Chapter 43
“Haa... haa....”
Karl's ragged breathing scraped across the floor of the empty study.
His knuckles had gone white.
In one hand, he clutched a small glass vial like a lifeline.
His lower body was heavy as lead.
It had gone cold and numb, as though it no longer belonged to him.
‘I have to get up.’
Karl gritted his teeth.
He reached out and grabbed the frame of his wheelchair.
His twisted muscles screamed.
Pain rushed through him as though his shoulder were about to come out of its socket, but he did not stop.
Creak.
The wheelchair slid, lifting Karl's body off the floor.
“Nngh...!”
He exerted himself with all his might, his veins nearly bursting.
Thud.
After slipping several times, Karl barely managed to pull his upper body up and settle it onto the wheelchair seat.
His entire body was drenched in sweat.
Though he looked like someone who had just been pulled from the water, his right hand still held tightly onto the vial.
The transparent liquid sloshed inside.
‘This is... Mother's medicine....’
The one his mother had dropped when she hurriedly left earlier.
With her pale complexion and trembling body, it was clear that her chronic illness had flared up.
She would be in trouble without this medicine.
Without the slightest idea that the bottle contained the deadly poison that was slowly killing him, Karl moved only out of filial devotion, determined to take care of his mother.
With trembling hands, he gripped the wheelchair's wheel.
But with the vial in his right hand, he had no choice but to turn the wheel with only his left hand, clumsy as that was.
Creak, creak.
With only one wheel turning, the wheelchair kept veering to the right.
He needed twice the strength and twice the skill to keep it on course.
The wheelchair advanced precariously down the corridor in a zigzag.
It nearly struck the wall several times, and its wheels occasionally caught on the carpet and jerked to a halt.
But Karl did not stop.
“Oh my! Young Master!”
The head maid, passing through the corridor, came running in alarm.
The attendants rushed after her in a line.
The sight of Karl sweating profusely while precariously pushing his wheelchair with one hand was heartbreaking.
“Why are you doing this alone? Give it here. I'll escort you!”
“Or at least let me carry that vial. Where are you going?”
The servants tried to grab the wheelchair handles.
But Karl shook his head and raised his remaining hand to stop them.
“...No. I'm fine.”
“But, Young Master! You look terribly pale. If you collapse like this....”
“Leave me....”
The servants knew.
They knew there was no way to break Karl's stubbornness.
“Move... aside. This is... something I have to do myself.”
Karl sent the servants away and began turning the wheel again.
Creak, creak.
A slow, arduous advance.
His mind was filled with only one person: his younger brother, Kairen.
He could not forget the expression on Kairen's face when they had encountered each other outside their father's study a few days earlier.
The moment Karl had been driven away after their father harshly told him, “Don't come here. You're unsightly.”
The look in his younger brother's eyes as he listened to it from outside the door.
That gaze, filled with anguish, had pierced Karl's heart.
‘Kairen will be leaving for the academy soon....’
He was a child leaving for a wider world after advancing three years ahead of schedule.
A younger brother who would compete against the Empire's gifted students and draw a brilliant future for himself.
Karl could not bear for his final image in his brother's memories to be that of a pitiful older brother who had been berated by their father and could do nothing.
He had worked hard because Kairen looked at him with admiration.
Because he had graduated from the academy at the top of his class.
Because he had successfully rehabilitated his injured leg.
All so he could see Kairen's red eyes, filled with affection and respect, one more time.
‘At least....’
Karl wiped away his sweat and pushed the wheel.
‘I want to leave behind the sight of myself carrying out even this small duty of bringing medicine to Mother with my own hands....’
Even if I cannot use my legs, I am still your older brother.
I am someone who can take care of our family.
So put your mind at ease and show off your talent at the academy.
That was the least dignity and love he could show as an older brother.
The long corridor leading from the annex to the main house.
Outside the window, a deep red sunset had already spread across the sky.
Karl laboriously pushed his wheelchair and looked down at the vial in his hand.
It was hard.
The muscles in his arms felt as though they were burning away.
But strangely, he felt good.
The way to see his father was always filled with the fear of walking across thin ice.
Every step felt like a road leading to hell.
But the path to his mother was different.
There was warmth there.
There was a smile to welcome him and warm hands to worry over him.
If I give this to Mother... she'll smile at me, won't she?
Will she say thank you... and pat my head as she used to?
A smile spread across his lips at the mere thought.
Then, suddenly.
He noticed that the hand clutching the vial was trembling faintly.
‘...What am I doing right now?’
Karl let out a self-mocking, hollow laugh.
It would be easier to put it in his pocket or inside his clothes and carry it that way.
Yet he was holding it tightly in his hand.
Like a young child desperate for praise.
Wanting to make it obvious: ‘Mom, I brought this. I did well, right?’
He felt both proud of himself and disgusted by his own pathetic state.
‘I say I want to be a dignified older brother to Kairen... but inside, I'm still a child begging for our parents' love.’
He had only grown older; inside, he felt frozen on the day he had ended up in a wheelchair.
‘No. An older brother should draw the path his younger brother ought to follow. Not show him this wretched sight.’
Karl shook his head, trying to dispel his shame.
So he tried to put the vial he was holding into the pocket inside his clothes.
But.
His weakened fingers would not obey him.
Plink.
“Ah....”
The vial slipped from his hand.
Roll, roll.
The small glass vial rolled across the carpet before coming to a stop on the floor in front of the wheelchair.
‘Ah... again....’
Karl's shoulders slumped.
He resented his own body for being unable even to hold on to a tiny vial like this.
Tears welled in his eyes.
But he soon gritted his teeth.
‘I have to pick it up.’
This time, he vowed that he would not fall.
He could not make a spectacle of himself falling from his wheelchair and rolling around in the middle of the corridor.
Karl gripped the wheelchair armrest tightly.
Then, keeping his weight on the seat, he cautiously bent his upper body forward.
He reached out his hand.
A little farther.
Just as his fingertips were about to touch the vial.
Swish.
Someone picked up the vial first.
“......?”
Another person's foot entered Karl's field of vision.
The uniform trousers and dress shoes worn by the men of House Northgard.
The exact same clothing he was wearing now.
But perhaps because he was looking up from floor level, the foot before him looked enormous, large enough to make his breath catch.
Then, as he slowly raised his head, he saw a shadow stretching over him.
‘Father?’
Instinctive fear swept over him.
The trauma of his father once again seeing his unsightly state and looking down on him.
‘You're unsightly.’
That cold voice echoed like a hallucination, freezing his entire body.
Trembling with fear, Karl slowly raised his head.
The owner of the shadow stood with his back to the light, making his expression difficult to see.
But.
Perhaps it was because the sunset shining through the window had melted away the cold, dry harshness of his father's voice.
“Huff... huff... huff....”
A rough yet warm breath came in restrained gasps, as though his heart might burst.
Hair damp with sweat clung to his forehead.
The shadow receded, revealing his face.
“......Kairen?”
Karl's eyes widened.
His father was not there.
His younger brother, Kairen, was.
The younger brother who should have escorted their mother to her bedroom and returned stood before him, drenched in sweat.
The vial Karl had just dropped was in his hand.
But Kairen's expression was different from usual.
His eyes were bloodshot.
His face was red enough to burst.
And in the eyes looking down at his brother, indescribable sorrow and desperation swirled together.
“Brother....”
Kairen called out in a hoarse voice.
The younger brother who had left his mother and run like mad to save his brother.
Kairen, clutching the vial and gasping for breath, and Karl, staring blankly up at him, met each other's eyes in midair.
Relief washed over Kairen.
His brother had not drunk it.
He was not too late.
But at the same time, Kairen's mind began racing.
‘What do I say? That Mother dropped it? That it's poison?’
He could not do that.
He could not yet tell his brother the cruel truth that their mother had tried to kill him.
Kairen hastily composed his expression with unpracticed skill.
They were already standing in the corridor.
If the 「dutiful son」 mask he had worn in front of his mother had shattered, he now needed a new 「mask」 to protect his brother.
“M-Mother said she dropped the vial... so I came....”
His brother's misunderstanding and his excuse for coming overlapped.
But Karl did not hear the excuse Kairen had cobbled together.
He saw only his younger brother, drenched in sweat, and the enormous figure looming over him.
The identity of the giant shadow that had inspired such fear moments ago was his younger brother.
Karl's blank expression slowly filled with emotion as he looked up at Kairen.
“Kairen... you....”
A faint smile spread across his brother's lips.
“How did you grow so... dependable?”
When had the gaze looking down at him and the shoulder shielding him grown so broad?
Unaware that his younger brother's heart was being torn apart, the older brother felt only joy and pride at his younger brother's physical growth.
Cruel truth and pure joy.
The two contradictory emotions lay side by side, intruding shamelessly between the brothers.
Kairen slipped the vial behind his back and firmly caught his brother as he started to topple toward the floor, settling him deep into the wheelchair.
“You need to be careful, Brother.”
“Ah... Thank you. But could you give me that? I need to take it to Mother.”
Karl wiped away his sweat and held out his hand.
“Mother seems very ill... She'll be in trouble without that medicine....”
“......”
Kairen's breath caught in his throat.
His brother still did not know.
He did not know that what was inside the vial was not medicine that would save their mother, but poison that would kill his brother.
And he did not know that the person who had procured that poison was their mother herself.
‘Should I tell him?’
No. He could not.
If he told his brother now, ‘Mother tried to kill you,’ what would happen?
His brother would collapse.
His body would shatter, and so would his heart.
That, at least, had to be prevented.
It was enough for the culprit and the culprit's son to bear the pain in their hearts.
His brother was already bearing more than enough needless pain, even without taking on that pain.
Kairen went around behind the wheelchair and grasped the handles.
Then he naturally turned the wheelchair around.
Not toward the main house where his mother's room was, but back toward the annex where Karl's study was.
“Kairen...? Thank you. But you took the wrong direction. Since we're already in the corridor, I'd like to pay Mother a visit. I need to give her the medicine, too.”
Karl asked in confusion.
Kairen was silent for a moment.
Something hot surged up his throat, but he forced it back down.
“Mother has... just fallen asleep.”
“Fallen asleep?”
“Yes. I escorted her to her bedroom, but she must have been very tired, because she fell asleep as soon as she lay down. I can give her the medicine later. If you go now, you'll wake her.”
“Ah... Is that so?”
A flicker of disappointment crossed Karl's face.
“Come to think of it, she overexerted herself again today, saying she would make tarts. If she just fell asleep, we shouldn't wake her.”
His brother did not suspect anything.
He trusted his younger brother's words completely and obediently let himself be guided in the wheelchair.
Creak, creak.
Only the sound of the wheels turning filled the silence.
Kairen looked down at the crown of his brother's head and bit his lip.
‘Thank goodness.’
Because I am behind you right now.
His expression was twisted into something he could never let his brother see.
He was grateful to be able to hide that ugly face, warped by a jumble of emotions.
‘This moment, looking in the same direction as my brother... who knew it would be so precious?’
When they were young, he had both liked and hated following behind his brother.
His brother's stride was longer than his, so keeping up with him left him breathless.
He had both liked and hated his brother's shadow.
The shade was cool, but sometimes he wanted the sun in his eyes.
But now, he was grateful for the fact that he could protect his brother from behind.
As they walked down the long corridor, Kairen's thoughts were a tangled mess.
‘I have to drop it.’
And he reached a conclusion without incident.