TFM 6

Chapter 6

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It had been less than a month since she had left House Taren's castle and entered the imperial palace.

While her mother was happy to finally have her daughter's name on the imperial genealogy, Talia was simply unhappy to be in a strange place. Talia's anxiety only intensified as Senevere’s attention turned to renovating the castle.

The palace was not what her mother had told her it would be, but rather a stark and frightening place. Stares followed her everywhere, and the servants were even colder than the servants of House Taren.

She felt like a lost child, so whenever she could, she would sneak out of her room and wander around the villa.

She was especially fond of wandering the grounds, where Senevere had uprooted every flower and tree in the castle to erase all trace of the former empress.

Rose trees and colorful shrubs had begun to fill in the gaps at the entrances to the main palace and the annexes, but the backyard, which had yet to be landscaped, was a cluttered pile of dirt. Thankfully, no one would visit the place.

When Talia grew tired of the whispering and the stares, she'd idle away in a corner of the messy backyard.

On this particular day, she was out in the backyard of the palace, escaping the annoying nanny and the maid who was stabbing her scalp with a sharp comb while trying to fix her hair.

Not a single worker was in sight in the garden, thanks to the rain that had begun falling at noon. Talia crouched down in a corner of an empty, deserted yard and stared at the falling raindrops.

She had been doing this for some time when she heard a small chirping sound from somewhere.

After a moment's bewildered glance around, Talia began to walk toward the castle's outskirts, as if drawn by something in the pouring rain. Only a deep pit had been dug where a large beautiful tree had stood until this morning.

Talia approached a tall mound of dirt and looked down. A small bird floundered in the mud, emitting a pitiful cry.

‘Did it fall from the tree?’

The bird looked as if it didn't deserve to die.

Heavy raindrops were beating relentlessly against its drenched brown body, and lumps of tar-like black mud were sticking to its spindly legs and floppy wings. The bird's insistent cries had suddenly turned into a muffled shudder.

Bending her knees to stare at the scene, Talia stuck her foot into the pit.

It was stupid. Despite her careful steps, the rain-soaked, swampy bottom quickly swallowed her shoe.

She twisted to get her foot out, but lost her footing and slipped into the muddy hole.

Tumbling headfirst into the puddle, Talia shook her head frustratingly as she felt the bitter muck seep between her lips.

The green dress her nanny had made for her was a mess, and the mud clung to her neatly braided hair.

Cringing, irritation flared.

She pushed herself to her feet and muttered a small curse.

What do you know about birds? You just do stupid things…

Grumbling, she turned to leave the pit, but then she heard the soft cry again. It was so faint that it was hard to recognize unless you listened closely, but to Talia it sounded like a bird screaming.

She took a few more steps over the black puddle of water, and then she saw its pale brown wings and shriveled little head submerged in the mud.

‘......is it dead?’

With careful hands, she picked up the young bird and felt its tiny, water-soaked body faintly throbbing. It was still alive.

She wrapped her hands around its lukewarm body and blew a warm breath on it. The limp bird twitched its tiny brown beak, flapping its tiny wings pitifully. It looked like it was struggling to stay alive.

Watching it, something tightened in her chest.

Talia didn't know what it was. She didn't know why it broke her heart to see a young bird, homeless, abandoned by its mother, floundering in the mud, resting in her grasp.

She carefully wrapped the bird in her arms and held it to the hottest part of her neck. She stared blindly up the steep slope of slippery mud.

The thickening raindrops were making the mud even heavier. She took a few tentative steps, but she didn't think she could walk up. She'd have to crawl on all fours like an animal to get out of it.

Talia pursed her lips; she couldn't abandon the little bird she'd managed to save, and she couldn't abandon her dignity as a princess and crawl through the mud like a cow.

So Talia stood still for a long time, the cold rain pelting down on her.

Then it happened. A boy emerged from the misty, white rain.

He was very tall, dressed in the black robes worn by monks, with a hood over his head. But Talia could clearly see his pale blue eyes shining through the veil of white rain. They were terribly beautiful eyes.

"What are you doing there?"

The blue-eyed boy asked, bending toward her. His cold voice at odds with his delicate face that still had a youthful edge. Talia felt a shiver run down her spine.

At the time, she chalked it up to the cold. But now, looking back, she realized she'd had a vague premonition the moment she'd heard that voice. She realized that the impassive-faced boy staring back at her was going to push her life into a hellish torment.............

If she had realized the identity of that vague sensation as clearly as she did that day, Talia would have thrown the tiny bird in her grasp, gotten down into the dirt and crawled on all fours over the mud like a pig that knew neither filth nor shame.

Then she would have run far, far away from the blue-eyed boy. She would have put him out of her mind forever.

But eight-year-old Talia had no idea that the boy who appeared out of the rain would become her despair, so she looked up at him and shot back in her usual prickly way.

"Can't you see, I'm stuck in a pit and can't climb out."

The boy's eyes narrowed. He looked like he wanted to ask why she was there in the first place.

But instead of asking, he slid into the pit, not caring that his well-tailored pants and fine leather boots were stained with mud.

Talia stared at him in amazement. She hadn't expected such behavior from the impassive-faced boy who looked like he wouldn't bleed if you stabbed him.

He trudged through the mud that had turned into a swamp. Up close, the boy looked even scruffier than he did from below. He seemed to be a head taller than she was.

He stepped in front of her on long, flexible legs and held out one hand.

"Take it."

***

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