Chapter 54

***

Filina raised her eyebrows slightly and questioned.

“Sir Argeny?”

Leon looked down at her quietly, perhaps bewildered by his own question, and bit his lips.

Yet he glanced at her, as if waiting for her reply.

“We know each other.”

She answered with her dissatisfied face.  She wanted to say she didn’t know him at all, but she had openly sent him to the infirmary, making it difficult for her to answer differently.

Leon raised his head and looked at her.

“Are you close to Sir Argeny?”

She replied with a shout, as if she had heard an absurd sound.

“Not at all!  Why are you asking such a question?  It wouldn’t look friendly just by looking at it.”

At her eccentric reaction, Leon tilted his head with a puzzled face.

“When you found out that Sir Argeny was ill, you were worried, so you called the instructor.”

At his words, she said as her expression distorted.

“How do you say that, Sir Leon?  I feel very bad.  Apologize for what you just said.”

Leon asked with a puzzled expression.

“What part offended you?”

“Are you asking because you don’t know?  You said I was worried about Sir Argeny.”

Filina ruffled her fine hair as it ran down her forehead.

“You shouldn’t say something like that.  Now Sir Leon has given me a great insult.”

As she spoke to Leon with a serious face, he looked at her with a bewildered expression, then suddenly turned his head to the side and covered his mouth with his hand.

Filina asked with a bewildered look.

“Are you laughing at this situation?”

She was genuinely angry with Leon.

It was no one else, and when she heard that from Leon, it felt like

her stomach churned.

He knew what kind of person Henry was, and it was just frustrating that he said such things.

But what was so funny, he had a smile on his lips that she had never seen before.

“Then, I guess I didn’t have to worry about it.  I’m sorry if I offended you, Sir Debussy.”

Leon lowered his hand that covered his mouth and said calmly.  There was a pretty smile on his face, staring at Filina.

She looked at him quietly and asked with a puzzled face.

“Then why do you care, Sir Leon?”

At Filina’s words, Leon had a slightly stiff face as if he remembered the words that he had spit out late.

Then he loosened his hardened face and opened his mouth with a blunt voice.

“…  …  I don’t know either.  Why do my eyes keep following Sir Debussy?”

“Yes?”

This time, she looked at Leon with a surprised face.

Leon’s eyes facing her showed firmness.  Then he frowned slightly and lowered his gaze.

“I have no intention of embarrassing Sir Debussy.  Of course, I am not in that position either.”

Leon, who muttered to himself, bowed his head politely and passed by Filina.

After standing there for a moment and reflecting on the words Leon had said, Filina turned and looked at Leon.

“… What do you mean by not being in that position?”

Filina stared at him as he walked away, hardening her expression.

****

Filina, who entered her dormitory building before Bessie, took out her key with a tired face.

With a slow motion she slid the key into the doorknob. However, there was no sound of metal clicking.

Her eyebrows raised. Obviously she had locked the door with Bessie when they left, but the door was now unlocked.

She felt somehow ominous.

She turned the doorknob slowly, holding in one hand the sword that she was wearing around her waist.

The tightly closed door opened and a dry wind blew in.

As she entered the front door, she made eye contact with an escort knight right in front of her.

A shadow appeared in the direction he was standing, as if someone was sitting on her bed. The person’s face was hidden by the corner, but she could guess.

Because the face of the escort knight was quite familiar.

A golden brooch engraved with a hawk was neatly set on his uniform. The pattern represented the imperial family.

The escort knight, who glanced at Filina and gave her a light greeting, took a step back and widened the space.

She walked slowly to her bed, with her feet not falling off easily.

At the same time, she met a pair of noble golden eyes.

“Your Highness?”

Filina looked at him and opened her mouth.

“How come you’re here…..”

It was disrespectful.  How dared he enter a woman’s room without permission.

It was also his bottom resting on her bed where she slept. It was arrogant to see him sitting with his arms and his legs crossed.

However, Ian tilted his head at an angle and opened his mouth with an expressionless face.

“You are late.”

Filina frowned and looked at him.

Actually, today was the day she finished her training earlier than the other days. Classes were usually packed until the evening, except during breaks.

But now it was only past 4 o’clock.

“This room is not for me alone.  No matter how much I tell you, it’s so careless… .”

“Filina.”

Ian called her name in a dry voice.

The escort knight standing on one side left the room without notice, and Filina wrinkled her eyes when she saw it.

So only Ian and her were the only ones in this space.

“Come here.”

He patted the seat next to him and spoke softly.

“I don’t like it.”

Filina frowned and answered in a displeased voice.

“How do you sit in bed with another woman when you have a fiancée?”

Ian, who raised his eyes with a sullen face at her words, said in a stern voice.

“If not here, is there any other place to sit?”

Filina looked around at his words.

The room she shared with Bessie in half had a bed in which Ian was sitting, as well as her wardrobe, a desk, and a chair.

The only problem was that she had a mountain of clothes in her chair. The wardrobe in her dorm was small, and she had too many clothes brought from her mansion.

However, to keep the luggage bag as it was, the necessary items were mixed in the bag and it was impossible to distinguish them.

In the end, whether it was organized or not, it was best to take everything out first.

So, it was inevitable that her room had not been organized.

Various clothes, hats, and gloves were scattered on the desk as well as the chair, and even undergarments were tangled randomly on the bed.

Filina, noticing it only later, quickly took her undergarments that were next to her pillow.

Ian, who was looking at her like that, smirked lowly, and said.

“I had a lot of doubts as to whether or not this is the right room for people to live in.”

Filina moved her body awkwardly and tucked her undergarments into her closet indiscriminately.

As Ian said, the only place she could sit was where Ian was.

But she moved her steps and put the heavy clothes that had been on her chair into her luggage bag, and she sat there steadfastly.

Said Ian, with a puzzled look on his face.

“If anyone sees it, they will think I’m going to eat you up.”

Philina replied, she glanced at the dorm door as the escort had closed.

“I want to leave the outside door open as well.”

She added her words as she shrugged her shoulders lightly.

“Honestly, I don’t really trust Your Highness.”

Fortunately, when they had a meeting at the duke’s residence, it was a much larger space than this room now, and there was no particular vigilance as there were employees in all directions.

However, the room was too cramped to be alone with Ian, and his large presence brought her discomfort.

Ian nodded his head to see if he knew it too, and then opened his mouth.

“Yes. Don’t trust me.”

He ruffled his golden hair back with a sullen face.

“Because I don’t trust myself either.”

His alluring eyes gazed leisurely at Filina. He naturally let out a dangerous sentence.

Filina asked, hardening her eyebrows.

“What did you come to see me for?”

Ian replied to her words with a bored face.

“Does there have to be a reason?”

“Absolutely. Your Highness has promised to marry someone.”

He said with a windy smile.

“Anyway, you are always using the reason I have a fiancée.”

“You know it well.  Then, please tell me.”

Filina said with a firm expression. Then Ian lowered the corners of his lips that rose gracefully at the resolute voice of Filina.

“There is no particular reason. It just came because I had time.”

Filina asked with a puzzled face.

“Am I the kind of person you see when you’re bored?”

At Filina’s words, Ian furrowed his eyebrows.

“Do you think I can afford that much?”

“That’s why you came to see me, didn’t you?”

Ian reached out and pressed his hand against his eyes, then pulled it off.  His face, staring quietly at Filina, seemed somewhat dry. He opened his mouth with a soft sigh.

“No, I came even though I couldn’t afford it.  To be precise, I wanted to meet you, even if I was forced to take time.”

“… Why me?”

“Well.  I’m curious too.  Why do you keep floating around in my head?”

He pressed his hand to the temple area.

He had a really tired face.

“But what kind of training did you have today?”

Ian narrowed his eyes and scanned the uniform Filina was wearing up and down.

It was covered in dirt. Her hair was also tangled in a mess.

She untied her braids and pulled it back neatly.  Ian, who was watching the scene quietly, furrowed his eyebrows and asked.

“Are you hurt?”

His gaze fell on Filina’s left cheek. This was where Leon said she was wounded.

Filina carelessly rubbed her wounds with her sleeve.

“It’s nothing.”

It tingled as the blood had hardened.  But she did not show it, and leaned her back deep in her chair.

Then Ian, who had been staring intently at her wounds, got up and pulled out a white handkerchief from his inner pocket.

Then he wet his handkerchief with a bottle of water that was lying around her desk, and he grabbed Filina’s chin.

“Don’t you know that wounds like this can become scarred if not treated immediately?”

Ian wrinkled his expression and slowly wiped her wounds with the white cloth. Red blood stained the white handkerchief.

She shuddered at the handkerchief that flashed before her eyes.

Ian, noticing her slight movement, stopped the hand wiping her cheek and looked at her.

Filina’s red iris was still obsessively following the handkerchief he was holding.

To be precise, the embroidery of the small crane pattern was engraved on the fabric that caught her attention.