Please Stop Recklessly Screwing Me Over

Hestia Gardner.

A woman of House Gardner who had never awakened, and who had therefore spent her whole life reading the room. Because of that she had grown quick to notice things, and skilled alike at reading people and at handling them. To be honest, up to this point it was common enough: a commonplace premise, a commonplace trait, the sort any character might possess.

But just as Nahan had said a moment ago, Hestia was a brilliant woman. Her intellect far outstripped her frail body, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and that exceptional mind had fused with her quick eye and her gift for reading others. The way one disposed of a gaze. The timing of a swallow. The gaps between a sequence of movements. A keenly honed instinct had slipped into the cracks of habit her eye had caught, and pinpointed with exactness the common thread between two figures.

That common thread was the cracks in the acting Nahan let slip from moment to moment. Don't worry. I've no intention of killing you. And, Ian Red, free priest, pays his respects to the brilliant young lady of House Gardner. Not Black Wolf, and not Ian Red, but Nahan himself showing through. To her, however, it registered as nothing more than a point in common.

And so she opened her mouth.

"……Black Wolf?"

She let it sound as if the words had escaped her unbidden, uncertain, only half-sure. In truth it was suspicion bordering on certainty. The situation, the circumstances, even the small crack she had found—taken all together, the man ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠before her could only be Black Wolf.

"……"

"……"

Hestia studied his reaction. Of course, if he truly was Black Wolf, she would very likely die. But if that death let them recover the Heavenly Shield and hold the war in check? If it was an exchange between one life—hers, the family's dead weight, who could not even walk—and the lives of hundreds of thousands of subjects?

Gladly.

Resolved, Hestia left the line in the water and waited for him to produce solid proof.

So if you truly are Black Wolf, then ask. I will gladly offer this one life, and save hundreds of thousands—millions—tens of millions of subjects.

A brief silence passed. Within her narrowed chestnut eyes, Nahan carefully raised a hand.

…Is he going to kill me? I'm the only one who knows who he is, so he'll kill me to shut my mouth?

It won't matter. By the family head's special order, countless warriors lay hidden all around her, standing guard. She would still die to Black Wolf; that much would not change. But with so many warriors nearby, and the hero party—Radiance—as well, they'll pin him down somehow. At the very least, they'll learn where the Heavenly Shield is. So she could die with an easy heart.

I would be of more use that way.

Not a flicker crossed her face. In the moment the woman who regarded herself as the family's shame steeled herself for death, Nahan scratched the back of his head with the hand he had raised and gave an awkward little laugh.

"I was trying to hide it, but since you've seen through me first, I hardly know what to do with myself."

"…Eh?"

An admission far quicker than she had dared expect. The dazed sound escaped her before she could stop it, and just as she was reaching for what to say next—

Nahan, having hauled the level of his Acting up in a single breath, went down on one knee before her.

"I am that free priest, Ian Red—the one who confirmed, from Black Wolf himself, that the young lady yet lived."

A kindness warm enough to feel, lowering himself so that a woman who could not walk might meet his eyes. For an instant, before she could help it, fondness stirred in Hestia. She mastered it at once.

Get a hold of yourself.

The way one disposed of a gaze. The timing of a swallow. The gaps between a sequence of movements. The man before her might still be Black Wolf……

"…Huh?"

The chestnut eyes that met Nahan again shook violently. The habits Hestia had caught were not the sort a person could easily change. Even acting as someone else, one could not keep them up the whole way through. Nine-tenths of her certainty had been circumstantial, and the remaining tenth—habit alone—had convinced her that the man before her, Ian Red, was Black Wolf. And yet—

"Young lady?"

Every piece of evidence vanished at a stroke.

…Did I imagine it? Was it only chance that, in that single moment I saw, he overlapped with Black Wolf? If not that, then acting?

No. Even trained spies never managed to rewrite their own biological rhythms completely.

Whatever the truth, if she clung to silence any longer she would only draw suspicion. Hestia smiled softly and bowed her head to Nahan.

"I have heard a great deal about you. Thanks to the word you gave concerning life and death, Priest, I was able to come back alive."

"How could that be my doing? It is thanks to the young lady, who endured and did not give up; to the courage of the heroes; and to the grace of Lady Aria."

Ian Red. The free priest who, when everyone believed her dead, had used a bestowed authority to send word to the Hero. Gentle and humble—formal in his manners, and yet somehow free, and easy to be near. Of the dreadful, overwhelming presence she had felt from Black Wolf, not a single speck remained.

Was it a mistake? People's biological rhythms differ, but now and then they do overlap.

…Yes. There's been far too much to do lately. I must have grown oversensitive without realizing it.

Hestia was brilliant. She knew her own condition with perfect clarity, and when she folded even her poor condition back into the sum and drew the conclusion again, what came out was this: Ian Red is not Black Wolf.

Even so, she had suspected, and the grounds for that suspicion had been solid.

One last confirmation.

If the man before her was Black Wolf, an attack he did not see coming would draw a reaction he could not help.

"Have you had your meal?"

"As it happens, I was just beginning to feel hungry, and thought I might beg a bite of something."

"Beg? You are a benefactor of House Gardner, Priest. Whatever you wish, we shall provide it."

Hestia carried the conversation along as if nothing were amiss, and quietly closed her hand around the dagger in her bosom.

"Free priest I may be, but how could I accept a reward in a priest's cloth? I am grateful enough simply to be remembered."

A smile of perfect, unguarded ease.

Roll the wheelchair one handspan farther and there's a slight lip. The moment it catches and tips, I'll pretend it was an accident and drive the dagger into his neck. Or stop halfway—and if I'm right, follow it all the way through—

The design finished in a breath, Hestia rolled the wheels exactly as planned.

"Please, there's no need. If I might just—"

Clunk!

The wheelchair tipped on the shallow step, and the dagger clutched against her bosom jutted free.

He might notice a small strike and simply take it. It has to be somewhere certain.

Even as she fell in a helpless scramble, Hestia—strictly by accident, and happening, of all things, to have a tight grip on her self-defense dagger—swung the blade at Nahan's heart.

Done.

She was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠watching the result with a faint smile, her body moving exactly as she had predicted, when—

"Young lady!!"

Nahan lunged. And at a speed—

"It's dangerous!!"

—that the frail free priest Hestia had imagined could never have produced.

"W-wait—!!"

By the time the plan twisted, it was already too late.

Thuk!

The chill of a keen edge tearing flesh, and warm blood flooding over her hand. Crash! The two of them tumbled across the floor in a tangle, and when Hestia jerked her head up, what met her was—

"Are you all right?"

Nahan, still smiling, and—

…gulp.

—a stomach stabbed deep enough to swallow the blade whole, and the blood pouring out of it.

"P-Priest!! Is anyone there!! A man is wounded!!"

"I'm… qu-quite all right. Please, calm yourself."

"But it was I who…!!"

"Everyone makes mistakes, do they not?"

"Ah…!! Priest!!"

To think she had suspected a man like this of being Black Wolf. Only then did Hestia understand what she had done.

The Hero told me the authority the priest possesses is a feeble one. So he must have trained his body at least, and she had missed the reaction speed that came of it. If I had only thought a little more—just a little—!! The priest need never have been hurt.

"Kh…!"

Her fingertips brushed the dagger without her meaning to, and Nahan let out a groan.

"Ah!! I'm sorry, I'm so sor—!!"

Flustered, Hestia shoved herself upright, and in that same moment she saw it: the edge of a rock, hidden until now behind a low rise of ground, lying exactly where her head would have struck—and Nahan's hand wrapped over it. She had meant to drive a blade into him. He had thought of no one but her.

"Ah…!!"

Guilt surged in all at once, and her chestnut eyes were growing wet, when Nahan, wearing the same thin smile as before, whispered to her.

The same sly, gentle tone he had used the first time he spoke to her, back when she was still suspicious of him.

A short while later.

"Over there!!"

"Don't pull the blade out!!"

"Let go—your hand!!"

The warriors guarding Hestia had the alarm, and several mages came running.

"On the count of three, I'll pull it."

"Hoo…. Ready."

"Three!!!!"

Shluck!

"You son of a—!!"

The dagger yanked free in a single pull. The wound knitting shut at speed. And—

Goddamn it, is staying alive seriously this fucking hard? Can one person's luck really be this catastrophically garbage?!!

Nahan, playing Ian Red to the very last breath, swallowing a stream of curses on the inside. Hestia falling by chance. The dagger in her hand by chance. The dagger buried in him by chance.

Is this seriously just the world griefing me? At this rate, is Eclipse going to hit us right now too?

"Kyaaaaaah——!!!"

"A-assassins!! We're under attack!!"

"What!? Don't tell me it's those Black Wolf bastards!!?"

"……Oh, for fuck's sake."

For the record, that last line was Nahan's.