NTBYRI 08

Chapter 08

She had to run. If not now, she could never escape him.

Midway, she looked back.

Kaiden was approaching with one step, then another. With heavy footsteps.

It felt as if her heart was surging up to her throat. A chilling fear spreading through her whole body crashed over Elsie.

“Customers going to Ernest Station, please board this train! Please sit according to the seat written on your ticket!”

An employee shouted loudly in front of the stopped train. Only then did Elsie look down at the ticket in her hand.

So the seats were assigned too.

Seats, how to buy tickets, how to handle money. There were too many things she didn’t know.

Desperately memorizing the numbers and letters written on the ticket, she leaped onto the train.

And she frantically looked around. In that moment, she finally realized.

Kaiden was not visible.

She had been sure he would follow her to the end.

She couldn’t understand why he had stopped. But that wasn’t what mattered right now.

Whatever the reason, he hadn’t caught her.

Letting out a ragged breath, she headed to the compartment written on her ticket.

There, an old lady wearing a pretty hat pressed down was seated. Elsie checked her ticket once more and sat across from her.

Please…

Elsie, who had set her leather bag on the seat beside her, clasped her hands together and prayed.

Please don’t let Kaiden chase me all the way here. Please let him leave me alone.

She cried out desperately in her heart.

“Excuse me… Are you alright? You look unwell.”

“I’m fine.”

“Wipe your sweat with this. It’ll take quite a while to get there—will you be alright?”

Seeing her face streaked with cold sweat, the old lady handed her a handkerchief. A small pink flower resembling the old lady was embroidered on it.

Elsie hesitated, then carefully accepted it.

“…Thank you.”

“You should go to a hospital as soon as you get off. Or shall I call a station attendant?”

“It’s fine. I’m just a little tired.”

As the train began to move, the tension that had been constricting her slowly loosened.

If Kaiden had really chased her, he wouldn’t wait until the train departed.

Or had she seen things?

At that thought, she felt much more at ease. Because if she had been mistaken from being so nervous, that would be a relief.

Only then did the old lady’s words begin to register.

“Seeing how light your luggage is, are you from the east? Your accent doesn’t sound like an easterner, though.”

“…I’m just going to get some fresh air for a while.”

“Ah, I see. I stopped by the capital for business and am on my way back.”

Her answers were half-hearted, but the old lady didn’t seem to mind.

“If you have time, try visiting Lübeck. It’s a truly wonderful city. Simple and warm.”

A pleasant smile crossed the old woman’s lips.

Lübeck.

Elsie repeated the city name the lady had mentioned inwardly and nodded.

“So where are you headed to get some fresh air, young lady?”

She didn’t really have a destination.

All she had was the thought of reaching a peaceful rest.

“I’m going to see the sea.”

“I see. The sea, how lovely. I go see the sea sometimes too. When I look at the sea and clear my mind, I find the strength to keep moving. Even after losing my husband, even after losing my son.”

Perhaps the old lady had read something in her.

Otherwise, she wouldn’t deliberately say such things to a stranger, words that seemed to say don’t let go of the thread of life.

Elsie stared out the window without affirming or denying.

“I’m being foolish in my old age. Just think of it as an old woman’s rambling. I wanted to talk more because I was envious that such a beautiful young lady was going off alone to get some fresh air.”

Envious? Of me?

At words she could never have imagined, the corner of Elsie’s mouth twitched.

She must be saying this because she didn’t know that she was ‘Elsie Lesles.’

“At this age, there are many things I’ve come to accept, but strangely, the things I envy have also increased.”

The old lady continued in a soft voice.

“Young lady, regardless, sometimes you need that kind of time. Standing at the crossroads where what happened is becoming the past, looking back on yourself—that kind of time.”

The past.

But to Elsie, all of this was not the past.

Kaiden, who wouldn’t divorce her, the constant neglect and mockery. All of it was so vivid that even now, having fled from them, her chest tightened.

And among all of it, what had actually moved Elsie’s heart the most was…

“Live unhappy for the rest of your life in place of the late Count of Lesles who died in vain. That’s the reason you’re alive.”

Kaiden’s cruel confession lodged in her heart.

“But seeing the sea won’t make me think I should live harder or… nothing will change.”

Elsie grumbled involuntarily.

“Of course. Just seeing the sea won’t make everything alright right away. Looking at the sea while soaking in the sunlight, eating delicious food for yourself, taking a walk in the pleasant sea breeze. You need that kind of process.”

“It takes too long and is too complicated.”

“No. It’s not as complicated as you think. It’s just spending a day for yourself.”

The old lady said this, but what Elsie needed was immediate rest.

Forget the fact that she had lost the child in her belly, forget the past where her only refuge, her paintings, had been burned.

She just wanted to erase all of it from her memory in one breath.

Elsie clamped her mouth shut. She said nothing more.

Until they arrived at Ernest Station.

—

The train stopped at Ernest Station.

“Oh my, we’re already here.”

Elsie, who had been blankly staring out the window, came to her senses at the old lady’s words and rose from her seat.

“Goodbye. If you come to Lübeck later, please contact me.”

She silently bowed her head toward the old lady in greeting. She didn’t say she would, because it was better not to make promises she couldn’t keep.

“You just need to find ‘Elise’ in Lübeck. There won’t be anyone with such an old-fashioned name but this old woman.”

Despite the answer that didn’t come, she smiled faintly and waved her hand toward Elsie.

—

Ernest Station was small and modest.

Elsie took a deep breath and slowly moved her feet.

The salty sea breeze brushed against her skin and wrapped around her body.

“Is it this way…”

Following the smell of the sea she hadn’t encountered in a long time, a blue shoreline soon spread before her eyes.

Just as she had seen beyond the train window, an open sea lay near the station.

Following the brick path made for tourists downward led to a wide sandy beach.

On the fine-colored sand, fewer people than expected were gathered.

Standing in the middle of the brick path, Elsie gazed at the waves billowing far away, then moved her feet one step at a time onto the sandy beach.

Her red hair scattered chaotically in the salt-laden wind.

Brushing it lightly aside with her hand, she stood before the beach.

After a moment’s hesitation, she took off her shoes as if she had made up her mind.

She had been raised hearing that she must never bare her feet carelessly, but what meaning did such things have now.

The soft sand seeping between her toes felt pleasant.

The sea breeze brushing past her nape was cool.

“Wow…”

The moment she took a step toward the waves, something the color of the ring in her leather bag caught her eye.

It was a shell—green on the inside, pitch black on the outside.

There was no need to pick up anything more. Leaving it would be enough.

But Elsie set down the shoes she had been holding and, as if it were a precious jewel, picked up the shell and put it in her bag.

‘Let’s go now.’

She set her shoes down neatly, and after some deliberation, placed the leather bag beside them.

‘Yes, this should be enough.’

The rippling sea was truly beautiful.

The thought that this would be her last place felt quite plausible.

Elsie walked forward without hesitation. Even though her legs grew heavy from being in the surging water, she didn’t stop.

At some point the sea grew deep and her feet couldn’t touch the bottom. She held back the urge to gasp for air and squeezed her eyes shut.

The churning waves shook her.

She floated up, then sank down again, repeating.

Elsie never once stepped back.

Just as she was nearly swallowed by the sea and her breath was running out.

“Elsie!”

Suddenly, a familiar voice reached her. It was like the auditory hallucination she’d had at the train station, as vivid as reality.

A voice so urgent, so desperate, it seemed exactly like Kaiden’s.