Previously
Jeanne realizes she has overstepped her bounds and apologizes profusely, but Baldur leaves the dinner in a visible state of agitation. While Jeanne spends the night in a spiral of regret, Baldur is equally restless, unable to stop thinking about Jeanne's words and her striking appearance in his mother's dress.
Would he have felt sorrow if his mother had held him tightly in her arms just once? There was no way to tell.
What truly astonished Baldur came afterward. His father, ever so composed and cold, turned into nothing more than an empty shell. From the day his wife passed away until his own death, he lived like a walking corpse. Only then did Baldur realize his father had loved her—even though that woman had abhorred him so fiercely that she chose death just to escape his presence.
‘Father loved Mother? That woman?’
Witnessing the change in his father stirred only horror within him.
‘How could he?’
It made no sense. Even through the eyes of a boy too young to understand women, she had been beautiful. But to love someone who despised him in return?
‘Was he insane?’
That was why Baldur de Skadi had learned to be wary of women early on. He vowed never to step into the same snare that trapped his father. That conviction only solidified when his elder brother, Will de Skadi—who should have inherited the ducal seat from an aging father withered by grief—ran off in an elopement with a maidservant.
Will had always taken after their mother as a free spirit, but Baldur had never imagined it would go this far. Such utter indulgence…. His brother, who had been both friend and father figure to him, took to his heels simply because he was forbidden to marry not a low-ranking noble, but a mere parlor maid.
‘All for a fleeting feeling that will one day vanish into thin air?’
If he loved the maid, he could have kept her as a mistress. The sheer bewilderment that seized the ducal estate back then remained vivid in his memory. His father, who had spent his days like a dead man, suddenly regained a spark of life and flew into a towering rage. For a fleeting moment, Baldur had wondered: ‘Was fiery fury what my ice-cold father needed all along?’
To cover up his son's scandal, their father publicly declared that Will had perished in battle against barbarian raiders. He then appointed his second son, Baldur, as Acting Duke and shut himself away in seclusion.
From that moment on, Baldur was the only sane soul left in the madhouse of an estate. In a region where war broke out year after year, he did everything he could to stand in for a father who had lost all will to live. All the while, a quiet part of him thought that his brother might return one day—having abandoned the woman he fled with.
‘Then I will step down and return to where I belong.’
He held no particular attachment to the title. He simply bore the responsibilities foisted upon the family name, fulfilling his duty and nothing more.
Yet his brother never returned, and twelve years slipped by in the blink of an eye. His father died, and Baldur rose from Acting Duke to Duke. It was an honor that rightfully belonged to his brother. Once his position was formalized, marriage proposals poured in from across nations, the most inescapable being the match pressed by his own sovereign, His Majesty the King.
He refused on the flimsiest of pretexts. Enraged, the King sabotaged every potential match with ladies of suitable standing. If Baldur would not wed a royal princess, he was doomed to live alone forever. To Baldur, this outcome was hardly unwelcome.
And deep down, he still hoped that his brother might return, even now, to relieve him of this crushing mantle.
Then, one day, Baldur discovered two corpses in a coastal village ravaged by pillagers—bodies he presumed to be his brother and the maid. Both wore threadbare rags. Their appearance suggested they had disguised themselves as commoners to settle in the hamlet. No matter how closely he scrutinized them hoping they were mere lookalikes, it was unmistakable: the man was his brother, and beside him lay the maid with whom he had fled. The two corpses lay slumped together outside the cottage doorway, as if shielding a treasure within.
‘What were they trying to protect that brought them down outside rather than within the house?’
Drawn as if spellbound, Baldur stepped inside.
Shattered crockery, soot-stained walls—nothing suggested anything of value remained. Even had they slipped away with jewels from the estate, more than a decade had elapsed. Anything they possessed at the time of their flight would have dwindled away long ago. Yet Baldur combed through the house, gripped by an inexplicable certainty that he would find something.
And find something he did: a cellar hatch hidden beneath a filthy mat woven of corn husks. When he cast the mat aside and lifted the door, a grubby, tear-streaked girl emerged.
A child who bore an undeniable resemblance to his brother. Disappointment washed over him—crushing and bitter.
‘Is this… what you threw your life away to protect?’
His brother was the rightful heir to the Duchy of Skadi, trained from boyhood under master swordsmen. Had he been alone, he never would have perished at the hands of common pirates. Yet here it was: their father broken by an arranged marriage, his brother dead alongside his wife at the mercy of raiders after casting away his birthright for love, leaving behind nothing but this child.
‘Was leaving the estate all for this?’
His brother could have become the Duke of Skadi. All he had to do was stand still. And had he taken the maid as a mistress, the child before him would be living a life of envy, even as an illegitimate daughter.
‘Yet all for the sake of wedding a maid, he never fought and fell as a commander, but lived under an assumed name only to be run through by a blade defending a single girl?’
The sheer futility of his brother's end left Baldur devoid of even a sigh.
‘Had he known it would end this way, would he still have run off with her?’
Who knew? Even so, ignoring the legacy his brother had died to preserve went against all brotherly duty. To abandon her would render his brother's death a dog's demise. Baldur buried him there and brought the child back.
The child's name was Ana. He adopted her and announced to the world that she was his late brother's issue, but not a soul believed him. Why adopt a child now when his brother had supposedly died over a decade ago? Everyone assumed Ana was Baldur's own hidden daughter. Even Ana herself was entirely bewildered.
‘Did Will truly intend to raise this child as nothing more than a peasant?’
She had received no education whatsoever, believing herself to be the daughter of a hunter and an ordinary housewife.
‘If anyone asks you about your life before coming to this manor, tell them you know nothing. Tell them you remember nothing.’
Baldur resolved to raise Ana as a young lady of the ducal house. Because that was the truth.
Yet how could a girl brought up as a rustic peasant be transformed into a noble lady? The only person suited for the task was a governess who was herself a highborn lady. In that sense, Jeanne de Toulouse's arrival was timely beyond measure.
He had expected nothing from Jeanne beyond her scholarly qualifications, assuming she would prove cold and haughty. Yet she defied his expectations at every turn. She was clumsier than anticipated, far less conceited, and above all, she loved Ana. Easily, and without hesitation.
At first, Baldur could hardly believe it. He suspected she was playing both Ana and him for fools. But Jeanne genuinely cared for the child, and Ana loved her in return. Jeanne showered her with an affection fit for a sister of her own blood. He often watched from within the manor as she led Ana outdoors, braiding her hair, weaving crowns of flowers, or strolling hand in hand across the grounds far beyond lesson hours.
Baldur had never received such warmth from the tutors who taught him. Surely, she was only playing the part of an affectionate teacher to curry favor with Ana. That prejudice was shattered only when Jeanne risked her very life to save the child.
That day, Baldur had seen it: the governess, clad in nothing but a single layer, clasping the bundled child in her arms before letting out a lone cry and collapsing into unconsciousness.
Baldur had watched many a person die. His mother, his father, and countless others whose souls had fled their bodies—the tally was beyond counting. After marching through battlefields, he believed himself numbed to death in every guise. He had been able to swallow down a meal while staring upon tangled mounds of corpses, unable to tell friend from foe. He could sleep soundly. Even as he dug the earth to bury his own brother, he had remained composed… or so he told himself.
Yet when she cried out and collapsed, the sight shook him to the core. A dreadful, incomprehensible panic had overtaken him.