Chapter 28 (1/2)

Rafael leaned on the chair by the bed and grasped his chin. A practitioner, who was halfway dragged by the employees of the Carnesis Mansion, trembled while examining Annette. It was the same practitioner who had visited the mansion to prove Annette’s ‘innocence’ before.

In front of Rafael, the young practitioner in his early 30s was as nervous as a rat who had met a snake. Before RafaeI’s beastly eyes, the practitioner recoiled and shuddered, while expressing his opinion.

“The fever is due to the inflammation caused by the fracture. The fracture has been corrected, so if Madam takes the inflammatory drug I prescribed and take a good rest, she will get better soon.”

The doctor who wrote the prescription tremblingly, looked at Rafael with eyes wanting to say something. In response, Rafael glared at him with a fierce look.

“What are you looking at?”

Rafael thought he wanted to say something like, “It looks like a husband hit his wife.” Of course, it was just Rafael’s delusion, but he felt really unpleasant because of that. It was because there was a possibility…

All Annette held in that little hand was a book and her mantle. Surely they couldn’t have been dangerous enough to fracture her finger bones. And considering the fact that Annette was fine until yesterday afternoon, the culprit was probably himself. Rafael’s eyes, which had become sore from sleepwalking, became grim.

However, contrary to Rafael’s thoughts, the practitioner did not doubt him at all. Even though the practitioner was intimidated by Rafael’s aura, he pushed out something with his trembling hands. It was a letter of introduction.

“There is a very capable female practitioner around here. Apparently, Madam seems to have a weak constitution, but if this is the case, wouldn’t it be better if she’s taken care by another woman? Well, if you don’t mind, I can arrange a meeting.”

Despite his fear, the practitioner steadfastly recommended a colleague, and then quickly left the mansion as if he was running away. Looking at his running back, it seemed that he would never step in this direction again. The recommendation of a colleague probably was to push in another scapegoat to suffer on his behalf.

“What, take care of each other? That’s not funny.”

Rafael frowned and tried to resist throwing away the letter of introduction given by the practitioner. As the practitioner said, Annette was very small and weak. So, it wasn’t a bad idea to have a female practitioner work as the chief physician of the Carnesis family.

Most aristocratic families already had their own family doctors. But the Carnesis was a newly-acquired title purely because of Rafael’s ability, and he was the first Marquis in the Deltium kingdom. The mansion had just been built a few years ago, and still had the smell of a new house, so he was not able to hire a separate doctor.

Rafael clicked his tongue but eventually put in a separate letter of introduction. Later, when Annette woke up, he was going to ask about her opinions on this. He didn’t realize he was paying attention to Annette’s opinion for the first time.

Annette’s mind was confused. This was because of the fever and inflammation caused by the fracture. The mental shock and fatigue caused by the regression, and the stress and worry she felt because of Rafael accumulated one after the other, and finally exploded. In addition, she decided to smuggle herself out of the country and paid attention to this and that. So it was natural for Annette, who had a weak constitution, to become sick.

Rafael sat in a narrow chair by the bed and frowned. It had already been two days since Annette’s fever. The furnitures in Annette’s bedroom were of small size to match her body. So a large, well-built man like Rafael had to fold his body in order to sit down. Rafael, sitting in an uncomfortable position, looked at Annette with a wry look.

A bandage was wrapped around Annette’s right hand which was protruding out from the blanket. Her bandaged right hand was thicker than her slender wrist and seemed as if she was wearing mittens. Strangely, Rafael found the hand ugly. Unwilling to see it anymore, he pushed it back into the blanket. Rafael then reached out to measure Annette’s body temperature and muttered ferociously.

“That damn quack. He said she would get better soon.”

Annette’s fever did not go down easily even after taking the medicine prescribed by the practitioner. Rafael had never taken care of anyone, but strangely, he felt as if he was used to nursing Annette. He carefully woke her up, gave her the medicine, and then wiped her nape and cheeks with a wet towel. He did all this very skillfully as if he had done this a lot.

His hand, which had only wielded a sword so far, was astonishingly nursing someone. Thanks to this, Annette’s condition was becoming quite stable. However, there was only one problem in this situation…

‘Why am I doing this?’

Rafael recalled the troubles he had repeated countless times over the past two days. It was enough to give this work to any of the numerous maids working in the mansion. If he wanted to, he could have Annette get a different maid every hour so that she could receive the best care.