Chapter 2: Three Portraits

I was called to breakfast after the sun had risen high in the sky. I was seated alone at the end of a long table, and before me lay a breakfast more elaborate than anything I had ever seen. But I had absolutely no appetite.

"How are you feeling, Riko-sama?"

The person who called out to me was the butler who had escorted me to the platform last night. When I asked his name, he answered quietly.

"My name is Takeru. I have served the Midoji family for a long time."

He was quiet, polite, and somewhat elusive. Suppressing the urge to ask his age, I spoke of what I wanted to know more about him.

"What did Ryo mean when she said yesterday that she couldn't have me die?"

For a moment, Takeru paused as he was about to put down the teapot he was holding. Then, he quietly sat down in the chair opposite me.

"It seems you are unaware of the curse on this house, Riko-sama."

"curse?"

"The head of the Midoji family has been burdened with a curse for generations. Whenever the head of the family comes into contact with a woman he truly trusts, she inevitably loses her life before her eighteenth birthday."

I felt all the blood drain from my face. I couldn't speak.

"This has happened three times before. Every time the head of the family opens up, that person has been killed by someone."

"So, I'm the fourth one, right?"

Takeru looked straight at me. Even without an answer, his eyes were the answer.

"There is exactly one year left until Riko-sama's birthday."

In one year, I will die. Those words, which sounded like they were about someone else, slowly began to sink in as a realization that they were about me. I clenched my fists on my lap.

"So, you didn't bring me here to protect me?"

"It's understandable that people might think I'm there to see it through. But..."

Just as Takeru stopped speaking, the door to the breakfast room opened. It was Ryo. He had the same emotionless expression as last night.

"I'll explain what happens next."

Takeru bowed and left the room. Ryo didn't sit across from me, but stood by the window a little distance away, looking outside, and began to speak.

"The curse is just as Takeru told me. All three of them were people I truly wanted to love. All three of them lost their lives in front of me, or before I even realized it."

"So, you're saying the same thing will happen to me?"

"I have no intention of waking them up."

When Ryo turned around, there was a strength in his eyes that I had never seen before.

"This time, I will protect you no matter what."

I didn't sense any lie in his words. But I wasn't sure if I should believe him either. After all, this person had only just met me yesterday.

"How can you say that with such certainty? You don't know anything about me."

Ryo didn't answer. He just stared at my face for a moment, then quietly left the room. Left alone, I tried to sort out my thoughts as I watched my tea grow cold. The curse, the fourth person, death a year later. None of it seemed real.

That afternoon, when I returned to my room, I found an unfamiliar box on the bed. There was no sender's name anywhere. With trembling hands, I opened the lid and found three old portraits carefully stacked inside.

The first picture shows a woman in a kimono. The second shows a woman in a Western-style dress. The third shows a woman in what appears to be a sailor uniform from a relatively recent era. Although they are from different time periods, all three women bear a resemblance to Riko in some way.

And what was even more terrifying was that I recognized the faces of the three of them.

In the dream I had last night, there were women with a man who looked very much like Ryo. The faces from that dream and the faces in the portrait before me started to overlap one after another.

The portrait in my hand suddenly felt heavy.

I've only been in this house for a day.