Chapter 18.
The Boundary Between Reality and Dream
Laurel hurried into the kitchen and slipped into the group that was talking.
“The cursed island?”
The kitchen maids were startled by the sudden appearance of the mistress’s personal attendant and immediately fell silent.
In order to learn even one more detail about the island, Laurel fired off questions without pause.
However, no one dared to answer and only exchanged uneasy glances.
“I’m only asking out of curiosity.
I won’t report it to our superiors, so please don’t worry.”
Having worked under others for a long time, they did not easily trust Laurel’s words.
But Laurel had once been in the same position at the von Hafen household, so she understood the psychology of servants well.
She persuaded them more actively, and only after thirty minutes did they begin to speak about the island.
“That island has been surrounded by rumors since long ago.”
A kitchen maid named Anna, who said she was born and raised in Haven, spoke with certainty.
Though it bore the romantic name “Island of Love,” no one who went there ended well.
Even if things seemed fine at first, the ending was never good.
As the most recent example, Marcus, Lucent Blackcarson’s father, had frequented the island and was murdered not long after.
“For what reason was the island cursed?”
At Laurel’s question, the others stopped their work and gathered around Anna.
“Long ago, during the height of the witch hunts, women fled to that island for refuge.
Whenever witch hunters approached after learning of it, fierce storms would rise and they all died.
In any case, the island served for a long time as a refuge for women accused of being witches.
To prevent outsiders from harming them, they planted trees all over the island to bewitch intruders.”
In other words, the fruit trees planted by witches lured outsiders with their scent and color.
More astonishingly, people never realized they had been seduced by the fragrance.
Could the fruit then be a weapon to kill intruders?
“What kind of fruit is it?”
Laurel asked tensely.
“They say it’s a perfectly ripe poisoned apple.
I don’t know whether it actually kills you.
Some say eating it drives you mad, or makes you fall into a love-crazed illness.
Others say it grants mysterious abilities.
In any case, there have always been many stories.”
“Ah, I see.”
‘A love-crazed illness?
Does that even make sense?
Love itself is madness.’
Laurel concluded the tale lacked credibility.
After all, was there any old castle or peculiar land without at least one such legend?
Even in her hometown, there was a forest said to house monsters, yet village women flocked there to gather mushrooms when the season came.
And Lucent Blackcarson’s father had lived a dangerous life; his death could hardly be blamed on an island.
“Thank you for the story.
When the storm calms, the master and madam will return, so please prepare warm soup.”
“Yes.”
‘Someone as kind as our young lady would never be cursed.
I worried over nothing.’
Laurel left the kitchen in haste to prepare bathwater so Applin could wash immediately upon returning.
* * *
On Applin’s tongue lingered the sweet scent and taste of the wild apple.
But her consciousness gradually blurred, and her body felt as though it floated somewhere in the air.
Darkness and light alternated, and after passing through thick mist, she stopped in an unfamiliar space.
‘Where is this?’
The moment the question formed, an unfamiliar sorrow engulfed her like flames.
It felt as though she had been swept somewhere between reality and dream.
Why did her chest feel so heavy and gloomy?
The intense grief stirring her soul was unbearable.
Just then, the sound of a boy crying in the distance drew her in.
In a stark white room stood a hospital bed and a boy crying beside it.
The child, with blond hair and blue eyes, looked strangely familiar.
It did not take Applin long to realize who he was.
‘Lucent?’
The boy, about seven years old, trembled as he clutched his father’s hand tightly.
A sharp pain pierced Applin’s heart.
Young Lucent Blackcarson’s anguish flowed into her.
‘How could a clever, remarkable child like you come from someone like me?’
The man dying on the hospital bed was his father.
With bandages wrapped around his chest, the shadow of death looming over him, he gave his final farewell.
‘Father….’
Lucent Blackcarson trembled in fear of losing him.
His father weakly raised his hand and touched his son’s face.
‘Lucent, just because your father was a gangster doesn’t mean you are.
You are very different from me.
You’re intelligent and kind-hearted.
So study hard and live a life respected by others.’
‘Don’t say that—just get up!’
As Lucent Blackcarson cried louder, Applin wept alongside him.
So this was what it felt like for one’s heart to be torn apart.
The father’s desperate love was vivid and overwhelming.
Though it was Lucent’s grief, Applin felt it as if it were her own.
Her limbs trembled.
‘I didn’t become a thug because I wanted to.
Watching my family starve before my eyes… I was terrified.
But you are exceptional, Lucent.
Live in the light, not the shadows.
Attend a good school, work in a respected place, build a happy family, and live more happily than anyone.
That is your father’s wish.’
Before such final words, a seven-year-old boy could only cry.
He wished desperately for his father’s fragile life to last just a little longer.
‘I’ll be scared without you.’
‘You’re strong.
Believe in yourself.
The money I earned may be dirty, but you can use it cleanly.
Never feel ashamed.
Do everything you want and live splendidly.
You can do it.
And… when I’m gone, you are the head of the family.
Take care of your mother and sister, Lucent.’
With those final words, his father breathed his last.
The boy clung to his father’s lifeless face and sobbed.
Applin reached out repeatedly to hold him, but her hands grasped nothing.
Perhaps she was a formless existence.
She wanted to embrace the small, fragile Lucent Blackcarson and comfort him.
All she could do was cry even more sorrowfully.
Covering her face with both hands, Applin wept aloud.
At that moment, young Lucent Blackcarson turned his head and looked at her strangely.
Who was she, crying with him?
The thought that someone witnessed his despair made his eyes tremble.
When Applin lowered her hands, exhausted from crying, she found herself elsewhere.
The hospital room and seven-year-old Lucent were gone.
Instead, a young man stood alone on a snowy street.
Knowing it was Lucent Blackcarson, she ran to him.
He now appeared about seventeen.
The previous sorrow vanished, replaced by awe at how gallantly he had grown.
But soon several men surrounded him and pointed fingers.
“Lucent Blackcarson, even if you placed first in the written exam, you cannot enter our school.”
“A gangster’s son applying to the Kroisen Imperial University?
Preposterous.”
“If someone like you enrolled, our university’s honor would fall.”
“A man must live according to his station. Tsk tsk.”
Cruel men spouting harsh words to a promising student.
Applin ran toward them.
As she waved her hands wildly, they dispersed like mist.
Only Lucent Blackcarson remained, shoulders trembling as he wept.
Though she knew it was impossible, Applin embraced him from behind.
“…?!”
This time, she could feel him.
Lucent Blackcarson turned around and looked at Applin with tear-filled eyes, his lips trembling as he tried to speak.
