Isabelle hurried out of the bedroom.

Without a candlestick to illuminate the darkness, she risked tripping on her steps, but she had no time to worry about her own safety.

“Isabelle, Lady Isabelle…!”

Marie cried in alarm, but only for a moment.

Thanks to her quick silencing, the other servants didn’t rush out en masse. With bare feet that made no sound on the floor, Isabelle sprinted down the hall.

No, she hadn’t really calmed down. It was impossible to put it aside, preoccupied as she was with every conceivable outcome.

‘I should have let him sleep next to me – just for tonight. I should have done that. How could I not have foreseen this?’ She couldn’t even register the pain in her thigh from Mario’s earlier kick.’

As she left the quarters, Isabelle burst through the small door at the back of the auditorium.

“Loui, Loui!”

There was no answer. Loui was nowhere to be found. Isabelle, her face white with despair, gasped for air.

Had the room been poorly lit, she might have blamed it. But Marie’s quarters were filled with lamps and candlesticks, suggesting that every nook and cranny had already been thoroughly searched.

“Damn!”

Normally, she would have waited for Marie to return, but with Loui missing, there was no time for such considerations.

Leaving the door ajar, Isabelle rounded the side of the auditorium and headed for the garden.

The night was deep in the dark and there were no maids to wash the plates that had been taken out earlier.

While this was fortunate in a way, it also left her feeling suffocated – there was no one she could reach out to and ask.

Isabelle swallowed harsher curses as she left the garden. She had never imagined that she would use her talent in such a way.

Her quick feet carried her through the cathedral, the underground kitchen, and even the long-abandoned stable, but Loui was nowhere to be found.

“Ah, hah, hic, ha…”

Isabelle had climbed the towering Zaphcada Castle in Imanoria countless times in a single day – so many times, in fact, that she’d been scolded for her tendency to reach the bell tower.

But perhaps because of her anxious mind, or the pain in her thigh, she could no longer sprint. All she could do was collapse and catch her breath.

“Where, where did you go, Hic, where are you?”

Even when she shouted with the determination to spread her voice in every direction, Loui did not appear.

Her parched throat felt like it was being scraped raw, and Isabelle clutched her chest in agony.

In the midst of it all, her eyes began to close.

Since her arrival in Héréthique, she had never gone without sleep. Even when she had skipped dinner and tea to stay up and read the liturgical book before Mass, it had been her own choice.

Surely she could endure something as trivial as drowsiness. Isabelle shook her head from side to side with all her might, but the sleepiness refused to leave her.

“Loui, Loui…”

Her eyes and mouth began to close at the same time.

She lacked the strength to scream, let alone whisper.

“I can’t fall asleep, I can’t fall asleep.”

She repeated a thousand times, but her body was already collapsing under the weight of exhaustion.

Even if she collapsed, it would have to be indoors. If she fell asleep like that, she wouldn’t be able to avoid all kinds of suspicions.

However, the sleep that overcame Isabelle was not something she could crush with sheer determination.

Just as Arnaud had been powerless against the poisonous herbs.

Finally, Isabelle found Loui.

In a place that was either a cave or a prison – an endlessly dark space – the child stood silently.

Sparse, mustard-colored hair sprawled across his forehead. His irises, though not as blue as Arnaud’s, still held a striking color as they gazed back at her.

His thin, frail frame confirmed that it was indeed Loui. Isabelle approached the child without a moment’s relief.

“…….”

She tried to get closer.

But her feet wouldn’t move.

When she looked down, she saw that her feet were completely gone.

Only then did Isabelle realize that she was in the middle of a dream.

It was total darkness.

Loui was nowhere to be found, gone without a trace – even his shadow had vanished.

She had to find him, but with her missing feet she could not move. All she could do was stare helplessly into the empty room.

Then her eyes opened.

“Loui!”

Her body jerked upright on its own. Clutching a piece of cloth tightly in her hand, she gasped for air. It took her about two minutes to catch her breath before she realized where she was.

In front of a wall, hastily patched together with wooden planks, stood a candle, almost completely melted and barely holding on. The plate supporting the candle was so old that it was covered in a sticky, messy crust of wax.

“Ah, Lady Isabelle!”

As she struggled to process this unexpected setting, a door creaked open with an eerie sound.

Through it came Laurent.

Forgetting to close the door, he ran toward her. Although only two candles lit the room, it was so small that Laurent’s pale, frightened face stood out.

“Are you okay? Are you really all right?”

“What the hell is going on?”

Laurent waved his hands as if to say that worries could wait, but he still couldn’t calm down. His restless, floating hands made it clear – her status made it impossible for him to even dare to touch her.

“Lie down, please lie down. If you collapse again, I swear I’ll cry!”

“I collapsed?”

Isabelle asked in astonishment, leaning her neck forward as she spoke, demanding an explanation. Laurent had no choice but to answer with a sigh.

“You collapsed near the stable.”

“And what were you doing when you bumped into me like that?”

“W-Well, I couldn’t sleep, so I went for a walk. I live in the basement of the nearby Forge.”

Despite the hasty arrangement, Isabelle was in no condition to take Laurent’s tone word for word. To make matters worse, her head throbbed painfully, and with a deeply furrowed brow, she pressed a hand to her forehead.

“Since only Mademoiselle Idor is allowed access to the private quarters at night, I had no choice but to bring you to where I live. Please forgive me.”

“No need for forgiveness.”

“But why did you come all the way here? And at such an hour…”

“Wait, Laurent. Just wait… just give me a moment.”

After opening and closing her eyes a few times, Isabelle finally remembered why she had come all the way to the stable.

Forgetting for a moment how uncomfortable she felt with Laurent, she grabbed him urgently and asked.

“During your walk, did you happen to see a small child?”

“A child?”

“I don’t know if you know, but I need to find him. Straw hair, blue eyes. His name is Loui. I don’t know his last name, but I need to find him anyway.”

Isabelle tightened her grip on his arm and fixed her gaze on Laurent. Though gray eyes could only shine so much, they were hard to resist when filled with such urgency.

There was an unusual tension in Laurent as he watched her. He neither widened his eyes in confusion nor glanced nervously over his shoulder.

Instead, his expression was difficult to decipher.

Isabelle knew instinctively that the man knew something.

“He couldn’t have gotten far with that bad leg. Help me, Laurent. I’ll reward you as best I can…”

“If I tell you, you’ll come right away, won’t you?”

Laurent interrupted.

Isabelle stared at him intensely – not because she couldn’t understand his words, but because of the deeper meaning behind them.

“Did you hide him?”

“That’s not it.”

“If it’s not that, then why are you saying this?”

No answer came.

Laurent simply lowered his head and remained silent. But Isabelle’s patience had long since run out.

Unable to hold back any longer, she was on the verge of issuing a threat when Laurent finally opened his tightly sealed lips.

“Promise me you won’t leave right away, and I’ll tell you.”

At the same time, his emerald-green eyes shone vividly.

Laurent clasped his hands in an almost tearful plea. These were not the eyes of a negotiator.

With no choice, Isabelle nodded. If Laurent hesitated so much, even if she rushed out, there was little she could do.

She had to know quickly. Tightening her grip on his hand as if to force him to speak, Laurent finally confessed.

“Madame Lotur’s residence also has a cellar. It was originally used to store fruit, but now she locks people in there whenever she finds an excuse.”

“Is Loui there?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

Her mouth fell open in disbelief. The culprit behind this was immediately obvious.

“That wretched Camille, that despicable Camille…”

“This is Saint-Mang’s work, isn’t it?”

Laurent nodded, his expression troubled and his mouth tightly shut for a long moment.

For a brief second, Isabelle almost swung her legs off the bed, but remembering her promise to Laurent, she forced herself to steady her knees.

“They want compensation for what happened that night. Wine usually costs 3 Crans, and there’s no way the boy could afford that… They’ll use it as an excuse to sell him to someone like a coachman. If that happens, you won’t be able to find Loui again.”

“They want to wipe out those who are loyal to me.”

“They are dangerous people. That’s why I asked you not to rush out.”

Isabelle let out an exasperated sigh, heavy with frustration.

Her anger was rising to the point where it felt like it was choking her. It was obvious that they were trying to isolate her completely, but without understanding their reasons, the frustration was unbearable.

“So what am I supposed to do? I can’t just sit on the sidelines, Laurent.”

“What is Loui to you, Lady Isabelle, that you care so much about him?”

It was a question without an answer – not one of irritation or absurdity, but really without an answer.

Isabelle’s mouth fell open again in silence. A shiver passed through the small part of her lips. It came and went five times, but still Isabelle could not answer.

Laurent looked at her with a conflicted expression.

What do you hope to achieve by this, Lady Isabelle? He didn’t say the words out loud, but his face said it all.

Her eyebrows were furrowed, of course.

Her eyebrows were naturally furrowed.

What was this child really to her? She was sure she wanted to protect him, but she had no reason to.

Yet she felt she had to save him.

The man continued to watch her intently, his lips moving slightly as if he were about to speak.

Like someone standing at a crossroads, Laurent thought deeply before finally opening his mouth.

“Go to Madame Lotur and tell her you know-you know she’s not pregnant, and you know she didn’t sleep with Monsieur that day.”