#59

Griselda’s fingers convulsed and twisted inward. No matter how tightly she clutched the baby clothes to her chest, the dying child could hardly cry.

…Sometimes.

Anger is a foolish thing. Like flames trapped in a narrow tube forcing their head through the weakest air hole, anger easily targets the most vulnerable. Even though the hole cannot open the tube. Without the slightest guilt or doubt.

No, perhaps it was only natural that a soft face could not even think of breaking a knife. For Griselda, severely misdirected killing intent felt like the natural order.

She slowly backed away. Quietly, she placed Sieglinde’s son in the bathtub and washed him with water. Carefully shining a candle, she thoroughly cleaned the muddy nostrils, ear canals, and even inside the eyelids. After wrapping the now cleaner child in fine cloth, she laid him in the cradle. The two firstborns lying with their heads together did not cry, and until then the princess showed no signs of waking.

She picked up the princess’s son. She left the birthing room with muffled footsteps. She brought the child in her arms to the empty room that was once her husband’s bedroom. She then went to find the priest.

“The young lord’s condition does not look good….”

She hurriedly returned to the birthing room, accompanied by the pale-faced priest. The priest carefully examined the remaining child in the cradle, but did not notice at all that it was different from before.

She knew he wouldn’t.

Griselda, who had been standing by the cradle with an icy expression, headed back to her husband’s bedroom. The princess did not open her eyes, and Griselda’s feet were not heavy. Now, the princess’s child would be lying on the bed her husband used. Her shadow flickering in the torchlight was like a giant beast.

She kept going down. Neither too fast nor too slow. Silently, as if sinking her whole body into an endless quicksand.

She walked down of her own accord.

It was a dark night with black rain falling steadily outside the window.

***

Sieglinde was found hanging from a tree in the back garden.

It was the next morning. I think she must have been afraid all night that I might report her.

It was probably an inevitable choice for her. Even if she fell into the forest of suicides after death, would that pain be greater than the agony of having her limbs torn apart right now? Poor, pitiful, foolish woman….

I feel a little sorry for her. If I had known she would make such a terrible decision, I would have given her some hint…. Actually, I was in a hurry.

The priests took charge of disposing her corpse outside the castle walls in the wasteland. Among them was a priest rumored to have played with her. That man, completely dazed, seemed at a loss for a while, then treated the woman who was once his as if she were a disgusting worm. His back was trembling as he crossed the moat, cutting through the bluish dawn.

Don’t ask me who he is.

Anyway, he’s a man who was stripped of his priesthood and banished from this fortress over 10 years ago. Old habits die hard. Once he let his guard down, he couldn’t see straight, and even then women were the problem.

And, I….

For many long years, I lived forgetting my sin. Strangely, I felt nothing.

It’s quite odd. I was no longer afraid of the night, felt no guilt towards heaven, and even felt refreshed as if my head had been washed with cold air.

Perhaps I relied on the curse. That it wasn’t my sin.

In fact, just before I put my hands on the princess’s child’s neck, I hesitated. For a very brief moment. And at that very moment, Sieglinde’s words came to mind.

“You don’t know? It’s all a curse.”

Her voice seemed like an indulgence prepared just for me.

“They say long ago they killed people like demons, that it’s all because they’re cursed.”

Even the slightest guilt was instantly erased. Yes, in the end it’s something you brought upon yourself, isn’t it? Isn’t all of this because of your strong-willed fate? So don’t blame me, blame the curse. I kept telling myself that.

My tone is quite disrespectful, isn’t it? You’re right. To tell you the truth, after that I didn’t even care about the princess. Although anger that couldn’t be completely washed away remained like saltiness, I was no longer afraid or resentful of her. I even found it laughable that she regained her mental stability without knowing it was a fake son. I laughed to myself occasionally.

A woman who knows nothing.

So sometimes I ignored her orders as if I hadn’t heard them. I was also negligent in caring for that woman’s twins. Aren’t they just one unknown monster and one daughter of an enemy-like woman? Even if something were to happen and I were to be banished from this fortress or punished, I was confident I could turn my back on the world with a laugh.

Lord Winfrid, at least you will survive and grow up well, living in luxury by that woman’s side. Ah, kill me if you want to.

With you coming into the empty place left by my husband, I had nothing to fear. Yes, I loved you. I still love you. Lord Winfrid, you were….

The root of my life. My sole remaining joy. My only affection.

Your slender frame lying down all day. Your frail gestures occasionally writhing in unbearable pain. The sound of dry coughs, even a single irritated glance – everything was so pitiful and lovable that it choked me up. How adorable you were, getting angry at everything but still snuggling well into these arms.

The brief moments when I lay quietly with my forehead against your small head, or the instant your tiny hand caressed my cheek, were the only times I felt truly alive and breathing.

At that time, everything except caring for your sickly self was meaningless and pointless to me. You were so precious to me.

Like that… with no one asking about the price of sin.

How well the meaningless years flowed. It was on a bright afternoon one day.

The princess, who had long seemed peaceful, suddenly came dragging the young lady by the wrist. The princess handed the young lady, who looked confused, over to me and immediately ordered her to be confined to the women’s quarters. That gaze, as fierce as when she had seizures.

With a pale face, I took the young lady, who was trying to slink away, up to the third floor. In the child’s room, only the three of you remained – you sleeping obliviously, Johannes who had followed breathlessly from outside, and the princess. I was only able to return after comforting the young lady, who was wailing loudly, for a long time. But when I went to the child’s room, the princess….

Was pressing down on Johannes’ neck.

She looked completely… like a ghost. I thought my heart would drop. I was shocked and ran over in one breath to barely separate the two. Even as she was dragged out of the child’s room, the princess was flailing her arms wildly and screaming at the top of her lungs.

“This bastard just won’t die.”

“No matter how much I kill him, he comes back to life.”

I couldn’t know the cause, but it seemed her anxiety had clearly relapsed. Perhaps that day, Johannes had done something terrible to the young lady. That’s all I can guess. Why else would the princess leave such a strange last command? To confine her daughter. I don’t know, but that may have been the only way to protect the young lady from the demon who would eventually take over this fortress.

And on that very day. One sprout that had seemed to grow through my insides after the bud burst, broke.

How many times had she pressed down?

Johannes’ nape was marked with the princess’s red handprints. Strangely, my body trembled as I looked at that sight. My breath caught for no reason. And the expression of the monster sitting up dazedly in the silent place after the princess left…. That expression as he watched the cruel mother’s back as she ran out about to collapse….

Ah, you don’t know anything either.

You too….

Must have been scared.

Somehow I shuddered. Even though I thought this creature was just a monster hiding its true form, for some strange reason my lungs felt cold and I couldn’t just watch. An inexplicable trembling overwhelmed me like a flood and I couldn’t keep my senses. In the end, I left the room almost like I was running away, without even thinking of tending to her.

And as you know, after that the princess hardly had a single day of sound mind. It was like that from when her illness relapsed that day until just before her death.

The young lady was more distressed than anyone.

Of course, that distress probably didn’t come from concern for the princess.

Before night fell, that is, before the duke came looking for the princess, having to stay alone with her completely insane mother in the soft women’s quarters without even a maid – it certainly wouldn’t have been something a young mind could endure. Moreover, didn’t the young lady have to bear the princess’s severe symptoms for the long period of six years?

At first, I tried to ignore the young lady. Even if I no longer hated her, it’s only natural to not want to offer any help to an enemy’s daughter, isn’t it? Nevertheless….

My heart wasn’t entirely at ease as I watched. I couldn’t help but feel sorry seeing the young one suffer. Meanwhile, you who clung to me were so lovable. Even the little remaining anger gradually faded as I watched you grow. And one day, as I was embracing you when you were sick, suddenly Johannes’ expression when the princess was strangling him came to mind….

Yes, what sin do the children have?

Of course, there was no way for my hatred towards the princess to dry up, but at least I didn’t dislike her children as much as before.

After that, I helped the two siblings meet occasionally. It was quite pitiful to see the once close siblings living separately, regardless of whether one’s contents were monstrous or not, and to be frank again, it was also a time when I looked down on the princess.

I shouldn’t have done that.

Until the young lady was married off to the royal palace, those were peaceful days for me, whether the princess had seizures or not. Days when neither curse nor nightmare nor past cast even a speck of shadow. It was only just before the princess’s death that I began to feel even a hint of uneasiness….

“He’s not my son, is he?”

The princess asked me. Grasping my wrist with her withered fingers, she asked like that. Her eyeballs seemed to have concentrated all her remaining life in them as they glinted.