I never expected my mother, who had always been tight-lipped about the affairs between husband and wife, to suddenly intervene—and in such an extreme manner.
But I had no intention of moving according to her wishes.
“Mother, I will handle matters regarding Freya myself.”
Taken aback by her son’s response, which differed from her expectations, Mathilde hurriedly continued.
“W-well. Of course, you would handle it well, as you always do. But still… that child is….”
“Mother.”
Max looked at Mathilde expressionlessly, as she remained unable to let go of her stubborn insistence despite his firm stance. Realizing her mistake, Mathilde averted her gaze and quickly stood up.
“Very well, I understand. I have taken too much of your time.”
As his mother left the office as if fleeing, Max pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, leaning his head against the back of the sofa. Committing his own wife to an asylum.
Suddenly, he recalled the woman’s face on their wedding day, smiling so brightly as if she held the entire world in her hands.
Perhaps, ever since that day, her life had plummeted toward misery like a stone rolling off a cliff.
If ignorance is also a sin, then his wife had surely paid for it by waking from the delusion she had cherished for half her life the moment she married him.
So, it was time for them to go their separate ways.
After closing his eyes for a moment to rest against the sofa, Max stood up slowly and exited his office.
“Do you have any orders?”
He bumped into the butler before walking very far.
“Lorenzo, where is Freya right now?”
“She is likely in the library. Shall I tell her you are looking for her?”
“No, I will go myself.”
Since moving to the current mansion—befitting the status of someone who married the sole heir of the Blanc Ducal Family—Max had not once stepped foot in the library. Perhaps his mother, who had no connection to refined hobbies like reading, hadn’t either.
The library was in a corner on the first floor.
At sunset, the shadow of the sofa stretched out to the tips of his feet as he stood at the entrance. Freya was buried in the cushions, reading a book.
The woman, who usually boasted colors so intense they strained the eyes, was wearing only a robe over a simple ivory dress today.
*Rustle.* As her long, elegant fingers moved, the sound of turning pages permeated the air.
His gaze, long accustomed to the stimuli she provided—the peacock-like outfits that ignored time and place, her resentment, her pleas, her fits—remained fixed on this unexpected sight, as if caught.
The red sunset shimmered on her fine hair as if reflected in a flowing river. Her large emerald eyes, set in a face freed from heavy makeup, were half-hidden beneath long lashes.
Bathed in the soft light, the woman reminded him of a painter’s work that had once caused a stir for capturing the lives of peasants on canvas.
She was not a farm wife, this was not a vast wheat field, and her life was as far removed from a peasant’s as could be… yet.
It was a peaceful scene that made the last two years, which felt like a small boat on a stormy sea, seem like a dream.
Perhaps that was why a faded moment from his memory suddenly surfaced.
The moment he had encountered a young girl surrounded by the smell of old books in the castle library during his own birthday party.
Though most seemed to have forgotten, people once called Freya Blanc by this name.
The White (Blanc) Saffron.
The most expensive, the rarest, and the most difficult flower in the Blanc family to cultivate. That was Freya.
Thinking back now, that birthday party must have been a venue to pick a playmate for the lonely young lady.
“The young lady is nowhere to be seen. Go and find where she is.”
The moment his father pushed him, other adults nearby began eyeing him, eagerly giving the same command to their own children. The party instantly turned into a competition of “Finding the Young Lady.”
Naturally, no one blamed the guest of honor for the rudeness of disappearing without a word.
Dressed-up little gentlemen and ladies turned into neighborhood kids on an Easter egg hunt, scouring the entire castle in search of Freya Blanc.
Under the Patriarch’s tacit approval, the children roamed rooms they would never have otherwise entered: the young lady’s bedroom, playroom, and parlor.
Watching the children of noble and bourgeois families search for her with sparkling eyes, Max had vaguely thought: Perhaps she hid away because she hated this.
“You, you’re the steel mill owner’s son, right?”
It was when he was having that very thought that a group of children approached him. The boy who spoke to him was a familiar face.
Hadn’t they said he was the eldest son of an Erle Tristan? Perhaps his name was….
“I am Erle Tristan. If you don’t have anyone to hang out with, why don’t you join us?”
Behind the boy who introduced himself as Erle Tristan stood two girls who were blushing and glancing at Max, and two boys who looked like they didn’t particularly like this situation.
It was a situation he had faced often. Whether it was women wanting to associate with him, or men—adults and children alike—trying to associate with him to win favor with those women.
Suddenly, his father’s advice flashed through his mind: The Erle Tristan has a chronic illness, so the young eldest son will likely inherit the title within ten years; make sure to get on his good side.
Max put on a smile befitting noble etiquette and said,
“I appreciate the offer, but I already have company.”
“What? That’s impossible. I’ve been watching you for a while… Hey, where are you going!”
I apologize to the future Erle Tristan and his father, but a strange urge arose in me not to encounter the young lady while being with them.
Recalling the image of the young lady who looked like an exquisitely crafted porcelain doll, Max distanced himself from Tristan’s group.
After that, he wandered the castle as if taking a stroll, with no real intention of finding her. As he moved toward places with fewer and fewer people, he eventually found himself in front of a large door.
The door was ajar, leaving a gap just wide enough for a child’s foot to slip through.
Max pushed the door open with both hands without much expectation. Stepping inside, he saw a young girl sitting all alone in the space packed with books.
The child was buried in a single-seat sofa much larger than herself, reading a book, completely unaware that people were turning the castle upside down looking for her.
“I told you not to come in unless Father is looking for me.”
The words the young lady uttered without even looking up from the entrance were cold and indifferent, as if covered in frost.
Max chuckled at the tone, which sounded like the most difficult flower to cultivate.
“Everyone is out looking for you.”
Ignoring the noble etiquette he’d heard enough of to make his ears ache, as well as the caution required when speaking to the young lady, Max approached her.
Perhaps due to the arrival of someone unexpected, or perhaps because of his rude attitude, the young lady—who hadn’t even glanced his way until now—opened her eyes wide and stared at him.
Dressed in a pale blue dress that matched her large turquoise eyes, the young lady looked remarkably like an elaborate porcelain doll, or perhaps a fairy from the storybooks that came over from Derland.
“It is not true that everyone is looking for only me.”
He expected to be chased away for his rudeness. But contrary to his expectations, the young lady returned to her original, indifferent face and proceeded to correct his statement.
“The servants already know where I am. And Father, too, probably.”
The young lady pursed her small lips as if to add something, then cast her eyes downward to the book she was holding.
On the open page, a princess with long, golden hair cascading from a high tower window was drawn, along with a witch climbing the tower by grabbing that hair.
Max, hiding in the library that no one visited, looked down at the young lady reading a fairy tale about a prince saving a princess trapped in a tower, and impulsively reached out his hand.
“What are you doing?”
The young lady frowned, staring at his outstretched hand.
“You want to be alone, don’t you? If you stay here, others will come looking for you soon. Let’s go, I’ll take you somewhere no one can find you.”
“If I want to be alone as you say, then my wish is not being fulfilled by going with you, is it?”
What she said was true, but Max didn’t care at all.
“Even so, you’re coming with me.”
“Why?”
In the eyes of the young lady who asked that, curiosity and a vague expectation she couldn’t hide were reflected. Max bowed politely, as if mimicking the prince in the fairy tale she was reading, and answered.
“Because I am the person who will take you, the young lady, away from this place.”