The Seventh Plan. Revenge Done Right. (9)
“That—it was because I never knew that Count Decca had been such a man.”
“Even the Count must have been so surprised.”
After a rough match, the Count nodded his head. Gellerhard stretched out his long arm and picked up one of the snacks before offering it to me. I shook my head and he took a bite of it as he started to murmur.
“Come to think of it, my aide asked if Count Decca’s eldest daughter would like to marry one of your brothers.”
“Marriage?”
“Yes.”
Count Decca only had two daughters. The Count would be executed for all of this and therefore lost all his estates as well as titles. On top of that, his two daughters would be executed as well, but if the daughters were to be married to my brother, he would be able to inherit the Decca family in return. In this part, Gellerhard should be a little more flexible in changing the punishment by only executing the Count who had solely committed the crime.
Count Decca was a vassal family with such deep ties to the Duke of DeMancier up to the extent that he would be willing to take on such a task. And my brother, who would be married to the Count’s daughter, would then very easily be able to absorb everything from Count Decca’s family.
It would be better for one of those young ladies to marry one of my brothers than for them to die too—but for it to be a funeral or a wedding. Due to the sins that her father had committed, she was given too harsh of an option.
“Carl’s maternal family is related anyway and Count Decca is pretty good too. Plus, Count Decca had agreed as well.”
“Still, you should ask the person who will be involved in the marriage. Well, anyway, we can just think about that later.”
As if the cookies that had been served as snacks were quite good, Gellerhard said so as he chomped on another one. I put back the discussion and the Count immediately intervened when a gap had opened.
“As someone who is the Lord of Viscount Bentta’s family, I can’t just stand still to that. If the marriage is consummated, I will send you a present as well.”
“I would be grateful if you could gift me with that.”
Gellerhard looked at me with a look in his eyes that were saying, ‘are you going to keep him alive until he gives it to you?’—which made me shake my head in response. It had not yet been decided whether one of my brothers would be married or not, but the Count would still be dead even before the marriage could be decided.
After I accepted his words, the Count changed the subject with a slightly confident face in exchange.
“Anyway, it was rather shocking to see that Carl didn’t recognize me earlier. I’ll have to meet up with him more often then.”
Yes, in the first place, Count Petrika ran to me because he became anxious to hear that Carl was going to be adopted as my son soon. My eyes eventually met with Gellerhard’s.
“If I come often with presents that the child is fond of, he will soon remember this grandfather’s face too.”
He had heard Gellerhard’s declaration that he would register Carl as my adopted son, but Count Petrika stated as if his relationship with Carl would remain still.
“What do you mean? I will not be seeing your face ever again.”
Count Petrika didn’t seem to have any further hidden cards and Gellerhard was here as well. There was no need to continue a longer tea time with the Count. Right at my words, Gellerhard stood up from his seat.
“You just saw it. Gellerhard and I had known everything—together.”
There was a sudden loud clunk as Gellerhard locked the door.
“Even the things that we talked about in the past, every single thing.”
*
Carl was playing with the escort knight along with his dog. The knight looked at Carl in moderation before an awkward cry—oops—leaked out of him as he lay his back down and rolled his body when Carl had given him a push. Carl’s puppy, which was no longer the size that could be deemed as a ‘puppy’, but rather a hound dog, named Puppy, followed after its young owner and pushed the knight’s body as well. As soon as the knight had laid down, it climbed onto his back. Carl then proceeded to sit on top of the knight’s shoulder.
“Stay still!”
When he yelled out, all the maids clapped their hands and cheered as if Carl had caught a thief. His chubby cheeks flushed red and the clumsy pronunciation that was shouted out had been so cute that made me want to take a bite of him.
“Carl.”
“Mandy!”
Even when I appeared, unlike the usual, Carl did not come running towards me. Instead, the child called out to me as if he was trying to show off.
“I got it!”
Woof woof! The dog barked after its owner. Carl’s green eyes were gleaming with a sense of achievement. I really did have to give my congratulations to the escort knight. No matter how much he was the successor of the Lord whom he served, it would not be easy to be brought down in front of the maids like this with the title of a knight, but his face appeared to be just gentle in response. He had a younger brother who was around the same age as Carl. During the selection of Carl’s escort knight, I seemingly did well to choose one with a younger brother or a child.
“Good job. Our Carl is just like a knight. Very nice.”
I grabbed Carl’s hand and hoisted him up before I kissed him on the cheek. The flushed cheeks felt quite warm. The dog also descended from the knight’s body at once and beckoned to the maid, who had already brought out some cold water.
“Hey, look at all this sweat. You must have had too much fun.”
“Have fun!”
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