Chapter 2

A maid’s daily life is monotonous. This was true even for a body servant serving a knight. The tags of war did not reach the barracks where the knights lived. Sometimes, captured enemies or spies would show up in the barracks, but a maid cooking for her master and warming his bed was never deeply involved with them.

However, even if a spy or prisoner caused a disturbance and a maid lost her life, it wasn’t a significant issue. Such incidents hadn’t occurred, but a maid’s life was of little consequence to the knights. A woman dying while doing menial work was not the daughter of a noble, just a commoner. Whether she died today or tomorrow, her masters wouldn’t bat an eye. Ella thought so.

“Ella.”

It was when she left the barracks to tidy up the bed she had shared with her master. His squire, Sir Arthur, called her. He had a youthful face matching his young voice, but he always tried to act sternly in front of Ella. But he was seven years younger than her. Ella had seen him since he was quite young, so even when he grew much taller than her, he still looked like a child to her. Of course, that didn’t mean she felt particularly close to him.

“Take this.”

Sir Arthur handed her a bundle wrapped in green cloth. Ella took it familiarly. It was armor, something a grown man could carry around but was very heavy for someone as insignificant and weak as a maid. Ella took the bundle and bowed her waist. Sir Arthur looked at her intently. His blue eyes sparkled like glass under the May sun.

“Your front is open.”

Sir Arthur muttered. At his words, Ella covered her front with the bundle. Holding the load with both hands made it difficult to fix her open front.

“Imprudent thing.”

It was an indifferent murmur. It didn’t feel malicious, so Ella let it pass without much thought. It didn’t matter. Ella knew she wasn’t noble.

To Sir Arthur, the knights, and their noble ladies, maids and prostitutes were probably not much different. Sir Arthur didn’t turn his back. A servant dared not turn away until the noble lords turned their backs, so Ella didn’t turn her steps. Her arms began to ache.

“Do you have more to say?”

“……”

“Are you going to Sir Larque like that?”

“No.”

Ella looked at her exposed front. Sir Arthur frowned.

“I’ll sew it up.”

“…Behave properly.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll remember that.”

Finally, the young man turned his back. Ella watched him until his blue cloak disappeared, then returned inside the barracks. She looked down at her torn front. A maid’s attire was light and frivolous. But it wasn’t in bright colors like a brothel prostitute. Ella had never worn cloth dyed with safflower outside. It might be different in a duke’s castle… A woman who belonged to a noble but could never be a noble’s wife. A maid’s status was ambiguous.

She set the bundle aside and removed the cloth covering her chest. A maid couldn’t wear robes or puffed sleeves covering her shoulders and arms. She could wear a simple gown without engageantes when going out, but otherwise, she had to wear a chemise with a half-exposed chest and several layers of petticoats.

Ella traced the places Larque had touched her several times. The man was ascetic. He rarely called her to bed. Yet yesterday, he was urgent and rough, as if he couldn’t hold back something. Having been in a long relationship, she knew when he would become fierce.

He sometimes acted like a beast. Regardless of small defeats and victories, when he clashed metal and tore human flesh with sharp blades, he would bury himself between her legs, covered in splatters of blood.

She undressed with the intention of sewing for a while. She didn’t have many clothes, so she had to make do with the one with the torn front. Sitting on the floor in her petticoat, she picked up a needle. A long shadow fell over her head.

“What are you doing?”

His ashen eyes were like cold metal. Ella stood up, covering her chest. The man didn’t take his eyes off her.

“I was sewing. The front part of my dress was torn. Sir Arthur said it didn’t look good.”

“Sir Arthur saw your chest?”

“No. He saw the torn front.”

Larque closed his mouth. The man showed no emotions, like an inanimate object. She lowered her gaze. It was an old relationship. She could tell his mood was off without asking. Ella covered her chest with her hair. The wind came in from where he stood. Ella shivered and coughed. The man came inside the tent. His gaze landed on the clothes strewn on the floor.

“I heard you skipped breakfast.”

“I woke up at noon.”

“And the milk?”

He looked at her round br*asts. There was a bit of milk on the n*pples. She reflexively wiped her dry br*asts and covered them with her arms again. The man removed her arms. Her bare br*asts were defenseless.

It had been nearly a year since she gave birth. Though it had been almost three months since she was separated from her nursing child, and her milk should have dried up by now, her br*asts were still swollen. If she didn’t regularly express the milk, she could get sick, so the man before her had reason to be concerned.

“Still……”

Ella hunched her shoulders. He picked up a blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders. The man was furrowing his brows as if thinking about something.

“I’ll return in ten days.”

Would she be able to see the baby? Ella thought of her crying baby with its flushed face. The baby had a wet nurse who could fill the mother’s place, but Ella had no other child to fill the void. Suddenly, the man wiped beneath his eyes. She opened her eyes wide, not realizing tears had formed.

“Do you miss Eddy?”

Eddy. Eselmund. Ella looked up.

“Master, don’t you miss the baby?”

“I never even heard that child call me father.”

“That’s because he’s only 9 months old. When we left the baby, he was just 6 months old.”

Eddy was not even a year old. He was too young to say the word father. But the truth was, Ella hadn’t taught the baby to say ‘father.’ She didn’t want to. By the time the child would be old enough to say ‘father,’ he wouldn’t be with Larque. Then Eddy wouldn’t need to know the word ‘father’ at all. While she was lost in thoughts of Eddy, her nipple was twisted. When Ella curled up in surprise, Larque removed his hand.

“I’ll write to Hermel.”

At Larque’s words, Ella thought of the white-haired butler. The old butler who had long served the House of Durac. It was a familiar name to Ella as well.

“By the time we return, I should tell them to starve the child.”

“You’re going to kill the child?”

Ella asked in shock. Larque’s expression hardened, wondering what she was talking about.

“I thought three months would be enough for the milk to dry up.”

At those words, Ella felt slightly embarrassed. But the man continued speaking as if he didn’t understand why her face was flushing.

“Deimos said your br*asts are swollen because you’re not nursing the child. I trusted his word.”

She couldn’t respond to the man’s words. From the time she was pregnant until now, the man before her would worry whenever even the smallest problem arose with her body. She kept her gaze down and remained silent.

“Does it hurt?”

Larque’s hand touched her br*ast. San Parvale. That’s why. Her br*asts had been hurting since they left the child at House Durac’s castle. As Deimos said, such symptoms appear when milk builds up. After hearing Deimos’s words, Larque would often suckle her n*pples. With no child, someone had to expel the milk, but the problem now was that too much milk was coming in.

“The midwife in the nearby village said the problem was that we kept expelling the milk.”

“You asked?”

Larque was serious. Ella bit her lip with a flushed face. He seemed to think it strange that her milk hadn’t dried up. Since a considerable time had passed since separating from the child, he probably thought it unusual that milk was still coming. However, Ella didn’t find it strange. Moreover, she didn’t want her milk to dry up.

“Are you pregnant with a second?”

Suddenly, the man drew closer and pulled at her waist. Ella watched helplessly as she was pulled along. His large hands kneaded her buttocks. Her belly was still flat. She raised her eyes to look at him.

There was no sign of lust in his expression. So he was genuinely curious. On whether she was pregnant again. It was reasonable to wonder, given how often they had relations. But this wasn’t what Ella wanted.

“I’m not with child.”

“Why?”

His breathing shortened as he asked. Larque was asking why she wasn’t pregnant. It was disconcerting.

“…It hasn’t been long since I had the baby.”

“You never know.”

“Yes. But…… I don’t get pregnant this frequently.”

Her voice grew smaller. Her shrinking voice was like a mimosa curling its leaves inward.

“We didn’t use protection.”

“Yes.”

There was the smell of iron. Hot iron. The sharp, keen, cruel blade of a knight. Helmet, scorched armor. His skin as firm as a smooth beast hide. Black hair. The flesh clinging to it. Blood spattered from where he’d slit enemy throats. This was how Larque always looked when he returned to the tent. With each war his kingdom waged, the scars on his broad back and arms multiplied. Burns and marks from arrow tips that had gone astray or pierced through. What were ugly scars to Ella must have been glory to him.

She stepped backward. The man remained rooted in place.

His expression was eerily blank. When she was young, she thought all knights were like this. Numb, feeling neither pain nor anguish… Making all decisions without regret…

“General. It’s Roymar. I’m coming in.”

“Don’t move.”

“Pardon?”

“The maid hasn’t tidied up.”

Ella quickly gathered the clothes strewn on the floor. Larque turned his back on her. Outside the tent, Sir Deimos, the Count of Roymar, was waiting for him. Sir Deimos glanced at her, blinked a couple of times, then turned his head away. Ella thought she was fortunate to have long hair as she picked up the scattered dress.

***