Chapter 13
Arel.
It was a nickname she hadn’t heard in a long time.
A sweet voice she’d heard when she was very young, when her memory was still a blur.
“I am an orphan.”
The sweet voice murmured.
“I don’t know who my parents are, I’ve never seen their faces, I don’t know if I was abandoned or if they died.”
She had never heard this before. Mehen’s backstory wasn’t part of the novel.
“I didn’t get care, obviously, and love… well, I don’t know.”
A furrowed brow and a deep breath that sounded like a sigh.
“I don’t really know what love is that people talk about.”
A low voice.
It’s hard to tell what Mehen’s expression is through his long, dark lashes.
“It’s funny to say this, but I never had children in my life plans, and I never intended to raise them.”
Except that somehow, the goddamn lord got in the way.
Mehen smiled slightly, unsure of why he was saying this.
“I’ll be honest with you, I still don’t know what to do with you.”
“…!”
“But that never meant I wanted to get rid of you, or that I didn’t like you.”
Mehen laughed bitterly.
“I know you don’t believe me.”
His voice was dry and cold, but the hand stroking her hair was so tender, she didn’t know what to believe.
Still, she sensed a certain emotion in him. Troubled, perplexed, and yet at a loss for words.
“It’s my problem. Still is.”
His long, slender hand, which had been fiddling with the hair, brushed the corner of her eye. Tears must have been building up again.
“It’s all because I wasn’t good enough.”
“…”
“I thought I could raise you well enough, if not well enough. I was wrong.”
“…Mehen did nothing wrong.”
“Do you forgive him?”
“You did nothing wrong.”
“You don’t say you forgive me.”
Silence fell once again.
But it was a much more comfortable silence than before.
“Mum.”
“Yes?”
“Mum, do it.”
“What?”
“If you’re sorry.”
“I’m a man.”
“Mum.”
“…”
She was aware that she was being ridiculous. That Mehen would get fed up and leave with her in two hands.
She felt better pushing him away. than to be tamed by this affection.
“Mum.”
Then.
“Mum’s a bit. Biologically difficult.”
Mehen shrugged, a disembodied smirk on his face.
“I’ll try.”
She couldn’t help but smile at Mehen’s uncharacteristic gesture.
“I haven’t seen you smile in a long time.”
She don’t know. She going to play along with this ridiculous mum joke, this ridiculous imposition?
“You look good.”
She couldn’t believe why this rational, reasonable man would go along with this absurdity, but she was so happy, so in love with it, that she opened her eyes wide in disbelief.
Mehen laughed.
His eyes softened, and with the addition of a gentle smile, his usually sharp features softened.
“You smile like that often.”
She could smile like that.
Watching Mehen laugh quietly in the warm morning sunlight, she suddenly didn’t want to miss this moment.
***
Though we were over the hump, Arellin’s condition hadn’t improved.
As soon as dawn broke, an overflow of healers and priests from the temple were brought in to nurse Arellin back to health and give her new medicines.
“This should give you some relief.”
“We don’t know yet. Please keep checking on him.”
“Yes, Sir Mehen.”
After putting Arellin to bed, Mehen went straight to Yuni.
He should be tired from the long night, but he was used to this kind of march, so far so good.
“So, what happened?”
Yuni asked, her face pale.
“I think someone stole my medication.”
“What?”
Yuni explained calmly.
“Well, the day you were supposed to take it, Mehen was here, so I didn’t give it to you, and the next day I was a little late because I was pulling an all-nighter, but another maid said she brought it to you, so I guess it slipped through…”
The problem was the maid.
“She was one of the maids who caused a disturbance yesterday.”
“One of them?”
“When I went to check on her, she was already dead in jail.”
Mehen loosened his tie without a word. As he unbuttoned his sleeves, his frustration seemed to ease a little.
“What was the cause of death?”
“Suicide. They say she hanged herself…”
“It can’t be suicide.”
Mehen quipped coldly.
“What happened to the stolen pills?”
“As of yet, we haven’t found it.”
“Ha.”
Look at this.
“Sir Mehen?”
How dare you do this to me, in my own Halbern manor? Mehen couldn’t hold back the laughter that escaped his lips.
“You’ve done some interesting things to distract me these last few days.”
Mehen snapped his fingers.
This had happened while his eyes and ears were darkened.
“Let’s just chalk it up to suicide and move on. Yuni, do you know anything else about this?”
“Ah! No, I’ve only told Sir Mehen.”
“Then keep it a secret, and keep looking out for her.”
“Yes!”
Yuni ran out of the room.
Alone among the piles of papers, Mehen’s eyes shone coldly.
***
It had been a long time since she had been sick.
She used to be sick in this body, but it’s been a long time since she can remember. In her previous life, she had the second worst health constitution.
She doesn’t know the position, but she knows the position, and now that it’s gone, she knows the value of health.
And now she understands what they mean when they say that being sick makes everything feel bad.
She thought she was crying because she woke up and there was no one beside her.
She is alone again.
“Are you awake?”
She sobs silently, and a muffled voice soothes her.
She turned her head in surprise, and heard the sound of palaks and papers being flipped at her bedside.
“Mehen?”
A long, slender hand strokes her hair. It feels good.
“You’re up.”
Mehchen was looking at the papers.
Why is he here looking at papers?
“You should get more sleep. They say sleep is better for recovery.”
“Yeah.”
She closed her eyes and opened them again.
She couldn’t believe what was happening. Mehen was beside her.
Was I dreaming?
Maybe I was dreaming after all?
“Mum.”
“…”
“Mum.”
Mehen tilted his head in confusion. She couldn’t help but smile at the sight.
She doesn’t know if he realizes that it makes her want to call him mum even more.
“Hold my hand.”
Cautious foolishness.
Mehen quietly takes her hand, still uncomfortable. Our hands are both familiar and unfamiliar.
Her eyes flutter shut at the lukewarm warmth of his hand.
She could smell the faint scent of ink and dry paper on her fingertips, the smell of how long he had been flipping through the papers.
Most of all, lingering on the tip of her nose, was the scent of Mehen’s arms.
The soft, affectionate scent of ash wood from the big hand relaxed her.
Today, for some reason, she thinks she has a good dream.
***
Mehen put down his papers and looked at Arellin, who had fallen asleep with her hand clasped tightly in his.
She was asleep alongside him, but with a more relaxed expression on her face.
“I am.”
What’s the big deal about holding her hand?
It was a shrug for a human who had never held her hand before, but Mehen didn’t look back.
“…I should have done it sooner.”
In many ways, it’s better to have an expert on your side than to have a bunch of humans looking after you.
But all of that flew out the window when he saw her sleeping child clutching his hand with two tiny hands as if it were a lifeline.
“Good thing I was here.”
There was a lot of paperwork to be done, a lot of things that needed to be checked, but Mehen’s attention was focused on the sleeping child.
It wasn’t the warmth of the small, hot hand that was unfamiliar.
More than that, it was the tickling sensation that confused him.
A tickling, undefined emotion that she couldn’t identify, couldn’t name, but that kept her hovering close to him.
“Mum…”
A word he knew but never said out loud.
He wished he could have been there to witness it, but unfortunately, Archduke Halbern lost his mother when he was a child.
How could a human being who had never even had a parent imitate ‘mum’?
“I don’t know.”
He was perplexed, but not in a bad way.
At least, not as bad as when he was trying to decide whether or not to turn the doorknob.
