The One Who Won't Be Abandoned - Chapter 25

Everyone who had gathered to welcome the heir to the Kaïman family bore witness to the shocking and chaotic scene.

Clint, Andre’s father, recalled the last time he had visited his son in Siamo two years ago. Even then, Andre had grown considerably, but in the years since, he had become a giant—practically monstrous in size and strength. Suspicious of the extent of Andre’s physical development, Clint carefully inquired.

“Are you using any… substances?”

“What kind of substances, Father?”

“You know, those supplements young men use to bulk up.”

Andre straightened his shoulders and lifted his head, meeting Clint’s gaze with unwavering confidence.

“I would never touch unregulated substances. From what I’ve observed, they don’t even work. In fact, I know of someone who used them and suffered side effects severe enough to have their engagement broken off.”

“What kind of side effects?”

“Impotence.”

“Ahem!” Clint coughed awkwardly, embarrassed by the blunt reply.

“Apologize to Jeanne as soon as she wakes up.”

“Yes, Father.”

With that, Clint set aside the discussion about Jeanne, picked up the teacup in front of him, and sipped quietly, savoring the tea’s aroma. Silence descended over the parlor, but only for a moment.

“A messenger from the imperial family arrived,” Clint said, his voice sharp and laced with tension.

While Clint had pulled Andre away from Jeanne earlier to reprimand him, the real reason for his urgency was the imperial messenger’s sudden appearance.

Until now, the only correspondence the imperial family had sent to Drehel Castle were New Year’s party invitations. Thus, Clint couldn’t help but feel uneasy about the messenger’s unexpected visit.

The contents of the emperor’s letter were far more shocking than anything Clint had anticipated.

“They tell me you proposed to the emperor that you’d marry the princess. Is this true?”

The letter stated that the emperor had approved Andre’s request to become engaged to Princess Gresia, his daughter.

At Clint’s question, Andre nodded calmly, without hesitation.

“Why?”

Clint had deliberately avoided arranging a betrothal for Andre, allowing him the freedom to pursue love without obligation. Proposals from noble families had been turned down repeatedly, and any talk of marriage had been dismissed.

That had been Clint’s mistake. He should have arranged an engagement himself.

The princess, Gresia de Snyah Sendfinden, was a well-known burden to the emperor. Despite being far past the appropriate age for marriage, she shamelessly lingered in the imperial palace.

“Are you out of your mind?”

Clint could have begrudgingly accepted that the princess was many years older than Andre—if that were the only issue. But she also carried the scandalous history of having a son whose father was unknown. That fact was unacceptable.

Andre, unfazed by Clint’s furious glare, met his father’s gaze and replied calmly.

“The princess proposed the engagement first. Her terms were favorable, so I accepted.”

“You accepted that ridiculous engagement? What could you possibly lack to make such a choice?”

Bang!

Clint slammed his fist on the table.

Clint slammed his fist down on the table, his rising fury spilling over.

At first, he couldn’t believe the contents of the emperor’s letter. He had thought it was another of the emperor’s ploys to bring Kaïman under his control.

But the more Clint thought about it, the more he was convinced that Andre must have been aware of the arrangement. Not even the emperor could dare to fabricate such a significant matter involving Kaïman without Clint or Andre’s consent.

“You’ve been in Siamo all this time. When did you meet the princess? When did you meet the emperor?”

“I crossed the border during each break from my studies. Since I wasn’t allowed to return to Drehel under your orders, I visited the estates of those who invited me. That’s when I met Princess Gresia.”

“What? You crossed the border during every break?”

Clint felt a sharp pang of betrayal. He had assumed his son had been quietly staying in Siamo during his breaks, but instead, Andre had been gallivanting around the Sendfinden Empire like an unbridled colt, entirely without his father’s knowledge.

“Are you unaware that the illegitimate princess has an illegitimate son? The entire empire knows about her scandalous reputation. Do you truly wish to be engaged to such a woman?”

“It’s purely a matter of necessity. We’ve agreed to break the engagement once it’s served its purpose.”

“Even if it’s an engagement meant to be broken, I won’t allow it! You know full well that Gresia was the very woman the emperor tried to foist upon me after your mother’s death. He mocked me by proposing her to me before your mother’s body was even cold! I’ve never forgotten that insult. How dare you do this to me?”

Clint could feel the emperor’s shadow creeping back into his life—a vile, sticky presence that corroded everything it touched.

“Father,” Andre said, his tone steady. “I’ve lived my life according to your wishes. I went to Siamo because you ordered it, and I stayed away from Drehel because you forbade my return. So, for once, I ask you to respect my decision.”

“Do you mean to drag Kaïman’s honor through the mud?”

“You are strong enough to weather a momentary loss of honor, Father.”

“People with loose tongues will use you as their plaything, chewing you up and spitting you out.”

“If you trust me, I’ll endure whatever insults come my way as if they were nothing more than passing breezes.”

Clint’s patience snapped. Seeing no other way, he resorted to his final, desperate measure. He knew it was petty, but he would rather disgrace himself than allow his son’s reputation to be irreparably tarnished before he even stepped into his role as Kaïman’s heir.

“Jeanne,” Clint said coldly.

“…”

Andre’s expression hardened as he shot his father a look tinged with disdain. Clint, however, didn’t back down, holding his ground firmly.

“If you refuse to withdraw from this engagement, I’ll have Jeanne removed from the castle. No, I’ll banish her from Drehel entirely.”

“Father!”

It was the first time Andre had raised his voice during their conversation. Clint felt a grim satisfaction at his son’s intense reaction. He had struck a nerve—Andre’s greatest weakness.

“I’ll ensure she’s matched with a good family, but she’ll never set foot on this land again.”

“Father…”

“If you still consider her a sister, family, then abandon the engagement with the princess. Write a letter to the emperor this instant, requesting the annulment of your engagement.”

Clint knew about Andre’s letters to Jeanne. She was the only person besides Clint himself who had received correspondence from Andre. He also knew that Andre and Jeanne had grown close during their time alone together at Mount Kayal.

Andre rose stiffly from his chair, stepping closer to Clint. Then, to Clint’s shock, he knelt down without hesitation.

“I’m sorry, Father. But I must go through with the engagement to the princess.”

“You… you fool…!”

“I’ve already signed the engagement contract, sealed with the emperor’s sigil.”

Clint felt as though the sky had collapsed on him. If the contract bore the emperor’s seal, not even Clint, the head of the Kaïman family, could annul it. Unless the emperor himself rescinded the agreement, it was unbreakable.

“I sent you to that faraway land to protect you from the emperor, and this is how you repay me?” Clint bellowed, clutching the back of his neck as if the pressure might crush him.

Raising his trembling hand, Clint struck Andre hard across the chest.

Thud! Thud!

“You ungrateful child! You’re a disgrace to this family!”

“The princess is a victim as well,” Andre replied calmly.

“A victim? That illegitimate son of hers—are you suggesting he was born of assault? And what about the men she supposedly brings to her chambers? Do you think those are lies? Most of them come from families so prominent that their names are known throughout the empire. Not one of them has denied setting foot in her chambers!”

Even Clint, who had been secluded in Drehel, had heard of the princess’s infamous exploits. The only reason her illegitimate son hadn’t been cast out of the imperial family was his fortuitous inheritance of the royal violet eyes.

“I respect the princess’s private life,” Andre replied.

“And yet you call her a victim?”

Clint shouted until his voice grew hoarse, eventually stopping as exhaustion overtook him.

Breathing heavily, Clint glared at Andre, who, despite the tension, kept glancing toward the door.

The issue of the emperor and the princess was secondary in Andre’s mind. His thoughts were consumed by Jeanne, who remained unconscious. Their long-awaited reunion had turned into a disaster, and no problem seemed greater than that.

Andre desperately wanted to rush to Jeanne’s side. But seeing his father, aged ten years in the span of their argument, he forced himself to stay put.

He had anticipated that Clint wouldn’t accept the engagement easily. But why did it have to be now, when Jeanne was lying in bed, fragile and pale? The memory of her delicate frame haunted him, and he silently resolved:

I need to return to Jeanne… quickly.

Clint collapsed onto the sofa with a stagger, but even as Andre glanced at him, his mind was entirely fixated on returning to Jeanne.

However, Clint had no intention of letting Andre go. Clint’s singular focus was to resolve the issue of the engagement, here and now.

“Haah… Huff… Huff… What do you mean by a ‘broken engagement’?”

Andre stared at Clint’s face, lined with what seemed to be an increasing number of wrinkles, as memories of the past surfaced.

Before the collapse of the Kaiman estate in the capital, Clint had once criticized a nobleman in front of a young Andre for taking a maid as his mistress.

“Taking a maid as a mistress when you already have a wife? He’s no better than a lust-driven beast.”

At the time, Andre had let those words slip by without much thought. But years later, as he lay in Siamose, longing for Jeanne and shedding tears in secret, those words had suddenly returned to him.

Pondering over them repeatedly, Andre found himself wondering: Was his father calling the nobleman a beast for cheating on his wife with another woman, or for choosing a maid as his mistress?

And so, when Clint came all the way to Siamose to visit him, Andre had asked.

“A senior at the academy got married but took a maid as his mistress. Father, what do you think about that?”

“He’s a despicable man.”

“Because he cheated on his wife? Or because he desired a maid?”

“Cheating on one’s wife is always a sin.”

Hiding his nervousness behind a calm facade, Andre pressed further.

“Then what about marrying the maid as a lawful wife and not taking any other woman?”

Clint furrowed his brow, setting his teacup down on the table with a sharp sound.

“What kind of thoughtless family would elevate a maid who does chores to the status of a lawful wife? That would be an insult to the noble blood passed down by our ancestors.”

Clint’s endorsement of free love only extended to noblewomen; a maid was never in consideration from the start. His firm belief in the tradition that marriage must occur within the nobility was no different from other aristocrats. Despite his outwardly kind and respectful treatment of subordinates, Clint was bound by the same biases.

“Hmm. If there’s a lady at the Siamose Academy you’ve been meeting, introduce her to me. I’d like to meet her while I’m here.”

“There’s no one.”

Moreover, Clint didn’t care about the nationality of a potential daughter-in-law. Yet a maid was unacceptable.

If Clint ever learned how much that conversation had influenced Andre’s decision to accept the engagement to the imperial princess, he might very well beat his chest in frustration and regret.

Meeting Clint’s demanding gaze, Andre finally spoke without flinching.

“The engagement is nothing more than a performance to capture the emperor’s attention.”

The engagement with the princess was not founded on affection or mutual attraction. Both the princess and Andre had long harbored feelings for other people. The engagement was merely a political arrangement, a shared strategy to protect their respective loved ones while serving as a distraction and a shield.

The illegitimate daughter of a lowly concubine. A childless woman with no claim to the throne. When the princess gave birth to a son and began nurturing ambitions, those ambitions had likely grown even stronger after the emperor’s second son died in a sudden riding accident.

The emperor and his heirs had no reason to see the princess as a threat. An illegitimate princess and her illegitimate son posed no significant danger to the throne.

The only person the emperor regarded with suspicion was his half-brother, Tim Ferrier, now known as Baron Ferrier.

The previous emperor had only two children. Though he had over five consorts in addition to the empress who gave birth to the current emperor, only one of them bore a child: Tim. Unfortunately for Tim, he did not inherit the emperor’s dazzling violet eyes, disqualifying him from being listed in the imperial family registry. He became a “half-blood” royal.

Even as a half-blood, Tim was still a royal and thus faced hostility from the emperor and crown prince. However, the illegitimate princess and her fatherless son were so insignificant they were treated as little more than trash.

[“It seems my noble blood was insufficient to cleanse the filthy blood of a whore. I can’t bear to look at her. Keep the princess confined until she gives birth to that wretched fetus.”]

The emperor, enraged when the unmarried princess’s pregnancy became apparent, soon lost all interest in her. After the child was born, he ignored her entirely, allowing her to continue her debauchery unchecked. On the contrary, he often laughed along with those who mocked her behavior in his presence.

The emperor, who had scorned the princess, would soon regret his actions bitterly.

Was Kaiman the only noble family to suffer under the emperor’s schemes? The emperor’s cruelty and insults were indiscriminate, fostering resentment and anger among many nobles.

Some had suffered immense financial losses, like the Kaiman family. Others had lost lifelong achievements or cherished loved ones to the emperor’s whims. Many harbored long-standing grudges and awaited an opportunity to strike back.

The imperial princess sought out these discontented individuals with uncanny precision, rallying them to her side. Disguising her plans as “reforms,” she lured one dissenter after another into her fold with the promise of revenge.

It was only natural that Andre would join her cause. As a boy who had lost his mother to false accusations of treason and been forced into exile, his thirst for vengeance was inevitable.

After years of preparation, the princess recognized the need to divert the emperor’s attention. She decided to dangle an enticing lure in front of the emperor’s greedy eyes.

The Kaiman family, once an object of the emperor’s obsession. A family so vast and influential that he would rather destroy it than let it slip from his grasp.

Even after Clint Kaiman fled the capital, the emperor had agonized over his failure to acquire the Kaiman estate. Presenting the emperor with the heir of the Kaiman family was sure to rekindle his dormant desire for possession.

When the princess confidently proposed the plan, Andre replied,

[“Your Highness, this is only your assumption—that the emperor still covets the Kaiman family. If he investigates further out of suspicion, he could uncover our rebellion.”]

[“Don’t worry. You’re an exceptional lure, Andre—enough to captivate him completely.”]

[“…How flattering.”]

Princess Grecia’s judgment was correct. When Andre visited the imperial palace to seek approval for the engagement, the emperor’s eyes gleamed with unhidden greed. The emperor still salivated over the wealth and power that the Kaiman family had amassed over centuries of history.

Under the weight of the emperor’s ravenous gaze, Andre smiled. It was a genuine smile, born of amusement. In Andre’s eyes, the emperor was nothing more than a pathetic old man, blindly convinced of the strength of his own ambition-driven power. Every action the emperor took reeked of selfish greed, leaving behind an unmistakable stench.

There was no need for Andre to lift a finger to deceive the emperor; the man was already blinded by his own arrogance. This blindness prevented him from seeing the loyalists who were slipping away, and because he couldn’t see them, he couldn’t hold onto them. Those who drifted away from the emperor’s grasp were easily swayed by the princess’s persuasion.

The rebellion Andre and the princess plotted wasn’t a war that required soldiers and weapons. It didn’t demand the sacrifice of thousands of lives. The conspirators gathered under the princess’s ambition sought only a handful of deaths, enough to be counted on one hand. They desired a seamless and rightful succession to the throne, supported by a stable populace, so that no one could question its legitimacy.

Clint, having listened silently to Andre’s detailed explanation, sighed deeply when he sensed the unyielding resolve in his son’s words. Though he knew how dangerous the plan was, he couldn’t help but ask:

“If I were to command you to abandon this scheme, what would you do?”

“As the heir to Kaiman and the son of my late mother, this is a choice I cannot reverse.”

Andre’s features mirrored Clint’s own. Yet within his determined gaze lay the unmistakable resolve of his late mother.

His wife, though usually gentle and obedient, always following Clint’s lead without opposition, would on occasion display an unshakable stubbornness when she believed she was in the right. Her will was like an unyielding stone pillar—unyielding, even if it meant breaking. During those rare moments of defiance, Clint would inevitably concede, unable to bend her resolve.

Andre’s unwavering eyes were exactly like his mother’s in those moments.

Faced with this realization, Clint knew there was only one thing he could do this time as well.

“My dear wife, what should we do about our son?”

Clint hung his head helplessly, defeated by the reflection of his late wife in their son.