14
Chapter 14
"Acorn mouse."
"Hup! S-s-s-sorry."
Leo quickly scrambled away.
Ah, I could have kept him clinging to me!
With a disappointed heart, I merely patted the hem of the dress where Leo had been attached.
"Th-that is, um, th-this place... everyone says it's... haunted..."
Haunted?
"What is."
"G-g-g-ghosts."
Leo said, trembling like a vibrating phone. It was quite adorable.
I focused on keeping the corners of my lips from lifting and nodded as if it were no big deal.
Well, yeah. It's a world with magic, Spirits, and Demon beasts, so it wouldn't be strange to have ghosts.
Come to think of it, the employees were whispering about the detached building. Was it because of the rumors of ghosts?
'Even if it's a house with ghosts, it's still a house, right?'
Besides, it's an incredibly large and magnificent house.
If it's this big, I can tolerate a few rooms being occupied by ghosts.
I didn't care and looked around every corner.
And the reason why this place was rumored to be haunted was revealed as soon as I opened the terrace window.
'I've heard of a Han River view, but a tomb view is a first.'
Blanche's ancestors' tombs were clearly visible in the backyard.
According to the story, there was a time when the Blanche family was desperately poor.
They were so poor that they sold off all their territory, and even though they were nobles, they didn't even have land to bury their family tombs, so they had to dig up the backyard of the mansion.
So, this detached building was actually the main house of the Blanche family in the past.
Then, an ancestor with extraordinary business sense was born.
If they bought an abandoned mine, a vein would be discovered, and if they bought a gloomy beach, a hot spring would burst nearby, turning it into a famous tourist destination.
It is no exaggeration to say that the current wealth is all the result of that one ancestor.
The descendants are just squandering that wealth and indulging in luxury.
Anyway, after accumulating such enormous wealth, they bought a lot of land around the house and built the current main building, and naturally, this place became a detached building and the burial ground for the ancestors.
The moment I leaned out the window to take a closer look at the cemetery.
Creak.
"Kyaaak!"
The wooden floor I stepped on made a twisting sound, and Leo let out another cute scream.
This time, he couldn't bring himself to cling to me and tightly gripped the end of the fan I was holding...
It wasn't because he was afraid of ghosts, but because Leo was so cute that my heart felt like it would explode.
Poor Leo seemed completely terrified by the fact that he would be living alone with me in this detached building from now on.
I couldn't quite tell if it was because of the ghosts or if he was afraid of being alone with me, but I had no intention of changing my mind.
'If I want to take care of Leo without worrying about other people's opinions, a freer detached building would be better than the main building.'
I strengthened my resolve and wandered around every corner of the detached building with Leo for a long time until he thought this mansion was safe.
* * *
Belinda pointed to the side room attached to her room and said, 'Acorn mouse, this is your private room from now on,' and smiled eerily.
Leo swallowed hard and opened the door in front of him with a nervous face.
To Leo, a private room was a cold and lonely place where abandoned things were gathered.
...That's what it was supposed to be.
Warm-colored wallpaper and a carpet that softly crumbled under his feet.
In the middle of the room was a wide bed, and along the walls were shiny children's furniture, and a mobile made of cut glass sparkled dazzlingly by the window.
A dazed voice leaked from Leo's mouth.
"This is a private room...?"
This isn't a private room...
'It's just like the 'my room' Hailon talked about.'
Leo tiptoed around the room as if he had sneaked into someone else's room.
The first place his eyes went was naturally the bed.
The duvet filled with goose feathers smelled of sunshine.
He didn't even think about getting on the bed and carefully rubbed his cheek against the duvet.
'Hee. It's so soft.'
Leo's expression quickly melted like a cat basking in the sun.
How long had he been rubbing his cheek like that?
Leo hesitated and went up to the bed and lay down.
"...!"
His body sank as if he were lying on a cloud. Leo flailed his arms and took a moment to catch his breath.
A certain impulse scratched at Leo's insides.
The child glanced around once for no reason.
Then.
Tumble.
He rolled around on the bed like a puppy seeing a snowy yard for the first time.
The bed was so wide that he didn't fall off even after rolling five times to the left and five times to the right.
"Hwa!"
Only after rolling around to his heart's content until his face turned red did Leo neatly arrange the crumpled duvet, lie straight in the middle, and prepare to sleep.
Then he quietly closed his eyes and waited for sleep to come.
Waiting, waiting, and finally...
"I can't sleep..."
He opened his eyes.
High ceiling. Fluffy bedding. Even the soft sleeping lamp reflected in the crystal lamp, illuminating his bedside.
Everything was unprecedented luxury, but he couldn't fall asleep at all.
'It's too quiet.'
In the orphanage, everyone slept in one room.
It was so cramped that he couldn't move his body, but he could feel each other's body temperature.
But now he was alone in this big room.
'Just me...'
Before he knew it, he was reminded of the nights he spent in the private room full of abandoned things.
He felt like he had become a useless object and stayed up all night with his eyes open.
Eventually, Leo got out of bed and scurried around the room. His heart was restless.
At that moment, he saw a faint light seeping through a slightly open door.
Beyond the door was Belinda's room.
But without hesitation, Leo's steps headed for the door like a moth drawn to a flame.
Beyond the door, he could see a tent set up on one side of the room. The light was leaking from inside.
'Am I dreaming?'
Looking closely, the tent was nothing more than two wooden chairs supporting a thin cloth.
But even so, it couldn't have looked more cozy and wonderful.
Just then, a very elegant and delicate female shadow was cast inside the tent, like a secret hideout.
"...Belinda?"
At Leo's voice, a hand suddenly popped out from the tent.
Click.
Following the gesture of a finger beckoning him to come in, Leo entered the tent as if he were a child in a fairy tale who had discovered a witch's gingerbread house in the forest.
The inside was very cramped, and the floor was covered with pillows, making it difficult to balance.
"A servant shouldn't fall asleep before the master goes to bed."
As always, Belinda's tone was cold, and her gaze towards Leo was icy.
But for some reason, Leo wasn't afraid of Belinda.
"It's milk hot enough to burn your tongue. Pour it into your mouth."
Was it because of the warm cup of milk Belinda handed him?
"Looking so poor."
Was it because of the blanket she carefully covered him with over his thin pajamas?
"Acorn mouse, I'll give you the opportunity to experience my elegant reading. Now, prostrate yourself like a servant and listen."
Or maybe it was because Belinda's voice reading the fairy tale sounded unusually gentle.
Leo lay down on the pile of feather-filled pillows as Belinda told him to.
At first, he was nervous and didn't know what to do, so he just fidgeted with his fingers, but soon he became engrossed in the story Belinda was telling him and leaned his body against the pillow.
It was a story about a princess who was cursed with Black magic to say everything backwards.
Even if the princess was hungry and asked for food, the servants only heard it as she was full and told them to clear away all the food.
"The princess confessed her love to the Prince. But the words that came out of the princess's mouth were hateful words that she hated the Prince the most in the world."
Belinda's voice gently patted Leo's back like a lullaby.
Before he knew it, Leo was nodding off and thinking about the princess in the fairy tale.
Why doesn't the Prince know the princess's heart?
Even though she said she hated the Prince the most in the world, the princess gave the Prince a handkerchief she had embroidered herself, and she never got angry even when the Prince was rude.
But still, the people in the castle didn't know the princess's heart and all gossiped about the princess.
'It's just like... Belinda.'
When he was in the main building, Toma and the other employees freely talked about how mean and cruel Belinda was.
But the Belinda that Leo had watched was different from what people said.
'Everyone doesn't know what Belinda is really like.'
Although the expression on her face when she looked at him was mischievous, as if she was thinking about how to torment him.
Sometimes when she twisted the corners of her lips and smiled silently, it was so terrifying that goosebumps would rise.
'But still...'
How kind the truth hidden in her harsh words is.
How warm the touch of her hand stroking his head is.
'Only I, only I know. So...'
Leo's hand, which had already fallen fast asleep, was clenched into a fist as if he had made a decision.
