Chapter 4

Gael Von Zenat briefly bid goodbye and left the beach. It’s understandable why he couldn’t have stayed at the beach for a long time.

“Let’s go Michael.” Archel gently swept Michael’s head. Still holding her hand, Michael looked up at her with his beady pair of eyes.

“I’m scared.” A shaky voice was fleeting inconsequentially into the chilly sea breeze and the little hands were unconsciously shivered.

Archel could feel Michael’s anxiety through the hand that she held. It was so heart wrenching to see his hand trembling.

Archel bent her knees on the ground, not caring that her clothes were getting wet and looking straight at Michael’s eyes.

“It’s alright, Michael.”Her hand reached out to his chubby cheeks. The tears hung around his reddish eyes and she wiped it with the tip of her thumb.

“Of course, I’m also scared. We have the enemy on our side and suddenly we had to have this talk with a stranger.”

Archel gave the little boy a tight hug.

“We just need to hold our hands tightly and survive together. That’s all.”

“….”

Despite the silence, the small head on Archel’s shoulder nodded weakly.

“You can do it, right? You don’t have to force yourself to be brave. If you can be brave, you can be brave. But if you don’t, you can lean on me.”

Archel’s soft voice rang in Michael’s ears. Michael, who is shorter than his peers, quivered in her arms.

“Hmm?”

Archel was astonished when she removed him from her arms. It’s because she discovered Michael’s tiny face was packed with determination.

Apart from his red eyes, the appearance of his tiny mouth that was closed firmly was unbearably lovely.

Archel hugged Michael again.

“Right, just like that. You did well.”

Archel, who patted Michael for quite a long time, stood up from her position. She then grabbed Michael’s hand while brushing off the dirt from both her knees and clothes.

“Let’s go.”

Although it was slow to match Michael’s tiny steps, both of them managed to hurriedly left the shore.

By the time that they passed the white sandy-beach and the pile of rocks came out, the composure that she barely maintained crumbled in an instant.

Gael Von Zenat is an outlaw of the eastern sea.

Archel had stepped in his territory. Conversing on an equal footing with someone who could take her life in an instant was difficult, no matter how much she reads and knows about the future.

But still, she didn’t want to crumble in front of her younger brother. So she discarded her fear.

“Ah.”

The carriage was gone. Just like in the story when the two died on the beach because they couldn’t afford to rent a carriage to return. Right now, the carriage also left them and went back.

Of course, even if she can buy the carriage now, she couldn’t find it easily. If she could catch it by chance in the street, it would be fortunate.

Among the nobility, they shouldn’t be glimpsed to catch the carriage themselves without a decent servant, but it wasn’t a big deal.

This was better than having a bunch of servants who might have been instilled by her relatives.

“…”

Archel tried to hold back her tears from coming out. When she recalled the book story, her heart aching from imagining their tragic ending.

The hand that held Michael got a little tighter. Even though she knew a lot, it was not easy to accomplish the work as she thought.

“Let’s go Michael. Let’s catch a new carriage.”

It was when they were about to walk away. From afar, a carriage was headed straight to their direction.

“…?”

It was a fancy carriage. A carriage decorated with silver ornaments and blue cloth, it was the symbol of the empire’s bureaucrat.

And one of them was The Dukedom of Zenat.

*Gallop* *Gallop*

The sound of the horse’s hoof pounding on the ground came nearer and nearer, Archel then hugged Michael with both her arms.

As if it was unbelievable, the carriage really strode towards the two people. The carriage, which was turning to the other side so that the dust won’t hit those two, had a distinct pattern of The Zenat Family.

It was a straight sword without a hilt facing down, that pattern was emitting Zenat’s unconquerable aura.

*Clack*

The carriage’s door opened and a maid got off. She then bowed and introduced herself.

“I’m Rosetta, The Dukedom Zenat’s Maid of Honour.”

It’s not even a maid, but a Maid of Honour. Archel opened her eyes wide at her greeting.

“Are you Lady Archel De Leire?”

“That’s right.”

Archel nodded briefly. Then, Rosetta gradually stepped back from the carriage’s door. As if trying to attend to the two people.

“It was the carriage prepared by The Duke himself. He particularly instructed us to give a special treatment.”

“Ah.”

When she heard that, Archel burst into a short breath. Since she decided to be his bride, there’s no way he could send someone who would become his bride into any ordinary carriage.

“Then, I’ll gladly accept.”

Archel relaxed her arms that were holding Michael. Michael looked up at her, holding Archel’s hand again.

“Let’s go.”

After glancing at the carriage once, Michael unexpectedly went first and got on the carriage. Then he looked inside the carriage, as if he was checking for possible danger.

She smiled as she followed Michael into the carriage. She was so proud of her brother.

Seeing the extravagant and luxurious carriage presented for them, it was only obvious that a wooden-carriage would not fit the class of Zenat’s soon-to-be bride.

It was a common courtesy towards a noblewoman who is about to get married to the family…

Archel thought so and was convinced that was the case.

Until she found out that the carriage was headed to The Duke’s mansion, not Leire County.

***

“Our home…?”

Michael looked up to her in a confusion. That was what Archel wanted to ask.

“I know. Maybe we should talk to the Duke first.”

She can’t believe that he sent a carriage to go to Zenat mansion.

Of course, riding a carriage without asking the destination itself is their mistake…. but why would he bring the person he met for the first time into his mansion?

Not to mention, he is the infamous eastern outlaw, Gael Von Zenat!

“Please come this way.”

When the door opened, all she saw was an old butler without any wrinkles in his face wearing a tailcoat. The butler, who briefly bowed his head and stepped away, was moving swiftly without making a single sound.

When Archel looked around, she could see that the mansion was surrounded by a strange silence. Although there’s no sea nearby, the salty-water aroma was stuck in her nose.

And the mansion in front of her was covered with a black vines that exude a salt water aroma, as if it had not been properly maintained for ten years. There was also a black smudge in the corner.