Memories Turn to Thorns (3)
"Aaargh!"
Caught between telekinesis and holy power, the Taste Officer let out a short scream.
For Shita Rahimu, was there ever a day as grueling as this one?
"The nightmare of the Fire Spirits..."
The days when she had almost been roasted alive came flooding back.
No — this was far, far worse than the Fire Spirit incident.
The two women the Central Officer had brought in were glaring at each other, radiating an ominous aura between them.
- Kugugugugu...
The problem was that this ominous aura was directly affecting reality itself.
"WhattodoIdoIdowhatdoIdo...?"
She couldn't even get her words out straight.
They were both far too formidable for her to stop.
On one side, the former Saintess of the Holy Church.
On the other, the current Princess of the Crossline Kingdom.
How was a mere Taste Officer supposed to hold back women of such standing that a single flick of their fingers could make someone like her vanish without a trace?
- Pajijijijik.
The ominous crackle of power grinding against power echoed ceaselessly through the recovery room.
At this rate, there was no telling what would happen.
"P-please don't fight, you two... the Central Officer will be sad..."
Gathering every last scrap of courage, the Taste Officer inched forward, her voice a tiny crawl.
The reaction was immediate.
"We're not fighting."
"Uuuuuh."
They didn't even spare her a glance, answering while still glaring daggers at each other.
You could've fooled me — that looks exactly like fighting.
"Princess. Say it again. No — choose again."
Erzena pointed at the table with the tip of her finger.
Piled there was a heaping stack of paper cards, each bearing a single written word.
"I won't ask twice. Choose wisely."
She spoke in the coldest voice Elaine had heard from her since seeking asylum at the Immigration Office.
"Nathan is... your what, exactly?"
Elaine raised the two cards before her without a moment's hesitation.
In her right hand, friend.
In her left hand, man.
Erzena read the two words aloud.
"Friend... and man."
Simple enough.
The words Elaine had chosen showed their meaning exactly as they were.
Nathan was the princess's friend — close enough that they exchanged letters.
And he was a man, too.
Friend, and a man. That's all it is.
That was exactly what Erzena herself had thought a mere two minutes ago.
But if you took those two words and, say... combined them just so...
"...Boyfriend."
They became a word of utterly outlandish meaning.
Once more, the gazes of the two women collided head-on.
- PAJIIIJIIIJIK!!!
Her holy power surged and writhed more violently than ever before.
Light blazed forth from her golden eyes.
- GUGUGUGUK.
As if answering the provocation, telekinesis shook the entire recovery room to its foundations.
"Hieeeek!! Central Officer, heeelp!!"
Only the pitiful Taste Officer's screams rose to harmonize with the clash.
About thirty minutes earlier.
"Hmm... what am I going to do with this."
Erzena had been staring at Elaine, who sat motionless in the recovery room, her expression etched with helpless puzzlement.
"Uu..."
The princess's face was pure gloom.
Erzena had no idea what she'd been doing outside, but after returning following quite the commotion, the princess had been in a complete low-pressure trough of a mood.
And Nathan, meanwhile, had gone off who-knew-where and hadn't come back in ages.
Why did Nathan send Princess Elaine to me?
She turned the question over in her mind.
Nathan would never have set something like this in motion without a purpose.
He must have entrusted the princess to her expecting something.
Does he want me to cure her aphasia?
No, that couldn't be it.
Even their first meeting had made that clear.
The mere sight of holy power had made Elaine bristle with open hostility.
That was why Erzena was still doing her utmost to conceal her golden aura even now.
Then what on earth could it be...
Just then, a single word surfaced in her mind.
Friend.
Right. Maybe he sent her here hoping I'd become her friend.
As things stood, the only people the princess knew were Hannah and the Central Officer.
It was the exact same situation Erzena had been in when she'd first applied for temporary asylum.
And she's already living under the same roof, at that...
The look in the princess's eyes when she watched Nathan did worry her a little, but it would surely be fine.
Nathan wasn't the kind of man to be so easily swayed by something like that.
But I have no idea what to say to her.
A conversation isn't made by one side talking alone.
Words flowing back and forth, feelings flowing back and forth — that is conversation.
Erzena opened her mouth slowly.
"Um... Elaine?"
"Uuuh."
A deflated mumble.
Just as she'd expected, completely incomprehensible.
Erzena frowned at the sight and glanced around the room.
"You can't speak, and... ah, then how about we communicate in writing?"
At those words, Elaine's head snapped up.
- Nod nod.
Why on earth hadn't I thought of that?
She hurriedly fetched paper and a pen.
The moment the paper touched her hands, Elaine began scribbling something down at a blistering pace, without pause.
- Shushushushushushu.
"P-Princess, hold on a moment—"
- Shushushushushushu.
And about a minute later, the paper came sliding back.
Erzena took it and read.
TodayIwokeupthismorningabsolutelyfilledwithanticipationaboutgoingtotheImmigrationOfficebutwatchingtheCentralOfficerconducttheentryinspectionsIcametothinkthatthisworldisquiteterrifyinginde—
- Tap.
Her hand clapped over the paper of its own accord.
She had barely dammed the flood of information threatening to pour out without end.
A visceral, instinctive rejection.
"Wh-what was that just now...?"
Letters crammed tighter than the Holy Church's own scripture.
- Tap tap.
Elaine tapped the desk with the end of her pen, applying wordless pressure — as if she still had more left to say.
"...Uu."
At that sight, the former Saintess understood.
Losing one's words meant losing, in another sense, the means of connecting with the world at all.
And for someone who had been cut off from the world for so long, conversation was nothing more than unilaterally dumping her every thought and feeling out in a torrent.
This could never be a conversation. It was only speaking and writing to an empty room.
That was the only way Elaine knew how to face the world.
"Th-then let's do it like this!"
Erzena snatched up two fresh sheets of paper and scrawled something large across them.
[YES]
[NO]
"With these, it'll be much easier!"
The most important things in getting close to someone are common ground and pacing.
Not too fast — just finding where your lives overlap. That's the first step to becoming friends.
Let's take that first step together.
Perhaps Elaine wanted it too.
Perhaps this was the very best road for her to learn how to speak with the world again.
"Elaine. Do you... happen to like cake?"
Start with food.
No one in this world hates cake.
A question she'd plotted out with her own brand of thoroughness.
Elaine picked up a card.
[NO].
"..."
From the very first question, Erzena felt the breath catch in her throat.
"Then, instead of showers — how often do you take a nice long soak in the bath?"
At the fifteenth question, Elaine picked up the cards laid out before her.
[Once a week]. [Every evening].
The word cards, which had begun with only yes and no, had already multiplied into more than a dozen.
"Excellent! Me too, you know. A bath before bed makes the covers feel impossibly soft, doesn't it?"
Elaine stared quietly at the woman chattering away in front of her.
...What a strange woman.
That was the conclusion Elaine had reached for now.
Erzena said she had been the Saintess of the Holy Church.
That fact alone was reason enough for Elaine to hate her.
And yet Erzena said she had cast herself out of the Church — excommunicated by her own hand.
Why?
She was a woman who had once stood at the very summit of the Church.
And yet she'd thrown all that away, and now sat across from Elaine as if it were nothing at all.
She should find me repulsive.
To the Church, Elaine was nothing but a walking plague.
A monster who, despite being loved by God, had used that very gift to kill her own brother.
Yet not a trace of that discomfort showed anywhere in Erzena.
Elaine's green eyes, brimming with curiosity, studied the woman before her intently.
Just what was this woman?
"Good. Let's add more words. Let's see... man, woman, money, trust, friend, funny..."
Now it was Erzena, of all people, getting caught up in it, scribbling dozens of words across the paper.
Watching her silently, the corner of Elaine's mouth trembled — just slightly.
The crushed, despondent feeling was fading, and something lighter was rising in its place.
Frankly, it fascinated her.
Hannah, who understood what she wanted without a word being spoken.
Nathan, the sole interpreter who caught every one of her mumbled attempts.
Those two were the only ones who never felt uncomfortable around me.
She hadn't imagined there would be yet another person so eager to reach out and talk with her.
"Ah, right! We should go buy flowers together sometime. Nathan doesn't care one whit about that sort of thing, so the house feels so dreary, doesn't it? Right?"
Little by little, her thinking was shifting.
Maybe... unlike what I saw at the Immigration Office, the world isn't made up only of dangerous things.
Come to think of it, hadn't even that stubborn, prickly dwarf grown tame after clearing up her misunderstandings through conversation with the Central Officer?
And the former Saintess had never once shown her holy power in Elaine's presence.
Consideration.
Something she had never received from anyone but Hannah and the Central Officer.
Elaine sensed a warmth in this woman she couldn't quite name.
A cozy feeling, as though her taut nerves were loosening thread by thread.
Even knowing she had been a member of the Church, this gentle feeling refused to fade.
It was almost... like having a sister.
"Okay, next question!"
But there was just one thing.
One single thing that bothered her.
"When Nathan came to the Royal Castle to see you..."
"Nathan..."
She kept calling the Central Officer by his name.
Not a saint's title. Not an official post.
Public duty and private feeling blurred together, Erzena called him Nathan, every single time.
There was no distance in it at all. As though it were the most natural thing in the world.
- Throb.
Without quite knowing why, Elaine pressed a hand to her chest.
What is this feeling?
She didn't know.
But every time she heard that name, something felt a little off.
It didn't hurt — it just felt tight, heavy in her chest.
A feeling she had never once known before.
And at the same time, one fact surfaced in her memory.
- Elaine.
The Central Officer called her by her name, too.
- Don't cross that line.
He sometimes even dropped all honorifics, speaking to her as casually as one speaks to the closest of companions.
But I...
She still called him by his title, and nothing more.
The uncomfortable feeling grew a little larger.
Nathan had called her his friend.
To the princess, Nathan Kell was a person beyond all price.
Her one and only interpreter.
I want... to call him by his name, too.
If I had that right.
If I had that courage.
Wouldn't it be all right, to call him by his name?
That was when it happened.
"Ahem. Princess Elaine. So then... what exactly... is your relationship with Nathan?"
Erzena asked it with the utmost caution, glancing aside as though it were a question of no consequence whatsoever.
"Ah, I'm only asking out of curiosity! That man hardly ever talks about himself, so..."
Elaine didn't hesitate.
The answer was already decided.
She swept her gaze across the countless cards spread over the desk.
"...Uu?"
But there was no card for one and only, and none for interpreter.
"Uu..."
A bewildered look.
She'd never thought about it beyond that.
So she searched for the words that came closest.
[Friend]. And [Man].
Nathan Kell was the first man to ever approach her, and a man she could lean on.
At the same time, a dear friend without equal.
She picked up the two cards.
At the sight, Erzena's face visibly relaxed with relief.
"Ahem. I see. A friend, and a man... wait, hold on."
Not three seconds later, her face went rigid.
"...A boyfriend?"
"Uwe?"
Startled by the completely unexpected combination of words, Elaine's head shot up.
- PAJIIIJIIIJIK!
Erzena's long-hidden holy power burst forth.
The instant that unpleasant golden aura — suddenly flaring into existence — met her eyes, Elaine unleashed her telekinesis without meaning to.
Entirely unaware of what misunderstanding she had just set off.
"What did you just say, Elaine?"
"Eh? Uweh? Uh... uaaa?"
A hedgehog can never know what, or how deeply, its own bristling spines have wounded.
But once hostility had been kindled, Elaine had no choice but to strike back.
"...Uu."
Because that was how she had survived, all this time.
- GUGUGUGUGUK.
As if echoing her emotions, the telekinesis began to churn and surge.
It was only after the Arcane Academy President had finally finished his business and departed that I was able to make my way back to the Immigration Office.
"Damn, I'm a little late."
The sun was already sinking low toward the horizon.
I headed for the recovery room where Erzena was staying.
Now that I knew what I needed to say to Elaine, what I needed to show her, there was no reason to hesitate.
- Bang.
I threw the door open and spoke.
"Elaine, Erzena. Are you two in— whoa."
And then I froze solid.
The first thing to catch my eye was Erzena, arms crossed, looking down at the princess from on high.
Her chin lifted in a haughty grace I had never once seen from her before, regarding the princess through lowered lashes — my jaw dropped at the sight.
The second thing my gaze landed on was Elaine, standing directly in front of Erzena, staring her dead in the eye.
All of her earlier despondency was gone; with a face full of tension and wariness, she held her right hand out like a shield.
Holy power and telekinesis rippled through the recovery room like two rival factions waging a turf war, splitting the room precisely in half.
And the last thing I saw was...
"Central Officer, help me..."
The Taste Officer, clinging to my trouser leg, sobbing her heart out.
"I wanna go home earlyyyyy..."
Her brown hair in complete disarray, thoroughly battered by the two inexplicable powers, she blubbered without pause.
"Send me hoooome waaaahhhh!"
It was already past quitting time — what do you mean, leave early?
"What... exactly is going on here?"
My brain simply could not keep up with the situation.
What on earth could have happened in one hour to wreck their relationship this badly?
That was when it came.
"Nathan."
A voice colder than the north wind of midwinter called out to me.
"Y-yes. Erzena."
The former Saintess, wreathed in a deep, dark golden aura — my housemate, asylum-seeker, and ally — spoke.
"You and I need to have a little talk."
"Pardon? A talk with... me?"
"Yes. Right now."
Hold on, I just got here to fix this whole mess?