There was a man lying at Theodore's feet, and next to him, the knife that had stabbed Theodore was lying on the ground.
This man was a pickpocket who came to steal the gold coins that Theodore tried to give to Annette.
Originally, this thief intended to tear open the bottom of his pocket with the knife and take out only the gold coins, but Theodore, feeling threatened, instinctively defended himself.
It was a ridiculous accident where he was stabbed with the knife used to rob him while trying to protect Annette with his body.
Theodore turned and kicked the man at the same time, so the pickpocket hit his head on the hard stone steps and fell while bleeding even more.
“That's why I told you it's not safe.”
“Are you making fun of me now!”
Annette screamed when she saw the blood flowing from Theodore's waist without stopping.
At the same time, a man inside the restaurant ran towards the pickpocket and pinned him to the ground, breaking his arm.
“Are you okay, Your Highness?”
“It's just a little bleeding.”
It was the same man who had been sitting at the table next to them while looking at them during the meal.
“Who is this man?”
“Your personal companion.”
“My companion?”
“So do you think I will send the Grand Duchess abroad without an escort to protect her?”
Theodore tried to smile, but then frowned due to the pain.
"the curse."
He leaned over Annette and rested his head on her shoulder, while covering the bleeding wound with his hand.
“Are you okay?
No, it’s impossible for you to be okay.
The hospital… let’s go to the hospital.”
“I will not go to any hospital.”
Theodore groaned in a whisper-like voice that only Annette could hear, just like when he came to Elysia Sanatorium a few months ago.
“It's enough that I've already been stabbed in front of people!”
Hearing his words, Annette swallowed back a scream.
***
Theodore returned to the Floris Palace as quietly as possible.
He had been stabbed in the middle of the street, so rumors had already spread, but they had to keep his health as secret as possible.
Therefore, Theodore was unable to go to the hospital and undergo an examination to determine his exact condition, nor even undergo appropriate treatment.
If his physical condition is known to the people around him, there may be enemies who will try to take advantage of this opportunity and attack him.
“I am done.
Your Highness has lost a lot of blood but the wound itself is not deep.”
"I did well."
Annette praised Lisa's work instead of Theodore.
Theodore looked very upset.
The fact that he had a nurse he was ignoring treat his wounds was extremely disturbing.
Even Annette was also dissatisfied with the treatment process.
Since she could not leave the nurse and her husband in the bedroom alone, Annette had to be with them as well.
Thanks to this, during the process of disinfecting the wound and suturing the affected area, Annette saw all the blood and torn flesh without adding or subtracting.
There was nothing interesting except that Lisa was not afraid this time in front of Theodore.
“Look at this.
Your Highness did not believe my words until the end, but the day has come when you have come to trust Lisa and have entrusted her with your life.”
“What kind of life are you talking about?
It’s just a small scratch.”
Annette tried to tease Theodore a little when his waist became bandaged in order to change the harsh atmosphere of the room.
Lisa said that the knife did not reach the internal organs and that the wound was not serious because it was stabbed in a place with a lot of muscle.
However, it was impossible to deny that he was in great pain.
Although it was not a life-threatening wound, Theodore was hurt anyway.
In addition to the pickpocket's stab wound, there were many traces of minor wounds on his body.
Looking at the scars on Theodore's body, Annette realized how dangerous the world she was living in was, so her voice trembled on its own.
“Assassination… Do you encounter things like this often?”
“My enemies tend to remind me of my position from time to time so that I do not forget my position.”
“Are you sure it wasn't a killer targeting us?”
“The fact that the knife I was stabbed with was not poisoned definitely means that that man had no intention of killing me.
If you get stabbed by someone who really wants to kill you, you will learn to know the difference.”
Theodore only overreacted to the pickpocket because there had been people who had tried to assassinate him in a similar way before.
But surprisingly, the pickpocket was a real pickpocket.
It was stressful for Theodore, who was injured while trying to protect Annette as he contemplated the possibility of an assassin targeting the Grand Duchess.
Theodore tried to investigate the man to see if someone had sent him after them, but he was just a known thief in the back alley.
The same was true for the perpetrator, who was surprised by the reactions that Theodore showed to no avail.
He was a poor pickpocket who did not know the face of the Grand Duke and his wife because he had only recently come to Lieder.
As punishment for stealing money from other people's pockets in the middle of the crowded streets, he was temporarily locked in the basement of Flores' palace.
“How long has this guy been accompanying me?”
“Since you left the villa.”
Annette's expression sank more and more into despair.
It was clear that she wasn't able to say what she really wanted to say and was just going around the topic by asking other questions.
Her face, which looked like it was going to cry at any moment, was extremely pleasing, so Theodore pretended not to notice it even when he noticed her expression.
“…Would you have avoided this stab if you were alone?
You are hurt now because of me, aren’t you?”
Finally, Annette swallowed her pride and let her true feelings out.
This woman knew why Theodore was hurt.
Right before the pickpocket came running towards her, someone approached her.
It was someone who happened to be heading towards the restaurant at that moment.
At the same time, the pickpocket was waving his knife in the air.
For an instant, Theodore thought that if the person approaching Annette was an accomplice of that pickpocket, then they were probably planning to stab Annette and try to kill her.
In a momentary error in judgement, Theodore did not run away from the pickpocket but rather pulled Annette towards him without realizing it and covered her body with his own.
At the same time, he moved his body to the other side of the street, which was the direction from which the knife was thrust.
In short, it was as if he had voluntarily exposed his body to being stabbed to protect Annette from getting hurt.
Therefore, if they followed the reason step by step, Theodore's current state would be because of Annette.
Of course, Theodore didn't think so, but this woman felt guilty that her heart was so tender in the midst of a strange situation in a surprisingly strong topic.
“If you hadn’t been unnecessarily smart, it would have ended with just ripping off your clothes and taking the money, so why didn’t you avoid the knife...”
Annette tried to blame Theodore, but swallowed her words again.
It seemed that if she said more here, she would make herself feel extremely ashamed.
The way her lips trembled was like a puppy whose fur had been soaked in the rain somewhere, so Theodore forgot the pain and smiled mockingly.
“He didn't intend to kill you, but I got confused and accidentally put my body in front of him because it was the first time I saw someone holding a knife.”
“Are you kidding me in this situation?”
Annette frowned as hard as she could and buried her face into Theodore's bed.
After a while, she raised her head again and looked at him silently.
“Can’t you be more honest and say what you really want to say?
That way you won’t regret it later because you didn’t speak up at the right time.”
"I …."
“Come on, don't hesitate.”
Annette lowered her gaze for a moment and thought carefully.
“What I want to say is...I'm sorry for what happened before.”
"What?"
“Your mother’s ring.
I threw it carelessly on the table and luckily it didn’t break.
It’s a precious keepsake, but I was rude and ignored its value.”
This time Theodore frowned.
Annette thought he frowned because he remembered the moment she threw the ring, but in reality, Theodore couldn't understand her words at all.
Why is she sorry?
When she mentioned that ordinary people usually cherished mementos of their mother, he burst into laughter.
“Hahaha...Are you sorry for this ridiculous reason?”
"Ridiculous?
Isn't it an expensive ring?"
“This ring is an item that is only recognized by the Imperial Nobles, so I gave it to you so that they can confirm your identity and believe that you are my wife.
It has no other meaning at all, so don’t worry.”
“However, it is a souvenir from your beloved mother.”
“Don't think of me and my mother as a normal family.
Not all fathers and children are affectionate with each other.”
Theodore thought of his mother after a long time.
Scenes that could not be called memories flooded his head.
“My mother was always worried that I would die first.”
“This is normal because she loves her son.”
“No, she was in love with His Majesty the Emperor.”
"Is this different?
She loved her family."
“Very different.
She was worried that if I died, her connection with His Majesty the Emperor would disappear and she would be abandoned.”
Her behavior was normal.
But Theodore's mother was not what everyone thought.
She was known to be an extraordinary concubine who betrayed the current Emperor and tried to put her son on the throne, but unexpectedly, she was sincerely in love with the previous Emperor Dominic.
She loved him so much that she wanted to be recognized as his official wife.
However, the love between the emperor and the concubine was a problem for anyone.
Some people laughed at Maria because she was naive and stupid, saying that she didn't know her place, but in fact she knew it very well.
She was just pretending not to know.
Maria, who knew very well why loving the Emperor was a sin and why it shouldn't happen, was always worried.
At the same time, although she believed in love, she did not believe in men.
She knew that Dominic truly loved her, but many things made her distrust him as a man, including his position as Emperor, as well as the presence of the First Empress Eleanora, his legitimate son Philbert, and the countless beautiful women of the Odentian Empire.
No matter how much Maria loved Dominique, the pressure that he could one day abandon her made her feel uncomfortable all her life.
That heavy heart was relieved with the birth of her little son.
“Are you angry with your mother?”
“The word anger is not enough to describe how I feel.
I hate her from the bottom of my heart.”
Theodore's voice drowned heavily in the darkness.
Annette felt involuntarily flustered.
Theodore has openly revealed his negative feelings that go beyond anger to hatred.
“Didn't you say I shouldn't hide anything from you?
So look carefully at this.”
Theodore took off his blood-stained shirt and turned his back to Annette.
On one corner of his back was a strange tattoo that didn't match his clean body.
“This...”
Butterfly tattoo with one wing torn out.
Annette had seen this pattern in the history book of the Odentia Empire.
It has now disappeared, but in the past it was a mark of distinction for slaves.
“Why is this pattern on your Highness’s body…?”
“My mother smelled it for me with her hand.”
"Sorry?"
“She took her 10-year-old son before the current Emperor Philbert, knelt down servilely before him, personally took up the knife and tattooed this symbol on my back with her hand so that I would become their slave.”
Maria herself carved the slave's mark on the body of her young son, who had inherited the emperor's blood.
No, she was a mother in name only.
Annette was so shocked that she couldn't even breathe.