Letter

Dear Lady Rozemyne,

By the time you read this, will the Royal Academy term have ended already?

Lord Ferdinand recently mentioned during one of our tutoring sessions that you finished your classes early. He says it is only a matter of time before you collapse from ill health, but I hope that does not happen. My wish is that you are doing well.

From what I am told, you are an excellent student indeed. I, myself, am spending my days studying and working on the tasks that Lord Ferdinand gives me.

While I was in the midst of writing my letter, my head attendant, Roswitha, leaned over and inquired, “Lady Letizia, are you composing a letter for Lady Rozemyne of Ehrenfest?” I paused, setting my pen down, and glanced up at her.

“Yes. She mentioned she would like to receive letters from me, and it’s also one of the tasks Lord Ferdinand assigned,” I explained.

Instead of sending the letter to the Royal Academy, I was instructed to direct it to Ehrenfest through the border gate. The point of this was to learn to successfully convey my position while accounting for the fact that the Georgine Faction from Ahrensbach, the border gate itself, and Ehrenfest’s scholars would be inspecting its contents.

I had only ever written letters to my parents in Drewanchel, so writing one to an exceptionally talented archduke candidate without embarrassing myself posed quite a challenge.

“Lord Ferdinand is quite demanding,” I complained. “This isn’t the sort of task to assign to a child who isn’t even attending the Royal Academy yet.”

Lord Ferdinand says knowledge is both a weapon and a shield that can be used to protect oneself, but seeing him pile up assignments one after another does make me feel somewhat dejected. Even if I know I have to learn to conduct myself in a way that doesn’t leave any openings for Lady Georgine or Lady Detlinde to exploit.

”…I understand it’s for my own good, but still.” It was difficult to stay motivated when the assignments were taking up almost all of my time, and when the most Lord Ferdinand said during their evaluation was “yes, just about what I expected.”

By now, I’ve already given up on waiting for praise and have learned to make do with the sweets I receive for completing each task. The sweets that, incidentally, were prepared by Lady Rozemyne, who suggested that Lord Ferdinand should use physical rewards if he is a man of such few words. At the very least, this is what Sergius heard from Justus.

If it weren’t for those sweets, I would probably have been tempted to escape my studies much earlier.

“Milady, since Lord Ferdinand doesn’t praise you nearly enough, allow me to do so in his place. You’re doing an amazing job, truly.”

My childhood nanny, Roswitha, followed me here from Drewanchel. From what I was told, she served my mother while she still lived in Ahrensbach, long before her marriage into Drewanchel. When it was decided that I would move to Ahrensbach, my mother assigned Roswitha to look after me as one of her most trusted retainers. Her family—that is, her husband and children—followed after her, also becoming retainers. And now, she’s always there to protect me.

I suppose, in the same way that Lady Rozemyne is like family to Lord Ferdinand, Roswitha and the others are like family to me.

“Besides,” she continued, “this increase in study time will only last as long as the winter.”

“What do you mean?”

“Once Lady Detlinde returns, it’s likely to become much harder for Lord Ferdinand to stay in contact with you.”

It seems that Lord Ferdinand anticipates that, once Lady Detlinde graduates and starts performing her duties, helping her will take up much of his time. As a result, the amount of time he can allocate to my studies will decrease significantly as well.

“Speaking of which, the scholars seem quite pleased recently. Thanks to Lord Ferdinand, a lot of their work has seen significant progress.”

I heard from my retainers and their families that a lot of the matters that were stagnant since my father’s passing were now moving forward swiftly. It appears that Lord Ferdinand has been sparing no effort to resolve numerous issues while Lady Detlinde is still at the Royal Academy.

“The rumors that claimed his administrative skills alone were enough to make him a stand-in aub were neither exaggerated nor false, it seems.”

I nodded in agreement with Roswitha’s statement. It appears that the nobles, who were initially doubtful of Lord Ferdinand due to his status as an archduke candidate confined to the temple in Ehrenfest, have also changed their views of him now.

”…Lady Georgine disappearing to her villa is a bit unsettling, though.”

It was expected that Lady Georgine, with her ties to Ehrenfest, would engage actively with Lord Ferdinand. However, she has relocated from the main building of the castle to a villa and barely made any appearances during winter socializing. Perhaps she is busy refurbishing her new home.

“It seems she only invites nobles to visit now. The fact that we can’t gather as much information as before has become a significant inconvenience.”

While Lady Georgine stayed in the castle, we were able to gather information from her through infiltration and eavesdropping on her retainers. However, once she moved out, it became much too difficult for members of our faction to enter her estate, and the flow of information had greatly diminished.

“According to the information Lord Ferdinand obtained, after moving to the villa, Lady Georgine hired new servants and welcomed nobles from old Werkestock as her retainers. He did not know any specifics, but I’m surprised he was able to gather any information at all.”

“It is quite incredible, isn’t it? He hasn’t even been in Ahrensbach for that long. Even Sergius, who follows him everywhere, mentioned he has no idea how Lord Ferdinand is able to do what he does.”

I understand very well how exceptional Lord Ferdinand is, but I just wish I weren’t expected to perform on the same level as him.

As I gazed at the letter I was tasked with writing, I recalled a conversation with Sergius, where he spoke about a letter from Lady Rozemyne to Lord Ferdinand. It came enclosed with a letter from Raimund, Lord Ferdinand’s retainer and disciple. Incidentally, he has all his letters checked for him, which makes the process quite smooth. That just leaves Sergius and Justus to pen the responses to them.

“When Lady Rozemyne passed her classes with excellence and faster than anyone else, Lord Ferdinand described her performance as “very good”. I wonder if the day will ever come when I, too, will receive such generous praise?”

“He did mention that even Lady Rozemyne has trouble with certain things, so there definitely are areas where you excel past her, milady.”

Rowitha’s attempt to comfort me made me feel somewhat downhearted.

“Maybe so, but his best compliment was that I, a noble’s daughter, am more noble than the temple-raised Lady Rozemyne, and that’s hardly a compliment at all. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Venting a bit of my frustration to Roswitha, I picked up my pen again and continued writing my letter to Lady Rozemyne.

“Was Lord Ferdinand as demanding of you as he is of me? Could you please share with me how you survived him piling on one backbreaking task after another while giving you his nerve-rackingly harsh glare?” …Well, those weren’t my exact words—I phrased them a lot more delicately, like a proper noble would—but I hope the message would get across to her.