IDIBC Chapter 10

7 Years Later

I foolishly stretched out both arms toward him who didn’t know me, waving them long. Adding words of farewell that he couldn’t hear.

“Farewell, Ricardo.”

Ricardo, who had been staring blankly for a moment, slowly turned his head away from me.

The carriage ran smoothly along the wide road without obstruction. The massive carriage that had been chasing the setting sun disappeared like a dot. Somehow, sorrow rose up to my throat.

Still, farewell, Ricardo Gardarelli Rochester.

Even if you don’t remember me, just be happy always.

Because my love for him surged more than my sorrow, I was able to keep wishing for his wellbeing while seeing him off.

The child of the winter palace whom I had risked my life to protect had finally flown away into the vast and distant world where he belonged.

He goes. Leaving me behind like that.

The child abandoned by the oracle, the child who fled from the oracle’s fate, but who was inevitably swept up in that destiny’s whirlpool—that incredibly strong child.

Without looking back even once.

****

Seven years later, on the outskirts of Resotia’s capital.

As I approached the chicken coop, the distinctive smell stung my nose. I carefully entered the coop so the chickens wouldn’t escape outside.

“I just can’t get used to this smell.”

Flutter, flutter. Whether hens or roosters, they all flew around the coop noisily, probably thinking I’d come to steal their eggs.

“Today they laid eggs right on schedule. Well done.”

Collecting eggs from the chicken coop in the backyard was always a pleasant task. Especially on days like today when I could take out eggs that were beautifully shaped and large, it felt more rewarding.

Seven years ago, after Ricardo left for the duchy, Count Fennel’s family eventually fell to ruin. By order of the Dermeier Empire’s emperor.

The Dermeier Emperor declared, just as in my memory, that Count Fennel had kidnapped and imprisoned Ricardo, the heir of the Rochester family.

Because of this, Count Fennel and his eldest son Justin were hanged on the gallows, but the remaining family members barely saved their lives and fled, moving to the two-story house where we now live.

Later, when the fact that we had survived became known to the duchy, the king of the duchy didn’t bother to hunt us down and kill us. Though our title was stripped, he let us maintain our noble status.

It was true that we had committed a crime tantamount to treason, but this was because Dermeier was not our homeland.

At first, we had to manage the household without a single servant. But starting two years ago, my mother’s family sent us three male servants and two maids. Though we now had help, I didn’t neglect the housework.

One of the maids had to be dedicated entirely to Lady Fennel, and the other was already overwhelmed just with cleaning. The old house required a lot of maintenance, and we needed plenty of firewood to keep it warm. So the servants were just as busy.

Time flowed without stopping. And so the world forgot about Fennel.

I thought that was very fortunate.

Like the egg gently held in my hand, my world today was warm and peaceful.

“Today I should make Jonathan’s favorite egg dish.”

When I came toward the front gate of the house with the eggs, I heard an unusual noise.

Tilting my head and looking in the direction of the sound, I saw a procession of massive carriages approaching from far away.

A carriage drawn by four black horses ran unobstructed along the single road. Two twin carriages and horses carrying knights followed in orderly formation behind them.

At first, I doubted my eyes and ears. That was because there was no reason for such a luxurious carriage to come all the way to this house on the outskirts of the capital, even having to travel a long way through the forest.

But it wasn’t just carriages approaching. There appeared to be more than thirty riders on military horses following the carriages. Black carriages and black horses, men approaching in a dark mass. An ominous premonition somehow surrounded my entire body.

However, in some part of my heart that was so deep I myself didn’t know it well, perhaps some kind of longing arose. Seeing the threatening lion emblem of the carriage that had stopped, raising pale dust, creating massive ripples in my heart.

The man who stepped out of the carriage after a servant opened the door stood still for a moment, silhouetted against the sunlight.

The black-haired man who looked around moved leisurely and relaxed like the lion carved on the emblem.

Then he seemed to pause his actions for a moment before immediately moving his body. Like a predator that had set its target, as they usually do.

“Ah…”

Step by step, there wasn’t a trace of recognition in the eyes of the man walking toward me with the sunlight behind him. But he approached me without hesitation.

“Just as you were.”

It was after everything had ended. After everything was completely over, you smile like that.

So terribly relaxed and distant.

“It is you.”

When he came one step closer and met my eyes, I felt it completely.

When his childhood changed, his future changed. When the painful moments of his hard life changed, his very nature became a completely different person.

But suddenly, the pupils of the eyes I met turned a yellowish color. It was a subtle change that couldn’t be detected unless you were standing close face to face.

‘Ah, this was it.’

The price that the awakened heir of Rochester had to pay for using his abilities was to reveal his own emotions instead of reading others’ emotions.

‘If it’s yellow… do you find this situation amusing?’

But before I could properly understand his emotions, the center of his black pupils immediately took on a grayish tint.

“Do you… remember me?”

At the words I spoke without realizing it, Ricardo furrowed his brow.

“Is that a soliloquy?”

Even his slight smile overflowed with his distinctive presence and sharp atmosphere.

If I hadn’t remembered his childhood, my legs would have given out and I would have collapsed.

“Or… did your thoughts just break through your mouth?”

If I had to answer, the latter was correct. As a member of a fallen noble family, I couldn’t ask questions of a ducal heir without permission.

‘But what is this familiarity?’

Ah… it’s twisted.

Realization struck the back of my head. He hadn’t changed at all. Ricardo hadn’t changed; he had simply learned to hide his true feelings beneath a very sophisticated exterior.

But why? Wasn’t it supposed to not hurt anymore?

I hadn’t changed at all either. When our eyes met, my heart—mine yet not mine—began to race endlessly, not knowing how high the sky was.

Realizing my situation at once, I bowed my head deeply.

Under my downcast eyes, his polished shoe tip twitched slightly. At the same time, my chin was caught under a warm hand.

“Don’t avoid my eyes.”

“…”

“It’s annoying.”

“You’re… annoyed.”

While meeting his eyes directly, I managed to smile with the most humble expression possible, relying on any trace of goodwill in his eyes.

“People who look at me have only two emotions in their eyes.”

I had heard Ricardo say this even as a child. So I already knew the answer. But could it possibly be the same answer as back then?

“Fear, or desire.”

Ah, his life hadn’t changed at all. He wouldn’t have felt even a lukewarm warmth. My brow furrowed involuntarily at the inexplicable rising emotion.

“But what about you?”

Why? What kind of eyes am I showing?

“Do you… pity me?”

“Ah…”

“Well, it doesn’t matter. I’ll go meet your mother and come back, so wait for now. I’d be grateful if you could prepare some tea as well.”

When no answer came from me, Ricardo prompted softly, “Hmm?”

When I nodded, he turned away without lingering. I gazed at him walking toward the group of people with measured steps. It was hard to open my eyes properly because of the sunlight breaking over his shoulders.

****

I couldn’t say my life was completely comfortable after Ricardo left. But after he returned to the empire, the strange incidents surrounding me no longer occurred.

The voice like a thin moan, and the visions that dizzily filled my sight—whether they were past or distant future, I couldn’t tell—no longer tormented me.

Yesterday, Ricardo, who had appeared suddenly and declared he would take me to the empire, came to our house at dawn the next day as promised.

I insisted that I would go along obediently if he would just tell me the reason for taking me, but he dismissed my opinion, saying I would find out when I got to the duchy.

Because Ricardo had barged in at dawn with no patience, I couldn’t even finish breakfast properly with my family before boarding the carriage with him.

Until the hot sun beat down at midday, it was cold enough to make my teeth chatter. Somehow my heart was trembling too.

I could feel Ricardo staring at me, but I stubbornly avoided looking at him. After riding for a while, dawn was beginning to break.

The two of us didn’t speak for quite a long time after getting in the carriage. No matter how accustomed I was to my life being turned upside down overnight, I couldn’t feel good about this situation.

Ricardo was the first to break the silence.

“Quite touching.”

“Pardon?”

“Even though you’re not full blood relations.”

This was probably about me and my family that he had learned from documents. To him, I would be recorded as the illegitimate child of the fallen Count Fennel family.

“After living together for a long time, we became family. Same with our chickens.”

“Family…”

Thinking of Sabrina and Jonathan, who had been holding one of my hands each just moments before, my chest tightened painfully. As I had told him, the name “family” hadn’t suited us from the beginning.

It had been a long time. Clinging to each other through storms.

Jonathan’s face, probably crying tears right now, flickered before my eyes. After he had firmly grasped the hand I offered in front of the Countess’s room, Jonathan had followed me like a baby duck. That was still the same now at fifteen years old.

As soon as I let out a long sigh thinking of Jonathan, Ricardo’s sharp voice filled the carriage.

“Until now, the fact that I had no memories didn’t bother me at all…”

“….”