The Sealed Door
“Ah, it’s nothing.”
He waved a hand and mumbled the words away, but she hadn’t asked because she’d failed to catch his muttering. She’d asked purely because the line itself was so baffling.
Nothing, my foot. I heard every word.
Unfortunately, she was not one of those novel heroines who somehow couldn’t hear a man muttering right in front of her face.
…Well. I suppose that means Plan D is proceeding nicely.
Cecilia decided to pretend she knew nothing whatsoever about her prospective lover’s… particular tastes.
So when Rien glanced around furtively and tucked the handkerchief back against his chest, when he smiled with a flushed, thoroughly satisfied face — she saw none of it.
Whether he was aware of her efforts or not, Rien returned to his usual self and turned toward the door.
“Then I’ll go fetch us something to drink.”
“Alright.”
The moment his broad back vanished, Cecilia dropped onto the sofa.
When the auxiliary battery disappears, electronic devices must enter power-saving mode — that was simply the law of the universe.
Without even lifting her head, she rolled her eyes sideways to check the time. Practice had run longer than expected; lunchtime had long since come and gone.
Maybe I was more tired because I was hungry.
Having identified the reason her body had been swaying, Cecilia suddenly remembered the lunch basket Melanie had left on a corner of the desk.
Come to think of it, Melanie packed me something to eat.
Worried about her mistress growing more exhausted by the day, Melanie had insisted she not skip meals and forced the basket on her. The rattan basket would hold a delicious-looking egg sandwich and a drink made from blended strawberries.
The weather’s nice — I should ask him to have lunch together in the garden.
Gathering her depleted motivation along with the basket, Cecilia laboriously left the room.
Is Rien in the kitchen?
She didn’t remember where the kitchen was, but it was probably somewhere on the first floor. So she guessed, and marched straight ahead.
Her footsteps alone echoed through the silent corridor — clomp, clomp.
It would have been nice to ask for directions, but just like when she’d first barged into the mansion, not a single servant was in sight. Instead, brooms swept by themselves throughout the house, and rags scrubbed the windows clean with squeaking diligence.
It’s just like a haunted house.
Ever since his identity had been exposed, he no longer bothered hiding the magic carved into every corner of the house. The first time she’d seen a duster floating in open defiance of gravity, she’d been so astonished she almost wanted to apologize to Newton.
Now thoroughly accustomed to the sight, Cecilia looked around. If her memory served, turning the corner should bring her to the lobby connected to the entrance hall — yet she was still in the middle of a corridor.
Was I not supposed to turn right?
Perhaps because she’d always moved under Rien’s guidance, she had suddenly become lost. The one silver lining was that the corridor looked familiar.
This seems like a place we passed when he showed me around the mansion on the first day.
She was fairly sure that room with the black wooden door had been called a bedroom.
Rien’s bedroom.
A brief, wicked curiosity flared — but she possessed at least enough common sense not to invade someone’s private space uninvited. Ending the short internal conflict, Cecilia continued walking as if she’d discovered nothing at all.
But she hadn’t gone far before she stopped dead.
Right next to the bedroom, a room that looked suspicious by any standard had appeared.
A narrow door that seemed only half the size of the bedroom’s. And on the doorknob, a strange engraving that looked like a magic circle. Moreover, the writhing characters within the engraving moved as if floating on water.
Is this some kind of secret room?
Just as Cecilia finally threw common sense out the window and placed her hand on the doorknob—
A large hand covered the back of hers.
“It would be best not to enter this room. It isn’t tidy.”
Her gaze traveled up along the black half-gloves that just barely covered the back of her hand. Rien stood behind her like a wall — she had no idea when he’d approached.
Caught red-handed like a child up to no good, Cecilia guiltily released the doorknob.
“I’m sorry. The engraving looked so fascinating I just… got carried away looking at it.”
Cecilia deliberately put on a dejected expression as she apologized. Just as expected, Rien looked thoroughly flustered and hastily shook his head.
“Ah, no, not at all. It’s just that this place is more like a storage room, so I’d be embarrassed to show it to you…”
Do people normally lock up rooms that are “just storage”? With magic, no less?
Right before he’d caught her, she’d given the doorknob a slight turn — it hadn’t budged at all. No keyhole in sight, so it was probably locked with magic.
But didn’t everyone have a space where they hid the things they wanted no one to see? She thought of the diary hidden in the bottom drawer of her desk, the amateur poems she’d written back when she was raising a black flame dragon, and the collection of steamy novels she’d been quietly stockpiling.
Alright. Time to drop this interest immediately.
She didn’t want to kill Rien with shame.
“Still, I’m sorry. I’ll be more careful from now on.”
“No! As long as it’s not this place, you’re free to enter anywhere in the mansion. Ah — would you like to see the bedroom right next door?”
The bedroom.
The battle between reason and instinct was extremely brief. Barely five seconds after saying she’d be careful, Cecilia accepted his offer without hesitation.
“If you don’t mind.”
When he was offering to show her his most private space first, there was no reason to refuse.
“Of course I don’t mind. Though there’s nothing much to see, so it’s a bit embarrassing.”
Trailing after him, Cecilia realized his words hadn’t been empty. Inside the spacious room, a single large bed sat alone like a sailboat adrift on a vast ocean.
“Wow, there really… isn’t much of anything.”
A sound somewhere between wonder and lament slipped out on its own. The only interior decoration was a thick blackout curtain that didn’t match the room at all.
“The room seems so empty — why not fill it with some furniture?”
“Well, the truth is I rarely sleep in the bedroom.”
“What? Then where do you sleep?”
“Usually on the sofa in the room we use for lessons, or on a cot I keep in the laboratory.”
“The laboratory?”
Something about that word feels like it might trigger trauma.
When Cecilia asked back with a dubious look, Rien’s eyes sparkled.
“Yes. It’s in the basement — shall I show you?”
“No. I don’t particularly want to see that.”
Cecilia shook her head very quickly and firmly. Memories of dozing under a thin blanket on a roughly cleared lab bench in a corner of a laboratory, running experiments on two-hour cycles, had come flooding back. Just recalling it made her want to go home with conditioned-reflex speed.
Even more exhausted, Cecilia left the bedroom without a shred of lingering attachment.
“I’ve seen everything, so I think I’ll head back for today.”
The plan to have lunch together had just been vetoed. Judging by how he lived, she shouldn’t be sharing food with him — she should be making a donation.
“This is a sandwich and juice — you eat them, Rien.”
“Pardon?”
Rien, who had received the basket in a daze, blinked his large eyes.
“…Did you prepare this for me?”
That wasn’t the case, but Cecilia roughly nodded. It was a gift for him, so the meaning was the same, wasn’t it?
“It’s so precious I don’t think I could bring myself to eat it.”
“Still, don’t let it go to waste — eat it.”
“Yes!”
Rien hugged the basket with one arm as if he’d been gifted an expensive treasure. Seeing him happier than she’d expected, she felt the tiniest twinge of guilt.
Ahem. Cecilia cleared her throat softly and spoke.
“Well then, I’ll be going now.”
“I’ll escort you to your mansion.”
They were next-door neighbors, so the offer was a bit much — but whenever they held lessons at his mansion, Rien always escorted her to the Weberdin front gate.
“Alright.”
Cecilia placed her hand on his arm with familiar ease. Thanks to the homeowner, she reached the entrance hall without getting lost again.
Just as she was about to leave the mansion, something occurred to her and she let out an “Ah!”
“Oh, right — for the past few days, guests have been coming and going constantly because of the Alms Festival and the celebrations. The front gate will be noisy, so it’d be better to go back through the rear entrance.”
“So that’s why it’s been busier than usual around the mansion.”
It had been noisy enough to wake her every morning, so of course Rien would have noticed.
“It’s the biggest event held at Weberdin, so it’s always like this around this time of year. I hear the festival itself is enormous in scale… Have you ever been to a festival like this, Rien?”
“Yes. But it was so long ago that I don’t remember it well.”
In that moment, a good idea she’d set aside for later flashed through her mind.
“So, about that. If you’re free tomorrow, would you like to go to the festival with me?”