A Certain Winter’s Tale Chapter 3.17 - Elia Winter

A chilly winter afternoon.

Although they were in the middle of a market where breaths scattered into soft mist, the expressions of the residents of the Winterfall central estate were full of vitality. This Spring Prayer Festival, said to have been created to pray for spring to arrive after a long winter, began as a custom where people short on food and supplies would barter with one another, and has now established itself as a proper festival of Winterfall.

Of course, during the period of the Spring Prayer Festival, the nobles within the Winter Castle enjoyed banquets among themselves. However, Elia, who was out on the streets for the first time during such a crowded season, found everything strange and awkward.

Noah, with a beaming smile, firmly pulled Elia’s hand and wandered here and there through the market with excitement, like a fish in water.

“El, be careful not to let go of my hand, okay?”

“I understand.”

Even as he pulled Elia along, Noah kept glancing down at his feet, seemingly concerned about whether Snow was following.

“Whoops!”

Because he was busy pulling Elia and checking on Snow, Noah failed to look ahead properly and almost bumped into oncoming people several times. Each time, it seemed he would have fallen or been hurt if Elia hadn’t pulled him into his arms.

Who is looking after whom, honestly. Eventually, Elia pulled Noah’s shoulder tightly into his embrace and spoke.

“Snow will follow well enough on his own.”

“Still. You never know. Snow probably hasn’t seen much of the market either. What if someone steps hard on those small paws? I almost want to carry him on my back….”

Elia couldn’t help but chuckle. Among the snow wolves, Snow carried the blood of a leader, and his physique was quite massive. The thought of Noah groaning while trying to lift a wolf like that made him laugh in spite of himself.

Ultimately, Elia made a whistling sound similar to a birdsong and gestured with his chin toward Snow. Snow perked up his ears as if he understood the sound, then trudged away from the crowd and disappeared somewhere.

“Huh?”

“Do not worry. I ordered him to go back first through the Monarch’s Forest.”

Noah seemed to find such a method of communication quite fascinating; he nodded with sparkling eyes and held Elia’s hand even tighter.

The two wandered through every corner of the market. Stalls were lined up along the frozen river. Adults set out various foods and goods, talking loudly and laughing, while the children gathered by the riverside were preoccupied with making giggling sounds as they played games like sledding and top-spinning.

Noah finally discovered a giant willow tree among the shops. It was a large and grand tree that made one imagine how beautiful it must have been when its branches hung long during the times when summer existed. Beneath it was a restaurant famous for all kinds of delicacies made with warm soup, meat, and seafood.

“Oh, a place like this actually existed?”

Noah led Elia toward that shop with a smile.

Upon entering the shop, they saw a sight where tables were packed tightly around a stove with a long chimney stretching toward the ceiling. Noah naturally asked for a seat from the shop clerk who approached to guide them, and then took Elia’s hand to lead him to a corner seat.

It was intriguing. Elia had heard that Noah grew up in the countryside, so how did he find a shop in the capital’s central estate so skillfully? When Elia couldn’t suppress his curiosity and asked, Noah answered with a look of slight sadness in his eyes.

“My sister… told me about it.”

“Your sister?”

“Yes. The sister who raised me since childhood.”

Elia tilted his head, but Noah did not answer further and stared off into the distance. Just as the seafood dishes the two ordered were set on the table and Elia was portioning food into a small bowl to take care of Noah’s meal, Noah slowly opened his mouth as if talking to himself.

“Um, Elia. I told you that I was raised by the hands of women in a brothel in the Sun Estate, right?”

Elia nodded with a dazed face. Normally, a person sitting in a high position of a country would find themselves concerned about the background of their companion. Because Elia accepted the place where he lived so naturally, Noah felt he was lovely and gave a faint smile. Of course, facing that smile, Elia felt a different kind of hunger.

“When you smile so prettily like that, it makes me want to devour you instead of the meal.”

“Haha, no! Eat your meal first!”

Noah smiled brightly and took a sip or two of the soup Elia handed him, slowly continuing his story.

“It was my sister who raised me since I was a child after I became an orphan without parents.”

“Your biological sister?”

“No. I heard we are not related by blood.”

“Then was she a woman of that red house?”

Noah gave a bitter smile and shook his head.

“According to the madam from a long time ago… she said that my sister appeared one day holding me when I was a newborn baby.”

“She appeared?”

“Yes. Saying she couldn’t say where she came from or what she had been doing for a living…. She supposedly begged, saying she would do any kind of work if they would just let her look after the baby.”

Recalling the memories, Noah smiled small as if he couldn’t hide his loveliness even while feeling sad. Because Noah spoke so dearly of a woman he wasn’t related to by blood, jealousy almost flared up.

However, Elia soon realized that the feelings Noah held for that sister did not match lust in a single way and composed himself. He thought that perhaps the sadness toward that woman was closer to the feelings one has for a parent.

“Sister Oz, who was an ordinary woman, reportedly started taking customers at the red house from that point on in order to raise me.”

That guess was not wrong. And Elia, not stopping at learning love from Noah, this time deeply realized in his heart what the emotion of pity was.

Noah, who closed his eyes and bit his lip once before letting go, confessed in a small voice resembling a sob.

“In that way, my sister worked at the red house for my sake until the day she left this world.”

Because of that, Noah had been somewhat prepared for the fact that he too would have to sell his charms if it ever became difficult to make a living.

‘Not yet. I can hold out a little longer.’

While thinking that way, he kept his conviction with the help of the women in the red house until years passed and his sister Oz reached the point of passing away from old age.

In the end, he was someone who was dragged to the central estate as if being sold. But by a stroke of heavenly luck, he met a man as kind and lovely as Elia.

When his thoughts reached that point, Noah suddenly felt a surge of bashfulness; he lowered his head slightly and picked at the soup Elia had portioned for him.

“Noah….”

“Yes.”

Even though it wasn’t something he had experienced, Elia’s heart ached and his eyes stung. This was an abnormal symptom that had developed after meeting Noah. Because the emotions that had begun to flood like a burst dam occasionally overflowed beyond control, Elia was happy to a frightening degree.

“Will you let me go together to the place where you lived someday? Noah, I would like to at least offer flowers at your sister’s grave.”

“I would love that. My sister would be happy too.”

Noah’s face wore a soft smile as if meeting a warm spring breeze. Elia also smiled back at him, wearing a breeze-like smile unlike any before. It was a radiant smile, as if spring would stay in that spot and never leave.

Just then, the restaurant grew noisy. Among the customers exchanging various stories while eating, a man entered carrying a grocery box full in both hands. The man’s voice was full of excitement.

“Proprietor! I’ve come to deliver tomorrow’s ingredients!”

“Oh! You’re finally here! What with the Spring Prayer Festival and all, business is going better than expected, so if you had been even a little late, I almost would have had to close tomorrow!”

Laughing heartily, a couple wearing aprons came out from the kitchen inside the shop, greeting him with delight.

“Haha, it seems people are especially excited for this Spring Prayer Festival. I suppose expectations are no joke because of the news starting to come in from the Night Estate side, right?”

The master couple handed a glass of water to the merchant, who wiped the sweat from his forehead and took off his thick coat. The merchant sat on the edge of the counter to catch his breath and met the curious gazes of the proprietor couple.

“Is there some good news?”

“There certainly is! Rumors are spreading that new sprouts have begun to bud in the meadows on the border of the Night Estate!”

“Oh my!”

The couple, who had been moving their hands busily while listening, marveled. The news that spring was coming—that in itself made the people in that spot look ecstatic, as if the frozen ground would melt at any moment.

“Then the rumors that leaves have begun to grow on the central tree of the Winter Castle since a while ago are also…?”

“According to what I heard at the merchant guild, they don’t think that’s just a wandering rumor either! Isn’t it a sign that spring will arrive any moment now? Thanks to that, what with securing stock and all, I’m all out of my mind lately.”

That day is coming. Elia, who had noticed the arrival of spring most certainly, stared fixedly at the spring in front of his eyes and tried hard to suppress the laughter that kept leaking through his lips. Noah found that gaze, which was fixed on his face and wouldn’t pull away, to be puzzling.

“Hmm?”

“What is it, Noah.”

“El. Why are you just smiling and not eating?”

“Just watching you eat makes me feel full.”