She didn’t notice the few times he washed away a cold feeling, but judging by her current expression, it seemed that his wife had caught on to something strange. Though it was about time for her to grow accustomed to magic.
“Thank you for resolving this.”
She followed Annecy with a brief smile, but her smile soon faded. It was because she suddenly remembered what she had been holding when she looked at Annecy’s face.
Although the handkerchief was made of soft fabric, the torn part felt unusually rough, which weighed on her mind.
As Goyo’s hand twitched, Annecy’s gaze followed it downward.
“I’m sorry that this happened just a day after you made it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The handkerchief…”
With a downcast face, Goyo opened her clenched hand and showed the state of the handkerchief.
Even though Annecy’s expression didn’t change when he saw the torn handkerchief, Goyo thought it was just an outward show of consideration.
After all, it would be natural to feel upset, since a handmade gift had been ruined in less than a day.
“It’s taken on an antique look.”
“I’m sorry. It got caught on a deer’s antlers… It was my carelessness.”
“It seems the deer, not you, was careless. But no need to worry, as this is more than just a handkerchief, as you mentioned.”
With a snap from his large hand, the handkerchief in Goyo’s grasp floated into the air, splitting into multiple fragments before folding together like flower petals.
The handkerchief, which had been torn to shreds, gathered into a neat shape, forming a flower-like hair ornament.
Annecy brushed through Goyo’s hair with his long fingers and gently placed the hair accessory, once a handkerchief, above her ear.
“I believe it complements your beauty quite well.”
At his affectionate smile, Goyo felt a surge of emotion well up inside her. Now that there was someone there to comfort her, the sorrow she had hidden rushed to her eyes.
Startled by the heat rising to her eyes, Goyo quickly blinked. Luckily, the person who had stirred her emotions had turned his gaze elsewhere, unaware of her state.
“I’m indebted to you, Sir.”
“Not at all. I’m a little late to receive your thanks.”
Seeing the knight’s bitter smile, Annecy shrugged.
“It seems the lady has already caught her prey, and we don’t have much time left. We should return now. But it seems Sir Eliom has yet to catch her prey.”
“Hunting wasn’t my main goal, so it’s fine.”
“No, even with time running short, I believe a knight of your caliber could still catch a couple of birds, at the very least.”
Seeing the cold gleam flash in his gray eyes, Rajin gave a bitter laugh.
It was clear she wouldn’t be let off so easily. Having no choice, Rajin opened her mouth again.
“On second thought, returning empty-handed would indeed hurt my pride. Shall I let you go ahead, my lady?”
“Yes, Sir Eliom.”
With Goyo’s final thanks for the day, the Bethelgius couple returned to the edge of the forest.
Rajin watched the two of them disappear into the distance before slowly turning around, raising both arms.
At the same time, the murderous intent that had been lingering all around her finally took form.
As if in sync with her movements, multiple blades all pointed toward Rajin at once. Amid the suffocating air filled with killing intent, slow footsteps echoed.
“Still, it’s fortunate, Sir Eliom. Had you tried anything even slightly sinister, I would have severed your head immediately. It’s a bit distasteful to sever a human head at a hunting competition rather than a beast’s, wouldn’t you agree?”
The man approached, wearing a smile as if mimicking his master.
“Pleasure to meet you. I’ve been quite busy lately, and on top of everything else, overseeing the surveillance of your actions had been killing me. I’m Kolabe Perroto, the Marquis’s chief aide.”
“You may know me as Rajin Eliom. Though, I must admit, I’m surprised. I thought the perfume I gave would’ve been misunderstood.”
“We’ve already examined that long ago. What do you take Bethelgius for?”
“And you’re proud to have inspected a lady’s belongings so carelessly?”
“Don’t say such frightening things. Of course, I did it with permission. The Marquis greatly respects the Madam’s opinion. I wish he would respect this pitiful subordinate even a hundredth as much.”
We’ve talked long enough. Kolabe’s smile turned cold as he stepped closer.
The passing clouds covered the sun, darkening the surroundings, but the blades still gleamed with an icy blue light.
“Are you ready to talk?”
“There’s no point in playing dumb, is there? I don’t see a need to, either.”
I’ll speak.
Without any resistance, Rajin Eliom opened her mouth, and Kolabe signaled for the blades aimed at Rajin to be withdrawn.
Rajin’s memory drifted back a few months.
One day, a woman came to visit the Eliom estate. She wore a robe pulled so tightly over her body that no part of her was visible, from her face to her feet, clearly hiding many things.
Since Iel had been away, Rajin Eliom was the one to deal with the woman.
Even that encounter only happened because Rajin had been on her way out the front gate at that exact moment. If it weren’t for that coincidence, the woman would have been turned away by the Eliom household’s guards.
‘I am called Mathel. I’ve come to retrieve something entrusted to the Count of Eliom.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Leave. We don’t deal with peddlers.’
‘Your father entrusted an item, didn’t he? A music box. It’s themed after a bird in a broken cage. The name “Eliza” is inscribed on it.’
Although she had never seen or heard of such an item, Rajin felt an odd sense of unease at the woman’s suspicious behavior. To probe further, Rajin deliberately concocted a story.
‘I don’t know how you know about that, but I have no memory of my father ever asking me to pass an item to anyone. Please leave.’
‘I am the owner of that item. But even if I say so, you don’t seem inclined to listen, do you? I suppose I’ll have to prove that my words can be trusted.’
‘Trusted?’
‘In three months, the Count of Eliom will be declared dead after a long disappearance, won’t he? Your elder sibling will become the head of Eliom.’
‘That’s assuming my father doesn’t return.’
‘Unfortunately, that’s not something you need to worry about.’
Though her face was mostly hidden by the robe, a thin smile forming at the edge of her lips was disturbingly clear.
‘He was killed by the Marquis of Bethelgius.’
Rajin blinked and returned to the present, her eyes reflecting the current moment.
“After that, I simply told her to approach the Marquis if she wanted confirmation. While contemplating what to do next, I attended a tea party in Vermus and happened to meet the Madam. Upon seeing magic, I thought it was a good excuse to approach. My interest in magic was genuine, so it wasn’t difficult.”
“…Do you know anything more about the woman?”
“Her identity couldn’t be traced, but while speaking with her, I secretly took a strand of hair from her robe. She had blonde hair, though it seemed dyed, as the actual color was different.”
Rajin faintly grimaced.
“It was an ashy gray, like something that had been burned. It was an unusual color.”
“Ashy gray…”
“I searched the entire house after speaking with her, but there was no such music box. Iel and the servants claimed never to have seen it, so I’m unsure if it even exists.”
There’s no way such a music box exists. Kolabe’s lips twisted unconsciously.
“Seeing how the Marquis was wary of me, I became certain that something had happened between my father and the Marquis. From then on, I began to piece together the woman’s true objective. She wasn’t looking for the music box at all…”
“She was trying to get you to talk to the Marquis about it?”
“It’s a rough guess, but yes.”
A rough guess, but damnably accurate, Kolabe thought.
“Eliza” was the name of Annecy Bethelgius’s mother.
The woman’s behavior, comparing him to a bird in a broken cage and brazenly leaving behind the name “Mathel,” was undoubtedly meant to send a message to Annecy.
Was she trying to signal that she was in the capital, or mockingly indicate that she knew Bethelgius was tracking her whereabouts? Or did she have some other hidden agenda?
Kolabe wasn’t sure if there was a deeper motive, but if the goal was to provoke Bethelgius’s fury, it had been executed flawlessly.
Both the target and the message had been delivered.
Kolabe clenched his teeth tightly, recalling the cold, blue gleam in Annecy’s eyes that had flickered behind his smile.
If you’re going to die, die alone.
“If what I said was helpful, there’s something I’d like to ask in return.”
“Well, this isn’t really a give-and-take situation, but go ahead. It sounds like it’ll be predictable.”
“Is the Count of Eliom dead?”
As expected, a predictable question. Kolabe Perroto answered immediately.
“He’s dead.”
“…I see. So, he’s dead.”
Even after hearing the news of her father’s death, Rajin only murmured calmly.
Despite using the Count of Eliom as bait to lure out Bethelgius, her lack of visible emotion was suspicious, and Kolabe’s eyebrow twitched slightly in response.
“So, are you planning on revenge?”
“Of course not. You probably wouldn’t care, but the reason I took up the sword in the first place was to cut off my father’s head.”
“To… behead him?”
“He was the kind of man who could become filthier than anyone when it came to the weak.
While my mother was alive, he at least tried to act human, but after she passed, he behaved as if he was the master of the world.
To both Iel and me, he was nothing but a stinking piece of trash. After he vanished and went into hiding, we were more anxious about the possibility of his return than anything else.”
Even if it meant ending up in prison for killing her father, Rajin had taken up the sword to protect her family, abandoning her dream of mastering magic. Her talent leaned more toward wielding a blade, after all.
As her body and mind matured, her determination only solidified. She imagined beheading her father hundreds, no, thousands of times, preparing for the day her father might return.
Yet when the moment came, she wasn’t sure if she could truly go through with it.
Despite all her anxiety and efforts to harden her resolve, hearing that the Count of Eliom had died at someone else’s hand left her feeling empty, bitter, happy, and furious all at once.
It was a truly strange feeling.
“So, that’s why the Marquis said you were of no concern. What a sly fox.”
“Pardon?”
Just as Rajin was about to ask what Kolabe meant, the ground shook with a deafening roar.
Instinctively, both Rajin and Kolabe turned their gazes in the direction of the sound. A massive, two-headed boar was charging toward them, pounding the earth beneath its feet.
How strong a scent did Emily Renier use?
Frowning, Rajin placed her hand on the hilt of her sword. She couldn’t recall its exact name, but it was an upper-tier monster she had seen in a bestiary.
Even a skilled warrior would struggle to leave a scratch on its hide, and the creature could easily claim the lives of several people present.
Though they had raised their blade to her neck earlier, leaving them to die was not an option, especially as a knight. She couldn’t ignore it.
Rajin infused her sword with a bright blue mana and swung it. In a blur of motion, faster than the eye could track, her wrist flicked, and one of the boar’s heads was severed, tumbling to the ground.
But, no. It wasn’t just one.
“…What?”
Though Rajin had only cut one head, two fell. Confused, she tilted his head and made eye contact with Kolabe Perroto, who wore the same perplexed expression.
The moment their eyes met, they realized they were both thinking the same thing.
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