The moment the door to the reception room opened, Rosalind was running her pen across the margin of her schedule.
Three o'clock. Twenty minutes.
That was the entire time allotted to today's agenda.
Crown Prince Alfred stepped inside and stopped short at the threshold.
Rosalind sat at the head of the table. Diagonally behind her, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, stood Lucas. Two secretaries, two guards, one record-keeper.
It was the seating of a hearing, not an audience.
"...Rosalind."
Without waiting for his host's permission, the Crown Prince lowered himself into the center chair. The creak of the backrest sounded strangely loud in the silence of the room.
"I'll be honest."
He opened more boldly than anyone expected.
"When a cold-hearted woman like you left the country, I was glad to be rid of you. I meant that, from the bottom of my heart."
Rosalind's pen didn't stop.
"...But. Today, out of the generosity of my heart, I've come to forgive you."
Behind Rosalind, to her right, Lucas took half a step toward the table.
"With respect, Your Highness."
His voice was low, with every trace of warmth drained out of it.
"An insult to our Economic Advisor will be handled as a diplomatic matter. Is that acceptable to you?"
Alfred's throat bobbed in a small gulp.
Lucas said nothing more. The record-keeper's pen took down the exchange, word for word.
Rosalind added a brief note in the corner of her schedule.
Insult to our Economic Advisor. Handling as diplomatic matter confirmed (Your Grace). His Highness: no response.
—A splendid bit of deterrence, for someone attending in a professional capacity.
That was how she filed it away. Without the faintest thought that she was being protected, Rosalind moved her pen to the next item.
"Your Highness, I understand that today's business is a request for economic aid to my homeland."
Rosalind finally looked up and put on a smile at the perfect angle for a noble lady.
"Kindly get to the point. We have only twenty minutes."
Alfred touched up his bravado with a fresh coat.
"Rosalind. The truth is, all this time... I've..."
His tone changed.
"Even breaking off the engagement—it was out of love for you. I was trying to test you..."
Somewhere inside Rosalind, the Ritsuko Tanaka of her past life quietly pressed a hand to her forehead.
—Ahh... there it is. The effortless blame-shift. "I did it for your own good." Bosses like this really never change, do they.
—My section chief back then was the same. He'd dump work on me after the last train had gone, then say a few days later with a perfectly straight face, "I wanted to help you grow."
Outwardly, she didn't so much as blink.
Rosalind set down her pen.
And looked the Crown Prince straight in the eye.
"Your Highness."
"Y-yes?"
"Whether or not your affection is genuine is not among the conditions for terminating the contract."
The air in the room stopped for a beat.
"...What?"
"I cannot place on the agenda anything that isn't written in the clauses."
One of the guards, eyes still lowered, let out the tiniest breath.
Rosalind slid the third document across to the Crown Prince.
"Have you read Article Three, Paragraph Two of the contract? Today's agenda is the request for economic aid to my homeland. My answer has already been given in writing. Three letters, to be exact."
"Rosalind, listen to me. I—"
"Your Highness. The point, please."
The same line, a second time, dropped the temperature of the room by half a degree.
The second mask slid off Alfred's face as well.
He pushed back his chair and stood.
And then he dropped to both knees on the floor.
His head bowed low. So low his forehead nearly touched the carpet.
"...For the sake of the kingdom. I'm begging you."
The secretary's pen stopped.
"The people back home are starving. We need what you can do."
At last, Rosalind set down her pen.
A long, long silence fell over the room.
"Your Highness."
Rosalind's voice held neither reproach nor pity.
It was simply direct, the way one confirms a point of business.
"I must ask you to withdraw this prostration."
"...What?"
"A royal's knees do not belong to the royal. They belong to the people."
Rosalind returned her teacup to its saucer.
"To bend them now for a mere economic advisor such as myself—is an insult to the people."
A beat.
"Besides—this is the first time I've ever heard Your Highness speak of the people."
The Crown Prince's shoulders gave a slight tremor.
Alfred couldn't lift his head.
He bowed once more, deeply, and froze there.
Rosalind wrote a brief line on the last row of her schedule.
Meeting concluded. Request for economic aid: denied.
"Allow me to state my conclusion."
Rosalind looked straight down at the crown of the Crown Prince's head.
"Under the terms of my contract, economic aid to my homeland, the Kingdom of Albert, cannot be provided."
Alfred lifted his face. His lips moved, ready to argue.
Rosalind didn't give him that beat.
"The interference clause of the bilateral memorandum. The compensation owed should your nation interfere in my employment has been set—at a sum your treasury could never hope to pay."
The Crown Prince's half-open mouth stopped.
"And that 'interference' includes your personal visit today. Should it have slipped your mind, do review the clause in the carriage on your way home."
The temperature of the room fell another half degree.
Rosalind picked up her pen again and drew a single line in the margin of her copy of the memorandum.
"Just one more point, for good measure."
"Your nation's remaining preferential trade quota runs for one more year."
Alfred's shoulders loosened slightly. One year. There was still time—that was what his face said he'd heard.
Rosalind quietly overwrote that hope.
"That said, nearly all of your nation's goods were rerouted to other sea lanes after I took up my post. Not a single shipment passes through that quota anymore."
"For the year remaining, what your nation will hold is—a preferential quota with nothing passing through it."
One by one, every expression drained from the Crown Prince's face.
"Do take it home with you."
From his place by the wall, Lucas tapped a fingertip once against the edge of the table.
That was the signal. The guards took up positions on either side of the Crown Prince.
The gesture urging him to leave was courteous—and for that very reason, merciless.
Alfred lifted his face one last time.
"Rosalind... at least—say my name."
"Your Highness."
Rosalind stayed seated and didn't move.
"Please take your leave while your head is still held high. —I shall do you the kindness of preserving a royal's last shred of dignity."
That single remark cut the last thread.
"...Why, you—"
The Crown Prince sprang to his feet.
"You...! You cold-hearted woman...! I'm royalty, and I lowered my head this far for you—how dare you!"
His chair toppled over behind him.
Across the table, the Crown Prince's hand reached for Rosalind—
It didn't reach her.
The back of a black coat blocked Rosalind's view.
It was Lucas.
No one had seen him move. Half a step. With only half a step, he had placed himself between the table and Rosalind.
He said nothing.
There were only his eyes, looking down at the Crown Prince.
For the first time in his life, Alfred faced the full chill that had earned the man the name "the Ice Grand Duke."
Lucas simply let his gaze drop to the Crown Prince's outstretched arm. He didn't so much as touch the hilt of his sword. It was a refusal quieter than that, and clearer than that.
The outstretched hand, with nowhere left to go, sank down, trembling.
The guards closed in again on either side.
Still seated, Rosalind quietly leaned out from beside Lucas's back, just enough to show half of herself. It was the only movement she made.
"Your Highness. One last thing."
It was the voice she used to bring a meeting to a close.
"I am grateful for your decision that day, you know."
"........"
"Breaking off our engagement. It must have been such a difficult decision, and yet you announced it so splendidly, in front of everyone."
Rosalind inclined her head slightly, at the angle of a noble lady's courtesy.
"Thanks to you, I was spared the chair called 'Queen'—and came upon a legitimate employer instead."
Rosalind's eyes narrowed, just slightly.
"I would dearly love to help, but economic aid runs contrary to the interests of my employer, the Grand Duchy. It is with great regret that, in this matter—I must respectfully decline."
Not even half of that reached Alfred, though. His terror of Lucas, standing half a step in front of her, had plugged his ears.
The red of anger drained from his face. What rose in its place was the pallor of fear.
—It is with great regret that...
It was the opening line Ritsuko had received dozens of times in her past life.
The spring of her job hunt. Rejection letters arriving in the same words every time, as if stamped from a mold.
We regret that we are unable to meet your expectations. We sincerely wish you every success in your future endeavors.
Polite, gentle-sounding boilerplate without a single word of real feeling in it. How many times had that thin sheet of paper quietly sent her back—her entire self along with it?
—Hey, Ritsuko. This time, we're the ones sending it back. That humiliation we swallowed back then—we've finally paid it back.
A sound that wasn't quite a voice escaped the Crown Prince's throat.
And that was all.
The guards' footsteps carried him out through the door.
The door closed.
The secretaries, the record-keeper, and the guards left in the room looked as though not one of them had been breathing.
Only Rosalind, breathing as she always did, took a sip of her tea.
Then, idly, she glanced toward the window.
The Crown Prince's carriage had been moved to a corner of the courtyard and stood there quietly, as if waiting for the hour of his send-off.
Rosalind murmured softly, so low the words never left her mouth.
"'Farewell'—can wait. Just a little longer."
It was a parting line she had swallowed again and again on the last train home in her past life. But today, it still wasn't time. —Just a little longer.
—Ritsuko, can you hear me? We're finally showing that kind of boss out of the castle. Just wait a little longer.
Somewhere in her chest, she felt as though Ritsuko Tanaka's hand had squeezed back, ever so slightly.
Behind Rosalind, to her right, Lucas spoke for the first time.
"...Advisor Rosalind. You should rest a little."
Rosalind answered without turning around.
"I'm touched by your concern. However, I have a backlog of other approvals starting at three-twenty."
"...I took three of them off your hands."
"Pardon?"
Rosalind finally turned around.
Lucas was no longer looking at the door the Crown Prince had left through. His shoulders, which had been as still as stone a moment ago, had loosened slightly. At some point, he had gathered a bundle of her approval documents into his arms.
"I've had pastries sent to your office. Go on ahead."
With that, still holding the documents, he turned half a step toward the corridor to open the way for her. It was far too gruff a movement to call an escort.
Rosalind took it as workplace health management.
—An appropriate workload adjustment. As expected of Your Grace.
Only Lucas saw how her expressionless face had softened, at an angle so slight it was almost nothing.