Knight Commander Miraine Laster (1)

1. Knight Commander Miraine Laster (1)

No sooner had Miraine left the palace than he was summoned by his father the moment he set foot in the manor.

“The Count calls for you, young master.”

Turning his head, Miraine met the pale face of the servant and instantly stiffened. At that moment, he felt a foreboding like a premonition.

Suppressing the feeling that something was going awry, Miraine parted his lips.

“I understand.”

Heading to his father’s chambers without resting, Miraine had to calm the rapid beating of his heart.

Why was he so anxious?

Because of their distant father-son relationship?

Because such summonses were unfamiliar?

No, that day, something was different.

And Miraine’s anxiety became reality.

Standing before the door, Miraine took a deep breath. As the creaking door opened, the young man held his breath, then spoke.

“Father.”

Inside the room was a large window with half-open red curtains. White sunlight streamed through, illuminating the face of the man seated in the chair.

At that moment, tension tightened the back of Miraine’s neck. Straightening his back, the young man clearly revealed his nervousness before his father, calmly watching him with light green eyes.

A blonde middle-aged man with an intellectual impression.

His immaculate red uniform proved that he, too, had only recently left the palace. His icy blue eyes held Miraine, and the man twisted the corner of his firm lips into an expression that could not be discerned as a smile or something else.

The Count’s cold eyes were on a different plane from Miraine’s warm green irises.

Their impressions were so different that a stranger would hardly recognize them as father and son.

And as their appearances differed, so did their temperaments.

“Father…?”

Count Laster did not answer. Leaving the puzzled Miraine standing before him, he merely remained silent. Tapping the cigarette held between his index and middle fingers on the ashtray, the Count stared at Miraine as if conducting an interrogation.

The silence lengthened, and eventually Miraine could bear it no longer.

“I heard you called for me.”

Only then did Count Laster open his mouth.

“Yes.”

And he uttered words Miraine had never expected.

“I’m going to give up the position of Knight Commander.”

Miraine could not respond immediately.

“Pardon?”

Sinking deeply into the plush chair, Count Laster continued.

“This is a task that can render greater service to His Majesty the Emperor and the nation than that paltry post. It is cause for enough rejoicing. Taking on such a heavy duty is an honor for both you and me.”

“Father.”

“I have just returned from requesting His Majesty to arrange a marriage between the Grand Duke Valenstein and you. You cannot avoid it.”

Cigarette smoke obscured Miraine’s vision.

“Miraine Laster. You are to marry the Grand Duke Valenstein.”

Marriage?

Putting the crackling cigarette in his mouth, Count Laster looked at his son’s shocked face with a blank expression. Miraine was trapped in shock, unable to break free.

His father’s shocking words, spoken as soon as he returned from work, left Miraine unable to collect his wits for a long time. It plunged the calm knight Miraine into a deep pit, making him flounder.

Time passed, and when Miraine finally came to his senses, his face twisted. An arranged marriage was shocking enough, but the name Grand Duke Valenstein carried even more implications. He was a man, from a rival house, and… his train of thought broke off.

No, what nonsense is this?

“If you have something to say, say it.”

“Can I refuse?”

“Try if you can. I’m curious how useful your struggle will be.”

His father’s face was cold as he spoke of sending his son to the cold lands of Wicker, to the remote village of Obert. His arrogant gaze, as if to say, “What can you possibly do?” stared at Miraine. Miraine’s face contorted in response.

‘I knew a day like this would come…’

His father’s brazen attitude rather cooled Miraine’s head. A part of his chest sank coldly. His father was always this kind of person.

‘Truly, I am nothing to my father.’

Staring at the thick cigarette smoke flowing from his father’s lips, he spoke.

“I am not my mother’s shadow.”

At that moment, Count Laster’s face crumbled like thin ice.

“You…!”

A faint anger rippled in his choked words. As if mentioning his mother had struck a weak point, the Count raised his eyes and glared at Miraine with a menacing aura.

In fact, if he had exploded in anger like that, Miraine might have felt somewhat relieved. It would have proven that he still possessed a human heart.

But Count Laster quickly calmed his erupting emotions, crushing Miraine’s spirit.

Watching his father’s shattered face swiftly return to its original coldness, Miraine abandoned hope at that moment. The “mother’s lover” who had shown at least a hint of humanity vanished, leaving only Count Laster, colder than the north wind, before his eyes.

After the initial shock subsided, his heart was utterly calm.

Or rather, it was resignation.

“I’ll take that as your obedience, Miraine Laster.”

Miraine opened his eyes again and looked at him expressionlessly.

“I’ll give you a month. Settle your affairs.”

“…Yes.”

****

Although startled by the sudden marriage decision, Miraine had to leave for Wicker. His father was the loyal Count Laster, and Miraine had never defied him.

After being long tamed by his father, Miraine dared not entertain thoughts of rebellion against his persistent, cold-blooded, even demonic father.

But that did not mean he held no resentment.

That night, Miraine could not fall asleep and paced by the window for a long time. In the early morning when the white moon rose, he welcomed the cold wind into his chest. He simply could not sleep. Or rather, if he could sleep peacefully after hearing those words, he would be lacking something.

‘Castell von Valenstein.’

Outside the window, bare branches swayed aimlessly in the wind with a whistling sound. Projecting himself onto them, the young man thought of the Grand Duke, his marriage partner, with a complicated expression.

Grand Duke Valenstein—the name rolling off his tongue was not unfamiliar.

In fact, the Grand Duke was the most famous man in the capital, in the country, in the entire continent.

A hero who slew a chimera, the head of nobles with a domain larger than most kingdoms, the only Grand Duke of Obert.

Thus, he was a man whom Miraine, a mere bastard, could never dare to approach—a marriage with him would never have been permitted given his status. In fact, Miraine still wondered why the Grand Duke had accepted this marriage.

‘The status difference is too great.’

The House of Valenstein was originally a cadet branch of the imperial family, and he was one of the most powerful figures on the continent. The Grand Duke of Wicker had traditionally been responsible for the Northern Wall descending from the Kyrgyz Mountains, possessing one of the strongest armies on the continent. He was not just a high-ranking noble; he was a grandee whom the Emperor kept in check.

A man who could marry a foreign princess is marrying a bastard?

And a same-s*x marriage at that?

Of course, imperial law recognized same-s*x marriages for political purposes. It also allowed for secondary wives to continue the bloodline. But that was just legal theory; same-s*x marriage was not common.

To put it bluntly, Miraine and the Grand Duke’s marriage was the first same-s*x union in eighteen years. No, common sense dictated that a marriage with another man could hardly be pleasing.

After all, a typical man prefers the opposite s*x over the same. Moreover, there was no rumor that the Grand Duke indulged in sodomy.

This marriage was clearly a bolt from the blue for Miraine, but when examined point by point, it was even more disadvantageous for the Grand Duke Valenstein.

Besides, wasn’t Wicker still in conflict with the central government over the sudden death of the previous Grand Duke?

Whether the death of the arrogant former Grand Duke of Wicker, Joachim von Valenstein, was assassination or not was one of the most sensational topics in the last twenty years.

Joachim von Valenstein.

He was the one who deepened the already poor relationship with the central government over the past hundred years. He was devoted to turning Wicker into his own kingdom, independent of the Obert Empire, and then he died suddenly.

This issue still circulated in people’s mouths even now.

‘It was certainly a suspicious death, no matter how you look at it.’

The people of Wicker believed his death was the work of Sisilia, the Grand Duchess’s maid and the Empress Dowager’s fifth cousin. They judged on their own and executed her, then turned their swords on the central government.

Miraine still remembered. When he was about ten, Count Laster had a fiery argument with an envoy from Wicker. It was the first time he saw Count Laster driven into a corner. That day, Count Laster wandered around like a dead man, and after the matter ended, he collapsed and was bedridden for a long time.

The grudge from back then remained unresolved.

‘Without evidence or witnesses, Wicker cannot formally protest the Grand Duke’s death. The Emperor hated the Grand Duke for killing his relative, the maid, and the Grand Duke likewise despised the Emperor, the enemy of his family. Both have reason to hate each other.’

The Emperor and the Grand Duke were sworn enemies, and for twenty years the feelings between the two regions had been extremely hostile.

‘And yet a political marriage in this situation?’

Miraine’s eyes darkened.

The House of Valenstein was irreconcilable with Count Laster’s house, which was the brain of the imperial faction, and Count Laster was hated by Wicker.

‘The rationale of bringing the imperial faction and the Grand Duke’s faction closer might be convincing to others, but considering my father’s character and His Majesty’s personality, reconciliation is out of the question…’

The hot-tempered Emperor and the authoritarian Count Laster. Together with the Grand Duke, who was equally arrogant, their compatibility was not just poor but the worst.

The claim of a political marriage for reconciliation was not just hard to believe; it was plain nonsense.

Miraine was certain. There was another political scheme behind this marriage. He just couldn’t guess exactly what it was.

He didn’t know what lay beneath the surface.

And that uncertainty drove Miraine into anxiety.

‘My father could easily use me as a chess piece in the treacherous political world. He could even use me as a discard. If we had a normal father-son relationship, I wouldn’t think so… but I have to prepare.’

Miraine gave a bitter smile.

‘If he can give away his only son to the monster of Wicker, what else can’t he do?’

At that moment, a deep sigh escaped him.