I Don’t Need a Guillotine for My Revolution

Chapter 189: Shadow Peace - Winter of Aquitaine (2)

Episode 189. Shadow Peace - Aquitaine's Winter (2)

“Y-Your Excellency the Countess, I-”

“No, I'll do it. ……Still, it's difficult, so could you just help a little?”

“I-In that case.”

Even with the butler's help, Christine struggled quite a bit before she could bring Louis to his room.

The servants, who had been dozing off while wondering when Louis would return, were utterly startled.

“Gasp, Your Excellency the Countess!”

“W-We apologize!”

The sight of them flustered, and her own disheveled state, devoid of any elegance, with sweat-soaked hair stuck to her forehead, was somehow amusing, and Christine burst into laughter.

Then she looked down at Louis, whom the butler had laid on the bed with the help of the servants.10 years ago, before that incident, when he was still quite affectionate, he was a complete child.

She had even carried him on her back, but he had since grown taller than her by a head.

Taking Louis, who was drunk and starting to nod off as if he'd never called her stupid, to his room was so difficult that she couldn't even drag him by herself, let alone carry him on her back like in the old days.

Christine watched the obliviously sleeping Louis for a moment, then turned away.

“I will attend to you.”

“No, we're inside the house anyway. The night is already late, so you should go and rest too, Butler.”

“Ahem, then please rest well, Your Excellency the Countess.”

The old butler bowed with a rather relieved expression and retreated, and Christine shot a slight glare at the back of his head.

He was a man who, if she so much as skipped a meal from being busy, would immediately run and confess to Pierre, making one wonder whom he truly served, but they had grown used to each other.

On the way back to her room.

In the darkened corridor late at night, only the sound of her shoes echoed.

The corridor she walked was not the one in the Aquitaine mansion in the Southern Region.

And yet, for some reason, walking down the mansion's corridor with all the lights off late at night gave her a strange sense of déjà vu.

But what filled this dark space was not the desolation and disquiet left after her relatively happy childhood was washed away with blood.

Christine walked slowly down the corridor, heading for her room.

For no short amount of time, she had waited.

With the thought that although she could not wash away all her sins, she would at least return to the innocent child the rights he should have originally possessed.

But the child neither considered himself innocent, nor did he consider it his right.

In the first place, he was no longer a child who needed her care.

"Then, what are you going to do now?"

"Well. I was just trying to do what you wanted from me, Sister."

"If you don't want to inherit Aquitaine, there's nothing I want from you. You're free, Louis."

Louis burst out laughing.

"Then, shall I first go to the Magic Tower and study a bit more?"

"Huh? Didn't you already graduate?"

"Um, I thought this would be enough to be helpful, but it wasn't. The Tower Master also said I was still lacking, and it really is true."

Even with his flushed, drunken face, Louis spoke with a rather manly expression.

"There's... someone I want to impress, someone I want to stand with as an equal, but that person is very competent, so I thought I need to become that great as well."

"...A woman?"

"Y-Y-Yes. Is there a problem? You act like you'd give Marquis Lafayette anything and everything!"

Christine had burst out laughing.

However, Christine, now walking towards her closet in her room, could not smile.

Christine opened her closet.

Several plain black dresses, nearly identical and without any particular decoration, which she wore as a sign of mourning.

Slowly turning her gaze from those clothes, placed in the most accessible spot, Christine looked at the rather splendid dresses that other ladies might wear.

She then tried to imagine herself in such a dress, but it didn't work, and she soon gave up with a bitter smile.

10 years.

For over a third of her life, she had lived with a clear goal.

But now that it was denied by her brother himself, the feeling was a sense of helplessness as great as the sense of liberation.

Christine slowly walked out onto the balcony.

The night breeze cooled her, and Christine closed her eyes, feeling the wind for a moment.

Though winter had passed and spring had come, making the wind moderately warm, the coolness was fleeting, and her body, which had sweated from the effort of moving Louis, soon began to feel chilly.

Christine suddenly thought that she missed Pierre.

And then she opened her eyes, met the gaze of a person standing in front of the mansion, and blinked blankly.

A man looking up at her room on the second floor.

Christine narrowed her eyes.

“Pierre?”

Did I drink too much while dealing with Louis?

To think I'd see illusions just because I missed him.

“Christine.”

As she was shaking her head, a reply came from the illusion, and Christine muttered blankly.

“Huh, is that really Pierre?”

At that, Pierre also tilted his head slightly and spoke dubiously.

“……Is that really Christine? You seem a bit unlike yourself.”

“W-Wait just a moment.”

Christine rushed into the room to find something to wear over her clothes, then turned around and was startled.

“Ah!”

Because Pierre, having leaped up to the second floor, was standing on the balcony and making a knocking motion.

“Pardon the intrusion on this late night, but may I come in?”

Christine wondered if she had ever been this flustered.

The dizziness must surely be due to the alcohol.

So, this is Louis's fault.

Because that child drank so freely, she unwittingly followed suit and ended up drinking much more than she normally would.

That's why she was so discomposed in front of him.

With Pierre standing still, a light smile on his face, still making a knocking motion as he waited for her, Christine was barely able to calm down.

“C-Come in.”

“Then, with gratitude.”

Only after letting Pierre into the room did Christine belatedly ask.

“What brings you here?”

She somehow felt like a mess.

Pierre seemed to think the same, his face showing he was suppressing a laugh, but he quickly composed his expression and answered.

“I just wanted to see you. Is that not enough?”

Just because he wanted to see her, he stood in front of his fiancée's mansion late at night and stared endlessly at her room?

It's a complete mess.

Even though it was a complete mess, Christine found Pierre's face, as he seemed to be gauging her reaction, so endearing that she couldn't stop the laughter from bursting out.

It must have been fate, not coincidence, that she had looked out from the balcony while blankly thinking she missed him.

“……Um, a bit. It's a mess, isn't it? Yes, you may laugh. I suppose being nagged so much by Dumont has made my head go funny.”

Dumont.

Baron Dumont. A loyal vassal of Toulouse and someone who was displeased that Pierre was only engaged and not married; this information naturally came to mind.

Guessing what the situation was roughly like, Christine laughed even more.

In truth, the fact that Pierre was being nagged was purely her fault, yet the reason she felt good and couldn't stop laughing must surely be the alcohol.

As Pierre's expression started to look awkward, Christine apologized with a laugh.

“I'm sorry, Pierre.”

“No, I'm the one who's sorry. It hasn't been many days since I returned to the Capital City after the war ended. Ah, please don't misunderstand. I know it will take some time for you to reach a conclusion with Louis. I've waited 10 years anyway, so waiting a little longer won't change anything.”

Christine watched Pierre, who was earnestly explaining himself with a smile.

To return Aquitaine to Louis.

Because she, who had run this far with only that goal in mind, had no future plans whatsoever.

She had thought that after handing Aquitaine over to Louis, it would take him a considerable amount of time to adapt and take control of the vassals, and she naturally thought she would have to help him take control of Aquitaine.

But all of that was denied to her face as useless consideration, useless guilt.

Louis had relieved Christine of the burden she had carried for a long time, but he filled its place with an equal amount of helplessness and emptiness.

In truth, she herself knew it well.

She thought that the person known as Christine Aquitaine was filled with nothing but a sense of duty.

She only avoided the end of being betrayed and killed by her family because it was unjust; she had no thoughts of what she wanted to do after that.

She must repay Pierre, who saved and helped her.

She must return the rights to the innocent Louis.

Nowhere in that life's journey was there anything Christine Aquitaine herself wanted to do, or any dream.

But, now.

Just facing Pierre before her eyes made all such worries and emptiness vanish completely.

An engagement with a family that had broken off the betrothal. An engagement of 10 years, which had made her long past the marriageable age.

"Are you planning to drag Lafayette's prestige through the mud? Or are you mocking me? Either way, I--to me, you as a person are more valuable than the prestige of Lafayette or the influence of the Aquitaine Merchant Guild."

A man who, despite being a nobleman, joined the revolution, thwarted a coup, was called the guardian of the revolution, and became the Commander-in-Chief of the Revolutionary Army.

A man hailed as a hero of the age, who defeated the great king of Krafte and even surpassed the Blue Knight.

Such a man had said he wanted her, not Christine of Aquitaine.

He had waited for her until now, and he was saying he could wait for her in the future as well.

So, if she was with him.

Just as they had walked a long and difficult path together until now, there would be no more wandering in the future.

Surely, she too would be able to find a new purpose in life.

And so.

“Pierre.”

“Ah, yes. Christine.”

Christine, her heart swelling with emotion, asked.

“Will you marry me?”

Pierre's mouth fell open, and his face became comical, as if he were gaping like a fish.

After a long silence, Pierre raised a hand to his forehead with a rather dejected look.

Thinking that such an expression was a bit much for a man who had just been proposed to, yet feeling not a hint of anxiety, Christine just chuckled.

“I've made the mistake of a lifetime. Isn't it too much to spring this on me as a surprise attack? If nothing else, I wanted to be the one to propose…….”

Christine smiled brightly.

“Then does this mean I have won a Victory over Francia's greatest General?”

“Haha, hahaha…… I suppose…… so. You are magnificent, my Admiral.”

Christine, while speaking reluctantly, embraced Pierre, whose eyes were overflowing with joy, and whispered.

'You are mine for eternity.'

“I am yours for eternity.”

And then she lightly kissed the black rose brooch that Pierre always wore on his chest, never taking it off for a moment.

“For I am already yours.”

Tears flowed uncontrollably, and Christine rested her head on Pierre's shoulder and continued.

“Will you become mine as well, my Knight?”

Pierre gently wrapped his arms around her shoulder and replied.

“As I have been since that day, gladly.”

Christine gave Pierre a light kiss, and laughed through her tears.

“I'm sorry for making you wait so long.”

Farewell to the long, long winter of Aquitaine.