The envoys from the homeland bowed their heads twice.
—The second time, they leaned further forward.
On the afternoon of the very day Lord Sutherland's carriage set off for the border, a second envoy party passed through the gates of the Grand Duchy, as though trading places with him.
The audience chamber.
"Then, if you will permit us to come to the matter at hand."
Finance Officer Gray pressed a white handkerchief to the sweat on his brow.
The air in the audience chamber had already frozen over a second time. On the very settee from which she had just delivered "I must respectfully decline" to Lord Sutherland, Rosalind sat without the slightest slouch.
Lucas sat half a step behind her, deep in his chair, one elbow resting on the armrest. His gaze was turned toward the envoys, but whose face he was looking at, no one could tell.
"As a duke's daughter, you bear, under the laws of your homeland, a duty of service to the royal house."
Gray's voice had at last recovered the cadence of lines rehearsed in advance.
"This is a matter separate from Lord Sutherland's negotiation earlier. By virtue of the obligations of your rank under the laws of your homeland, we ask that you relinquish your post as Economic Advisor and return home."
"Hmm." That single syllable was all Rosalind gave back.
"May I confirm one thing?"
"B-by all means."
"A duke's daughter's duty of service, under the laws of the homeland—that is what you said, is it not?"
"...Y-yes."
Rosalind tilted her head, just slightly.
"I have already been formally separated from the register of House Abel."
Gray's pupils contracted sharply—visibly, even at that distance.
"My father completed the procedure before I left the country. Shall I show you the documents?"
For just one second, the scene in the study that day surfaced in Rosalind's mind.
Before her departure, her father, Duke Abel, had drawn from the back of a drawer in his study desk a single sheet whose wax seal was still new. A certificate of separation. "In case it ever comes to that, I have left the homeland not one pretext for calling you back. You are no longer a daughter of this house," her father had said, briefly. At the time, Rosalind had simply bowed her head. "Thank you, Father."
The document lay at the back of the locked drawer in her office.
"Anna, please show them the copy of the certificate of separation."
"I shall fetch it at once!"
From the office to the audience chamber was twenty seconds at a run. Anna was back in almost exactly that time. The single sealed sheet slid across to rest in front of Gray.
"Please, examine it. It bears the acceptance stamp of the Royal Records Office back home."
The color drained, plainly, from Gray's face.
Lucas finally opened his mouth.
"If the duties of a duke's daughter can be imposed on one who is not a duke's daughter,"
His voice was low.
"then that is not your homeland's law. It is mere intimidation."
From where Rosalind sat, she could see a single line of sweat run plainly down the back of Gray's neck.
"Y-Your Grace, that is—"
The excuse Gray had begun never took full shape. Instead, a young secretary stepped forward from the middle of the envoy party.
"...And, one more matter."
Trembling fingers produced a sealed letter.
"A private letter from the Saint, addressed to Lady Rosalind."
Rosalind accepted the letter and lowered her gaze to the seal.
Miria's personal seal. Sent from the north wing of the royal palace. —She did not need to open it to know half of what was inside.
Without breaking the seal, Rosalind quietly set it back on the table.
"I must decline to read it."
The secretary's shoulders gave a small jerk. Between the letter, laid face down on the table with its seal unbroken, and that single word "decline," there was nothing left to hold on to.
Rosalind offered no one an apology for that silence.
"A private letter carries no official force between nations."
"...Pardon?"
"A letter addressed to an individual, I receive as an individual and deal with as an individual. It is not a bargaining chip for the homeland."
"B-but it is from the Saint herself—"
"Do you have an official letter of request bearing her own signature?"
Gray could not answer.
With one fingertip, Rosalind pushed the letter back across the table toward the secretary.
"As it is a private letter, I have no grounds to keep it here, either. Kindly take it back with you."
The secretary bowed deeply and picked up the letter with great care.
"As for my reply—quite clearly—"
Rosalind straightened.
"I respectfully decline."
"I respectfully decline." With those words, the audience ought to have ended.
Gray bowed and had begun, unsteadily, to turn away, when at his back—
"—Ah, Lord Gray. Do wait a moment."
Rosalind's voice floated after him, light and soft.
For a man already flattened by the single word "decline," perhaps that gentle tone was the more frightening of the two. Gray's shoulders jumped.
"You have come all this way. To send you home empty-handed would be discourteous. —Allow me to give you a parting gift."
"...A parting gift?"
"The homeland is troubled at present by sluggish exports, is it not? Iron ore, silver ore, woolens—with the Grand Duchy's tariffs so high, they cannot compete on price with goods coming through Porto. Am I mistaken?"
Gray could not answer. She had hit the mark.
"I might be willing to lower those tariffs for you."
Gray's throat made a thin, whistling sound.
"There is, however, a condition."
Rosalind raised one finger.
"That ten percent fee your Chancellor's office takes. Abolish it entirely."
"Th-the fee...?"
"As long as it remains, even if we lower our tariffs, the difference will simply be siphoned off by your Chancellor's office. That is not fair trade. And so we cannot lower them. —On the very day you abolish the fee, we shall reduce the tariffs accordingly."
"Th-that would be... more than we could ask for—"
"Wait."
Lucas, who had not said a word until then, slowly raised himself from the back of his chair.
"On that condition alone, I cannot approve it."
"...Your Grace?" Gray's voice cracked.
"My Economic Advisor was born in your country."
Lucas's low voice fell over the audience chamber.
"If she arranges a deal that lowers tariffs for her homeland—and that is all—what will be said of it later? 'She favored her homeland.' A conflict of interest."
Lucas went on without so much as a glance at Rosalind.
"I will not leave her a shred of room for such suspicion. So I am adding a condition."
A knuckle tapped the edge of the desk, once.
"In exchange for lowering the tariffs, the Grand Duchy will now, in turn, collect a customs fee. For exactly as many years as your country imposed yours."
"Wha—!"
The color that had begun to return to Gray's face drained away once more.
"Without this, there is no deal. —Her fairness, I guarantee."
(—His Grace is even taking my position into account.)
Inwardly, Rosalind nodded deeply.
An Economic Advisor who handed down lenient rulings to her country of origin would damage the organization's credibility. Stamp out the spark while it was still a seed. As labor management—no, as organizational defense—an exceedingly correct decision.
What's more—Rosalind lined up the figures in her head once again.
Lowering the tariffs would not benefit the homeland alone. The same went for us. Lower procurement costs would fill the Grand Duchy's coffers as well. And on top of that, thirty years' worth of customs fees would come in. That single move to protect my fairness had become, just as it stood, the best possible deal for the Grand Duchy.
(Defense and offense, both in a single condition...)
(As expected of Your Grace. Not a single oversight.)
No other interpretation, once again, existed within her.
Rosalind turned back to Gray with a soft laugh.
"—And so, there you have it. Not a bad proposal at all, is it?"
"If the tariffs come down, your iron ore and woolens will flow into the Grand Duchy once more. If exports grow, foreign currency will return to you. When trade circulates properly, the price of goods coming into your country will fall as well, and prices at home will settle. —Even the people's lives will be somewhat eased."
"Even after giving up the ten percent fee and paying a new fee to us—by my estimates, your country's gains will far exceed it."
"Besides—I only ever propose deals in which both sides profit."
Half a year ago, when she had raised the tariffs, that one fee she had left untouched.
—So that one day the homeland itself would say, "We'll abolish it, if it means we can sell." She had left it in place on purpose, for that day.
For some time, Gray stared at the single sheet held out to him.
This was—without doubt—a negotiation that would save the homeland. What it gained was far greater than the fee it surrendered. Next season exports would open up again, and the country would, eventually, breathe again.
—Eventually.
That single sheet said nothing about how to get through this winter.
And yet, it was not the winter at his feet that had brought the sweat to Gray's brow. That the one who had drawn up this sheet that would save the homeland was the very daughter the homeland itself had let go of half a year ago—that one point alone, he simply could not wipe away.
—At that same hour, in a bedchamber deep within the homeland's royal palace.
Miria sat on the edge of the bed, a washbasin clutched in her lap.
The morning sickness had gone on for four weeks now. No one came to change the basin. Her maid had been made to stand out in the corridor, and when called, did not come right away.
From downstairs came a young woman's laughter.
The sort of laughter that came tagged on to Alfred whispering something to a new young lady.
Miria wiped her mouth.
Beside the bed still lay a single half-written sheet of letter paper.
"Big Sister"—a sheet on which the pen had stopped after just that much. Humiliation had kept the flattery that should have followed from coming.
Next to it lay another letter, already fair-copied and sealed. It would no longer reach Gray's main party in time. She meant to entrust it to the follow-up envoys departing tomorrow morning, to chase after them.
—Seek your Big Sister's help. It was the Queen Mother who had commanded it. "You were close enough to call her 'Big Sister,' were you not? To a letter from you, perhaps even that girl might open her heart." Whether Gray's negotiations would bear fruit, no one could say. In that case, a path that clung to sentiment was one more road to keep open—such was the court's calculation.
Facing the letter paper, Miria ground her back teeth. Bowing her head to a woman like that—it was humiliating.
—When it came down to it, it was all that woman's fault. A coward who ran from her duties.
She'd known perfectly well what had been rigged into that seat. Not one word of warning, and then she alone ran off with that cool look on her face. The sneak.
(Even a coward like her ought to at least have a duty to help me.)
With that thought settled, the pen finally moved.
With trembling fingers, Miria pressed the wax seal down one last time.
"...Big Sister, please, save me."
The whispered voice was crafted to sound sweet. No one was listening, yet it had already become a habit.
(Having to beg that woman to save me is infuriating. Fine, let her play the good person and help. It's the seat you threw away—so it's your responsibility.)
That to the very end this letter would not even be opened, and would be carried back home in a secretary's hands—this, Miria did not know.
In the audience chamber, the envoys withdrew, bowing more deeply than when they had arrived.
Gray held that single sheet to his chest with both hands. It was a paper that would save the homeland's tomorrow, and at the same time—a paper that, once accepted, meant the homeland would spend the next thirty years paying the Grand Duchy exactly the fee it had once gorged itself on for thirty years.
Not the gait of a man who had been saved. Nor that of a man who had been turned away. —Only the back of one who could not win slowly vanished beyond the doors.
Rosalind carefully folded the copy of the certificate of separation. With her fingertips, she lightly squared the corners of the leather-bound folio.
On a thought, she looked up at Lucas beside her.
"Your Grace, I apologize for taking up your time."
"No."
"Now I can return to work."
Lucas did not answer. Only, for an instant, he let his gaze fall to the top of her head. To the crown of her silver hair.
The temperature of that gaze was too low for anyone to measure, and too soft for anyone to see.
Rosalind, as ever, did not notice what that gaze meant.
"Then, let us continue with the currency reform estimates."
"Yes."
Lucas rose.
Rosalind set off first, and Lucas again walked half a step behind. Not to help her. So as not to get in her way—and so that no one else would.
The doors of the audience chamber closed quietly.
—That same night, in the homeland's finance council chamber, a single name was about to be written into the nominee field of a pledge for increased donations. Its owner would not be the one writing it. Someone would be made to write it.
Of that, Rosalind did not yet know.
But the things she did not know no longer bound her in the slightest.