The Witch Didn't Raise the Tyrant That Way - Chapter 1: This is How I Raised Him (8)

Even when I tried to act cold toward him during the day, I often found it pointless. I couldn’t bring myself to turn away a tearful child.

“Lyn.”

As a result, we often ended up having little conversations in bed, talking about random things. My priority was to soothe Kyle’s fears, so whenever he started a conversation, I made sure to listen and respond.

“Do I have to leave here someday?”

“What?”

“Max said so before.”

“Ah, right.”

Max had said something like that the first time he came to deliver supplies and saw Kyle.

“Witches are usually women who live alone, like me or Aunt Evie, without any male relatives.”

“But Lyn has me.”

“What are you saying, kiddo?”

“….”

Kyle pouted and burrowed further into my arms at my teasing remark. Somewhere out there, heavy rain must have been pouring, though the distant sky flashed silently despite the calm sound of drizzle.

“In the kingdom, legal registration is usually tied to men—either under a father, a brother, or a husband. If a woman loses her male relatives for any reason, it becomes hard to survive, so some just end up retreating to the forest.”

I used Lilithea’s knowledge to answer casually, but clenched my teeth silently to keep Kyle from noticing my frustration. Damn patriarchal family structures. It’s a typical relic of a premodern society.

“Then does that mean you’re not registered, Lyn?”

“No. My mom was fooled by some nobleman and had me. She thought he’d force her to give me up if he found out, so she ran away from her village and came to the forest. Since she lived alone, she couldn’t register me in any domain, so there’s no record of my birth.”

Who that nobleman was, whether they were genuinely in love, or whether my mom loved him… I never got to find out, since she died before I could ask. Thinking about it, Lilithea technically has noble blood flowing through her veins, yet she’s despised simply for living alone. Judging by how common stories like hers must be, it makes me wonder—what does it even mean to be a witch?

“It’s weird.”

“Isn’t it? That’s why you should go to the palace when you grow up and fix this mess.”

“Huh?”

At my joking remark, Kyle widened his eyes like a startled rabbit, looking up at me. With his red-rimmed eyes, he really did resemble one.

“You, you need to go back to your real home.”

“Me?”

“That’s where you belong.”

This was actually the first time I’d spoken to Kyle about returning to the royal palace. But it was something that needed to be said. No matter how cold I acted toward him, if Kyle started to feel too comfortable with life here, all my efforts would be for nothing. I had to remind him regularly of his origins and his ultimate goal.

Kyle could not, under any circumstances, remain in this forest. Not just for his own future, but also for the people who needed a new king—one who would rule diligently instead of being a puppet to the current queen.

“I heard the regional taxes will go up again next year… They say it’s because those aligned with the queen are skimming off the top, raising the taxes every year. When Kyle becomes king, he’ll understand what I’ve told him, and maybe he’ll lower taxes for remote areas like ours. And if he improves the roads, it’ll cut transportation costs, too.”

As I daydreamed about the golden age that would come when Kyle took the throne, lost in my own thoughts, he suddenly spoke up.

“What about you, Lyn?”

Kyle, who had been looking up at me this whole time, asked this out of the blue.

“If I go to the capital… you’ll be alone again, right?”

“…Well, I suppose so. Maybe… I’ll find someone to bring here?”

“Someone?”

Kyle’s voice cut in sharply, almost as if interrupting me. His crimson eyes glimmered coldly for a moment, though I didn’t notice it at the time.

“…Max?”

“Huh? What would he be doing here?”

Was Max the only man around my age that Kyle could think of? Maybe it was because of all the books he’d been reading lately; his imagination was certainly growing.

“Hm, who knows? I suppose getting a husband wouldn’t be a bad idea.”

“A… husband?”

“Yeah. Preferably someone good at… nighttime duties.”

“Nighttime duties?”

“It’s… a thing.”

I chuckled and ruffled Kyle’s hair roughly. Not that I knew much about “nighttime duties” myself. In my past life, I’d been too sick to think about such things, and in this life, I’d been too content enjoying the peaceful country lifestyle as Lilithea to care about men or romance.

“I told you, witches are just women who live alone. I’m not even a proper citizen of the kingdom, so who would want to marry a witch?”

“But if you get married, wouldn’t you get registered?”

“Who knows? After being ostracized as a witch for so long, would anyone suddenly start treating me like a normal person? I doubt it.”

“…”

“I’d just like my business to do well. If I got official registration, I wouldn’t have to rely on the herbalist auntie anymore and could trade with other merchants. Then I could even hire staff, right? I could sell herbs to the village without needing your help.”

“Selling herbs… Is that what nighttime duties are?”

“What are you even saying?”

I shoved Kyle back under the blanket, patting him as if to lull him to sleep, hoping to avoid more sharp questions from this clueless yet curious child. “I can’t breathe,” he grumbled from under the covers, but I ignored it, humming a made-up lullaby that mixed lyrics from my past and present lives.

* * *

Winter passed, and spring arrived. I was now seventeen, and Kyle was eleven.

Thanks to eating well since coming to live with me, Kyle had grown nearly half a hand taller over the past six months. Even so, he still only came up to about my chest.

The most significant change was that he had gained some level of recognition from Aunt Evie as a sort of unofficial assistant at our home.

“What? Since when do you read books?”

“Oh, that’s something I told him to do!”

“You told him?”

“I’ve been bored out of my mind lately and wanted to know more about what’s happening in the world. But when I try to read, I get sleepy, so I’ve been making him summarize and recite it to me at night.”

“You’re really something, you know that? Kids these days….”

This meant that Aunt Evie no longer muttered about taking Kyle with her to discipline him or teaching him proper manners. Still, just in case, I always acted distant around her and pretended to bully Kyle in ways she wouldn’t understand.

Kyle, however, was still prone to making strange mistakes and hurting himself whenever he tried to do household chores. It was odd because when I saw him training with a wooden sword using the beginner’s fencing manual, he seemed to have quite a knack for physical activities.

“Here’s today’s shopping list. I’ve got an important experiment today, so don’t even think about coming home until you’ve bought everything on the list. And if you do get back early, don’t bother me—just keep yourself occupied, okay?”

“Got it.”

“Eat lunch while you’re out. Only spend up to one-tenth of what the herbalist auntie paid us. If you spend more, you’ll get in trouble.”

“Understood.”

“And if someone picks a fight with you?”

“Assert dominance. Trust my judgment and act first.”

“Why?”

“How they take it is their problem.”

“Good.”

Since Kyle had grown taller and become more familiar with the area, I started sending him to the market on his own. Kyle, who had grown much stronger, even insisted on pulling the cart himself instead of paying extra to have Max deliver it. While it was a shame not seeing Max around anymore, it wasn’t a big deal since he wasn’t a real friend anyway.

I also deliberately gave Kyle free time, letting him train with his sword in the forest or explore the area on his own. Sometimes, he’d visit bookstores by himself; one day, I noticed his copy of The Kingdom’s Swordsmanship Manual had been upgraded to the “Intermediate” level. Since he hadn’t asked me for money, he must have sold his old book and saved on meals to buy it.

The seasons continued to change. Winter came again, with Kyle crawling into my bed more often than usual, and another new year arrived.

“Lyn, that ointment you made last time? The merchants are raving about it. The herbalist auntie said she’d give us the ingredients for dirt cheap if you’d just make more of it. She’s been grinning from ear to ear.”

Over time, the ointments and potions I began selling through the herbalist gained popularity. Following Lilithea’s records for crafting them was paying off. I was happy to be earning money, and Kyle… well, he must have enjoyed having more time to himself as he went to the market alone.

Years passed, and Kyle, who was now almost my height, still crawled into my bed on nights when he had nightmares.

“You’re fifteen years old now. Aren’t you too old to still be scared of nightmares?”

“But, it’s… because of Mom…”

“Alright, alright.”

When Kyle and I first started sleeping like this, the bed never felt cramped. But now that Kyle’s frame was almost as large as mine, it was starting to get a bit tight.

“If you keep this up, I’ll blow all our gold coins building a new house and kick you into a different room, you know?”

“Why not just use that money to get yourself a new bed instead?”

“What? Do you even know what that money is for?”

“What is it for?”

Kyle looked up at me with innocent eyes, and I was momentarily at a loss for words.

What was it for? Of course, it was to fund his return to the palace one day… but I couldn’t bring myself to say that.

“With twenty gold coins, you could get a bed fit for a lord,” he added casually.

“With two gold coins, I could hire a guard-level mercenary for a month. With twenty, I’d rather siege a lord’s castle.”

The words slipped out before I realized it, likely because I subconsciously considered the pouch of gold to be Kyle’s war fund. Kyle didn’t seem to think much of it, probably because I made similar remarks about money all the time.

“The smell of potpourri you have on nightmare nights is the only thing that helps me fall back asleep…”

Mumbling those words, Kyle pressed his now sharp nose into the crook of my neck, rubbing it gently.

What good was his size if he still acted like this? In moments like these, he was no different from the little boy he’d been years ago.

I couldn’t help but chuckle softly as I ran my fingers through his silky, well-kept hair.

*

Another year passed, and before I knew it, Kyle had grown taller than me. He had come to my house when I was sixteen, and now, this year, Kyle was turning sixteen. It was hard not to feel a wave of emotion thinking about it.

But to me, Kyle was still the budding tyrant I needed to raise carefully. The only real change was that Kyle had mostly stopped crawling into my bed at night. The debate about buying a new bed had ended with us buying a single bed for Kyle and saving the gold coins for something else.

He was probably too embarrassed to ask to be held after nightmares now.

Instead, Kyle had taken over doing the laundry, a task he now insisted on handling entirely by himself. He claimed it was to help me, but it was likely because he felt awkward about me washing his undergarments now that he was going through puberty. I had no idea why he also washed the bedding so obsessively every day, though.

“Lyn.”

One morning, while braiding my hair, Kyle casually asked a question.

By now, Kyle had taken on so many household responsibilities that I hardly had to do much myself. Yet, every morning, he still insisted on braiding my hair. Sometimes he styled it into twin braids, other times into a single long one, or even a ponytail with a neat braided bun.

Having done my hair for six years, Kyle was probably better at braiding than I was. I didn’t bother to stop him anymore.

“Do I really have to go to the palace?”

“Why? Don’t you want to go?”

Kyle didn’t respond, but I didn’t need him to. After six years of raising him, I knew well enough that his silence was as good as an answer.

As the once frail child had grown into a strong and capable young man, I began to sense that the day he would leave our home was drawing near. In the original story, he had left around the time he became an adult, so at most, we had four years left together.

How I felt about it didn’t matter. Kyle had to leave this place. Because of that, I had become more direct, more adamant in talking to him about leaving the forest.

“The people who sent you here… They should be punished for it.”

“…”

“But whatever you do, don’t tell me when you’re leaving, okay?”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s treason. I don’t want to get involved.”

“Should I leave in secret, then?”

“Yes. Witches can’t get mixed up in this sort of thing. If others get one hit, we’ll get two.”

Kyle didn’t say another word as he finished braiding my hair. It seemed my answer hadn’t satisfied him.

A few days later, we had a similar conversation. It was after Kyle had returned from the marketplace. I prepared a bath for him at dusk, tossing in his rubber duck as usual. I wasn’t sure if he still used it, but it felt strange to stop including it now.

While he bathed, I prepared a pizza loaded with arugula and ham, baking it in the oven. When he finished his bath, I dried his hair with a towel, just as I had for the past six years.

“Lyn.”

“Yeah?”

“When I go to the palace, should I really leave in secret?”

“Yes, that’s what I said.”

“And I shouldn’t tell you?”

“How many times do I have to say it? If I know, I could get arrested for aiding and abetting treason.”