Elsie asked carefully after a moment’s hesitation, and Nellie nodded without reservation.

Nellie stepped ahead and led the way out of the station. Elsie followed.

“Bear with me if I’m slow. My leg is like this.”

Nellie walked with a cane, limping along at a slow pace.

“Not at all. I…… thank you.”

“Don’t mention it. Such a beautiful young lady looked like she was in trouble. If I had walked past, I’d have had a restless night.”

Elsie murmured another thank you at her playful words.

Nellie heard the soft reply and smiled brightly.

She led the way and talked about Earnest here and there as they walked. Elsie listened the way one listens to a pleasant song.

“Here we are.”

They passed through the town center thick with the smell of the sea and arrived at a single-story building enclosed by a stone wall. It was the kind of ordinary-looking place you could find anywhere.

“Don’t be too startled when we go in. My husband will be home from work, and he’s very outgoing, so it might feel like a lot.”

Elsie hesitated at the hard-to-answer warning, and Nellie burst into a clear laugh.

The two of them went inside. Elsie’s shoulders tensed for no particular reason.

“Nellie, you’re late today…… ah, you were late because you brought a guest. Nice to meet you, Miss.”

A man sitting in a chair and poking at the stove with a fire iron looked up at Elsie and greeted her promptly.

“Hello. I’m Elsie Gr…… Resleth.”

She barely swallowed the “Grey” that had been on the tip of her tongue.

Then she glanced at Nellie.

Nellie hadn’t asked her name, and Elsie had simply followed her without a word.

Was there anyone in this country who didn’t know the name Elsie Resleth.

Her green eyes wavered as she watched the couple.

“What a lovely name. Dear, did you already tell her about me?”

“I just said there was an ordinary man at home.”

“Ordinary man…… well, that’s…… ahem. I’m Thomas Reed. Ha. Not just an ordinary man. I’d appreciate it if you remembered me as, well, a handsome one.”

“Oh, honestly!”

“Hey now!”

Thomas’s easy introduction dissolved Elsie’s unease.

For the moment, the two of them didn’t seem to know who she was. There was no hint of pretending otherwise, and the weight in Elsie’s chest lifted a little.

“Anyway, make yourself at home. You look like you could use some rest.”

Thomas muttered something that sounded like a string of excuses and went into his room. It seemed to be his way of being considerate.

When he moved, what had been hidden behind the sofa came into Elsie’s view.

She had thought he was sitting in a chair. But it wasn’t a chair.

A wheelchair moved with a creak.

“Let me show you to your room.”

Nellie spoke to Elsie, and she quickly looked away.

“……Thank you.”

“You can stop thanking me. It’s just like I said, we’ve been a little lonely. And Earnest has a long-standing tradition.”

“A tradition?”

“Welcome every guest who comes to Earnest. That’s the tradition. Now, the bed is over here, and for clothes…… mine might be a bit big, but if that’s all right……”

Nellie stepped into the room and showed Elsie around.

“It’s fine. There should be a few changes of clothes in the bag.”

“Good, then. But let me know if you need anything.”

Nellie left, and Elsie changed into the clothes from the bag.

Changing without anyone to help her was unfamiliar, but she managed well enough.

She came out of the room afterward to find Nellie had set out a warm meal. After that, Nellie asked nothing about Elsie’s circumstances and cheerfully told her about Earnest.

The day passed like that, thanks to Nellie’s kindness.

It wasn’t a bad start to standing on her own.

***

Nellie said she taught children at an orphanage.

It was a small place run by nuns, and most of the children there were war orphans.

Elsie hadn’t planned to go.

But one thing Nellie said changed her mind.

“You looked like you were wondering what to do with yourself. At times like that, spending time with good people and children can help.”

Something in those words drew her, and she followed Nellie to the convent.

“Here, this is a small gift out of courtesy. What do you think?”

Nellie lifted the lid of a basket and showed Elsie.

“It smells wonderful.”

“I made it early this morning. I set aside some for the sisters and some for us, so let’s eat together later.”

She made it early this morning?

So much had happened. Elsie had slept soundly without hearing a sound from outside.

A faint flush of embarrassment crept into her cheeks.

“Next time let’s do it together. Though I don’t know much about cooking…… if it wouldn’t be a bother, would you teach me……”

“I’d love that. It’s a little embarrassing to call it cooking, but I do bake a remarkable loaf of bread.”

Nellie answered warmly at the apologetic words.

“There she is. Sister Agnes is already out front.”

A woman in a nun’s habit was waving at the two of them.

Sister Agnes.

Elsie quietly repeated the religious name and title to herself, feeling the unfamiliarity of it.

She had visited a large convent a few times with her father. But on those occasions she had kept her mouth shut and trailed silently behind him.

“Nellie, you’re early today. And who might this lovely guest be?”

“This is Elsie. She’s staying with us. I’m showing her around Earnest.”

“My, is that so. Though I have a feeling there’s a particular reason you came to Saint Liora Shelter rather than the center of Earnest.”

“I was hoping she might assist me, so I brought her along to try my luck.”

Assist?

Nellie glanced at Elsie carefully. Elsie’s eyes went wide at the look and the words.

Even imagining it made her feel thoroughly unqualified.

“Anyone Nellie has her eye on will do well at anything. And honestly, you’re so beautiful it already feels like more than we deserve.”

“Sister, really……”

Elsie could only blink as the conversation continued without her.

“Come along, Elsie.”

“Oh, yes.”

Elsie gave Agnes an awkward bow. Agnes smiled back with warmth.

***

Mornings in the orphanage began early.

Sunlight filtered through thin windows, and the children clung to one another like family.

Standing among them, Elsie felt strangely out of place.

So she only nodded at the children’s greetings and quietly took in the unfamiliar space.

“For now, just look around.”

Nellie smiled.

“Coming this far is enough. You don’t have to do anything. Welcome, Elsie.”

She didn’t know what to say to that.

But it was all right even so. Elsie understood her meaning right away.

The children of Saint Liora Shelter were so bright and open that simply being there was enough to belong.

“Where did the teacher come from?”

“I bet she’s from the capital! She looks like a princess!”

“Hey, there are no more princesses!”

“Still!”

The children bickered and raised their voices. The chatter was overwhelming, and yet it breathed life into the air.

“Elsie is your teacher, and she came from Eldenmarche.”

Nellie stepped in as Elsie stood there awkwardly.

“Wow! Eldenmarche? I heard there’s a huge forest there! They say it’s even bigger than the sea!”

“Eldenmarche? I feel like I’ve heard that somewhere.”

“Dummy, that’s where the hero lives. Frost Death!”

“Oh, I know! Teacher told us before.”

Hero. Frost Death.

Hearing the name used for Kaiden made her stomach turn strangely. In this new place, his presence had surfaced from somewhere she had managed to forget.

She hadn’t expected to hear Kaiden’s name from children who barely reached her waist.

“All right, everyone settle down. I came today to introduce your teacher Elsie.”

“Yes!”

The children’s eyes turned back to Elsie.

“Have you all been doing your homework?”

“Well, um……”

A few of the children squirmed at Nellie’s question.

“Teacher! John hasn’t even started yet!”

“Hey!”

“I finished mine already!”

The children started chattering over each other again. Watching them, a smile rose to her lips without her meaning it.

And at the same time, something in her chest grew heavy.

The baby she had lost before she even had the chance to know it flickered before her eyes. The ache of that unhealed loss seeped back in slowly.

She slipped away from her spot without drawing attention.

Nellie watched her go.

***

The strategic planning council.

In its early days it had been a small gathering formed to prepare for revolution and war, but it had grown until it now functioned as the Republic’s primary policy-making body.

Even in that setting, Kaiden Grey performed at a remarkable level. Naturally, talk of his promotion had begun to circulate.

No one bothered to ask what he actually wanted.

“Intelligence from Druelsha.”

A urgent report came in the dead of night, well before dawn.

A hastily torn note with scrawled writing.

It was written in a cipher only a handful of people, Kaiden among them, could read. The moment he finished reading it, his face darkened.

“So it’s started.”

“It appears so.”

He had known for some time that voices within Druelsha were calling for war again.

The Druelshan king, grown skeptical of war, had been suppressing those voices, but the problem was that Druelsha’s economy was in poor shape.

War was profitable.