Chapter 113
Though they were certainly meeting for the first time as she said, the nursemaid couldn’t understand why those blue eyes felt so piercingly cold.
She unconsciously trembled slightly as chills ran down her spine, then jumped noticeably at the sound of a knock from behind.
—Clatter.
—Knock, knock.
As the knocking sound mingled with the clinking of medicine and refreshments on the tray, Sierre tried to speak, but his severely parched throat prevented his voice from coming out properly.
Immediately recognizing Sierre’s condition, Einar granted permission in his stead.
“Come in.”
Servants entered behind the nursemaid, who stood frozen like a pillar of salt.
They skillfully arranged the teapot and cups, bowed, and disappeared, leaving the four people alone in the room once more.
After moistening his throat with the lukewarm water Riina handed him, Sierre rolled his eyes around before speaking.
“Did you come because it’s time for my medicine?”
“Yes, Your Highness. However, since these two have arrived…”
Before the nursemaid could finish, Riina cut her off cleanly.
“Leave it here.”
Though her voice was calm, it somehow felt edged with a blade.
“Yes. I shall do so.”
Despite the chill creeping up the back of her neck, the nursemaid, having lived in the imperial palace for many years, very naturally picked up only the medicine and straightened her back, leaving the rest of the refreshments behind.
But she couldn’t take even one step.
“Leave the medicine behind.”
Riina spoke definitively, leaving the nursemaid no room to respond.
Under the pressure that seemed to bear down on her shoulders, the nursemaid lowered her eyes and pressed her lips tightly together as a frozen gaze descended upon her faded gray head.
Though she swallowed dryly, she couldn’t utter a word and had no choice but to leave.
The moment the hem of the nursemaid’s skirt disappeared through the doorway, Einar took hold of the medicine.
“Will you drink it?”
Despite being ill and naturally needing to take medicine, especially medicine brought by his closest nursemaid, when asked this seemingly obvious question, the light in Sierre’s eyes flickered before fading.
The child clutched at his blanket as if tearing it apart and said:
“You knew?”
“Knew what? That your nursemaid is killing you? That the tool is medicine?”
There might have been more that Sierre knew, but perhaps it wasn’t something he could speak aloud.
“That… yes.”
In response to his timid answer, Einar gently tapped the bridge of Sierre’s nose, careful not to hurt him.
“I have good intuition.”
It was an answer that both explained everything and nothing, but Sierre didn’t press further.
He merely shook his head with a face that mixed dejection and relief.
Riina, who had received the medicine from Einar’s hand, sniffed it, furrowed her brow, and pushed it aside.
“I’ll take care of this.”
Sierre pulled the medicine bowl toward himself and added hesitantly:
“Before that, I’ll take a little.”
“Mm.”
He filled the vial Riina had prepared with some of the medicine.
“We’ve got the medicine in hand now.”
An outside observer might wonder why they so blatantly demanded evidence from the culprit, but there was no need to go through a roundabout process of tracking the medicine out of concern the nursemaid might flee.
They had already confirmed that the nursemaid had no connections leading outside the imperial palace that would enable her escape.
So the assumption that she had no intention of hiding was almost a certainty.
Perhaps she had planned to follow Sierre in death.
Disgustingly so.
Was she planning to play the martyr, claiming there was no meaning to life after the death of the one she served?
No, how could ordinary people fathom the thoughts of such a person?
In contrast to Riina’s gaze, which held a blue blade of murderous intent, Sierre looked down at the bowl of sloshing medicine with eyes that seemed ready to burst into tears.
Suddenly, he bit his parched, fever-dried lips.
“Why… why would she do this?”
There was no one present who could answer the question that flowed out like a sigh.
But once unleashed, Sierre’s inner thoughts wouldn’t stop.
“If she had just smiled at me.”
One sentence.
“If she had just scolded me.”
One sentence.
The nursemaid he had followed like a mother.
“If only… if only.”
Sierre wasn’t crying. Unable to cry, he was smiling instead.
“If she had just loved me and stayed by my side.”
That would have been enough.
As the child’s sincere words flowed out like a dying flame, Riina, moved by their poignancy, slowly reached out her hand.
Sierre’s life had been too short.
Sierre had too little.
That’s why letting go of what he held must be unbearably difficult.
He was different from Riina, who had possessed more than most yet helplessly lost everything like sand slipping through her fingers due to misfortune.
But Riina, accustomed to loss to the point of mastery, embraced Sierre.
As she slowly stroked the back of the child who seemed so thin he might crumble, Riina whispered:
“I won’t tell you that you’ll be able to forget. I won’t say that time will heal it. And telling you to find someone else would be useless too.”
She didn’t offer the comfort that everyone wants to hear.
Having lost her mother at a young age, Riina still couldn’t forget her scent, and even after much time had passed, the loss and despair embedded in her heart remained unresolved, and she couldn’t find anyone to replace her.
Losing someone was like that.
Though this was a person who needed to be cut off, in the end, it was still a “loss.”
It would have been nice if it were as refreshing and satisfying as eliminating a villain or a pest, like in novels.
In reality, the time spent together and the heart given away couldn’t be returned, leaving only pain and bitterness.
Though Sierre had been holding his breath in Riina’s embrace for a while, he didn’t cry in the end.
“If you need time, I’ll give you more.”
Einar’s voice was so gentle as he softly caressed Sierre’s feverish cheek that Sierre somehow found himself smiling.
“It’s the first time I’ve seen you so affectionate, Brother.”
“Oh? I thought I’d been treating you quite well during our meetings.”
“It was no different from stroking a plant about to wither.”
At Sierre’s cutting yet smiling remark, Einar openly showed a troubled expression, and Riina narrowed her eyes at him.
Caught between a smiling face and a sidelong glare, Einar grinned and thoroughly mussed up Sierre’s hair.
“I’ll be affectionate from now on.”
“Ahhh, Brother!”
As Sierre fluttered like a paper doll under his touch but still burst into clear laughter, Riina couldn’t help but smile as well.
As the laughter subsided, a slow silence filled the room.
After smoothing his hair this way and that for a while, Sierre unconsciously spoke.
“Give me two days.”
Einar didn’t ask the child why.
Instead, he left him with different words:
“If you ever want to talk, I’ll always be there.”
Upon returning to the Bolshevik residence, Riina encountered yet another figure she always seemed to meet in unexpected places.
“Max? Why are you here?”
“Good evening.”
Max, who greeted her smoothly, was on his way out of the mansion as Riina was entering.
“I doubt you’re leaving because you grew tired of waiting for me.”
“If my lady were to summon me, I could wait forever without getting tired.”
As Max rubbed his palms together as if obviously flattering her, Riina motioned with her chin.
“Don’t change the subject. Who did you come to see?”
Though she asked, it was a question whose answer would come after just a few seconds of thought.
There were only two people in this ducal residence who could privately summon a merchant.
The Duke and the Duke’s heir.
Neither the servants, nor the knight guards, nor Jane the shadow could invite outsiders to the mansion without permission.
So if Riina hadn’t summoned Max, the person looking for him must be…
But it was hard to believe, so she asked.
“Don’t you know? The Duke of Bolshevik.”
After hearing the answer, it seemed even more unbelievable.
Father summoned someone like him?
“That look is rather hurtful.”
Max whined and wiped away nonexistent tears, but Riina mercilessly asked:
“Why?”
“There was a request to adjust the price of a deal, but…”
Max, who answered promptly, tilted his head with a broad smile.
“I can’t adjust a price that’s already been paid.”
“You’re still speaking in riddles that make no sense.”
“Well, isn’t that part of my charm?”
“Your charm must have frozen to death.”
Though they exchanged words like a game of banter, Riina’s nerves sharpened like the point of a well-honed needle.
Surely Father wouldn’t do anything to harm the Bolshevik family.
But considering the person he met…
No, is that even a person?
As Riina’s gaze grew increasingly sharp, Max hastily backed away.
“I’ve told you everything! Farewell then!”
Riina looked down at the empty space where Max had vanished like the wind before she could even open her mouth.
The price of a deal, he’d said.
Max and her father had made a deal.
It was hard to believe, but he wouldn’t have deceived her to her face.
Whatever his true identity might be, he had called himself a “merchant” now, so he wouldn’t lie before a Bolshevik.
Seeing how Max had fled like that, discovering the truth from him seemed unlikely.
Riina hesitated briefly, but due to Max’s extremely suspicious behavior, she finally made a decision.
“Sebastian.”
“Yes, my lady.”
“I need to see my father.”
