A small child who looked to be about his age.
Because he wasn’t even wearing shoes in this cold weather, his toes were bright red from the cold.
He wore clothes several sizes too big, who knows where he found them? And they were tattered all over, stained with marks that could be blood or mud, smeared across his hair and clothing with no regard.
“Your Highness, what are you doing running off like that!”
The Knight who had followed the child quickly wrapped a thick cloak around him and handed over an umbrella.
“I’ll handle things here, so please get inside the carriage first. It’s far too cold.”
The child glanced at his Knight, then looked around, searching for the parents of the child who’d been struck by the carriage.
But no matter how much he asked, the child’s parents didn’t appear.
Only after someone yelled did an old man, trembling, finally speak up.
“Your Highness, please forgive us. That child only appeared in this village recently. He’s an orphan, with no family to punish him. Please, please have mercy.”
Mercy?
He was the one who’d killed the child, who was supposed to forgive whom, and who was to pass judgment?
The Prince swept his gaze around, looking as if he might burst into tears.
The villagers’ clothes were already soaked, perhaps from kneeling on the cold, damp ground for so long.
The sleet was falling even harder now, numbing everyone’s hands and feet.
The Prince decided he should send the villagers home first.
“Everyone, get up and go home! If anyone here is related to this child, only they should stay behind.”
“B-but…”
“Foolish, stupid people! Get inside, now! If I see anyone still loitering in front of me, I’ll have them all flogged!”
At the Prince’s words, the villagers’ faces went pale.
They remembered the child from the neighboring village who’d died from a flogging.
After a brief commotion, a few people began to slip away. Soon, everyone hurried off and disappeared.
The street was left empty in no time.
The Prince let out a small laugh.
He was just the powerless Second Prince, yet these people, who knew nothing, trembled before him.
It was laughable, laughable, and yet so pitiful that it almost hurt.
Water dripped from the dark green hair dangling before his eyes.
Dirty, swamp-colored hair.
They called him the Swamp Prince, didn’t they?
Was there any nickname more fitting for him?
It felt as though sticky filth was dripping from his head, and the mood grew even heavier.
“Your Highness, please go inside now.”
Snapped out of his thoughts by the Knight’s voice, the Prince looked up and glanced at the child lying in a pool of blood.
It was a truly miserable sight.
He’d done that to another person, and yet here he was, feeling sorry for himself over the color of his hair. He must be a terrible person.
That must be why he had no friends.
Why everyone cried and left him behind.
Sleet fell onto the blood-stained, ashen hair of the child.
Without realizing it, the Prince crouched down beside him and held the umbrella over him.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do it. Please forgive me. Be born somewhere better next time. I’m sorry. I really am.”
The Prince offered a quiet farewell to the nameless child.
May you live somewhere warm and never hungry, next time.
He prayed silently, then, without taking his eyes off the child’s body, spoke softly to the Knight standing by his side.
“Sir Evan.”
“Yes, Your Highness?”
“You’ll be sad if I die, right?”
“I’d probably die before Your Highness ever does. I am your Knight, after all.”
“Then I’ll have to mourn for you, Sir Evan. But if I die, who will mourn for me?”
“…Please don’t say such things.”
The Knight’s face twisted.
His Prince, battered and worn from so much pain, looked as though he might shatter at any moment.
The Prince thought to himself.
He was a Prince, so at least many people would come to his funeral.
His Majesty might grieve a little, but he doubted he’d die before His Majesty did.
The thought made him feel even gloomier, and he shook his head.
“This child has no one to mourn for him, so I’ll do it instead. When I return to the Capital, I’ll make just one friend. A friend who’ll mourn when I die. I don’t need many, just one will do.”
Watching his master mutter to himself, the Knight felt a pang in his chest.
He’d lost count of how many Noble children sent as Play Attendants had left in tears.
They’d been forced to send their children as Play Attendants by His Majesty’s order, but under pressure from the Queen Helia and the Thesaurus Ducal Estate, the Nobles had strictly warned their children not to get involved with the Second Prince.
The Knight thought of his own little sister, who’d been bedridden for ten years and never met anyone her age.
If she hadn’t been sick, would she have become the Prince’s friend?
“……!”
Just then, the Prince suddenly stood up, only to stumble and drop the umbrella from his hand.
Startled, the Knight quickly helped the Prince up and retrieved the umbrella before it could blow away.
“Your Highness, what’s wrong?”
“It… it moved!”
“Pardon? The corpse?”
“It definitely moved!”
“That can’t be.”
Evan glanced at the child, doubting the claim.
But the only thing moving was the ashen hair fluttering in the wind.
Right.
After being trampled by a horse and losing so much blood, even a grown man wouldn’t survive, let alone a child…
“…Your Highness.”
He was about to gently reassure the Prince that he must have imagined it, when—
Twitch.
The blood-soaked, ashen head jerked so violently that it couldn’t have been a mistake.\
***
“U-uhhh…”
Squish.
A small hand groped through the pool of blood, and the ashen-haired head slowly began to rise.
The child let out a thin groan, trying to push up with his arms, but could only raise himself halfway.
Seeing the blood-soaked child move so eerily, the Knight and Prince instinctively froze.
Could it be an undead? Was there a Dark Mage nearby?
The Knight stepped in front of the Prince and drew his sword.
The Prince, face pale, clung tightly to the Knight’s cloak, unable to take his eyes off the child.
The Knight looked down at the child, who was barely propped up on the ground.
He couldn’t see the face clearly, but he was certain the child’s gaze had found the Prince.
The Knight kept his guard up, shielding the Prince further behind his back.
But through the dirty fringe, the Prince caught a glimpse—
Dark eyes met his own, and his eyes widened.
“…Wait, Sir Evan.”
The Prince saw a mysterious, shifting light in those black eyes.
Ignoring the Knight’s attempt to hold him back, he stepped out and cautiously approached the child.
He heard the Knight calling, “Your Highness!” from behind, but the Prince, as if entranced, took one step after another toward the child.
I want to see more.
Those mysterious, shimmering eyes.
He crouched right in front of the child and brushed aside the dirty hair.
The child’s face was so stained with blood that it was hard to make out any features, but those eyes—like the Milky Way at night, or a black opal shimmering with many colors—were clearer than anything else.
“…Hey. You…”
The child’s lips moved, letting out a faint whisper.
The sound was so quiet the Prince couldn’t make it out and tilted his head.
The child frowned slightly, then spoke up a little louder.
“What are you looking at? Who are you?”
The voice was a bit clearer now, but the words were so unexpected that the Prince’s yellow-green eyes went round with surprise.
The fringe he’d just lifted slipped back down, hiding those galaxy-like, black opal eyes again.
Unwilling to lose sight of them, the Prince leaned even closer and brushed all the hair aside. His hand was smeared with blood and filth, but he didn’t care.
For some reason, he suddenly wanted to be friends with this child.
Maybe, just maybe, now was the time to put his earlier resolution into action.
His mouth felt stiff, as if glued shut, but he couldn’t let this chance slip away.
He was certain—if not this child, then no one.
I have to make a friend! I will, for sure!
Gathering his courage, he spoke softly.
“Um, uh…”
“What.”
“S-so…”
“Stop stammering.”
“W-will you!”
“……?”
“…be my friend?”
Ah, he said it wrong.
The beautiful black opal eyes scrunched up in confusion.
***
…In the end, making a friend didn’t go very well.
From starting with business without a single apology to a child lying bloody on the ground, to bungling the words and accidentally asking, “Will you be my friend?”—not a single thing had gone right.
…But he’d really worked up his courage to say it.
“Stop spouting nonsense and get lost!”
He flinched.
…Still, even if his courage was ignored, he shouldn’t have hit someone who was hurt.
It wasn’t on purpose.
He’d never intended to hit an injured person.
He’d remembered what happened at the Duke’s Estate, and the Play Attendants who’d run away in tears, and just got a little emotional.
He hadn’t hit hard—just pressed down on the child’s head a little.
The child collapsed right back onto the ground.
He must have fainted from blood loss.
There’s no way it was because he hit him.
It had to be that way.
The sleet had stopped at some point.
With the clatter of hooves, the carriage rolled on toward the Capital.
Ever since getting into the carriage, the Prince kept staring at the child lying on the seat across from him.
It was too cold outside, and the child had lost too much blood.
He couldn’t just leave him there, so he’d brought him into the carriage.
Worried about the child’s low body temperature, he’d even taken off his own cloak and wrapped it snugly around the child’s feet.
The eyes that had captivated him—those black opals—were now hidden by eyelids, but that let him finally study the child’s face up close.
A truly beautiful face.
Even smeared with blood, the child’s looks couldn’t be hidden.
“Sir Evan.”
The Prince called to his escort Knight driving the carriage.
“Yes, Your Highness?”
“What should I say he is?”
The Capital didn’t allow outsiders to enter without proof of identity.
Even the lowest servants and maids couldn’t apply without a letter of introduction, and even the Nobles’ attendants needed personal guarantees from their masters to enter the palace.
For a vagrant orphan with no proof of status, it would be even harder.
Evan, pondering his Prince’s lack of social skills, thought maybe he could just insist on it and opened his mouth cautiously.
“……A friend?”
Sitting on the driver’s bench, Evan couldn’t see into the carriage, but he knew for sure that both the Prince’s ears and tail—like a kitten’s—must be drooping.
He let out a long sigh.
“That’s why you shouldn’t have hit him.”
The Prince grew a little gloomier.
There was no excuse.
He really had hit an injured person.
The child had surely fainted from blood loss, but since he’d happened to hit him before that, the child would probably think he’d knocked him out.
He’d resolved to make a friend, finally worked up the courage to confess, and now, instead of gaining a friend, he’d probably be mistaken for an enemy.
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