Chapter 70: Family Matters May Matter

The evening finally greeted the convent, but the main road was still alive with flame torches.

A carriage had stopped before the gates, white and gold, with a wreath of lilies carved into its door. It could barely be seen. Commoners were packed around it from wheel to roof, kneeling, bowing, and pressing their foreheads to the painted wood as if the carriage itself were holy.

"Bless the First Prince! Bless him!"

"He paid for my daughter’s medicine!"

"I heard he knelt in the mud with the orphans in Rensfell and ate the same stale bread they did! A kind man, a gentle man, a man of the people! The nobles could learn a thing or two from him!"

"I won’t even be surprised if he’s Saint Melcius reborn."

The crowd gasped.

Within moments, half the crowd was shouting praises and the other half was singing the prince’s good name.

Then the carriage door opened.

A coachman stepped down and raised his hand.

"Make way! Make way for His Highness, First Prince Godfrey Falsbane, who has come to join the Holy Church for the spiritual week! You are free to watch him, but give him space!"

The commoners split apart like the Red Sea.

In seconds, they’d arranged themselves in two neat, orderly rows along either side of the carriage, hands folded, backs straight, as if they’d rehearsed it prior.

The carriage stayed shut, inside was quiet.

Godfrey sat against the cushioned seat with his head tilted back and his eyes closed, and the lantern light was not kind to him. His eye bags were heavy and purple. The dark circles beneath them had spread so wide that they looked like bruises. His skin was pale, almost waxen, but his cheeks had a strange, feverish flush, as if someone had lit a candle behind a sheet of paper.

He looked like a man who was dying from exhaustion.

And maybe he was.

Ever since the duel he’d become the highest-ranked prince in succession "present" in the kingdom, his days had stopped belonging to him.

There was a charity banquet in the capital.

Then a ribbon-cutting at a new granary.

Then a trip to Rensfell to hand gold to an orphanage and another trip to Calder to hand gold to a different orphanage.

[More people need to know your achievements] the Church had told him.

[You must build your image] his mother had said.

It wasn’t that Godfrey was lazy, he’d never been lazy.

He could spend twelve hours in the royal library without noticing the sun had gone down.

But there was something exhausting about doing something so shallow. Handing gold to children and doing many good deeds while making sure people saw it.

Giving to the poor was supposed to be the quietest of virtues, and he’d been turned into a parade of it.

It wasn’t who he was.

Years ago, when his father decided the First Son lacked the talent to wield the throne, Godfrey had given up on it. He hadn’t been angry about it. He’d just put the desire down one day and found that he didn’t miss it.

And he didn’t want revenge, either.

A son who was rejected by his father and responded by seizing the throne through the Church was a story as old as the kingdom, and Godfrey didn’t want to be in it.

’I’m not stupid...’

He knew what the Church wanted. They wanted a prince of the royal blood on their side, a face they could hold up against the peerage as they scrambled to take back the power they’d lost.

But he couldn’t turn against his faith, and he couldn’t turn against his father.

Not like Adonis could.

His little brother had stood in front of the entire court and said what he wanted to say, done what he wanted to do, and never apologized for it. Godfrey admired that. It was also the reason his stomach ached every time he thought of him.

’He worked so hard for that duel. And I took the win. I’m a sinner before the White Saint and a sinner before my brother...’

Godfrey clasped his hands together and lowered his head to at least pray for forgiveness.

But someone was poking his shoulder.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

"Godfrey! Are you listening to me?!"

It was his mother’s voice.

First Queen Esmarie sat across from him, fan clenched in her fist, her painted lips thin with irritation.

"You’re about to join the Church for the spiritual week! Do you understand what that means?! You must give your best performance! The commoners must keep praising you. The clergy must keep praising you. Not one slip, not one yawn!"

"..."

"Remember, the only reason the Second Prince is first in succession is because he’s talented, because he awakenedatbirth! You may not have his gifts, but you can use your manners to charm the masses! That is your only weapon, so use it!"

Godfrey raised his head.

His eyes were tired, soulless, almost.

"Mother, since when are you so interested in the commoners? Or in my religious life?"

Esmarie blinked.

"You’ve never once followed me to the Church. I built my spiritual life by myself, without you. Every time I asked if we could visit the orphanages together, you told me no. So why are you being a pest about it now?"

SLAP!

Godfrey’s head nearly spun on his neck.

"How dare you speak to me like that?!"

Esmarie rose halfway out of her seat, shaking with her fan now pointed at his face like a blade.

"After everything I’ve done! After everything I’ve sacrificed! Every night I lie awake planning your future, and this is how you repay me?! Ungrateful boy! Ungrateful, ungrateful child! Everything I do is for you and your siblings, and you stand there looking at me as if I’m some kind of monster!"

Godfrey said nothing.

His head was so low that his bangs covered his eyes and nothing could be seen of his face except a pale, still mouth.

"...I’m sorry. For being an ungrateful son."

He lifted his hand and pushed the carriage door open.

"THE FIRST PRINCE!"

"God bless him!"

"Look at him! Look at that humble face!"

Godfrey stepped down with a weak smile before the roars.

...

Meanwhile, Adonis had been released from the dungeon.

He walked toward the hostel with his hands behind his head and a yawn leaving his mouth every other second.

"Aiyaahh, I can’t believe I did something so stupid and impatient. I turned the Church’s holy mother into a woman who’ll do anything to convert me."

He shook his head, then looked at the floating panel.

[Euphemia – Affection: 0]

That’s the worst part.

Euphemia was a shallow woman who didn’t care about men, or romance, or any of it. She’d never feel anything for him, since to her he was just another spiritual challenge; a lost sheep that must be guided.

In fact, if he hadn’t put on such a convincing act, she might not have asked his name at all.

[What’s your name?] is what she asked back at the dungeon.

She didn’t know the name of one of the kingdom’s princes? It’s a shock to Adonis. Then again, it wasn’t that unusual for someone like her who is always so aloof, and most people knew him more as "the Fifth Prince" or "that wastrel" than anything with a proper name attached.

[Nonie...] that’s the name Adonis told her.

[Nonie...? That’s quite a unique name...]

[Eheheh. Of course it is.]

That’s the last thing they talked about.

Adonis exhaled and moved on. He reached the hostel and twisted the doorknob, wearing a happy smile.

Why wouldn’t he be happy? Tonight he’d get to snuggle with Alpis and use that to tease Prussia, as usual. A man who’d spent years admiring ladies like these from his old, mundane world could only call this one thing.

It is the life!

The door swung open and his smile tightened.

The room was destroyed.

The vases were in pieces, his fancy clothes had been torn to strips, the bed frame was snapped in half, and the mattress looked like a giant cat had spent an hour clawing at it.

There’s feathers drifting around like snowfall.

In the one clean corner, Alpis slept soundly on a pile of ruined pillows, drooling a little.

"What... the hell..."

CRAAAASHHH!

The wall exploded inward as dust rushed into the room.

"Stay behind me!"

Prussia leapt out of it with a golden longsword raised in front of him like a shield.

"I’ll protect you!"

Adonis stared.

Her nightdress had been torn to rags. It’s quite sexy as most of her body could be seen, and if he was being honest, she was basically naked. Sweat ran down her skin. There were bruises across her ribs, dirt on her thighs, and shallow cuts along her arms and shoulders.

"What’s goingon?!"

"YOU SHAMELESS WHORE!"

A scream tore out of the dust.

Claire charged out of the haze with an emerald rapier in her hand and a smile that didn’t belong on anyone sane. She slashed at Prussia, who caught the blade on her golden sword, but Claire’s knee drove straight into her stomach.

"How dare you wear something so seductive in the same room that my sweet little brother’s scent is in?! Do you plan to steal his virginity... IS THAT YOUR PLAN?!"

Prussia are the pain and shoved back against the rapier.

"Are you crazy?!"

She pivoted and sent a high boot kick into Claire’s ribs that threw her straight into the wall.

... Craaaash! The wall cracked and Claire slid down it, and then she laughed like it’s nothing. She’s insane.

Prussia panted, her sword still raised.

’This is Adonis’s stepsister? Then why is she so obsessed with him? It’s uncomfortable. And worse... she’s strong. Really strong. She’s gold-ranked, just like me.’

She lifted her sword to charge.

But Adonis stepped in front of her.

"Stop, Claire!"

Claire’s red eyes shrank to sharp points, like an animal that had just been told to heel.

"Stop?"

Her voice was very quiet.

"You’d defend a whore over your own sister who has shown you nothing but love? So disrespectful. I should have cut your dick off and kept it for myself when I had the chance. Aaah~ ?? my dear little Addy’s dick~"

Adonis sighed.

"It’s not that. Prussia is my fiancée."

... Fiancée, the forbidden word.

Nothing else he said mattered to Claire.

In a flash step, she was in front of him with her slender hand closed around his collar, then pulled him down until their noses almost touched.

"So you love this woman?"

"Mhm."

"More than me? Your own sister?"

"Ermm..." Adonis looked to the side.

Claire’s eyes narrowed with fury.

She dragged him in.

"Mmph?!"

She kissed him, her tongue pushed inside his mouth, soon it was deep down his throat. Claire has a long tongue, and now there’s also a wicked smile at the corners of her kiss as she looked past his shoulder and glared at Prussia.

"Goneehhh ?? this is how to love a man fufufu~"

Prussia vibrated with anger. "This bitch..."