IDIBC Chapter 64

Summer Hunt (2)

“Whether you experienced any difficulty because of my letter, whether the yellow roses I sent as an apology seemed spiteful, or whether you simply found my letter itself unpleasant.”

Walter seemed somehow a bit excited. Whether it was pleasant anticipation for the hunt we were about to undertake, or some other negative emotion, I couldn’t tell, but I took a step back from him.

“Young Duke Chaplin.”

“Please speak.”

“But why did you send me a letter? Did you have something you needed to tell me in secret?”

Walter’s jewel-like eyes gleamed with light.

“It wasn’t that. I simply… wanted to formally apologize for the rudeness I committed by misunderstanding you.”

“A formal apology, using the format of asking a friend rather than sending a formal letter?”

He stared at me silently for a moment.

“That’s correct. However, that was…”

I know there was no other way. I also know that Ricardo had been unusually sharp with him.

That must have been the only way to deliver a letter without informing the Rochester family that there was any connection between Walter and me.

“I fully understand what intention you had in sending me that letter, Young Duke. I’m grateful to some extent. But I am the fiancée of Young Duke Rochester.”

“…”

“Of course, that’s a fact both you and I know well, Young Duke Chaplin. What this engagement… means. But, no, rather because of that…”

I paused and swallowed dryly. There was no reason to be this sensitive.

That day on the balcony, I had felt as if I’d been stripped bare before him. Yet through our conversation under the moonlight, a kind of camaraderie resembling friendship had formed between us.

His desire to convey a sincere apology wasn’t a great wrong. And yet my heart kept growing prickly.

So this is how terrifying an inferiority complex can be. Though my thoughts reached that point, my words didn’t stop.

“Please treat me with proper courtesy. If you don’t have something to tell me in secret, sending such letters is not right. I don’t want to do anything that might cause misunderstanding with others.”

“…”

“I’ll take my leave now and return to where my fiancé is.”

I politely bid farewell and tried to turn away from him.

“What if I did have something I needed to tell you?”

My steps halted abruptly at his voice, far more agitated and urgent than usual.

“Yes, as you said, in secret—that’s right. I don’t want to use such an expression, but what if I had something I needed to tell you in secret?”

At his rather loud voice, I unconsciously looked around and locked eyes with Ricardo in the distance, mounted on his black horse. He began approaching us slowly.

With his gaze fixed on Walter and me.

I turned from Ricardo to face Walter again. When our eyes met, I saw him let out a great sigh of relief.

Walter too seemed aware that Ricardo was approaching, but he didn’t shift his upright gaze from me even slightly. Rather, as if the one committing a shameful act was not him but Ricardo.

“What on earth do you mean by that?”

“Though it’s difficult to speak at length now, I’ll say just this one thing.”

“Please speak.”

“The reason I wish to meet with you separately, my lady, is related to the safety of you and your family.”

“…”

“So I will send you another letter, even if I must use the format of asking a friend again. To arrange a place and time to meet.”

“Is this something my fiancé shouldn’t know about? If so, I don’t want to hear it.”

“…Well. But I can tell you that it’s a matter worth hearing even at the risk of being misunderstood by others.”

I tried to refuse. After all, I had just been asserting my pride. But given my current position, I couldn’t keep insisting on pride, so my eyes wavered involuntarily.

The man with turquoise eyes before me seemed to perceive this change in my emotions with uncanny accuracy. The gaze that had been wavering as if watching a waterfowl about to take flight was now as relaxed as one watching captured prey.

“Then I’ll send a letter and wait.”

Seeing Walter’s gaze shift from me to elsewhere, I followed his eyes. My fiancé on his black horse slowly approached and extended his hand.

“Let’s go.”

Without adding a word, I took Ricardo’s hand. In an instant, as soon as my feet left the ground, I was seated in front of him.

On the saddle of a horse much taller than the one I’d been riding, I had to feel a moment of dizzying sensation.

“Walter, it seems my previous warning didn’t have much effect.”

Goosebumps rose on the back of my neck at Ricardo’s low voice behind me.

“I was merely greeting Lady Fennel.”

A lie. Ricardo would know better than anyone that Walter wasn’t telling the truth right now. Yet Walter showed no sign of hesitation.

“Well then, I hope you have an uneventful day.”

Walter nodded lightly and then briefly looked at me. Even that short moment was filled with such awkward tension between us that it was unbearable. I had a premonition that today wouldn’t go smoothly.

****

Ricardo rode the horse without a word. When a loud horn sounded in the distance announcing the start of the hunt, fierce dogs rushed past our horse toward the rough forest.

Ricardo turned the horse’s head in the opposite direction from where the dogs had run. The heavy sound of hoofbeats on the sporadically wet path—as if it had rained while we weren’t aware—grew more and more distant.

A whistle from a man who had found prey rang out, and the bustling commotion soon moved further away before completely disappearing from us.

The forest was peaceful, but the turmoil stirring in my heart didn’t subside. Enough to find comfort in the fact that he was sitting behind me.

Ricardo’s demeanor and the horse’s movements were utterly calm. We walked the forest path in silence for quite a while.

‘What on earth does Walter want to say?’

Though they didn’t show friendly faces toward each other, Rochester and Chaplin had a peaceful history. Even if it couldn’t be called an alliance, their responses were aligned when national crises struck.

For instance, when war broke out, or when the emperor’s tyranny reached the heavens.

But Walter’s attitude today differed from the trajectory between the two families that I’d known.

What reason could there possibly be for him, praised as a gentleman sent from heaven, to secretly request a meeting with the Rochester heir’s fiancée?

Just then, Ricardo suddenly stopped the horse, and the thoughts whirling in my head halted for a moment. Only then did I realize he hadn’t asked me anything all this time.

The real Ricardo should have subtly asked what we had talked about. While raising the corners of his mouth with a leisurely smile.

“Let’s head back.”

Ah, he’s angry. Only upon hearing Ricardo’s suppressed voice did I realize he was truly angry, unlike before.

So angry he couldn’t even ask what I had discussed with Walter.

The place where Walter and I had been standing was open. Since we were already acquainted, if we had merely exchanged greetings in a public place, Ricardo would have no reason to be upset.

So the reason he was this angry was clear. Ricardo had noticed. In that brief moment our eyes met, the noisy confusion that had risen in my eyes.

I couldn’t answer a question he hadn’t asked, but even if he did ask, I had no answer to give.

Should I tell him that the young lord of the House of Chaplin would secretly send me a letter requesting a meeting?

Though I was certain I would confess everything down to the last detail if he looked me in the eye and asked, for some reason he wouldn’t look at me.

It was around the time when the silence between us was beginning to grow increasingly uncomfortable.

That’s when prey chased by hunting dogs appeared before us.

“Ahhhhhhh!”

I screamed in terror at the sight of a massive beast I’d never seen before in my life. Hunting dogs that had appeared from nowhere surrounded us, barking fiercely.

‘A bear. It’s a bear.’

When the bear, highly agitated from people’s attacks, threatened us by swinging its paws, the horse carrying Ricardo and me reared up on its front legs. Ricardo, who had dismounted like the wind, gripped the reins tightly to calm the horse.

They said we’d be hunting badgers or rabbits today.

Like a barely clinging leaf flying off in the winter wind, when I flew off the horse, Ricardo stretched out his arms and caught me firmly. The enraged bear scratched the horse somewhere and charged straight at us.

The moment I thought such a large beast could be this fast, Ricardo, who had drawn his sword, severed the bear’s neck in one strike.

Fresh red blood splattered across his pale face. The massive bear stopped in place with its arms raised, unable to make a sound.

At the same time, the scene from the terrible dream I’d been having since early childhood unfolded before my eyes.

Ricardo swinging his sword again and again at something, his empty eyes. Unidentifiable lives falling before him.

The moment he raised his sword toward the bear again, I wrapped my arms around his neck and clung to him.