Chapter~10
“I’m fine. What about you, Dana? Does anything hurt? You must have been very scared.”
When Ria, her face clearly showing exhaustion, gently caressed Diana’s cheek, Diana rubbed her cheek against her hand like a kitten.
The people of the ducal household watching the scene were all so surprised that they momentarily forgot how serious the situation was.
‘The young lady, who is usually so particular, is being this docile!’
Only Ria, unaware of the reason for their reaction, tilted her head in confusion before her eyes met Duke Ellard’s expressionless gaze.
Then the duke spoke in an unexpectedly gentle voice.
“Diana, come here now.
We have to go home.”
At those words, Diana bounced excitedly, and the duke picked her up with one arm.
“I was going to scold you, but it seems you stayed brave without crying, so I’ll let you off just this once.
But you’ll listen to me from now on, won’t you?”
“Hmm.”
Diana rolled her eyes from side to side, pretending not to hear him.
Then she smiled brightly as though trying to charm him.
Even with oily hair and a face covered in grime, she looked adorable.
“You’ll look like a crow, young lady.
No one will recognize you.”
Although the duke had recognized his daughter at a glance, he deliberately teased her, and the watching knights joined in with their own comments.
“Indeed, Your Grace.”
“If she goes home looking like this, I imagine Her Grace and the young masters will be quite surprised as well.”
Young Diana did not even realize they were teasing her and puffed out her cheeks.
The sight was so cute that the duke gently pinched and shook the tip of Diana’s nose with a laugh.
The knights also smiled warmly.
It felt as though all the exhaustion from their desperate efforts to find the young lady had vanished in an instant.
Ria stared blankly at them from the side before her eyes met the duke’s once again.
Her heart sank for no reason.
It was like a child who had been caught doing something wrong.
When she saw the duke’s impassive gaze, completely different from the tenderness he had shown Diana, as though he were looking at an inanimate object, she somehow felt as if he had seen through her hidden intentions.
Fortunately, instead of saying anything else, the duke turned his attention back to Diana.
“If we go straight home like this, you’ll be teased about it for the rest of your life, and I can’t have you resenting me later.
We should stop at an inn on the way back.
Prepare the carriage for now.”
It was truly time for Ria to part from Diana.
She had known this moment would come, yet she could not help feeling a little sad, so Ria lowered her gaze.
Then it happened.
“Daddy, what about Sis?”
“……If you want, it would be fine for her to come with us.”
At those words, Ria abruptly raised her head and looked around in bewilderment.
The duke narrowed his eyes as he watched her before speaking.
“If you’re worried about that child you were looking for earlier, you don’t need to be.
Once he regains consciousness, he will be sent to the same orphanage as the other children.”
Ria realized her mistake.
“Would you like to come with us?”
“Not me.
Jack has to come with us!”
“Hmm?”
“Jack was hurt because he tried to save Dana.”
“……”
The duke’s expression did not change at all, and Ria grew anxious.
In her previous life, when Duke Ellard saw Jack, who had been rescued after being locked in the attic with Diana, he had taken him to the ducal household without a second thought.
So Ria had assumed that if she told him Jack had thrown himself into danger to save Diana, he would accept him this time as well.
Then the duke spoke again.
“Very well.
We’ll talk to the boy after he wakes up.
But don’t you want to come with us?”
“I, I……”
When Ria hesitated, unable to figure out what to say, the adults around them looked at her with pity, as though she were still too young to understand the ways of the world.
But Ria knew as well.
There was no question that following Duke Ellard was a better choice than staying at the orphanage.
‘Normally, with my status, I couldn’t even enter an ordinary noble household.
But if I could be employed by the Ellard ducal household…….’
It was an opportunity far too precious for a worthless orphan.
Yet Ria still could not bring herself to readily say that she would go.
She had only vaguely thought about leaving together with the orphanage children and had never even considered the possibility of following Duke Ellard.
“Sis, you not going with me?”
At that moment, Diana looked at Ria with an expression like an abandoned puppy.
Seeing how she looked ready to burst into tears at any moment, tension spread among those around them.
Ria kept her mouth tightly shut, unsure what to do, before finally nodding.
‘First, I’ll calm Diana down and make sure Jack’s place is properly restored to what it was.
I’ll think about my own situation afterward.’
—
While Duke Ellard gave instructions concerning the orphanage’s disposition, I waited for the carriage with Diana in one corner of the orphanage yard.
I had just wolfed down the bread and soup the knights had handed out, so sleepiness was washing over me.
Then a knight suddenly approached.
Without a moment’s hesitation, he knelt on one knee, placed a hand over his chest in a respectful manner, and bowed his head.
“Young lady, I am truly grateful that you are safe.
And child, I also wish to thank you for taking such good care of the young lady.”
The man spoke with deeply earnest eyes before bowing once again.
“I will return and receive the punishment I deserve for failing to properly protect the young lady.”
Then he precisely split the jeweled ornament attached to his sword into two.
My eyes widened.
“Please accept this keepsake my father left behind.
Even if I am stripped of my knighthood, I swear that I will protect the young lady with my life……”
At that moment, Duke Ellard punched the back of the man’s head with a thump.
“What an ignorant fool.”
“Your Grace……”
“You are the only fool who would use his parents’ keepsake as proof of his own failure, Tayze.”
As I listened to Duke Ellard scold him and tell him to worry about returning and being confined instead, I became certain.
Tayze Seidian.
The knight who wore a jeweled ornament split in half on his sword.
He was the man who would later become Jack’s adoptive father and the vice commander of the Rexion Knights.
Many knights who admired him had made countless novel-like guesses about the ornament he carried.
Some thought it had been split during a life-or-death battle, some believed it was the jewel that had saved his life, and others thought it was a token he had shared with a deceased lover.
Who would have thought there was such a behind-the-scenes story?
I was thinking that although it was somewhat anticlimactic, perhaps I could sell this information for a high price someday when it happened.
“The carriage is ready, so let’s go.”
At the duke’s words, Diana immediately grabbed my hand as though she had been waiting for him to say it.
She looked worried that I might change my mind and not go with her.
We had only spent a few days together, yet she was being more affectionate toward me than toward the family she had struggled so hard to reunite with, which made me feel a little embarrassed.
And besides…….
“D-Do I ride in this carriage too?”
The carriage stood out despite clearly having been obtained in haste to reach these mountains.
Since I obviously could not ride a horse like the knights, I had assumed I would ride in the carriage carrying the physicians and mages standing farther back.
“Sis, ride with me!”
Diana reached for my hand with both of hers and…….
“There is more than enough room for one small child like you, so get in.”
At the duke’s indifferent voice, I climbed into the carriage almost before I realized it.
The seats inside looked soft, and everything was so clean that I could even smell a pleasant fragrance.
By comparison, my hair was dirty, and my clothes were grimy, so I wondered if I was really allowed to sit comfortably.
But there was no way I could stand the entire journey, so I eventually sat awkwardly on the seat.
Soon, I felt the carriage begin to move.
I stared blankly at the orphanage growing farther away outside the window and spotted the children standing in a line and climbing into the other carriages one after another.
‘In my previous life, I watched Jack leave in a carriage from among those children.’
Being inside the carriage leaving like this felt strange.
Along with the realization that the future had changed, I wondered if perhaps I could live a new life as well.
With vague yet fearful feelings, I fidgeted with my fingers before suddenly raising my head.
Diana, who had been extremely excited when the carriage first departed, was already curled up in the duke’s arms, sleeping peacefully.
And just then, my eyes met Duke Ellard’s as he watched Diana.
As though he had been waiting for the opportunity, he asked me.
“What is your name?
How old are you?”
“R-Ria.
I don’t have a surname.
I’m eight years old……”
Of course I did not have a surname since I was an orphan.
Thinking that I had added something unnecessary because I was so tense and stiff, I inwardly blamed myself for being foolish.
I wondered if my face had turned red with embarrassment when the duke spoke again.
“Did you know Diana’s identity?
And did you know who I was?”
“……!”
My eyes widened at the unexpected question.
‘Does he find me strange?
Does he suspect me?’
Despite his indifferent tone, his piercing gaze made my heart race uncontrollably.
—
Duke Ellard found Ria strange and inexplicable.
There was nothing particularly eye-catching about the child before him.
She was a pale, dirty-looking child wearing shabby clothes similar to those of the children he had seen at the orphanage moments ago.
If he had not seen her lying after falling from the attic, and if she had simply been mixed in with the other orphanage children, he would have passed her by without a second thought.
But when the child regained consciousness and desperately clung to him with terrified eyes, begging him to save her, he had been stunned as though struck in the back of the head.
While he stood frozen and hesitated over what to do, like someone caught off guard by an utterly unexpected ambush in the middle of a war, the child held out evidence she had secretly taken beforehand, as though she had known that someone capable of solving every problem would come.
Evidence that could completely destroy the orphanage director.
Common sense dictated that this was not something a child from such a small orphanage could recognize, and even if she had recognized it, secretly taking it would not have been easy.
Only then did the duke begin to truly notice the child.
The body hidden beneath her loose clothes was thin as a stick, and her face, covered in bruises and wounds, was so pale that her veins showed through.
Her roughly cut brown hair was stiff and coarse at the ends, while the cheeks that rose and fell with shallow breaths were neither plump with baby fat nor flushed like Diana’s.
Perhaps she had realized that he was observing her.
The child lowered her head deeply and spoke.
“I recognized that Dana was a precious person.”
As he watched the child avoid his gaze, Duke Ellard felt inexplicably angry.
He also felt strangely suffocated, as though something were pressing tightly against his chest.
