390 - Giselle's Perspective The White Good-for-Nothing 5
There is something I have finally realized recently. I had thought that Christina ignoring me was a silent protest against an incompetent guard, but it seems that is not the case. After confirming that Kalisa was nowhere in the castle, Christina stopped responding to anyone's calls, no matter who. Before, if I invited her saying "Let us go look for Kalisa," she would walk alongside me with a short reply. But now, she remains silent. If I pull her arm, she stands up and walks, but she barely moves on her own. She merely passes each day in a daze.
...But she still sits at the edge of the lounge chair, unchanged.
The current dazed Christina will sit down freely, on the floor, in the hallway, whenever she feels like it, but it is different when I seat her on the lounge chair. I try to seat her in the center because it is a wide lounge chair, but then Christina always stands up and moves her bottom to the corner of the chair. The other gathered maids do not understand what meaning this action holds. But I understand its meaning.
...Because the spot next to Christina-sama is Leonardo-sama's place.
Christina, who neither shows fear nor cries, but also no longer laughs at her situation, has lost her heart yet still keeps Leonardo's spot open. So that Leonardo can always sit beside her. In that regard, she is unchanged from her time at the detached palace. Whether Leonardo is there or not, Christina chooses the lounge chair and sits at its edge.
When spring came, flowers gradually began to bloom in the castle garden as well. In the Kingdom of Ivizia, the Spring Blossom Festival was a season overflowing with flowers, but in the Zugarri Empire, a little snow still remained. From this slight difference in the changing of seasons, I keenly felt that I was in a foreign country. During autumn, I was packed into a carriage for travel, and during winter, I was confined inside the castle. Even when I peeked out the window, it was a landscape of nothing but snow, so I only saw the indoors and never felt any regional differences.
When the snow completely melted and warm sunlight began to stream in, the garden flowers burst open their buds all at once. The temperature was perfect for a stroll through the garden, so I opened the window as if it were nothing, but the watching men said nothing to stop me. The window had iron bars fitted into it, but it seemed they judged from Christina's state that there was no risk of escape. As for me, thanks to Jasper's unappreciated testimony calling me "the White Knight among White Knights," the surveillance on me was not that strict either. "Knight among knights" sounds like a compliment, but in my case, "White" is attached before "knight." When speaking of knights of the Kingdom of Ivizia, the Black Knights are famous, but the White Knights are also famous, in a bad way. They are positions taken by the children of nobles, and it is practically guaranteed that they possess no real ability whatsoever. With so many men assigned as watchers, they probably think it impossible for a White Knight (me) to escape with Christina. And I know for myself that this is indeed true.
"Tina-sama, it is lovely weather today. Would you like to go out into the garden and look at the flowers?"
I could not bring myself to call Christina by the name "Sistina" that the kidnapper (Edgar) had given her since coming to this castle, so I called her "Tina-sama," as Kalisa used to. At first, Christina showed some reaction to this address, but now there is none at all. Whether I call her name or invite her for a walk, Christina merely sits in a daze at the edge of the lounge chair.
"...Giselle, come here a moment."
"I was just inviting the young lady for a walk, but..."
"Sistina-sama will be fine if left alone. She always sits obediently like a good girl."
A brown-haired maid beckoned me over, saying she wished her own son required as little attention as the young lady. I was worried about Christina, but I left the room. I had an idea of what the maid might want me for.
"It seems the cook improved the 'pudding' again, and he wants you to taste it."
Last time it scored sixty points, this time he is aiming for about eighty. Talking about such things, I headed to the kitchen in the basement. The reason pudding was being made through repeated trial and error in Edgar's castle kitchen was solely for Christina's sake. Seeing Christina's condition, which anyone could tell was abnormal, the castle's commoner servants felt sympathetic. They asked what her favorite food was, hoping to somehow cheer her up, and I recalled the 'pudding' that Kalisa used to make.
With its simple ingredients and easy process, I thought even I could make this 'pudding' and tried my hand at it. I managed to shape it, but it was a spectacular failure. When Christina ate the pudding I made, she gave only one word of feedback. "Sweet." Looking only at the word, it might seem like she was pleased, saying "Sweet," but in reality, it was a single mumbled word, "Sweet," in a voice utterly devoid of emotion. Even I understood that this was not "sweet and delicious" but rather muttered to mean "too sweet."
After that, I left the improvements to the cook. An amateur clumsily interfering would be less effective than leaving it to the cook to more quickly approach the 'pudding' that Christina desired.
"It is wobblier than last time."
"You bet. This time I changed it to have a little more milk than eggs."
I took the plate with pudding and gently shook it. The pudding on the plate wobbled, but compared to the one Kalisa had made before, the movement was still stiffer. When I scooped it with a spoon, there was more resistance than I remembered.
"...I think the amount of sugar is closer to Tina-sama's preference."
If this was the case, perhaps the taste would reach eighty points. At the detached palace, Christina had enjoyed both firm pudding and smooth-textured pudding. Of course, I thought there was still room for improvement, but the taste should be much closer now.
At any rate, I decided to have Christina try it. I pushed a cart carrying the pudding and returned to the guest room where Christina was. I had the men who were supposed to be watching her open the door and entered the room. But Christina, who should have been there, was nowhere to be seen.
"Tina-sama!?"
Christina would not respond even if I called her name now, but that was useful for signaling something was wrong in the room. The watching man, half-asleep in his chair, scrambled to his feet, and the men who should have been guarding outside the door rushed into the room. Meanwhile, I moved the cart aside and peered behind the curtains, under the bed, behind the lounge chair, confirming that Christina was not hiding anywhere. As I did this, the men also finished checking various parts of the room, and we gathered in the center to share our reports. We were in completely different positions, the kidnap victim's side and her watchers, but in terms of not wanting Christina to disappear, our interests aligned. I had the mission of safely bringing Christina back to the city of Grenore, and the men were hired by Edgar to watch Christina and me. They seemed to have completely let their guard down because Christina was so docile, but having lost the person they were supposed to be watching, the men would surely face some punishment from their employer.
"...Ah, outside?"
Since it was becoming spring-like, I had been opening the window lately to let in the outside air. I had hoped the scent of the garden flowers might comfort Christina's heart even a little, but thinking about it now, there was no guard on the window. The iron bars were there, but the lock was not fastened. If Christina remembered my earlier invitation to "go for a walk," she might have gone out through the window on a whim.
I hastily jumped out the window and split up with the men to search for Christina. Even if it was called a garden, it was a garden attached to what was nominally a castle. It was spacious enough to fit a small village whole, and because they employed many gardeners, garden trees were planted here and there throughout the garden in addition to flowers. The scenery was pleasant, but the visibility was not good. If Christina sat down in the shade of a tree as she usually did, she would not come into view unless I got close.
...Could it be that she did not go into the garden, but was taken by spirits?
It was not the Recollection Festival or the Divine King Festival, but with Christina, something like that could happen. Since being kidnapped, Christina had been wearing long bandages and had not worn the animal costume she had put on almost every day at the detached palace. Edgar did not know that Christina needed an animal costume, and I had no intention of telling him. Rather than remaining Edgar's captive like this, I thought it would be better for Christina to be taken by spirits. If she were taken by spirits, with luck, she might even return to Leonardo's side.
"Tina-sama!"
I ran around the garden for about thirty minutes, peering into the shadows of garden trees and inside the garden pavilion, but Christina appeared normally. Rather than appeared, it would be more accurate to say she was led by the hand of a middle-aged gardener.
"This young lady was wandering around the garden, then suddenly started sleeping on top of a flower bed, so I brought her along. Is something wrong?"
It could not be helped that the gardener found it suspicious, asking if something was wrong. The men who had been searching for Christina with bloodshot eyes collapsed on the spot at the sight of her being led by the hand by the gardener, her face sleepy. If they had not found Christina like this, their heads would have rolled. It was inevitable that the men would be overwhelmed by exhaustion from relief.
"And also, take this."
"What is it?"
I took over Christina's hand from the gardener and turned to head back to the room, but a voice called out to my back. When I turned around, the gardener was holding a bouquet of white flowers.
"It seems the young lady took a liking to these flowers. I promised her flowers if she returned to her room, so I brought her along."
Apparently, the gardener was initially angry when Christina started sleeping on top of the flower bed. But he gave in to Christina, who would not budge an inch, and coaxed her by saying he would give her flowers if she returned to the room, which was how they came back. Since these flowers had attracted Christina so much, I gratefully accepted them and arranged them in a vase. I closed the window so Christina would not wander out alone again, and then I noticed. The scent of the white flowers resembled the perfume that Christina's tutor had worn. Christina, following after Kalisa, had likely gone outside searching for Hermine.
When I placed the vase with the white flowers on a sunny windowsill, Christina would not move away from the window. She stood there, gazing fixedly at the white flowers, and when she grew tired, she sat down on the spot.
Until the white flowers wilted, Christina was glued to them all day long.
...I finally got into the library.
There were still watchers, and I could not do anything suspicious, but simply being allowed into the library was progress, I supposed. Someone raised without any connection to libraries would not understand, but this was a kind of treasure trove. At the very least, I should be able to look up roughly where in the Zugarri Empire Edgar's castle was located.
...If only I could freely investigate.
For appearances' sake, I asked to be taken to the library on the pretext of researching the white flowers Christina had taken a liking to. The watching man showed reluctance, saying I could just ask the gardener for the flower's name, but I pushed through by arguing that while the gardener might know the flower's name, he would not know the name of the perfume. What I wanted was the same perfume that Hermine had worn. I knew that on the journey from the capital to the city of Grenore, Christina had put perfume on a ribbon to soothe her loneliness. If I could get that perfume, perhaps I could comfort Christina's heart a little.
I found the flower's name and the name of the perfume used in it in the library. Additionally, I wrote down as many characteristics of the perfume Hermine had worn as I could remember, and sent a letter to Edgar through Jasper. Edgar, who apparently wanted Christina to read Japanese, was growing frustrated with her current state. If it was for getting her to read Japanese, he would surely provide as much perfume as necessary to stabilize Christina's heart.
As planned, Edgar immediately sent several perfumes. From among them, I found the same perfume as Hermine's and applied it to the ribbon of a doll that seemed to have been prepared for Christina. With a doll and perfume, unlike real flowers, they would not wither, and she could also bring them into bed.
...The perfume was working remarkably well.
Thanks to the perfume sprayed on the doll's ribbon, it became easier to get Christina's attention. For walks to help her regain strength, I only needed to move the doll, and she would follow without a word. It made for the bizarre sight of me walking around carrying a doll, but if this could maintain Christina's strength, it was a small price to pay.
Perhaps reflecting on having lost Christina once, the watchers no longer dozed off. They would likely not let their guard down for a while. Using the doll as bait, I lured Christina out for a walk in the garden, with three watchers following behind. Colorful flowers were blooming in the flower beds at our feet, but Christina's gaze was fixed on the doll. They were beautiful flowers, but they did not catch Christina's interest.
"Ah, Tina-sama!"
Suddenly, Christina brushed aside my hand and ran off. Before, she would not have trampled flower beds, but now Christina did not care. She ran in a straight line toward her target, crossing the flower bed. I wondered what Christina had found and turned my gaze in the direction she was heading. And there, black hair was visible through the garden trees.
"Whoa, what the!?"
Suddenly grabbed by his clothes by Christina, the black-haired boy screamed in surprise. While the boy sat there, legs giving out, I caught up and grabbed Christina's shoulder.
...Could it be that she mistook him for Leonardo-sama because of his black hair?
The gardener boy's face and body were nothing like Leonardo's. If I had to pick a common trait between the two, it would be black hair and black eyes. Unfortunately, black hair and black eyes were colors you could find anywhere, nothing particularly rare. Even if Christina had run off by mistake, the likelihood of Leonardo being there was low.
...Come to think of it, was this a different gardener from the other day?
He had been brought by the middle-aged gardener. An apprentice, perhaps? He did not look like a full-fledged gardener, so it seemed more natural to think he had been hired as an assistant to another gardener. I was thinking about such things, but my silence seemed to have brought terror to the gardener. Or perhaps it was because of the watchers who had caught up behind me. When the gardener boy suddenly began begging for his life, saying "Help me, please do not kill me!", I was the one who ended up startled instead. Christina had apparently frightened him, and I thought we should be the ones apologizing, but something seemed strange about the situation. And Christina, who had caused this commotion, had already lost interest in the boy whose clothes she had grabbed. She was staring blankly at a fountain a short distance away.
Urged by the watchers to return to the room quickly, I took Christina's hand. As I quieted my breathing and strained my ears toward the conversation behind me, the watchers seemed to be giving a warning to the gardener boy.
"...Forget what you saw today."
"...Do not breathe a word to anyone about meeting the young lady."
From the words I caught, I felt I understood why the boy had been so frightened. This was the Zugarri Empire, not the Kingdom of Ivizia. The relationship between nobles and commoners was completely different. He worked at the castle as a servant, and he had probably been frightened by Christina, who was clearly dressed as someone from the master's side. In the Zugarri Empire, commoners could easily be killed just by incurring a noble's displeasure. I had heard that this was the kind of country it was.
"Rejoice, Sistina. I have brought you something good today."
At Edgar, who showed his face at the castle for the first time in a while, Christina lifted her face. At first glance, it looked like she was reacting to Edgar, but this was because Edgar had changed his perfume. After I reported on Christina's changes in response to the perfume and the doll, Edgar gave instructions that on days he came to the castle, the doll with perfume should be hidden or the doll's clothes changed. And by wearing the same perfume as Hermine himself, Edgar was drawing Christina's gaze.
...I should not have told him.
I regretted having told him, but I could not have not told him either. I had no money I could freely use right now. If the perfume for Christina ran out, I would not be able to buy new supplies. Therefore, to have Edgar continue providing the same perfume, I had to explain that the perfume had a certain effect.
"I had a doll made for you. Is it not lovely? Rejoice."
...The doll was cute, but I had my doubts about that.
An intricately crafted doll, about the size of a small child, was brought before Christina. It was a doll of a girl with silver hair and blue eyes, but its face seemed to only express Edgar's twisted obsession. The silver-haired doll had the same face as Christina. As if that were not obvious enough, the doll was wearing the same dress that Christina had been instructed to wear today. If there was a difference between Christina and the doll, it was only the difference in size between a human and a doll, and the difference between black hair and silver hair.
"To hide that unsightly hair, I have also prepared beautiful hair."
...She was being treated completely like a doll. This was a little...
It was more than a little. A chill ran down my spine.
A maid Edgar had brought from the imperial capital quietly approached Christina, and a watching man removed the black wig that had been prepared. Immediately, a new silver wig was placed on her, and her hair was arranged to look exactly like the doll's.
"Hmm. As I thought, silver suits you better than black."
At Christina with silver hair, staring fixedly at him under the guidance of the perfume, Edgar nodded repeatedly with a greatly satisfied expression. He looked at Christina from the right, from the left, from the front, and then made her hold the doll. The doll, the size of a small child, seemed heavy for the current Christina. She staggered backward and sat down on the lounge chair. And then Edgar sat down beside her.
...Ah.
Christina, who had sat down on the lounge chair in a stagger, lowered her gaze to the doll she was made to hold. She stared at the silver-haired doll with blue eyes that showed no emotion at all. Then she lifted the doll and placed it in the space between herself and Edgar. The gesture of patting the doll's head, as if to soothe it, was a reaction she had never shown before. At first glance, it looked like she was playing with a doll, treating it like a person. Edgar also seemed satisfied with this reaction from Christina. He probably thought to himself that dolls were necessary for a girl's upbringing, impressed with his own judgment in preparing one.
But I somehow understood Christina's true intent. The spot beside her was Leonardo's place. She was using the doll to keep Edgar away, as if to say, "You are in the way."
[Author's Note]
As a mob among mobs, the gardener boy was planned to be named "Teo," but since someone once said in the comments section that "there are too many Teos," I am considering whether to give him a different name. But I think Teo is easy to recognize and good. Ah, he will exit mid-... no, never mind.
Will fix typos and errors at a later date.