| Chapter 9

As soon as I arrived at the marketplace, I went straight to the library to return Laurel’s book, then I lingered around the temple. I peeked inside, looking around cautiously, but he wasn’t there. An old man cleaning the place looked at me suspiciously as I kept going in and out, and finally spoke to me.

“Child, do you have some business here?”

“No, it’s nothing.”

Flustered as if caught with a secret, I hurriedly left the temple. I circled around in front very slowly dozens of times, but I couldn’t meet him.

Don’t priests come to the temple every day? Maybe I’d have to do this every day to run into him. No, what if I couldn’t meet him even if I did this every day?

My legs were aching, and the sun would set soon, so it was time to give up. With a tired face, I was chewing on my lips as I crossed the marketplace when suddenly someone blocked my path. I looked up to see Mark standing there with an awkward expression.

“Hello. Your name is Lucy, right?”

My name is Lucienne, but I didn’t feel like correcting him. It’s not a very meaningful name anyway.

“Sorry about that day. You invited me, but I just went home because I felt uncomfortable.”

As I spoke briefly, Mark waved his hands.

“No, it was my fault for not thinking. Some people don’t like such noisy places. Most people found it fun though.”

I agree with Laurel that Mark isn’t a bad kid. Though I didn’t quite understand the confidence that oozed from his attitude as he ran his hand through his hair, trying to look cool.

“What do you like? Shall we do that together next time?”

“Well, I like walking around the temple.”

As I turned my head to take one last look at the temple, Mark made an expression of disbelief. But he soon broke into a bright smile, showing his teeth.

“Haha, you have a really unique hobby. But does it have to be around the temple? I know a better place.”

“It’s meaningless if it’s not around the temple.”

At my firm answer, Mark furrowed his brow and scratched the back of his neck.

“Well, alright. If it’s around the temple, it’s close, so I can make time anytime.”

At first, my gaze was on him, but soon it flew over his shoulder. A group of soldiers was walking towards us, and their wandering gazes found me and then fixed directly on me.

The one standing at the front was a short man with a small build. He was wearing a leather vest proving he was a guard. As the man behind him pointed at me, he approached, waving his hand.

“Move aside. Everyone, move aside.”

Mark turned around with a “What?” and stepped aside with a surprised face. The man, barely half a span taller than me, looked me up and down and asked,

“Are you Mrs. Almon’s maid?”

“…Yes, what about it?”

I answered with a bewildered look, clutching my shopping basket. I could feel my heart tensing up. Before I could even swallow my dry saliva, the soldiers surrounded me following the man’s gesture. The man’s voice, trying to sound solemn but unable to hide his pettiness, rang out.

“I’m arresting you on suspicion of murdering Baron Christopher Bickman.”

I could see Mark’s mouth fall open. I heard a middle-aged woman screaming in the distance.

The murmur of people rushed in like a tide. The ground of reality I had been standing on was endlessly sinking towards an abyss that had opened its maw wide.

* * *

Lars, who was reading a letter with his legs up on the desk, furrowed his brows in displeasure.

He didn’t like scribbled handwriting. Especially in letters that should contain important content.

If it looks careless, it directly leads to a trust issue. He shook his head and was folding the letter when the door burst open.

Although he was staying in a cheap inn, the door never opened like this unless it was a crazy drunk intruding in the middle of the night. Lars frowned, and Yanken entered his sight.

They had been together for nearly 10 years. Yanken wasn’t one for facial expressions, but Lars could tell something was wrong just from the atmosphere. As he quietly stared, Yanken closed the door firmly and approached closely.

“The baron has been murdered.”

“What?”

He thought it would be something serious, but the news Yanken brought was completely unexpected. Lars jumped to his feet.

“Bickman? When, who did it?”

The deal was just four days away. Bickman wasn’t the most reliable person, but this deal was possible because he had vouched for it.

The complex web of interests flashed through his mind. In two days, people from the suspicious Freemont guild would be sent. He couldn’t be sure if they would trust him without Bickman, having come to the negotiation table relying on their connection with Baron Bickman’s family.

“Could Count Balshwin have noticed and sent someone?”

If this deal went through, the person who would be hit the hardest was Count Balshwin, who held the existing trade route with Freemont. If it was him, cruel and capable of anything for his own gain, he might have made the decision to kill Bickman after noticing the situation.

As Lars asked quietly after finishing his calculations, Yanken’s expression became puzzled. He soon opened his mouth, scrunching his already grim face a bit more.

“He was found crumpled in the closet of his mistress’s house, poisoned. The woman reported it.”

Every word was astounding. This couldn’t be a coincidence.

“If it’s Bickman’s woman, is it Kayla? Nicole? Cynthia?”

“It’s a woman named Nora Almon.”

Bickman’s womanizing was a well-known fact to those who knew. He enjoyed so-called ‘romance’ with various women regardless of their status. Lars knew more than ten names, but Nora Almon wasn’t among them. It meant she wasn’t a frequent lover.

“Are you saying this woman really poisoned Bickman? At this timing?”

“That woman works at an herb shop. They say the poisonous herb used to kill Bickman was found in a drawer at her house.”

Lars, who had collapsed into his chair in disbelief, furrowed his brow.

Given the timing of the poisoning just before the deal, he was more suspicious of Balshwin’s side, but considering Bickman’s complicated love life, it wouldn’t be strange if he was killed by a lover who had grown to hate him.

Especially since poison is a method of murder often used by women.

The agreement with Bickman was proceeding in secret, so he couldn’t openly investigate. Above all, he was in a position where he couldn’t publicly come forward.

“What a fool. Couldn’t even keep his last journey clean. We need to look into the situation a bit more. The woman. Is she in custody?”

As he asked while rubbing his chin, Yanken cleared his throat.

“Actually, someone else was arrested.”

“What do you mean?”

“Lucienne Gwynter. The girl working as a maid in Mrs. Almon’s house.”

Lucienne.

The image of her back as she ran away after cheerfully throwing out her name flashed in his mind. A crack slowly began to form on Lars’ handsome forehead, which was tinged with an unusual radiance.

“That child, surely not…”

Yanken raised an eyebrow in affirmation. A shallow sigh escaped involuntarily.

“What on earth is going on? What kind of relationship could that child have with Bickman?”

“Mrs. Almon was apparently with another lover that night. She only returned home in the morning. The other party is a woodcutter who sells firewood, and he provided testimony.”

Although this country was relatively tolerant of love affairs, Lars couldn’t understand calling multiple people ‘lovers’ in the first place. He asked again, pressing his throbbing forehead.

“So what does that have to do with that child?”

“Given the circumstances, she’s the only one who could have killed Bickman. She occasionally helped with Mrs. Almon’s work, so she knew how to handle and use that poisonous herb, and she was the only one in the house at the estimated time of Bickman’s death. There is another elderly person in the house who’s like a corpse, but they’re literally an immobile old person.”

As Yanken laid out the explanation, Lars suppressed a laugh and waved his hand dismissively.

“That’s just a possibility. When did Bickman die?”

“They say it was the night before last. Probably before midnight.”

“…The night before last?”

As he searched his memory, the tension left Lars’ face. He rested his chin on his hand sarcastically.

“Then it’s simple. That child was at the theater and then went home with me.”

“You’re not saying you’ll testify to that, are you?”

For a moment, he was at a loss for words. Yanken stared at his handsome face, which seemed to have let its guard down, and continued speaking.

“And it’s not entirely impossible. She might have returned home like that, but a drunken Bickman could have harbored ill intentions towards her and pounced on her, and to escape that situation, she might have offered him wine laced with the poisonous herb. It’s quite possible for a baron to do such a thing.”

Lars laughed at the words that sounded like a novel.

“She’s not the type to do such a thing.”

“I didn’t know you were someone who trusted people so easily. Especially a child you’ve only seen for a day.”

He wasn’t being sarcastic. Yanken was raising his eyebrows, genuinely surprised.

“You’re not the type to naively think she couldn’t have killed someone just because she’s a child.”