Chapter 34
2024.07.04.
It was a question stripped of any trace of a smile — something unlike Robert at all.
“What would Dietrich be like if he were into men?”
I’d never really thought about it, because there was no way he could be into men.
“Still — what if Dietrich really did like men?”
Even then, Dietrich would remain Dietrich.
Imagining him saying with his own mouth that he liked men made my head swim, but that was only my perspective.
I had no right to prattle on about Dietrich’s tastes.
Feeling the pleasant early-summer evening breeze, I scratched my cheek.
“Well. I’ve never really thought about it.” I replied.
“…Really? Would you mind if someone like that was around?”
“Why are you asking that all of a sudden?”
Maybe that conversation the maids had earlier stuck with him.
Curious because of the unexpected question, I looked sideways at Robert who had been walking beside me.
He still didn’t look my way, his gaze fixed straight ahead.
The breeze made Robert’s light brown hair flutter.
Random observation: Robert was objectively pretty.
His talkative, oblivious personality usually hid it, but when he was quiet he was clearly good-looking.
“Just — seeing everyone talking so intently made me curious. Is it really that surprising to like men?” he muttered, flicking his hair back with an exaggerated laugh.
“Liking someone isn’t something you can control,” he added.
For some reason, saying that made Robert look bitter and a little sad.
I quietly sympathized with him.
How nice would it be if one could choose whom to love.
It’s my heart, yet I can’t properly manage it — that’s the reality.
‘Like me liking Nocturne but not being able to see him,’ I tried to find the closest parallel to Robert’s situation, but it wasn’t a great fit.
This wasn’t it.
Liking Nocturne but not being able to see him was because of my circumstances.
Delgado’s housemaid being likely never to meet the Frey Marquis’s Yeong-sik — a formidable 6th-circle mage — was a different kind of barrier.
Maybe a better example would work.
I slowly reviewed the thing that had most recently contradicted my feelings.
Of course that annoyingly handsome face came to mind first.
‘Ah — I don’t want to care what Dietrich is doing, but I can’t stop thinking about him.’
Yes, that was the most appropriate.
I didn’t want to be curious about Dietrich, who never even bothered to show up, yet whenever I heard news of him my ears perked up.
That was what it meant for my feelings not to obey me.
Hearing Robert’s words made me completely understand his heart.
And thinking about it again made me mad.
If only my feelings would move the way I wanted, everything would be easier.
“So would you understand if Master Dietrich were like that?”
At that reverse question, Robert came to a sudden halt.
On the way back to the kitchen, Robert’s shadow stretched long under the dim orange streetlamps, as long as his silence.
But then he hunched his head. He glanced at me like he was gauging my reaction, then let his shoulders droop.
“What about you?”
“Robert, I already asked first.” I said.
“Still — answer first! I’m a coward.”
I didn’t know what Dietrich being gay had to do with Robert’s courage, but I shrugged nonchalantly.
“It makes no difference. If that’s his preference, we should respect it.”
“Isn’t it filthy?” he blurted.
What the—?
Did he mean Dietrich was filthy?
I balled my hand into a fist and glared with triangular eyes.
Startled by my menacing growl, Robert waved his hands and hastily began to explain.
“I didn’t mean Master Dietrich is filthy!”
He was sweating coldly, as if afraid I’d snitch to Dietrich.
‘Hah! Like I’d tell him that!’ I thought.
If Dietrich heard such gossip, he would probably say expressionlessly, “So what?” and move on.
He would act as though it didn’t matter, but I couldn’t guarantee he wouldn’t be hurt.
I couldn’t read what was in his heart, so I wouldn’t say more.
Besides, Robert was my friend — there was no reason to stir up Dietrich’s temper.
“Stop being quiet and don’t chicken out. So? Are you filthy?”
“No way! Whoever someone likes, it’s the same feeling.”
“Then that’s fine, right? I don’t care about those secret conversations from earlier. No one has the right to judge someone else’s feelings.”
“I see.”
“Then if I ever find anyone running around saying Master Dietrich is into men or whatever, I’ll sock them right away!”
I shot my compact fist up into the air; Robert burst into laughter.
“See! Heidi, you’re the best!”
“I know!”
Robert draped his arm over my shoulder and we resumed walking briskly.
He was maybe half a head taller than me and tugged me along, but I didn’t mind.
He looked much better than his earlier listless self.
Besides, I was in a good mood.
Maybe because I’d just given the ignorant gossipers a piece of my mind and felt satisfied.
‘I wasn’t doing it to look after him, really.’
I was simply not the type to stand by while someone said wrong things, and it would also help Delgado House’s succession.
That was the only reason.
Thinking that, I gripped Robert’s hand resting on my shoulder.
“Nice! I’m in a great mood — shall we go back and have a cold beer?”
“Steal one from the storeroom?”
“No one will know! After all, we’re closing the kitchen today!”
“Good idea!”
We joked, shoved and pulled as he hugged my neck and we headed back to the kitchen; it wasn’t far.
Maybe pride was controlling my whole mind.
I failed to notice the turquoise gaze watching us.
“…Hah, unbelievable.”
He hadn’t been seen for days, weeks even. So he’d been off playing with someone else.
Dietrich coldly watched a couple — a man and a woman smiling at each other — from below, under the dimming evening sky.
They were standing in the garden path visible from the second floor of the mansion; seeing them laugh so boldly in public made Dietrich bristle with annoyance.
‘Their mouths are going to split,’ he muttered.
Harpe’s big eyes were half-lidded in a broad, bright smile.
He was smiling so cheerfully it seemed to brighten the dim garden a little.
Dietrich, watching the smile with displeasure, bit his lip.
There was no reason to watch them any longer.
Seeing the two of them cozying up like that had been pure chance.
As usual, the empty room was ready; he had gone to the window to light a lamp and draw the curtains, and that was his undoing.
He grabbed the white curtain to do what he had meant, but the soft fabric crumpled mercilessly in his large hand.
“Who the hell is that guy?”
He stopped halfway through drawing the curtain and turned his gaze to the man chattering beside Harpe.
A handsome man with dark brown hair and black eyes.
‘A household staff member?’
Of course — a guest wouldn’t be dressed like that at this hour.
Dietrich frowned at their attire.
Then he noticed they wore white aprons tucked at their waists.
Now that he thought about it, Harpe hadn’t been seen around the house since the northern campaign started.
‘I wasn’t even there when I waited during his shift,’ he murmured to himself, then froze.
Did he just say he had been waiting for Harpe?
Startled at his own thought, he looked away from them.
His eyes landed on Harpe, who gleamed as if showing off next to the neatly made bed.
A deep green jewel glittered in the middle of Harpe’s chest; seeing it, Dietrich naturally thought of her eyes.
Those green eyes that had looked at him straight on, showing neither fear nor dread.
The rumors that Dietrich Delgado brought nothing but fear and death — he’d never cared to hear them.
A genius swordsman, the Delgado family’s candidate for head of house.
He had many epithets. The most widely known was ‘a cold-blooded man with no pity.’
Dietrich wasn’t particularly offended by the nickname.
Although it was a silly title coined by idiots who’d barely spoken to him, it wasn’t entirely untrue.
He knew the horrific rumors, too.
That he’d cut out a maid’s wrist and tongue and expelled her; that he’d killed a servant who had poisoned the food where they stood.
None of those were wholly true, but while he kept silent, falsehoods had hardened into “facts.”
If you spent time in the Delgado estate, you couldn’t be unaware of those rumors.
Hearing them, he expected the housemaids’ attitudes toward him to change.
But Harpe remained unchanged.
[Young Master! Master Dietrich! Where are you going?]
She asked him in the same friendly way regardless of other maids.
She’d call him to come eat when the food was ready.
She showed no sign of remembering the time she’d supposedly eaten poisoned food and nearly died.
So it made sense that she could be that bright; he couldn’t find any reason to hate her for it.
‘Did she become a kitchen assistant?’
He watched Harpe raising a fist high into the air, and inspected their clothes more closely.
From the attire, it seemed likely.
He didn’t understand why a maid from the main house would suddenly be transferred to the kitchen.
Dietrich clicked his tongue and pulled harder on the curtain to finish drawing it.
But when he saw the audacious dark-brown-haired man placing a chin on Harpe’s shoulder, his thoughts changed.
‘…Where did you put your hand?’
He glared at Robert as if he could throw his sword at him.
Then he stormed out of the bedroom and went straight to the head housekeeper.
It was the second time Dietrich, who usually paid no attention to the household staff, had sought out the housekeeper.
