TCS 02

Chaper : 2. The Young Lady Has Vanished

The man stepped closer.

Stella took a few steps backward at his gaze, which felt intimidatingly huge due to his towering physique. Clamorous noise rippled through the crowd here and there at his appearance, but she had only one thought in her mind.

‘Quickly, I have to run away.’

It didn’t matter who was in front of her right now. Escaping from a presence that threatened her life was the most critical priority. Sure enough, the man before her approached with a razor-sharp glare, looking as if he had just ruthlessly severed the old man’s arm. Avoiding the gaze of the man in the blue uniform, Stella shuddered slightly.

‘Will he kill me too?’

She clenched her fists. The voice echoing inside her head warned that someone was threatening her. That someone could very well be this man. Naturally, she had no choice but to stay on guard.

‘No, I won’t die here.’

The more she backed away, the more a fishy, damp smell enveloped her body. Though terror blinded her and made her body tremble, she didn’t loosen her tension and kept looking for a chance to escape. As she became hyper-sensitive to every small sound, he spoke to her.

“Young Lady.”

“!?”

“Are you alright?”

A strangely warm, low voice. Would things have been different if he had approached and spoken to her softly from the start? Having almost been dragged away by the old man just moments ago, Stella’s vigilance was at its peak. She avoided his eyes and scanned her surroundings.

“……D-Don’t come any closer.”

“Ah, I see I’ve startled you.”

He wiped the blood from his face with his thumb.

“No matter how urgent the situation was, I shouldn’t have brandished my sword in front of you, Young Lady.”

With a single gesture from the man, not only the old man but also the people who had gathered around her vanished without a trace. Instead, several individuals dressed in uniforms similar to his were surrounding the area. A thought crossed her mind that in trying to avoid a fox, she might have crossed paths with a lion. Stella wrapped her arms around herself with both hands and asked:

“Are you going to kill me, too?”

“No.”

“Then why are you d-approaching me?”

Whether he felt something was amiss from her terribly frightened words and demeanor, he slightly furrowed his brow. At that look, her shoulders flinched. After remaining silent for a moment as if lost in thought, he showed her both of his hands to demonstrate he harbored no hostility.

“Do not be afraid. I have not the slightest intention of harming you, Young Lady. I simply came because it seemed you needed help. If you wish, I will not take another single step closer.”

Faced with an attitude completely different from the old man’s, Stella stared up at him fixedly. As his eyes met hers, he offered a gentle smile and introduced himself.

“I am Adrian of the House of Duke Castillo.”

“Castillo.”

The quietly uttered word felt familiar. It seemed that even if she had lost her memories, her acquired knowledge remained. As Stella sank into thought, Adrian added to his introduction as if to confirm something.

“Yes, a member of the Castillo family, one of the three Ducal families of the Empire.”

While remembering nothing, the approach of a kind man from a family whose name sounded familiar made her lower her guard slightly, yet…

“Do you know me?”

“Yes.”

“Then, why…?”

‘Are you trying to help me?’

She was still suspicious of his kindness. Not only did he brush off the fact that she was wandering around with memory loss as if it were nothing, but he also read right through her anxious emotions.

“I understand that this situation is confusing.”

Adrian took off his outer coat and draped it over Stella’s shoulders.

“Above all, wandering alone in a place like this, it is only natural that you wouldn’t trust anyone.”

The shoulders touched by the stranger’s hands grew scalding hot, and her heart began to beat wildly. She felt she could understand why people said handsome men were dangerous. Her runaway heartbeat made it terribly difficult to breathe. She clutched the coat tightly and stared into his glowing red eyes.

At that moment, another knight approached.

“It will soon be dawn, my— Apologies.”

At the sudden intrusion of his subordinate, the man’s red eyes flickered with annoyance. Startled by this, the subordinate took three steps back. Stella turned her head instead of Adrian to gauge the surrounding atmosphere. Though the guards were holding off the perimeter, as the day grew brighter, more people were beginning to gather than before.

Scanning the area, he made an unexpected proposal.

“Would you like to come with me?”

“To the Duke’s residence?”

“Yes. Do you have anywhere else to stay?”

Touching the hem of Adrian’s coat, she shook her head. With no memories whatsoever, there was no way she had a place to stay. Even the final voice telling her to run away hadn’t specified where to run. Stella shook her head bitterly.

“I’m not sure.”

“I see.”

He added carefully:

“You may stay at the Castillo residence, and if you wish, I can arrange a separate place for you to stay later.”

Unlike the old man, Adrian helped her so that she could make her own choice.

‘Can I trust this man? What if he’s a bad person like the old man from earlier? But…’

Stella lowered her head and looked at her own state. Dressed in a thin white nightgown, her ruined feet were bare without proper shoes. Gathering her toes together, she squeezed her eyes shut.

‘How long can I keep running away in a state like this? My memories are hazy, but the Castillo family is a power second to none in the Empire…’

Stella pressed down on her chest.

‘If he wanted to kill me, he would have killed me right here. He wouldn’t be persuading me like this.’

Even though it was a choice that required no deliberation, the reason she hesitated was that the red eyes she met felt strangely familiar, as if she had seen them somewhere before.

‘Still, those eyes look familiar…’

While she glanced at Adrian and deliberated, a shop door in the plaza opened with a creak. Surprised by the loud noise, Stella stepped closer to his side.

“Yaaawn.”

What caught their eyes was a child. The child who stepped outside patted their mouth. The child’s mother, who followed behind, panicked upon seeing Adrian and offered an awkward excuse.

“Oh dear, the child doesn’t sleep much and is being troublesome like this. We didn’t see anything!”

The woman picked up the child and went back into the shop. Flustered, Stella opened her eyes wide. He turned his head toward her.

“Young Lady.”

“Yes?”

“You are too close.”

She blinked her eyes. Realizing belatedly that she was holding onto his lapel, she hurriedly pulled away and offered an excuse.

“Actually, I’ve lost my memory, and everything feels so unfamiliar. That’s why I accidentally…”

“Have you lost your memory?”

Meeting his slightly lowered red eyes, her breathing grew so ragged that she didn’t know how to look him in the face. Stella hurriedly bowed her head.

“Yes, so I committed a mistake.”

“It is alright.”

His voice remained steady. Calmed by his composed demeanor, Stella turned her head elsewhere and thought:

‘He said he knows me, so it’s only natural those eyes look familiar. I was worrying over nothing.’

In an instant, the number of eyes around them grew. The murmuring voices in the street gradually became louder. Realizing there was very little she could do, she clutched the thin garment.

“M-May I rely on your hospitality for a short while?”

“I shall escort you personally.”

His voice echoed ticklishly near her ear. Stella nodded naturally. Her heart kept beating uncontrollably on its own. She couldn’t tell whether it was due to tension from the unfamiliar environment, or because his scent was subtly drifting toward her.

A moment later, a knight standing behind him approached them leading a white horse. Adrian smiled as he stroked the horse’s back, then held out his hand to her.

“Shall we ride together?”

“The two of us?”

“Yes. Or do you know how to ride a horse?”

Shaking her head lightly, she took his hand. The warm body heat felt from his large hand pushed away the chilly morning air.

“Everyone, disperse. And as for you, inform Liam that everything here has been cleared up.”

‘What is he telling them to report?’

At words she couldn’t understand, Stella turned her head toward Adrian. She then saw that his gaze was directed at the surrounding people.

‘Ah, he means the commotion in the plaza has been wrapped up.’

Once the street’s gaze, which seemed unlikely to curb its curiosity, vanished all at once, he placed her slender arms around his waist and spoke.

“Hold on to me tightly.”

“……”

Stella hesitated. At that, he offered a smile once more.

“It would be troublesome if you were to fall off the horse, wouldn’t it?”

As Stella nodded shyly and tightly grasped Adrian’s coat lapels, he pulled the reins with refined skill and set off.

As soon as they left, the plaza returned to a peaceful daily routine as if nothing had happened. Among the busy people, only the red bloodstains remained to signal that there had been a disturbance this morning. Even those were quickly washed away as the child’s mother splashed water over them.

The child tilted their head, finding it strange.

“Mom, where did the lady and gentleman go?”

“Shh!”

The woman covered the child’s mouth. At that, the child blinked their clear eyes, showing curiosity. Picking up the child, the woman warned in a stern voice:

“Child, we didn’t see a single thing.”

Though the child innocently asked ‘Why?’, the woman merely repeated the same words over and over again.

“The Young Lady has vanished.”

Stella, the cherished only daughter of the House of Bronte, was gone.

Leaving behind only a single sword engraved with the family crest on the bed, her disappearance threw the Marquis’s estate into total chaos from early morning. Having entertained an unwelcome guest overnight, Marquis Bronte, who hadn’t even realized Stella was missing, expressed his rage upon seeing the empty room.

“Where on earth did that child go?!”

“I… I do not know.”

“You call that an answer right now?!”

Marquis Bronte’s eyes turned fierce. At that, one of the maids who attended to—or more accurately, monitored—Stella spoke up.

“It seems… I might have seen someone entering and leaving the Young Lady’s room, but…”

As the frightened maid’s voice trailed off, Marquis Bronte’s anger reached its absolute boiling point. Grabbing the head maid—who failed to properly understand her duties—by the collar, he vented his fury.

“Why didn’t you report it?!”

“T-There was a guest last night, so we had no presence of mind to check on the Young Lady. We were short-handed…”

A guest. Hearing that word, Marquis Bronte collapsed onto the sofa and ground his teeth together fiercely.

“Adrian de Castillo.”

He had an uneasy feeling the moment that man paid a visit! Ultimately, things had erupted like this. Contorting his face savagely, he muttered:

“That damned bastard!”

“……”

“I knew something was suspicious when he brought his knights along. It undoubtedly has to do with him.”

Unable to contain his rage, Marquis Bronte began to gasp heavily for air. If Asher, Marquis Bronte’s son, hadn’t appeared to calm him down, he might have lost consciousness and collapsed right then and there.

“Father, please calm down.”

“Asher.”

Marquis Bronte turned around.

“I will look into Stella’s whereabouts.”

In the House of Marquis Bronte, which had two sons and one daughter, Asher was always a trustworthy son. Unlike the second son, Matthew, who wandered around aimlessly on the outside, he carried out every task reliably. That was why he commanded even more trust. At Asher’s words, Marquis Bronte’s rough breathing gradually settled.

“Find out quickly.”

“Yes.”

“You must not make a mistake this time.”

At those words, a bitter smile settled on the corners of Asher’s lips.

‘What can even be defined as a mistake?’

The disastrous fire that had occurred at the Marquis’s estate altered the destiny of Stella, a child born noble enough to become an imperial woman. Far beyond pushing her out of the position of Empress, it had even threatened her very life.

‘Whoever it was, they prepared it meticulously. To call this situation a mere mistake…’

Asher clicked his tongue and scanned Stella’s room thoroughly. Just then, a crumpled piece of white paper rolling on the floor caught his eye. He picked it up.

‘For honor’s sake?’

The words written on the paper were extremely simple. The problem, however, was that the handwriting belonged to Asher himself.

What if Stella saw this and misunderstood? He couldn’t help but think so. Because the House of Bronte and he himself had provided ample grounds for her to harbor such misunderstandings.

Blue veins bulged on his hand.

‘Damn it!’