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“This MUST be of utmost importance, if you have traveled all the way to House Nuvelle. With a child, no less!”
Felix stood staring at Constance as she scurried back and forth across her lab. He adjusted his hold on Bella the way his father taught him. She had been reaching out towards some of the suspicious-looking substances on the counters, and he was not about to let her put anything from this place in her mouth.
“And what an adorable little dear you are!” Constance cooed as she passed them. Bella's eyes widened and she turned back into Felix's shoulder. She didn't seem to be the most social child, and that needed to be addressed as soon as possible, according to Felix's father. Without any other children around in Castle Fraldarius, they would need to introduce her to others outside of it. The problem was Bella's appearance. She looked absolutely nothing like a Fraldarius, and he was sure Ingrid would sniff out the ruse in a blink. It had already been three weeks since Bella had been dropped off with Felix. It took him approximately one day to figure out she looked remarkably like Sylvain. Hazel eyes, wavy, red hair… and if he could figure that out so quickly, there was a very good chance others would pick up on it too.
“So what are the options?” Felix asked.
“There’s nothing to be done about the eye color,” Constance answered, clicking her tongue. “Hair color, however! That is an easy fix!”
“Nothing too crazy. She's still a baby.”
“How rude of you to suggest I would experiment on a child! No, all it takes is a simple potion. Put it in her food over a few weeks and her hair will start permanently growing an entirely different color!”
“Sounds easy enough,” Felix shrugged. “What do you need from me?”
“Merely a sample of your own hair. I have all the rest of the ingredients here. Potions aren't my specialty, but my results are consistently high quality. You've come to the right place, Felix!”
“Remember. Not a word to anybody about it,” Felix warned.
Constance side-eyed him over her shoulder. “Very well, but may I ask why? Traveling so far to get the best quality results is one thing, but to keep it a secret is rather strange.”
“No you may not.”
At that, Constance turned to him with a furrowed brow. “Hmph! Do you surmise me to be unintelligent? Clearly this child looks too much like someone else, and you are attempting to conceal it!”
“Would you stop talking so loud?” Felix hissed. “I'm not making a comment on your intelligence. I'm keeping a promise.”
“Hm. Sworn to secrecy then, are you? Well then! You have nothing to fear, for I, Constance von Nuvelle, have a perfect deal for you!”
Felix stared at her. “A deal? Excuse me?”
“Of course! And it is quite simple,” she chirped, busying herself with mixing liquids at one of the counters. “Since you cannot spread the word about my services for you, I require some other kind of compensation.”
“Didn't we already agree on a price?” Felix deadpanned, resisting the urge to roll his eyes.
“Of course we did,” Constance replied, swirling a bluish-green substance in a beaker. “But my house has not fully recovered its reputation. I ask my clients to spread the word of my services so that I may build my name back up. Alas, it seems as though you are not inclined to speak of what I am doing for you. So! I ask instead that you provide me with a larger sample size of your hair. Simple enough, no?”
Felix narrowed his eyes. “How much larger?”
“Ugh! I am not suggesting you pull out all your hair! Merely running a comb through it all once is enough.”
“...Fine.”
“Ahahaha! Splendid! Let me fetch a comb for you.”
As Constance disappeared out of the door to the lab, Felix sighed and looked at Bella. “...What a loud woman,” he muttered. The girl just blinked back, with those eyes that looked so very much like Sylvain's. Her hair was less curly, and with a different color she would definitely look drastically different. Hopefully unrecognizable. It wasn’t like anyone outside of House Gautier had seen her before. But plenty of people had seen Sylvain. And that was the real issue.
Of course he had his own… reservations about this. He didn't really like changing the girl’s appearance to look more like him. It was egocentric, or at least seemed that way to Felix. This was at his father's suggestion. Apparently, as a Fraldarius “she should look the part” or whatever. At least the old man wasn't suggesting any long-term life decisions like betrothals or knighthood or stupid shit like that. Yet.
“I have returned!” Felix resisted the urge to groan as Constance scurried back in with a comb. He figured he would be brushing his own hair, so he started to hand Bella to Constance, but the woman didn’t even seem to notice, and before Felix could protest, she had taken out his hairband, freeing his shoulder-length, navy hair and was brushing through it. “Felix, I had NO idea your hair was so wavy! Whyever do you keep it so messy?”
“I don't know, I don’t make a point to style it,” he grumbled. “Also, I know how to brush my hair.”
“Clearly not, if it is in such a state! Besides, your hands are full! I shall collect my sample so that you can keep your eyes on the little one.”
Felix made a noise of indignance. “Why do you even need my hair other than for the potion?” he asked grumpily.
Constance hummed a little as she continued to tug at his tangles. “Ah, that. It turns out that there really aren't very many willing human test subjects out there,” she explained with a dramatic sigh. “I must rely on samples I collect from clients. Hair, nail clippings, blood samples-”
“Nail clippings?”
“You heard me. Aha! That should suffice.” Constance finally ceased her assault on Felix's scalp, gathering his hair back into its ponytail holder before hurrying back over to the substance she had been mixing earlier, comb in hand. She plucked a single hair from the teeth and dropped it into the beaker to mix it, giggling happily. Felix was starting to think there was some merit to the mad scientist mutters he had heard about Constance.
“Here we are! Just right!” she announced finally, and brought the mixture to a cabinet where she produced a small glass potion bottle. “This should be enough for three weeks,” she explained, pouring the dark blue final product into the bottle before capping it with a cork. “One-half teaspoon into each meal. Around the end of the second week, you'll start to see the roots of the hair turning color, but don't stop feeding it to her until the bottle is empty.”
“How long until the old color is gone?” Felix asked carefully.
“Oh, a month or so after the first dose. Not long,” Constance answered with a wave of her hand as she brought over the potion. Felix nodded and reached out for it, but she drew it out of reach and wagged a finger. “Ah-ah-ah! Gold first!”
Felix sighed and reached into his pocket to grab the bag of pre-counted money. This had better be worth it.
Thankfully, it was indeed worth it. As the bottle was slowly emptied, Bella's hair grew darker and darker, first at the roots and then all the way down to the tips. After a little more than a month, she looked like a completely different kid. Felix doubted even Ingrid could figure out she was actually Sylvain's.
Speaking of his friends, he was currently staring at Dimitri's response to his letter of absence. Felix had written to Fhirdiad shortly after Bella's arrival at Castle Fraldarius that he would be on leave to take care of the orphaned child of a distant relative, whom he would be raising as his daughter. Dimitri's letter was filled with congratulations and understanding, all of which Felix found eyeroll-inducing. At least the guy bought into it.
Felix looked out the window of his office. It was dark as hell, which meant it was probably late as hell. He sighed and turned to glare a little at the pile of paperwork on his desk, still yet to be done. Then his eyes fell on the envelope on the other side of his desk, and his gaze softened. He picked it up and turned it over in his hands. The front was sealed with wax, stamped with the Gautier crest. On the back, Sylvain's loopy handwriting spelled out To My Dear Isabelle. It had arrived a few days ago from a shady-looking messenger who, according to the maid who answered the door, simply handed her the envelope and left without a word.
Felix didn't know what it said, but he could guess. An explanation, to be given to Bella when she was older. But the more Felix looked at it, the more he found himself feeling bitter. Which was pointless, because there was absolutely nothing he could do about Sylvain's situation without causing major problems. He would have to live with what he had. And he had a daughter to raise, now.
Felix opened one of the drawers of his desk. At first it appeared empty, but lifting the false bottom of it revealed dozens of letters, all from Sylvain, all containing words of love, all from the carefree period just before their world was shattered by the announcement of Sylvain's engagement to a noblewoman without his consent. Felix tossed the new letter on top of the pile, lowered the false bottom into place, and closed the drawer.