/
If I picked that up and put it in my pocket, would that look too low?
This time, it seemed even Haniel was surprised to the point of raising her head slightly to look down on it
‘You saw that too, right? Your brother isn’t that scary.’
Since Rashid was nearby, I couldn’t talk to her like usual, so I placed a hand on top of Haniel’s hand with as much of my heart wrested into it as possible. When I did that, Rashid’s gaze also stopped at my hand.
“So, what’s next?”
“W-what do you mean, next?”
“What you don’t like, using your daughter as an excuse.”
“…….”
That’s really not the case.
I was about to tell him that I didn’t care what he did—that I wouldn’t even care if he went around naked, for goodness’ sake—but I gave up.
Because I felt like I would care about that a little bit.
“Not talking anymore?”
“……”
I was worried that he might be saying that in a bad mood, but Rashid took his spot in the pavilion with authoritative strides. Whether or not he had his sword or his badge, he wasn’t a man to be influenced by such things in the first place.
Seeing him sit there first and wait for me, this time I really thought that it wouldn’t make much of a difference to me now if he was actually naked.
“What now, that it’s making your face red?”
“It hasn’t gone red.”
After answering him without much thinking, I was a little surprised on the inside.
In spite of myself, maybe because I now knew that he wasn’t going to kill me anymore, I was finding myself sounding out the person that I’d only ever been scared of at first.
To see how much this man would allow.
“I said, sit here.”
“…..”
And also to see how close I was allowed to go.
“And where will you seat that thing?”
“Oh, I can just keep the child in my arms.”
Even as I carefully sat next to him, I prioritized my attention on Haniel’s mood.
After he had taken off his badge too, she hadn’t been chirping, so it looked like there wasn’t going to be any occasion for her to flail about saying ‘Bwother scawy!’ at this moment.
“She doesn’t quite adapt quickly when she goes to an unfamiliar place, you see.”
“You’re saying this much is unfamiliar to a bird?”
“Yes. She’s a child I keep close in my arms in bed when we sleep, too.”
“…..”
He should take a look at his own face, instead of acting like only my face is red.
Secretly pushing out my lower lip, I carefully lowered Haniel on top of the table. Even then, I couldn’t have her stand completely on her own, and surrounded her with my arms like a fence, sitting with my body close.
“By the way, Your Highness.”
So say it clearly enough so that our little princess pretending to have fainted but is actually completely fine can hear it well.
“What?”
“About the lost princess. Her name was……”
“Haniel?”
“Yeees. Princess Haniel.”
At the same time, Haniel’s webbed feet flinched strongly.
Brother, brother knows my name!!
A surprised but not at all pleased shock spread through her white body visibly.
“I ask this just to be sure, but, when Your Highness went to see the princess, you weren’t trying to scare her on purpose, right?”
[…….]
Blinking, interest appeared in Haniel’s eyes.
This was our chance!
As Rashid looked at me with a pretty dubious expression, I smiled at him even more innocently.
‘No-ow, bark out that there’s no way that’s true in a loud voice!’
Roar!
The more he fumed, the more the point—that it wasn’t true—could be emphasized. As I awaited to be yelled at with the attitude of a voluntary martyr, Rashid’s expression towards me was only strange.
“Hm….. is that right?”
“…How, how can….”
How could someone fail what was literally put right under their nose…?
If a person tries to push you towards reconciliation, practically opens your mouth to feed you your meal, then you should at least stick out your tongue!
“Hoo.”
Watching him as he supported his chin with his hand, unexpectedly entering serious mode, I suppressed my harshening breaths. It was already long since Haniel had closed her eyes again, too.
“…..Your Highness, please think about it carefully.”
“What’s there to think about? She’d just cry if she saw me anyways.”
“And I’m saying, Your Highness didn’t make her cry because you wanted to make her cry.”
“…..”
This time, he couldn’t say anything that flipped my insides over.
Yes, this was it!
Not stopping here and taking a step forward, I softly thumped my squeezed fist in front of him.
“Now, one more time. At the very least, Your Highness surely wouldn’t have done that because you ‘disliked’ Princess Haniel, I suspect.”
“That’s true.”
“…..as I thought!”
Now that I’d finally reached 1/100th of the way to the answer I wanted, I pressed my lips together, touched.
As my smile regained its bright radiance, Rashid only gazed at me silently.