In the story, Theodore was hired by Claude to kill Siegfried, but he hadn’t been an assassin by trade.
“I need money for my family, so I’ll do whatever it takes.”
That line made him popular among certain readers who liked to read between the lines, but when I originally wrote it, I hadn’t really put that much thought into building his character as an assassin.
Actually, I hadn’t really fleshed out the characters or plot at all with this story in particular. I’d just poured the ideas onto the page as they came to me. But maybe that lack of structure worked out in the end. The imperfections left enough gaps for me to exploit now that I was a character in it—not that I was trying to justify how sloppy I had been back then.
“I didn’t say anything, you know!”
I felt like you were going to!
“Why do you hate pity?” Theodore asked.
“Because pity makes the person giving it feel better, but not the one on the receiving end. Don’t you think so? When someone looks at you and their eyes are full of pity, it’s like you stop being a human in their mind. That’s why I hate being pitied. It makes it hard to ask for help.”
Theodore stared at me, like he was trying to figure out if I was telling the truth.
“I may look like your typical noble, and technically I am. But that doesn’t mean I’ve had an easy life. My father adored my younger brother but treated me like I was garbage. I was covered in lashes until just recently. And my hands are still rough with old cracks and calluses.”
I held out my hands for him to see. They’d healed considerably, but I still couldn’t go out without wearing my gloves. Theodore looked down at them and realized they resembled his own. That must’ve told him something about the life I’d led.
“So yeah, I understand why you’d be cautious of me, but this isn’t charity. That’s why I’m proposing a deal, Theodore.”
“A deal?”
“My name is Kreis von Louboutin. As the name suggests, I belong to the Louboutin marquisate who governs this territory. My father has made the people suffer without a second thought, and I plan to overthrow him. My first step will be building an orphanage in this town.”
“Why would you do that? Building an orphanage won’t get you anything.”
I shook my head. “You’re missing the point, Theodore. People are a valuable resource. If we give these kids a chance to learn and a skill to live by, they’ll find work in town. And then the town will flourish. If that happens, my grandfather will see that I’m more capable than my useless father, and he’ll name me the successor instead.”
“You’d really give them a chance to learn?” he asked.
“Yes, but you all must take it seriously in return. I’m not doing this for fun, after all. So if I decide someone’s useless, they’re out. No exceptions.”
I hadn’t actually meant to be that harsh, but if I didn’t lay it out firmly, he’d only get more suspicious of me. I needed him to understand that this was a transaction with benefits for both sides—that was how I’d chip away at his defenses.
Theodore’s eyes were still fixed on me. Even after he’d grown up in such a brutal world, those eyes hadn’t lost their light. When he had faced Kreis as an assassin, his eyes had been dark and lifeless, like the color had drained out of them. But now they were shining brilliantly with hope.
“I’ll do anything.”
“You kids keep saying that. I’ll tell you what I told your friends: Don’t just toss that phrase around, especially to a noble. They could take advantage of it.”
“I’m not just tossing it around; I mean it. I’d do anything for you.”
“Really? Then for now, go to bed. Just because your fever’s down doesn’t mean you’re out of the woods yet. Get some rest and get better, then we’ll talk some more.”
“Yes, sir.” Theodore nodded obediently and lay back down, pulling the blanket up to his chin as he looked at me.
“Close your eyes and go to sleep now.”
“Yes, sir.” He squeezed his eyes shut like a child. Once he settled in, I started humming.
“You were humming last night too, weren’t you?” he asked, eyes still shut tight.
“Are you going to complain about how bad it was?”
“No, it was gentle, that’s all.”
It was an old lullaby from Japan. I smiled at the compliment and kept humming until I heard his soft, steady breathing.
The children were eager to learn, soaking up knowledge like sponges in water.
At first I taught them myself since many of them couldn’t read. But they all picked it up quickly and began reading books on their own, fighting to be the first to ask questions.
Eventually it was too much to handle on my own, so I decided to hire a full-time teacher. I wrote to Lucas, Siegfried’s butler, and asked if he knew anyone. He quickly wrote me back and introduced me to a retired instructor who’d once taught at the kingdom’s prestigious noble academy. The children’s education took off from there.
“Are you really okay with this, Theodore?”
“Of course,” he said with a warm smile as he offered me the teapot. “Would you like some more?”
His hair had been long and unruly when we met, but now it was neatly trimmed and he wore a proper butler’s tailcoat.
“If there’s ever anything else you’d rather do, you can just say so,” I reminded him.
“This is what I want to do, Lord Kreis.”
Once Theodore had recovered, I’d asked what he wanted to learn. “I want to be useful to you,” he’d said without hesitation. It just so happened that Karina had been serving me tea at the time and overheard.
“Well, the only position that’s available right now is for a butler,” she’d said.
They say a butler is the face of a noble’s household. That was why top-class butlers were highly sought after and rarely let go. It wasn’t easy to find one. To get around demand, it was common for nobles to start training a successor while the current butler was still in service. I’d been troubled over the issue for a while now.
Once Theodore had heard that, he’d suddenly offered to become my butler and shut himself in his room with a stack of books on butler duties. This boy offering me tea now was the result when he finally emerged.
I’d always thought he was a capable boy, but I hadn’t expected this much. I watched him with a sense of wonder and disbelief.
“Well? More tea, my lord?” he asked again.
“Yes, thank you.”
“I know I have a lot more to learn, but I promise I’ll be useful to you someday.”