Convalescence (2)
The report had to be given.
Ellen, who as a rule made sure Harad never set foot off the bed, had not thought to stand in the way of the report itself.
Because a reward was bound to follow it.
Killing a 5th-tier magician was a feat of immense merit.
He was more or less mended.
His body was just about fit to see real battle again.
Truthfully, Ellen had been singularly overattentive these past days — that much he couldn't deny.
The reason he could well imagine.
To a woman blessed with Heavenly Might, Harad must have looked fragile indeed.
He had, after all, all but carried his aftereffects around with him day and night; naturally she would have concluded he needed one long, proper rest.
It was not a mistaken judgment.
Merely an unexpected one. He had never dreamed she would fuss over him so devotedly, right there at his side.
Smooth sailing.
They had drawn closer than he had ever planned.
His points of contact with Elain had been few, but that was no obstacle.
Elain and Ellen. Befriending either one of the two would do. They were, after all, the same person — when Ellen changed, Elain changed with her.
Ellen is the better of the two.
Elain had resolved to live exactly as she pleased, yet in the end she could not match Ellen.
Hadn't Ellen been born for freedom from the very start? She was the true nature of the human called Elain.
"Sorry about that. Things looked to be in full swing."
"We're not like that."
"How could you not be?"
Toremote could not comprehend a man and a woman who weren't involved sharing the same room.
"I already belong to someone, you know."
"You're telling me Lady Ellen was your partner for the night?"
Toremote recoiled in horror.
"Man, your nerve is abnormally large."
"..."
And here they called him the passionate knight.
Toremote was passionate in more ways than one.
The distance between Harad's annex and the Grand Duke's residence was not far. And yet Toremote's steps never carried him to the Duke's door; he circled around it like a man out on a stroll.
"If you have something to say, say it."
"Quick on the uptake. Is that a mage thing?"
"Mages usually are, as it happens."
Toremote's footsteps slowed.
He seemed to have plenty to say.
"I hear you've been keeping company with Cassion."
"Less keeping company than sharing a dining table. Kubel's cooking is simply that good."
"He's a mage too, that one. And yet here you are — when Cassion can't so much as breathe the same air as one."
Toremote murmured, half to himself.
It sounded as if he were dying to know the secret of how a mage could get along with Cassion, but the truth was the exact opposite. Toremote, having come to a stop, was not looking at Harad at all.
He was suspicious of Cassion.
"What about Sir Cassion?"
"Hard to put into words. He's like gristle caught between my teeth."
"Has it always been so?"
"No. Only as of late."
Around the time Cassion had been found out to be a mage, most likely. From then on, Toremote's nose had caught a different scent clinging to him.
Keener than any true beast.
Even Harad felt a faint chill crawl up his skin.
"It's beyond mere unease."
When it was mere unease, the parties in question had usually turned out to be enemies, Toremote added.
Such was the instinct of a Swordmaster — it had a way of being right about extraordinary things. And Toremote's instinct was stranger than most.
"That's not yours to fret over. His Excellency knows all there is to know."
"Understood. And thank you for lending me Delic and Pissarro."
Toremote accepted it in a heartbeat and steered the conversation elsewhere.
It was a glimpse of the loyalty and trust he held for Grand Duke Aratus.
"All I did was render a service."
"You could have stacked merits easily enough through Delic and Pissarro."
Using the two as shields — the option Ellen had once laid out for him. But Harad had chosen the path of sacrificing himself instead.
"You must care for them a great deal."
"They're my men and my comrades. No different from my own life."
Comrades.
That, perhaps, was the answer to why Toremote had died in his previous life.
No instinct, however extraordinary, amounted to anything if it went unheeded. That passionate Swordmaster had died precisely because of it — because he chose his comrades over his own gut. Because he held another knight's life equal in worth to his own.
If it would save a handful of comrades, Toremote was the sort of knight who would think nothing of trading his own life for it.
It was not a problem for the present, though.
Toremote's death lay years ahead.
Of course, the future would change, and variables would spring up along the way — but he was more than capable of handling those. The regressed Harad now held no small influence over the 1st Knight Order.
"Make good use of Kubel. He'll serve you well, I promise you."
"Perhaps not as well as you would, though."
Toremote's gaze was intense.
Anyone could see it: naked covetousness.
"Much as I'd like to, I have too much on my plate."
Harad was not a man who could be confined to the 1st Knight Order alone.
"Kubel knows a great deal too. At times he may even surpass me. He doesn't know half of what I do, but in exchange he carries no prejudice."
"What would you have me do for him?"
"See that he doesn't die, above all. And raise him into a comrade."
"Pissarro seems especially taken with him."
It meant he would work around Pissarro's search schedule. A satisfying answer.
"How on earth did you cure Gulen of his foolishness?"
Harad laughed without a sound.
The Gulen who had returned seemed to have chosen the axe.
"You said it yourself — you never know when you'll die. Like my family."
At that, Toremote laughed loud enough to shake the Inner Castle.
"Does that sting your pride?"
"No. It's the plain truth. I could die tomorrow and it would surprise no one."
Toremote looked like a man utterly at peace with death.
Because he was always ready to toss his own life away. Serzila, his comrades — his son too, probably. Toremote had many things that mattered more to him than his own life.
"You're twenty, if I recall?"
"That's right."
"Several times the man my boy is."
For Gulen's sake, Harad had put his own family into words.
Only the strong can afford to show their weaknesses.
Toremote's eyes on Harad burned all the hotter for it.
"The more I look, the more I want you."
"I'm a mage, not a knight."
"Quibbling over that at this point would be a shameful thing."
They had gone into the Boundary together, and Toremote owed him his life.
To the 1st Knight Order, Harad was already a comrade.
That was when his body turned heavy.
The air had changed.
"Dear me. My laughter must have been too loud."
To be precise, it was not the air at all. It was aura.
"He's calling us in, it seems."
The aura that had risen from the Grand Duke's residence was summoning Harad and Toremote both.
He had steeled himself for this a full fortnight prior.
That his nerves had slackened ever so slightly, however, he could not deny.
The 1st Knight Order's Commander was standing right beside him, after all.
A miscalculation.
The moment Harad stood before Grand Duke Aratus, he was crushed flat into the floor.
It seemed the only beings Grand Duke Aratus ever showed restraint before were his own flesh and blood.
Well, fair enough.
He was hardly the man to tiptoe around retainers.
"I believe I told you not to make contact."
The Duke's voice was murderous.
Do not make contact. It meant Ellen.
Once before, the Duke had warned him away from her. Back then, Harad had answered that he would try — that it was hardly a matter a hostage could settle.
"This time, too, she was the one who came. Not I."
"..."
"Next time she comes, I'll try telling her to get lost."
The Duke answered with aura.
Harad was driven into the floor. His bones rattled; his stomach heaved.
And that was all.
It hurt, certainly, but the Duke never tormented him hard enough to leave aftereffects behind.
He merely dislikes it. He doesn't stop it.
The Duke knew Ellen was staying in Harad's annex.
If he had truly despised it, he could have had them separated. But he had done no such thing.
For want of a justification?
No.
Come to think of it, it had been the same last time. The Duke had issued warnings, and never once a hard response.
Harad had been granted passage into the Boundary through the tunnel.
And every time he went, Ellen was at his side — under the pretext of guarding the tunnel's mouth while Harad was on the far side.
As if he'd believe she only ever went as far as the tunnel's mouth.
The first time, perhaps. By now, the Duke would certainly have noticed that Harad was the one bringing Ellen into the Boundary.
And that is an ironclad justification.
The Duke balked at his daughter setting foot in the Boundary. It was the very reason hunting days had come into being.
And yet her crossing into the Boundary through the tunnel, he simply let slide.
What's the difference?
Try as he might, Harad could find only one reason: himself.
He hates my touching Ellen — and yet he needs the touching to happen. So it strikes me, anyway.
But why?
"I'll let you live. Consider it your reward."
"I'd sooner die than take that."
Harad tossed the words out to test the waters.
The pressure swelled in answer. He was pressed so deep into the floor it felt like a coffin moulded to his body.
And that was all.
His bones felt ready to crumble, yet none broke. His internal injuries were light, too — a single day's sleep would mend them.
It simply hurt like hell.
The Duke knew, with perfect precision, how to inflict pain without damage.
So I'm right, then.
He despised his daughter keeping company with Harad.
Yet separate from his feelings, he needed the two to associate.
Every circumstance pointed that way.
The reason itself remained unclear.
Because he welcomed Elain's change?
Undoubtedly — the Duke had nothing against Elain's judgment in sparing Rick the tunneler.
And yet something didn't add up.
Those changes had only begun to show themselves recently. Harad and Ellen had been slipping out to the Boundary through the tunnel since well before that. The Duke had known, and let it be.
There's another reason.
The pressure eased. It meant: speak.
Harad gingerly lifted his head. The Duke's expression was grave — it seemed unwise to bring up Ellen.
"I killed a 5th-tier magician."
"I know."
"The Ivory Tower's infiltration route should fall within the 1st Knight Order's search radius."
Psina was a timid mage.
She wanted her disciple avenged, but she had no courage to cross the Great Wall.
A woman lacking even that much daring would hardly go roaming the Boundary at large.
She would have used the same road as Ios and Compaso.
"Not enough."
If he wanted that information counted as merit as well, he would have to bring back the infiltration route drawn out precisely.
"I'll take my time with that one."
It was no urgent matter. In his previous life, the Outlands had shown no appetite for crossing the Great Wall.
The variables of his regression would need weighing, to be sure — but for the time being, simply tightening the watch on the Wall would suffice.
The Duke gave a slow nod.
It meant he was persuaded.
"Do you happen to possess an otherworldly object as well? Something like a round pebble."
At that, the Duke's face creased faintly.
Less the look of a man caught out than of one thinking, what in the world is this nonsense.
"If you haven't one, I'll claim my reward another time."
There was nothing he particularly needed just now.
He had brought back no magicians, and the otherworldly objects the Duke had gathered were nothing to write home about.
"Go to the 3rd Knight Order."
For the 1st, the painting on the Great Wall; for the 2nd, the hand behind the plot against the Grand Duke's heir — the Duke's orders had always carried their reasons.
This one did not.
The Duke simply commanded him to go to the 3rd Knight Order. Meaning: go, and come back with their recognition.
So I've finally passed.
It meant there was no longer any need to prove himself.
The Duke had acknowledged the mage called Harad.
The head of a 5th-tier magician carried worth enough to demand it.
"I am still a patient, Your Excellency."
"Then rest you shall. Properly."
"The matter of the tunnels has yet to be fully settled."
It was neither Rick nor the brokers that gnawed at him. It was Isota.
The masked mage. She had belonged to the Liberation Magic Tower — and there was no telling when that tower might move.
And the tunnels themselves still want checking.
There were thirteen tunnels in all.
Ten of them had yet to be verified.
Now that a giant had been observed on the Deep Sea's road, Harad needed to find the other road — the one bound to the Red Tower's object.
"I'll settle it for you."
It sounded remarkably like an offer to settle his life.
"I depart first thing tomorrow."
"Is that how you always give your reports?"
Toremote burst out admiring the moment they were clear of the Grand Duke's residence.
"How are you even alive?"
"From what I've observed, His Excellency has a taste for the audacious."
"There are limits, man. I'd assumed your injuries were confined to your head."
Toremote studied Harad as one studies a curiosity.
"It's the first I've ever seen His Excellency flatten a retainer."
"Likely because I'm a hostage, not a retainer."
"He must be extraordinarily taken with you, then."
"How do you figure?"
"You're a hostage, and yet he stopped at crushing you. You understand — His Excellency is not a man known for mercy."
Toremote's words carried reason enough.
Crushed though he was on every visit, Harad remained alive.
He had assumed it was his competence and audacity that bought that much — but perhaps some other reason was at work.
Toremote was one of the few who knew Grand Duke Aratus well.
"I'd wager you won't be leaving tomorrow after all. Winter's nearly on us."
Harad cocked his head.
"His Excellency may not show it, but he's looking out for you."
Toremote said nothing more, and took his leave.
He had a garrison to return to.
Harad went straight back to the annex.
Arika was sitting at the table.
"What are you doing?"
"Eating a late-night snack."
Arika answered without so much as lifting her eyes.
The snack was meat. She appeared, by all indications, to be sharing Ellen's late-night portion.
"Why eat it here?"
"Shura is asleep."
Presumably she couldn't go clattering about in Kubel's annex.
That said, Arika had breeding.
She ate in perfect silence.
It's not as though Shura would wake.
Shura slept on the second floor.
And yet Arika had chosen this place. Which meant Harad's presence neither displeased nor discomforted her overmuch.
"Doesn't that catch in your throat?"
"Water, please."
Thus his rapport with Arika, too, was running smoothly.
"Take your time with it."
"I eat, and then I work."
Working late seemed to be Arika's natural state.
"There's work left over? I heard they've caught every last broker."
Walk into the territory's plaza and you would find no small number of heads staked out on display.
The brokers the Information Bureau had hauled in.
Among them had been northern nobles — and imperial nobles as well.
"That... is not something you need to know."
Arika put a piece of meat in her mouth.
To Harad's eye, it looked for all the world like she was stuffing her mouth shut.
In the middle of it all, Ellen came downstairs.
"How did it go?"
"I'm to take my reward later. Nothing came to mind on the spot."
Harad relayed his audience with the Duke.
The part about being crushed, he left out.
"You're going to the 3rd Knight Order?"
"Their recognition has to be earned."
Harad needed the acknowledgment of every knight in the North.
Not to survive — but to stand at Elain's side.
"Surely they'd all acknowledge you already?"
The mood had long since been tilting that way on its own.
Word of what had happened with the 1st and 2nd Knight Orders had travelled.
The slaying of a 5th-tier magician could only have driven that mood further along.
"Even so, hearing of a thing and standing through it are different animals. No one knows that difference better than you."
"When do you leave?"
"Tomorrow morning."
Ellen's brow creased.
"You haven't finished healing."
"At this point, healed and this are one and the same."
There was nothing special in this order.
Collecting recognition was, for the Harad of now, an exceedingly simple task.
"Still, isn't this going too far? He could let you rest a little."
"Well, what can I do? He's the Grand Duke. When he says dig, you dig."
"Shall I put in a word for you?"
"Would that even work?"
"Why wouldn't it? We're relatives."
In truth, his daughter.
But he was hardly the type for that.
The Ellen before him looked utterly sincere.
Anyone would have taken her for furious.
"I'll treasure the thought, then."
"...Fine. Noted, for now."
Ellen walked straight for the door.
"Where are you going?"
"To fetch clothes. Comfortable ones."
"Clothes?"
"We're going into the Boundary, aren't we?"
When they went to the Boundary, neither Elain nor Ellen wore magic-beast leather.
Because even the Boundary's brutal environment counted, in their eyes, as part of their training.
A notion only the strong could afford.
"Why pack for that now?"
"You're the one who said you leave tomorrow morning."
"I'm the one going."
"And what of it?"
Ellen looked thoroughly resolved to come along.
Perhaps she had been swallowed whole by the Prophecy of the Moon.
Harad had, after all, very nearly died this time.
For his part, Harad had no reason to refuse her.
Ordinarily he might have worried about her poaching his merit.
This should be fine.
Thanks to Psina's death.
Even with Ellen at his side, little of the credit would slip away now.
What knight of recent years had slain a 5th-tier magician?
As far as Harad knew, the last official record dated back ten years.
"Um..."
It was then that Arika — who had paused mid-snack and been watching the two of them warily — worked up the nerve to speak.
Her face was blank with disbelief.
She was still reeling from Ellen's display — posturing as if she would take on the Grand Duke himself for Harad's sake.
"What?"
The voice that came back was sharp.
Arika shot Harad a glare. There was something wrong with Ellen.
"...That order will most likely be rescinded. Winter is nearly here, isn't it?"
Arika offered the same words Toremote had.
Harad and Ellen tilted their heads in unison.
That Harad didn't get it was one thing — but Arika, for a moment, found herself lost for words.
"When winter comes, the imperial envoys arrive. The searches are suspended — and amid all that, they won't be turning a mage loose."
On the surface it had been an order. In truth, it meant he was being given a rest.
So that's why Toremote said it. That the Duke is looking out for me.
But in Harad's judgment, Toremote was wrong.
Ellen was the proof of it.
"Oh."
She opened her mouth as though the memory had only just returned to her.
"Did you hear anything about it?"
"No. His Excellency has likely forgotten it as well."
Grand Duke Aratus had never once, in all his days, received the imperial envoys in person.