PDCOO Chapter 8

"Call me when you get the cleaver out. Anna's my daughter too."

"Would our daughter ever be interested in your son?"

"Dieter works so hard to impress Anna! Just you wait—I'm going to have her as my daughter-in-law."

Collie laughed, bright and full, and left. Karlah let out a small sigh.

"His mother has that much nerve. So why is the boy so spineless?"

If Dieter had just a little more backbone, she'd have married Anna off to him already.

Meanwhile, Anna, with no idea that her mother was wearing herself to a thread with worry, was wiping tears and mucus and sorting through the seasonings.

Cough, cough! Uhh……

"Anna, please step outside and give me verbal instructions. I'll handle the organizing."

"But if I leave it to you, who knows what century it'll be done."

It had seemed like a fine idea to ask Bertram to mince the onions, garlic, peppers, and assorted other seasonings. The problem was that Bertram didn't yet know the storage methods.

"Watch and learn! The minced onion goes in that container there. The sliced onion we'll soak in water."

"Noted."

"And the minced garlic goes…… hnn……."

The tears were running freely now. She was in danger of weeping directly into the seasoning container.

But before that—a more immediate threat.

His seasoning-covered hands, reaching out to wipe her tears.

Anna lurched backward.

"Yikes! Are you trying to blind me? If that touches my eyes, I'll actually go blind!"

"Ah, I apologize. I'll wash my hands."

"Even washed, some of it lingers. Don't touch me for a while."

"How long should I not touch you?"

"At least four hours…… No, don't touch me at all! What am I saying!"

Anna swatted her own absurdity briskly away.

Something about being around this man produced a continuous stream of accidental nonsense.

Because whatever she said came back to her in that same flat expression, she had no opportunity to consider what her own words actually meant before they escaped.

'Setting conversation aside entirely—has he ever once thought about what his face does to people.'

Anna found herself suddenly curious.

"Do you ever look in a mirror?"

"Every day, for shaving. I was once mistaken for a mountain creature when I skipped it."

"Ahaha! That's believable. You know, you're surprisingly good at conversation, which is strange given that talking to you feels like corresponding with a wall."

"I practiced. In the past, even this much was difficult."

"The past?"

Bertram glanced around to confirm Karlah was elsewhere, then said:

"……When I was at the front."

"……Bertram. What were you, exactly? A deserter?"

"No. I fought at the front longer than most. I'm simply a debtor now."

"And when the debt's paid, what then?"

"I'll go home."

"Where's home?"

"The capital."

"Doesn't your family worry that you haven't come back?"

"My close family are all dead. The uncle I have left finds me inconvenient."

The conversation, maintained by sheer effort, dropped off a small cliff.

When Anna fell silent, Bertram added:

"You haven't been rude. Please don't feel sorry. I have no emotions."

"……Even so, I can't help but feel rude."

"Without emotions, this is uncomfortable. It's difficult to predict and avoid other people's negative feelings."

That "uncomfortable" wasn't his feeling, either—

Just a descriptor for the situation.

His expression, as he finished organizing the last of the seasonings, was entirely matter-of-fact.

Anna sighed and put away the remaining bowls. What was there to say now. Sitting in silence went against her nature, and yet!

At that moment a village man came in as a lunch customer.

Anna leapt out to meet him.

"Welcome! What can I get you?"

"Well, now. I don't think I've ever seen Anna look glad to see me. Give me whatever for lunch. Say—is that the one who caused all that fuss yesterday?"

The man glanced sideways into the kitchen, then grinned.

"What were you two up to last night?"

"W-we just shared some onion porridge because he hadn't eaten! That's what I always do, what's strange about it!"

"But he's good-looking."

"……Is he?"

Anna glanced back into the kitchen.

With the cloak off, you could actually see his jaw and his shoulders, which were considerably more visible than before……

Belatedly, Anna realized what the problem was.

"He's too tall for me to see his face properly."

"Ha! Forgive me. I was trying to put a cicada and a tall oak together. Anyway, since you've gone to the trouble of finding a handsome one, might as well enjoy it while you can."

"How does one enjoy a tall oak!"

"Then for a real husband, marry someone steady like Dieter."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Got to play with the pretty faces while you're young, so you don't regret it later. Nothing beats a hometown man in the end."

The man's expression had gone entirely serious at some point. Anna manufactured a smile, took the order, and turned away. She'd have been better off back in that awkward kitchen silence than listening to marriage advice.

But as she started back, she nearly screamed. Bertram was changing his shirt. Karlah must have brought him a dry one while she wasn't looking.

With his face hidden by the shirt, the tightly woven muscles moved underneath his skin with each small motion, as though alive. Anna tried to turn her flushed face away—but at that moment, something caught her eye.

There, at the center of his chest, a blue jewel was glowing.

The color of the ocean kept in a bottle. Occasionally, from somewhere below it, a red light like molten rock surfaced and rippled……

Then Bertram's head emerged from the shirt, and Anna became a person with a great deal of interest in the restaurant ceiling.

Bertram was a good worker.

He learned quickly and handled fire with competence. Even Karlah had the look of someone weighing whether to hire him properly.

That night, Karlah allowed Bertram to sleep in the restaurant.

His bed was a thick blanket beside the hearth, while it still held warmth. The most hospitality one could offer an unknown guest.

Of course, it was also a precaution against the unannounced visitor having unannounced intentions. If he tried to steal, the soot on the floor would do a fine job of tracking where his shoes had been.

Karlah, praying for an uneventful night, fell asleep first.

The moment Anna confirmed her mother was asleep, she slipped quietly out the front door.

'I wonder if Bertram sleeps.'

A person so unlike a person—she half expected to find him sitting awake, still and expressionless in the dark. Like a golem from the old stories, or one of those automaton figures they sold in cities.

Eyes open and watching wouldn't surprise her at all.

Anna crept across the courtyard and peered into the restaurant kitchen.

'He sleeps like a person…….'

Bertram was lying on his back, in good form, fast asleep.

Now at last she could look at his face without craning her neck.

The man from the village had been right.

'He really is handsome.'

The moonlight caught in his black hair moved like a night tide as he breathed, dark waves and then lighter ones. Beneath it: skin white as sand. At a glance, a hard impression. But the lashes that fanned out from those firmly closed eyelids traced a rather fine arc, and that arc sat oddly well against the sharpness of his nose.

Above all, with his mouth shut, there was nothing to deduct points for.

'Just needs feeding up.'

The gaze that had lingered on his face, once it confirmed that Bertram showed no sign of waking, began to drift downward.

A shirt with one button undone at the collar.

Half a handspan below the collarbone, a blue jewel glowed.

'So what I saw earlier was real. But—it looks like it's embedded in the flesh?'

Too embedded to be a necklace—there was no chain at the throat. It was genuinely sunk into Bertram's chest, half-submerged.

Anna, out of pure curiosity, reached out and stroked the surface of the jewel.

The moment she did, Bertram's hand shot out and gripped her wrist.

'Hiik—ow, ow!'

The grip was tremendous. Anna thought, with sudden clarity, that if he mistook her for a thief she might actually have her wrist broken. This was the man who had shattered a wolf's ribs. That wouldn't be difficult at all.

But then, eyes still closed, brow furrowed, Bertram's lips opened, and what came out was something she could not have imagined.

"Please don't……. Please……. I'm afraid……."

Anna questioned her own ears.

The pitch and weight were the same—that low, unhurried voice—but it was trembling like a boy cornered by something he couldn't fight.

Anna cried out without thinking.

"I'm sorry! But I didn't have any wicked intentions! I swear!"

Bertram, however, did not answer.

Anna slowly opened one eye.

"Bertram?"

"Mm……"

Bertram released her wrist, rolled onto his side, and was quiet. The jewel embedded in his chest disappeared into the shadow of his shirt.

His breathing smoothed out.

"W-what on earth!"

There was no one to answer. He had already gone back to wherever dreams take people. Anna looked down at her arm. On the rough skin, a red mark in the shape of his grip.

'I thought my bones were done for. Granted, I started it.'

But what had that been, that sleep-talking?

Flat as his voice had been, that sentence had sounded—somehow, unmistakably—like something frightened.

……Not an emotion that suited Bertram.

She got that far, then shook her head.

Even someone this large and strong must have things they feared in the dark. And he was a man who had lived through a war.

'What would keep Bertram from having nightmares.'

Anna looked down at the great sprawl of him—and noticed that his feet were sticking out from the blanket.

'Cold feet might bring bad dreams.'

Anna went and found a spare apron and tucked it carefully around his large feet.

When she stepped back and looked, they appeared to be wearing a pair of red floral-patterned boots. Anna found this unexpectedly funny and snorted.

The sleep talking that had sounded like a nightmare had stopped, at any rate. Only one thing left to say.

"Sweet dreams, Bertram."

Walk in flowers.