Nihil was starting to regret if this was really the right thing to do.
Honestly, what use did he have for taking Royal Studies?
The dog had barked, and he worried the seaweed might get soaked in the extract, but he’d already made his move, and now he was stuck tailing Lianus around and attending classes together.
The only consolation was that, even if it ran late, all the classes usually ended by three or four in the afternoon.
“Ah, aside from the regular lessons, sometimes when the weather gets warmer, there’ll be extra Equestrian Training or Archery classes. But you don’t have to worry—at those times, you don’t have to attend with my brother.”
“…….”
Nihil’s answers grew slower, and his voice quieter.
He couldn’t bring himself to blame Lianus, so he just stared blankly at the guard dog standing nearby.
Evan, knowing how much Nihil had contributed, just rolled his eyes and, thinking it was better to let things be, lifted the corners of his lips into a small smile and gave a thumbs up.
Seeing that, Nihil couldn’t even muster up annoyance anymore and just let out a deep sigh.
After that, Lianus went off to wash up, seaweed fluttering as he entered the bath, leaving only Evan and Nihil behind as the sound of water echoed through the bedroom. Nihil, practically fused to the sofa, quietly spoke up.
“Tell me why you barked today.”
“…When exactly did I bark?”
Even this morning, he’d been standing guard outside, calm and silent, and yet he’d been told to bark more, or accused of drooling just because he looked at the fondant au chocolat. Did this wildcat really see him as a dog?
Evan narrowed his eyes, trying to read Nihil’s intentions, but as always, Nihil’s expressionless face gave nothing away.
Of course, he had moved around noisily at dawn, and made a fuss about attending classes with the Prince, but when Nihil told him to bark more, he was sure he hadn’t done anything at all.
‘Hmm, no. I did hit the wall once… Could that have been what he heard?’
“You kept sighing after meeting Lianus’s instructors today, didn’t you?”
“…That, could you hear it even inside the bedroom?”
Evan’s eyebrow twitched, and he stuck out his tongue with a look of exasperation.
Not the sound of hitting the wall, but sighing.
He couldn’t quite remember if he’d really sighed, but after meeting the Queen and the First Prince, his mood had soured, so he’d probably let out a sigh for sure.
“You sighed so deeply it was like the earth would swallow you up—how could I not hear? I couldn’t get a wink of sleep because of you.”
Wasn’t that his own fault, being so sensitive he reacted even to sighs from outside the door?
Annoyed by the wildcat’s prickliness toward him, Evan narrowed his eyes and glared, but then suddenly stopped, struck by a thought.
‘Wait, could it be that this guy woke the Prince because of me?’
“Hurry up and confess.”
Nihil, still expressionless, pressed Evan for an answer, but Evan just opened and closed his mouth, unable to reply right away.
Come to think of it, this wildcat wasn’t the type to ask to play first.
He’d probably have preferred to be left alone.
He could be a bit rude, but he wasn’t the sort of sociopath who’d wake a sick Prince just for fun.
He was the one who noticed the Prince was unwell and made sure medicine was prepared in advance, and just like Evan, Nihil had nursed the Prince until his fever broke.
Even after the fever subsided, he’d put up with Evan’s noisy antics, only snapping and tossing a pillow at him.
Evan looked down at Nihil with a mixture of horror and disbelief.
“You—did you really wake the Prince so roughly just because of me?”
“If it weren’t for you, I would’ve let him sleep longer. When the dog starts whining, even the owner has to wake up and soothe him.”
“…..”
Really, this wildcat is a damn mutt…
“Looks like you’re not going to tell your master, so just spit it out already.”
“…”
Evan hesitated.
In fact, he’d forgotten that the wildcat’s noisy wake-up had led him to meet the Queen and the First Prince.
He wondered if he should say anything, but somehow, he felt that with this guy, even serious problems would be made to seem trivial. In the end, Evan decided to unburden himself.
“…Even though I didn’t inform anyone about the Prince’s illness, the First Prince already knew.”
“The First Prince?”
“Yeah. Even the Servants here didn’t know until the Prince told them himself, so I don’t think the information leaked through them. I only told the Instructors that he was absent, not that he was ill. Of course, since he’s often sick, they could have guessed, but still…”
“You don’t know where the leak was? Isn’t there only one place left?”
“Are you saying one of the Instructors is the culprit…?”
Evan tilted his head. Most of the Instructors, except for the Duke Thesaurus, were neutral.
There was no Swordsmanship lesson today, so he hadn’t met the Duke to report the absence either.
There could be a First Prince supporter among the Instructors, but the First Prince seemed to know about the Prince’s illness even before they did, so the Instructors probably weren’t the source of the leak…
As Evan pondered, Nihil let out a deep sigh, as if exasperated.
“Your own mouth is the problem.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Think carefully. If not you, then who?”
“Don’t be ridiculous! If I’d told anyone, why would I be agonizing over it now?”
“You didn’t tell the Palace Servants or the Instructors about the illness. But there’s one person you couldn’t help but inform about Lianus’s condition.”
“…Someone I couldn’t help but inform…? No way…”
Evan’s face grew increasingly grim.
The one person he couldn’t avoid reporting the Prince’s symptoms to in detail.
The apothecary.
Evan, unable to believe it, blurted out a defense.
“…But, he’s from the main Palace. His Majesty pursues perfect neutrality. Even if the nobles have their subtle allegiances… those employed in the main Palace wouldn’t dare take sides with one Prince or another. They’d be beheaded at once.”
“Hmm.”
Perfect neutrality…
‘Is it thanks to the King that a Prince without a mother hasn’t been driven out of the Palace?’
Nihil was lost in thought. It seemed Lianus was more loved than he’d realized.
“Well, in any case, the apothecary wouldn’t tamper with the medicine. If it was too obvious, it’d be dangerous. But if it’s just a matter of observing the medicines you pick up and deducing the condition, it’s entirely possible. The leak definitely came from him. And the fact that a royal’s condition gets out is more serious than you think.”
“….”
Not from some other Palace, but from the main Palace’s apothecary—there couldn’t be anything more dangerous.
Until now, he’d never suspected and had always fetched medicine whenever the Prince was ill.
If he’d done something to the medicine, the Prince would be…!!
“Don’t worry. The medicine you brought this time was fine.”
“…Then, what should we do?”
Evan’s expression grew darker and darker.
It wasn’t really something to ask a child he’d only met a day ago, but he felt so helpless he would’ve borrowed even a cat’s help if he could.
“I’ll write you a list, so from now on, when you fetch medicine, bring the herbs in their raw, unprocessed state.”
At those words, Evan’s drooping head snapped up. His eyes went wide. He’d hoped for a cat’s paw, but a wildcat’s paw had reached out instead.
Nihil was still expressionless, and that unwavering indifference brought a strange sense of reassurance.
But Evan couldn’t help but ask.
“…You can prepare medicine too, not just take pulses…? How?”
“I told you, I raised a sick child. I struggled for a long time to save him. I’m older than I look.”
Evan’s mouth hung open.
Could he really trust this guy? His thoughts jumbled in his head, but Nihil continued on, unconcerned.
“…At first, I thought if he died, I’d just bury him. Death is a natural thing for all living creatures. But… I just couldn’t let go.”
Nihil was still as nonchalant as ever.
Or maybe, his expression looked a little twisted.
The sudden heaviness in the air left Evan speechless, barely able to breathe.
“Knowing I might never see that child again was unbearable. But all I did was survive; I had no idea what to do when a child was sick. I’d never been ill myself, not even once. I didn’t know you were supposed to see a doctor when you’re sick, or that treatment required money, or how to earn money. I knew nothing.”
“…..”
“That was the first time I ever interacted with people. I tried talking to strangers and nearly got kidnapped. I went to an apothecary without money and got thrown out. That’s when I first realized how helpless I was.”
Evan’s face grew more and more grim. Nihil, disliking the darkening mood, shrugged lightly and spoke as if it were nothing.
“I don’t know how I ended up rambling like this. Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t take long to adjust to society, since I’m so outstanding. And luckily, the child held out for quite a while. Maybe it was just a trivial illness, and I made it worse by clinging to him. Maybe he only got sick because I didn’t take proper care of him.”
Evan understood that Nihil was trying to lighten the mood, but his stiff expression didn’t relax easily.
He knew all too well how terrifying ignorance could be.
Evan had felt that helplessness himself, unable to do anything for a sick child.
“I finally managed to get an herbal medicine book, but, laughably, I couldn’t read. And even after I learned, the drawings weren’t clear enough to tell the herbs apart, so I had to taste anything that looked remotely similar. Leaves, flowers, fruit, roots, even tree bark—I tried everything.”
“……”
“I got stomachaches and fevers from all that experimenting. Since I’d never been sick before, it was really hard. I even tried a lot of poisonous plants, but maybe because I was sturdy, I never died.”
He seemed to have had special feelings for the child he’d raised, yet the wildcat remained as nonchalant as ever.
Even though it had to be a hard subject to bring up, he used his own past as a tool to persuade Evan, and for some reason, that bothered him a little.
Evan, still with a stiff face, asked,
“…Did the child recover?”
“He got better just fine. We spent a long time together after that. I kept studying herbs just in case he got sick again. Maybe I gave him too many tonics, because he ended up way too healthy, and all that knowledge became pretty much useless. Anyway… it’s not just a superficial skill, so you can trust me. Well, who knows how long the Prince will keep me at his side, though.”
Nihil said that, then calmly asked, ‘When do you think I’ll get kicked out?’ and muttered to himself.
That people are truly fickle creatures.