Epilogue: Witch
Epilogue: Witch
HIDDEN deep within the forest was a lake.
In the middle of the pristine lake floated a small island upon which a lone witch’s hermitage stood. For decades and centuries the scenery had remained unchanged.
Since ancient times, the witches who lived there sometimes helped people, guided them, or profited off their wishes.
Today, like the days of yore, a small boat arrived at the Witch’s hermitage. The man and woman on board disembarked with familiar ease. The woman glided from the dock to the hovel knowing the exact steps needed to cover the distance and flipped over the closed sign hanging out front. Satisfied that the sign now read “Open,” the Witch pulled the key from her neck, unlocked the door, and entered the building.
Boots trotted the ground behind her.
“You don’t have to come with me…every time you have a day off, you know?” Rose muttered with a hint of dismay to Harij, who followed her. “You should take it easy on your days off at least…”
“I come here to take it easy. So it’s all good.”
Harij pulled a tablecloth out of the basket he brought. His broad hands smoothly spread it to the edges of the table without a wrinkle. It smelled of being fresh out of the laundry.
He took a book out of the basket and sat on his usual chair bathed in sunlight shining through the small window. Spending time with Rose while sitting in his special chair without disturbing her work had become Harij’s favorite way to spend his days off recently.
Harij had received his reinstatement orders after he had successfully escorted Billaura to the border. In other words, it was two months after the break-in and the incident with the horrifying accidental ingestion of a love potion. The long time off was likely to reward him for his many years of service without using leave. After his two-month break, Harij was reinstated as a Royal Knight serving within the palace.
The reason why Rose was so informed about Harij’s situation was because she was now living under his care as a houseguest in his manor.
Even Rose, who never thought about taking preemptive measures to prevent home invasions, had been traumatized enough by the break-in to think twice about it now. She tried to do as much as she could to strengthen the island’s security with Harij’s assistance, but his worries were endless. Eventually, he obstinately insisted he would live in the hermitage with her.
Things probably would have been solved quite easily if she had immediately accepted his marriage proposal.
But, to the witch who had lived as a shut-in recluse since birth, change was the scariest thing in the world. Generations of witches had lived on this land and protected it, and it was also the irreplaceable home she grew up in and loved. She couldn’t give it up for good.
After a lot of back and forth discussions, Rose decided to reside in Harij’s manor at night. During the day, she resumed her duties as a witch in the hermitage. The fact that he welcomed her into his home as a houseguest rather than his fiancée showed how much he was being considerate of Rose, who couldn’t make up her mind about marriage.
Where she lived wasn’t the only thing in Rose’s life that had changed. For some reason, people were becoming friendlier toward witches.
Did Harij successfully convince them? Or was it because Rose didn’t look like the hideous witches in stories? The answer was a mystery. Rose knew that humans easily changed their minds, but also not that easily. It was because they didn’t change that Rose was able to make a living as a witch.
Still, while Harij might have asked them to do it, people occasionally ventured from the city into the forest to check on her. They might not have been 100 percent sincere about it, but Rose simply decided to accept their kindness at face value.
The lake had also become a playground for the children, and they sometimes left fruit in front of the hermitage for her.
“Ouch…!”
“Are you okay?”
“Yes. Happens all the time.”
The hermitage was still a castle of clutter. Rose put the vase she accidentally kicked back in its original spot. Her gaze dropped to her feet as she stood up.
Rose was wearing a new pair of boots. Harij had bought them for her after she gave her spare pair to Billaura. These were completely different from her prior drab and tasteless boots. While emphasizing practicality, they were also delicate enough to decorate a lady’s feet. They could probably last for years as long as she took proper care of them. Small beads had been embroidered in an ivy pattern along the polished black upper leather. Rose was smitten with the way they glittered in the light with every step.
“Oh, right, Harij, would you mind checking the mailbox for me?”
Clients still came to the Witch seeking the witches’ secret potions even though she wasn’t in business twenty-four hours a day anymore.
She prepared a signboard informing them to leave a note in the mailbox describing what they needed and the next day and time they planned to visit. Harij accepted the mailbox key from her without complaint and fetched the letters. He came back with a single envelope the color of lettuce, or rather, the soft shade of spring buds.
“Thank you… Oh, it’s from Lady Lau.”
Harij was surprised when Rose mentioned the name of the sender.
“I haven’t received a single letter from her yet!”
“Girls mature faster than boys. They stop clinging to their older brothers sooner.”
Rose tore open the seal, careful not to rip the paper inside. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a letter opener.
Lau’s letters were easy to read and enjoyable for Rose, who had little experience exchanging missives. Beginning with seasonal greetings, Lau would then launch into a fascinating story about recent events.
“Do you…well…often get correspondence from her?” Harij asked, fidgeting restlessly as Rose scanned the contents of the letter with a soft smile.
“This would be the third.”
“…His Majesty would cry if he knew,” he said with a grimace. He seemed to feel sorry for his friend.
The second prince, and the older brother closest in age to Billaura, was Harij’s childhood friend. And Harij just so happened to be reappointed as the second prince’s Royal Knight.
“…My, oh my,” Rose muttered while reading the letter.
“What’s wrong? Something happen?”
Harij hurried over to her side but was too much of a gentleman to impolitely peek at the letter. Clutching to her chest the paper that conveyed an important message, Rose looked up at Harij through her lashes.
How much will he panic if I tell him? Rose tightened her jaw and schooled her features into something more serious.
“It seems congratulations are in order.”
“Congratulations for what?”
“Lady Lau seems to be pregnant.”
Harij’s eyes bulged. His mouth fell open, but no words came out.
Rose bit the inside of her cheek, desperate to stop her lips from breaking into a wide smile at his obvious reaction.
“The potion seems to have helped. As far as I can tell from her letter, this is what Lady Lau wanted.”
Rose softly smiled over the blossoming romance between Nefrit’s king and Billaura as described in the letter.
The king of Nefrit had seen a semblance of his deceased wife in the much younger Billaura when they met while he was out on royal business. The king waited until she came of age to formally propose to her through the official channels of their kingdoms so that he could legally leave an inheritance to the young princess once he passed away.
Judging from what Billaura wrote about their married life, the elderly king wasn’t after a romantic or physical relationship with her. Falling in love with such a devoted king, Billaura was the one who eventually threatened him into bed: “If this is the way our life is to be, then I’ll just drink this!”
The poor king. He misunderstood the secret potion his young wife had sneaked in from her homeland as a poison to end her life.
He couldn’t very well let his dear Billaura, whom he yearned after for a great many years, die by her own hands. So he reasoned that he, an elderly man with few years left to live, should die instead for forcing Billaura into a marriage she would commit suicide to escape.
The king also had a great successor. He downed what was left in the vial for his young wife with a promising future after she took a sip—not the least bit aware of what the potion was.
“He’s forty years older than her!”
“Anything goes as long as there is love and consent, Harij.”
Harij wouldn’t have wanted for Billaura to be mistreated or given the cold shoulder, but this bit of news came a little too soon for him. Shock rendered him speechless.
Considering the king’s age, Rose might start receiving orders for the potion’s functional uses for men. It wouldn’t hurt to prepare for future requests. She heard a familiar sound as she was calculating costs in her head.
Ding-a-ling.
The bell announcing the arrival of a visitor rang. She looked through the window to where a man looked back at her, waving. Next to the man were three donkeys—each saddled with piles of bags.
“……”
Rose buried her face in one hand. Harij peered out the window beside her. Their shoulders touched.
“It’s that man…”
“You know Tien?”
“I’ve crossed paths with him here before.”
“Oh yes, I remember something like that happening…,” Rose answered with her attention elsewhere.
Harij scooped up a lock of her pale-pink hair. He looked unhappily outside as he twirled that lock around his finger.
“What’s that pile of goods for?”
“Um, well, it’s…” Rose frowned in place of an answer. She was being distracted by him tugging on her hair, but the more urgent problem was on the other side of the lake.
“You aren’t going to tell me those are all gifts, right?”
Her head sank lower and lower instead of responding.
“I’ll go refuse him,” Harij said.
“Wait! Um, those things are, well, well!”
“I’ll get you anything you need. Don’t accept stuff from other men again.”
There he was being arrogant again, but the jealousy she sensed in his words turned Rose pink down to her neckline.
Regardless, she couldn’t yield the point to him. Rose covered her face with both hands.
“All of that is…well…you could call it a gift…but not quite…so…um…”
“What is it?”
“In other words, it’s…”
“Yeah?”
“Supposed to be given…in place of my parents…”
“Huh?”
“Tien—he has been looking out for me since I was a girl…and, um, it seems like my grandma asked him to take care of me on her deathbed…”
“Yeah?”
“So…um…I think it’s probably that…”
Damn you, Tien! Why did you have to come today of all days?! Rose cursed him out in her heart.
Tired of beating around the bush, she shouted, “I’m trying to tell you that it’s supposed to be my dowry!”
Harij eyed Tien but didn’t say anything more.
A dowry is something a woman’s family prepares for when she marries. In other words, that could only mean she intended to marry Harij.
White flowers would bloom in the forest soon.
Undoubtedly, they were going to bear sweet, red fruit.
