“Let me down! Eenh, let me down, quickly!”
“Slowly. You’ll fall.”
He straightened carefully and set her down on her feet.
She took off running down the garden path like a small, unruly foal — darting this way and that, scattering the peace of the walkway the way a child tears through a restaurant while its parents plead uselessly from their table.
“Ivelina. You’ll hurt yourself.”
“Hmph! I don’t care! It’s my choice!”
She made herself a nuisance, careening from one end of the path to the other.
She stole a glance at him. He was standing with his arms crossed, watching her in quiet silence.
The look in his eyes said: ‘let’s see how far you’ll take this.’
‘Ha. Whatever you’re imagining, I’ll go further than that.’
“Oh!”
‘Thud—!’
She let herself stumble — one ankle going out from under her with a perfectly timed gasp — and went down.
“Damn. Ivelina!”
His voice rose.
Behind her, she heard fast, unbroken footsteps closing in.
‘Tears. I need to squeeze out tears, quickly!’
She scrunched her brow and forced her eyes wide open. Fortunately, some pollen had drifted into them and they were already stinging faintly — a lucky coincidence.
“Let me see.”
He dropped to one knee beside her almost instantly and examined her ankle with quick, careful hands.
“Damn. I told you to be careful.”
There was something slightly sharper than a sigh in Kael’s voice — something that edged toward a curse.
‘Now.’
“Huh — hhuang…”
“…”
“Hhuang, it hurts! It really hurts here! Hhh—”
“Does it hurt a lot?”
“Yes! Hhiing… I can’t walk. Carry me, quickly~…”
She gave it everything she had.
“We should go inside.”
“G-go inside? Where to—?”
He slid one hand under her back and the other beneath her knees and lifted her in a single smooth motion.
Her body left the ground so suddenly that she reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck on pure reflex.
“The injury needs to be looked at. Bear with it for a little while.”
“Ah…”
He had reacted more sharply than she’d expected — brow furrowed, a curse under his breath. He genuinely seemed shaken.
She couldn’t bring herself to take it back.
A small, uncomfortable pang of guilt settled in over the lie.
* * *
A miscalculation.
‘I was trying to avoid going inside as much as possible. After what happened in the bedroom and the study…’
She lay on the sitting room sofa and stared blankly at the ceiling, regretting it thoroughly.
A short while later, Kael returned from wherever he’d gone.
“I’ve sent for a doctor.”
“A — a doctor?”
“Yes. My personal physician will arrive shortly.”
‘Oh no. Oh no, no, no.’
If a doctor examined her, the lie would be completely exposed.
“Oh — that really isn’t necessary, I’ll be fine if I just go home and rest—”
“No. It could get worse if it’s not treated properly.”
“…”
He lifted her again.
“Where are we going?”
“My bedroom. You’ll be more comfortable lying down there.”
“Oh…?”
‘It’s barely even a sprain. Is this really necessary?’
They arrived at the bedroom. Kael lowered her onto his bed with careful hands.
“I — I really am fine now—”
“You were in enough pain to cry. Just wait. I’ll make sure it doesn’t hurt.”
He pressed a brief, soothing kiss to her forehead, as though settling a restless child, and left the room.
The physician must have arrived already.
She lay still and cast her eyes slowly around the interior of his bedroom.
She pressed her lips together in a complicated expression.
‘Why do I feel so uneasy?’
An anxious restlessness had crept over her for no reason she could identify. She folded her hands over her stomach and turned them over, fidgeting with nothing.
Then — footsteps in the hall outside, multiple sets, followed by the sound of voices.
Kael seemed to be exchanging a few words with someone. The man who entered with him looked to be in his fifties — silver-haired, with deep-set lines carved into his face and a slim monocle perched on the bridge of his nose.
‘That must be the physician.’
He had the bearing of a master craftsman — someone whose expertise had been accumulated over decades.
‘He’s definitely going to find out it was a lie. What do I do?’
Anxiety made her fingers restless. Her hands were cold from the tension.
The physician crossed the room and stopped beside the bed.
“I’ll take a look, Miss.”
“…Yes…”
She offered her ankle like a compliant lamb.
The physician began to examine it with careful hands — working the joint gently, rotating the ankle in different directions. After a moment, he made a quiet sound of consideration.
Kael, standing beside the bed with his arms loosely crossed, asked:
“What’s the verdict.”
“Walking would not be advisable at present.”
‘What?’
‘Is this man a quack?!’
She pushed herself upright on her elbows.
…But she had been the one crying and insisting she couldn’t walk, only minutes ago.
Which meant she had absolutely nothing to say.
She narrowed her eyes at the supposed physician and pointedly flexed her ankle back and forth in demonstration.
‘Don’t lie! I can move it just fine! Look! There’s nothing wrong with me!’
Her pointed stare apparently failed to reach him. He continued studying her ankle with a thoroughly grave expression.
“I would recommend keeping movement to a minimum. The bones are naturally on the slender and delicate side, which makes the ankle more susceptible to strain. If it’s pushed further, the condition could worsen considerably.”
‘That can’t be right… I need to go home soon…’
Something was going wrong.
She stretched one hand out toward the two of them.
“Actually — I really don’t think it’s quite that—”
“In the opinion of the Hardeion family’s longtime physician, I would advise complete bed rest for one, perhaps two days. Absolute rest is paramount, Your Grace.”
‘Bed rest?’
“I thought as much.”
‘What do you mean, you thought as much?!’
Kael and the physician exchanged several more words, their expressions identically serious.
‘What are they saying?’
She strained her ears.
But, frustratingly, both of them were speaking too quietly for their voices to reach her. She was trying to eavesdrop without looking like she was eavesdropping when the conversation came to an end.
“Then I’ll take my leave, Your Grace.”
‘No. Please don’t go.’
‘This is a misdiagnosis!’
She called after the physician as he bowed at the door, pushing herself upright and reaching out with one arm.
“E-excuse me, doctor—!”
“Yes. Thank you.”
“—r…”
Her thin, desperate voice was swallowed entirely by Kael’s.
The physician gave Kael a small, respectful nod and slipped quietly out of the room.
‘Click.’
The door closed firmly.
The bedroom was silent. It was just the two of them.
‘Step. Step.’
Kael crossed the room with slow, deliberate footsteps. He settled on the edge of the bed beside her and regarded her for a long moment, as though taking inventory.
One to two days. Not allowed out of bed.
‘What kind of physician — there isn’t even any swelling!’
‘Right. I need to say I have to go home, immediately—’
At that moment, Kael bent forward abruptly, closing the distance between them.
He moved so quickly that she flinched backward on instinct. Even so, he was close enough that his scent hung thick around her — close enough to fill her lungs with each breath.
Something about his expression was strange.
His red irises had taken on a cold, glittering quality — and underneath it, that familiar, unsettling shimmer.
A nameless unease moved through her. She curled inward slightly, as though making herself smaller.
Cold sweat traced a slow line down her spine. Her palms, curled tight in her lap, were growing damp.
Time seemed to have stopped.
In the silence, the tension in the room pressed against her like a held breath. She swallowed.
Kael drew the back of his hand across her cheek — slowly, deliberately, with a kind of unhurried thoroughness — and spoke.
“What a situation, Ivelina.”
“…”
“For the next day or two…”
“…”
“I’ve been told not to let you out of my bed.”
“…”
“We should follow the doctor’s orders, shouldn’t we?”
His voice was low and settled and, underneath it, faintly chilling.
There was something in it — a quiet anticipation, a subtle undercurrent of satisfaction — that she couldn’t quite account for.
Her mouth had gone bone dry. Beads of sweat were forming at her hairline.
“…B-but I really do need to go home now… everyone will be worried—”
“I’ve already sent word to the Florence estate.”
“What?”
The hand that had been tracing along her cheek began to move.
His fingertips drifted to her hair.
He combed through it slowly — strand by strand, with the same unhurried patience — and said:
“That you’d be staying in the guest room for two days. For your recovery.”
“…”
“So there’s no need to worry.”
Kael’s blood-red eyes curved at their corners.
The ghost of a smile at the edge of his mouth.
‘Thud. Thud.’ Her own heartbeat was loud in her ears.
‘This man… he knew. He knew all along?’
