Chapter 16

“…Need some help?”

“Yes, go fetch me a sack of flour from down there.”

“Not that.”

“Hm?”

Christine’s gaze sank in too deep, and Adele felt herself flustered.

At times like this, it was as if he could read a person’s mind completely. As if he knew exactly what she was afraid of.

“Never mind. Just bring up the flour, that’s all?”

Fortunately, Christine looked away first.

“Yeah, it’s a bit heavy for someone as delicate as me to lift.”

“Ha. As if.”

“Who was it that told me I’m nothing but skin and bones?”

“Fine. I’ll go get it.”

Surprisingly easy to persuade, Christine headed down into the cellar.

“In House Oswald, they say, they called her the Cellar Mistress.”

The words Zimmer had told him only a short while ago came back to him.

---

“The Cellar Mistress?”

“Yes. She married the Marquis Oswald, yet her bedchamber was in the cellar.”

“The cellar? Was that by the Marquis’s order?”

“No. The Marquis couldn’t move on his own, and between that and the strong medicine he took to dull the pain, his mind wasn’t always sound. My lady saw to his meals and attended him whenever he was lucid. Apart from that, she lived among the maids.”

“Did the other maids live down in the cellar too?”

“That’s… she was the only one.”

“Why?”

“Likely to put her in her place from the start — so she couldn’t carry on as if she were truly the lady of the house.”

He understood well enough.

Adele, the baker’s daughter from a mining town.

At just eighteen, she had become mistress of a distinguished household.

What was more, most of the Marquis’s children were older than she was.

To nobles arrogant to the bone, a girl that young must have looked like something to use and discard however they pleased.

“So in the end, someone murdered the Marquis, and pinned a crime that wasn’t hers on her?”

“That isn’t certain. It’s true that Stone and the Marquis quarreled that day, but my lady never claimed her innocence either.”

“She must have been threatened.”

“But Stone has been serving as a diplomat in the Kingdom of Orbis ever since. He’s been in a position to defend himself whenever he liked, and yet he’s kept silent the whole time. Which makes me think…”

“So she killed the Marquis, then?”

Christine’s voice rose with an edge it had never carried before.

“No! But if my lady won’t speak, there’s simply no way to ever prove who actually did it.”

He couldn’t make sense of it.

Setting aside the marriage to the old Marquis — why had Adele stayed, enduring treatment like that?

And what was she staying silent for?

---

“Oh, good. I was worried about how I’d haul this up myself.”

Christine set the sack of flour down on the kitchen counter, and Adele broke into a wide smile.

And to think she’d been trembling like a leaf only a little while ago.

“Anything else you need help with?”

“The Hero of Kalaim, offering to help in the kitchen?”

“Even the Hero of Kalaim has to eat.”

“Don’t tell me you’re about to say you’re hungry again—”

Perched on the edge of the counter, Christine smiled lazily and nodded.

“Why is it that I only ever get hungry when I look at you?”

“Do I look like food to you?”

“Yeah. You look awfully delicious.”

He licked his lips, looking for all the world like he might devour her on the spot.

That was when—

Stretch—

“Ow — what are you doing?!”

Adele had grabbed both his cheeks with her hands and pulled them wide.

“Keep making that greasy face and I’ll throw you right out of my house.”

Having delivered her warning, Adele let go of his cheeks.

“Are you insane?”

He rubbed his stinging cheeks, indignant, but Adele only laughed brightly.

“If you behave and wait quietly without getting mad, I’ll make you pancakes. Those I can whip up fast.”

“Ha — pancakes, of all things—!”

But just watching Adele tie on her white apron and get ready to cook was enough to stir an unbearable hunger in him.

“If it’s no good, I really might eat you instead.”

“Ooh, terrifying. Would you crack those eggs for me first? Then open the left cupboard door and get out the butter. Vanilla extract’s up there too, and the maple syrup.”

“Could you give me one order at a time?”

He arched a brow, scowling, when—

“Sorry, but can I ask for just one more thing?”

She carefully held up a single finger and gave him a sweet, coaxing smile.

“No!”

“Oh, come on — you’re already being generous, so be a little more generous?”

“Fine. Just one more, then.”

Christine was still scowling, but it clearly wasn’t working on Adele — not if she was about to ask for something like this.

“There should be a hair tie in my apron pocket. Use it to tie my hair back.”

“Do what to your hair…?”

He’d cut plenty of heads in his time, but he’d never once tied one up.

But Adele, shameless as ever, simply held up both hands.

“My hands are covered in flour. Just tie it back loosely — as long as no hair ends up in the dough.”

“Why am I even doing this…”

Grumbling all the while, Christine fished the hair tie out of her apron pocket.

A faded green ribbon tie.

He didn’t know much about women’s hair ties, but he was fairly sure no woman alive still wore a ribbon this worn.

“How long do you have to use something before it turns into a rag like this? It’ll snap if I so much as pull on it.”

“About ten years now, I think?”

Christine’s hand, mid-gathering her hair, went still.

“Throw it out this instant and buy a new one.”

“It’s still good.”

“Not being able to throw things away is a sickness too, you know.”

“No. It’s worn in from years of use — that’s what makes it precious.”

“Don’t go assigning meaning to trash and clinging to it.”

“My, aren’t you starting to sound just like Tanya?”

“Good to know the maid has some sense, at least.”

“She calls me obsessive. Says I can’t even throw out a single old thing without getting attached. Now that I think about it, I suppose I do have a bit of that tendency.”

Adele let out a playful little chuckle.

“Then what about an old person?”

The low voice came from somewhere above her head, out of nowhere.

“…Hm?”

She tilted her head back and met Christine’s eyes, dark and still.

“Ten years ago… I wondered if there was some special reason you left the way you did. If you’re someone who can’t even throw away one worn-out ribbon.”

Adele dropped her gaze and bit her lip.

“I already told you. I wanted to become a noble.”

“And did you? Become the noble you wanted to be?”

His low, quiet voice sounded almost like an interrogation.

Then again, with his reach for information, he might already know — just how wretched her life in House Oswald had truly been.

“In a word, I got cheated. I thought I’d become the Marchioness and live in style.”

Adele answered as though she didn’t care, playing it cool.

Even as the feeling inside her spiraled into an uncontrollable mess.

“Then why didn’t you run from there? You could have, easily enough.”

“And if I’d run, where would I have gone?”

“Our house.”

At those words, Adele’s eyes suddenly burned hot, and she bit down hard on her lip.

It sounded as though he’d been waiting for her, even after she’d left the way she had.

That he’d said “our house” without a moment’s hesitation was so warm, so achingly kind, that she could hardly stand it.

Christine turned her around to face him.

“Adele…”

“I’m sorry. I’ll make the pancakes in a little while.”

Unable to hide her feelings any longer, Adele pushed him away and tried to flee. But Christine wouldn’t let her go.

“Tell me. What is it you’re hiding? Did you really kill the Marquis?”

His voice was so gentle, so tender, that Adele felt she might crumble at any moment.

“Don’t you even hate me? I abandoned you right when you needed me most.”

“I did hate you. For a while, I even despised you. But we were both young then — you and I both.”

So tell me everything, Adele.

Maybe then I could understand you.

“They sold off the illegitimate daughter they’d abandoned, for money. It was only the young Marchioness, married off not knowing any better, who deserved any pity.”

Adele caught her breath at last and looked back at Christine. Her eyes were red-rimmed.

“Yes. I didn’t kill the Marquis.”

“It really was Stone, then?”

She nodded slowly.

“But I knew what he was going to do, and I looked the other way. So I can’t say I’m entirely innocent either.”

“That still doesn’t mean you had to take the blame for it on purpose. Let me help you.”

Adele shook her head.

“I was never actually punished for it — it’s only ever been rumor. If you really want to help me, just hurry up and finish my hair.”

Adele gave her glossy, dark-brown hair a little shake.

But Christine only stared at her, sharp and unmoving, like a painting frozen in place.

“Come on, hurry up. I don’t have time — I need to get the dough proofing before I can sleep.”

To Adele, still hurrying him along, he asked in a low, quiet voice:

“Don’t tell me… you had feelings for Stone?”

“…!”

Adele’s expression visibly hardened.

In that instant, Christine felt something twist inside him.

---

“Ha. So that’s it, is it? The reason you stayed there despite being treated like that. The reason you kept silent even under a murderer’s name. So the rumor that you seduced him wasn’t just a rumor after all?”

He couldn’t hold back the venom pouring out of him, even as some part of him prayed it wasn’t true.

In the end, Adele covered her face with both hands. Her shoulders began to shake, as though she were sobbing.

“Damn it…!”

“Adele…”

That was when—

“Pfft!”

A sound like air hissing out from between her lips suddenly burst free. Then she broke into laughter so loud it seemed fit to bring the kitchen down.

“Sorry. Honestly, this is too funny not to laugh at. Me and that man? No way! Just thinking about it gives me chills!”

Adele rubbed her arms as if genuinely repulsed.

“…Guess not, then.”

Christine was taken aback, but strangely, he also felt relieved.

“Chris, you really do have some imagination. How could you even think something so absurd! Besides, that horrible man was practically my stepson, you know.”

“It was only a hypothesis.”

“Do you have any idea how much that man tormented me? Every time lightning struck, I prayed it would land right on his head. I hope he never comes back from the Kingdom of Orbis as long as he lives.”

“Then should I kill him for you?”

“Do that and I’ll hand over my entire fortune!”

It came through so clearly — how thoroughly, down to the bone, she despised him.

Christine realized, a little bewildered, that the twisted feeling inside him had vanished without his noticing.

“All right. Turn around so I can finish your hair.”

Gathering her hair into one hand, he wound the worn ribbon around it with the other.

Then, after a moment, he confessed cautiously:

“Adele, I’m starting to think… your hair might actually be alive.”

He was a man confident he could master anything quickly. But tying up a woman’s hair seemed like the single hardest task in the world.

“No way. It only comes alive on nights of the full moon.”

“Then why does it keep clinging to my hands?”

“It’s just static. Just tie it so it doesn’t come loose — ow!”

“Ah — that wasn’t an accident. That was on purpose.”

“Chris!”

“Hold still. I’m almost done…”

Christine, struggling to tie the ribbon into her hair, suddenly went still.

The fine, neat down at the nape of her pale neck, the slender line of her throat, had come into view. It looked as though it would taste sweet and languid, like milk stirred through with sugar, and his mouth watered before he even realized it.

“Are you done?”

Perhaps sensing his gaze, Adele reached up to touch her neck and turned to look at him.

“…Pfft!”

The instant he saw her, Christine burst out laughing.

Adele caught her own reflection in the window glass and was equally at a loss. Half her hair had slipped free of the tie, sticking out in every direction from the static.

“Anyone who saw you would think you’d just been in a hair-pulling brawl.”

He still couldn’t stop laughing, and before long, she found herself laughing too.

As if his feeling had simply spread to her.

“Since you didn’t manage to tie my hair properly, do me one more favor.”

Christine, laughing a second ago, immediately turned serious.

“Didn’t we agree that was the last one?”

But Adele pushed forward regardless, stepping in close with a bright smile.

“Let’s do it together tonight.”

Christine’s throat bobbed as he swallowed hard.

“T-tonight, you and I… d-do what…?”

He was so startled that even his voice came out strange.

“I just remembered — the cut on my hand still hasn’t healed.”

She held up the hand she’d injured swinging a dagger. It wasn’t a bad wound, so she’d taped a bit of gauze over it and tied it with a strip of cloth.

“You’re going to knead the dough. With those strong arms of yours, it’ll turn out even chewier.”

“Ah — come to think of it, I just remembered I have plans with Zimmer—”

She stepped in front of Christine as he tried to flee, smiling with her eyes. As it turned out, the smiling-eyes attack wasn’t Christine’s exclusive move after all.

“You’ll do it, won’t you, Chris? You will, right? Hm?”

And then came the second wave: outright pestering.

“Can’t hear you.”

He turned away, but it did him no good.

“Aw, come on, Chris… mm, do it… please, would you? Please?”

The moment she unleashed the full three-stage combo of cuteness, it was already over.