(Sweet…somehow sweet…!)

After getting over the evening party and Luna Mare’s barrage of questions the next day, everyday life had finally returned. However, at the regular weekend tea party, Aurora was writhing in agony, clutching a thread and needle.

“What’s wrong? It doesn’t seem like you’re focused on it.”
“I-It’s nothing, Ouch!!”
“It’s because you look elsewhere.”
(It’s your fault!!)

Aurora grimaced as she pricked her finger for the first time in years. It might have been possible when she was young and a beginner, but now that she was in double digits in age, she no longer made such a basic mistake, even when she was half asleep.
As she stared resentfully with teary eyes at the ball of blood floating on her fingertip, someone gently took her hand, and she froze.

“Come on, let me see the wound.”
“I-It’s okay!　Therefore!　Just licking it and it would be cured!”
“Saliva will have germs in it.”

Without giving her a second thought, Felix took her hand and cast a spell on the cup before him. He then poured the water, which turned hot, into a white handkerchief with his initials engraved on it, that he had taken out of his pocket, and gently wiped the small blood from her fingertips.
His gesture was so gentle, like handling something fragile, that Aurora couldn’t help but flinch instinctively.

“Okay, it’s clean.”
“Thank you very much.”
(so…… uneasy)

Felix had been like this in every way for a while now.

It was their first time meeting after that sinister evening party, and he had been acting strangely from the moment he arrived at the Porta family’s townhouse.
He appeared with Aurora’s favourite pastries and tea leaves, and was wearing his usual summer clothes, with a slightly mismatched, but shining, green stone ear cuff. When Aurora tilted her head and realised that it was the same as the one she had seen at the evening party, he declared in a low, calm voice:

『I never know when your whisper will reach my ear.』
He narrowed his eyes, likely saying ‘I’d love for you to join in too’, to which Aurora vehemently shook her head.
『Ah, these are designed for evening parties; they are too fancy to wear daily.』
『Then, I’ll send you an earring for daily use shortly.』
『No, you must not waste your money!』
『On what basis is it a waste of money? I just want to give it to you.』

It was hard to refuse when he whispered, ‘Please accept it.’ Seeing Aurora reluctantly nod, Felix sat down on the terrace sofa in a good mood.

Aurora holds her forehead as she remembers and exhales, wondering what is going on.

“……Does the wound on your forehead hurt?”
“No, it’s just a scratch. You can’t tell unless you look closely.”
“Are you sure?”

A shadow suddenly appeared in front of her. Aurora, who had been looking down at the embroidery frame on her lap, raised her head and saw Felix’s blue-violet eyes and white hands right in front of her.

“Wh… what?”
“Don’t move.”

The bare fingers of his ungloved hands gently lifted her cream-colored bangs, and the tips of his pale pink nails smoothly stroked Aurora’s round forehead.

“There is a faint pink tint remaining, but you certainly can’t tell from a distance.”

‘Good,’ said the cool beauty, relaxing softly. Seeing this melting expression so close, Aurora froze in return and dropped the needle she was holding to change the thread.

“Be careful. It’s dangerous if the needle gets lost in your dress.”
“Ah, thank you very much…….”

Felix picked up the thin needle, which seemed to be buried in the lace, and gently handed it to Aurora. Aurora took the needle back with trembling fingers and gripped it tightly.

(Calm down, calm down, Aurora. This is a scarf for the Crown Prince’s fiancée. There must be no rough spots!　Focus!　Focus!)

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes.
After a few moments of deep inhalation and slow exhalation, Aurora opened her eyes. She carefully stitched the final pattern, one stitch at a time, with her mind at rest.
The thread on the needle was shining white, and the embroidery on the finest silk was almost finished. The embroidery had been set up on the embroidery table until this morning, but she decided to stitch the remaining parts on the terrace so that Felix could see the result. All that was left was to stitch the white star in the centre of the scarf, and it would be complete.

Felix watched intently as Aurora worked the needle with even greater concentration than usual.
Her profile as she engrossedly embroidered was one of the things he liked most about her. It highlighted his pathetic inability to hold a conversation and made him feel depressed, but there was something about her profile that made her more attractive.

Until he met Aurora, Felix’s idea of a noblewoman was divided into two categories: married women who were devoted to being beautiful and energetically engaged in social activities, like his mother and sister, and unmarried women who were desperately trying to flaunt themselves to get a good son-in-law. He had no connection with healthy women like Aurora, who were absorbed in what they were good at.
Surely, among the women he had been treating so coldly, some were committed to something like her. There must have been others who had the same charm as her. But he had no way of knowing that if he hadn’t met her. She expanded his world. It all started with the ring he had thrown away. Some people might say it was a coincidence, but for him, it felt like it was inevitable.

Felix thought about this as he rested his chin on the tea table.
Aurora’s green eyes sparkled in the summer sunlight as she stared intently at her hands.

“…Okay, that… let’s finish off the edges…”

She had been on it for so long that the blue sky gradually started to fade, and the sun was setting. Aurora suddenly raised her head and let out a big sigh. Then she patted her shoulder, lifted the embroidery frame from her lap, and smiled.

“It’s done”

With a look of great satisfaction on his face, Felix suddenly peered into the embroidery frame. He leaned over to her, making her tremble for a moment, but she quickly relaxed, tilted the frame she was holding slightly, and handed it to Felix.

“……This is amazing.”
“Since this is for the Crown Prince’s fiancée, I made it into an embroidery style that is often given to brides in the past.”

Felix let out an honest exclamation of admiration as Aurora puffed out her chest.
Threads of all kinds of purple, dark purple, bluish purple, and bright purple fill the soft and elegant wisteria-coloured silk cloth. They represent a wheel and ivy pattern, said to have been used in ancient times for the wedding of a princess from the land of the sea, to celebrate life and guide fate. The inside of the wheel is decorated with white and silver threads and silver beads to depict the brightest North star and the starry sky, a blessing to start one’s journey, foreseeing the future and ensuring a life without obstacles.
It is an embroidery of encouragement and blessing for a bride who is marrying from the ‘former royal faction,’ which is neither the old nor the new royal faction, a position that has not been seen in the long history of the nation. (Tl- can’t seem to find the correct meaning of the kanji 『旧王家派』, so going with former royal faction. Do comment if anyone knows.)
Felix couldn’t tell if the design was good or bad, but he could tell that it was made with great skill. As he gazed upon it, Aurora blushed in embarrassment.

“This finally takes a weight off my shoulders.”
“I’ll have to set up another audience with His Royal Highness the Crown Prince……”
“I look forward to it, thank you.”

Aurora gave a slight bow, then let out a small “Ah.” She glanced at the maid standing diagonally behind her, who nodded as if she understood and handed Aurora the basket that was on a chair a short distance away. Felix watched as she rummaged through it, and suddenly, “Here you go,” she handed him a white tie.

“This is……”
“This is the tie that I promised Clavis-sama when I received the request to make a tie for the Crown Prince.”
“Felix”
“Yes?”
“You called me that at the evening party, right?”

Aurora shivered again at the whisper. She cleared her throat and glared at Felix with half-closed eyes.

“Felix-sama”
“Yes?”
“So this is the tie that I promised that time”

With a frown on her face and a slight blush on her cheeks, Aurora fluttered the tie. A monogram of Felix’s initials was stitched with white thread. It was a magnificent piece, decorated with arabesque patterns and inflated with a core inside, so beautiful that it was hard to differentiate from the embroidery done by the artisans who embroidered the linens and handkerchiefs that the Clavis family orders.
And, Felix senses a subtle hint of magic power covering the embroidery, which the artisan may not even be aware of. It is a pleasant magic that wishes the wearer a little happiness.

“For the crown prince’s tie, I chose the national emblem as the design, but for Felix-sama, I thought the initials would be better than the family crest. With a family crest, it would be difficult to tell which member of the Clavis family it belongs to, wouldn’t it?”

Just for me. When Felix realised the implied words, he felt something welling up in his chest and gently held his heart. That something filled his chest with heat, making his heart rate increase.
Felix accepted the swaying white tie and stared at it intently, then gently pressed it to his forehead.

“Thank you for the wonderful stuff”
“N-No, it’s not that big of a deal. ……”
“But it’s just for me. I couldn’t be happier.”
(Oh come on, that face is so unfair……!)

Aurora couldn’t take it anymore, so she slumped at the sight of his smile again.

“I’d like to personally give it to him before I leave for summer vacation, so please schedule an audience early!”

Aurora said this in an unusually fast voice and hid her face behind the embroidery frame. Felix just stared at her with a relaxed expression.

Author’s Note:-

A guy is excited about his first love.