Chapter 42
Chapter 42. The Touching Scars (2)
Sionne’s face twisted as he looked at his sleeping sister. In front of her constant chatter he could pretend to be strong, but alone in the dark, fear crept in.
“Mother…”
Deep in the forest, no sound of people reached him. Only the sound of the wind cutting through the trees could be heard.
It felt like something might leap out from the darkness at any moment. Yet he couldn’t take his eyes off the dark.
That fearful staring contest continued until Sionne fell asleep.
The next morning, Sionne woke after tossing and turning at the base of the tree.
“Mother?”
He rubbed his eyes and searched, but no answer came. Only after he was fully awake did the memory of the night before return.
He realized he had to go look for her. He couldn’t just wait any longer.
“El, now we—”
The moment he turned to the side, his body froze. Ariel was no longer there.
“Ariel!”
Sionne leapt out of the tree hollow, shouting her name. But no matter how he searched near the tree, there wasn’t a single strand of her hair to be found.
He ran straight to the house.
Please, let Ariel have found Mother. Let them both be at home.
Despite the rising panic, the boy wept loudly as he clung to that last hope.
Sionne arrived at the house and called out for his family.
“Mother! El!”
During the night, the house had been wrecked.
The fence was broken, the door smashed as if something had rammed into it. He pushed past the shaky door and entered.
Everything inside was scattered across the floor. More than once, Sionne tripped over the mess.
But he didn’t care, he kept searching for his mother and Ariel.
“Mother… El…”
Yet there was no trace of them left.
Shallow hope turned into deep despair, and that day Sionne cried until he collapsed.
“So… what happened then?”
When Sionne’s story stopped, Rosalyn asked. Focusing on the calm voice of the man did help to steady her emotions.
Maybe it was avoidance. No, it was definitely avoidance.
But concentrating on the fear and sorrow that seven-year-old Sionne must have felt helped her forget about Nadan for a moment.
“For a few months… I wandered through the market streets. I asked everyone I met about Ariel, but no one had seen her.”
Sionne furrowed his brows. The memories of hunger and hardship were still vivid.
At that time he drifted about the streets, but he couldn’t join the other children there. Too young and lacking skill, he was dismissed as a fool and cast aside.
Of course, he did have the valuables his mother had packed for him.
“Show the bundle only to adults you can truly trust, like your mother. Don’t give it to anyone else. Understand, Sion?”
He had to follow his mother’s last instruction.
And besides, little Sionne didn’t even know how to use the valuables properly.
“Then one day… I saw Ariel. She was holding someone’s hand.”
Black hair. A small frame. Those light-blue eyes that shone so brightly.
“El! It’s me, El!”
He called to her with joy, but the girl never once looked back.
She only smiled at the old woman whose hand she held.
“Ariel!”
Clutching his empty stomach, he ran with all his strength. His vision spun from hunger and exhaustion, but he pushed himself harder to grab the girl’s shoulder. Startled, she turned around.
“Where were you… El. Do you know how long, how desperately I’ve searched!”
Sionne hugged the girl tightly and wept. Relief spilled out of him at the thought that he had found his sister.
“Boy, I don’t know who this El is, but this child isn’t her.”
A voice and gentle hand stopped him. For all that it restrained him, the tone was soft and kind.
“Waaahhh…”
The girl in his arms burst into tears.
“Anna, it’s alright. This boy must be mistaken.”
The child cried, and the old woman soothed her.
“Now let go of my granddaughter.”
The old woman spoke a little more firmly, trying to pull his hand away.
But Sionne had no time to think about what was really happening.
His body, unfed and now sobbing, was spent. The world spun as he clung even tighter to the girl.
“Boy, boy! Oh dear, what do I do with you…”
And like that, Sionne collapsed, still holding the girl in his arms.
* * *
The young Sionne awoke in a small hut.
It was narrow and old, but traces of human warmth could be felt throughout.
“You’re awake? I’ll bring you some soup, so eat before you go.”
The old woman, Merilyn, spoke kindly to Sionne, who was sitting up and glancing around. Her words were no lie—rich aromas filled the entire hut.
At the smell of food, Sionne’s stomach rumbled violently.
“El…!”
But food was the least of his concerns. Fear surged that he might have lost Ariel again, right after finding her.
“Me? But I’m not El…”
Anna, who had been watching him from beside the bed, tilted her head as she pointed to herself.
“Ah…”
Freckles dotted her face. One of her front teeth was missing.
And most of all—her eyes were brown.
The child before him was not Ariel.
“Hhhhuuuuhh!”
Sionne couldn’t help but cry on the spot.
The guilt of failing his mother’s last request to protect El. The sorrow of losing his sister forever.
He was far too young to bear it all.
“Why are you… crying? Hhhk, waaahhh!”
Watching him cry, Anna soon burst into tears as well. Hearing the children’s cries, Merilyn hurried back into the room.
“Oh, heavens…”
Setting the soup down on the table beside the bed, Merilyn soothed them both. With one hand she patted Anna, with the other she gently stroked Sionne’s back.
“If you keep crying like this, you’ll collapse again. Eat something first, then you can cry more, alright?”
Merilyn’s heart ached for the boy.
In Feitan, famine had raged for years, and the number of street children had grown drastically. Some had lost their parents, others had been abandoned.
She assumed Sionne was one of them.
“Poor child. Come by whenever you’re hungry. I’ll give you something, even if just a little.”
She spoke as Sionne quieted down and began to eat the soup. The way he shoved his face into the bowl, devouring it desperately, was pitiful to watch.
For the first time since losing his mother, he felt such warmth. Halfway through eating, tears welled in his eyes again.
It wasn’t a physical hunger being satisfied, but a spiritual one—and that made the tears flow endlessly.
From that day on, Sionne lingered around Merilyn and Anna’s home. At the time, he didn’t know why he stayed so close.
But looking back as an adult, he realized he wanted to see Merilyn’s gentle smile that reminded him of his mother. Or perhaps it was Anna, who looked so much like Ariel.
As the days passed, Sionne visited Merilyn’s house more and more, until eventually, they became his other family.
* * *
“And so I ended up living with Merilyn and Anna,” Sionne recalled.
“Then… you never saw your mother or sister again?” Rosalyn asked hesitantly.
“Did you try searching once you became a prince?”
She wished this story would have a happy ending. Of course, she knew all too well that such things rarely happened in reality.
“After I became a prince, I did look into the records of that day. It’s certain my mother was executed then.”
Sionne had to take a deep breath before continuing. From this point on, he was stepping into the true depths of his pain.
Facing it was terrifying. It was darkness itself—waiting with its jaws open, ready to swallow him whole.
“But my sister…”
“…”
“She did not die that day. When I was twenty years old, I was able to meet El again.”
“!”
Rosalyn lifted her face from his shoulder and looked at him. She didn’t say a word, but her gaze urged him to go on.
‘This is what unsettles me…’
Sionne was confused.
Where was the woman who had been indifferent to others’ pain?
The woman before him now, though subtle, could empathize and understand.
She seemed… like an ordinary person. Not the “Red Witch,” not the “Hero of War.”
“I’m glad you found her, then.”
When Sionne remained silent, Rosalyn offered her own thoughts instead.
‘But… was there ever mention of the prince having two younger sisters?’
Rosalyn tried to recall the reports she had read before. Was it missing from the report, or from her memory? She couldn’t tell.
“…Yes. At least I was able to see her one last time, and for that I am grateful.”
But for someone claiming to be grateful, his voice was heavy with regret.
