Dirty Heart - Chapter 6

Duke Erhardt’s study was like a silent library.

Neatly organized medical texts and clinical papers. A vast volume of materials so extensive it couldn’t even be counted. Even the annotations and references the duke had written in himself.

All of it was the father’s relentless record, made solely to save his son.

The duke, who’d been buried in stacks of documents for a long time, rolled his shoulders and looked up at the ceiling. In that broad space, an astronomical clock that recorded the movements of the heavenly bodies was turning slowly.

The structure, with hundreds of minute and hour hands interlocked with exquisite precision, detected the orbits of the sun and moon and countless planets, and foretold mankind’s fate.

“Your Grace. We still haven’t found a donor suitable for the heart transplant.”

“No suitable donor? I’m offering them the dignified chance to give their heart to my son and die. Why?”

“O-of course… there’s an abundance of candidates willing to welcome a dignified death. However, the donor must be someone whose transplant engraftment rate matches the Young Duke’s perfectly.”

The heart transplant procedure he’d longed for so desperately had been developed, but finding a donor who fit Lionel wasn’t an easy matter.

Unable to endure the anxiety piling up day by day, the duke summoned an astrologer. He decided to ask the heavens about what couldn’t be solved by science and medicine alone.

The astrologer, shut away in a small room measuring the paths of the planets, finally opened his mouth after six days of silence.

“The direction of the stars points to the western edge that meets the border. Though the blood is lowly… that child’s life is strongly entwined with your son’s fate.”

Accepting the prophecy without a shred of doubt, the duke immediately dispatched a search party to the western border.

As it happened, the region was in the depths of hunger due to a long drought, and the duke used their desperation as an opportunity.

“Tell every starving person. For those who offer their blood, we’ll gladly provide food from the ducal territory.”

It was no different from exploitation disguised as relief, but the people, exhausted by hunger, offered up their blood one after another without the slightest suspicion.

Among the thousands of blood samples gathered in an instant, a single sample was found that showed near-perfect compatibility with Lionel, and that holy gift was Courtney Balkan.

Though her birth was unclear and her status lowly, the duke didn’t care about any of it. If she would willingly offer her heart for his son, what did something like bloodline matter?

From that day on, the duke trusted the astrologer’s words even more and once again divined his son’s fate.

“Tell me the fated day my son’s heart will be reborn. The very moment of fate when science and medicine and God’s blessing overlap as one.”

After calculating the flow of the heavens for a long time, the astrologer finally pinpointed the single moment when the stars would align and reported it to the duke without delay.

“How many days are left until Lionel’s birthday?”

The duke tore his gaze from the astronomical clock and asked his aide in a dry voice.

“Exactly 100 days, Your Grace.”

“It’s already almost here.”

Lionel’s twenty-third birthday.

The fated day when the sun devours the moon, at last, his son’s heart would be reborn.

“How has that child Courtney been lately?”

“This is the result of the regular medical examination conducted on all maids a month ago. In Courtney Balkan’s case, her nutritional status, heart rate, and body temperature were all good, and there were no signs of drug reaction or emotional instability either.”

After carefully flipping through the report the aide handed him, the duke nodded slowly.

“Good. Since there isn’t much time left until the day of fate, make sure she’s managed with special care. If that little child so much as catches a cold, it’d be a disaster, wouldn’t it?”

The moment that worthless concern fell from the duke’s lips, the study door flew open violently, and an attendant came rushing in, panting.

“Your Grace! This is terrible!”

“What is it?”

The attendant hurriedly dropped to his knees and delivered the news with a face gone white.

“T-the Young Duke’s oak tree… i-it’s reached the end of its life.”

The duke’s expression, which had been smiling kindly just a moment ago, turned icy. That tree was practically his sickly son’s other self.

“Reached the end of its life?”

“They say all the oak tree’s leaves fell overnight. Not only are the roots completely rotten, but even the soil has also turned black and spoiled…!”

After a heavy silence, an ice cold voice leaked from the duke’s mouth.

“Who would dare do such a thing!”

“…Judging by the circumstances, Courtney Balkan is the most likely suspect.”

“What did you say? Courtney Balkan?”

At the vicious voice that demanded it again, the attendant’s shoulders hunched even more. He could feel killing intent so cold it made his spine bristle, but he couldn’t stop reporting.

“Yes, it’s… they say Courtney Balkan was the last person to touch the tree.”

***

Slap!

A harsh hand struck her across the face. With a stinging heat, one side of Courtney’s cheek swelled red.

“You damned bitch! What the hell did you do to the Young Duke’s oak tree?”

Ella, the head maid, practically screamed. Her eyes blazed with fury, looking like she might strangle Courtney at any moment.

And no wonder. The Young Duke’s oak tree was something the servants had guarded for years as if it were their destiny.

A sacred existence they’d carefully tended each season, choosing quality soil, not even easily allowing a single spiderweb.

“Do you even know how many servants have died because of that tree up to now?”

Thinking of the servants’ arms and legs that had been cut off each time the oak tree’s leaves fell years ago, Ella shuddered.

“Thanks to that nutrient solution, it finally seemed like things were livable, and this trash goes and causes an accident anyway!”

Even though the one who’d done wrong was that damned Courtney Balkan, maybe because Ella felt she couldn’t escape responsibility as head maid, her face turned bluish pale by the second.

“How long are you going to keep your mouth shut? You can’t tell me the truth?”

At the pressuring interrogation, Courtney’s eyes went wide.

“…I, I’m being wronged!”

“Ha, wronged? You made this mess and you’re wronged?”

“You’re the one who assigned me the task, Head Maid. I just poured the nutrient solution on the oak tree like you told me to!”

Slap!

Another blow came flying in, and Courtney’s head snapped to the side.

As both cheeks swelled red as if she’d been bitten by bugs, even the maids watching held their breath.

“Look at this shameless bitch. You planned to dump it all on me?”

“There has to be someone who portioned out the nutrient solution, right? If you’re innocent, Head Maid, then catch that bastard and beat the hell out of him!”

Courtney confronted her with eyes full of resentment, but it seemed like Ella couldn’t hear her anymore. In her shrieking voice was a desperate, crazed scream beyond simple urgency.

“You don’t seem to get the situation, do you? What do you think will happen if the duke hears about this? You and I are both finished, finished! We won’t survive!”

But Courtney herself remained perfectly calm. With the slight curve of her lips, she didn’t look like she had even a trace of fear.

“Ah, you don’t need to worry about that.”

The reason she could be this bold was simply because she had something to rely on.

In the end, the duke couldn’t lay a single finger on her. His precious son’s heart was beating inside her body, so what was he going to do?

If he tortured her for no reason and it put strain on the heart, it’d be them who lost out.

‘So what can you do? If I die, that young duke bastard dies too.’

No matter how unforgivable her crime was, she was endlessly confident, thinking the card she held was stronger.

“By the duke’s order, Courtney Balkan is to be thrown into the dungeon at once!”

“…Huh?”

At the command that struck like lightning, Courtney blinked slowly. The armed soldiers storming in with fierce momentum twisted her arms behind her back and bound her, and until that happened, she couldn’t make sense of what was going on.

“Aah! W-wait, sir, I think there’s been some misunderstanding… no, seriously…?”

Only when the cold armor brushed against her skin did her mind snap awake.

Before she knew it, Courtney’s lips began to tremble. The confidence that had soared to the sky had long since vanished without a shadow.

“I, I didn’t do anything wrong…! Somebody say something! I’m telling you, all I did was do what I was told and give the nutrient solution!”

She screamed and screamed, desperately begging for help, but of course everyone turned away from her.

“Y-Young Duke!”

What burst from Courtney’s mouth as she was dragged along with her arms bound behind her back was almost instinct.

“Call Young Duke Erhardt right now!”

With everyone turning their backs on her in this moment, the only person who came to mind was, sadly, Lionel, that sickly son of a bitch.