Chapter 45………………………………………….
“…Yes. I am worried. Who was it?”
Still pressing a hand to my throbbing forehead, I slowly lifted my head from his arms.
Enrique’s red gaze was still fixed on me from above.
“Who did that to you?”
As if waiting for me to blink, silence briefly settled between us.
Then he slowly lowered his head toward my shoulder.
He had to do more than just bow—he rounded his back and curled his tall body inward.
Honestly, for someone who had to bend that much, trying to press his cheek against the shoulder of someone much smaller looked rather pitiful.
But I didn’t avoid him.
It felt as though he craved warmth—or perhaps wanted to hide his expression. So I simply accepted it.
I wasn’t cold-blooded enough to ignore someone’s wounds after seeing them up close.
A soft rustling sound followed. The clothes he had yet to fully put on crumpled between our bodies.
In a voice that sounded like a murmur, Enrique asked,
“Teacher, would you like to have a cup of tea before you go?”
He had held me like this once before.
“……”
Back then, I had nearly died.
I raised my head briefly to steady my breathing.
The ceiling of the dim room caught my eye.
It was high, adorned with lavish decorations and a painted mural.
But though the ceiling was vast and grand, the candlelight was pitifully small, too weak to properly illuminate the faint painting.
No matter how beautiful a masterpiece might be, if there isn’t enough light to shine upon it, no one will see it.
Just like Enrique now.
“…Yes. I suppose I should.”
So I nodded.
After sending away the carriage that had been waiting for me, I sat on the sofa in the room where Enrique had been standing.
Only after roughly throwing on his clothes himself did Enrique ring the bell. Then, a servant who had been nowhere to be found earlier appeared at once.
He ordered tea, closed the door, and came to sit beside me—perching on a chair next to the sofa.
The chair creaked under his weight.
“I’ve always wondered. Do you not have attendants help you dress?”
“I don’t wear a cravat—it feels suffocating. If I don’t wear one, I don’t need help.”
“So it’s not that you don’t want servants to see your body?”
“That too.”
I recalled the countless scars crossing his body and squeezed my eyes shut.
Placing my hands together on my knees, I spoke quietly.
“…First, I apologize.”
“You? For what?”
“I thought it was the classroom. I’d left my materials behind and only meant to retrieve them quickly. If I had known Your Highness was inside, I would have knocked.”
“Ah. You did leave your materials. I had Dietrich deliver them to Crimson Estate.”
“…Thank you.”
He made the knight commander do that?
More importantly—
I slowly raised my head and asked,
“…So who was it, really?”
Click.
The servant carefully entered and placed two cups of tea on the table. It had already been brewed.
Darjeeling.
I used to drink it often—for the caffeine.
Only after the servant left did Enrique wrap his hand around his teacup and speak.
“If I tell you not to concern yourself with my past… would you do so?”
What?
“What teacher could possibly ignore something like that—after seeing it?”
Emotion slipped into my voice before I could stop it.
At my sharp words, his expression vanished for a moment.
“……”
It was perfect emptiness. Candlelight flickered across his sculpted face like shadows over a statue. After a long pause, his lips parted.
“I see.”
Clink.
He lifted the teacup. His thick Adam’s apple bobbed once. But when he set the cup down, not a drop had been drunk.
He smiled coldly.
“They’re all wounds given by my teacher.”
“…Your teacher?”
My body stiffened. I almost hoped he wouldn’t nod.
But he did.
“Yes. Before Lillian Crimson… my swordsmanship master.”
There was still so much I didn’t know about Enrique.
“…Your swordsmanship master?”
He murmured calmly.
“We spent my childhood together. From how to hold a sword, to cutting straw bundles, to chopping wood… and eventually, how to cut down people. He taught me everything.”
As he spoke, he stretched a hand toward the armrest of the sofa where I sat.
“When I was exiled, the Epsilon Knights accompanied me. He was their commander, so naturally he came as well.”
“……”
The Epsilon Knights’ commander? That’s Dietrich Carlson.
“He had a newborn son. After following me into exile, he desperately wanted to return to the Empire. So… he trained me to escape exile as quickly as possible.”
But Dietrich Carlson had never even married, let alone had a son.
He was speaking of someone I did not know.
After a brief pause, Enrique asked slowly,
“These are the marks of that training.”
His massive frame leaned closer, casting a shadow over my face.
Without realizing it, I had clenched my hands into fists atop my knees.
Still, I met his gaze and asked quietly,
“…What kind of trash method was it?”
“……”
His dark red eyes flowed over me like blood.
After a brief silence, he spoke.
“For every knight who died in battle that day, he carved a scar with a blade.”
He slowly removed his shirt again.
“For every enemy I failed to kill that day, he lashed me.”
The crumpled fabric fell away, revealing once more the scars I had glimpsed before.
There were almost none that looked like battle wounds.
Every mark was inflicted deliberately—wounds meant solely to cause pain, dealt to someone who did not resist.
“If I failed to win and had to retreat, I was denied water and food until the next battle. No sleep either. If I did sleep, a fist would come immediately.”
He spoke languidly, watching my face pressed close to his body. Even knowing he was studying my reaction, I couldn’t hide my emotion. I bit my lip hard.
“But when I killed everything—perfectly, completely—when I seized flawless victory, my teacher seemed pleased.”
“…Pleased?”
For doing this to a child—and taking pride in the result?
Enrique nodded as if it were obvious.
“He said it was the only way to return to the Imperial Palace. To quell His Majesty’s anger, I had to become someone so threatening and cruel that His Majesty would not even dare show his fury.”
His voice remained calm.
“He said I had that potential.”
“……”
“My madness was something everyone already knew.”
That path would dry a person out completely.
It was a road that cut off all possibilities and urged one toward insanity.
“That was the ‘teacher’ I knew. But you…”
He murmured,
“You worry about me. Strangely.”
No. I am not unusual.
The one he spoke of simply didn’t deserve to be called a teacher.
I picked up his clothes from the sofa and handed them to him, finally voicing what I had been holding back.
“…Where is he now?”
I couldn’t forgive it.
Even if I was only a count’s daughter with little power.
Dietrich Carlson was the current commander of the Epsilon Knights.
That man might have retired somewhere—perhaps still teaching knights in the same way.
At the very least, I wanted to stop that.
“……”
Enrique fell silent for a moment at my question. Then, gripping the shirt I handed him, he said,
“He’s dead.”
“…What?”
I couldn’t help asking blankly.
Speaking slowly, Enrique pulled the shirt back on, hiding his scarred body beneath the fabric once more.
“When was it? The third campaign against the rebels, perhaps. He rode toward a cliff. The horse stopped abruptly, and he fell to his death. The horse lived. The man died. A rather ridiculous end for a knight.”
He smiled faintly while fastening the buttons.
“After that, I carried on his will. I annihilated the rebels, ended the long war, and returned from exile after five long years.”
A knight commander dying like that?
It was so contrived it bordered on unnatural.
“……”
When I frowned at the story, Enrique let out a hollow laugh.
“Ha, ahaha.”
He didn’t stop. The twisted curve of his lips now looked almost natural.
“Hahaha. Ha….”
Only after a long while did he finally stop laughing.
His pale cheeks were flushed from it.
And because of that, his next words sounded almost like a confession.
“No. You’re right, Teacher. What you’re thinking is correct.”
He met my eyes.
“In truth, I killed him.”
