Eglantine/Story

Eglantine is present at a tea party with the music teachers at the Royal Academy, along with Prince Anastasius and Rozemyne. When Anastasius orders Rozemyne to compose a song for Eglantine, she is impressed and deeply touched when Rozemyne and her personal musician Rosina begin to compose the song on the spot.

Later, Eglantine invites Rozemyne to a private tea party and inquires about her work at the Ehrenfest temple. She praises Ehrenfest upholding old traditions by allowing one of the archduke's children to serve as the High Bishop. She also confides in Rozemyne that both Prince Anastasius and Prince Sigiswald have proposed to her, but she fears that marrying either of them might ignite another civil war. After losing her family in the last political conflict, she is determined to avoid marrying either of them and hopes to join the temple instead.

However, Rozemyne reveals that she is expected to leave the temple and get married once she comes of age, and that joining the temple won’t help Eglantine avoid marriage. Despite her disappointment, Eglantine appreciates Rozemyne's honest advice and expresses a desire for them to become closer friends.

A few days later, Eglantine is invited to a private meeting with Anastasius. Following Rozemyne’s advice, the prince tells Eglantine his true feelings and promises to renounce his claim to the throne in order to fulfill her wishes. She accepts his feelings and agrees to allow him to escort him at the graduation ceremony. When he mentions that Rozemyne collapsed during a meeting, however, she insists that they work together to write a letter of apology.

Over the ensuing weeks, Anastasius meets several times with the king, his older brother Prince Sigiswald, and the previous Aub Klassenberg to declare his intentions and secure permission to marry Eglantine. When she sees his determination to fulfill her wishes, Eglantine finally reciprocates his affections.

As they near the end of their final term at the Royal Academy, Anastasius gives Eglantine the hair ornament and song he ordered from Rozemyne. Eglantine invites Rozemyne to a tea party under the pretext of learning how to properly put on the accessory. At the meeting she inquires with Rozemyne whether Anastasius had forced any more unreasonable demands on her, but is assured that the ornament was Rozemyne's idea to begin with. She also expresses her deep gratitude to Rozemyne for helping her and Anastasius express their true wishes to one another. During the meeting, Rozemyne covertly sells Eglantine a jar of rinsham, although interduchy trade is usually only authorized during the Archduke Conference.

Later, Eglantine is among those invited to Ehrenfest’s joint tea party. She introduces Rozemyne to her circle of friends, including Adolphine of Drewanchel. When Detlinde treats Rozemyne condescendingly and tries to pressure her using their duchies’ respective statuses as leverage, Eglantine comes to Rozemyne's aid and chastizes Detlinde.

After dutifully practicing to improve his skill, Anastasius is an equal match with Eglantine during their dedication whirl performance at the graduation ceremony. When they perform together at the graduation ceremony, he is equal to her skill and the audience is awed. Later in the day, when Rozemyne watches the recording of the event using a magic tool, she is touched by their love story and inadvertently gives them a blessing.

When the blessing showers down around the couple as they process into the grand hall, it causes a stir among the assembled nobles. The Sovereign High Bishop declares that the gods themselves have blessed Eglantine’s coming-of-age and marriage. Shocked and shaken, Anastasius and Eglantine both suspect that the blessing came from Rozemyne, although they have no proof.

At the Archduke Conference following Anastasius's and Eglantine's graduation, the king announces that the two are engaged to be married. He also announces that Anastasius is no longer in line to inherit the throne, but will be overseeing the territory of the Sovereignty in a similar manner to how a giebe rules a province of a duchy. This step down in status was likely part of a compromise with his brother Sigiswald to be able to marry Eglantine.

Spoiler from Part 4 Volume 5 Due to her engagement with Anastasius Eglantine is invited to Prince Hildebrand's Baptism, alongside Lestilaut and Hannelore who are relatives of the third prince's mother.

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