Beads of sweat had formed on Lisette’s forehead, and she was barely catching her breath, her face drained white. At the sight of his little sister looking so wretched, clearly exhausted, he snapped back to himself and released the wrist he had been holding.

“Sorry. I forgot about your condition.”

Alexander scratched the back of his head and twisted his face.

She glared at him as he drooped his eyebrows like a puppy’s ears, looking genuinely sorry, then pressed a hand to her waist and straightened up after a long moment.

“My, sir knight, that’s rather harsh treatment for a lady. Do that to other ladies and you’ll get a slap on the spot.”

At Lisette’s playful deflection, his expression finally eased, and he gave a shameless bow of his head.

“I would never make such a mistake with real ladies.”

“So I’m a fake lady?”

She had been catching her breath when she bristled and lifted her chin, and Alexander snickered.

“You’re still a little one. What do you mean, a lady?”

“Twenty is a lady!”

Lisette put her hands on her hips and glared at him.

“No, if twenty isn’t a lady, then what age is?”

“Right, twenty is that kind of age, but you specifically are not. Real ladies are a bit more refined.”

“Ha. Sounds like you’ve met quite a few of those real ladies.”

At Lisette’s sarcastic words, Alexander smiled and flicked her on the tip of her nose with his middle finger.

“What’s a little one doing poking her nose into grown-up matters!”

“Ow! Alexander!”

Lisette yelped at the teasing she had hated even as a child and rubbed the tip of her nose. Watching her, he let out a soft laugh and tilted his chin toward the end of the corridor.

“Let’s take a walk for old times’ sake. Just the two of us, nice and quiet.”

But Lisette shook her head, annoyed for no particular reason at his attitude of doing nothing but teasing her.

“No.”

She crossed her arms without turning away, and Alexander naturally took hold of her shoulders and turned her around.

“Come on, let’s go.”

He turned toward the back garden and walked, pushing Lisette forward.

“Alexander! Brother!”

“Come on, let’s go, let’s go. Keep moving, keep moving.”

She could barely tell whether she was walking or whether her legs were simply being pushed along as she was shoved out to the end of the corridor.

In the distance, the manor’s training grounds came into view. She used to come and go there all the time as a child. She had not visited once since Alexander and Leon left, yet from that place the sound of sharp, forceful shouts still rang out.

At that familiar sound, she softly closed her eyes.

‘Those were good times.’

She thought of those days before the war, when simply spending each day playing with Alexander and Leon had been enough, and her nose stung without warning. A deep, aching longing settled over her heart before she even realized it.

Recalling those moments of pure happiness, Lisette pressed her lips inward and scratched at the rough skin around her thumb with her index fingernail. She could feel the hardened scab at the tip of her finger splitting open each time her nail caught it.

“Looks like they’re training again today. I keep telling them to rest. These people never listen. Rest is part of training too.”

Alexander clicked his tongue as he looked toward the training grounds, and Lisette tilted her head.

“I heard you have to work on your body every day. The body is dumb, so if you don’t, it forgets quickly. Leon said….”

‘Right.’

The name slipped to her lips and vanished. Lisette pulled off the scab that had been hanging loosely from the edge of the skin and curled her thumb into her fist to hide it.

His name would not go down, lodged in her throat like a sharp thorn.

‘Why did you come all the way out here. It’s late.’

‘Don’t come looking for me alone from now on.’

She thought of him from the night before, who had walked her to the edge of the forest and then pushed her away. And then, the dream she had dreamed that same night.

‘He was so warm in the dream.’

Lisette had been touching her lips when she squeezed her eyes shut.

Thinking of how different he was from the dream, she felt that grief rise in her again, sudden and sharp. Enough to make her eyes sting and tears threaten to spill.

“That Leon, he’s always been a strange one… hm? Are you crying? Why are you crying?”

“I’m not crying.”

At the sound of a sniffle, Alexander turned his head sharply and stood in front of her.

“What is it. What now.”

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s clearly not nothing, why are you crying? All of a sudden. Wait, don’t tell me it’s because of the marriage.”

At Alexander’s pressing question, the urge to cry vanished in an instant and Lisette shook her head.

“It’s not! And I’m not crying!”

‘Right, I absolutely cannot cry!’

If she cried here and Alexander started to misunderstand, things would clearly spiral out of control.

He was a fighter and a rebel all at once.

And when it came to her affairs, he was the type to resist even more fiercely than he would for his own. So if she gave him any cause for misunderstanding, she didn’t even want to imagine how far things might go.

So until he went back to the capital, she had to stay quiet, stay still, as much as possible.

“Something got in my eye….”

“If you don’t want to get married, say so. I’ll take care of it….”

“It’s not that!”

She shook her head at Alexander, who cut her off with a serious expression.

“I told you, Baron Tarmen is a good person.”

Afraid he might pick another fight with their mother and eldest brother, she waved her hands frantically and shook her head with everything she had.

“…….”

Of course, the look on Alexander’s face as he watched her made it clear he did not believe a word of it, but even so, this was all she could say.

“I’m fine. Brother.”

So she forced a smile.

And above all, hadn’t their mother said he was a good man?

‘Théodore too.’

‘Théo and his wife worked very hard to find this match. You know your brother, don’t you? He only worries about you. So if he’s the one who found this man, he must be more than decent. Honestly, Mother has no worries.’

‘So you don’t need to think too hard about it. Everything will work out. My dear.’

‘Mother only wants you to be quietly happy.’

The people who cared for her had called him a good man.

“I’m really fine.”

Right, it really would be fine.

‘Of course, when I actually met him, he talked too much and seemed a little frivolous, which did catch me off guard a little….’

She recalled her mother’s words, that a man should be looked at with generosity, that he must have made mistakes from the awkwardness of a first meeting, and she smiled and looked at Alexander.

“From what I heard, his first marriage failed because his first wife was too extravagant….”

“He’s been married before?”

“Yes, did no one mention it?”

“Ha.”

Watching the back of Alexander’s neck slowly flush red as he pressed a hand to his forehead, she felt a rush of urgency. She had to clear up this misunderstanding quickly.

“S, still, he’s quite kind. The Baron said it doesn’t matter at all that I’m sickly and frail. Elben has a similar climate to our estate too, so. So it will really be fine. Brother. You don’t have to worry….”

“…Ha.”

At the rambling words that kept coming out like excuses, Alexander pushed his hair back. She turned her head away from his furious gaze to avoid it. And watching Lisette like that, Alexander drew one long breath after another.

“Right, fine, I’ll accept it for now, I’ll just watch how things go for a bit… hm? Leon?”

‘Leon?’

At the name that suddenly came out of Alexander’s mouth just as he was grudgingly nodding, Lisette snapped her head around.

“!”

‘It really is Leon.’

Right where Alexander’s gaze had landed, there Leon stood, as though it couldn’t be real. He had just finished training, it seemed, and held his removed shirt in his hand. Moisture clung beneath his black hair.

‘How long has he been standing there?’

The memories of the night before seemed to have gone completely dark. Lisette looked up with a brightened expression, glad simply for this chance encounter.

“Le…!”

But she raised her hand to wave and call out to him, and the moment she saw his expression, her parted lips froze in place.

“Oh.”

Unlike her own gladness, his set mouth and cold expression brought back the memory of him pushing her away the night before. No, his expression was even colder than it had been last night, and Lisette bit her lip.

It brought back his words from the night before. ‘Don’t come looking for me.’

‘Like a fool.’

A light breeze drifted past, and the thin sleeve that had been hanging down over her wrist slid with a soft rustle up toward her elbow. Lisette froze with her hand still raised in the air and bit her lip.

What stung in that moment was her own foolish feeling, still glad to see him in spite of everything.

And on top of that, that strange dream.

‘Miss.’

The image of him from the dream, so unlike the cold person in front of her now, calling back the Leon he had once been, and every sensation from it, vivid and sharp, came flooding in all at once.

The cool clarity of water sliding down her throat, quenching a burning thirst. His lips. The tip of his tongue pressing through the gap between them. And the way she had bitten down on his collarbone, worrying it slowly….

“Hm?”

Following the thread of the night before, she looked up, and her gaze landed on his collarbone.

‘That….’

His chest and his nape. Swollen, red marks stood out clearly across his body. Marks so dark they had gone from red to nearly black.

‘Ugh.’

“What the…!”

“Young master, Miss….”

Lisette let out a sound to stop her thoughts from going any further and covered her mouth with both hands, and at that exact moment she could see him, who had been about to bow his head, pause at her words.

‘What do I do?’

She didn’t need to look to know he must be flustered by the sudden outburst. But the shock left no room for any other thought.

That… wasn’t a dream?