Episode 13
In the past, I’d had no occasion to meet my elder half-sister until my powers manifested.
I’d never gone to her first, nor had she ever come to me first. Naturally, ignorant of her true nature, I had believed her blindly.
But now that she had revealed her hostility so openly, I found myself wondering what expression she would make when my powers manifested.
Just how would she try to win me over?
Since I want to see your face then, for this moment, I shall meekly follow your lead.
“Yes, I’ll bear it in mind. Sister.”
I gave her a deep bow, brushed past her, and went up to my room. I could feel eyes watching me from behind, but I deliberately ignored them.
The moment I entered the room, I tossed the book in my hand roughly onto the bed. Since there was a chance she might ask about the contents, I intended to read it when I was in the mood.
I took off my hat, threw it onto the desk, approached the window, and looked outside.
By then, the sunset that had reached all the way to the ground had completely vanished, and the dark veil of night had taken its place.
Today, too, I gazed at the moon that had risen without fail and prayed for time to pass quickly. Only then could I move to the ‘Holy Room.’
“……Huh?”
I had been staring blankly at the moon when I realized someone was standing below.
Obscured by darkness, I couldn’t see well, but he was definitely looking up at the building with his head raised.
Thinking it might be one of the knights who admired Sister Viart, I turned around when, as if by fate, my eyes met his head-on.
If my eyes hadn’t deceived me, that person’s eyes were glowing red, reflecting the moonlight even in the darkness.
Could it be Lakein?
I hurriedly turned back to look, but only moonlight remained in that spot.
“Did I see wrong?”
There was no other way to explain it, so I decided I had seen wrong. I had been so preoccupied with Lakein today that it seemed I was seeing hallucinations.
“Let’s wash up first.”
There was still time before the moon reached its zenith. I turned around and headed to the bathroom.
***
“…….”
Viart remained standing on the stairs, lost in thought, even after Herna had returned to her room.
‘Of all people, why did that brat have to see that?’
Her deep green eyes narrowed.
It had been a fleeting lapse. That she had been swayed by the dazzling eyes like sunlight, and by that beauty, and had committed something so foolish.
Fortunately, she had come to her senses and stopped before going all the way, but that memory was something she wished to erase as well. Because it was the most foolish thing she had ever done.
“Well, even if she saw, she wouldn’t know what it was about.”
Viart’s beautiful lips twisted slightly.
The only ones who knew the exact situation then were Viart herself and her mother.
Of course, there was one other person—the man who had seduced her—but he had been silenced for good, so there was no use even if he knew.
‘What bothers me more is that Sir Hekeus suddenly took a leave.’
Since becoming a knight of Croizen, Lakein had hardly taken leave. Even when he did, he always asked permission a week in advance.
Yet that very man had suddenly informed them he would take leave today.
At any other time, she would have passed over it without a thought, but because of the half-sibling she had encountered just moments ago, it nagged at her.
But Viart soon scoffed.
‘As if. The two shouldn’t even know each other.’
If Lakein Hekeus were such an easy man, he would have already fallen for her. After all, she kept reaching out to him.
And yet he would show interest in her half-sibling? Impossible.
Viart recalled the half-sibling dressed as a boy who had stood before her moments ago.
Herna. Her half-sibling, a half-blooded Croizen. A thorn in her eye.
Ever since that child’s mother appeared in this territory, everything that had been maintained even formally until then had become twisted and ruined.
Viart still remembered. How her father, who had always been cold to her as a child, had gazed at Herna.
When Herna was born, she herself was only four years old, so she didn’t know what a half-sibling was. She merely thought it was something bad after hearing her mother curse.
Then, when she turned six, she suddenly became curious in her childish heart.
What kind of being was a half-sibling, that her mother hated and despised them so. Wondering if they truly looked like a demon, as her mother said, she had gone to sneak a peek.
As it happened, the wet nurse seemed to have stepped away, for there was no one in the half-sibling’s room.
Intending to slip in, take one look at the face, and leave, she approached the crib.
When she stood on tiptoe and peered into the crib, Viart blanked out for a moment.
Like a doll.
The moment she saw her sleeping half-sibling, she thought that. She couldn’t understand why such a pretty, angel-like baby was called a demon.
Charmed by the plump cheeks, she had unknowingly reached out her hand when she was startled by the sound of footsteps coming from outside and quickly looked for a place to hide.
Because if her mother found out she had come here, she would surely be scolded.
She entered the wardrobe, hid her body, and surveyed the situation through the cracks. She had expected the wet nurse or a maid, but was surprised to see her father enter.
And that day, she came to realize. What it felt like to resent someone, to detest them.
In her father’s gaze as he looked down at her half-sibling, there was affection she had never received even once.
Eyes that seemed to gaze upon something precious and beloved.
From that day on, her half-sibling became the most detestable being in the world to her.
She could not accept that a mere half-blood had received their father’s love, which even she had never been granted.
Demon. Yes, her mother’s words had been right to call it a demon. Because from the moment that child was born, everything she had collapsed.
‘So live on forever in the darkness. Forever.’
The corners of Viart’s lips rose, drawing a long arc, as she turned her body and slowly climbed the stairs.
***
Time passed slowly in proportion to one’s waiting.
Having waited anxiously for the moon to reach its zenith, I took off my hat and quietly slipped out of my room when the time came.
After confirming that everyone was asleep, I silently descended the stairs and headed to the ‘Holy Room’ on the first floor.
Of course, the counterfeit was safely tucked in my pants pocket.
The ‘Holy Room’ housed not only the Guardian Stone but also the memorial tablets of the deceased ancestors, so it was a place I, too, could enter. My father’s tablet also rested in the very last spot on the altar there.
As I approached the ‘Holy Room,’ the knight guarding the front recognized me and slightly bowed his head. It seemed he remembered that I had come once or twice before.
“I’ve come to see my father for a moment.”
At my words that I had come to see the tablet, the knight silently opened the door.
Upon entering, I saw the altar with the tablets lined up along one wall, and the portraits hanging above them.
But my goal was not the tablets.
I turned my head to the opposite side, and the red Guardian Stone atop the altar came into view.
Though it should have been mine yet could not be mine, it shone brilliantly under the light.
As if entranced, I approached the Guardian Stone.
The Guardian Stone, which I had not seen once since my powers manifested, was more beautiful than what remained in my memory.
Thinking that I would now make this mine, a thrill surged up from deep in my chest.
I slipped my trembling hand, shaking with anticipation, into my pants pocket and took out the counterfeit, comparing the two. Of course, I didn’t forget to use my sleeve to hold the fake so as not to leave fingerprints.
The luster and transparency were naturally superior in the Guardian Stone, but that was only because they were side by side; if the counterfeit were alone, no one would likely notice.
The thought that I could finally switch them brought a wave of tension.
As I gripped the counterfeit tightly and reached my other hand toward the Guardian Stone, a familiar voice struck my ear.
“What are you doing there?”
I knew all too well the owner of the voice coming from behind me.
My hand, just about to touch the Guardian Stone, and my body as well, froze solid like a statue.
Why did the Countess have to enter at this very moment…….
With my body frozen, I rolled only my eyeballs toward my outstretched hand. Conflict surged within me.
‘Should I lower it?’
If I were caught like this, it would be game over with no room for excuses. Yet if I retreated now, I felt I would never get my hands on the Guardian Stone, just as in the past.
What little fortune I had was that the ‘Holy Room’ was dark, and the Countess was standing behind me, so she couldn’t see what I had been about to do.
“Who are you? What are you doing there?”
The Countess asked again in a sharp voice. Since I was wearing men’s clothes and had my back turned, she didn’t seem to recognize me.
As I hesitated briefly over what to do, she seems to have found my behavior suspicious and tried to call for the knight outside.
“Is anyone there……!”
I gritted my teeth. Since it had come to this, I had no choice but to move first and see.
“Countess, it’s Herna…… Kyah!”
I deliberately pretended to be startled by her voice, staggering as if losing my balance while turning around.
Keeping the hand holding the counterfeit pressed tightly to my chest, hidden from the Countess, I swung only the arm that had been reaching for the Guardian Stone.
To the Countess, it probably looked like I was flailing my arms to keep from falling.
The problem was that, afraid she might suspect me, I had actually tangled my feet, and my center of gravity truly collapsed.
Like a drowning person grasping at straws, I grabbed the Guardian Stone and tumbled across the floor.
My shoulders, arms, and every place that had struck the hard stone floor throbbed with pain, but I had no time to pay attention to the pain.
At the sound of the Countess’s scream, I quickly crouched to hide from her sight and shoved the hand holding the real Guardian Stone into my pants pocket. The counterfeit was still tightly gripped in my other hand.
“What is the matter, Countess?!”
A man’s urgent voice was heard along with the sound of the door bursting open.
It seemed the knight guarding the ‘Holy Room’ door had rushed in, startled by the Countess’s scream.
“Th-that child, the Guardian Stone……! Quickly, get that child up!”
The Countess seemed more shocked that the Guardian Stone had fallen to the floor than by my fall.
Well, it was only natural. How could a bastard compare to the Guardian Stone her own daughter would inherit?
Scoffing inwardly, I slowly rose. I didn’t want to be forcibly lifted by the knight under the Countess’s order.
Fortunately, I was truly in pain, so my expression needed no acting.
Nothing seemed broken, but the places I had hit throbbed with pain. I could already picture dark bruises forming before long.
“I-I’m sorry, Countess. Still, the Guardian Stone is safe…….”
Still staggering from the impact of the fall, I cautiously held out the counterfeit in my hand.
“…….”
The Countess’s lips hardened stiffly as she looked at the Guardian Stone in my hand.