Oscar crossed the main floor with long strides and stepped onto the black stairs carpeted in red velvet. Even Barbara, who was taller than most women in Luxen, had to quicken her pace to keep up.
She watched her master’s retreating back and let out a quiet breath.
Last night, Oscar had showered several times. That only happened when something weighed on him. The problem was that she still didn’t know what.
Lost in thought, Barbara rounded the landing and started up the stairs again. That was when she noticed the jacket in his hand.
“Your Excellency, I will carry that.”
Oscar’s relentless pace paused for a moment.
Barbara took the jacket. It held no warmth, as if he hadn’t worn it for some time. Then she saw his eyes.
A pair of cold—indifference blue eyes. As devoid of warmth as the jacket. They were fixed below the landing. Without thinking, Barbara followed his gaze.
“……”
She didn’t know what he was looking at.
Then she saw her. The woman designated as the target.
Today, she looked like a ghost. Abel’s black jacket hung loosely over her shoulders, making her small frame look even smaller.
Just then, Oscar, who had paused, began to ascend the stairs again. Barbara watched his back for a moment, then stepped aside.
Simon, Abel, and the wolves looked to her for instruction. She gestured for them to continue upward. Then she quietly stepped in front of the foreigner, blocking her path.
The woman, who had been walking along the landing, stopped short. Their eyes met for a brief moment before breaking.
“Are you alright?”
The foreigner blinked and lowered her head slightly.
“Yes. I’m fine.”
Barbara exhaled slowly. She wondered if it was age, but something felt off, and she couldn’t name it.
“Have you eaten?”
“……”
“Miss?”
“…Yes? Ah…”
“……”
She tried to continue the conversation, searching for the source of her unease. But the woman didn’t seem capable of talking. Barbara set the thought aside.
“Please go to your room and rest.”
It was as she stepped back onto the stairs she had descended.
“Excuse me, Madam Barbara.”
Barbara stopped and turned.
She had expected a request for food.
The question surprised her.
“Is Traun a city?”
“Traun, you say?”
“Yes.”
Barbara narrowed her eyes at the sudden mention of the name. She glanced back out of habit. No one was there.
She was puzzled as to why she was suddenly asking about that place, or how she knew of it. Why did she know that place? Still, there was nothing to hide.
“Traun is Reinhardt’s private property.”
“Private property…?”
“It isn’t a city. Not just anyone can enter.”
“……”
“Does that answer your question?”
The woman’s face seemed to pale further. She nodded faintly.
“Please go to your room and rest. You don’t look well.”
Barbara signaled the wolves at the bottom of the landing and went upstairs.
Several agents stood in the hall, their expressions tense. Seeing them, Barbara quickened her steps and opened the Marquis’s reception room door. As she stepped inside, she involuntarily swallowed a gasp.
All the backup agents who had been dismissed earlier had been summoned back. Abel Sting was kneeling. Oscar’s hand gripped his neck.
Oscar, perched askew on the desk, holding Abel’s throat tight and spat out words. A cruel smile curved his lips.
“You can wander wherever you like. But losing it is another matter, isn’t it?”
Abel held his breath. Oscar drove his boot into Abel’s thigh.
“As long as you’re sane and breathing, that’s enough. Do whatever you want. But secure those two things.”
“……”
“But you lost it in a place like that. Not even a battlefield.”
At the reprimand, the entire backup team dropped to their knees and bowed their heads to the floor. Oscar’s grip tightened. Abel’s face, once red, drained white. He had been holding his breath. His mouth fell open as consciousness began to slip.
“…Sir.”
Oscar, whose grip held Abel's breath, turned his eyes towards the person who had called him. At the sight of Barbara, whose eyes were as blue as the bottom of a glacier, Barbara prostrated herself on the floor immediately.
“Sir, it was my oversight to assume the department store would have been safer.”
A deathly silence descended.
Oscar looked at Barbara for a moment in that cold, dry quiet. Then he turned his gaze back to the wolf whose neck he held. His eyes traced the man’s pale, bloodless face, the swollen veins in his neck, then the back of his own hand.
A laugh escaped him.
In the silence, it sounded out of place. Still laughing, Oscar tossed Abel’s neck aside as if flicking away a cigarette.
“Cough— cough.”
Abel collapsed to the floor, finally able to breathe, coughing violently. The harsh sound echoed through the frozen room.
Oscar brushed his hair back, took another cigarette from the case on the desk, and lit it.
He took several slow drags of the acrid smoke. Then he looked down calmly at Abel, who was struggling to stand.
“This is the last time you cross the line of foolishness.”
Abel bowed so low his head nearly touched the floor.
“Go tomorrow morning. As soon as it’s light.”
“I will not make any more mistakes, Sir.”
Oscar gave a languid smile and slid off the desk.
“Habits are frightening. I should have sent you there from the start instead of bringing you here. If you’d wandered around, you’d only find fields. With just the two of you, it would’ve been easy to disappear, wouldn’t it?”
He crushed the half-smoked cigarette into the ashtray and headed toward the dressing room.
With the first step, the smile faded. With the second, it was gone.
Oscar’s face turned blank. He unbuttoned his shirt carelessly and removed it. His clothes dropped one by one as he walked. When he was bare, he entered the bathroom. The air was damp and cold enough to show his breath. It touched his skin.
He stepped into the frigid air. Without hesitation, he entered the water. It was colder than the air. The freezing water rose past his ankles, then his thighs, then his chest. Up to his neck in an instant.
Still not enough. He submerged himself completely.
Only then did everything recede.
Only in water where he couldn’t breathe did the noise disappear.
Water filled his ears canals, dulling sound. The cold numbed his thoughts.
But the stillness didn’t last.
As his breath reached his throat, Oscar broke the surface and gasped for air. He wiped his face. Water blurred his vision. He wiped again, roughly. Several more times.
Then he suddenly laughed, covering his face. His shoulders trembled. Drops fell from his hair.
The laughter echoed against the walls and returned to him.
Oscar leaned his elbows on the edge of the tub and tilted his head back. A drop slid down from his chin past his prominent Adam's apple.
It had been an irritating night. Annoying one.
The water, once cold enough to bite into his bones, now felt lukewarm. As it warmed, his thoughts returned. Chaotic.
The woman’s stare. As if possessed. Only after she flinched in surprise had he realized what he’d done.
Even then, he couldn’t look away from her lips. There had been a faint scent. He had forced himself to look away.
Something hot churned in his chest.
What had he been trying to do?
The question lingered and driven to the brink of madness.
Unanswered.
For a man who was always certain, it was intolerable.
Even got out of the tub and under the shower, the cold water cleared his head only briefly.
If cigarettes and cold water weren’t enough, the next option was alcohol.
He dried himself roughly and put on a robe.
The bedroom was as cold as the bathroom.
He stood before the darkened room at the entrance and surveyed the room, as always.
Anything out of place?
Anything unwelcome?
“……”
His gaze moved slowly, like a predator searching. It stopped at one spot.
Without a sound, Oscar walked to the liquor cabinet. He took out a bottle of strong liquor and a glass. The golden liquid filled the glass. He lifted it to his lips, gripping it tightly, as if he might crush it.
Just as he tried to swallow the night along with the alcohol—
“…Sir.”
—