Chapter 118
That was the last conversation she had with Dorian. After that, she kept her distance, flying only high above the imperial palace to observe.
Sometimes Dorian would look up at the trees or the sky in the garden, as if searching for something. But Zynie never approached him again.
Once he had realized Donovan wasn’t an ordinary crow, she could no longer remain his friend. Part of her heart felt heavy and sad, but she had to be careful. She couldn’t risk losing Donovan.
“Mister, is there someone you keep thinking about even though you don’t want to?”
“……”
“For me… I keep thinking about that idiot. I worry that he might suddenly die, and I feel uneasy until I see that he’s doing well.”
Zynie let out a long breath, her chest feeling strangely tight.
She had thought that talking about what had been on her mind would make her feel better. Complaining about Virelda had certainly helped before. But this time the heaviness in her chest wouldn’t go away.
“Actually… a few days ago I asked Virelda something.”
She had asked what would happen if a prince who lost the struggle for the throne tried to seek asylum.
A normal witch would probably frown at that question. But Virelda had even accepted traitors back into the city, saying more hands would help rebuild. So Zynie thought she might respond positively.
“But… I’d never seen that kind of look from her before.”
It was the kind of look someone might give a five-year-old who had asked a completely ridiculous question.
And then Virelda demanded to know why, instead of watching the palace like she was told, Zynie had been doing other things there.
Zynie quickly covered it up, saying she had only been curious about what would happen to the princes who lost the succession struggle when only one could become emperor.
“I shouldn’t have brought it up in the first place. It’s not like Dorian would ever come here anyway…”
Instead, she only ended up hearing Virelda say, “What, are you trying to fall in love with something ridiculous like Fay did?”
Because Virelda jumped to that conclusion, Fay had groaned and gone silent. Luckily so—otherwise Fay might have asked questions, and Zynie, who was weak when it came to her, might have spilled everything.
“Mister… do you think I like him?”
Zynie let out a long sigh.
At the time she had denied it to Virelda, but the way Dorian’s face kept appearing in her mind made her sigh again. Maybe Virelda had been right.
Alnazir blinked and tapped the notebook with his finger. Since she had been whispering, it seemed like something important—but he hadn’t understood a single word.
“Sorry. It’s not like you’d understand anyway.”
Zynie glanced at the notebook, hesitating about whether to write things down.
“But I like that you listen to me instead of interrogating me.”
Still hiding her biggest worry, Zynie wrote in the notebook: “The problem is that I’m too young.”
“By the way, how old are you, mister?”
Judging by how Donovan seemed to think he was ancient, he was probably quite old. Yet outwardly he looked only four or five years older than Fay.
Zynie narrowed her eyes at him as if trying to guess his age, then gave up. Staring at his face wouldn’t reveal anything, and if he wouldn’t even tell Fay, there was no way he would tell her.
“If you’re so old, couldn’t you give a little of your age to me?”
Half joking and half serious, she scribbled in the notebook.
“I want to grow up quickly. I want to become a real adult, someone who’s stronger with magic, someone who can speak confidently to Virelda and everyone else, someone they can rely on.”
Zynie muttered with a gloomy expression. Everyone called her a genius, but no one truly relied on her. That always bothered her.
Fay was the same. She relied on Virelda all the time, but treated Zynie like a younger sibling she had to take care of. Just the fact that Fay told Virelda about Alnazir but hid it from Zynie proved that.
Fay had taken her in and raised her when she had no parents. In a way, she was both a sister and a parent to her. Zynie wanted to become a witch Fay could rely on.
But Fay always treated her like a child. No matter how much she praised her, that was all it ever was. When it came to relying on someone, Fay went to others.
“Dorian too. If he had just asked for help, we could’ve thought of a way together…”
Why did no one rely on her?
Zynie believed the reason was her young age. And age wasn’t something that could be solved quickly. Time would have to pass slowly before that changed.
She sighed deeply and wrote something in the notebook. When she finished, she set the pen down with a tap and rested her head on the desk.
Alnazir quietly looked at the top of Zynie’s head, then read what she had written.
[I should have been born older than Fay…]
He didn’t quite understand why she wanted that so badly. But the longing behind it was obvious.
He wrote in the notebook.
[Very well. I’ll grant your wish.]
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