“Look at me, Miss Berienne.”

The command was a means to elicit obedience. Celian raised her gaze again. She couldn’t lower her head until he allowed it. She held her head stiffly and kept her mouth shut.

The man, who had been staring at the woman, suddenly extended his left hand. It was somewhat different from the usual gesture of extending the right hand for a handshake. Celian, caught off guard, also extended her left hand and grasped the hand offered before her.

Black hair, red eyes, tall stature and expressionless face, and the habit of primarily using the left hand.

She pretended not to notice the increasing pressure on the white hand that she thought would simply shake and let go. She hoped that the man before her was not the person she knew, just someone who looked similar.

But this time too, God abandoned her.

“I’m Izer. Pleased to meet you, Miss Berienne.”

Izer Chesterfield, no, Izer ‘Ren’.

The son of the gardener who was driven out for coveting a noble young lady without knowing his place had appeared.

* * *

The woman stammered out that she too looked forward to working together and disappeared. Just like when she appeared, her footsteps were silent.

The drab gray dress with buttons fastened up to the neck, quiet footsteps, and calm voice. She was perfectly suited as a tutor for a noble young master.

Izer muttered in disbelief.

“A tutor?”

That Celian Berienne?

The door closed with a click. A strange laugh escaped the man’s lips. The choking sound could have been crying or laughing. Since both crying and laughing result in tears in the eyes, perhaps even he didn’t know what his emotion was.

He heard she had disappeared. It was the expected end for a young lady who had lost everything and was left with nothing but her body.

He pulled back the curtain. The garden with its white fountain came into view. The scenery, which didn’t match his black hair at all, seemed to look up at him mockingly.

The man looking down from the window narrowed his eyes. Someone appeared in the garden that had been empty.

A blonde child neatly dressed in a white children’s shirt and suspender pants, and a silver-haired woman holding the child’s hand.

The woman’s clothes were a drab gray, but her exposed arms and face were dazzlingly white, matching breathtakingly well with the fountain.

The woman seemed to be pulled along by the child’s hand. From the glimpse of her profile, she was smiling. It was impossible to think she was the same person who had been frozen stiff before him earlier, unable to even raise her head.

The man irritably drew the curtain.

* * *

The clear day must have been the calm before the storm. The dark clouds that had gathered at sunset began to rain.

Inside the window battered by the howling wind, Celian, who had been embroidering a handkerchief by lamplight, put down her needle. She couldn’t concentrate.

“……”

David Ren was a skilled gardener. He declined the request from Marquis Berienne to work in a townhouse in the middle of the capital, instead tending to the garden of a villa located in the suburbs. Adding that the stuffy air in the city wasn’t very good for his wife’s health.

And Izer Ren was David Ren’s son.

The Ren family lived in a small house attached right next to the villa. Celian, who lived in the villa, often saw Mr. Ren and Izer while going around the area.

But she had never seen Mrs. Ren. It was easy to guess why.

‘They said Mrs. Ren was frail…’

If she couldn’t go out often due to illness, it was understandable that Celian didn’t recognize Renéee Ren, now Renéee Chesterfield.

But would Renéee not have recognized Celian?

‘That can’t be.’

Celian’s face was reflected in the dark window. Her fingertips touched the cold glass.

Silver hair and sky-blue eyes are uncommon. It had been only six years since Celian and the gardener’s family parted ways. Even if Renéee had stayed indoors most of the time, it would have been difficult not to recognize the young lady of the house where her husband worked.

Then Renéee must not know what Celian did to her son.

It felt like a stone had been placed on her heart. Celian removed her hand from the window. The neat fingerprints left behind quickly faded.

Plop, plop, the rain became increasingly harsh. Celian blankly stared out the window where nothing could be seen.

It rained like this that day too. Rain that poured through the darkness, one so painful that when it hit a person, they couldn’t help but wail.

She remembers that day. The screams echoing in the barn, the dull impact sounds too harsh to be raindrops, the limp black hair and grotesquely twisted right hand.

Her pale sky-blue eyes fell downward.

The neat gray dress belonged to Owen’s mother. The clothes she had put on thinking they would be appropriate for serving the young master now felt uncomfortable.

Celian unconsciously grasped the top button. Although she knew it was too early to change into nightclothes, she wanted to change.

It felt like she was wearing clothes covered in filth. She thought she had put on a clean, starched dress, but it turned out to be clothes pulled from a garbage heap and roughly rinsed in water. The guilt of the past raised its head ominously from the swamp of oblivion. It seemed to stink. The source was Celian Berienne, herself.

Knock knock.

An untimely knocking sound echoed in the small room. Startled, Celian released the innocent button.

An elderly maid conveyed the message.

“Miss Berienne, the Young Duke is asking for you.”

“Yes.”

She had no authority to refuse the Young Duke’s orders. It was laughable. Just as Izer had to come when she called in the past, now she had to go immediately when Izer called.

She hoped he wouldn’t call for her, but it was something she had to face eventually. Celian took a deep breath and knocked on his door.

A low voice telling her to enter was heard. Even that was a command.

Celian stood at the doorway and bowed her head.

“I heard you were looking for me.”

“Close the door.”

It had been exactly six hours since they had greeted each other. Celian turned around. With a click, the door closed.

The closed door created an isolated space. Celian avoided Izer’s gaze. The room seemed to serve as both a bedroom and a study, with a bed in the center and a desk attached to one wall.

Izer, who had been looking at Celian, spoke indifferently.

“Are you interested in the bed?”

“…No, I’m not.”

“I see, that’s unexpected. Usually, the maids who come into this room harbor some hope.”

Celian took a deep breath. Right now, she was the young master’s tutor. The other party was the young master’s brother. Right now, she was a commoner, and the other party was one of the highest nobles in the country.

The man abruptly asked.

“How is Percy?”

“He is well-mannered.”

“For a child with a father who doesn’t care for his son and a sick mother?”

It was a blatant statement. Celian raised her head abruptly.

Percy was a cute child. And, if what Izer said was true, it meant that no one in this house gave Percy wholehearted affection.

She unknowingly raised her voice.

“Such qualifiers are neither important nor correct. Compared to any of his peers, the young master is more than enough….”