The Romantic Trials Of A Transmigrated Empress
Chapter 392: Roland’s blindness.

Chapter 392: Roland’s blindness.

When he left Benjamin’s Roland was driven straight to Benjamin’s secret town manor where he did all his painting from. He broke into his brother’s wine cabinet, sat in the back of the painting room and watched Galen paint.

The room smelled of paint and heavy smoke. It also smelled of vanish and newly furnished furniture. Roland could not see any new furniture in the room. There was only a single couch by the window, the table where he was sitting and three chairs. Two were around the table and he was sitting on one of them.

The other, Galen was sitting on it unevenly, bare chested, smudges of paint in his hair, on his back and on the floor all around him. His hand moved rapidly over what looked like dark jugged mountains.

Roland poured wine into a glass and downed it all in one go. The first drink went down with little effort, then the second and then the third. In thirty minutes, half a bottle of fox fire wine was gone. Each glass of wine had been meant to chase something, but he was not sure what it was. The more he drunk, the more he felt a stone growing in his throat and it made it more difficult to swallow.

Galen turned around and he waved the paint brush in the air once. "Let’s have it. Out with it already. What has got you day drinking when you promised your wife that you would not be touching any brew until she gives birth?"

Roland grimaced and he put down the glass. Sigrid would not be too happy if she smelled alcohol on him. He would have to pass by his chambers at take a bath before seeing her.

"I have been to Benjamin’s." he said in a deep low voice that carried unwillingness and uncertainty.

Galen’s head inclined downwards a little. "Ah, I see." He moved from where he was and took the other chair around the table. He took the very glass Roland had been drinking from and finished the contents. "I am guessing from that look on your face that it was not a pleasant visit."

"I told him to leave the empire." Roland answered.

Galen’s widened in surprised. "Now this is a surprise. I never imagined that one day you would send father’s precious son packing. I always thought that I would behead him secret and that would be his end."

Roland drew his head back. He looked at his brother as if he was not being serious.

Galen shrugged with his right shoulder. "What? Does it really surprise you that I want Benjamin dead? That little bastard was nasty to me while we were growing up. If I so much as touched him he would run to father and cry. Then I would be punished by having to shovel horse shit or be whipped on the back.

I don’t care about the he was just a kid excuses, he knew what he was doing. So, we are drowning in sorrow because you are regretting the choice you made or are we celebrating?"

Roland opened his mouth but found that he had nothing to say. He sighed, leaned back and stretched his legs. "A part of me feels sorrow because he is my brother. I spent more time with him than I did with you."

Galen raised the glass. "You don’t have to rub it in. Both of you bonded over swords and I was left out to play with paint, sheep, and servants." His voice held some bitterness as he thought back on the lonely memories of his childhood and the envy he felt whenever he saw Roland and Benjamin together. "He was your favorite brother."

Roland lowered his eyes to the table, fixing them on the bottle of wine.

"You don’t need to feel guilty, this is all in the past and we have resolved it." Galen comforted him candidly. "I don’t resent you anymore Roland, but him.....I will always loathe him."

The word loathe was said with such passion that Roland felt it being inked into his skin.

"He should count himself lucky that you are chasing to rum him out of the empire rather than killing him. We both know how relationships between sons of the king usually end." Galen took another drink.

Sons of kings killed each other when it came to inheritance. For some it was before their father passed away, others immediately after and even those that survived would at times keep going even after one of them took the throne.

"You are still Benjamin’s good brother." Galen poured more wine into the glass.

Again, Roland heard bitterness in Galen’s words. There was anger there, layers of it that were hidden deep.

"Do you want me to kill him?" He asked.

Galen lifted his eyes to meet Roland’s. "Do you want to kill him?"

Roland clenched his teeth for a moment, then he loosened them and shook his head. "I am afraid that if I kill one brother, I might grow a fondness for the habit and end up massacring every relative that so much as glances at the throne with what I perceive to be suspicious looks. I want to be a different ruler, a wise one that does not need to spill the blood of his family to rule comfortably. It should be enough that I have forced him into exile."

Galen did not think so. He thought Roland was unnecessarily soft and compassionate and sometimes such a kind nature resulted in disaster. What his brother so easily forgot was the fact that Benjamin was a legal heir to the throne.

If he went into exile, made money and powerful friends, what would stop him from raising an army and returning to set the empire on fire as he battled for the throne. What if he met their bastard brother and magically stumbled into his identity. What would stop them from joining hands and demanding that they bastard claim the throne?

What if Benjamin run and tattled to their father about this exile threat. Roland so easily forgot that Benjamin was still the favorite son. If they had been the ones that failed to save him, leading to his current condition, their father would have ordered for their execution or exile as soon as he opened his eyes.

It had been more than a week since he opened his eyes and still, he said nothing about Benjamin. Galen was certain that his father was intentional about this. He did not plan to do a single thing and Roland could not see this.

This was why his brother needed Sigrid. She could see the red where Roland saw white. If he would not handle Galen’s matter permanently, Sigrid would do it.

Galen smiled at his brother and tipped the glass to him. "You are right, it is enough that you are forcing him into exile."

No matter what decision Sigrid came to, Galen’s mind was made up. Benjamin was too big of a threat to be left roaming the world. He had to die and Galen needed to see it through personally if that was what it took.