002 A Funeral For a Friend (Revised)

Orville sneered at Chad's question, "Are you saying that I did not know right from wrong and killed such a good, honest person like her by mistake?"

Chad broke into a sweat of shock and had to bow.

"It was only a servant who had signed a contract to sell her body, and it is not for you to say whether I wants to fight or kill her."

Orville could read her sign language , watching with indifference as she panicked.

Orville approached her and asked aggressively, "You're just friends,....are u sure? But you give her a fan and she gives you a handkerchief.

"The feather fan is a birthday present, and I also gave Enoch shoe polish and a sword spike, just as a present to a friend, I never thought of anything else. As for the handkerchief, I did not accept it ..."

Orville laughed and asked, "If you had no intention, why would she, a woman, give you a handkerchief despite her shame?"

Chad was at a loss to explain.

She had served by the Duke's side as a knight for ten years, and she knew best that the Duke had always been eloquent, but she was a mute who could not speak, and could only twitch her fingers slightly, but did not know how to prove her innocence.

"It could be ...," Chad gestured slowly, "it could be a misunderstanding."

"Is that so?"

Chad bowed his head again.

"Get rid of the body," Orville frowned, "it smells fishy."

"Yes,my lord." Chad took on the task immediately, but didn't get up right away.

She knew she shouldn't have asked, but in the end She did: "Was it because I was too close to Gill that Lord Duke ... killed... ..."

Chad was only halfway through when Orville interrupted, "You shouldn't ask too much."

The words were as cold as the frost that had frozen on the branches outside the palace.

She knew he shouldn't ask any more questions, so she walked over to Gill's body and gently picked her up.

After Chad had carried Gill away, Orville beckoned to Enoch.

"What are  Lord Duke's orders?" Enoch leaned over and spoke.

"When Chad returns from burying the body," Orville said lightly, "kill him, For the sake of his many years of service to me, leave him with a full body and bury him with dignity.."

Enoch was stunned for a moment, then nodded, "Yes, my lord."

Orville paused, then added, "Remember to dispose of him neatly and disguise everything as the work of the Ackerman family."

"As ordered."

The words came out of his mouth procedurally, but Enoch felt his voice tremble involuntarily.

*

  It was dusk.

  It was early winter, and a light breeze had picked up after sunset, and a few snowflakes had fallen from the sky.

Gill's body should have been stripped of her clothes, her face scratched and dumped in a mass grave, but Chad can't bear to treat a girl like that and bought a thin coffin for Gill, but didn't dare put up a headstone and buried her hastily under a quiet spot with good light.

Chad stood quietly in front of the small grave.

She did not have many friends on the estate and the only people she could think of at the moment were Enoch and Gill.

She envied Enoch's people skills, as well as anyone else in the manor, but she was mute and she couldn't communicate with everyone unless they knew sign language.

Chad stood for a while, then she took a handkerchief out of her cowhide bag, which she had just found while packing up Gill's body, a very ordinary material, just like its owner, such an ordinary girl.

She thought of Gill again.

Early this morning, Chad planned to go to the sword training Ground. On the way, she passed a lake called 'Lake Luv', which had been planned centuries ago when Lancaster I first built his estate on the land and eventually named the lake after his first son.

From a distance Chad saw a figure, a short purple shirt, a silk ribbon wrapped in a round brown bun, hands behind his back, head down, tinkering with something in the snow.

A slight smile crept across Chad's face and she walked quietly up behind her.

Before she could pat her on the back, Gill looked back as if she had sensed something and smiled immediately, her small eyes narrowing into slits as she spoke and gestured to Chad: "Why are you standing so quietly behind me? Did I accidentally upset you and are you trying to scare me on purpose?"

Chad smiled a little and then gestured, "What are you doing here on a cold day like this?"

"It's a cold day like this but I'm hot," Gill half-joked with a flush on each cheek, "You're up early too, aren't you?"

"I need to attend morning training every day." Chad said.

Chad, though a girl, had lived as a man for as long as she could remember and had no friends of the same sex, so she couldn't see that Jill had used vermilion powder on her face and guessed that she was suffering from a wind-chill and fever, so she kindly advised, "You look strangely red today, so you should ask housekeeper Ford for a half day's rest."

Gill froze and touched her cheek with her hand, but instead of getting angry, she laughed harder and harder.

"You're such a fool, that's the rouge I put on."

Chad looked at her and smiled, she loved people like Gill, no status, no background, as 'ordinary' as she was, but with a vitality that in some ways was really like her own.

For years, apart from Enoch, this had been the only girl in the territory with whom she could have a good conversation.

The two looked at each other in silence for a while, but Chad was so stupid that she didn't even notice the ambiguity (?) that had arisen between them.

Finally Gill sighed softly, then took a brand new handkerchief from her sleeve: "I saw that your old one was very old, so I took the time to make you a new one, I smoked it with the laurel and plum blossoms I had in the autumn, it's clean and fragrant.

As she said this, she was about to reach into the cowhide knight's pouch hanging from Chad's waist and rummage through it for her old 'handkerchief'.

It was only then that Chad finally realised what was going on and took a step back.  Even for an ordinary daily interaction between a man and a woman, this was too intimate, not to mention that Gill didn't know her true identity as a 'woman', it's hard not to guess that Gill is interested in her.

Chad's mind was in turmoil, not daring to look Gill in the eye, only over her shoulder - She is 19 years old,and the knights she worked with had families and companionship that Chad sometimes envied, but she was not allowed to be with either men or women, although she had nothing against homosexuality. 

But she knows in her heart that she is heterosexual, and she had a crush on the Duke that she dared not make public, but she could only keep it to herself, she would never be with him, and that dirty thought was already a stain, if she opened her mouth and confessed it, she could be condemned to death by the Duke.

On reflection, Gil was a lovely girl who never despised her for being mute and was warm and welcoming, and She couldn't afford to waste good girl Gill's great youth. So Chad took her step back and Gill understood, her eyes were red, probably because her pride was hurt and her heart was broken.

With nothing to say to each other, and by the time Chad reacted, Gill had run away.

Only a day had passed, but that lively Gill has disappeared..

Chad felt a dull ache in her heart, then she pulled out the handkerchief, knelt down and buried it in Gill's grave.