TRHK Chapter 9

I hadn't expected Maylin to have a father.

Having the same face, the same voice, the same body—I'd been unconsciously collapsing us into one person without realizing it. The original Maylin and the me from my previous life, folded together until the seams disappeared.

The man who called himself Maylin's father had been warm enough when he spotted me at the castle gate. It was only when we moved somewhere without witnesses that he showed what he actually was.

"You ungrateful wretch!"

"......"

"A castle maid now, are you, and you think you can look down on me? That's my doing! Did you think you could get anywhere without me?"

He didn't wait for any response before the words came pouring out, rapid and practiced. The grey-streaked man's face held faint traces of mine—or Maylin's—but honestly not enough to be striking. The original Maylin, and probably me in my previous life too, must have taken after her mother.

...Wait. Did that mean her mother was still alive?

"How much do you think I sacrificed to raise you, and you dare ignore my letters?"

Letters. What letters? I hadn't received a single letter since waking up in this body. Did that mean they'd arrived before I arrived?

"Enough."

He settled, after a long while. I still hadn't managed a single word—partly from fear of giving myself away, and partly because I genuinely didn't know what you were supposed to say to someone doing this.

Maylin's father held out his hand.

"You've brought money, haven't you? You've had time to save up by now."

...What money?

I stared blankly at that outstretched hand. The man's face shifted back to something ugly.

"Well? Hand it over!"

I fumbled through my pockets. Fortunately, I had a little coin on me—the walking-around money I carried for errands. When I held it out, he snatched it away.

"Why is this all you have?"

His sharp eyes moved between the coins and my face. I hesitated, then opened my mouth.

"This is... all I had on me..."

"Stupid girl."

But the money seemed to have done something, at least. His voice had come down a register.

"If you ignore my letters one more time, I won't let it go. Don't think I can't get inside that castle. I'll walk right in and break both your legs and marry you off to the first man I find!"

I considered the question seriously. Was this man really Maylin's father, or had there been some kind of mistake—each of us looking for someone else?

He tucked the money carefully into his pocket and asked, almost as an afterthought:

"Have you spotted anyone worth getting close to?"

"...Pardon?"

"Oh, for—honestly! Haven't I told you this over and over? You're in the castle now, so make yourself useful and get close to the wealthy ones. The Count—he hasn't taken an interest?"

At the word Count, the memory surfaced uninvited: that gaze in the noblewoman's chambers, moving over me from head to toe. Goosebumps prickled up the back of my neck. The man delivered his warning in the same tone one might use for a perfectly ordinary piece of advice.

"Remember this. Maylin. You cannot thrive while abandoning me. It will not happen."

The one mercy was that he turned and left immediately after, walking back out through the castle gate.

"......"

He knew my name. He knew I was a castle maid. Whatever was wrong with everything he'd said, I couldn't honestly deny that he was Maylin's father.

It would have been better to have no one, like me. I felt a pang of genuine sorrow for the original Maylin. Was it because of a father like that—that she'd wanted so badly to marry Joel Courtner? But she hadn't become part of the Count's household in the end. She'd been killed, her body floating down a river. If I couldn't change what was coming, I would—

I exhaled slowly and turned back the way I'd come.

"La—la—la—Lady."

Seyron, after some time apart. He started forward gladly enough, then seemed to catch something wrong in his own breathing and faltered.

Good timing.

"Would you like to drink this? It should help with the tension."

I'd made it from one of the herbs I'd gathered in the forest. The moment I'd found that particular plant, I'd thought of him.

"Wh—what is th—heuhk—at?"

"Water with an herbal powder mixed in. It won't do you any harm."

Which made it sound, the moment the words left my mouth, as though it would. I made a mental note about my complete lack of a way with words, and took a step toward him. Seyron took a step back.

"......"

I took another step. He took another step back.

"Don't run away."

"I—it's not that I'm d—doing this on p-purpose... kreuhk!"

I walked toward him quickly and he bolted. Flat-out ran, as though I were something that needed to be fled from. Any other day I would have let him go, but today there was the medicine to deliver, so I couldn't.

I ran after him.

"Stop right there!"

"Heuk! Lady! Why are you—why are you chasing me—!"

He shouted the question without slowing his legs even slightly. Something stubborn woke up in me. Today. Today I was going to catch this man.

"I said stop!"

Seyron ran into the training grounds. I followed without thinking, then caught myself and looked around.

No sign of Knight Commander Landale. No other knights visible. There was someone standing off to one side—one person—

Hm.

"Eeagk!"

Seyron, sprinting at considerable speed, suddenly pitched forward and went down. I slowed, and looked at the man standing beside where Seyron had fallen.

"Kahron! You just tripped me!"

Seyron pulled a face and accused. Kahron responded with something approaching indifference.

"Did I?"

"You—!"

I seized the opportunity. I crossed to Seyron and brought the water bottle to his lips while he was still down.

Seyron flinched away from the sudden intrusion, then spotted me and went rigid. Which made things considerably easier. Gulp, gulp. Half went down his throat. The other half ran off his chin.

What a waste.

"Drink a mouthful or two of this regularly. It should ease the tension."

I smiled when I said it, and Seyron, face gone red, gave a small nod.

Task complete. I brushed off my skirt and stood. Kahron was watching me with an expression I couldn't identify.

"...What?"

Had I done something to irritate him? But what? Whatever I'd done, I'd done it to Seyron, not to him. I asked, genuinely puzzled. Kahron walked past me without answering.

"Wait—I'll be going, then."

I said a quick farewell to Seyron and followed. I had things to discuss with Kahron anyway. I fell into step beside him—lean and solid up close, an impression that didn't help—and lowered my voice.

"When are we meeting?"

"Why would I meet with you?"

The flat question hit like a betrayal.

"You promised!"

I caught my own volume and corrected immediately.

"You said you'd come to the forest with me... I need to collect those herbs."

"Did I?"

"Don't pretend you've forgotten."

Kahron, apparently, possessed a gift for looking completely placid while thoroughly dismantling everyone around him. I couldn't tell whether he was doing it deliberately because he knew I went blank every time I looked at him, or whether it was simply his nature. Somehow his nature being the explanation was worse.

This was too important to let his face derail me. I reached out with both hands and stopped him by the arm. That was when he actually looked at me, and I resented it a little.

"The herbs might not even be in the forest. If they're not, we'll have to search elsewhere—we need to move quickly."

My first plan was the forest; if that failed, I was willing to use the 'dark auction house'—the black market. The one mentioned in the original novel was an underground auction that ran on a fixed schedule, open to anyone who knew the location regardless of rank. I was genuinely relieved I'd remembered that detail.

"This is for your benefit."

The Madness was progressing even now, and here he was being stubborn. Or perhaps he still didn't trust me.

Kahron detached my hands from his arm with no particular effort.

"Get the words right."

"......"

"It's not for my benefit. It's for yours."

And then he smiled—that particular smile, the one that belonged to someone who found people faintly contemptible. Even with that, the angle of his mouth managed to demand attention whether you wanted to give it or not.

"Isn't it? Maylin."

He tapped his index finger against my forehead—a single light push—and walked on.

...Did he just call me by my name?

Everything that had come before the name vanished from my head entirely. Maylin. Maylin. Maylin. It wasn't the first time anyone had used my name—not even close—but when Kahron said it, the effect was disproportionate in a way I couldn't account for.

I stood there pressing one hand absently against my chest, where my heartbeat had gone strange and quick, and then a thought arrived with sudden urgency and I called after him:

"So when are you going to come with me?"

"Huff... huff..."

I really did need to do something about this stamina. My legs were trembling as though auditioning for a performance I hadn't consented to, and every time I caught a glimpse of Kahron walking ahead without apparent difficulty, I wanted to disappear into the undergrowth from sheer embarrassment.

But I had to endure. I had worked so hard to get him here.

The memory of every failed approach, every pursuit, every conversation that went nowhere—all the time I'd spent following Kahron around trying to persuade him—surfaced briefly. Hwirozen had started looking at me with something very close to pity by the end of it. If my body wouldn't cooperate, then stubbornness would have to carry me.

"Isn't this what you described?"

Kahron, who had been examining the undergrowth with the attention of someone who found it marginally interesting, pointed at something with his index finger. I dragged my uncooperative legs over and looked at what he was indicating. The shape of those jagged leaves. The color.

One of the herbs we'd been looking for. Definitely.

"It is!"

Two hours of walking for this one find. The happiness that came out of me was perhaps excessive given the circumstances.

"Good work, Kahron!"

"......"

He gave me a look I couldn't quite classify.