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A moment later, I realized I was peering at the man through the window like a spy. I was about to leave the window to knock on the door, but McKenna’s gaze suddenly locked onto mine. His eyes widened, and he hastily drew a blanket over himself.

“Your Majesty? Why are you here?”

“That’s what I want to ask you.”

“Huh? Oh yes, this is...”

McKenna’s eyes darted around in panic. He opened his mouth as if he were about to say something, but then the door squealed open and the merry voice of Duke Elgy filtered through the room.

“McKenna, you don’t have to dress when you’ll have to take it off anyways.”

Duke Elgy held a box in his hand, but he stopped dead when he saw me by the window. A look of surprise stole over his face, then he whistled and laughed wildly.

“We’ve been caught again.”

McKenna cried out in frustration.

“Stop the weird jokes from now on!”

“How fun. I like this.”

“No! I mean, this is a joke. Sorry.”

Did he think that I didn’t know what a joke was? That seemed to be the case when McKenna suddenly apologized to me instead of protesting against the Duke Elgy.

“It’s fine. If you’re busy, shall I come later?”

I would just close the curtain and play along, but McKenna continued to protest.

“Please, it’s a misunderstanding!”

“...”

I don’t know why everyone tried to take me so seriously. McKenna hurriedly tried to make his explanation.

“I was on an errand for King Heinley, and I was injured and ended up here—”

His words stopped and he doubled over in pain.

“Sir McKenna?”

I almost ran into the room to help him.

“Are you alright?”

The blanket slipped, revealing a bandage around his torso. He kept on groaning, and I saw that the linen was spotted with red.

“Blood....!”

My eyes widened amazement, and Duke Elgy quickly dragged McKenna back into bed, murmuring at him to be quiet.

“See, this is why you’re called bird-headed.”

Duke Elgy opened the box he brought. I couldn’t see its contents from my vantage point, but from what I saw Duke Elgy pull out of it, I guessed that it was a first aid kit. Instead of treating the wound, however, he immediately turned to me.

“Can you come back later, Your Majesty?”

Was I disturbing them? However, McKenna’s injury seemed serious. Could Duke Elgy treat it by himself?

“Shall I call a doctor for you?”

It could cause a fuss if McKenna was discovered here, but it was hard to ignore the wound, and his hands were trembling in agony. However, McKenna shook his head.

“No, thank you. I’m fine.”

The palace had places where visitors could come and go, but the southern palace was not one of them. Why would McKenna, a close aide of a foreign king, be found in the middle of the southern palace? I wrung my hands worriedly.

‘I don’t know what’s going on here, but...’

It would be difficult to explain away a suspiciously injured person, so I turned towards Duke Elgy.

“Duke. I have a favor to ask of you.”

“Me?”

He smiled as he held a bandage in his hands.

“Even when I asked you to go, you didn’t. I wonder what you’re going to say to me?”

“Are you still a friend of King Heinley’s?”

“Well, that is an unexpected question.”

He burst into laughter.

“Why are you asking that all of a sudden, Your Highness?”

“When you meet King Heinley, tell him his blue bird is dead.”

His laughter suddenly disappeared. He raised his eyebrows and looked at me with a curious expression.

“The blue bird is dead?”

McKenna started coughing loudly.

“Yes. And that even in the future it will die—”

I didn’t know how to finish it. At this point, Heinley was clever enough to work out what Sovieshu had ordered. I didn’t bother to talk about the roast bird because it was too horrible.

I took two steps back, and saw McKenna behind Duke Elgy’s shoulder. He was still clearing his throat awkwardly and staring at me.

***

“Is she saying that you’ll be killed as soon as you’re discovered?”

After Empress Navier gracefully departed, Duke Elgy turned back to McKenna.

“I suppose she knows I was hit by an arrow.”

“Is there something strange going on behind her?”

“...”

“She said it with such a grim look.”

Duke Elgy pretended to slice his throat with his finger, imitating the Empress’s words of ‘In the future it will die.’ However, McKenna shook his head.

“She probably meant that whoever shot the arrow would continue to do so in the future.”

“She said it with a straight face. Like you were going to be killed.”

“No. Oh, why do you keep doing that?”

McKenna suddenly moaned in pain, clutching his head with both his hands.

“What is it, Bird Head? Hurts?”

“The letter you told me to deliver. I didn’t...”

“You mean that incredibly sappy letter?”

“Sappy! It was a very clean and simple letter!”

“So you did read it.”

“...”

“Be thankful I didn’t say it was made of butter instead.”

Duke Elgy approached the bed McKenna was lying in, then took out the gauze, tweezers, and disinfectant out of the first aid kit.

“When you’re delivering Heinley’s letter in the middle of this, you’re basically promoting ‘I’m the blue bird.’”

McKenna sighed. He had yet another problem. From the look of things, it seemed that he couldn’t go back and forth from the Empress’ chambers anymore. He didn’t know how many more secret messages he had to deliver in the future.

***

I returned to my room, but all I could think about were Duke Elgy and McKenna. I wondered why the knight was here and why he was hurt. My eyes alighted on the blue feather on my desk. The feather was retrieved from the window sill...and reminded me of McKenna’s blue hair.

Heinley’s bird was injured, and McKenna was hurt too...was that a coincidence? A person couldn’t change into something else.

The strange timing frustrated me, and my suspicion only grew the next day.

“Your Majesty!”

Around breakfast time, Laura came in the room and caused a commotion.

“You were looking for a bird that was hurt yesterday!”

“Is there an injured bird?”

“Yes! I heard someone say they saw Duke Elgy hugging an injured bird!”

Yesterday’s events seemed all the more strange after I heard Laura’s story. A blue bird was wounded by an arrow, Duke Elgy rescued the injured bird, and a hurt McKenna lay in his room...

Meanwhile, McKenna was in the palace on an errand for Heinley, and no one knew he was here...

As soon as I finished holding my audience duties, I went straight to the court mage to consult him.

“Can a person change their form with magic?”

The court mage looked at me peculiarly, but he answered with a serious tone.

“You mean into bird, Your Majesty?”

“Yes, but it doesn’t have to be a bird. It can be any animal.”

The mage crossed his arms in thought.

“No. There is no mage that is characterized by animal transformation.”

Was I off the mark that McKenna was the blue bird? But the mage’s words did not end there.

“But there is a record of the ‘Bird Headed Tribe’.”

“Bird...Headed?”

Have I heard this before? That name seemed to stir a memory.

“It’s not a well-known story. The records are very old, and I’m not even sure it’s true.”

“Ah...”

“But if it is, there’s a claim that werewolves may be part of that group.”

McKenna and werewolves...did not seem to match. The mage smiled and waved his hand.

“It’s a strange claim. Even if that was real, they wouldn’t be monsters like werewolves. The Bird Headed Tribe was said to be no different from walking and talking people, whereas werewolves went mad at the full moon. The Bird Heads did not have that trait.”

“Where are the tribe members now?”

“Gone. Their numbers naturally diminished, faded only into legend.”

“Is there any chance that any of them would be alive?”

“Perhaps. If they are, they wouldn’t reveal themselves.”

The mage chuckled to himself.

“You can tell by the fact they were recorded not as the ‘The Bird Tribe’ but rather ‘The Bird Headed Tribe’ that they did not have good relations with normal people.”

Was it possible that McKenna could be a part of that tribe? What if the blue bird that flew to me was actually McKenna? It was a far-reaching conclusion, but it was my best guess.

“Why are you asking all of a sudden, Your Majesty?”

The mage looked at me with interested eyes. Perhaps he wanted to know I had found some traces of such people.

“I was only curious.”

I made up an excuse and left the mage’s laboratory.