“This is the largest and most spacious room in our inn! But, excuse me, what is your relationship with the young child who came with you? Don’t tell me he’s your son…?”
You have no prejudice either. It was amusing that he carefully asked if he was his son even after seeing those ears and tail. Moreover, even if he didn’t know Jaena’s actual age, wouldn’t it make no sense even inferring age just from appearance? Jaena looked to be about eight or nine, so if Ban actually had a child that age, he would have had to make a child in his early teens… No matter how much this world had a culture of marrying early, this was scientifically impossible.
Of course, rather than explaining all those things one by one and kindly, it was convenient and a good method in many ways to firmly say no.
“No. He’s just an acquaintance’s nephew.”
“Aha, I see! Well, you don’t resemble each other too much… and thinking about age, it doesn’t make sense. My goodness, I was startled just in case.”
Would it be wrong for me to have a child? Why does the inn owner feel such familiarity toward me and act like he knows me? Actually, this wasn’t just the inn owner’s attitude. The guards and the inn’s guests were similar too.
I feel like I’ve seen that appearance somewhere… Where was it? Ban thought and thought again, listening to the inn owner chattering alone with one ear and letting it pass through the other.
‘Ah, I remembered.’
“Then please stay comfortably! If you need anything, just pull the cord here to call.”
When he from his past life visited England for work, the eyes and attitudes of people looking at the British royal family were like that. Of course, as ordinary citizens they probably had never even met the royals, let alone exchanged words with them, but since they had known their every move since childhood, it was natural to feel familiarity… But he had no idea why he himself had become such a target.
Anyway, a complete stranger arbitrarily having goodwill and acting friendly was more uncomfortable than expected. They were certainly polite, and treating him kindly was correct… but what was this uneasy feeling?
Humans meeting Ban for the first time were generally favorable, charmed by Ban’s beautiful appearance, but this evoked a different kind of displeasure.
Ban, who was left alone in a room with Orma for the first time in a long while, rather let out a small sigh as if he could finally live, and at the same time Orma spat out in a voice full of dissatisfaction:
“…Don’t go out.”
That appearance was like a cat with its fur standing on end, so Ban inadvertently let out a slight laugh. Though his lips returned to their original position after his eyes met with Orma, who had become frightening in an instant.
“Mm, I don’t really want to go out either, but to leave Gillia, shouldn’t I check if there’s a ship heading to Yeru?”
“…I feel like they’ll tell you to hurry to the castle there too.”
“That’s right. People seem to want me to go to the castle. Conversely, Orma-nim must hope I don’t go there, right? Don’t worry. I don’t know the reason, but I won’t go to the castle.”
Now Ban was one who would notice like a ghost when Orma felt anxiety and discomfort. Especially recently, after even marking his eyes with a seal, he quickly realized even the reasons and would remove the cause in advance. Whether his prediction was correct this time too, Orma frowned but didn’t add more words. Ban quickly added, thinking this was the time:
“It would be better to have meals brought to the room. If I go out, people’s gazes will focus on me, and it seems like Orma-nim would be uncomfortable.”
“…Aren’t you uncomfortable with those gazes?”
“I’m uncomfortable too, but rather I’m closer to being bewildered not knowing the situation. But since Orma-nim seems to want me not to know.”
Whether Ban’s painstaking effort full of kindness and meticulousness not to stimulate his anxiety shone through, Orma finally slowly nodded.
“…But, aren’t you going to ask? Aren’t you curious?”
“Do you want me to know?”
“No.”
That’s right. Ban said so and just curved his eyes. If what he didn’t know was what his God wished… according to God’s will.
* * *
Among the antique paintings decorating the gorgeous wallpaper, a woman who reached out to a frame alone wrapped in dark cloth brushed off the accumulated layers of dust and carefully lifted the cloth. After adjusting the position well so it wouldn’t be crooked, she walked back two or three steps and began appreciating the painting in a daze.
It was always like this when looking at just this painting. If no one told her, she would look at the painting idly for hours. Once she felt so foolish about herself that she covered it with cloth and hid the painting. The painting she saw after a long time boasted vivid colors without fading at all. Would it be just the colors? She thought it would have been beautified while immersed in memories, but the painting was much more beautiful than her memory, and simultaneously sacred and lovely.
However, the face of the woman who had been looking at the painting for a while gradually became distorted with sadness.
“Madam, you were here.”
“…Leila, the castle interior was noisy. Did someone visit again?”
“They haven’t visited the castle yet, but they’ve entered Gillia. They say this visitor greatly resembles you, Madam.”
“I see…”
The voice answering weakly was exhausted from long years and no longer carried emotion. Now not expecting anything had become medicine for the woman.
“What about the Duke?”
“Perhaps because of the disaster, some trade ships haven’t arrived, so he went to the port to check.”
An ordinary, ordinary daily life. The woman felt relieved at the daily life where nothing changed and appreciated the painting once more.
In the painting, the woman from her younger days held a young baby preciously with a beautiful appearance. The baby boasting brilliant silver hair along with sky-blue eyes looked purely innocent like an angel and simultaneously sacred, and the woman looking at such a baby was smiling with a benevolent smile like a saint.
However, the reason the woman in the painting was beautiful enough that one couldn’t take their eyes off wasn’t simply because she was young. Not knowing that her precious thing would be taken away, that she would have to give it up, the pure maternal love full of affection for the baby must have molded the woman in the painting more beautifully.
“…O Serka, please raise me up and strengthen me…”
The woman offered a prayer to Serka, muttering in a small voice close to a sigh. The words that followed were generally ordinary prayers like ‘and keep me from wavering’ or ‘shine glory on your path ahead,’ but today was different.
“And please keep the child from… seeking me out.”
Leila, who had been quietly bowing her head at the woman’s prayer, was startled and inadvertently glanced at the woman, but the woman with a desolate appearance kept her mouth firmly shut as if she hadn’t said anything and still only looked at the painting.
The woman’s true feelings, which she wouldn’t have voiced if the Duke were present, were like that. How disgusting she found herself for pretending to search for the child only now at this point, she rather hoped her real child wouldn’t come seeking her.
“…Tell me, Leila. Does this one seem ‘real’?”
“I… didn’t see directly, but the guard seemed to firmly believe that this time it’s really the real one.”
If they resembled each other enough for a complete stranger to notice, the possibility it was her child was high. The woman let out a strange sigh, slowly shook her head, and said:
“Then we must prepare. A very grand welcoming ceremony… No, should it be called a return ceremony?”
“Yes, I’ll tell them to prepare.”
“…If the visitor doesn’t come directly to the castle by tomorrow, go to the inn where they’re staying and invite them directly.”
“Understood.”
All the people of Gillia expected the woman would finally find her child. They thought this time it would really be real, and then finally the woman would smile happily and brightly. Everyone was excited by such expectations and dreamed of a bright future, but the woman herself just stared blankly at herself and the child in the painting with eyes that had no expectation at all.
It wasn’t a worry like ‘this time it won’t be either.’ She was simply trembling. Only fearful of that moment, that someday when she would face her sin.
Rather, may the child not have grown up well, or be frail. May it be a child greedy and unable to see far. May it be a dull and inadequate child who wouldn’t know even after seeing its parents’ faults.
…Then, I could willingly embrace them in my arms rather than as a god.
