/
From then on, somehow, she suddenly became ashamed of her shabby appearance. As she lowered her head, a cold hand fell from her forehead. She combed her sweaty hair with her hand belatedly, but the Grand Duke was not looking at her.
“Haven’t you drunk this yet?”
She took out a bottle of healing accelerator from a cloth pouch on the bedside table without even asking what it was.
“Did your Highness give it to you?”
She nodded her head as he uncorked the bottle.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t tell others.”
Why? As she looked up curiously, the Grand Duke silently held out the bottle. Watching her drink the medicine, he said this.
“Those who take care of others cannot say that they want to take care of themselves when they are in trouble. because of a sense of duty. That’s why it’s easy to get sick alone.”
Was it an experience story?
“I just think it might be. I don’t know.”
“Thank you for telling me.”
The Grand Duke scratched his cheek shyly and took out an empty bowl.
“I hope you get well soon.”
She stared at the closed door for a long time. She thought that the Grand Duke would know that loneliness.
* * *
Spring cleaning wasn’t until April. She looked around the glittering cabin and smiled proudly. Carrot cake was baking in the oven, smelling fantastic. In the large bucket of water, dishes and cutlery clattered as they washed themselves.
“Good. Perfect.”
The cleaning was finished in the short time the children had in the morning classes. That wasn’t enough, so she made dessert for today and headed to the sofa. On the couch, Lady and Daisy were taking a nap in the spring sun. She sat between them and snapped her fingers.
“Shall we do some study now?”
How long had it been since she opened a magic book and started reading it?
Knock, knock.
Hearing something knocking on the window, she looked up and saw a stork standing outside the window.
“Hi. It’s already been a month.”
When she opened the window and said hello, the stork just nodded without saying a word. It was because he had a large pouch in his beak. Ever since she came here, she would occasionally see a stork flying through the sky holding a bag of white cloth in its mouth. So she thought this place was really like a fairy tale, like a stork carrying a baby.
“Hazel, how are babies born?”
“The stork brings them.”
So, after answering Luca like this, she became an adult who didn’t know that Luna knew too.
“No! A baby is born when an adult man and woman sleep in the same bed.”
“Luna, that, where did you hear that?”
“In the book. Anyway, the stork delivers newspapers.”
She took a rolled up roll of parchment from the pouch hanging from the stork’s beak.
“It’s a lot of work.”
She wanted to give something to the stork, just like giving a drink to a delivery man, but what would the stork eat? Weren’t he eating meat?
“Ah!”
At the moment when she was worried about not having anything suitable in the kitchen, when her eyes landed on the chicken in the yard, she clicked her fingers. At that moment, the worm that the rooster had just pulled out of the ground entered the stork’s mouth. The stork nodded his head, thanked her, and flew away flapping his wings. She shook her hand and tried to close the window, but a hissing sound rang in her head.
[My worm! I won’t let this evil witch dare to steal my game!]
The naughty rooster spread her wings and lunged at her.
Padduk.
The rooster was about to fly through the open window.
Charleuk.
A handful of rice from the rice jar was scattered across the yard.
[I’ll give you this instead.]
[Rice! My rice!]
The rooster forgot all of his anger for her in an instant and began to pick up rice in the yard and eat it. She laughed and closed the window. Now her skills have improved enough that she could easily communicate with small animals such as birds. She put away the magic book she was looking at and opened the newspaper instead.
Monthly Wizard April issue.
This was a newsletter given only to members of the Wizards Association. Since last month, she had become a member of the wizard’s association. The subscription fee was expensive, and the place where everyone had given up on joining because they hated her gave her a letter first.
-We present this plaque of appreciation to you for your contribution to increasing the employment rate of witches.
While sending that plaque of appreciation that was now on the shelf in the living room. A cookie show in front of noble children during the New Year’s festival caused an unexpected stir. After that, the aristocratic families started scrambling to hire a witch as her babysitter. In this way, witch nannies became popular throughout the empire, and the low-level witch unemployment problem, which had been a headache for the association for a long time, was quickly resolved.
-We would like to invite you as an honorary member of the Wizards Association, so please join us in raising the honor of the association.
Since she was an honorary member, she immediately signed up because she was told that the membership fee and annual fee were waived. But when she heard it belatedly, the opposition of the members was strong. Not even that. She was still an evil witch outside the Grand Duke’s palace. Her reputation was still so-so, to the extent that she overheard by chance when she was out in town worrying about the Grand Duke’s family, saying that she had some nefarious plan. However, when she asked why they gave her honorary membership, the Grand Duke gave her some kind of identity guarantee.
Why? It was a time when she was scratching her cheek while reading the newsletter without realizing it.
A broom set up in the living room shook the bell.
“Hazel, let’s go on a picnic!”
When she went back to the nanny’s room and opened the door, there were night guards standing there. But why was the Grand Duke standing together?
* * *
They said it was a picnic, and the nanny and the children picked a bunch of herbs. So, when she spread a blanket on the grass to eat lunch, she was quite deep in the forest. After sitting on a hill in the sunlight and eating a sandwich, the children started to play.
“Don’t go too far.”
Elliot watched over his younger siblings like a guard dog. The dog, which should have served as a guard dog, was sleeping lazily on a blanket enjoying the warm sunlight.
“Sleep again? Doggie sleeps every day.”
Luka, who had picked a lot of wild flowers, muttered sullenly.
“Is it an old dog? You sleep a lot.”
“Oh, that’s not it… haha…”
The nanny’s complexion made her look nervous for some reason.
“Anyway, I didn’t know that cats have such habits…”
Wasn’t that what dogs do? She muttered at the sight of a cat digging under a nearby tree, and the nanny jumped to her feet.
“Daisy, your hair is muddy.”
The nanny picked up the panting cat and brushed the dirt off its fur.
“Daisy, Lady. I think the name has changed…”
“The original owner attached it like that, haha… I don’t know why either.”
Was it hot? The nanny’s white blouse was wet with sweat and clinging to her back.
“Hazel, make me a corolla.”
The nanny sat Luna in front of her and she made a wreath of wild flowers that Luca had been diligently picking. Couldn’t she make it with magic? Elliot watched intently as her slender, white fingers moved busily, twisting vines and tying wild flowers. Then, when the children ran around again, the nanny began to trim the herbs. Elliot, who watched the water from her corolla’s flowers spreading on her fingertips, came to his senses only when the nanny suddenly asked.
“Aren’t you busy?”
Busy. In his office, paperwork waiting for his approval was piled up like a mountain. But the paperwork was not going to run away. It wouldn’t wait, of course, and Daniel’s nagging would be waiting, too. When he didn’t answer, she pouted her lips at what the nanny had misunderstood.
“You said you believed in me, but you’re still monitoring me these days.”
But the nanny seemed to be annoyed to have him around.
“Surveillance.”
“Sure?”
“Didn’t you tell me to spend a lot of time with my younger siblings?”
“You just followed me around like a guardsman today.”
“Because I came to protect my younger siblings like the guards. The forest is dangerous.”
“Then shouldn’t you be chasing after the children? You won’t be sitting here like you are now.”
Elliot leaned over to the nanny with her chin on her chin and looked into her squinting eyes.
“Does Miss Hazel hate me?”
The nanny’s face, which was already turning red, turned into a ripe apple at that moment.
“No, it’s not like that…”
“Is it good then?”
“Oh, no… It’s not like that…”
“So you don’t like me?”
“No, I mean…”
Nanny had fun teasing. It was fun to see them blushing and not knowing what to do as they were being teased. The nanny, who had been responding unfailingly today, suddenly put her hands together and she made a serious noise.
“Thank you for giving me a good job. I heard you vouched for me with the Wizards Association. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
He told them not to tell her about it…
“Your Highness is a really nice person.”
The moment the nanny said that with a smile, Elliot was at a loss.
“Oh! Shower!”
He thought the sudden rain would save him, but it didn’t. He hastily packed up, took the children, and sheltered from the rain in a nearby abandoned chapel. He looked out through the broken window and saw that the sky was covered with thick dark clouds. It meant that the rain would not stop easily.
“Then we need to light a fire.”
The nanny snapped her fingers, saying the children would catch a cold. Immediately, firewood piled up on the dusty floor of the chapel and caught fire. Elliot was taken aback when his gaze landed on the back of the nanny, who was squatting and sifting the campfire with a branch. Her blouse was soaked in the rain and her bare skin could be seen through. Elliot wiped his hot face with one hand, and the moment their gaze met her again, he couldn’t stand it.