27: Broken trust

Broken trust

Vexed beyond reason, Adela's knight who stood four steps down from her ran a hand through his wet hair.2

"…Do you plan to stay here all day and get yourself ill?"

As if displeased to look over the events of the day, the sky thundered above Lanark indignantly.

Adela had already lost count of the times she knocked on the Archduke's closed door. Undoubtedly, her father required reflection time before he would agree to an audience, but neither that fact nor the teeth-chattering shivers in her face swayed her from challenging the bolted door standing between them, for that was her way of asking him to open up his heart to her.

With throbbing knuckles, she knocked on her father's door once more, "F-Father…I respect your lack of desire to c-c-communicate… If you would only listen to what I have to s-say to you,"

With a long sigh, Arkin's eyes descended on Adela's sopping wet coat then lingered on the small puddle forming beneath her.

The heavy black clouds that loomed over the knights' heads on their way to get the Archduke's coerced daughter let go of all the load they carried on the knights' trip back to the Archduke's estate, and Kaiser who refused to look Adela in the face locked himself in his study the minute they got back to their manor, leaving Adela out in the cold hallway, refusing to go back to her room before talking to him.

While the Archduke refused to speak to Adela, Adela refused to speak to Arkin. 

"Adela… You can punish me in whatever way you think is appropriate, just talk to me…"

Thanks to the loud ringing in her ears, she found it all too easy to ignore Arkin's shameless suggestions. She needed every bit of her concentration to make it through her father's walls anyhow.

Father will open eventually, he must...

King Emanuel's feeble proposal to collaborate with Egon and rescue a captured Andreas might or might not take place depending on how Egon responds to it. And as far as Adela had gathered from the exchange, the chances for that collaboration seeing the light were not very promising.

But the Archduke's situation was different. He simply could not ignore the hostage situation his Lanark was going through. It was Kaiser's responsibility to follow up with Egon on that matter, no matter how much he detested it.

Adela's head throbbed along with her knuckles when she thought about Larissa. Andreas's ordeal was proof of his innocence, but then, Larissa was not aware of Arkin and Adela's speculation about the von Conradies in the first place.

She will be devastated once she learns about the kidnapping...

Watching her furrowing then unfurrowing her eyebrows, Arkin ran out of patience.

"What did you want me to do? Hm?... Watch you with tied hands as you return depleted at the dusk of the day only to go back the following dawn? My nerves…Hell…My eyes couldn't handle it anymore! My options were to either expose him for the scoundrel he was or to assassinate him!"

Her arm stopped moving in the direction of the door, the intensity of her feelings outmatched her ability to manage them. His lack of trust in her was degrading, but the indecent threat Egon received was intolerable. 

Arkin took her unusual tranquillity for the empathy he had wanted. 

"You wouldn't want to make a murderer out of your knight, would you?"

She finally faced him with shaking eyelids.

"Do you realize what you have done?... Do you even know what you took away from me?"

His face hardened, her end goal was not worth her suffering, "Gathering information…"

"I am not talking about that!"

Her voice sounded strange; it was hard to speak through the anger that almost blocked her throat.

"I am talking about my agreement with Egon von Conradie, the infirmary he wished to establish for commoners… I am talking about the fact that I was there as myself instead of somebody else for the first time in my life… Do you know how that felt?"

The wrong decision that a noble Lady such as herself should never have made felt like the best thing she had ever agreed on.

Arkin's hard face was marred with bafflement, "Adela…"

"Of course not. You cannot know... Because unlike me, you can proudly put on your knight's armor every day and be yourself, bringing honor to your family while you are at it…While I…"

She turned around then leaned her back against the door and closed her eyes, letting herself shed the tears that had stung her eyes for so long, not caring who was watching anymore.

Taken aback by the Lady's sudden outburst, Arkin finally felt regret as he realized what he had unintentionally done to her. He not only ruined her relationship with her father, but he spoiled something she felt passionate about and stood in the way of commoners' improved course of living.

"…You never told me any of this,"

"Why would I?! Our deal was to come to you when I am faced with a problem," her eyes measured him up and down in a belittling manner, "I could not have dreamed that the problem would be you!"

She turned her head away from his falling face.

"…The King would have stopped you anyhow,"

What he said was not void of truth, for neither the King's arrival nor the dramatic little play he put on for his audience had anything to do with Arkin telling on Adela.

Restating that fact did nothing to soothe her sizzling pain. 

"Today, the Archduke and his knights saved de Lanark's reputation from sinking in mud…" she shook her head and swallowed the lump in her throat, "Whereas I…" 

Arkin held his breath, his eyes tense now seeing how she struggled to find a way to say what she wanted without hurting him.

"...I will trust you no more,"

His face twisted with anguish, but Adela's attention was stolen by the rattling sound of unbolting the door she leaned against, it was nothing short of melodic freedom from her captivity. She looked back with hopeful eyes when the air around her was pulled to the inside of Kaiser's study as he finally opened the door. 

Kaiser's gaze on her was torturing.

"…I will ask this only once,"

She was quick to nod, willing to give in to any and all the demands he had to make on her. 

"...Do try and explain all about that agreement of yours. Leave not a single detail out of it,"

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