The glade was busy as the knights ran around to secure everything. The couple didn't pay attention to them as they stood there in each other's arms.

But at some point, Owen came to them and proved their feeling of being alone wrong. “Your Majesty, the rest of the forest was examined. There were not any other people except for the dozen men that we took care of.”

Theodore tilted his head so that his forehead was resting on Blanche's shoulder and he could speak. It still sounded like his nose was stuffy, but he was already much more collected than his lover was. “Is there anyone left that could testify?”

“Unfortunately not. All the knights followed your orders, so when the assassins tried to flee, there was no other choice.”

The emperor let out a low groan. “Damn it. Is anyone hurt?”

Owen replied after a few seconds. “Some knights were knocked out, but they will only have a little bump on their heads, which will heal within a few days of rest. They will be brought to the doctor to confirm that though. Two others have little cuts, but those are not deep, so they won't even have to get sewn, just disinfected. There were some with small scratches too, but those were caused by them running through the forest and not by our enemies. We were lucky.”

Theodore relaxed a bit again. “Thank the gods. What about the archer?”

“He only had one arrow, and that was the one he fired at Lady Blanche before being hit by our archer. He fell out of the tree and was...rendered motionless immediately.”

The concubine couldn't help but feel like they were trying to use kinder words around her despite her being well aware of what it meant when people couldn't testify anymore. She didn't interrupt them though and just continued to stroke over her lover's hair.

The emperor slowly lifted his head but kept his chin on her shoulder and spoke to the guard. “Did you collect the arrow before anyone touched it?” He paused for a moment. “Good. The attackers will all be brought to the glade for an investigation now. Confiscate all of their items. Weapons, crests, personal belongings. It doesn't matter. Anything that could reveal their identity.”

Owen moved around and yelled to another person that apparently needed to bring an attacker's corpse back to the center before focusing on the conversation again. “I already ordered them to do that. I also sent a group to inform the rest of the knights in the palace. They will arrive shortly and immediately begin an investigation. I do not know when they will finish though. Do you believe that there is any chance that we might find something useful?”

Theodore let out a chuckle without any amusement. “Nothing that would be sufficient in a trial. Any evidence is going to be called forged anyway. But I have a feeling that I know who this was, and I want to confirm it. If that was them, we just got rid of a huge problem. This still doesn't make the situation better, but at least we gained something from it.”

Blanche finally forced herself to speak up at that. “Do you think that the assassins belong to those two?”

Her lover's response came immediately. “Yes. I didn't see their faces yet, but I would guess that these were number two and three of our enemies' best men. The later one yelled like it was him, so I'm pretty sure. But it would be better not to get my hopes up.”

In that case, it was probably better for Blanche to let go of him so that he could confirm their identities quickly. The only problem was that she wouldn't be able to keep him in her arms then anymore, and she didn't know whether she would take that. “I don't want to let go.” Those words came out of her mouth before she could hold them back. She felt like a child once again, but in her current situation, that was justified.

Theodore put his lips on her neck and planted a small kiss on her skin. “I won't allow you to let go either. You'll stay right here. I'm sorry for pushing you earlier. You fell onto the ground, didn't you? I'm so sorry.”

“You're saying stupid things, Theo. You did that to get me out of harm's way. If you hadn't done that, I wouldn't have moved at all. I was paralyzed. You saved me, you know. Give yourself some credit. I remained unhurt because of your quick actions.” In all honesty, her knees and her palms were burning, so she guessed that she had scratched her skin a bit, but that didn't matter. She definitely wouldn't complain.

Theodore stroked over her hair and rested his lips on her nose for a moment before replying. “I'm still sorry. I hate the thought of doing something that would be anything but affectionate, not to mention something that could get you hurt. I will make it up to you a thousand times.”

Blanche dug her fingers into the fabric of his shirt while combing through his hair with the other hand. “It's alright. Don't think about that now. You need to take care of the investigation.”

Her lover nodded before whispering into her ear. “I will still make it up to you.” Before she could decline, Theodore continued in a normal volume. “Owen, please take off that man's mask. I should be able to identify him from his face alone. If it's him, I know that his brother was the other one.” Footsteps moved away from them, and Theodore's hand gently pressed against the backside of his lover's head so that her face was resting against his chest. “Don't look.”

Blanche nodded as much as her current position allowed her to and waited for the result. She could only hope that those were the people the emperor expected. After all, it was better if the enemies lost as many of their competent people as possible. They wouldn't be able to use those against Theodore anymore, so he would have one fewer problem amid hundreds of issues.

Her lover was quiet for a moment before his whole body relaxed. “It's him. Thank the gods. Those two are gone.”

Blanche let out a deep breath of relief and nuzzled against his chest. “That's good. They won't bother you from now on.” She was silent while she went through the memories of the moment of the attack. A shiver ran through her body despite her attempt to stop it. Now that she thought about it, the situation was much worse than she had thought. “You were attacked at the hunting grounds again.”

The emperor sighed. “I thought that only that the date of the competition was horrible, but apparently, this place is the one that messes everything up. I'm sick of getting attacked here. I should hire archers that sit in the tress and just shoot everything that moves.”

Blanche considered asking why that wasn't an option but decided to keep quiet about that since she knew that so much ground would be impossible to cover. Instead, she just allowed herself to say what she was thinking right now. “It's unfair. You didn't do anything but being born into the royal family and standing on the side of the one person that showed you love, and now you are being targeted. This is the third time this year alone that someone tried to kill you. It's-”

“They didn't want to kill me.”

Blanche lifted her head and looked up to meet her lover's gaze with wide eyes. “What are you talking about? Didn't they try to stab you with a sword?”

Theodore shook his head and continued to pat her head while he talked. “Not at first. I think they just wanted to...scare us, as stupid as that sounds. But when they noticed that I fought back, they got serious because they didn't want to get arrested. I didn't intend to let them run away though. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to capture them, but I won the duel with one of them. Then the other one, the one that yelled and charged at us, attacked me because the other man was his brother. So, I ended it. I didn't want that, but since they are gone now, it was worth it.” He averted his gaze. “Even though I would have liked to spare you that sight. I'm sorry.”

The concubine hurriedly shook her head. “You can't just stop protecting yourself because you think that I could be upset. You told me to look away, but I was scared. I thought that you might have gotten hurt, so I turned around. But I couldn't do anything, so I just sat there. I watched how you fought him. You were way better than him, so I shouldn't have been that terrified, but I couldn't help it. But it really looked like he wanted to kill you. So, what do you mean by saying that they wanted to scare us?”

Theodore slowly moved his hand to her chin and stroked over it before grimacing. He extended his arm to the side and turned to one of the servants. “Give me a handkerchief.”

The maid rushed to them and handed a cloth over to him before leaving.

Theodore gently began rubbing it over his lover's skin and cleaned it of what she suspected to be blood. While he did this, he spoke to her in a soft tone. “The second one only wanted to kill me because I...defeated his brother. The first one knew that I wouldn't let them run away. And since attempting to assassinate the emperor is an automatic death sentence, he wanted to avoid that no matter what. After all, my death would put a specific person on the throne, someone they hadn't expected to harm his own people. So, those attackers gave their best to get rid of me. That they didn't know that I'm better at sword fighting than when they last saw me was unfortunate for them but great for us. They didn't prepare for a duel at all despite knowing that Owen would be there. That is what made me suspect that they just wanted to surprise us and then run away before we can hurt them so that we think that we scared them off. They didn't wish to kill anyone because that would make us want to kill them too.”

“That makes sense. But about Owen...” Blanche scanned her lover's face before questioning him about one thing that had seemed strange to her before. “You gave to servants and knights a signal earlier. Why did they go into the forest because of that? Owen turned away too.”

Theodore nodded and put away the now red-stained cloth. “I instructed them while you were upstairs.” His expression darkened. “I didn't expect them to be forced to listen to the plan I explained to them so soon, but it was good that I was quick to inform them. I told them to pretend that they didn't notice anyone with this gesture.” He lifted his hand to show her how he crossed his fingers. “This one would have told them to run away.” He alternated the posture of his fingers. “And this one to attack.” He spread his fingers. “I asked them to pretend like I didn't notice that none of the guards were moving around or chatting behind me anymore. I assumed that they were knocked out, but back then, I wasn't sure. Luckily, it seems like our enemies truly didn't intend to kill anyone.”

Blanche felt like that would be a quite risky plan for their enemies. “But isn't it hard to knock someone out without killing them? It would be harder than to...”

Theodore lowered his hand again. “Of course. But I doubt that they care whether anyone they attacked might end up dying anyway. I hope that the knights are fine, but...” His voice trailed off. Instead of admitting the obvious, he changed the topic. “Anyway, with the sign I showed you, I told the knights to take a detour through the forest. They were supposed to attack our opponents from behind, which they successfully did. The only problem was that the two leaders of that troop were too close to us. They reached us before the knights could take them on. I had to get you away from me in case they intended to attack me. I knew that there couldn't be anyone in front of you, so I thought it would be fine if I was behind you. That's why I sent you away from me.”

Blanche already saw how his mood shifted as he resumed, but she didn't dare interrupt.

Theodore paused and looked at her with dejection on his face. “I didn't expect them to have an archer. I basically pushed you right into danger when I was just trying to protect you. That person seemed like they missed on purpose, but if you had only taken one more step...” He pressed his mouth into a thin line and wrapped his arms around her to pull her against his body. “He is lucky that he is dead now. I would not have let him off the hook this easily after he tried to hurt you.” His voice was dripping with anger, which made her give her best to soothe him.

Blanche reached up to his face and cupped his cheeks while gazing into his eyes. “But he didn't succeed. I'm not hurt, and he is dead. So, don't think about that now. We should rather focus on investigating. If this incident brought you any evidence, even if it's just a little hint, you might be able to use it later. We need to use this against our enemies in some way.”

Theodore was about to reply when the world around them became loud again. A large group of people from the palace had arrived with countless guards that scattered to investigate the forest around them. Owen had said that there wasn't any attacker left, so it was questionable whether they would find another person, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

It was easy to see that the knights were nervous despite their experience and regular training, but one of the people in the crowd stood out.

In the middle of all of these royal guards in their uniform, a maid squeezed past the others to reach the glade. As soon as she managed to get away from all the people blocking the way, her gaze frantically darted across her surroundings before she found the concubine.

Blanche made eye contact with her and inwardly thanked the gods for her previous decision. She had allowed Stella to stay behind, so the servant hadn't been present during the attack and hadn't been hurt. Relief washed over her, but apparently, the maid wasn't as pleased.

Stella immediately sprinted towards her mistress, which earned her a few complaints from staff members that she had startled, but she didn't look at those people once. It seemed like she would crash into the emperor and his lover with full force, which made Theodore pull the concubine a step to the side, but the maid managed to come to a halt without bumping into them. “My Lady...” Now that she was closer to them, it was obvious that she was pale with widened eyes and deep wrinkles etched into her forehead. “My Lady, you're alright.” Stella's shoulders slouched, and it looked like she would collapse to the ground at any moment.

Blanche withdrew one arm from her lover's back and extended it towards her maid, who immediately gripped her tightly. “Yes, I'm fine. Theo protected me. I'm sorry for worrying you.”

Stella held her mistress' hand between hers and leaned forward to press it against her forehead. “I thought... What if... Because I wasn't there...” She didn't manage to finish even one coherent sentence before closing her mouth and just standing there in silence with a few occasional jolts of her shoulders.

Blanche had been sure that she wouldn't want to cry again after already not managing to do so the first time, but this sight made her want to wail again. “Don't cry... I don't want to start too.”

Stella nodded but didn't stop anyway. She continued to cry.

The concubine's hand quickly became wet with tears, and she gave her best to hush her maid despite not knowing what could make this situation any better. No matter what she said, there had still been an assassination attempt on the emperor just now, and she had seen someone die right in front of her. Theodore insisted that their enemies probably hadn't intended to kill him, but she didn't trust that completely yet, and even if she did, it wouldn't be much more pleasant either.

Their enemies had still managed to bring a group of attackers inside the royal estate for the second time this year. So naturally, everyone was in distress. Except for the person that had actually been targeted.

Theodore still didn't look happy, but he seemed to be more furious and regretful for pushing his lover aside than scared. The short fight that she had witnessed easily explained why. He was excellent with using the sword, which Blanche wouldn't have thought before. He had never liked fighting, and him suddenly becoming so strong worried her. He had probably noticed that his mother and brother were making their move and had prepared to be able to defeat them if it ever got serious. That meant that he had burdened himself with that thought for much longer than she had known and that he had secretly trained despite always being buried in work.

The concubine leaned her face against her lover to hide how her face scrunched up when she thought about that.

But apparently, he had noticed already since he quickly put his hand on her head and stroked over her hair. “It's fine. I'll keep you safe.”

Blanche lifted her head immediately and looked up at him with a grim expression. “You were the one that was attacked. I worry about you, not me.”

Theodore shook his head and met her gaze with a slight frown. “No. The arrow was clearly aimed at you. Or at least in your direction. They wanted to scare you as well.”

Blanche felt the blood drain from her face at that. Why would the dowager empress target the emperor's concubine specifically? Surely, Theodore cared about her, but aside from that, Blanche was just an uneducated girl living in the palace. She wasn't much of a threat and certainly not someone that needed to be scared to give the dowager empress an advantage. “That doesn't make sense... Why-” She cut herself off when a thought appeared in her mind. “They thought that I was the empress. So, they wanted to keep her away because they know that she would become the ruler of the nation if something happened to you.”

Theodore put his hand on her cheek and shook his head again. “No, they aren't that clueless. I never spend time with the empress, and I would never sit with her to have a picnic. You two don't even look remotely similar, and since those men were professionals, they probably watched us a while before attacking. They wouldn't have made such a mistake. Their goal was you.”

Blanche unwillingly turned her head to look in the direction of the corpse, but her lover gently grabbed her chin and guided her gaze back to him. She barely knew what to say about this revelation, so she just voiced the first thing that came to her mind. “Why? What do they gain from this? Scaring me might upset you, but...” Her stomach churned as another idea appeared in her head. “You don't think that... Duke Vasquez...”

“That was my first thought, but I doubt it.” Theodore narrowed his eyes. “He wouldn't have told them to spare us. He just wants Cedar to become emperor as soon as possible, so why would he delay this by keeping me alive? These were men that the dowager empress works with. I don't understand why they didn't kill me, but I assume that Cedar realized that they wouldn't win a duel with me. After all, I got rid of his personal guard during the hunting festival, and that person was way better than the other ones.” He let his eyes roam across the glade while continuing to speak. “So, they'll try to make us feel uneasy in our own home to keep us on edge. Maybe they want to use this to clear the suspicion of them being involved by having an alibi. I don't understand why they were confident that their plan would work though. Now they only gave me a reason to heighten the security measures again. None of us will leave the palace any time soon. So, they lost many chances to corner me because of this. I can't imagine that they are that stupid. There must be something else that they gained from this.”

Everything he said seemed logical, but Blanche still didn't truly comprehend why anyone would have pointed an arrow in her direction. “And they attacked me because they knew that you would worry? I don't think that this is the only reason.”

“It isn't.” Theodore lowered his gaze to her again. “This is one of the many reasons. It's obvious that you getting hurt would crush me, so they know that they can scare me much more if they target you.” He averted his eye and continued in a lower volume. “They could have also hoped for you to push me away after you saw this today.”

Blanche slowly pulled her hand away from Stella and gave her a small smile, which the crying maid attempted to return. Then she cupped her lover's face as she stood up on her tiptoes and pressed her lips onto his when he bowed down to meet her. Their kiss was short and sweet. As soon as she pulled away, she spoke up. “You could do everything imaginable, and I still would never consider pushing you away. You know that. I loved you no matter what happened, and I always will. For some people like those awful ones that keep pestering you, those words may mean nothing, but for me, they are more important than anything else.”

Theodore's lips formed a soft smile, but his eyes were still full of sadness. “I know that you would always be on my side. I know that more than anyone else. And I think they haven't understood that yet and try to pull you away from me. After all, their plan would be ruined if we had a child.”

Blanche hadn't considered something like that, but as soon as she thought about it, a realization crashed over her like a wave. If the emperor had a descendant, that child would become the next ruler of Artias. The empress might take over until the successor was an adult, but after that, the direct descendant of Theodore would be the one in charge. At least if he named the child his heir.

Then Camille's plan would be ruined completely. There was no way that the second prince would become emperor if his brother had a child. If the concubine got pregnant, all of their intrigues would be rendered useless. Unless they killed that child and the empress too, which would dent their chances of success enormously. After all, the emperor's death might be blamed on someone else or could be called an accident, but if his wife and child died soon after that, it was obvious that someone was pulling the strings in the background.

Such rumors wouldn't take away Cedar's chances of becoming the ruler, but his reputation would suffer greatly, which could possibly cause problems later. So, the prince and the dowager empress would favor getting Seraphina to divorce Theodore and preventing the emperor from having any children at all.

This meant that Blanche's existence was a thorn in their flesh. This wasn't anything fully new, but the thought was still scary.