Earthbound Spirit
The new-hire recruitment in Avignon wrapped up more or less successfully.
Arturo Paleheart swore his loyalty to me with an intensely serious expression, and his younger sister Arisa joined the party as well.
Of course Arisa was a complete freeloader who couldn't do a single useful thing, but I could hardly leave the kid behind in some hut either. I'd already promised to help, so I decided to look after her and call it a good deed. Arturo's work ethic would improve that much more—win-win. Besides, I happened to need a sharp secretary right about now.
For the moment she was still young and couldn't see, so assigning her real work would be difficult. But if I diligently taught her this and that, later on I could work her to the bone as much as I liked.
And… though it was a thought I really shouldn't entertain. If—just if—Arturo ever betrayed me—
…I could use her as a hostage to keep him in line.
It was a trashy idea, but there was no helping it.
Arturo Paleheart was neither a devout believer who would do anything for his faith, nor a vengeful spirit nursing hatred toward heretics or other races. If the only compensation I could offer him was gold coins, it wouldn't be strange for him to switch sides at any time. So the wise… yes, the wise method was for me to personally protect Arisa, build a rapport, and stamp the master-servant relationship into him so thoroughly that he wouldn't get any foolish ideas.
…Damn it.
I barely managed to keep from throwing up at my own inventiveness and leaned back against the still-rattling inner wall of the carriage. This was no situation in which I could afford to be hobbled by some pathetic sense of guilt. Our thoroughly ruined order was only just about to dig the first spadeful of reconstruction, and Arturo Paleheart was the finest blade for gutting the loan-shark king. He was far too important a card to abandon control over for the sake of private feelings.
I had already seen clearly, back in the modern world, what becomes of idealists who insist on walking only the righteous path. Here, even if it was terrible, following the judgment of reason was the best course.
"Ah, I miss my senior."
I felt inexplicably sad today.
The carriage ride was still garbage. It was a groundbreaking level of unpleasantness that no amusement-park attraction could match. How does your leg hurt just from sitting in a vehicle? I had packed a soft pillow as a cushion for times like this, but since the carriage itself was rattling like mad, it didn't help much.
In the end there was only one way to escape this hellish motion sickness.
"I'll borrow your lap for a bit."
I offered an apology that would never reach the soundly sleeping Rebecca and lay down. The carriage still rattled hard enough to put any carnival ride to shame, but once I was horizontal, sleep came with surprising ease.
Yeah. I'd been living pretty busily lately. Until we reached Montpellier, I would just close my eyes for a little while—just a little while.
According to the sophisticated satellite maps and distance-measurement methods of the twenty-first century, the distance from Montpellier to Avignon is about ninety-seven kilometers. That figure is measured from the central points of the administrative divisions of modern France known as Départements, and it matches exactly the distance on the Europa Continent, whose topography is identical to Earth's Europe.
Of course that is a short hop that would take an hour by car. Sadly, the cutting-edge conveyance of the Middle Ages—the carriage—moves at less than one-tenth the speed of an automobile. Racing down unpaved roads at a pace that would make a fair contest with a slug only results in the wheels and the horses getting smashed to pieces together in perfect harmony.
"There's a decent clearing up ahead. It's getting late, so let's rest for the night and continue tomorrow."
"Uh… let's do that."
Therefore, when traveling by carriage, proper rest and reorganization are essential. The carriage is fragile, the wheels are fragile, and the horses pulling it are fragile. That is simply how this era is. Both people and objects are so frail that they snap or shatter into fragments at the slightest provocation. There is no need to spell out how easily a wooden body fitted with wooden wheels will come apart while hurtling over unpaved roads.
"We're here, we're here. First, let's get a fire going—"
The coachman parked the carriage in the clearing with practiced skill and busily moved about preparing the campsite.
"…Brother, how much farther to Montpellier?"
"They say if we leave tomorrow morning we'll arrive around midday. Rest while you eat something."
The Paleheart siblings climbed down from the carriage, sat beside the campfire, and warmed themselves while chatting quietly. The girl who had lost both her parents and her sight overnight confirmed the coming schedule in her usual cautious voice, yet this time with a faint thread of hope.
Ever since Saintess Asty had bestowed the goddess's grace in exchange for her eyes, the headaches and crushing fatigue that had tormented her so relentlessly had vanished completely. Arisa understood Asty's medical treatment as a kind of sorcery. In keeping with the truth that everything in the world exacts a price, she had come to believe that Asty had offered her eyes as a sacrifice to restore her health. And healing a body that was already falling apart in exchange for eyes that were already ruined was the sort of ruinously generous service that even a working angel would shake her head at.
In reality it was simply that the infection spreading from her eyeballs into her entire head had been purified, and her condition had improved naturally as a result. But since her health had improved, it was all the goddess's grace. And so hope was born. To a girl who had been walking an endless downhill path ever since her family's collapse, someone had appeared who had essentially granted a miracle without demanding payment.
"Then I'll rest just a little…"
"Yeah. Rest well."
Her brother, however, did not believe in miracles. It was not that he suffered from misanthropy or paranoia; their situation had simply been that dire. A family that had once occupied the lower rungs of the upper class had fallen overnight, and Arturo—still of an age that needed protection—had been forced to become a guardian whether he liked it or not. To make matters worse, the blood relative he had to protect was a young child who had lost her sight, and the only thing he could rely on was his own martial skill, which still had a long way to go.
To a young man who had resolved to become strong enough to face such absurd trials, a miracle that arrived without the slightest omen felt like a lie. The two girls who had come to them also looked a little too young. Asty, who appeared roughly the same age as his sister, especially so.
"…Haa."
But he could not simply display this tangled state of mind. When all was said and done, the ones holding the initiative were on the other side. If a penniless fallen noble who would have to go dig wild greens the moment his money ran out rashly revealed his suspicions, both he and his sister would end up on the street. So for now there was no other way. He could not know whether the words of the girl who called herself a Saintess were true, but even if she was suspicious, it was not a situation in which he could do anything about it. She was endlessly dubious, yet she did not seem like a bad person. All he could do was pray that this was not the beginning of a cursed bond.
"Here—your bandage has come loose. You were told to keep it on until the prosthetic eye is made, so please bear with it even if it feels a little stuffy."
"Ah…? You startled me. Thank you…!"
Yet the most suspicious one was not Asty but Rebecca. Asty, who claimed the title of Saintess, was strange in every word and gesture, but he could roughly grasp what sort of person she was. This one, however, was completely opaque; he could not begin to fathom what intentions she harbored. He understood that she was something like Asty's guardian, but for what reason, exactly, was she guarding that girl's side? And what was that lantern hanging at her waist?
No—more than that. Had she been awake this entire time? And had she approached his sister so silently that he never even noticed, and fixed her bandage?
In the ordinary world, that sort of thing is called a threat.
Arturo, eldest son of a rural baronial house, knew little of the subtle wars of nerves and political rhetoric between people, but he felt a profound threat in a superior who could approach Arisa without a sound. Still, he could not crudely demand to know what scheme this was from someone who clearly outclassed him. With his sister's safety always his highest priority, Arturo carefully probed Rebecca's intentions as gently as he could.
"…How long have you been awake? I assumed you were sleeping."
"I have been awake from the beginning. I simply remained still so that the Saintess could rest."
And he was certain. This girl, skilled yet somehow vacant-looking, was unmistakably a madwoman who lived only for Asty. Feeling an inexplicable mixture of kinship and unease toward Rebecca, who flaunted her madness as if it were the most natural thing in the world, Arturo simply nodded and let the moment pass.
"Then I must clear the path ahead, so I'll be going."
Rebecca laid Asty down beside the campfire and left the campsite. The Paleheart siblings had no idea what her words meant. In truth, it would have been the same no matter whom they had brought along.
And so the rioters of Avignon received three skulls.