Your Majesty, Please Don’t Kill Me Again - Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Rupert, who was slouching but sitting in a very haughty position, lifted his head. He looked radiant, like a living sculpture, like the sun always followed his every movement. But even in the warm light, he was cold and unmoving.

“You…”

“Yes?”

“Shut up. I told you to stop interrupting me.”

He raised one eyebrow when I answered too quickly. In the past four months, I haven’t always been with Rupert, so I don’t know much about him. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that he hates being interrupted in the middle of something, enough to make him say mean things that don’t go well with his good looks.

“I’m sorry.”

He’s warned me several times already, but since he doesn’t speak much, I forget about it and continue to make the same mistake without realizing it. I looked down, wondering what he was going to say next.

“Are you well versed in any instrument?”

“I can play a little piano.”

“Singing?”

“My mother was a singer for Abad.”

I liked their songs so much that I watched Ardell’s opera more than once because they reminded me of my mother’s singing days. My father doesn’t like to spend much, so I actually didn’t watch many.

“Just because your mother can sing well doesn’t mean that you can too.”

Rupert laughed like it was the end of the world.

“It’s not impossible.”

I laughed to myself as I answered in an arrogant but humble way.

Let’s hear how good your voice is, then.

“Then you should stay as well.”

“In Your Highness’s class?”

“Sing a song by my side.”

Spending more time with him is great, but the orders from a fourteen-year-old who had laughed at me earlier aren’t a good sign. He could tell my face was getting a little more serious, so Rupert sat down and tilted his head.

“You don’t like it?”

“No, Your Highness, I will.”

As usual, I answered with a gentle smile.

Rupert didn’t like my smile very much. However, it was impossible to deal with him with complete sincerity while acting, so in the end, I always dealt with it by giving him an ambiguous smile. It wasn’t a smile or a frown; it was just a clumsy look that hid my true feelings.

Tori, who rarely uses good manners, ate Rupert’s leftover food messily without any shame.

After a while, I turned away from the maid who told me that Sir Alberto had arrived.

I felt strange when I saw Tori and Rupert together. Rupert always smiles when he’s with her like all his walls collapsed just by the sight of her. It looks weird when he smiles, pats her on the back, and tells her to eat slowly.

He’s just like a normal person…

“Lariette.”

A high-pitched male voice wakes me up from my idle thoughts. I grabbed the bottom hem of my dress gracefully and bowed my head.

“How was your trip, Sir?”

“It’s been a long time.”

Alberto used to play the piano at Abad. Even though I didn’t know him, he knew my mom and was nice to me.

“I met Amanda not too long ago, and she’s worried about you. How about you write her a letter?”

I really wanted to, but I didn’t have the courage. I don’t even know what explanation to give as an excuse. As my face darkened a bit, Alberto gave me a soft smile.

“Well, I was also like Lariette when I was younger.”

It was troublesome how he thought he understood me. I looked at him and smiled, and we started moving.

“Her Highness will be here soon.”

“Will you be here as well today? It’s rare to see Her Highness be with anyone other than that commoner Tori.”

Whenever he talks about Tori, his mouth twists momentarily out of disgust. The fact that a maid who worked for the noble royal family was a commoner was very offensive. I looked at the way his lips were turned and closed my eyes.

“Yes, for today.”

“Her Highness is someone who’s very lonely, and you can tell by the way she plays the piano. So you should sing her a song to make her feel better.”

Lonely? What a load of crap.

From observing him first-hand, I counted the emotions Rupert could feel. With the fingers of my hand, he expressed the five emotions of anger, irritation, annoyance, impatience, and outrage. None of them vaguely resembled a human emotion like loneliness.

Alberto’s pretentious, rude comments angered me, so I walked faster.

The door to the room of evil was open, so I was able to quickly get away from Alberto.

“Your Highness, Sir Alberto is here,” I said.

Rupert was already sitting at the piano. He gave Alberto a nod, then turned around and put his hands on the piano. I rest my chin on the chair as Alberto tunes the violin he brought. Tori wasn’t there because she was afraid of Alberto.

I slowly leaned back on the soft velvet couch and listened to the violin play. Alberto moved his hand after he had tuned. Rupert’s blonde hair and white piano went well together. On a hot day when the sun was shining, the soft violin melody fluttered as if to enchant me along with his pretty figure. But I laughed out loud as I looked at the beautiful scenery.

“Pfft—”

I just barely put my hand over my mouth and held on long enough to suppress it so the sound that came out wasn’t loud.

Lonely?

It was an interesting interpretation. Alberto must be either a hopeless romantic or tone-deaf for hearing those sounds and interpreting them with such sad words as loneliness.

Rupert was really bad at playing the piano. He’s just slamming the keys, and it somehow passed as music to Alberto, but it’s not!

As if reflecting his harsh temper, he sounded furious at the keys. The sound of slamming the keyboards can’t be called music. When I looked at Rupert’s small but rough back, I felt sorry for him. Even though I heard such a rambunctious noise, I had to admire and praise him as if he had just given the best performance in the world.

It takes a lot of energy to flatter someone this bad.

Rupert sat down at the piano and looked down at me with a sly smile as I clapped mechanically at the end of what could not be called a performance.

He looked at me smugly.

It was a bit disgusting. He practically beat up the poor instrument, and now he’s proud because he thought it was an actual performance.

“What do you think?”

“It was terri–”

For a moment, my true thoughts leaked out without me realizing it. I found Rupert raising his eyebrows at me with a strange smile on his face.

“What?”

“It’s… It’s terribly wonderful! My word, it was such a wonderful show! What a performance… it almost made me cry!”

Of course.

I could almost hear Rupert’s thoughts, but I kept my lips smiling widely.

“Now you sing.”

“Ah, forgive me, but if I did, I’m afraid my voice will ruin your perfect performance.”

Rupert just stared at me when I turned him down. He never really made it clear that he didn’t like the fussy praise I sometimes gave him. He doesn’t take it seriously at all and doesn’t even get his attention. He never seemed to believe that my feelings were genuine.

I don’t mind because I’m not being honest anyways. But I am worried about how to express my ‘trustworthiness’ to that cold child.

“Bravo!”

Alberto seems to have been really moved while I was just thinking about random things. He looked at Rupert, who left immediately, and then he walked over to me and shook my hand.

“Lariette can feel it too! What a rebellious energy that loneliness has given her in musical form!”

What is this madman saying?

I went away, holding my sore ear.

“I bid you goodbye now, sir.”

“No… wait, I still have goosebumps….”

“Then please take care.”

Alberto was just making annoying noises, so I left him and rushed to Rupert. The little kid’s pace is crazy fast, and he’s already striding down the stairs and through the hallway. Even now, I can’t even imagine how quickly he’ll walk with his tall and big body.

Can my small frame even catch up to him?

“Your Highness!”

Even though I was shouting so loudly that he couldn’t possibly have not heard my voice, Rupert didn’t slow down at all. His pace got a little faster, so I almost had to run to catch up with him.

“Where are you going so quickly by yourself? You should bring with you at least one maid.”

“Did you learn etiquette the wrong way? Who told you to run?”

Since Rupert’s palace is quiet and there aren’t many people there, even Rupert doesn’t always behave according to etiquette. Not to mention the way he treats Tori. Also, it was rare for him to come out every now and then.

But instead of arguing about how he doesn’t know how to keep the etiquette, I laughed shyly.

“Don’t laugh.”

“Are you afraid of liking me?”

“You look ugly when you’re laughing.”

Rupert cursed at me and then turned away. Even though I thought he was being too hard on my appearance, I didn’t feel bad about it. As a man, he’s already so stunning that any woman would look like a pumpkin next to him.

“Where are you going? Let me go with you.”

Rupert didn’t answer.

I didn’t say anything as I followed him because I knew his silence was a confirmation of permission. He went to the palace garden.

He liked being outside, even though the garden that led to the forest wasn’t very well kept. He didn’t tell me that he likes to go for walks, but I knew because he always took Tori with him to the garden.

Even though it is definitely spring, there is still a little bit of snow in the Capital because it’s so cold here. Whenever I take a step on the half muddy, half-melted snow, it makes a weird crunching sound… but I like it, so I made it a motivation for me to continue walking.

What could be called a landscape only consisted of the dry branches in the garden. Even though it had snowed a lot recently, the grass was still frozen and asleep, and of course, there weren’t any flowers blooming either.

Still, if someone asked me if this scene was beautiful, then yes.

The green leaves that looked worried about growing on branches that were dry and cold were worth looking at. I quickly took off my coat when I noticed that there was snow on the tip of my nose.

“Wear this, Your Highness.”

I’m from Bellua, and I get cold rather easily, so I was wearing several layers of underwear and a thick wool coat under the maid’s uniform. When I took off my coat, I shivered in the bitter cold, but my main goal was to show Rupert my good side.

He stares blankly and doesn’t say a word as I hand him the coat.