Feeling her heart pounding, Laila exerted strength reflexively to pull her ankle from the grasp.
But he didn’t move.
Surprisingly, the child didn’t budge at all.
Laila wondered for a moment if she was weak or if her opponent was stronger, and then she spoke.
“Excuse me, umm, how are you……?”
“…….”
“I just want to make sure you don’t misunderstand; I swear I didn’t do anything bad to you; I just put some medicine on your wound. Oh, and that herb you have in your mouth right now, I put that in.”
The child’s brow furrowed slightly at Laila’s words. Then he gagged and spit something out of his mouth.
It took Laila a second to recognize that it was the herb she’d given him.
Laila’s eyes widened significantly.
“Hey!”
What was that?
Laila had to go through a lot of hardship to obtain the expensive and rare herb.
As Laila was literally shocked, a low voice came from the child.
“Always doing unnecessary things…”
It was a voice that sounded deep, like an animal growling.
But it wasn’t the voice that caught Laila’s attention. She focused on the content of the words.
Unnecessary?
……Always?
Unconsciously, Laila clenched her fist, the hand that had touched the ground moments ago.
Was it because of her that the child underwent the punishment? Yes, she admitted it. But…
‘There’s no need for him to be punished further for this behavior.’
Would he know how fearful and anxious she had been while descending the stone stairs?
She was afraid of getting caught and fearful of retribution from the villain.
It had truly been frightening and nerve-wracking.
As the emotions she had barely endured resurfaced, Laila shot a penetrating glance at the child.
However, the strength quickly drained from Laila’s eyes.
The child’s eyes.
Black pupils that seemed like they could swallow up everything around them without a trace.
The moment Laila looked into those eyes, she was suddenly overwhelmed with fear.
They were the same eyes she had seen on the first floor of the mansion this morning.
But was it because the situation and the surroundings were different now?
Perhaps she only now noticed the hatred in the child’s eyes that she had failed to read in her panic earlier.
Regardless, the black eyes ultimately brought forth the fear that had lurked within Laila.
Laila was entrapped in an illusion.
The small, injured child vanished, replaced by an adult man who was at least a head taller than her.
The man held a knife. And with that knife…
Laila exerted all her strength once again to free her ankle out of his grasp once again.
But there was still no sign of it budging even a little.
Laila gasped for breath.
Though it was undoubtedly her ankle that was caught, she felt as if her throat was being strangled.
Feeling her breath becoming more difficult, Laila managed to speak with great effort.
“Let go of my ankle…”
Ah.
Oh no.
She spoke too softly.
Even for her ears, the words she uttered were too faint to be clearly heard.
There’s no way that sound could have gotten through to the other person.
Should she say it again?
However, her lips weren’t moving.
Should she speak to be released?
What if speaking now leads to an even tighter grip on her ankle?
Breathing is difficult enough as it is.
What should she do?
What if…….
But then, the force that was pressing on Laila’s ankle weakened.
Before she had time to think about why, she quickly pulled her ankle out of the slackening grip.
She immediately got up, hastily grabbed the lamp, and escaped through the iron-barred door.
‘Hurry, hurry…’
With trembling hands, Laila searched for the key that fit the door.
She remembered it was the fifth from the left, but in her panic, she couldn’t count.
Laila barely found the key, locked the iron-barred door, and ran without looking back.
Even though she knew the child couldn’t follow her, the fear compelled her to keep running.
“Miss?”
As Laila rushed out of the entrance, Hans stared at her in surprise.
“Did something happen back there?”
“No, nothing.”
Laila hastily handed the key bundle to Hans, hiding the ankle that had been grabbed by the child behind the other one. She realized it wouldn’t be visible under her skirt, so she pulled it out again and stood up.
“Uh, Hans. I’ll be going now. Bye!”
Laila mumbled a hasty farewell, not even sure what she was saying, and climbed the stone stairs.
On the way up, she wondered when she’d gotten up those long stairs that seemed so endless when she descended. The next thing she knew, she was in her bedroom.
Laila carelessly placed the lamp on the table in one corner of the bedroom and buried herself in the bed.
Curling up inside the blanket, she hugged her shoulders tightly.
Tears welled up in her eyes out of fear.
“I’m scared…….”
Eventually, Laila started whimpering softly.
“I’m scared, so scared. I don’t want to…”
It was a fact she was aware of.
However, she momentarily forgot, only to feel the sharp reality just a while ago.
Laila was terrified of the child.
The notion that what she fears is not the small, frail child currently lured to her at this moment but the adult man she will meet ten years later was a lie she told herself briefly to deceive her own thoughts.
They’re the same person, after all. How could one be scary and the other not?
Laila shivered under the blanket. Her tears wouldn’t stop.
She was sad.
She was miserable.
She doesn’t want to be this scared, terrified, horrified, and nervous.
Not only did she have to refrain from seeking revenge against her tormentor, but she had to make an effort to appear favorable to him.
Not to mention falling to such an extent that she had to win their favor, even resorting to false words…
It was truly distressing and unbearable.
Moreover, what made it more tormenting and difficult to endure was that, amidst her tears, no other means of survival came to mind.
Someone might say,
‘Do you really have to go to such lengths just to survive? Instead of fawning over your enemy, you should rather accept death honorably.’
However, Laila couldn’t bring herself to do that.
She had to live. Until her entire face was covered in wrinkles, until she reached the age of ninety.
Laila cried until the moment her tears no longer flowed.
She couldn’t determine exactly how long she had cried, as she hadn’t checked the time when she arrived in the bedroom.
Her throat was sore, and her eyes were stinging.
Her head felt dizzy.
Her body, heavy as if soaked in water, had almost no remaining strength.
After exhausting all her energy crying, Laila finally managed to calm down and lift the blanket slightly.
She then lay down in a comfortable position and closed her eyes.
Even if her mind wasn’t that of a ten-year-old—though considering the current circumstances, it may not be wrong—her body seemed inevitably ten years old.
After crying her heart out, drowsiness rapidly took over.
As consciousness gradually faded, Laila heard a comforting sound in her ears.
‘You will survive. That’s a promise, Laila.’
It was a warm voice.
Laila recalled that same voice over and over again.
Slowly, she drifted into sleep.
✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧
Laila was given an opportunity.
What opportunity?
An opportunity to treat the child imprisoned in the underground prison well.
There is no way to be nice to a dead person.
Well, maybe if one searches hard enough, one might find something, but Laila didn’t know how to do it.
In other words, the child survived.
And on the surface, quite well.
The child seemed unharmed, without additional injuries, maintaining consciousness without fainting again.
Laila seized the opportunity.
Since Marquis Hildegarde started neglecting the child, Laila took advantage of the opportunity and visited the underground prison every day.
There were times when she visited twice a day.
Once in the morning and once in the evening.
“Hello, Hans!”
“…You’ve come?”
After learning that Marquis Hildegarde wasn’t separately monitoring the child, Hans didn’t bother stopping Laila from entering the prison.
Laila didn’t go to the underground prison empty-handed.
She carried the same things in her hands almost every time.
Warm and soft food and clean water. Medicine for wounds, healing herbs, and more.
Laila brought plenty of such things to the child. Always greeting the child with a smiling face. No matter how scared or frightened she was, she never let it show.
She smiled, greeted him, talked to him, gave him what she had brought, and checked on his wounds to make sure they were healing.
Laila did her best to treat the child kindly.
There were no other words to summarize her behavior. After days of consistent efforts from Laila… A change occurred.
In the relationship between the imprisoned child and her.
It was…….
‘How could this happen?’
The child hated Laila even more than before.
