Chapter – 07
“Alright, let’s check.”
“Hah. Didn’t I say I would walk here, Young Master?”
“You’re slow, and I’m fast, so I got here like this.”
Leo grumbled as if he didn’t appreciate being dragged by the collar, but he carefully examined Solitaire’s awakened condition.
Only after finishing some conversation and various examinations was Leo finally released from Heinrich’s grasp.
“She doesn’t even look seven years old now. For a child who’s twelve… no, should be thirteen now, to be this small… Above all, nutritional intake seems to be the most important.”
“She is small.”
“If you poke her wrong, she might even break, so don’t bully the fragile child.”
“Bully? What bullying could I possibly do?”
As if he couldn’t trust such a Heinrich, Leo narrowed his eyes and glared at his young master. Heinrich promptly poked Leo right in the eyes, the one who had been acting cheeky since last time.
“Ow.”
“Why are you opening your eyes like that? If you’re done, get out.”
After Leo disappeared, Heinrich turned his body to look at Solitaire. The cool voice and gaze from moments ago were nowhere to be seen.
He approached her very carefully and slowly, as if unsure how to handle this small creature.
“Are you awake now? Earlier, you couldn’t even open your eyes properly. Does it still hurt? If so, I’ll quickly go and drag that guy back…”
“Ah.”
Rather than continuing his words, Solitaire’s mouth opened first. Heinrich hurriedly picked up the water nearby and handed it to her.
As her hands seemed to lack strength and the cup kept slipping, Heinrich, with his own trembling hands, helped her drink.
Once he confirmed she had finished the water, Heinrich hastily took a step back from Solitaire.
“He said you need to eat a lot. So weak and fragile. Hah, she really looks like she’d break if you hit her anywhere.”
Heinrich roughly ran his hand through his hair in front of her, who was watching him with wide eyes. A slightly complaining mutter came along with it.
In an instant, Solitaire recognized who he was from his sharpened appearance.
The angel who resembled the demon who saved her from the iron bars—no, from that hell—was that boy.
“Ah! Ah… Aah.”
Unable to utter a single proper word, Solitaire hurriedly got down from the bed and knelt on the floor. Shocked by her action, Heinrich hastily picked her up and sat her back on the bed.
“You! What are you doing?”
“I… wanted to thank you…”
One might find it frustrating how Solitaire mumbled and couldn’t speak properly, but Heinrich slowly chewed over her words and understood their meaning exactly.
“What kind of… with your body still unwell? Forget it.”
“Thank you, Young Master.”
Heinrich waved his hand, saying it was fine, but he froze solidly upon her subsequent words and stared at her.
As if she didn’t understand his frozen state, she tilted her head and called him again.
“Young Master?”
“Why… are you calling me that?”
Heinrich looked at Solitaire with a utterly stupid, dumbfounded face. Even though it was natural for her to call him that, Heinrich kept asking as if he couldn’t understand.
“Because you are the Young Master.”
“Just call me by my name…”
“That wouldn’t be right…”
Solitaire, who had been looking straight into Heinrich’s eyes until then, suddenly became frightened and started trembling. It seemed a specific word had acted as a trigger for her fear.
“If it’s wrong… it must be corrected. I hate it…”
The word ‘wrong’ held a very significant meaning for Solitaire.
She remembered the maids who would say, ‘You’re being hit because you’re wrong,’ whenever they found her annoying, and her mother who said, ‘Your very existence is wrong,’ making it seem natural to be treated as worthless.
Seeing Solitaire soaked in fear, Heinrich soon raised his hands in surrender.
When Heinrich raised both hands, Solitaire naturally thought a hand would come flying at her. She flinched in anticipatory fear, but instead of a stinging pain, a warm voice reached her.
“I don’t get it either. Call me whatever you’re comfortable with.”
At the calm and quiet voice, Solitaire raised her head and met his eyes. The him she met smiled very brightly. Then, as if boasting, his eyes sparkled as he said.
*There’s no one here who will bully you.*
“There are no of those bug-like Lepus beastmen here, so don’t even worry.”
Then, as if a memory from that place suddenly surfaced, Heinrich scrunched his nose. Solitaire, who had been quietly watching his actions, tried to scrunch her nose too.
Seeing that, Heinrich let out a short laugh and admonished her.
“Don’t copy me.”
“Yes.”
Even as she heard that, Solitaire smiled happily for some reason.
Heinrich, seeing that smile head-on, froze solid on the spot.
She was clearly skin and bones, nothing but a pitiful figure, yet behind her, flowers were scattering abundantly.
*Even though it’s winter right now.*
Perhaps finding the dazed Heinrich strange, Solitaire tilted her head and looked at him. Only then did he snap out of it and began giving instructions one by one.
“You heard what Leo said earlier, right? To get healthy, you need to eat meals and exercise. Eat meals with me; I need to see if you’re a picky eater. And exercise with me too. I’ll watch over everything. And also, if you’re curious about anything, ask. I’ll tell you.”
Heinrich had no awareness that he was using up a year’s worth of words right here. Solitaire simply nodded her head without much reaction.
Feeling frustrated by that, Heinrich asked first if she had any questions, but she only shook her head, not opening her mouth. Seeing that, Heinrich felt something welling up in his chest, and he let out a short laugh as he looked at her.
“It’s the first time. A beastman who has no interest in me.”
As if finding it both absurd and ridiculous, he muttered, a laugh not disappearing from the corner of his mouth.
Heinrich then neatly clapped his hands and smiled brightly.
“Fine. You can ask later when you become curious, right?”
Solitaire had no interest in him, but Heinrich was quite interested.
He wanted to ask everything, to find out what was going on in that small head, but afraid she might run away, he carefully chose his words and asked what he most wanted to know.
The thing he couldn’t figure out no matter how hard he tried.
“What’s your name?”
At that question, Solitaire’s pupils shook.
She seemed to be pondering whether she dared to utter these words. As if noticing her hesitation, Heinrich didn’t rush her, but just blinked and waited.
After moving her lips for a long while, Solitaire finally managed to say her name, all five syllables.
“Solitaire… it is.”
Hearing that, Heinrich rolled the name on his tongue, pronouncing it. As the name that never left her lips came out, Solitaire, as if accustomed to it, said to Heinrich.
“The name is long and inconvenient, so you can just call me ‘this’ or ‘that’.”
Displeased by her words, Heinrich frowned and called Solitaire.
He looked like he had a lot to say.
“Solitaire?”
At his call, Solitaire felt as if the world had stopped and stared at him blankly.
Misinterpreting her expression as being due to his annoyance, Heinrich was about to apologize when tears began to fall, drip, drip, from Solitaire’s eyes.
“Huh…?”
“Hey! You, why.”
The flustered Heinrich clumsily fumbled over Solitaire’s face.
“Hey. Hey? Solitaire! Did I do something wrong? Don’t cry. Huh? Why are you crying?”
Her name, which had always been torn apart and treated as worthless, was called warmly for the first time in her life. A sea flowed endlessly from her large green pupils.
Solitaire cried pitifully. She tried her best to hold back the tears from escaping, biting her lip hard. Her lips, congested with blood, and her grinding teeth looked quite pitiful.
“Just cry loudly, open your mouth. If you bite down that hard, your teeth will get damaged? No, you shouldn’t bite your lips either. I don’t want to see them burst. If you really need to bite something.”
Heinrich looked at his own finger, then stretched it out towards her.
“Bite this.”
It was an awkward consolation. Words that a third party might not even recognize as comfort. As if he himself knew it was strange, his ears were turning red. But Solitaire, who had never received any comfort in her life, even found that joyful, and opened her mouth, bawling as she burst into tears.
The sadness of a child who had never known warmth combined with his consolation, becoming a large droplet that overwhelmed Solitaire.
“Hic…”
“It’s okay, cry louder.”
Once the tears started, they flowed incessantly.
How long did she cry? Around the time the bright sun was setting, Solitaire stopped crying. Thanks to the tremendous thunderous sound emanating from her stomach.
Hearing the gurgling sound, Heinrich laughed uproariously, enough to shake the room. Seeing that, Solitaire also burst into a bashful laugh.
At that moment, wind blew through the crack of the opened window.
Heinrich’s hair fluttered in the wind, and as if annoyed, he swept it back and asked her.
“Shall we eat now?”
