〈034〉
“Why did they all make those faces?”
Inside the returning carriage, I tilted my head and asked Lord Winchester. He had been deep in thought and seemed to mull over my question for a moment, but in the end, he just shook his head, unable to come up with a suitable answer.
The once warm and cheerful atmosphere had frozen in an instant, and the kind and gentle royal family members had all simultaneously pulled expressions as if they had just eaten rotten durian. The reason for that was still a mystery.
“By the way… is it strange to address each other as ‘Lord Winchester’ and ‘Miss Naery’?”
This time, it was Lord Winchester who asked me.
While I had been pondering the strange expressions of the royal family, it seemed that this was what had been on his mind.
“I don’t think those are particularly odd titles.”
I honestly didn’t think they were. That’s why we’d always used them. I had been just as surprised by the royal family’s reaction earlier today.
But when I gave it some more thought with my basic social sense intact, I realized most married couples around me didn’t address each other as “Lord” or “Miss.”
“Though now that I think about it… people around me don’t really speak that way.”
“Then what do they say?”
“Hmm… If I think about my parents or my brother and his wife, they usually call each other ‘honey,’ ‘dear,’ or simply ‘wife.’ My older sister is a bit eccentric, so she uses strange nicknames, but that’s just her being weird.”
“Strange nicknames?”
“Oh, they’re too ridiculous. You really don’t need to know.”
I carefully left out the fact that my sister’s household wasn’t running a beekeeping business, yet they used pet names like “honey~,” “sweetbee~,” “my queen bee,” and even “syrupy-sweet.” No wonder their baby’s prenatal nickname was Bzz-Bzz.
Suddenly, I imagined Lord Winchester calling me “my queen bee” with that emotionless face of his.
Ack! No, absolutely not!
“Then I’ll start calling you that from now on.”
“…What?”
Excuse me? Was that not just in my head?! Did he just say he’d call me a queen bee?!
“You said people usually say things like ‘honey’ or ‘dear’ or ‘wife.’ So I’ll start addressing you that way, Miss Naery.”
Oh… thank goodness. Not queen bee—wait, no! Still no!
“N-no! You really don’t have to do that!”
I quickly shook my head. While I was relieved it wasn’t “queen bee,” the terms he had chosen were still a bit much.
“But you said that’s what’s common?”
“Well, yes, but… aren’t there other options? I mean, that’s just how it is around me, but what about the couples around you, Lord Winchester? What do they call each other?”
“…”
He said nothing in response.
“I’m not sure. I’ve never paid attention to things like that.”
At last, he gave an honest, straightforward answer.
“So I suppose I’ll just follow what’s customary around you, Miss Naery. Or rather… I should say, my lady.”
It sounded like he was already committing to changing his wording immediately.
“What do you think, my lady?”
Lord Winchester asked me. He was as serious as if he were performing a mission of the utmost importance. As if we were truly married out of love, like a real couple.
“Shall we, then… dear…”
And so, I found myself replying like that. For some reason, whenever Lord Winchester showed genuine sincerity, I always seemed to get swept up by it. When those blue eyes looked into mine so earnestly, I ended up responding like I was under a spell.
“…”
Unable to handle the sudden awkwardness in the air, I turned my head and looked out the carriage window.
The night sky was filled with beautifully twinkling stars.
It was night. Very late at night.
Lorinus quietly turned his head to look at the seat beside him. Naery was sleeping soundly, breathing peacefully.
“…”
As he watched her silently, a strange sound escaped his lips—something between a sigh and a breath through the nose. It was so quiet that only someone listening intently for his presence might’ve noticed it.
Lorinus thought back to their first night together. That had also been very late at night.
Naery had seemed incredibly nervous. She stuttered her words, her face was stiff, and when he approached the bed, she even let out a small scream.
As if he were some kind of violent conqueror or a brute about to do something terrible.
“I will honor your chastity. So please, rest easy and sleep well.”
That’s why he’d ended up saying that—without even realizing it.
He was taken aback by how she treated him like a rogue. As a knight, there was no way he would ever violate a lady. Besides, he wasn’t someone consumed by lust.
Lorinus’s only true desire was the sword.
To imbue more of his will into the blade. To reach a higher level. To attain something beyond a sword master.
That was Lorinus’s only desire, his hope, and his life’s goal. And that still hadn’t changed.
“Hmmm…”
As if sensing someone watching her in her sleep, Naery made a small groaning noise and furrowed her brows slightly. Maybe she was dreaming.
Lorinus knew that Naery snored softly when she was very tired, and that she occasionally talked in her sleep. Despite how frightened she had been on their first night, she now slept incredibly well next to him.
All those stories about her pining in unrequited love, unable to eat or sleep, crying through the nights—they seemed completely false now. At the Camellia mansion, Naery ate well, slept well, and lived well.
She even got along with Daniel like a real sister. She bought him things without restraint, fought people if they insulted him, and praised him with sparkling eyes—not like a warm mother, but more like a fiercely devoted sister or friend.
“…”
Lorinus wondered if her furrowed brow was because of how the blanket was bunched uncomfortably. He reached out and gently pulled it down from her shoulder.
That revealed her nightgown. It looked like an old chemise she’d worn for years, with faded linen and a slightly worn ribbon at the chest.
Lorinus himself didn’t care much about clothing, so his nightwear wasn’t much different. To outsiders, they probably looked too modest to be a count and countess.
In fact, it almost looked like a matching set—like a sweet, ordinary couple.
Come to think of it, while she had spent money freely on things for Daniel—so much that the former housekeeper Madam Perede even commented on it—Naery had never bought anything for herself. Not even for her husband, Lorinus.
She brushed off her own injuries and barely commented on Lorinus’s. But when Daniel had a bump on his forehead, she became so enraged she nearly challenged another noblewoman to a duel.
At meals, she always checked if Daniel had food he liked first. She worried about snacks, whether he was studying well, playing happily, or if the wind might blow him away, or the sun might wither him like a fragile flower.
Anyone watching might think Daniel was her biological son.
And yet, considering she had supposedly fallen in love at first sight and lost sleep over it, her behavior toward Lorinus was far too calm.
Sure, she occasionally blushed or looked away when their eyes met, but her usual demeanor didn’t suggest she was a woman in love with him.
If anything, it looked more like she was in love with Daniel.
“…”
Lorinus stopped his thoughts. Instead, he gently pulled the blanket back over her, tucking it in carefully.
The dawn breeze blowing through the open window was cool, and he worried she might catch a cold in her sleep.
Just as Naery had said—Lord Winchester was a kind man.
