The Hunting of Snow White: A Grim Tale - Chapter 25

About to nervously bite her fingertips, Prina noticed her thumb, which she had hastily bandaged after being pricked by the rose’s thorn. In her room, there was a basket full of medical supplies.

‘He must have noticed my injury and was being considerate… And I didn’t even realize it. How foolish of me…’

She felt like an idiot for always misunderstanding things on her own.

‘I’m the one who gets hurt most by those mistaken assumptions…’

There was no one watching her, but she couldn’t raise her head out of embarrassment.

She was free during the rest of the day, but Prina always tried to do something.

If she just stayed still, it felt as though she was becoming useless.

He still hadn’t given Prina a specific role.

Ironically, it was Prina who grew anxious because of that.

In order to stay here until the search calmed down, she felt she needed to make herself useful, no matter what. Of course, a sense of guilt for having initially mistaken him for a bad person also played a part in that.

Prina couldn’t survive outside Hunter’s mansion.

But Hunter didn’t need Prina. There was no particular reason for him to keep her in his house.

Even after several days, nothing had changed.

He continued to show her one-sided kindness, simply because she had earnestly begged. This imbalance of need made Prina anxious.

On closer thought, it wasn’t just simple anxiety. It was a feeling born of dependency.

Ever since the first day she received food from him, Prina couldn’t deny that she had started to rely on Hunter.

She paid attention to when he brought her meals, waited for him, and in the end, when the meal didn’t come, she even went looking for him herself.

Yet, despite all that… Prina still couldn’t shake her sense of discomfort about Hunter.

Hunter lives alone. Is it really possible for him to maintain this mansion by himself?

In this huge house, Hunter was the only one living here. Given its size, you’d expect there to be servants, but she hadn’t met a single other person. Was it just that there was never an opportunity to meet them?

That couldn’t be it. She hadn’t even seen any trace of anyone else.

At the convent, even a much smaller chapel required three nuns to clean it. It was strange.

‘Then why is there a woman’s room?’

As she was wiping down the clean banister on the stairs, Prina suddenly thought of her own room.

‘It’s also strange to have women’s toiletries or clothes…’

Even the vanity, the toiletries, and the brushes were all perfectly prepared, too meticulous to have been thrown together in a hurry.

At a glance, everything from the decor of the room to the bedding was distinctly feminine. It was as if someone had known from the start that she would be coming.

And yet, there were no portraits or personal belongings that looked used. Everything was either new or barely touched.

That detail kept nagging at Prina.

‘He’s someone I’m deeply grateful to. Why do I keep thinking like this…?’

I must be crazy.

Her suspicions always quickly turned into self-reproach.

She needed and depended on him, but at the same time, she feared and doubted who he really was.

Even she thought herself contradictory and strange. To have such thoughts about someone who had only ever been kind to her made her feel like a bad person.

“Do you always look at good people with such frightened eyes?”

“So, what I mean is, are you still afraid of me?”

It’s strange to fear a good person.

He hadn’t done anything wrong from the start, had never treated her badly.

Yeah, it’s because of his black hair.

Maybe, when she first saw him holding Lucky’s ears in the secret forest, she found him more frightening because of his uncovered black hair.

It was a kind of prejudice, just like the way people misunderstood her.

It was her one-sided misunderstanding, a fault of her own.

Even now, he was hiding her with no expectation of anything in return.

‘It’s all because I’m too sensitive. He’s someone I should be grateful to. I shouldn’t overthink it.’

Prina shook her head as if to chase away unnecessary thoughts.

‘If Hunter were a bad person… he would’ve demanded something terrible from me. But he never asks for anything.’

As soon as she reached that thought, she felt strangely relieved. Prina raised the corners of her mouth and continued to wipe the already clean banister until it gleamed.

Even if it wasn’t immediately visible, it must not be completely dust-free. She tended to it with a careful touch.