Betrothed to My Sister's Ex

“Oh my, oh my, I never imagined the lady would think that way. This Toppo, truly caught off guard.”

“Oh, please don’t apologize. I should have spoken clearly. As Mio said, only the things I especially liked were eaten—ah, but I’m sorry, everything was so delicious! I was just so happy!”

“Oh, oh, my lady. Oh, oh, oh.”

Toppo burst into tears again, and Lord Cyrus and I worked together to gently stroke and comfort him.

Finally, when his tears dried up, Toppo stood up with a beaming smile.

“I’m truly glad! Now that I know, I’ll bring out the dessert after the meal! I just happened to have baked an apple pie. It’s loaded with butter, five apples, topped with fresh cream—a perfect sweet treat before bedtime!”

Eh?!

Toppo cheerfully went off to the kitchen, and Lord Cyrus sighed with a wry smile.

“What he really ‘never expected’ was the fact that no one else could finish that many dishes besides himself.”

“Ah, um… I’m really full already, so I don’t think I can manage dessert.”

“I understand. It’s clear now you have a light appetite.”

I don’t think I’m so small-eating as to be called light appetite… Five apples’ worth of apple pie? And what even is a pre-bedtime snack?

While I was puzzled, the head chef’s freshly baked apple pie was plopped down on the table. Wow, it’s huge.

But Lord Cyrus calmly took a slice and immediately speared it with his fork.

He stuffed a big mouthful into his cheek.

“Mmm, delicious. Marie, you should try some too, maybe tomorrow.”

Then he eagerly kept eating.

I just stared blankly at him.

Unlike me, Lord Cyrus had skipped dinner, so it makes sense he had room in his stomach. Still, the scene was so strange that I timidly asked,

“…Do you like sweets?”

“Hm? Is there anyone who doesn’t?”

He answered with a question.

“Well… my father mostly drank alcohol and rarely ate sweets, and I thought all men were like that. But I don’t really know for sure.”

“I see. Now that you mention it, I’ve never asked other men about it. Everyone I know in this castle and my friends all eat sweets normally, so I just assumed that’s how it is.”

“Toppo really loves the sweets he makes.”

The head chef Toppo was cheerfully slicing the remaining pie. I was honestly overwhelmed, but he seemed to understand that too. He took the whole pie with just some cuts in it and left the dining hall.

“…Where did he go?”

“To his room, probably. He just shared one slice of his own treat with me.”

I see.

“He’ll definitely save some for you too, Marie. Or bake another… Don’t worry, you won’t miss out on eating.”

Well, I wasn’t really worried about that.

Soon, the kitchen door opened again and Mio returned. She was carrying a large tray with something in each hand. She was supposed to have gone to prepare tea, right…?

“You’re late. We finished dessert already.”

“Can’t be helped. I missed dinner too.”

Mio set down a giant omelette rice with a thud that made the table shake. It was huge—bigger than the apple pie earlier.

“If that’s the case, you should have eaten it with us earlier.”

“That amount won’t fill me up. But instead, I brought something good for tea.”

“Oh… I see, that explains it.”

Lord Cyrus grinned.

What was it? A strange object. It looked like a common kettle for boiling water, but somehow it was stacked in two layers.

“This is called a Chaidan set, an Eastern Republic-style tea set. Every household, no matter how poor, has one.”

I tilted my head.

“In the East, tea is almost like medicine, and coffee is the more common drink, isn’t it?”

“That’s old information. After the tax on coffee went up during the war two hundred years ago, tea became far more commonly drunk in the East. But the way they make it is a bit unique—”

As Lord Cyrus began to explain, Mio said, “Take your time,” and left with the omelette.

Wait, what? Just the two of us?

Lord Cyrus didn’t seem to care about my panic. He happily continued explaining the two-tiered tea set.