Baby Prisoner of the Winter Castle

“What a teacher demands from a student is just the will to learn. Isn’t that the most talented thing girl has?”

“Still, I’m worried.”

Clarisse, who arrived almost at the front of the drawing room, looked around at Noah and cried.

“What if the teacher doesn’t like me?”

Noah shook her pink hair.

“He’ll like it.”

He continued stroking her hair and explaining.

“Because you’ll like the teacher first. It’s hard for anyone to hate someone who likes them first. “

“Really?”

“I assure you.”

“Has Noah ever been like that?”

At that moment, she felt a very strong gaze over the mask.

It’s like he’s staring at Clarisse…

“….?”

She didn’t know why he was looking at her like that, so she just tilted her head, and soon she heard the butler knock on the drawing room door.

“Anyway, meet him well and come back. I’ll wait here.”

“Yeah, Noah is tired. After meeting the teacher, I’ll go to the room.”

Clarisse smiled.

It was a much more comfortable smile compared to when she started moving to the drawing room.

“Somehow, I feel like I can do well now. It’s really easy for me to like someone first.”

As she turned around while talking like that, the butler just opened the drawing room door for Clarisse.

The girl took a deep breath and boldly entered the drawing room with the words “Excuse me.”

*****

The moment he noticed a girl with pink hair entering with a smile on her face.

Rafferty Lockhart was so surprised that he only stared at the child.

‘I, it’s a girl?’

He had expected a boy with the dignity of a royal family to come, so he gave no answer to the child who greeted him with slick manners.

“It’s Miss Clarisse.”

Perhaps because he didn’t respond, the butler who followed the child gave a word of introduction again.

Lockhart tried to regain his composure.

‘Come to think of it, in the past, the more precious a child was, the more likely they were to raise it by changing their gender.’

It is to hide the identity of a precious child so that they don’t become a target of the bad guys.

It’s really rare in today’s world, but isn’t the opponent a royal child?

It may have been that he was disguised like this every time he was sent over the third wall.

Yeah, he can tell by the way she stands.

Her upright posture without any disturbance was enough to put that child right in the middle of the royal palace.

‘My eyes didn’t make mistakes. He’s a child of the royal family.’

He quickly changed his expression, which had been frozen for a moment, to a benevolent smile, and sat down with one knee on the floor.

“Nice to meet you, Miss Clarisse. My name is Rafferty Lockhart, your tutor.”

“Please speak comfortably, Mr. Lockhart.”

“Is that so? Please take good care of me during the three days of experiential learning.”

He smiled and reached out to the child.

He knew from long experience that when he shook hands like this, most of the high-ranking children were inwardly happy.

It was an act of treating a child as an adult.

As if the child in front of him was no different, he held his hand while blushing a little.

*****

After greeting Mr. Lockhart, Clarice ran excitedly to Noah’s guest room.

She had a lot of things she wanted to say to him.

However, when she opened the door and entered his room, it was rather dark and quiet.

“…Noah?”

There was no answer even if she called him in a low voice.

As she crept into the room, she saw Noah lying on the bed with a mask on crookedly.

‘The mask… it must be uncomfortable.’

Is it because he is so afraid of people coming in and out that he can’t take off his mask even when he’s alone?

‘Then he can tell no one to come in.’

The generous Noah had given permission to Clarisse, who always wanted to play together, saying, ‘You can visit anytime.’

「Anyway, I always wore a mask as I lived in the wizard’s castle. Rather, taking it off is awkward for me. Doesn’t even a girl feel empty if she suddenly doesn’t wear socks? It’s like that.」

But she doesn’t wear socks until she goes to sleep.

Clarisse carefully climbed into Noah’s bed and straightened the crooked mask.

Clarisse climbed carefully into Noah’s bed and fixed the crooked mask.

“It’s done.”

She lay down on one side of the wide bed, resting her chin.

“You know, Noah, you were right.”

And somehow, she couldn’t suppress her desire to talk, so she whispered like that.

However, it was a bit lonely that there was no answer, so Clarisse took Mallang out of her pocket and quietly kissed it.

Mallang quickly returned to its usual form, walking around Noah’s bed and then sitting on Clarisse’s arm.

“Cooh?” (Why did the little cat fall asleep from the daytime?)’

“He must be tired.”

“Cooh.”

“Me? Yes, when I’m with Noah, I feel strangely good.”

It was quite sincere, but it seemed that the feelings were conveyed to Mallang.

“Cooh.”

Folding its arms, Mallang turned its head and lay down on his stomach, touching the tip of Clarisse’s nose.

“Cooh. (Well, more than that, I’m glad a proper teacher came.)”

“Are you worried?”

“Cooh. (No, I was just annoyed because the inner wall guys were making noise all the time while you were meeting the teacher.)”

“It was noisy?”

“Cooh! (Looks like they didn’t want to tell you… Inner wall! You, be quiet! Clarisse has the right to know everything!)”

Mallang, who was talking, shouted at the inner wall.

“Cooh. (The Duke and his wife worked hard to call your teacher.)”

“Eung.”

“Cooh. (It means that they’ve been looking for a teacher much longer than you knew. Well, no one wants to come to work in the countryside like this, so it’s natural to suffer.)”

“Sheridan is not a countryside.”

“Cooh.”

“Above all, there is no one who refuses the honor of working by the Duke’s side. If the teachers were reluctant to come here, that’s….”

It may be because of Clarisse’s status.

“Cooh!”

Nevertheless, Mallang seems to have fully understood what she was trying to say.

When they threaten with a strict tone, saying, “I’m going to get in trouble.”

Clarisse smiled bashfully, still lying on the bed.

“Anyway, I have a teacher now, too. He’s a very nice guy, too.”

“Cooh.”

“There’s nothing to wait and see. Spending time with the teacher from now on will be very beneficial.”

Clarisse grabbed Mallang and held it close to her heart.

Leaning her forehead on the cold arm of Noah somehow made her feel better, and she fell asleep right away.

****

Upon returning from meeting the Duke and Duchess, Lockhart unpacked his belongings in the guest room.

Children’s educational books, suits, and family portraits that he made himself.

In the faded portrait of the Baron family, his parents, Lockhart as a boy, and his younger brother were together.

He fiddled with the little portrait by the window for a moment.

“…This is all happening.”

He looked at his younger brother’s face fondly and smiled sadly.

「If it’s my brother, you’ll raise our family even more.」

The war against Grezequaia.

News of victory was heard every day in the war against the unfortunate land suffered by the corrupt royal family.

In the first place, the residents of the land welcomed the Saphers Kingdom army, so all the soldiers did was march to the palace.

Under these circumstances, Lockhart had no doubt that his only brother would return safely.

Time passed and the Saphers Kingdom army returned.

Everyone is happy because it’s a war that barely sheds blood.

…Lockhart heard the sad news that his younger brother was stabbed to death by a sword wielded by Prince Grezekaia.

In the war in which people ‘barely’ died, he lost his brother who was ‘everything’ to him.

But.

Lockhart smiled bitterly as he looked out the window.

A little while ago, he heard about Clarisse’s true identity from the Duke and Duchess.

“…Ha.”

If there was anything he found comforting about after his brother’s death, it was the fact that all the people of the damn royal family were gone.

He never imagined the last princess would be alive.

“And you want me to teach… that remnants?”

What kind of fate is this?

Lockhart’s only thought was how quickly he could leave this cursed north.

If Clarisse was uncomfortable with what happened to his younger brother, and if her background in teaching death row inmates was known, the job would be cut off immediately.

But he couldn’t get out of here right away.

This was because he had already been signed up for three days for crafting and hands-on learning.

In the meantime, he had to take care of that nasty girl’s class without moving.

****

The next morning.

Lockhart, struggling to suppress his displeasure, headed to Clarisse’s room.

“Hello, teacher!”

“…Yeah, hello.”

Lockhart managed to greet her.

‘That child’s brother… killed my brother.’

A wild urge made him glance at the child’s slender neck.