The season has arrived when there are no grapes in the vineyard.
Midwinter has not yet arrived, but the wind temperature has already changed.
Workers who endured the scorching heat of the summer sun while picking grapes happily welcomed the new season.
Soon, Annette won't even remember the summer that sucked her energy and kept her lying on the ground all day, and she'll worry about soothing her shivering, frozen mouth by boiling wine and drinking it.
Time has passed quickly.
In particular, for Theodore, this summer will be remembered as the fastest summer of his life.
On the other hand, for Annette, this same season was the longest and driest summer of her entire life.
During the hot season they met only twice.
The first time he brought her from Elisia Hospital, and the second time when he gave her his mother's wedding ring.
After that, his knowledge about her was all about confirming that she was still alive through Hans' reports.
Even if they met today, it would only be their third meeting, but it was not difficult for Theodore to already imagine her appearance.
Theodore remembered Annette's frail appearance, which he had left behind among the light-green grapes the previous summer.
No one will be able to forget her if they see her determined and resolute face, full of the will to live.
Moreover, if her face was beautiful with sun-kissed blonde hair that seemed to make grapes bear fruit even in winter, her personality was much more than that.
That's why Theodore was puzzled by the fact that Annette wasn't at the villa when he arrived.
Hans had told him that she was not feeling well, so where had she gone when the cold wind started blowing like that?
Annette, Theodore remembers, was a woman so weak that she collapsed after a long carriage ride.
He couldn't imagine that she would become strong enough to walk outside alone in such freezing weather.
The answer to his question came from the nurse.
“The Grand Duchess has gone for a walk at the foot of the hill now.
These days, the warmest time is noon, so she takes Silver with her at this time of day and they go out for a walk around.”
“It's very cold here.
Is she okay?”
“She has recovered a lot lately.
This light walking exercise is very beneficial for her.”
Lisa told him about Annette's condition, but he never believed it.
However, even if the nurse was still unreliable, Annette's vitality was reliable, so it seemed like she would really be fine.
It did not seem to him that Annette would become a completely different person in just a month or two.
He had thought that she had mysteriously escaped the danger of death, so it was difficult for him to think that a woman who had had difficulty walking properly just a few months ago had suddenly become healthy.
So when he saw her sitting on the edge of a low hill, stroking the dog's fur, he was so astonished that he stopped in his tracks and could not advance his horse even a single step.
On the hill where the grass had lost its green color and turned a little yellow, Annette was shining alone in the place.
A soft wind blew and caressed her blonde hair, swaying over her dark clothes.
She was wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a dark blue coat to block out the sun, and she smiled at the dog with a calm face floating like sunlight on the hill.
At some point, Annette naturally blended into the landscape of this world.
Annette rejected this world, but this world wanted Annette.
What was she thinking now as she calmly walked with her dog?
What kind of eyes would she have if she saw Theodore standing there like that?
This was only their third meeting.
If he asked her if those three times she met him were fateful and beautiful...
Her answer will be no.
Instead, his meeting with her will be an opportune occasion for Annette to hate and resent Theodore from the bottom of her heart.
Even Theodore didn't see her as a woman he might be attracted to either.
It was a relationship where they completely used and deceived each other, so there was no room for human emotions to penetrate between them.
No, there should never be room in the first place.
Annette had not even seen his face lately, and Theodor alone had been receiving a written report about her from Hans.
Recently, every time Hans went to the villa, the news of Annette he brought would constantly come to his mind one after another.
He remembered the date of the day she was able to get out of bed on her own without the nurse's help, the titles of the books she asked to read, and the types and number of medications she took each day.
He also remembered all the benefits he had gained by using the information Annette had given him.
Thanks to her, Theodore recovered a weapon secretly stolen by a hunting grounds guard, and solved some problems at work.
They had only met three times, but there were so many things tying them together in tangled knots.
This mysterious woman was helping Theodore step by step, as he was slowly approaching his goal.
Like his first victory over Hugo, in a strange way, and at an unexpected moment.
A strong wind blew in the place.
Annette clutched her hat tightly to keep it from flying off, but the wind blew even stronger as if it stubbornly wanted to take it with it.
When the hat flew away, Silver quickly jumped and skillfully caught it.
However, due to his missing leg, he couldn't keep his balance and rolled on the ground, but despite this, he never let go of the hat from his mouth.
Annette held her hat in one hand and stroked the dog's fur with the other, as if she was proud of him.
Silver jumped over her excitedly at her touch, so Annette fell backwards, unable to overcome the weight of the huge dog.
Her golden hair was still swaying in the wind, and something unexpected happened at that moment.
Theodore climbed onto the top of the hill while watching her the whole time.
He didn't even know that he was watching Annette with all his heart, and he didn't realize that his heart was beating hard because of the horse's shaking movement.
Theodore dismounted and slowly approached Annette.
Theodore's shadow completely covered Annette's body lying on the ground.
Annette felt like there was something huge covering her body other than the dog that was on top of her.
Theodore said briefly as Annette realized the identity of the strange shadow cast over her body and looked up.
“I came to take you with me.”
Annette was still looking at him with a sad face.
No matter how much she cared for Theodore, she now had to get out of this villa and small village and become his wife, who loved him madly.
The moment had finally come for them to step out onto the stage they had been preparing for for a long time.
***
In Odentia, the custom of giving a house a name rather than a number had a special meaning.
Only when an emperor gifts a house to someone is it given a unique name instead of a regular address.
This has nothing to do with the size of the palace at all.
Even if a nobleman built a palace bigger and better than the one gifted by the Emperor, he could never name it.
There was never a case where the Emperor granted a palace to someone without reason, so the mere fact of living in a house with a name meant that the owner of the house had a noble status among the nobility.
Theodore's palace had Floris' name attached to it.
To be precise, Floris was a palace for his mother Maria, not for Theodore.
Flores was the house where Maria lived when she was not Empress.
Emperor Dominic gave a palace as beautiful as a flower to his secret lover who was like a flower.
Since she could not enter the imperial palace, he built a palace-like house for her.
Of course, at the time of receiving the palace, Maria was just a lowly concubine and had been brought here with Theodore.
The status of the two was below Flores' reputation.
The way they were brought here was somewhat disrespectful, but as a result, living on Flores proved that Theodore's birth was precious.
Aside from mocking Maria as a lowly concubine, everyone envied the prestigious house.
The essence of the Flores Palace was its name, and the banquet hall with its huge chandelier and dozens of rooms were the additions that supported this name.
“So, what would he lose if he spared me this tiring palace tour?”
Annette muttered angrily as she felt her body slump with fatigue.
She sat on a nice sofa, but her body gradually drooped toward the floor.
The sofa was very large and soft, but not enough to accommodate Annette's great strain.
She came to Theodore's palace, but she never saw his face after getting off the carriage.
Just because they were under the same roof didn't mean they were living together.
The house was too big to meet by chance.
Annette was taken around the Flores Palace by the butler all day and the tour ended just before sunset.
Going to more than 50 rooms one by one, getting information and learning the geography of the palace was more difficult than she thought.
“It's a filthy big mansion, really.”
The house was too big for two people, so Annette felt as far away from Theodore as she did from the size of this grand mansion.
She had never owned a branded apartment, let alone a prestigious mansion.
She lived the life of an ordinary petty bourgeois person who lived in a small studio and had never seen an ordinary house with more than three rooms in her life, so Theodore's life was completely different from hers.
Annette closed her eyes and remembered the sight of the kitchen and the hallway leading to the banquet hall, which she had found difficult to forget.
Another advantage of the Flores Palace was that there was no servants' corridor.
Usually, in nobles' palaces, there were separate, invisible corridors for servants to move through, out of sight of the nobles.
But there was nowhere to hide behind the walls in the Flores Palace.
Such passages had been in place at the design stage, but after Theodor received the title of Grand Duke, he repaired the house and removed everything.
This was to prevent spies from listening.
Such a thing started among the nobles because of a servant who was secretly listening to his master behind a wall.
So Theodore couldn't bear for this to happen to him.
He wasn't in the mood to let his servants hide behind his back and watch him, so he had to put everything in a place where his eyes could reach it.
While Annette was thinking about him, someone opened the hall door wide, and then Theodore entered through it.
"Welcome."
“….”
“Aren't you going to welcome me?”
“……”
"You didn't even say hello.
Can't you even do this?"
“Did you want me to greet you?
You really have no shame.
It’s okay, I will congratulate you instead.”
"congratulations?"
“Because you became my first guest in my living room.”
“Can't you just greet me normally?”
“I have no desire to welcome you.”
“I heard what you said.”
Theodore was not at all saddened by Annette's lukewarm reaction.
He never thought that he would receive such a welcome in the first place, so her reaction was very normal in his eyes.
“Since you are at my house, let me welcome you first.
Congratulations to you as well.”
“Why are you congratulating me all of a sudden?”
“Because you are still alive even though you became my wife.
Some women who would have married me have died without even having the chance to see my house.”
"Did you forget that it's just a play?
I don't date men who have previous relationships with other women, so how did I become married to you like this?"
Annette frowned and slumped further onto the sofa.
“So, how did you feel seeing your husband's house for the first time?”
Annette gave a very brief answer to Theodore's question.