Stone Thrown into the Lake

Chapter 6

Three men wearing swords and two women wearing white aprons, they were clearly Yvor’s knights and maids. They were mocking Duran and threatening him. She was angry at them, and she was angry at herself.

‘Did this happen in the past?’

‘And I didn’t know?’

At that very moment, she was so angry that her eyes clouded over. She found their faces familiar, too.

Yvor’s heart dropped sharply. They were the ones who followed her no matter what she did.

A maid threw dirty clothes at Duran.

Yvor knew her.

On the day the coup finally reached the royal palace, she was the woman who covered Yvor with her body to protect her, and was almost cut down with the king.

She laughed at Duran, who flinched to avoid the clothes thrown by the knight. Yvor knew him too. Once her escort, he gave up on the knighthood he received from Salzmia when she became the king’s mistress and followed her as a mere servant.

Yvor didn’t even think much about it, let alone appreciate it. He died during a small quarrel while taking charge of the unpleasant dirty work she had ordered him to do. It was a disturbance caused by one of the nobles who disapproved of her.

At that time, Yvor had never even thought of saving him.

Perhaps they were all such terrible humans, she thought to herself.

She didn’t even have the right to be angry with them.

“Ah…”

Yvor moved again and stopped. Unlike the knights and maids standing with their backs turned away from her, Duran was looking at this way and found her. His grape-colored eyes darkened.

What passed through his eyes was resentment.

And Yvor finally knew.

How could he have loved her?

Everyone who cared and loved her, hated him.

Harassing and disrespecting him.

Just for her, but it was not Yvor’s will. But then what was it?

For Duran Craig, he would have been just another living being, who was sometimes looked at from time to time. He could have been the lord of those who bothered him.

How could he have loved her, who had never said a warm word to him in her life?

His sister, who came down from the castle but didn’t even come to meet him properly, sent him letters and delivered all her love in them.

Nevertheless, Yvor had no doubt that he would know that she thought of him. That they loved each other, and that she loved him more than her own life. It was no comedy, but it was so ridiculous that she almost burst into laughter.

If it’s love, then she’s blind.

No, she is deaf and mute.

She didn’t show it, didn’t say it, and didn’t try to listen, therefore it couldn’t be.

What kind of love is there when it’s only known to yourself, and you have never tried to express it?

It’s just an illusion, Yvor thought.

Yvor Adela, who had lived without even knowing that she was a human since birth, did not know how to love. She didn’t know who loved her, and she had never imagined a moment when the expectations of love turned into despair and hatred.

So she left it until her brother hated her. She didn’t even know what she was doing.

“Stop.” Yvor gasped, as if it was hard to even breathe.

The knights hurriedly looked back. In the past, she didn’t know about the abuse, because they never did that in front of her.

“Master.”

“My Lady.”

The knights and maids were embarrassed and tried to organize their surroundings. They tried to make it seem like nothing had happened, but it wouldn’t work.

“…Back off.”

She glared at the knights and maids. The members of the Serium Castle loved their young miss. For them, Yvor Adela was a poor, tall girl who had lived hard without being loved by her parents as a child.

Of course, it must be envy and distress that such a lady sees and feels when she witnesses her younger brother, who has a mother to love him. He even received affection from their father, which she has never received.

They didn’t want her to suffer because of Duran. Also, they didn’t want to show her their dirty side.

Thus, Yvor Adela lived without knowing the abuse Duran had received until her death in the past.

Now she can see what they were doing for her, it was so sad. She was unhappy because of the people who committed acts that she didn’t want. In the end, she was also crestfallen that it happened because she never clarified anything.

“I knew about it. Duran, how lonely my brother must have been.”

Contrary to their thoughts, Duran was also not a child loved by his parents. She had never heard of, nor seen Duran’s mother. As to what her father did to his mother, Duran would not have received love from there either.

Yvor Adela knew it, but didn’t care. That is because she had lived like that too. Her loneliness was forgotten because Duran was there, so she did not care about Duran’s isolation. His unhappiness was also thought to have disappeared because of her.

“….”

Duran was looking at the ground with his mouth closed tightly until both the knights and maids moved away, then he finally looked up at her. A burst of fear came, but he had a different look than she remembered. Even before she thought about what that expression meant, she said, “I’m sorry.”

She hugged him.

“I’m sorry. Forgive me, your sister was stupid and didn’t know anything.”

“Dew… Dew.” She called him

Duran stiffened with fear. It was a name that no one had called him before. Yvor wrapped her hands around Duran’s cheeks. She looked at his trembling eyes and forehead.

Tears flowed and she could no longer see what Duran looked like. Tears flowed from Yvor’s eyes and fell on Duran’s cheeks. She rubbed Duran’s cheeks without even thinking of wiping away her own tears.

“My brother, my only family,” she said.

“I love you. My dear brother, I’m sorry I never told you. Even if I don’t say it, you should know. I’m sorry for being self-satisfied. I don’t even know what to say, leaving you alone like this, really.”

Tears also flowed from Duran’s eyes. Feeling him carefully grabbing her sleeve, Yvor Adela cried with her head down.

When her crying above his head stopped, Duran became uncomfortable. Yvor was surprised because the small movement felt as if the ground was flipping. Was she hugging him too tightly? Did it hurt? Yvor grew restless and relaxed her arms.

“Dew…”

‘Did it hurt?’ She couldn’t find the words, and she shut up again. This was because she was not sure if she could ask him. Instead, Yvor reached out and only smoothed Duran’s cheek. Drying tears were felt on her fingertips.

When she called Dew again, Duran turned his head. The cheek she was fiddling with, fell away from her hand. He pushed her away without saying a word.

“…!”

Yvor froze and her breath caught in her throat. In the past, he pushed her away like this. She remembered clearly that she had been thrown into a prison without being able to reach out to him. The memory came to mind vividly and overlapped with the present.

Yvor was so surprised that she grabbed Duran’s arm and hung on. She forgot for a moment that the arm was unlike the one from her memory, and that there were no iron bars between them. If he moved away like this, she felt like she would lose him forever. This was her last chance, and it seemed that everything would end up the same just because she failed here.

Don’t go, she begged in her mind.

“Please don’t go.”

‘You can’t leave me twice. I didn’t want to be cut off like that again. If you push me away, I’ll hang on. If you get angry, I’ll apologize; and if you don’t know, I’ll tell you how much I love you, all day and night…’

Duran was rather embarrassed to see Yvor hanging onto him with a face that seemed like it would break down at any moment. She grabbed his arm again and pulled it toward her, and Yvor faced Duran again.

“Huh? Dew, dear Dew.”

‘Your sister is really…’

“Stop it!” cried Duran, shutting his eyes tight. The young voice or the embarrassingly elevated tone was different from what was in her memory. Yvor came to her senses and realized why he was desperate enough to separate himself from her.

It was only then that she could see Duran’s cold face in her memory. Duran’s boyish face, which coincided with his grown up face, was blushing furiously.

“Oh…”

Yvor was relieved and sighed at the same time, knowing that he was not rejecting her.

In the past, she had never hugged her younger brother. As a result, she became a woman who didn’t even know how to hug her younger sibling. It wasn’t just that, it was hard to think of countless things that she had never done before as they came into her mind all at once.

Also, what about the younger brother she loved so much? He was so embarrassed that it felt unfamiliar. If he was the only one in the family for her, who would have been in his family? Neither her father nor her mother deserves to be part of their family, so who?

Since her father didn’t act like one for him, and his mother didn’t either. He didn’t have anyone to hug him, unless it was her. Yvor held his hand tightly.

“I love you,” when she whispered those words, Duran looked at her with a bright red face. He frowned as if he didn’t know what to say.

She was still good.

She will never leave him alone this time. She made a resolution. Just as she forgot her loneliness because of him, she will relieve all of his.

Duran Craig, who just turned 15, was as bad at expressing affection as his sister. In the past, Yvor considered it dignified and proud of him.

He used to stand there, looking at her with an icy gaze from far away. Even if he turned away from, she was just happy that her Dew was mature. Even if they didn’t talk properly even once, she used to believe that they could communicate even if they didn’t talk.

Yvor Adela, who realized that it was nothing more than mist on a spring morning, could not help but worry now.

What she had done in the past for love, and what she needed to do for love now.

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