Had you been a blade I was never meant to grasp?
Thinking back, I believe I knew my hand would be cut as I took hold. Then was I the one who caught you, or the one who was caught?
The image of Grace laughing over that self-mocking question came to mind.
His heart raced as he watched her suppress her voice and tilt her head, anxious that those hollow dimples might show again. The urge to seize the hand covering her lips and pull it away surged through him, and he had to clench his own hand tightly.
And when she finally lifted her head and burst into laughter, Ares could not tear his eyes away from that pale, unblemished face.
The dimples sunk deep into her pale face, teeth showing between pink lips, jewel-like green eyes peeking from between curved crescents.
Grace's laughter was less like a bright summer and more like a spring driving winter away.
"Spring…."
He crushed the long-unspoken word inside his mouth. Like the gentle wind of that season, the word swept softly through his mouth and vanished.
"Spring."
As Ares ground the word into pieces between his teeth as though dividing flower petals, he stopped exhaling.
In his world, where the chill piercing his collar and the late Duke's robe of bereavement had both been worn smooth as a paperweight and faded into mere background, she appeared like a lie.
Blonde hair that seemed as though it would leave gold dust on his fingertips, a face white as falling snow, clear eyes imbued with an unyielding pride—
she who seemed to stand at the boundary between winter and spring.
＊ ＊ ＊
Grace went to the Chandelier Room to find Eliza, and heard from Lady Lexington that she was at the mausoleum.
"You're going to the mausoleum? Oh, then please wear a fur coat. It's cold there."
Grace donned the fur handed to her and headed to the mausoleum guided by Andrew. Andrew blamed himself, saying her injured hand and arm were his fault, and Grace told him all the while they walked that he mustn't think so.
Even so, Andrew made a firm resolve with a determined face.
"From now on, I will protect the young lady properly!"
Jessie patted his back as if he were a younger brother, perhaps proud of him, and Grace had nothing to add, so she merely offered an awkward smile.
After walking for some time, they entered the mouth of a stone corridor that looked especially pitch-black. The corridor, with drifted snow piled thickly within, exuded a mystical air. As Grace and Jessie couldn't tear their eyes from the accumulated snow, Andrew puffed out his chest, feeling needlessly proud.
"This much snow is nothing."
Grace carefully trod upon the white snow. The snow, crushed without a sound, was fluffy. Even in Taylor, it snowed once every few years, but it had never piled up like this.
Step by step, walking on the snow as if entranced, she suddenly heard a voice like a deep ravine from above her head.
"First time seeing snow?"
When she snapped her head up, Grace realized she had already reached the end of the corridor, and that he had been watching her all this time.
A man who looked as though sketched with a sharp pen leaned against a mausoleum pillar.
"I suppose it is your first time."
Grace moved her briefly halted steps and approached him.
"Your Grace brought the Duchess. It seems she is still inside."
Ares glanced at the mausoleum door and nodded. Then he unreservedly extended his hand. Grace couldn't readily understand what that hand meant, so she looked up at him. Then Ares gestured with his eyes toward her right hand.
"I was asking if you've been treated."
A strange ticklishness welled up from somewhere. At the same time, she seemed to feel the warmth of the large hand that had enveloped the back of her right hand. Grace wrapped her right hand with her left and quickly stated her purpose.
"I have. I came to see the Duchess. May I enter the mausoleum?"
Ares lowered his extended hand and raised an eyebrow.
"Yes. Go and escort her out. She seems intent on spending the night here."
At the biting yet somehow tender tone, Grace bit her lip and smiled. Then she took the torch the grave keeper courteously handed her and descended the stairs.
Scarcely had she taken a step down when his voice came from behind her.
"The stairs are steep. Slippery."
At the absurd worry, she turned around, but Ares's expression, standing still at the entrance, held nothing but earnestness.
"I'll be careful."
With each step down, the cold deepened, and the lingering hint of laughter vanished. Soon, arriving at the resting place of Richmond's masters, Grace's eyes found the Queen sitting alone with her back turned.
Grace carefully approached her, trying not to make a sound. She hung the torch she held on a bracket and stood beside Eliza. How long had she kept vigil by her side? Only after quite some time did Eliza raise her head.
"……."
"……."
When a moment arrived that no human words could console, merely existing became comfort. Grace conveyed solace by being there, and Eliza read her heart.
Eliza turned her eyes back to the sarcophagus and asked in a low, subdued voice.
"How did you endure."
It was the exact same question Ares had once asked.
"How did you endure those long, cruel years? You must have had no one to trust or rely on."
Looking at Eliza's silver hair holding a reddish glow, Grace answered honestly.
"I believed that when the time came, Your Grace would stand by me. So it is a misunderstanding that I had no one to trust or rely on."
Eliza turned to look at her again, and Grace felt their gazes meeting in some deep place.
Having gazed at Grace for a long while, Eliza slowly rose. Then, at an unexpected moment, she raised her right hand.
"......!"
Grace lost her words at Eliza's touch in her hair. Eliza brushed the hair that had fallen forward over her shoulder and gently shook off the snowflakes caught in it. Then, finally, she cupped Grace's slender cheek as if cradling it, and smiled faintly.
"Let's go. Staying in the cold will harm your health."
"...Yes."
Eliza, moving her steps first, glanced at Grace following beside her and spoke.
"I shall give you a different fur. I have something warmer."
"This is very warm."
"I told you there's something warmer. From now on, when I say I will give you something, simply say 'thank you' and accept it."
The imperious words were so like her that Grace let out a small laugh.
When the two came outside, Ares was still standing in the stone corridor.
"What have you been standing there for all this time?"
Eliza asked deliberately gruffly, but for some reason, Ares had little to say. He merely shrugged like a man lost in thought. Then his gaze reflexively drifted toward Grace. Eliza's eyes, catching that fleeting instant, narrowed subtly.
Come to think of it, the grave keeper, who never left his post, was nowhere to be seen—apparently sent away. That she could command society while looking down upon it as if it were in the palm of her hand was thanks to her status and, above all, her uniquely quick and accurate discernment.
"What to do." After brief deliberation, Eliza began walking with brisk steps. As the maids followed as if they had been waiting, Eliza gestured toward Jessie and Andrew, who stood watching Grace from a distance.
"You two, follow me."
As Jessie and Andrew's eyes went wide, Eliza made an icy expression that no one could refuse, quelling any defiance.
"Do you mean to make me repeat myself?"
"Andrew."
Lady Isaac called to the youngest sternly, and Jessie hurriedly turned to look at Grace.
Grace wondered why Eliza had called Jessie, but nodded to indicate she should go for now. As Jessie quickly took her place behind Eliza, the Queen of Richmond gathered her cloud-like entourage and swept away like a storm.
"We were all going to go together anyway, so why......"
Just as Grace muttered questioningly and tried to move to follow Eliza.
"It seems Her Grace noticed I have something I wish to say to you."
"......?"
When she turned to him, Ares met her eyes without looking away.
It was a deep night with falling snow. The surroundings were so silent they felt desolate, and perhaps that was why the sound of snow piling up rang all the more clearly.
It was a dreamlike night where the whole world was blanketed in white. Strangely, Grace found it difficult to meet his gaze, so she hastily lowered her eyes.
Then Ares grabbed the snow piled on the corridor railing and began to gather it into a round shape. Having made a ball the size of an adult's fist in an instant, he asked Grace.
"Do you know what I'm trying to make?"
"...Are you making a ball?"
"Heh. I knew you'd answer like that."
Ares let out a laugh that seemed to scrape somewhere in his throat, set down the gathered snow, and began to gather more. In the blink of an eye, he made a ball the size of two fists. Then he placed the snow he had made earlier on top and stood it on the railing.
As Grace approached with a serious face, Ares stuck his hand in his pocket and spoke lightly.
"It's a snowman, a snowman."