Nox knew exactly what she had meant.
Half of Nox’s blood came from his filthy father. The other half came from his pure mother. Foolish, but not stupid. That was one of Nox’s misfortunes.
“…Move Khalid to my room.”
“But…”
Her Grace ordered that he be thrown out. Maeta’s worried voice reached him. Nox slowly closed and opened his eyes, the corners of them burning as if tears might spill at any moment, and spoke.
“It’s fine.”
His voice was already thick and muffled.
“Once everything is finished, I’ll send him away properly.”
Maeta hesitated for a moment, then nodded and ordered the servants to carry Khalid to Nox’s room. Drop by drop, blood ran down Khalid’s back.
The path to his room was marked with bloody footprints and smears.
Nox walked slowly after them, following that trail of blood. Every step was heavy.
He wanted to hide the boy in his room just as he was and never let anyone see him again. But for Khalid’s sake, for the child’s safety, he had no choice but to admit that it would be better to send him away from himself.
His father, always watching for a chance, was a problem enough, but Nox had never even dreamed that his mother, Olga, had been watching Khalid too. With eyes sunk dark and black, he stared at Khalid’s back as the servants carried him away.
Creeeak—
He walked down the long, long corridor. A servant opened Nox’s door first. Then he stepped inside and carefully laid Khalid down so that his back faced the ceiling. Nox signaled with his eyes for the servant to leave, and the servant, taking the hint, closed the door and stepped out.
Creak, click.
The moment the door shut, the room was filled with nothing but the child’s ragged breathing and the sound of Nox’s own heart, beating as if it too were holding its breath.
Nox slowly dragged a chair over and set it beside the bed. Then he sat down and stared at the blood soaking into the sheet. He did not have the courage to look directly at Khalid’s face.
Tick, tick.
Time passed little by little. The blood flowing from the child’s back gradually began to stop. But the wounds left by the thorn-vine lash were terrible. Nox thought that once Khalid left the estate, he would have to make sure he received proper treatment.
Of course, he would have to make it seem as though it had not come from Nox himself.
“Ugh…”
How much time had passed?
Khalid let out a low groan and opened his eyes. The child’s voice was split and ruined.
Nox had been staring at the floor. Slowly, with eyes sunken black and dark, he looked at him. Khalid’s face was drenched in cold sweat.
He wanted to reach out and wipe it away. He wanted to apologize, to say I was wrong, I made the wrong choice. But he bit down hard on his tongue and held it back. If he did not sever it here, his mother, Olga, would sever it by force.
“You’re awake?”
“Young… Master?”
“Yes. Khalid.”
Nox’s voice was not the voice that had once called Khalid sweetly.
It was endlessly cold. Hard. A voice that sounded as though he were speaking to a complete stranger. At that tone, the eyes of Khalid, who had only just regained consciousness, trembled uneasily. Khalid reached out with fumbling fingers.
And hoped Nox would take his hand.
Suppressing the urge to clasp the slowly approaching hand tight, Nox pushed the child’s hand away with the back of his own—slowly, but firmly.
The child’s eyes widened, as though he could not believe it.
“…I, I made a mistake.”
Then Khalid opened his mouth, as if trying somehow to fix the situation. It was pitiful. The boy was trying to smile so hard it was painful to watch. With his back in ribbons of blood. Trying, somehow, to erase the wave of terror closing in on him.
“Y-You never said anything like that, Young Master, so I must have gotten the wrong idea on my own, and you’re angry, aren’t you?”
The hand Nox had already pushed away once reached out again and seized his.
Nox tried to pull back, but the grip—stronger now without him noticing, grown stronger with time—did not let go of his hand. Nox bit down harder on his tongue. His fingertips trembled violently. He tried not to let Khalid notice.
“Khalid.”
“Don’t say it.”
“Khalid.”
“Please. What did I do wrong?”
Khalid was acting like someone who had already sensed something. Of course he had. Nox had asked him to bring the brooch, then pretended not to know anything about it. Khalid must already have thought something was wrong from that alone. And when he had begun to receive a whipping he had never needed to suffer, he must have known for certain that everything had twisted out of shape.
Looking at the gray-blond hair damp with sweat, Nox spoke. He could not meet his eyes.
“I thought it would be best if you left the estate.”
Khalid went silent. His blue eyes opened wide.
“I’m at the age where I’ll have to make a suitable engagement soon.”
Nox tilted his head. As though he were perfectly at ease. As though none of this mattered to him. He forced himself to wear composure.
“Khalid, do you love me?”
And then he said the cruelest thing of all.
“That’s your fault.”
Khalid—young as he was—could not say a single word. At the voice telling him that his very heart was wrong, the child froze, as though speech itself had been stripped from him.
“The fact that you make it so obvious, with your whole body, that you love me—that is your fault.”
“Young… Master…”
Khalid’s voice barely slipped out, as though it had to claw its way through his throat.
A body soaked in sweat and blood. And Nox, standing over him with cruel words on his lips.
Khalid’s mind spun. Part of him wanted to faint just like this. This had to be a dream. He could not believe that the Young Master who had been looking at him so gently only moments ago could simply vanish like this.
Khalid braced one arm against the bed and pushed himself up, trying to rise. Watching him, Nox tore his hand free from Khalid’s grasp once more.
“As soon as you can move, I’d like you to leave the estate as quickly as possible.”
“Do… do you mean that?”
“I do. You can understand my intentions, can’t you? I even used Mother to do it.”
Nox lifted the corners of his mouth. It felt as though the muscles around his lips were cramping, but somehow he managed it. He could only pray that it looked like a smile.
Khalid rose to his feet.
With that blood-soaked body.
Nox thought Khalid would be angry with him. Thought he would ask how he could betray him like this. Thought he would curse him and spit out all his fury.
But—
Thud.
It was the opposite.
Khalid dropped to his knees in front of the chair where Nox sat. Nox’s eyes widened.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
Khalid clutched at the hem of Nox’s trousers.
“I won’t let it show again.”
And then, crying, he begged. Just as he had desperately begged in front of Olga to be allowed to remain in this estate.
“I’ll try not to be seen by you.”
Soon the child released Nox’s trouser leg and clasped both hands together. Wide blue eyes. Hands pressed together, asking forgiveness for something that was not his fault.
Every part of it made Nox feel as though he were going mad.
“Please. Just let me stay in this estate.”
Nox could not make his voice come out. Only his lips moved.
He had thought Khalid would be angry at him. That he would pour out his rage. But that had only been the mistake of someone who had not loved the child enough. Khalid’s love had already grown far beyond anything Nox had imagined.
He had never intended to let it grow this far.
He had never known it would become this big.
No—
he had never even realized it was growing at all.
“……Khalid.”
“Y-Yes. Yes, my Young Master…”
Nox struggled to keep the smile on his face. It felt, literally, as though his insides were rotting away. Every word that left his mouth felt as though it were cutting not only Khalid, but himself. Even so, with the desperation of biting through his own tongue, Nox forced out the last words.
“You are not someone who can love me.”
Khalid stopped breathing.
“Don’t think you can love me.”
Thump—the child’s hand fell away, trembling.
“Know your place.”
Nox slowly rose to his feet. Then he turned away, as though there were nothing left worth seeing.
“I have to go to the knights’ training. I’d like you gone before I return.”
Khalid said nothing.
Nox clasped both hands tightly together where Khalid could not see. The trembling would not stop.
“Live well.”
After driving him away more cruelly than anyone else ever could, he told him to live well.
“You’re beautiful, so I’m sure you’ll manage wherever you go.”
Nox thought that would become Khalid’s resentment—give him the strength to hate him.
Without looking back, Nox left the room exactly as he was. The door shut with a click, and as if the space between Nox and Khalid had been severed, darkness seemed to fall.
The corridor felt strangely dark today.
Nox stood there for a moment, staring up at the ceiling. His eyes burned hot. But he knew better than anyone that he had no right to cry.
“Young Master…”
Maeta, who had been waiting outside, called to him softly.
Nox began to walk slowly down the corridor. Maeta followed behind him.
In the place where Khalid should have been walking.
“Find somewhere that can treat Khalid. Write him a letter of recommendation, and arrange a place for him to stay, along with enough money for him to live on for a while.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And don’t let him know that any of it came from me.”
At those words, Maeta halted for a moment. Her face was twisted with grief.
“But if you do that…”
Knowing full well what Maeta was about to say, Nox shook his head.
“It doesn’t matter.”
It doesn’t matter if he grows up hating me enough to want me dead.
As though she understood Nox’s heart perfectly, Maeta answered him with silence.
Nox wandered outside for a long time.
Long enough for the child to gather himself from the hurt.
Long enough to hate him thoroughly.
And long enough to leave him completely behind.