Chương 294: 62. Tower 2

The lower we got, the weaker that tower-stale chill became—and the stronger the warmth rising from below. Not luxury-warmth, just the simple kind: hearth heat, candlelight, dry cloth, soup steam, and the tired, lived-in breath of an old building that had seen too many winters and was still, somehow, occupied by human beings. I'd seen far too many things today that didn't deserve to be called "human." So this tiny bit of warmth felt almost… disorienting. Fina was still curled against me.

She'd finally accepted that yes, she was in fact being carried down from the tower. The death grip she'd had on my tunic loosened a little. Just a little. Her forehead stayed pressed to my chest, her breaths quiet and rapid, the flush in her ears refusing to fade. She looked like she wanted nothing more than to disappear inside my cloak. I glanced down at her.

"Only just starting to get embarrassed now? Isn't that a little late?" She flinched and whispered a protest.

"Brother… you don't have to sound so casual about it…"

"What do you want me to do?" I took another step down and kept my tone light.

"Narrate the whole thing in a tragic epic voice? Behold, how I carry my sister forth from her inhumane tower of unjust captivity?" She blinked. Then, very softly, she laughed. Good. If she could still laugh, things weren't hopeless. Humans really are pathetic creatures sometimes. Half an hour ago in the reception hall, I'd wanted nothing more than to nail every last Rosa to the wall. Now, the moment this slip of a girl laughed in my arms, I had to admit: the climb up the tower had been worth it.

Which probably meant there was no saving me either. We rounded the last bend and stepped off the staircase into the first-floor corridor. Someone was already heading our way. The first to see us was Charlotte. She was carrying a freshly folded blanket, clearly en route to deliver it somewhere. She looked up—and when she saw me coming down from the stairs with Fina in my arms, she froze like a hammer had pinned her to the floor.

"... Young master?" Her voice was so soft it trembled, as if she were afraid that speaking any louder might shatter what she was seeing. I stopped and looked at her. Charlotte hadn't changed all that much. Time had left marks on her face, of course, but the way she looked at people hadn't. That look—always first checking whether you were cold, hungry, bleeding, sleeping badly—always putting you ahead of herself—there aren't many people in the world who look at others like that.

Which only made it harder to meet her eyes. Because one look was enough to remind me that I'd once been on the receiving end of it too.

"It's me." I shifted Fina a little higher in my arms, trying to keep my tone steady.

"From now on, Fina doesn't live upstairs." Charlotte stared for two heartbeats. Then her eyes went red almost instantly. Not with theatrical sobbing, but like a patch of skin that had been numb with cold for too long, suddenly being warmed by a light touch—color and pain returning all at once. Her mouth opened as if to say something, but no sound came. Finally she just pressed the heel of her hand to the corner of her eye.

"Good… good," she whispered, her voice shaking.

"Good. This is good. This is right." The person standing half a step behind her finally moved into my field of view. I'd assumed I would recognize her face first. I was wrong. I recognized the color. A deep, warm chestnut. Not the over-polished, fake-looking brown nobles liked to cultivate, nor the glossy shade that looked gold in the light. It was the color of dark beer fresh from the hearth on a winter night. The color of dried fruit and honey left for years in an old wooden cupboard.

Her hair was thick to the point of extravagance, naturally wavy, spilling all the way down to her waist. In the mingled candlelight and dusk of the hallway, it reflected a soft, deep glow. Then I saw her eyes. Amber. Not cold amber. Warm. Like honey thinned a little by sunlight. Like that one time, years ago, in the back courtyard of Thornhold, when someone had crouched down to pick up my broken practice sword and glanced up at me. My heart skipped, entirely without permission. That was bad.

Worse than I'd expected. Because if she'd looked completely unfamiliar, this would actually be easier. Then it would just be: the old house has acquired a dangerous-looking woman. I ignore it. Everyone lives their lives. But no. She was standing there, no longer the little maid trailing after Charlotte with a basin or a pot of hot water, tripping over her own hem while running too fast. She'd grown taller, her shoulders had broadened, her figure had fully become a woman's.

A white linen dress cinched under a dark bodice, her waist drawn in just right, the hem still cut with the practical ease of real work. Nothing about her posture was artificially polished. It was alive—warm, solid lines carved by years of walking these halls and doing real work. This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. Not frail. Not airy. Which only made it more dangerous. But the most dangerous thing still wasn't any of that. It was the way she looked at me. No fear.

No calculation. None of the wary, sidelong measuring I'd spent all day watching in the reception hall. Just a flash of shock—and then clear, aching concern, and an almost-uncontrollable swell of something else. I knew that look. Too familiar for comfort. Because when you've spent an entire day holding a blade and a cold face toward everyone around you, the thing you fear most isn't someone who hates you. It's someone who still looks at you the old way. That kind of look makes you want to put the knife down.

And I clearly wasn't done using it yet. She opened her mouth.

"... Young master Cedric." Even her voice had grown up. No longer the bright, cutting little-girl pitch I remembered—deeper, softer, with a warmth in it, and that same stubborn, unbending line in the tail end of her words. Just like the rest of her: outwardly gentle, but with a bone inside that refused to bend easily. I held her gaze for exactly one breath. Just one. Then I looked away. Not because I'd suddenly transformed into some bashful youth.

I simply knew very clearly that standing here, in the aftershock of a day spent shipping my blood relatives off to prison, brain already fraying, staring too long at someone this familiar—who had grown into this—was not what any reasonable person would call safe. In short: it was an accident waiting to happen. And I'd already processed enough disasters for one day. I wasn't looking to create a fresh one. Unfortunately, fate had other plans. Because she stepped forward.

Not back, not into a formal bow, not the way the hired hands who'd already learned bad habits would—checking my face first to calculate a safe distance. She just walked naturally up to me. She looked at Fina first, confirming nothing was wrong, then her gaze moved right back to me. More precisely—to the edge of my shoulder guard, where a smear of soot and ash still marked the leather. Her brows drew together.

"You're hurt?" Excellent. That was exactly the problem. When I'd stepped out of the reception hall, Jessi, Alvira, Olivia, Ignicia—they all knew I was exhausted. They all saw I was in no mood to be tested. But the first person whose first question wasn't about the situation, the trial, or what came next, but whether I was injured— Was this one. My throat snagged for no good reason. I managed, finally:"It's fine. Just a scrape." She looked at me. The expression said, very plainly: liar.

And the more ridiculous part was that I understood her perfectly. Charlotte finally shook herself and hurried aside.

"This isn't a place to stand and talk. Let's get Miss Fina settled first. I'll—I'll go tidy a room—""No need." I cut in.

"The east-side ground floor room. Best light, closest to the hall. That one's Fina's now." Charlotte blinked.

"T-that used to be—" I knew what she was going to say. It wasn't an empty room. Someone had been using it. And I didn't even need to ask to know who. So I turned my head toward the woman with the deep chestnut hair. She was already watching me. The moment our eyes met, she seemed to understand exactly what I meant. Without a single unnecessary word, she nodded.

"I'll fetch the spare wheelchair and clear the room," she said. Then she turned to go. And as she pivoted, my eyes betrayed me and dropped to her hands. Her right hand. Along the edge of her palm, a thin, pale scar flashed into view when her wrist turned. Like someone had taken a very fine blade and drawn a line straight through my memory. I remembered. Of course I remembered. That wasn't the kind of thing a person forgot.

Years back, a few golden-haired little bastards had been playing at scaring people with swords. They'd pushed it too far, and the blade had nearly cut me. The person who'd grabbed the steel bare-handed wasn't a guard, wasn't an adult, wasn't some suddenly-conscientious family member. It was her. She'd been young then too. Small hands, guts far too big. She'd grabbed the sword bare-handed, blood running so fast her own face went white, and still ground her teeth and refused to cry. I'd been furious.

Furious she'd leapt in. Furious those little bastards were still breathing. So angry that in the end, I hadn't managed a single proper sentence. And that scar was still there. Sitting quietly on her hand, proof that all these years hadn't managed to carry certain things away. She must have felt me looking. Her steps paused, and she glanced back.

"What is it?" Only then did I realize how long I'd been staring.... Embarrassing. I lifted my eyes back to her face like nothing had happened.

"Nothing." I hesitated, then added, "Don't run. Don't fall." She blinked. Then the corner of her mouth moved—just slightly. Not a full smile, nothing calculatedly gentle. More like, for just an instant, the girl from years ago—the one who'd clutch something to her chest and still find a way to sass me—poked her head out from behind the grown woman's face.

"... I don't do that anymore." With that, she really did turn and leave. Her skirt hem brushed the floor, her hair swinging once behind her, her steps quick but never sloppy—the walk of someone who'd long since learned exactly how to fit herself into this fortress without being in the way. I watched her go and thought: this was bad. Very bad. Because if she'd only grown pretty, that would be the low-level, generic male problem everyone deals with. But she wasn't just that.

She was pretty, familiar, marked with old scars and older ties, carrying what felt like the last unspoiled warmth this house had left—all standing directly in front of me. That wasn't a problem. That was a catastrophe. The kind you walk into willingly. I swore at myself silently, and only then realized Fina was peeking up at me from my arms.

"... Brother."

"Mm?"

"You were looking at Lorelei for a long time." My foot caught mid-step. Excellent. Not only had my trial technique glitched today—apparently my face management had too.

"You imagined it." Fina pressed her lips together, her eyes writing I absolutely did not in perfectly clear letters. She looked so much like a little sister that even trying to pull rank as commander felt pointless. I kept a straight face and looked down at her instead.

"Right now, you'd better focus on deciding whether, once you're moved in down here, you want hot soup first—or to curse our brothers first." Fina blinked. Then, after a moment of perfectly serious thought:"... Can I have the soup first? And then curse them?" I went silent for half a second. Then, finally, I laughed.

"You can." Good. At least someone in this family still understood basic priority. Charlotte wiped at the corner of her eye, caught somewhere between laughing and crying. She rushed ahead, pushing open the doors along the corridor.

"I'll have the kitchens heat soup at once." I carried Fina toward the east room. As we stepped into that corridor, slowly brightening under the combined glow of candles and the last of the day's light, only one thought sat clearly in my head: The thing that had truly caught me off guard today wasn't the half-dead blood relatives in the reception hall. It was Lorelei. Her eyes, still exactly like they'd been years ago. The scar still on her palm.

And the fact that with one look, I'd already understood— Some kinds of familiarity don't make you feel safe. They make you addicted.