Chapter 67
Aaron, as always, greeted everyone with a gentle face, smiling as he passed them one by one. Even though Amelia had stayed in the imperial palace for quite some time, the temple was still crowded with worshippers—and that was precisely the reason why.
“Has the additional supply for the relief house been delivered?”
At the voice that came from behind them, the clerics who had been counting and recording the sacks of wheat flinched and turned around. The one holding the pen was the very man who had once demanded the dismissal of several apprentice clerics.
“Yes. Just as you instructed, we sent them first to the relief house and the orphanage. They were overjoyed, saying the Lord is always kind.”
In Esclyf, the temple—and the existence of the priestess—could not afford to completely abandon charitable works. After all, it was precisely because the priestess had once healed the sick among the poor and helped them endure hardship that she first gained fame.
“It is fortunate they too could feel the Lord’s grace. Poverty must not deprive anyone of sensing the Lord’s presence or will.”
Aaron nodded with relief. If Amelia had seen him, she would have accused him of shamelessly pretending to be the apostle of God without so much as moistening his lips with saliva.
“High Priest.”
Just as Aaron was about to continue on his way, one of the clerics, having set his paper and pen atop a sack, carefully called out to him.
“The apprentice cleric, Ricky… he is officially dead, isn’t he?”
In Esclyf, the name Ricky was common enough. Yet Aaron had turned it over in his mind so often that it was far from unfamiliar to him.
“That’s right.”
Aaron replied casually. A sinner’s death was something no one considered of great consequence.
“May I ask why you bring him up?”
Aaron inquired as naturally as he could, curious whether the boy might somehow still be alive. If, by some chance, he was, Aaron intended this time to strangle him with his own hands.
“When I visited the orphanage, a woman came, saying she could not raise a child on her own, and handed the baby over….”
What of it? Aaron had no interest in his rambling story but forced a faint smile to hide his disinterest.
“She said the child’s father had seemed like a decent man, but it turned out he was an apprentice cleric. When she told him she was with child, he simply told her to get rid of it and ran away. As it was a disgrace to the temple, I thought I ought to at least take a look at the child, and when I did….”
“He resembled the dead man?”
At Aaron’s question, the cleric nodded.
“Yes. Those blue eyes kept bothering me.”
“……”
“Of course, the father was a sinner, but the child is innocent. So I wondered if perhaps the mother and child might be allowed to live under the temple’s care, the woman doing odd chores, perhaps laundry, and the child being raised with us.”
It was too ambiguous to dismiss outright. Indeed, the apprentice cleric had been a criminal, but the abandoned child was not. Born unlucky, he had ended up discarded to the orphanage from the start.
“In that case…”
Taking in a woman and a child was no burden. Aaron had almost ordered the woman to work as a laundress when he hesitated.
“You said… blue eyes?”
The cleric blinked in puzzlement, as if surprised Aaron would ask about something as trivial as the eye color of a dead apprentice.
“Not green, but bright blue?”
“Yes, that’s right. A vivid blue.”
The old cleric was one of the very few who truly knew what Ricky looked like. Which meant the chance he was mistaken was nearly zero.
“…He couldn’t possibly have had blue eyes.”
Back then, the man had worn his hood low, and Aaron, consumed by fury, had eyes only for Amelia. The apprentice’s identification tag had been proof enough of his status, and Aaron had thrown him in prison, intending to beat him later, so he had not checked his face closely.
Even so, Aaron clearly remembered that fleeting glimpse of green eyes beneath the hood.
“High Priest?”
The old cleric cautiously drew Aaron back from his thoughts.
“Ah, I was merely distracted for a moment.”
“Is that so.”
Aaron answered smoothly, and the cleric smiled kindly.
“Let the woman work as a laundress with proper pay, and the child…”
Aaron’s words trailed off briefly as he spoke of the child.
“Let the child also enter the temple so that the mother and child may live together.”
It only seemed like Aaron had paused to weigh what to do with them.
“When the two of them arrive at the temple, inform me.”
“As you wish.”
The old cleric bowed low. Aaron passed by with his calm expression intact. His smile vanished the instant they were apart.
First, he would need to see what the child looked like, and then confirm with the woman once more what Ricky’s features had been.
A few seconds after Amelia, in a violet chiffon dress, passed by, the maids turned their heads in surprise. As they had been walking in opposite directions, the distance between them widened quickly.
“I thought she must be some noble lady, but that hair…”
“She always wore only that white dress, didn’t she?”
“I thought she was simply modest, but she’s more glamorous than I expected.”
“They say His Majesty sent her a gift the other day—maybe it was that dress.”
Their voices were not so low that Amelia could not hear. She pretended indifference and walked on.
“They say the daughter of the Marquis of Clark has come. I’d be nervous to run into her.”
“She’s arrived?”
That was the end of the chatter. The daughter of Marquis Clark had proudly accepted Ivan’s proposal of marriage and had come to the capital with her mother to prepare for their engagement. Before the ceremony, she would occasionally visit the palace to spend time with Ivan. Amelia already knew this.
“The palace servants have loose tongues,” Louis whispered.
Amelia gave no reply. She thought Louis had no right to say such a thing when he reported her every move to Aaron and Duke Russell.
“They say the Marquis’s daughter is in the palace.”
At those words, Amelia stopped walking. Quietly, she turned to look toward the main palace—toward the place where Ivan and his future fiancée would be spending time together.
“So. At last.”
Amelia murmured, turning back, and stepped across the threshold into the west palace. Outwardly, her movements were as composed and flawless as ever.
But Louis caught the trace of sordid emotion hidden in her tone and looked intrigued, as though watching some tawdry drama. He now fully believed Amelia’s hostility toward Ivan.
“And Ian?”
“He’ll be with Madam Howard, of course.”
When Amelia asked about Ian, Louis answered lightly, as if wondering where else an infant who could hardly crawl could possibly be. He wasn’t wrong.
“Nothing could have happened while we were just out walking.”
His voice was so matter-of-fact that Amelia’s tension began to ease. But as she stepped across the garden stones, she noticed the unusual commotion in the west palace.
“Something’s wrong.”
At her murmur, Louis’s eyes widened.
“What’s happened…?”
Only two guests stayed in the west palace: Ian and Amelia. Since nothing had happened to her, the problem could only be with the other.
“Priestess!”
Before Louis could even investigate, Amelia had already gathered her skirts in both hands and rushed forward. As she feared, the lobby of the west palace was filled with chattering servants.
“Please, come in quickly!”
At Madam Howard’s gesture, a physician of the palace hurried into Ian’s chamber.
“He’s lost consciousness. I don’t know why this has suddenly happened.”
Through the still-open door, Amelia heard Madam Howard’s anxious explanation. The physician bent swiftly over Ian’s small body.
“What in the world?”
“Another disaster, it seems…”
The door shut, cutting off their voices. Amelia’s hands grew icy. With trembling fingers, she seized the doorknob.
“……”
She stepped inside hesitantly. The first thing she saw was Madam Howard dabbing her tears with a handkerchief, and the physician examining Ian.
And above the din, one sound rang clear—the desperate wailing of the child, crying as though he were about to die. Amelia watched with a rigid face.
