I Won’t Accept Your Regrets

"Your Majesty, is everything alright? Is he hurt her?"

As soon as we descended the mountain, Helen hurried to me with questions.

"I'm fine, Helen."

When I smiled, Helen was relieved and touched her chest and exhaled with relief.

"Looks like the sun will set soon. The mountain road is dangerous at night, it would be good for us to hurry."

"Yeah. Oh, I need to tell you something before this. I have been informed that His Majesty and the Crown Prince have left the Imperial Palace to go to the night market."

She brought the communication device that I forgot last time, when we left today. The communication port connected to the Imperial Palace could only communicate unilaterally by the person in the Imperial Palace.

"Night market?"

‘Why suddenly the night market?'

When I tilted my head in doubt, Jeremy answered my question.

"Oh, now that I think about it, I heard that the night market is held for three days as a festival as summer approaches."

“I see.”

I had completely forgotten that it was soon summer.

It will soon be summer. The Empire with four different seasons used to open a huge festival and night market every time the seasons changed… I can't believe summer is already here.

I lived without knowing how time passed by the things that happened.

Come to think of it, the day was getting warmer.

" Your Majesty, would you like to go to the Imperial Palace or the market?"

"Let's go to the night market."

Trying to talk to Helen and dismiss Jeremy, I wandered over to his invisible carriage.

"Hm, I don't think I've ever seen the carriage of the Drua House, or at least the horse… Are you going on foot?”

"I'm going to spend the night at Raker's hut."

"You'll be fine?"

Raker's venomous stare crossed my mind at that moment.

He was uncomfortable with my appearance.

Besides, he must have been very angry with Jeremy because he brought me in.

Jeremy smiled as usual, pretending that he was okay.

"Don’t worry. If it doesn't work out, I'll sleep in his stable. And although he is a hermit, he won’t leave his friend to sleep outside."

"Well, if so… I'd better go."

"Yeah. The night is coming. Be careful, Your Majesty."

I smiled and got into the carriage with Helen.

* * *

When I left the mountains and arrived at the gates of the capital, the sky was already dark.

Night fell, and the colorful lights of the night market lit up the square. Since it is a night market held as a festival, there were many street vendors as well as all kinds of troupes and magicians.

The carriage stopped, I changed and went out to the square with Helen.

"His Majesty must have come out in disguise."

Since it is a place where many people gather, they can’t have revealed her black hair and black eyes, which are symbols of the royal family.

“There are more people here than I thought. So it won't be easy to find them."

Helen was confused by the crowd.

"Oh yeah?"

However, as soon as I thought about it, I could see a tall man who stood out from afar. A man with ordinary brown hair, but handsome in appearance… Of course it was Raymond.

"His Majesty is over there."

Helen also pointed in the Raymond’s direction, as if she had found him right away.

He was there among the street vendors.

We hurried through the crowd of musicians in the square.

However, as I got closer, I gradually slowed down as the picture ahead became clearer.

"Your Majesty?"

When my slow walk came to a complete stop, Helen felt puzzled and turned her head.

“For a moment…”

I closed my lips, erasing the end of my speech. And standing about 20 paces away, I looked over at Raymond and Carlisle. The two laugh as they look at the dolls.

Carlisle told Raymond his preferences, and Raymond gently stroked Carlisle on the head.

The doll moved into Carlisle’s hands, and his face showed excitement.

Raymond hugged Carlisle and showed a happy and carefree smile.

‘Were they so alike?'

Carlisle occasionally resembled Raymond in detail, but I had never seen such an identity between them before.

These two, even smiling, looked like befitting father and son, as if they had stepped out of the picture.

Just like what I dreamed of a long time ago.

"His Majesty and the Crown Prince are very close," Helen said, noticing the same thing as me.

"…I see."

"Your Majesty, are you okay?"

“…”

I couldn’t say that everything was okay.

Even though I wanted Carlisle and Raymond to be close. I even specifically set aside time for this in the schedule.

‘But why do I feel this way?’

I had nothing to complain about. But I didn't feel well either.

I was uncomfortable, because Raymond's friendly appearance kept catching my eye every now and then.

Like a small crack on perfectly flat ice.

Memories of the past and emotions came back to my mind again.

"Your Majesty…" Helen called out to worriedly.

Raymond's gaze went to me just as I was stuck inside my weary head.

He looked me over and recognized.

His smile vanished, and I noticed how his eyes widened in surprise.

I walked towards them, still hesitating.

"Your Ma… Ellie."

Raymond called me by name, thinking of the crowd around us.

"How did you get here?"

"I warned the servants. If Carlisle goes somewhere, that it have to be reported to me."

"Mom! They gave me a teddy bear!"

Carlisle, still in Raymond's arms, triumphantly showed me the teddy bear.

The material wasn’t very good, like other things on the market.

However, Carlisle’s face was full of bright smiles as if he liked it very much.

"Yes, it’s pretty. You thanked for such a cute teddy bear, right?"

"Yeah! I said thank you to my father!"

The word ‘father’ so naturally flies from the lips of Carlisle. My forced smile twitched slightly.

‘What's so weird about Raymond being a father? It's obvious.'

Raymond is a father, I am a mother.

It is natural.

“But why…”

‘It was probably because Carlisle had never said that he was his father. He always called Raymond ‘His Majesty'.'

It seemed that I had advised him to draw such a line, without noticing it myself.

Now everything was very strange.

Raymond spoke up, wondering what was wrong with my reaction.

"Before coming to the night market, I told him to call me ‘father’. If he calls my title here… It will attract attention to us. However, besides ‘father', there was no other title that I would wear."

It seems that he misinterpreted my embarrassment.

“…You don't have to explain it. It's natural to call your father."

"…Yeah," he replied, embarrassed. Then he looked at me for a while in silence. "May I ask where have you been?"

"Oh, today I met someone who could be Carlisle's mentor."

"If it’s a mentor… The one you mentioned last time?"

"Yeah."

I told him about Raker at dinner two days ago.

"I heard such a person is difficult to meet. It's interesting how you got to him. Is he in the Empire?"

"Duke Drua helped me."

His reply came a little late.

"Duke Drua?"

"Duke was his friend… With Duke's help, I was able to meet with Raker."

I knew Raymond hated Jeremy, so I even considered dodging the answer. But it’s better to honestly give him everything, otherwise it will become even worse if the Emperor finds out about the meeting through someone else's lips.

"It gets on my nerves…"

"What?"

Raymond's lips were twisted and moving, but I couldn't exactly hear him.

"It’s no big deal. I’m glad that you were able to meet the sage. More than that… Did she say that she was going to do it?"

"He hasn’t yet given a definite answer… Although it looks like there is a possibility."

"It's great that we managed to convince him."

He was very surprised.

This is clear, since Raymond knew how much Raker hated the Agrita Empire.

After all, he didn’t even give a reaction to the handwritten letter of the Emperor.

"There hasn't been a definite answer yet… But it still seems like there's a chance."

"He will think about it… It is already a great thing. No one in the Empire could convince him before."

Raymond was delighted.

"It would be great if Raker agreed. It's not even just Carlisle. This will be of great help to the whole Empire."

It was very gratifying to watch his voice rise slightly with anticipation.

I didn't know you were so worried about it.

"I hope so. More than that, Carlisle, you can't keep hugging him like this. Is he not past the age to be carried in arms?"

"But… my feet hurts."

"You're okay," Raymond spoke as if he was wrapping up a sullen Carlisle, but I cut him off firmly.

"No, he can walk by himself, so you have to let him walk."

‘Carlisle didn't really hurt his feet.'

Just by looking at my child's face, I could tell if he was lying or telling the truth. Now Carlisle's job was to cover up for Raymond.

This is harmless, since he is still small, but if he gets into the habit, this will affect the image of the prince.

"Carlisle, come down."

"Ah…"

But then Carlisle's face lit up with light, and he stared somewhere to the side.

Then he pointed somewhere with his finger.

"Mom, dad, I want that too!"

I turned in that direction and saw a certain couple, a man and a woman, who were playing with a child.

Mother and father held the child by the hands between themselves and played, as if they were rolling him on a swing.

The child laughed happily as his feet lifted off the ground.

It doesn't look very complicated.

The problem here is I have to do this with Raymond.

Mother and father had to stand close to lift the child by the hands together.

And their well-coordinated movements looked very cute.

Such a phrase as ‘well-coordinated movements’, it doesn't suit Raymond and me very well, yeah?

"Mom! Come here, please!"

"Huh?"

After watching a happy family of three people, I felt that someone was grabbing my hand. Contrary to my reluctance, Carlisle was already ready.

Carlisle grabbed Raymond's hand and laughed at me. Looking up, I saw the confusion on Raymond's face.

He also seemed embarrassed by such a surprise.

"Oh that's…"

"It's not a difficult request, so why don't we do it," I said to Raymond as he was about to take his hand away.

"Yes?"

"When can we still play with him, if not in childhood? It will be a pleasant memory for Carlisle."

At that moment I was thinking only about Carlisle.

‘Only about Carlisle…’

"Well, so be it."

I decided not to think about anything else and held Carlisle's hand tightly. The three of us got up and got down to business.

"Can we do it in three?"

“Yes, let’s do it… One, two, three.”

He counted quietly, and Carlisle's body flew into the air.

"It's so fun!"

As Carlisle laughed happily, a smile spread on my lips.

Raymond also smiled softly at Carlisle.

It's been a long time since I saw his smile.

At that moment, I felt a surge of strange emotions.

Carlisle… At this point, I'm just smiling because of Carlisle's fun, yeah.

Now I have nowhere to go, and I do my best to put aside difficult emotions.

It was inevitable, so I tried to ignore such subtle feelings and turned my attention away from Raymond's happy face for the first time.