Rosiental Font Villa – One Month Later
The night of return arrived without warning.
A six-horse carriage stormed through the gates of the Fontclair mansion with impatient neighs, kicking up dry dust from the gravel road.
He had returned to the mansion.
Inside, seated with an erect posture and hollow eyes, was Desmond; staring out through the carriage window his father had sent for him. The gaze that once belonged to a curious child was now that of a soldier who had seen things never spoken aloud.
The military uniform he wore pressed tightly against his shoulders and chest. Once pristine when he had been summoned, it still carried the scent of gunpowder and steel. Black gloves hid hands marked with calluses, healed scars, and knuckles broken more than once.
He exhaled deeply as he pushed open the carriage door, finally stepping onto the front entrance of the grand mansion.
His stride was firm, untouched by wonder, tasting the bitter certainty of what awaited inside. The air already trembled with scandal and music, loud enough to reach him from a distance.
The mansion loomed darker and more majestic than he remembered. Its walls carried the same scent: dust, damp earth, staleness, obedience, iron, and rot.
And that very night, an event had been prepared.
Desmond was escorted inside by two of his best recruits, crossing a long ceremonial hallway.
Men, women, nobles, some masked turned to watch the returned captain as he was led to the grand hall.
Crystal chandeliers glistened overhead, tables heavy with wine and roses in collector's vases. But above all, the room brimmed with laughter and piercing stares.
The duke, Desmond's father—rose from his seat upon seeing him arrive. Cloaked in crimson velvet, clad in a wine-colored suit embroidered with black threads, a golden-headed cane in hand.
With a rigid smile and a raised glass, he proclaimed:
—"My son returns as commander of the Seventh Division! A Fontclair leading the war!" —he toasted, casting a side glance toward Desmond —"To the health of Desmond Fontclair!"
—"To his health!" —voices echoed, as nobles raised their wine glasses like hollow standards of allegiance.
Laughter, applause, approval from dukes and marquises, perfumed ladies, curious gazes; the hall erupted in a chorus of clinking glass.
But Desmond did not smile. He drank in silence, posture rigid, face serene—yet vacant.
Dressed in a black ceremonial suit, leather gloves, a dark gray cloak, and a golden brooch.
As hours passed, shaking hands, greeting nobles and ladies his father introduced, he neither danced nor spoke more than necessary. He was, in their eyes, the perfect son.
A soldier molded.
But within… fire seethed behind the ice wall he had built around his heart.
Everything reeked of hypocrisy, tension, curious stares, dirty money and hidden dealings. Masks not only worn on faces.
He felt the weight of gold in the frames, the oppression of luxury on the walls, the echo of laughter that did not belong to him. His father paraded proudly among the nobles, strutting as though he had forged his son with his own hands.
—"He is a true man." —he boasted to allies, clasping hands, smiling wide, half-embracing peers.
—"Never shed a tear, even as a boy. I made him strong, as befits a Fontclair. Worthy of the legacy."
Desmond listened. Jaw tight, the rim of his glass pressed against his lips.
Each glance around the hall made him dizz—the noise, the drink, the suffocating persistence of it all. Three cups of wine were enough to blur the edges of his patience. And beneath the subtle smile he wore while shaking hands, a mantra repeated itself: "Just a little longer. A little longer. Soon, I'll be gone…"
Later that night…
He finally slipped away from the hall, his boots striking against marble as he took the side corridor leading out to the gardens.
Outside, the night was warm, a gentle breeze stirring the brittle branches of the rosebushes lining the stone paths.
Dry rosebushes dotted the narrow walkway plants he had never noticed in his childhood. His steps carried him, almost unconsciously, to the edge of the garden, where wilted flowers piqued his curiosity to see what else might lie deeper within.
That same path of red earth smelled no different from the mansion inside: of abandonment, of things forgotten.
His brow furrowed slightly as he tore aside vines and brambles along the way, searching for what his mother had once asked of him. Each step grew more intent, more desperate, until at last—Iron gates loomed, tall, bearing initials etched into the metal.
The left gate with an "F", the right, an "R".
Desmond gripped both handles, twisted locked.
With irritation, he kicked, splintering them open.
Inside lay what seemed an abandoned garden. Concrete tables and benches choked with moss and creeping plants.
A place hidden, forgotten, frozen in time.
He scanned the grounds, eyes narrowing as he walked in more further inside. The floor cracked under weeds every step, two skeletal trees reached overhead.
Ahead, a stagnant pool reeked of rot, statues lay shattered across the dirt. Beyond, another path led toward an orchard.
And there at it's end, a different shadow emerged. The peach tree.
Massive, weathered, yet alive. Bare of leaves, with scarce fruit, but still standing as if refusing to die.
He stepped forward, until its shadow covered him. The warm breeze stirred its branches above, and for the first time that night, a faint flicker stirred in his gaze as he looked upward.
One fruit hung high — velvet-skinned, glowing orange, almost golden.
He hesitated. Would he take it? Leave it?
His eyes dropped briefly, his thoughts sinking inward. Then he looked back up, raising his hand. Not to pluck it, but in an unconscious gesture.
As though his body remembered what his soul had long since buried: Hope.