Saving The Abandoned Empress

201 “Eleanora’s Fear”

“So, we don’t have beds in the imperial palace?”

Valerian asked the two people infront of him, who was kneeling on the ground with an embarrassed face.

He was sitting on the bed of his new room, as his previous emperor’s room is occupied by his son now.

“I can expect nothing from this blockhead, but what about you, Crown princess?”

Eleanora flinched and looked at her father with pleading eyes to help her out, but Alexander just pretended not to see it.

As Sir Anthony and Sir Raymond were the only person who knew that they were in the ballroom, went home this morning.

The whole imperial place was in uproar when they couldn’t find the emperor and the crown princess in their rooms.

Some even said Evan Ravens subordinates kidnapped them for revenge.

In the end, everyone found them sleeping together on the floor of the ballroom.

.....

“You! Don’t you know she is sensitive to cold?! How could you let her sleep on the ground!”

“A-Am sorry...Father,”

Valerian rebuked Cathain, who didn’t knew why he was getting punishment at this age like some teenager.

Where Alexander just watched the show with his arms crossed over.

‘Serves him right for eyeing at my daughter,’

“Just how old are you two?! The whole imperial palace now knows about this!!”

“The emperor and the crown princess were playing house game and fall asleep while they were at it, like children’s!”

‘Children?’

Suddenly a scene from his childhood popped up in Cathain’s mind; when the seven year old him once played house game with the three year old Eleanora.

At that time, The Alexander used to live at their own ducal territory. And only returned to the capital after the dead of the duchess.

Before that, Cathain would only meet her when the duke would take his wife and daughter for a vacation in the capital.

As his father used to be busy for chatting with the duke and duchess, he would be sent to play with her as usual.

Flashback~

The little Eleanora was sitting on the mattress, under a big tree; as she took out her toy tea cups and other necessary toys with her small hands.

Her silver hair was tied up into two buns with ribbons, and she was wearing a light yellow coloured fluffy dress.

As he walked in the garden, Little Eleanora turned her face and waved her hands at Cathain, before she opened her mouth to speak.

“Cow pins! Play with Elee!!”

“...”

The seven year old crown prince felt like he had turned into a stone after hearing his genius fiancee’s pronouncing.

‘From an ice man to cow pins?!’

“Cow pins!”

“Hey- It’s CROWN PRINCE! Not COW PINS!”

Cathain explained and little Eleanora tilted her head with confusion before she spoke again with a bright smile.

“Clown pinch!”

“...”

Cathain sat beside her on the mattress with a frown and decided to correct her one more time.

“Am telling you the last time, listen carefully!”

“It’s C-R-O-W-N... P-R-I-N-C-E!!”

“...”

“Say it! C-R-O-W-N... P-R-I-N-C-E!!”

“...The Cloud looks like peach!! Elee wanna go to the beach!!!”

Eleanora murmured the poem which her mother sings to make her eat peaches and forces Alexander to take them at the beach by saying that, their daughter wants to go.

“...”

‘Aughhhh!!!! How come she can sing poems with such difficult words but can’t utter Crown prince properly?!’

‘Were those nobles insulting my IQ by comparing me with this girl?!’

“Cain...”

Cathain murmured his nickname as he looked at her with embarrassment and Eleanora tilted her head again as her round blue eyes stared at him.

“Cain?”

“Yeah... Am only allowing you to call it except my father!!”

“Cain! pay Elee!”

Little Eleanora spoke as she hold out her toy tea cup towards him to drink, which had nothing in it.

“Wink tea..”

“...It’s ‘Play!’ ‘Drink Tea!’ And what kind of childish game is it? I won’t play it!”

He wanted to push the toy tea cup away but he has unintentionally used much strength, which resulted the tea cup to fall down from her hands.

“...”

Cathain felt a litte guilty for breaking her tea cup as Eleanora’s eyes widened to see her little tea cup broken into pieces.

“...I will buy you another one- HEY!!!!”

He paused on his words before he panicked to find Eleanora’s round blue eyes filling up with tears.

“D-Don’t cry-”

Cathain didn’t knew what to do, which made him panic even more.

Eleanora rubbed her eyes with her tiny hands as she started to cry more louder.

“Pa-paaaa!!!... Cain hit Elee!!!”

“What?! When did i hit you?! Don’t speak nonsense!”

“PAPAAAA!!!”

“Hey!!! Don’t cry!!!”

“PAPAAAAA!!”

“I will play!!!”

“...Okay! lesss pay!!!”

“...”

Cathain become speechless as Eleanora instantly stopped crying, as soon as he agreed to play.

She happily started to take out more toys from the basket beside her to play with him.

‘...What was that crying for then?’

But after sometime, he also started to enjoy playing with her. In the end, both of them felt exhausted and fall asleep together.

~End of flashback.

“ARE YOU IGNORING YOUR FATHER NOW?!”

“Ouch!”

Cathain touched his upper arm which was hit by a bamboo stick by his father, which he uses to walk.

But he was still chuckling because of the past memories, which angered his father more.

Valerian become frustrated as his son started to lazying up as soon as he returned.

He is afraid that his son might dump all the works on him, to chase after Eleanora.

“Haizz... What more can i say...”

“...”

.....

‘You’ve been lecturing us for 15 mins, father!!! and still say that you have nothing more to say?!’

“You two- It’s time for you two to make a child instead of playing children’s game!”

Eleanora’s face turned red as she heard Valerian’s words and Alexander’s face turned dark.

“No, she is still young.”

Alexander spoke.

“Hah... Look who’s talking! How old was the duchess when you married her?!”

“...”

Valerian mocked Alexander, whose lips was pressed together tightly as he couldn’t refute Valalerian’s words.

Alexander become speechless as his wife was only slightly older then his daughter when she was pregnant.

“YOUR MAJESTY!!!”

A knight called out for Cathain with a loud voice and everyone in the room turned their attention on the knight.

Cathain stood up as he helped Eleanora stand up too, Where Alexander helped Valerian.

“What’s the matter?”

The emperor asked.

“There is a fire in Toastra!!”

“TOASTRA?! How severe is the damage?!”

Cathain furrowed his brows as he approched the knights for more information.

“We heard that they are having a hard time extinguishing the fire because of the strong wind.”

Where Eleanora stood still with her face turning pale.

‘Toastra?’

‘This fire happened before a month of my execution…’

‘At that time, it was Evan Ravens doing... To worsen the public opinion about me, who asked for Cedrick to help by controlling the wind.’

‘But it only worsened the situation more.”

‘Why is it happening now?’

‘Father and his majesty, none of them was present at that time... So they doesn’t know much about this incident...’

‘Is it a hint that... My fate might repeat again?’

“Take me with you,”

Eleanora spoke to the emperor, who was stunt to hear her words.

“No! That’s dangerous! I have fire mana so i can control it-”

Cathain wanted to stop Eleanora from going there but she paid no attention to him as she started to command everyone.

Like she used to do before.

“Sir Edmund, call the reinforcement soldiers at once. Then inform Duke Hertz to contact the magic tower and gather magicians to deal with the situation.”

“Tell him that if young master Hertz refuses to help, then we have to do it the harder way.”

“Inform Lady Raven and Duke Richardo to get prepare with the medical team and ask Duke Raven to rescue the people first.”

“Make the banquet hall available to help the victims.”

The knights glanced at the emperor as they was confused either they should follow her or not.

But after seeing the emperor nodding to them in assurance, the knights immediately startes to work according to her instructions.

“I will take you there, let’s go.”

Cathain spoke and Eleanora followed him out to go to Toastra.

“She resembles the duchess a lot...”

Valerian spoke as a smile appeared on his face, after seeing Eleanora finally acting like a monarch.

“This is why am also afraid... What if i lose her too?”

Alexander spoke with a painful voice as hw knew what she was worried about.

He knew that she still couldn’t let go of the past.

“Don’t worry, trust them. They are different from us, very different.”

Valerian spoke as he sensed Alexander’s worry.

“Looking at them...don’t they look like us?”

Valerian recalled the past, when Alexander would assist him in every imperial work and stay beside him most of the time.

Just like how Cathain and Eleanora are working together now.

“No, compared to them; i am a lot younger then you.”

“...”

“Duke... You aren’t calling me old right?”

“Are you not?”

“...”

“Let’s get going, Your excellency. So that they don’t lose themselves in their duties like us...”

Alexander spoke after staying silent for a few moments with a faint painful smile on his face.

Then he decided to follow The emperor and his daughter, with the previous emperor to also help them.

He doesn’t want his daughter to lose the current cheerful version of hers in this political fights and all again.

‘I hope that no matter where you are, you will always be happy; My princess,”

…

Toastra, a industrial place for foreign renters in the Capital city of the Valentino Empire~

“I will try to absorb the fire and merge them with my powers.”

“Hmn, I will observe the situation and lead the people then.”

Cathain and Eleanora divided their works and both of them went two ways with separate teams following them.

“How’s the situation?”

Eleanora asked Sir Charles, who was following her from behind.

“As you know that Toastra has a large number of renters, so the exact population of residents is not known.”

“However, the total number of households are estimated to be about 5 thousands.”

‘The damage is greater then i expected, it’s just like the past.’

“Have the soldiers and the magicians arrived?”

Eleanora asked as they entered an old building which didn’t caught fire, where other high ranking official members were waiting for orders.

“Yes, A number of healers have also arrived. We also bought some extra mages, since the wind is strong.”

Count Green replied with a little annoyance as he didn’t liked the crown princess to be here.

“That’s it? What about the rescue operations?”

Eleanora asked with a frown as this old man’s again neglected the safety of the people.

“There isn’t much we can do with a fire this size.”

“We did our best to bring in the healers.”

“We have no choice but to pray for their safety.”

“Perhaps this is their fate.”

“We have already done plenty to save this commoners,”

Eleanora raised an eyebrow as she heard the words of those nobles, who acted to help but actually waiting to pass down their responsibility.

“Sir Charles,”

“Yes, Your highness?”

“Sent them back, we don’t need useless people’s here.”

Eleanora spoke as she narrowed her blue eyes and everyone looked at her with shock.