[Why don’t you leave the castle and become a child of a family I know?]
There was a family that had produced knights of the Yurinova Order for generations, but their two sons had both become knights and had died in the line of duty without having married yet. The discouraged parents had intended to let the family die out, but they still felt lonely and decided that they would like to take in a girl and raise her. If it was a boy, they would undoubtedly raise him to be worthy of being a knight, but if it was a girl, they believed she would stay by their side forever if they took a son-in-law.
[But I can’t do it. They will be disappointed.]
If a family had been knights for generations, there was no way that Laiza or anyone else would be taken in. He could have chosen any number of suitable foster children, even if they were not from a poor countryside village.
But Sergei smiled.
[That’s the thing; they want you. Besides, I want you to be a child of that family. And I want you to become a child of that house, after which you can study and learn. I want you to come back and work at this castle in a different position. Your presence would be very reassuring to me.]
***
“So, I had been adopted.”
“…Laiza must have adored Grandfather very much.”
She simply said, “I was adopted”.
In the Dukedom of Yurinova, the status of knight was only for one generation, but there were families where the father was a knight and then properly trained their children for generations, in effect, becoming generations of knights. By being raised in such a way, they naturally become strong.
Such a family was considered a great family and treated second only to the nobility, so it would be a bit unlikely that a servant would be desired to be adopted by a family of knights for generations. It was suspicious.
And yet, when she asked Grandfather about such a possibility, he simply answered that it was alright.
“There was a reason I was wanted for adoption, though it was sort of orchestrated by Lord Sergei. Do you know why, Young Lady?”
“A reason, like the one Grandfather gave you?”
Well, I wonder.
Was it because Laiza was considered a favorite of Grandfather’s? If they were often talking in the garden, people would have seen them, even if they didn’t tell anyone. It was strange for the heir of a ducal family to repeatedly meet with a laundry girl.
If Laiza was older, she might have been rumored to be a lover of different status, but at eight years old, that would be impossible….
Ah.
“I wonder if Grandfather… adored Laiza [as if you were his younger sister].”
“I suppose Lord Sergei hinted that I might be the illegitimate offspring of his father. Of course, there was no such possibility, but it was a convenient excuse for him to contact me, who was someone of a different status.”
Grandfather… Well, that was probably just a lie, but… Grandfather, you did it the wrong way!
But, Great-Uncle Isaac was thought of as a bastard, and my great-grandfather did have a mistress. I guess there were some people who remembered that, or at least interpreted it that way…
“When Lord Sergei proposed that I be adopted, my parents-in-law wondered if there was some secret about my birth, given the fact that he was willing to do so given our different social standing. I was surprised when I learned of the misunderstanding. I clearly denied it to my adoptive parents, but they kept me as their adopted daughter. They said that my personality was similar to that of their deceased sons.”
Grandfather…you knew your knights very well. If they were not yet married, they must have been quite young. Maybe they were close to Grandfather’s age. If her father was also a knight, he knew their personalities, so he thought that as long as they could manage to meet Laiza, who resembled their sons, they would be able to work things out.
I was uncertain if he had it all planned out from the beginning… but he was quite a schemer!
