Chapter 11: Strange and Warm
by fnovelpia
Aunt wished for,
The child to remain ignorant forever.
That way, she could control and use the child however she pleased.
No speech,
No letters,
No understanding of how the world worked.
She gave the child no chance to learn anything.
So, the child was slower to develop than others her age.
But still, she knew the word kidnapping all too well.
The child’s parents were wealthy.
And just as much as they had built up their fortune,
There were just as many people who despised them.
Enemies were everywhere.
There were those who approached for money,
And many who held grudges against their wrongdoings.
Everyone who came near them
Hid blades behind their fake smiles.
The parents trusted no one, never let anyone in completely.
They always judged others from behind a wall.
Even between their child and the world, the child built a sturdy wall.
And yet—
The child was still her parents.
The child was precious to them.
They didn’t want their child hurt because of their own sins.
So they always said:
“Trust no one.”
“Never go with a stranger.”
“Be most wary of smiling faces.”
“You might get kidnapped.”
And so kidnapping
Became a word often heard from her parents’ mouths.
Even before the child learned to speak,
They whispered it like a spell every day.
The child didn’t know what each word meant,
But she vaguely understood the emotions behind them.
That the world—
Was strange and cold,
A terrifying place where no one could be trusted.
And because of her one and only aunt,
That became a reality.
The child was afraid of people.
She couldn’t trust any act of kindness.
But why, then—
“If I pick you up now, would it count as kidnapping?”
The tone was indifferent, even languid.
And yet, for some reason, it felt warm.
Strangely so,
Something deep inside her chest
Suddenly swelled,
Rushing up all at once.
“If you don’t want to come, just say no.”
“……”
“If you say no, I won’t take you.”
With those words,
It felt like some tightly bound knot began to unravel.
The child quietly closed her eyes.
***
Her cold body began to thaw from the warmth.
It was peaceful,
And so unfamiliar.
So much so that it woke her from a long-lost, gentle sleep.
She opened her eyes.
Slowly,
Ever so slowly.
She saw an unfamiliar room,
And an even more unfamiliar warmth.
And then,
A man—
His face slightly familiar—came into view.
“…You’re awake?”
The man came closer.
Just that slow movement sent her heart into a wild panic.
Terror, anxiety, fear.
Her body reacted instinctively,
Memories engraved in her bones.
Her mind knew nothing,
But her body responded fast.
Hold your breath,
Curl up,
Don’t move.
The man kept talking.
“Are you cold?”
“…Mm.”
“What’s your name?”
The child just curled up tighter,
Refusing to respond.
Because she had learned—
That silence was the safest defense.
“…Rowe. That’s my name.”
The child slowly raised her head.
Not from fear, or curiosity.
She was drawn to him without realizing it.
Because in that single word he spoke,
There was warmth—
A warmth that cracked open her long-closed heart.
As she looked at him,
Her eyes met his red ones,
And she snapped back to her senses.
She quickly lowered her head again.
Don’t make eye contact.
If you do,
Then again,
A hand will strike—
Just like the only aunt she had ever known.
Her anxiety—
Proved to be true.
The man’s hand reached toward her.
“…Ah!”
She trembled violently and backed away,
Wrapping her arms over her head in fear.
“Are you really that cold?”
But—
What returned wasn’t pain,
But warmth.
This man…
Was strange.
I didn’t hit the child,
Nor did I glare at them fiercely.
Instead—
I covered them with a blanket.
I handed them something from my arms.
A small, soft bundle of fur.
A snow-white rabbit.
“Hold onto this for a bit. It might run away.”
The man placed the rabbit in the child’s arms.
It was alive.
It was warm.
The child instinctively hugged the rabbit tightly.
“Don’t squeeze too hard. It bites.”
Eyes widened.
The child hated pain.
Got hurt, they’d be scolded again.
But—
They didn’t want to let go of that warmth.
They held it with awkward, clumsy movements.
They were scared, but they didn’t want to let it go.
Because it was that warm.
“Good job.”
A compliment.
One they hadn’t heard in a long time.
Strangely, they felt like crying.
Those few words somehow poked at a deep part of their heart.
The emotions they’d locked away,
The warmth they’d forgotten,
Slowly floated to the surface.
The child stared intently at the man sitting by the fireplace.
The man was still indifferent.
His expression was relaxed,
And he didn’t seem to care much about the child.
He didn’t come closer,
But he didn’t move away either.
He just quietly stared at the fire.
He was the one the child’s parents had called a scary man.
A stranger who had taken them away.
What their parents had most warned them about: “kidnapping.”
And yet, he wasn’t scary.
The heart that had been tightly closed started to loosen.
He made the child want to trust him.
He was the strangest person the child had ever seen.
He didn’t threaten.
He didn’t order.
He didn’t look at them with pity.
And—
He stuck his hands into the fire,
And tried to drop the rabbit into a boiling pot,
“…You want me to prep the rabbit first?”
He tried to kill the rabbit he had told the child to hold.
The child, startled, hugged the rabbit tightly.
Shook their head vigorously.
Even so, he said—
“Alright. I won’t put it in.”
Unlike the other adults the child knew,
He simply nodded at the child’s refusal.
With those few words, the tension melted away.
But…
His hands still remained inside the blazing fire.
Fear crept in.
The warmth they had felt—
They were afraid it would burn away and vanish like ashes.
‘…No.’
So again,
They clung to him, without thinking.
They just—
Didn’t want this person to get hurt.
Didn’t want him to disappear.
The child desperately clung to him.
For the first time,
They tried to protect someone.
With small, frail arms,
They hugged the man’s arm as tightly as they could.
They still couldn’t speak,
But their heart screamed desperately.
‘Don’t.’
‘It’s dangerous.’
‘Please.’
And finally—
A hand rested on the child’s head.
So gently,
Softly,
Patting.
“Okay. I won’t put it in.”
“So let go now.”
The child,
Slowly, very slowly, loosened their arms and thought—
‘I wasn’t scolded.’
The man was truly strange.
His eyes,
His voice,
His actions.
He said he was a dragon and that it was fine,
Suddenly revealed big horns and claws,
And seriously considered, “Should I feed you my tail instead?”
But the strangest part—
Even after seeing and hearing all of that,
The child didn’t feel afraid at all when near him.
Rather,
It was so warm…
They felt like it would be okay to stay here.
They didn’t refuse the man’s embrace.
They forced themselves to swallow the bitter powder he gave.
Not because they were afraid of being scolded,
Not because they were scared—
But because, for the first time, they thought, ‘Maybe it’ll be okay.’
“Good job.”
At his praise again,
The child felt a ticklish warmth spread through their body.
The man muttered indifferently—
“…Tomorrow, I think i’ll go buy a book.”
“If I want to know about you, I need to learn first.”
At those words,
Something stirred deep in the child’s heart.
The world was still scary.
Frightening,
Threatening,
And something to run from.
But—
‘I want to know too. About you.’
For the first time,
That thought crossed their mind.
The child quietly closed their eyes.
***
Creeeak—
The piercing sound made the child open her eyes.
The man was about to leave the cabin.
The world was blurry.
The child’s eyelids were heavy,
Sleep weighed down, but none of that mattered.
He was leaving.
That warm presence.
Those hands that didn’t scare.
The first person they ever wanted to stay beside.
‘…Don’t go.’
The child’s body moved on its own.
A small, thin hand grabbed onto his coat.
“Why?”
He asked,
Short and calmly.
They gripped tighter.
Tiny fingers dug into the fabric.
“Let go, will you?”
No.
They shook their head.
Silently, but clearly.
“I have to go to the village. You’re hungry, aren’t you?”
It didn’t matter.
Losing him was scarier.
But—
The man gently pried their hand off.
Carefully, so he wouldn’t hurt them.
He turned his back once again.
‘No.’
The child crawled forward.
The child’s knees scraped,
The child’s shins bruised.
It hurt.
But they crawled anyway.
The child didn’t want to let go.
His warmth.
His voice.
His touch.
Everything about him.
When the child finally grabbed his coat again, the child sighed in relief.
“I told you to stay— …Huh.”
The man’s eyes fell to the child’s legs.
He saw the bleeding knees and scraped shins.
The man let out a short sigh.
The child’s body flinched in fear.
‘I’m going to get scolded.’
The child’s aunt always got angry
When the child had wounds.
Even though she caused the injuries,
She beat them harder because of the scars.
But—
Instead of getting angry,
The man hugged the child.
He took out a handkerchief and gently cleaned the wounds.
The child’s body trembled.
That warmth was too overwhelming.
“I guess I’ll need to buy medicine too.”
“……”
“I’ll be right back. So wait for me, okay?”
The child’s hand slightly pulled back.
After a long pause,
The child slowly, very cautiously, nodded.
It was the first time the child—
Offered someone a gesture of trust.
They waited.
For the man to return.
They believed he would.
The late autumn morning was chilly,
But the child chose the spot closest to the door, not the fireplace.
The floor wasn’t warm,
The wind seeped through the cracks and brushed their feet.
Even so, the child didn’t move.
They stared at the door he had left through,
The door he promised to return through.
Time passed.
The sun rose into the sky,
The inside of the cabin grew brighter.
The rabbit, bored, slipped out of the child’s arms and shook itself off.
They reached to grab it, but lowered their hand.
The child kept staring at the door.
“I’ll be right back. So wait for me.”
The child’s body began to tremble, but the child didn’t look away.
‘He said he’d be back.’
‘I’ll wait.’
Then—
Something dropped onto the child’s head.
The child looked down.
A piece of wood lay on the floor.
It had fallen from the ceiling.
The child slowly looked up.
One side of the cabin’s roof was sagging.
The child froze.
The child recognized it immediately.
A sign of collapse.
Just like the day the house swallowed their mother.
The child reached out.
Pulled the rabbit close and laid flat over it.
Then—
A crashing noise rang out.
The child’s vision shook.
The air trembled, the ground rumbled.
Something poured from the ceiling.
Dust, wooden debris—
And—
Huge chunks of the roof came crashing down toward the small, fragile body of the child.
‘Low…!’
The child instinctively hugged the rabbit tighter.
“…You okay?”
The voice they had been waiting for.
The child’s eyes widened.
Slowly, the child looked up.
The roof was intact.
The cracked walls looked like new.
The windows weren’t broken.
The floor was spotless.
And—
“No injuries. That’s a relief.”
A slow, low voice.
The man smiled gently as he looked down at the child.
The child remembered.
“Always be wary of smiling faces, dear.”
The words the child’s mother had whispered like a spell.
The child had heard it countless times,
Memorized it.
And yet—
Right now, the man’s smiling face wasn’t scary at all.
And still—
The child’s heart stirred slightly.
So the child,
Just a little,
Believed its mother’s words.
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