PDCOO Chapter 34

Beautifully polished, entirely transparent nonsense that amounted to: feed me by hand.

The vein in Karlah's neck made itself known.

Anna, meanwhile, stared at Franz with blank eyes. Her head had been occupied with worry about Bertram since morning, and she couldn't locate the man's intentions anywhere in there.

She said the first thing that came to mind.

"If you can't manage a spoon, you could simply drink it."

"……I beg your pardon?"

"Correct."

That was Karlah. She was already gathering the dishes around her, ladle in hand, smiling.

"I'll mix it all together nicely for you."

A generous blend of everything on the table appeared in front of Franz in approximately no time. Hot dishes combined with cold ones, steaming in configurations that suggested geography you'd prefer not to visit.

"Here we go. Just open up and slurrrrp!"

"……"

"Anna—go see to the soldiers' sleeping arrangements. I'll clear up here. Now then, Sir Knight. If you don't open your mouth, it'll spill."

"This is NOT a meal!"

Franz ground his teeth.

He'd come here to provoke, and somehow ended up with his own stomach provoked instead.

He was trying to determine which particular injustice to enter his formal complaint against when Karlah beat him to the outrage.

"Not a meal?! We have barely enough for ourselves right now. Do you have any idea how hard I worked on this?"

She proved it by eating a spoonful herself first.

Genuinely not bad, all things considered. The ingredients had been good—they'd used better ones than usual, given the distinguished guests.

The moment Anna left the restaurant, Karlah loaded the ladle to the brim and brought it directly to Franz's lips.

"Allow me to assist you with your meal. You'll need a full belly if you're planning to keep chasing him tomorrow."

"Wait a moment—mph—! gkh—!"

With one arm useless, Franz was no match for Karlah, who had spent years building exactly the arm strength that restaurant work produces.

The soldiers ate their own portions in complete silence.

In great, appreciative silence.

How often did you get to eat supper while watching your commanding officer being fed by a third party against his will. You had to enjoy these moments while they lasted.

Dinner ended. The soldiers retired first. Franz looked down at his shirt, which had acquired several new decorations, and sighed.

"……Madam. I will concede that I was the one who started behaving childishly."

"Shirt laundering, one silber. Leave it at the well if you want it done."

"I won't be staying long enough to need laundry."

Franz took the shirt off, crumpled it in his fist, and walked out.

Karlah watched him go.

"Well," she said, to nobody in particular. "For once we actually agree on something. Please leave. All of you. Quickly."

The second night of their distinguished uninvited guests.

Franz—who had completed the first hand-laundry of his life that evening—and four soldiers, six horses, and eventually Karlah herself had all gone to sleep when—

'……Sorry, Mama.'

Anna took the smoked meat from the pantry without telling Karlah. She intended to grill it for Bertram.

She was somehow entirely certain Bertram would be at the ruins. The way figures in famous paintings always stand in exactly the right place for them.

With a bag of food, she climbed to the ruins halfway up the mountain and called his name into the dark.

"Mr. Bertram. Are you here……?"

The castle, buried under moss and fallen leaves, didn't even permit echoes. Something unsettled turned over in her chest. Anna took a step back—

And something bumped into her from behind.

"Anna?"

Bertram.

"Mr. Bertram, I knew you'd be here! The pursuers are asleep at our restaurant. Have you eaten? Don't tell me you haven't eaten anything?"

"I had something simple."

"You didn't have breakfast."

"No."

"And lunch?"

"Something simple. There were quite a few nuts on the trees—"

"I knew it. Are you a squirrel? Sit down right there and wait!"

Anna unpacked her bag in stages. Bread, nuts, jam—everything you could want. Plus one very substantial piece of smoked meat.

"Isn't that meat for the restaurant?"

"There's a more urgent use for it right now. Oh—if I had a mirror, I would hold it right up in front of you. Do you know your face has become half of what it was?"

She was looking up at Bertram—who was at least three times her size—with genuine worry in her voice.

This made further argument impossible.

A small feast materialized, as if from nothing.

While Anna cooked the meat, Bertram bit into one of the apples she'd brought. Crunch—the sound of it giving way—and Anna's head turned toward him as though she'd pricked up her ears. Humans are creatures who cannot move their own ears, supposedly, but there was no other way to describe the movement. Not knowing what Bertram was thinking, Anna smiled softly anyway, as though she herself were the one tasting the first apple after a very long fast.

By the time Bertram had finished the apple and the bread, and neatly pressed a finger to every last crumb, the smoked meat was done. The knife broke through the crackling skin and rich fat ran freely out. Anna sliced a piece well-soaked through and handed it over with a cup of apple cider.

"Would you like a drink?"

"I can't get drunk. Are you certain you want to spend good cider on someone like that?"

"I've always tried to feed you only good things regardless of whether you can taste them. Besides, the real waste of alcohol was yesterday—I had to force-feed the uninvited guests until they passed out."

"The uninvited guests being—"

"The ones currently occupying our restaurant. The third son of the twelfth ducal house of whatever-it-was, Sir Knight, and assorted others!"

Saying it out loud seemed to reopen the wound. Anna poured herself a cup as well. She already looked drunk before she'd touched a drop.

"The other soldiers aren't bad, actually. But that knight, Franz—I mean, it's not just that he does more than his share of irritating, it's—"

She was halfway through a comprehensive indictment when she glanced sideways at Bertram. The worry arrived suddenly: if she insulted a noble too freely, might he report her for defaming the nobility?

"……Ahem. That is—the handsome knight. Are you close with— Mr. Bertram? It does seem strange, assuming he's not lying, that a duke's son would come all this way just to find one person."

"Ah. Franz Gerhardt concluded an escort contract with me some years ago. We were also childhood friends, so I suppose we are fairly close, in our way."

"A knight of all things asked you to protect him? He must be incompetent in inverse proportion to his looks."

Franz had been misunderstood.

Bertram was significantly stronger, yes, but Franz was hardly an incompetent knight. He offered a silent apology to Franz as a precaution, then offered Anna a defense.

"Sir Franz's swordsmanship is genuinely excellent. The problem is that his conduct resembles an untethered young horse, and someone is required to hold the reins. The Duke requested that I befriend him specifically for that reason."

"Ah, so he really does have a personality problem! I thought there was something off—he kept smiling at every moderately pretty woman in the village. Even smiled at my mother. Said all kinds of worthless nonsense to me as well……"

Bertram silently withdrew the apology.

"I'll need to have a word with Sir Franz soon. A very serious one."

Anna laughed, assuming it was a joke. Bertram was not joking, in several senses.

"Beyond Sir Franz—having armed people stationed in the village indefinitely will unsettle everyone. I'll persuade Sir Franz to leave."

"Persuade him? He came here to catch you! Shouldn't you be running away so he can't even see your face?"

"I had intended to avoid them……. But if they're causing trouble for the villagers—and for you—there's nothing else to be done. I'll meet him directly."

The most important reason Bertram had been avoiding Franz's party: the possibility that they might address him as "Your Highness" in front of witnesses.

Franz had apparently described Bertram's identity vaguely to avoid complications—something like "he's not a criminal"—but in person, who knew what Franz might do in the name of proper etiquette. Getting on his knees in front of the entire village and announcing: Your Highness Bertram! His Majesty is waiting!

He would rather not think about it.

This village already disliked the nobility.

If Franz's party couldn't be avoided forever, it was better to arrange a meeting in advance and simply order them to keep his identity secret.

"Anna. Tomorrow, would you tell Sir Franz to come up here alone? I'll speak with him directly."

"Are you sure? He has a sword! I'll get some liquor into him first before I send him up!"

"That won't be necessary. However."

Bertram paused briefly before speaking.

"If Sir Franz has caused any further trouble for anyone—please tell me. Smiling at women counts as well. Tossing around worthless jokes counts. I'll see to his discipline."

"Ha! Disciplining a fully grown adult?"

"It's possible. Just pass the message along."

"……Right, but, Mr. Bertram."

There was something she wanted to confirm first.

Anna's voice went quiet.

"What if I……said I didn't want to pass it along?"

"Pardon?"

"Mr. Bertram, you're going to leave with them in the end, aren't you. You can't send a ducal heir back empty-handed."

Anna added quickly:

"W-we haven't even finished repaying the debt! The piglet still can't do anything except eat and make a mess. We'd need to raise it a bit longer before you could really call the debt repaid. So—what if Mr. Bertram stayed hidden a while longer……and after the knights leave, worked a little more before going?"

"Sir Franz is not someone to take lightly. That he's shown no sign of leaving after searching the entire village suggests he may already have a lead. I cannot stay hidden forever. And the longer this drags on, the more unsettled the village will become."

"……I suppose so."

Anna dropped her head.

He was right.

Franz had already suspected her once. And the longer his party remained, the more cause the villagers would have to resent Bertram. If it came out that she'd been sheltering him, her own reputation would suffer as well.

But Bertram gave her something she hadn't expected.

"If you send Sir Franz up here tomorrow, I'll ask him to delay our return for a while. Would that be enough?"

Anna's eyes went wide.

"That would actually work?"

"It will."

If a prince says jump, an escort knight jumps. He wasn't refusing to go—just requesting a delay. Making excuses for the timeline was Franz's own problem to manage.