My Former Disciple Wants Me as His Bride

When they opened the door, they were greeted not by the cheerful chime of a bell, but by a long, grating creak. At the sound, the doctor sitting behind the desk and going through paperwork looked up.

“Oh! Huh?”

Eris shot him a sharp look, cutting off Sarod’s enthusiastic greeting before he could finish. His eyes darted around, and when he noticed the large man standing behind her, he cleared his throat a couple of times and straightened his coat.

He picked up a pair of round silver spectacles from one corner of the desk and approached Eris and Ciel. The bright, cheerful expression that had lit up his face moments ago was gone, replaced by the seriousness of a physician.

“What happened?”

Instead of answering, Ciel carried the boy over to the clinic’s only bed and laid him down. The child, whose body was trembling with faint spasms, weakly reached out and clutched Ciel’s clothes as though desperately begging him not to leave.

“He was being beaten in Elves.”

Keeping an eye on the boy, Eris briefly explained what had happened to Sarod.

“This is serious.”

Sarod began examining the child, carefully checking him from head to toe and assessing even the injuries hidden beneath his clothes. Then he brought over a soft white blanket that looked strangely out of place in such a shabby clinic and gently tucked it around the boy.

“I’m a doctor. I’m going to treat you.”

Perhaps those words finally reassured him. The boy’s fingers slowly slipped from Ciel’s clothes, and his barely open eyes fluttered shut.

Sarod straightened from where he had bent over the bed and turned to Eris.

“Fortunately—or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it—there don’t seem to be any fractures aside from the injuries to his face. The wound on his forehead is deeper than I expected, so I’ll have to stitch it. As for the area around his eye, I won’t be able to make an accurate diagnosis until the swelling goes down.”

“So there could be damage to his eye.”

All they had done was chase after a pickpocket. How in the world had things escalated this far…?

Eris’s head began to ache just thinking about the chain of events that had brought them here.

“Yes. The swelling doesn’t look good. If it’s only a fracture, we can consider ourselves lucky. If it’s more serious, there may be damage to the optic nerve. Either way, I think this boy will have to remain under medical care for quite some time before he recovers.”

Eris glanced at Ciel. He, too, seemed lost in thought as he listened to Sarod.

“Do either of you know him? If you’d prefer, I can arrange to have him transferred to a hospital closer to where you’re staying.”

“We don’t know him. We happened to run into him.”

“…Hmm. I see.”

Just then, Ciel raised his head and looked at Sarod.

There was something resolved in his eyes, and Eris knew at once that it was not a good sign. Whatever he had just decided, she needed to stop him.

She had barely taken a step across the old wooden floor, which creaked faintly beneath every footfall, when Ciel spoke.

“Does a small clinic like this take long-term patients?”

Sarod flashed an easygoing smile and nodded.

“Well, that depends on who’s asking, doesn’t it? If it were a request from our dear Miss Eris… I’d take the patient without question.”

Sarod swept his long blond hair back, pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose, and winked at Eris.

Eris promptly forgot all about stopping Ciel and scowled, making a silent vow to murder Sarod later.

“If it’s possible, then please keep him here. I’ll cover all of his medical expenses.”

Why in the world had he decided to go that far?

Eris stared at Ciel in surprise. Being meddlesome was one thing, but this was taking generosity toward a complete stranger to an entirely different level.

“Lord Ciel, you don’t need to do that much. You’ve already done more than enough for him.”

“If I hadn’t seen it, that would be one thing. But now that I’ve watched him being beaten with my own eyes, walking away and pretending I know nothing about it would leave a bad taste in my mouth.”

“Oh, you must be quite wealthy, then. He’ll probably need to stay here for a long time, so the treatment won’t come cheap.”

Sarod shrugged, sarcastically. Ciel merely raised an eyebrow and answered without hesitation.

“Yes, I am. So you don’t need to worry about the cost.”

They were only having a conversation, so why did the air suddenly feel so heavy?

Eris glanced between the two men, who seemed to be locked in some silent contest of wills.

Unable to think of any particularly good way to break the strange tension, she decided to leave them to it and walked over to the bed instead.

The boy still had her money pouch clutched tightly in his hand. Somehow, despite everything that had happened, he had managed not to let it be taken from him.

Eris stared down at the pouch for a moment, seemingly debating something, before pulling it from his grasp.

“Miss Eris…?”

Only when she opened the pouch, shook out every gold coin inside, and placed them beside the boy did both men turn their attention toward her.

Eris shrugged and gave the now-empty pouch a little shake.

“I’m taking this back, though. It’s precious to me.”