoners or daughters of barons from the provinces.
They come to the royal capital and take up live-in positions.
What would the Japanese equivalent be?
Something like a shared house?
Now imagine a Marquis's daughter and a Count's daughter, each backed by a terrifying amount of political power, moving in and making themselves at home.
You wouldn't want that, would you?
In the end, I had two guest suites prepared for them.
They're suites for distinguished guests, so they're quite spacious.
As I mentioned earlier, both ladies have brought several personal ladies-in-waiting with them from their family estates.
We therefore had to prepare rooms for those attendants as well.
At this point, they've practically got entire houses to themselves.
Which is why I want to tell them to go back to their own rooms.
Hosting tea parties is part of my job as king, so I sometimes invite young ladies from other noble families.
On those occasions, the two of them sometimes come in to serve tea—something they would ordinarily never do.
Or rather, something the people around them would never allow them to do.
The young lady invited to take tea with the king is naturally going to be the daughter of a fairly prominent noble family.
And then the ladies-in-waiting serving her tea, their hands moving with obvious inexperience, turn out to be daughters of noble families of exactly the same standing.
It's like watching a showdown between the most powerful monsters in the world.
Naturally, they all greet each other with impeccable manners.
“Oh, it's been ages! How have you been?”
That sort of thing.
Young ladies from families of that standing all know one another, after all.
On the surface, they seem perfectly friendly.
On the surface.
What do they do when there aren't any tea parties?
They immerse themselves in their hobbies in the sitting room.
Knitting, needlework, that sort of thing.
Santeneri doesn't have a particularly wide variety of entertainment options, you see.
Sometimes they chat with each other, too.
Actually, they're chatting most of the time.
The sitting room is next to my study, so I can faintly hear their voices.
“…His Majesty…”
“Oh my! And then…”
That sort of thing.
My heart immediately starts pounding.
I wish they'd do that in their own rooms.
When they stay at their workplace, I'm going to end up being cornered by someone saying, “Well, this effectively counts as working hours, doesn't it? Mr. President, this is a serious problem.”