Until this time, the Queen's eyes moved away from the map full of various marks and moved to Prince Arthur's face. She was still resting on the table with one hand, her long hair fell down from her left shoulder as she moved her head sideways, and her face was more delicate and beautiful.
With a smile, the young prince in exile leaned over like a gentleman, approached the queen's ear, and whispered something.
The queen listened, smiled, and did not agree or refuse.
She stood up, and the drop-shaped sapphire earrings on her ears brushed against the lips of Prince Arthur who was still leaning over. The shy prince held the gem embedded in the silver jacquard in his mouth.
Feeling the slight pull from her ears, the queen tilted her head slightly, and looked at Prince Arthur reproachfully from under her thick eyelashes.
Their cheeks were almost touching, close enough to feel each other's breath.
"Well, if you insist."
Adele raised her eyebrows lightly, said meaningfully, and then tilted her head.
Prince Arthur let go obediently, and the outline of the earrings left light traces on his lips. His face was half shrouded in shadow and half shrouded in light, and the tip of his tongue and teeth licked the cold trace of metal remaining. His lips are very thin, like a rose petal, and at this moment, they are as charming as a vampire who has sucked blood.
"I am glad," he said softly and tenderly, "that you are willing to do me the honor."
The queen looked at him for a while, but didn't care about his little "faux pas" just now.
In contrast, when Prince Arthur was sent out of the queen's room by Mrs. Kelly, he received a more fierce and cold gaze from Mrs. Kelly than before. Still, there was a contented smile on Prince Arthur's lips until Abigail passed him in the cloister.
In the court, Abigail can be regarded as an unusual upstart.
She is the only woman who wears long trousers in the palace and hangs a saber and a gun. Even if she wears a navy coat with a gold badge, she still has a lingering gangster look. The boundaries between men and women were blurred on her body. Among the maids, there were those who hated her extremely, and some who were secretly infatuated with her.
Compared with Prince Arthur, the officials of the Roland Empire probably hope that this woman who wears pants like a witch will disappear from Roland's court as soon as possible.
— Indeed, many people have tried it.
If Abigail's vigilance and strength were not strong enough, she might have been poisoned or assassinated at this time. These things, neither Abigail nor the Queen brought them to the surface to make a fuss. Just as the queen is crowned and faces countless potential assassinations all the time until today, it is no easy task to cut the way of women in a world where men have been dominant for thousands of years.
"I will give you all the support I can," the Queen once said to Abigail, "but, Abigail, you and I both know that there is a limit to how much support I can offer."
"That's enough," Abigail replied. "Leave the rest to me."
Leave it to me to prove to the world.
"Your Majesty," Abigail walked into the queen's room silently like a swift big cat, she put her hand on her left chest and saluted the queen like all soldiers, "all are ready. "
Adele nodded to her, and said softly and tenderly, "Then I'll leave it to you, Abigail."
…………………
Even if the Free Commercial City has a grudge against the two new regulations of the Roland Empire, and the Roland Empire has a grudge against the Free Commercial City's encroachment on the port industry, some superficial etiquette is still indispensable. At least during the meeting ceremony before the official start of the negotiation, both parties Be personable.
The Free Merchant City negotiators even gave the Queen a rare gemstone necklace as a gift, and the Queen returned an equally precious gift.
The most important representative of the negotiating team is one of the thirteen-member committee of the governing hall of the Alliance of Free Commercial Cities, the Consul of Javelli.
The Consul of Arvillis had the usual shrewdness of a banker, his brown eyes always scanning the whole banquet hall swiftly. However, his facial features are quite correct, and there are some silver hair mixed in the neatly combed hair. He is not just a businessman, he has a strong risk factor in his bones, which makes this middle-aged Mr. Consul look a little arrogant and aggressive.
The Royal Orchestra played brisk dance music, and the Consul of Avelli observed quietly, thinking about the many ambiguous scandals about the queen, trying to judge which rumor was closer to the truth.
He then saw the visibly well-groomed Prince Arthur walking towards the Queen, and it looked like he was the lucky one.
The jealous eyes of almost all the men in the hall fell on the prince of the Root Empire.
"I should make more trouble for my dear brother Wang."
said Prince Arthur, watching the Queen with whom he danced without blinking.
The queen wore a well-tailored black velvet coat with double rows of gold buttons, extending down from the left and right shoulders, revealing the dark red petticoat inside, and then joining together at the waist to form a slender waistline. The overlapping and wide skirts are red called "St. John's Blood", and the folds are inlaid with a small diamond. With every movement of the queen, the skirts interweave and change thousands of blurred lights, like The stars enveloped her.
Hearing his words, Adele looked sideways at him while spinning: "Don't you cause your brother less trouble?"
"certainly."
Prince Arthur replied without shame, and at the same time walked gracefully backwards, turned half sideways, held the Queen's hand firmly, and pulled the Queen who left with the melody back into his arms, and put his left hand lightly on her slender waist .
"I should make endless troubles for him, so that he can't get away from Roland until he goes into the coffin."
They danced to the melody, facing each other in the high or low strings, rubbing shoulders and spinning, whispering... The shadows in the flickering brilliant lights sometimes overlap and sometimes separate.
Anyone who reads it will think that this is a pair of matching lovers.
Archbishop Rodrik stood in the crowd wearing a solemn monk's black clothes, frowning as he watched the scene on the dance floor. As a priest, Archbishop Rodri naturally did not have the right to step onto the dance floor. He stood in the shadows, like a stern statue, and whenever Prince Arthur embraced the Queen with the melody, his steel blue eyes were as sharp as blades.
After Queen Roland and Prince Arthur finished leading the dance, groups of men and women stepped onto the dance floor one after another.
The Consul of Avelli pinned a rose on his button, went up to the Queen, and invited her to a second dance, as was the custom.
Not surprisingly, when he was bowing, the handsome Prince Sen who was standing next to the queen gave him a cold look.
When Adele handed the hand to Consul Yavelli, he almost felt that the back of his hand was covered with spikes, and he almost couldn't maintain a decent smile on his face for a while.
Only very quickly, the Consul of Yavelli threw that feeling behind him. He stepped onto the dance floor with the queen, and the closer he got to know Roland's queen, the more he could feel her breath-holding charm. Even if the Consul of Avelli had deep hostility towards Queen Roland, he could not deny against his will that she was the most dazzling woman he had ever seen in his life.
Her presence overshadowed the other beauties in an instant.
Even the snow that has just fallen from the sky and has not been stained with mortal dust is about to be inferior in front of her skin. Not to mention the rosy eyes that are like the blood dripping from an angel, and the fire that the devil sprinkled on the world, the slender and elegant neck like a swan, and the pair of fascinating collarbones...
It is an unforgivable crime to let such a beauty spend her beauty.
"If you are willing to accept the goodwill of the Confederation's Office," the Consul of Avery said with some hints, "the Thirteen-member Council will become your reliable ally, and this will save you from a terrible crisis."
"Avoid a dire crisis?" the queen read it with interest, and then smiled. "Compared to this, my garden is only thirteen fountain statues short."
At the beginning, the Consul of Avelli didn't understand her meaning, but soon he realized that there was always a statue of the ruling family on the square in front of the governing hall of the Alliance of Free Commercial Cities.
The face of the Consul of Yavelli turned livid in an instant.
The melody just came to a small point, and the queen spun and said coldly as she passed him:
"I will make the statues of your governing coalition the soles of my feet."
… … … … … … …
While the banquet was in progress, several carts came from the direction of the fort in the port. The carts were very wide, no different from the common carts for transporting wood in the port. Two of them were pulled by mules and moved forward slowly.
The cart passed by in the alley with few people. The drivers and those who followed the carriage were all dressed in coarse cloth and breeches, no different from dock workers. When they passed a corner, several half-grown men rushed out recklessly, and one of the leaders accidentally bumped into the cart while laughing.
"Oops."
The daredevil screamed in pain and fell backwards on the road. He raised his head while rubbing his back.
"Sorry, sorry, I'm not—"
The latter words disappeared in his throat, and Daredevil stared wide-eyed at the cart he had just hit. The high pile of timber on the cart was knocked away at a corner, revealing the bronze tube hidden under the plank—he had seen it in the port Something like that. It was the bronze cannon mounted on the port battery.
Before he could say anything, a "worker" stepped forward, drew out a knife, covered his mouth, and stabbed him in the chest at the same time.
Several other half-grown children in the alley followed in the footsteps of daredevils almost at the same time.
The corpses were lying on the ground in all directions, and the blood slowly spread in this dark and damp corner. One of the drivers raised his head and took a cold look at the gradually darkening sky. Under his double-sided hat, was the simply disguised face of Sir Avaro.
"Go faster."
He didn't give a single glance to those innocent children who died tragically.
"The patrol is coming soon."
The "workers" hid their knives in their sleeves and continued to push their carts towards the official residence where the banquet was held. When they came out of the alley, the wind carried a fishy smell from the sea not far away.
Sir Avaro turned his head and glanced in the direction of Thousand Island Bay.