The Circle Beside the Seal
After that, whenever Nina went in and out of the forest, she examined the plants with painstaking care. Whenever she found one the original heroine had discovered, she brought it back and planted it apart in the field.
“Someday, Young Master, when you become a duke, we’ll bring the domain back to life with these.”
Nina said it through a bright grin. Adrian looked at her and answered.
“When I become a duke?”
“Yes.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Then we use them here. Obviously.”
“What’s there to worry about?”
Nina shrugged. Adrian studied her little garden, then asked.
“Nina.”
“Yes?”
“Do you want me to become a duke?”
“Mm…”
Nina squinted for a moment, then whispered.
“I want Adrian to laugh.”
His rose-quartz eyes had been resting on her. Caught in that dazzling color, Nina had held her breath before she could answer, and now his own eyes went wide. Then he laughed.
“You only ever want the difficult things.”
“What’s difficult about it? I’m with you.”
Nina set a hand on her hip. Adrian looked at her as if something had just become clear.
“That’s right. You’re with me.”
“See?”
Nina chattered on about the garden’s future, and Adrian listened in earnest. Year by year the plot grew larger, and the Black Knights grew used to the plants she raised there—to lighting fierce, high-burning lamps, among other things, with the clear fruit gathered from her beds and the oil pressed from the oil trees. Those lamps shone brighter than any other, and the only scent they gave was a pleasant smell of wood.
In that same stretch of time Nina shot up as well, until the long coat fit her properly at last. Adrian stood a good span taller still. Supplies sent from outside grew shoddier by the day, but they could provide for themselves well enough now, and life was richer than it had been. Nina was content.
This much isn’t bad. You worked hard, Nina.
So she thought.
Until today.
Nina crouched on the ground.
Damn it. I’m screwed.
She let out a heavy sigh. The rough mouth had rubbed off on her from her comrade, Jin.
Purple, in every direction—the Purple Forest, familiar by now. At its heart stood a pure-white cubic building with a jewel set into every face. The seal. Fallen leaves had always lain heaped around that building, but somewhere along the way they had vanished from one side, and a magic circle lay drawn there, sharp enough that anyone could see it.
Nina cast about like a hound on a scent, but there was no other trace. Only the circle. No one came to this cursed forest, and no one laid a hand on the seal.
No one but a mad cultist.
“This is completely screwed!!”
She could shout all she liked. The forest stayed silent. Alone where no one walked, Nina crouched and tore at her short brown hair, then straightened with a groan.
“Ah, but why would you mess up like this, Nina. Here. Like this.”
She sighed, long and low. This was the problem she absolutely had to avoid.
4. Because of the villain’s scheme, the knight order is annihilated.
+ He is left with a wound upon the heart that can never be undone.
I have to stop this. I have to.
Nina grimaced and narrowed her eyes.
It is a magic circle, isn’t it?
She stared at the circle drawn beside the seal. The lines were far too intricate to dismiss as chance.
When did someone get in here and draw it?
No. Nothing’s even started yet. Has it?
Get back first, and report it.
Looked at one way, she had found it early. And if she had found it, there was still every chance she could stop it.
Nina was eighteen this year, tall and willow-straight, and the long coat suited her. Her brown hair had grown until it brushed her shoulders. She bound it in twin tails the way her sister once had, though it never carried the same presence it had when her hair was long. Even so, she would not give the twin tails up. They reminded her of family, and of the hands that used to stroke her hair.
“?”
A gaze prickled over her. Nina drew her sword on reflex and swept a look around. There was no sign of anyone. Silence held on every side.
What?
She backed away with care, measuring every step—and in an instant her vision warped, and dizziness crashed over her.
Poison!
She had been had.
Without warning the ground gave way beneath her, and she began to sink as if driven into smooth mud. The moment she braced her legs to wrench free, something snagged her ankle.
“!!”
Her sight filmed over. Nina clenched her teeth and swung. Her body was yanked up and inverted, as if a snare had taken her, and even then her blade cut the line true. The vine cinched around her ankle parted, and the force of the swing flung her clear. She caught her balance in midair like a cat and landed.
“Ngh!”
Pain stabbed her ankle as if a knife had gone in. Nina blinked the tears loose and swore without pause.
“Kh—hack—ah, that actually hurts. Damn it, this ankle’s useless.”
Had Adrian been there, he would have taken her to task. Still going to talk like Jin? But Adrian was not here, and it hurt enough that the curses came out on their own. Nothing to be done.
Fortunately—if that was the word—her opponent was not the human who had drawn the circle, but a plant-type Bellac. A moment ago it had looked like an ordinary plant. Now it was some enormous insect-eater.
No. A man-eater?
The vine Bellac, flaunting its huge leaves, shot its stems out again at speed. Corrupted living things, Bellac bore humans nothing but malice, and they always attacked.
“If Jin chews me out, are you going to take the blame?”
She had already been told not to go alone until the words might as well have been nailed into her ears.
The ankle’s out, so my mobility’s shot. And I’ve breathed in poison.
Every time the great vine shook its leaves, a colorless, odorless poison seemed to spread.
“O North Wind! By the swiftness that is yours, blow all things away!”
⟨ North Wind ⟩
At Nina’s incantation a cold wind began to blow hard. It would hold the poison off to some degree, but the fight had to end quickly.
“O Frost! Keen breath that freezes all and cuts all away—come, here!”
⟨ Frost ⟩
At the cry, frost bloomed along her sword. Nina set her teeth, sheared through the vines that lunged in fast, and twisted clear of the ones bursting up under her feet. She reached the main body and cut it down in a single stroke. Green smoke hissed free, and the Bellac went soft and melted away.
“Blech.”
Nina recoiled from the vile stench. Her eyes hurt. Her nose hurt.
Get back. Quickly…
Limping, she called the North Wind. Cold wind wrapped her and lifted her body light. She could not properly use the ankle, but the North Wind let her pick up speed.
Forts stood scattered along the edge of the Purple Forest, and making the regular rounds of them was the order’s work. She barely reached one around sunset, and of all people Jin, an Elite, was playing gatekeeper. He saw her.
“Nina?”
He had made out her shape in the dusk and said her name low. All at once the tension left her, and she pitched forward.
“I can’t walk anymore!”
She shouted, and Jin came running—bear-big, red hair blazing, easy to know even from far off.
“Nina? Hey! You all right?!”
He closed in with a rough shout, dropped into a crouch, and startled at the pale face of Nina where she lay gasping.
“My ankle hurts, and I think I breathed in poison.”
Jin reached for her, and she shook her head. The plant’s poison might still be on her clothes.
“The poison might be on my clothes—eek!”
Jin had already stripped off his long coat and rolled her up in it. The difference in their sizes left her wound tight, as if in an enormous blanket.
“That hurts. Pick me up gently.”
“If you’ve got the breath to yell, you’re fine. What did I tell you. Huh?”
“Don’t go alone.”
“You know, so why don’t you listen? Why? Our rule is pairs. Even the rookies keep that much, and it’s the basic rule!”
Nina panted, in heartfelt agreement with every word of the scolding. When they went into the fort’s infirmary, the physician Kirill scowled.
“Why do you come back hurt, and alone.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
Nina gave a weak little laugh.