Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 283

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 53.
Finding the Cat in the Furnace (2)
From the moment I set foot on Blue Coral Island, something felt amiss. A resort, they’d called it—yet here was a vagrant’s paradise. After kicking over a barrel in frustration and getting into a scuffle with its owner, I quickly grasped the situation.
Fair enough. Anyone uninterested in the festival would postpone their visit to Sword-la-Chapel and Blue Coral Island until after the festival, unless the matter was genuinely urgent. But people rarely face only postponable business. From those forced to come regardless, I heard advice about choosing sun-drenched clearings or shadowy grasslands where fewer passersby would kick things over. For five years I’d harbored no ill will toward my absent friend, yet now I found myself resenting him bitterly.
“What cursed festival nonsense!”
Moreover, upon reflection, wasn’t that very friend the architect who’d drawn all these people here in the first place?
Venting my anger accomplished nothing. Using the lack of shelter as an excuse, I began my inquiries without rest, and before long, I’d located the Arnim Family Estate without much difficulty.
“You’ve come seeking Young Master Joshua? He’s not here at the moment.”
The Gatekeeper’s eyes held suspicion, though not because of my shabby, travel-worn appearance—servants at estates commonly assessed visitors this way. Rather, he bore the expression of someone unable to decide whether to speak truth or conceal it. I caught the scent immediately.
“When might he return?”
“Well…”
“He hasn’t gone far, then?”
“That is to say…”
I narrowed my eyes, studying the Gatekeeper’s expression intently, then spoke as though suddenly enlightened.
“I see. You know nothing of the young master’s whereabouts? I’ve traveled all this way from Keltika only to strike empty air. Shall I return and tell the Duchess that the young master’s location remains unknown, and that no one at the estate possesses any information?”
“Wait—the Duchess? The Duchess sent you?”
I tilted my chin upward.
“Had bandits not waylaid me en route and stolen my carriage, I’d have arrived sooner. The Duchess, being unwell, desires the young master’s return. I came bearing her message, but since the household staff know nothing, I can only report as much.”
“Wait, you said a message? You truly have one?”
I withdrew an envelope from my coat and displayed it. The cream-colored envelope bore the unmistakable seal of House of Arnim, complete with the official stamp. Of course, I returned it to my coat without surrendering it.
The Gatekeeper weighed my appearance against my words one final time, but his reluctance to assume responsibility won out. He opened the door and gestured for me to enter.
“Madame Bwaju can provide more detailed information.”
The situation unfolded as expected.
Madame Bwaju, who oversaw the estate’s management, stated that Joshua hadn’t returned for several months. However, she showed me a letter in Joshua’s handwriting that read, “I’m well, so don’t worry.”
I skimmed the letter perfunctorily and returned it. Madame Bwaju looked deeply concerned, though whether she worried for Joshua or feared I might report his conduct to the Duchess remained unclear. More importantly, I sensed something wrong in the air.
“When precisely did the young master leave the estate?”
“He came and went sporadically before, but since mid-February, he hasn’t appeared at all.”
“It’s May now. You’ve known his whereabouts for three months yet never informed the main house?”
Madame Bwaju regarded me with a defensive gaze.
“To be truthful, I believed Young Master Joshua had already gone to Jade Ring Castle.”
I felt a slight pang but concealed it, asking calmly.
“On what grounds?”
“Would we not have searched for him? First, we inquired at his school and learned he’d already completed his withdrawal personally. From the border officials, we heard that a carriage bearing House of Arnim’s seal had crossed into Anomarad. That official knew the young master’s face and swore he saw him inside the carriage. Thus we assumed he’d gone to the main house in Keltika without informing us—the young master’s moods shift easily, after all. But now hearing he didn’t go to the main house leaves us in darkness.”
As I listened to Madame Bwaju’s explanation—part plea, part probe—I arranged the information in my mind.
Her account and Joshua’s appearance at Jade Ring Castle aligned perfectly. It could be true. Yet accepting it would render my journey here meaningless. Should I simply abandon my suspicions, enjoy some sightseeing, and depart? That wasn’t the Maximian Lifkne who’d pursued this lead all the way here.
If I maintained my original suspicion, then the information I’d gathered here and what I’d witnessed held no significance. Rather, the perfect alignment itself seemed suspicious—evidence of some grand conspiracy lurking beneath. This wasn’t the moment for conclusions.
Therefore, this was a lie.
“You remained complacent with mere conjecture while ignorant of the young master’s very fate? Let’s see what the Duchess says upon hearing this. I doubt she’ll find it easy to escape responsibility.”
Madame Bwaju visibly paled.
“Such words… Of course I bear some fault, but once he crossed the border, I never imagined the young master would have anywhere else to go…”
“Then shouldn’t you have sent someone to the main house to verify that the young master actually arrived? What if something happened to him on the way? Don’t you think you bear responsibility for finding that out?”
“Your words have merit, but….”
As Madame Bwaju trailed off, Maximian grasped something else. This woman, being the manager of the estate, would bear full responsibility if anything ill befell Joshua. Yet regarding the missing Joshua, hadn’t she taken remarkably little action?
Why had she suffered in silence from February until now without sending a single word to the main house? Unless she were a fool, she’d know that some things cannot be hidden no matter how hard one tries—so what audacity had sustained her, and why, after months of surely fabricating excuses to evade responsibility, did she now stumble and hesitate before Maximian?
In other words, Madame Bwaju had never anticipated this situation—Maximian appearing suddenly to inquire about Joshua’s whereabouts. She believed the matter had slipped from her hands entirely.
Who, then, had given her such certainty?
Maximian suddenly rose to his feet.
“I understand. It seems there’s nothing more to discuss with you, so I shall investigate further before returning to the main house to report.”
Madame Bwaju made no move to detain him. Maximian felt a complex, enigmatic gaze pierce the back of his head as he departed the estate.
In the afternoon, with the festival in full swing, even the smallest alleys overflowed with crowds. Maximian wove through them, bumping into people as he walked lost in thought. He ignored—though did not fail to hear—the curses hurled by those he’d collided with.
Maximian’s senses operated in such a chaotic tangle that, if he so chose, he could conduct two or three trains of thought simultaneously while listening to ambient sounds, perceiving his surroundings and approaching figures, and even engaging in simple conversation.
At present, he was also tearing into a large hunk of stale bread from his pack, devouring nearly half of it without hesitation while simultaneously noticing a flying insect on his spectacles, swatting it away with his other hand, and determining that he was walking northeast. In that same moment, he considered whether to stop by Joshua’s school, whether sleeping in the grassland would be acceptable if it didn’t rain, how much Madame Bwaju actually knew, that the festival would surely be loud at night as well, where Joshua—who’d been missing for months—might be living if still alive, whether there might be a fountain at the next intersection since he was thirsty, and countless other thoughts that he processed not in sequence but all at once, arriving at answers just as swiftly: no need to visit the school, rain unlikely, Madame Bwaju certainly knows of Joshua’s presence at Jade Ring Castle, sleep on the outskirts when the time comes, there’s only one place that could be feeding a runaway like Joshua.
Soon after, he found a fountain, sat upon its edge, and drank. Then he looked up at the sky.
“….”
By the weather’s measure, the tattered coat he’d carried from Keltika would soon outlive its usefulness. Within the fountain, the early summer sun gleamed like a wish-granting coin, and blue and white fragments drifted, mimicking the sky.
Presently, Maximian dunked his spectacles into the water and dried them with his coat’s hem, thereby concluding the season’s coat’s final duty. He rolled it up and fastened it to his pack’s strap, though he didn’t abandon hope that he might sell it cheaply somewhere.
Maximian, indifferent to whoever might drink from the fountain next, even washed his face there, and thus presentable enough, set off to investigate the first place where he suspected Joshua might be. In one hand, he carried not a poker for stirring ashes, but a worn violin.
“Come out of those ashes at once. You wretched gray cat.”
Children of Rune – Winterer
Author: Jeon Min-hee
Publisher: 14 Moon Books
The copyright to this book belongs to the author and 14 Moon Books.
To reuse all or part of this book’s contents, written consent from both parties is required.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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