It was an extremely faint sound.
If she hadn’t seen the child’s lips twitch, she would have assumed she had misheard.
Laila paused for a moment and stared at the child. However, even as time passed, the child’s eyes remained closed.
‘Are you sleep talking……?’
Laila blinked, recalling what she had heard a while ago.
‘Cecile? Who could that be? A friend?’
It sounded like a girl’s name.
Laila casually guessed about the relationship between the owner of the name she heard and the child.
The child’s dry lips moved again. This time, the faint muttering continued for quite a while.
“…er, father…”
“…….”
“Brother, sister…….”
Tears gathered in the child’s golden eyelashes and rolled down his cheeks.
“…Don’t. Don’t die. It’s my fault…”
Thud!
Laila, who had backed away without properly checking her surroundings, froze like ice. She didn’t see the nearby chair and accidentally hit it, causing it to fall to the floor with a loud crash.
Laila, with a thumping heart, looked over the child.
“…….”
The child still showed no signs of opening his eyes. Laila stood guard for a bit longer, then quickly turned and hurried out of the bedroom.
Laila, who climbed the long, winding staircase without realizing how tiring it was, returned to her bedroom and crawled into bed, exhaling heavily.
She was confused.
‘Did he have a family?’
But the child was clearly from the orphanage…
‘Oh.’
Laila clamped her mouth shut as she lay back on the bed. Why didn’t she think of this earlier?
You don’t have to be related by blood to become a family.
If the orphanage was the child’s home…
People at the orphanage would naturally be the child’s family.
It collapsed and burned down, along with the orphanage.
They’d probably died a painful death in front of the child……….
Laila closed her eyes. However, the tears flowing from the child’s cheeks wouldn’t disappear from her mind.
Laila knew the pain the child had experienced and the pain he was still enduring.
How could she not know?
It was once hers, after all.
‘……Don’t think about it. Don’t dwell on it. It’s none of my business.’
But no matter how well Laila understood the child’s pain, it wouldn’t change anything.
The pain wasn’t something she inflicted upon the child.
The child’s suffering wasn’t her fault.
The person at fault was undeniably someone else.
So none of these feelings are hers to feel right now…….
Laila forced herself to go to sleep, trying to escape from emotions that weren’t hers.
To an unknown place.
There stood an adult Laila. She stared directly ahead, then hesitated.
The enemy, who had killed her several times, was approaching her.
Instinctively, Laila tried to step back to avoid the opponent but ended up stumbling and falling to the ground.
Unable to do anything, Laila stared up at the man, terrified and helpless.
But then, at that moment…
The surroundings of the man were suddenly engulfed in flames.
The man gradually diminished within the flames.
Smaller and smaller…
Suddenly, the man disappeared, and an approximately ten-year-old child appeared in his place.
The child stood in the midst of the flames, crying loudly.
His skin, hair, and clothes were smeared with soot.
Calling out for his family, he sobbed, desperately…….
The light was blinding.
Laila squinted, lifting her heavy eyelids with difficulty.
Bright sunlight was pouring in from the window Laila had forgotten to close before going to sleep.
Laila raised her hand to block the pouring sunlight, then suddenly wiped her cheek with that hand.
It was damp.
“….Ha.”
Laila chuckled, followed by an incredulous mutter.
‘Indeed, being a priest suits me naturally…’
✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧
Sympathy and fear are different things.
After hearing the news that the child had regained consciousness after two days, Laila rushed to the 1st-floor bedroom where the child was and stood in front of the bedroom door for a moment, contemplating such thoughts.
Yes, she undoubtedly felt pity for the child, enough to have dreamed of a crying child engulfed in flames not long ago.
However…
‘Pity is pity, and fear is fear.’
Laila swallowed hard, glaring at the doorknob.
Well, wasn’t it natural?
It was one thing to be objectively sorry for the child’s plight, but it was another to know that the child would grow up to kill Laila in the future.
‘Hoo. It’s fine. I did well dealing with the villain and standing up for myself. So…’
She could handle this too.
With that thought, Laila took a deep breath and pushed open the bedroom door, stepping inside.
At the same time, she realized she’d forgotten to knock, but it was too late.
“……Hello?”
Laila mouthed an awkward greeting in place of the omitted knock.
However, the child, sitting on the bed, didn’t look at Laila.
It was as if he didn’t know she had entered.
‘I hope you’re not deaf…….’
After waking up, the child had been examined by Elvin, the mansion’s physician.
Laila had come to his bedroom after hearing all the results.
The child was currently in surprisingly good condition without any notable aftereffects, as mentioned.
Perplexed, Laila carefully approached the bed and sat on the chair next to it before speaking.
“How’s your wound?”
“…….”
“Do they hurt a lot? Or are you feeling uncomfortable?”
“…….”
“Did you have breakfast? Do you want me to have someone bring you something to eat here if you can’t get to the dining hall?”
“…….”
“You can ask for it yourself. See that cord hanging by the bed? If you pull it, a maid will come. Tell her my name, and…”
Laila babbled to herself, then shut up.
She realized.
It wasn’t that the child didn’t know she’d come in.
‘He’s just ignoring me.’
And still doing so.
‘…What should I do?’
In fact, Laila was prepared for the child to glare at her and tell her to get lost. That’s why she trembled and even took a deep breath before entering the bedroom.
It’s good that such a confrontation didn’t happen, but…
‘But I can’t keep being ignored like this.’
Laila decided to become friendly with the child.
And if they become friends, she would have to have a “conversation” with him rather than talking to herself.
After contemplating for a while, Laila threw a question.
“Hey, why did you save me in the forest?”
Upon hearing this, the child looked at Laila for the first time. While Laila inwardly flinched at his gaze, there was no familiar hatred or animosity in the child’s black eyes.
“I never did that.”
Laila belatedly recognized the child’s response.
“Huh?”
“I never saved you.”
“…But thanks to you, I didn’t get hit by an arrow, right? Because you pushed me.”
Laila mentioned the incident in the forest when she and the child fell together, and right after that, an arrow whizzed by.
“It was a coincidence.”
“Did you push me? Or was it because the arrow came afterward?”
“Both.”
Laila wasn’t disappointed at all by the child’s firm response.
She expected something like that from the beginning and threw the question with the aim of extracting ‘answers’ from the child.
And she succeeded!
‘I thought if I used the expression “saved me,” he would immediately deny it. It was the right approach.’
Laila glanced at the child’s face.
‘Well, there’s no way he would have saved me. It’s an absurd idea. There’s no reason for him to do that, and most importantly, he wouldn’t have known that an arrow was coming.’
Despite her nonchalant inner thoughts, Laila, in contrast, drooped her shoulders as if she were genuinely disappointed.
“Oh, I see…”
“…….”
“But still, thank you! Whether it was a coincidence or whatever, the fact that I avoided the arrow thanks to you remains unchanged.”
The child’s pupils narrowed. Wow, he really doesn’t like this.
Laila hurriedly continued.
“You’re my benefactor.”
“…….”
“And from now on, you’ll receive treatment accordingly.”
