Festival (6)
The fireworks that had painted the sky began to fade.
The riot of color was swallowed once more by shadow, and through the gaps in that darkness, the stars started to emerge in quiet splendor.
The fireworks in this world of magic had been far more beautiful than I’d imagined, and the brilliant bursts I’d just seen still lingered behind my eyes, making it hard to look away.
It was the kind of scene that seized me so completely I almost felt as if, if I closed my eyes, I’d see that blaze again in the darkness behind my lids.
But once all that brilliance was gone, what remained was a rather deep sense of emptiness.
I shut my eyes tightly, then opened them and let out a sigh.
Maybe I shouldn’t have talked Irene into coming to the festival at all.
I’d only meant to lighten the burden pressing on her chest, to give her even a little time to set it down and breathe easily.
But after we’d come here, what showed plainly on Irene’s face was a shadow.
She seemed so far removed from light.
As if, whenever the sun rose, she chose to stand on the far side of it, always trying to keep herself under darkness, as though she truly believed brightness and she were made of different things.
Watching Irene answer nothing, say nothing, I’d noticed one thing: whenever people around her laughed, she frowned.
It wasn’t because she disliked them or found them irritating.
It was more like they made her uncomfortable, something she instinctively avoided, like oil recoiling from water.
I thought I understood, at least vaguely, why that expression surfaced, which was why even when I smiled, it wasn’t really a smile.
If I frowned too, this gloomy mood would sink all the way to the bottom, and I was afraid of that, so I smiled instead.
Taking a deep breath, I drew the cool air in through my nose until my lungs were full.
Even so, the tightness in my chest wouldn’t go away, and when I let out a heavy breath, Irene glanced at me and spoke.
“You don’t look very happy.”
Well, thanks to you, I was feeling a little uneasy. But I couldn’t exactly say that, so I forced a smile and shrugged.
“I guess I’m just disappointed.”
“......”
“I just thought... maybe on a better day, in a better mood, with better memories, we could have come and enjoyed it more.”
It was only disappointing because that hadn’t happened. Was it my mistake for thinking she would simply enjoy the festival? Or was it her fault for seeing only the negative in the middle of all this joy?
I knew it wasn’t anyone’s fault, so all I felt was a small pang of regret.
A regret born from having let the last fireworks we’d get to see for perhaps the next five years pass so hollowly over the course of a single week.
When I shook my head and smiled bitterly, Irene stared at me blankly, then looked away and raised her eyes to the sky.
“I don’t know if there’ll be another chance.”
“Huh?”
“I mean, if the festival comes around again, let’s come back.”
I couldn’t make sense of what she meant by saying that so suddenly, so I just stared at those blue eyes, dumbfounded, and Irene spoke in her usual flat voice.
“If you’re still around then, Evan, we won’t think about complicated things like this. We’ll clear our heads, buy some skewers from the street stalls, and eat them.”
“...Yeah.”
“We’ll just come out like this and enjoy ourselves lightly.”
Still looking at the sky, Irene finally turned her gaze back to me.
Her face looked oddly relieved, so much so that I was briefly startled before she went on staring at me with a straight face.
“So, please stop making that face. Anyone would think you’d just had your heart broken.”
“...Do I really look that bad?”
“Yes. Very much so.”
I’d thought I was smiling. Apparently the crooked corner of my mouth wasn’t a smile at all, but something rather ridiculous.
I brushed my fingers over my lips and let out a faint sigh.
I didn’t know why her mood had changed so suddenly, but at least she seemed better now, and that was what mattered.
The pallor in her face no longer carried any shadow.
With no worry or gloom left in it, her expression looked much better than before, and I couldn’t help snorting softly as I looked back up at the sky.
“Did you see the fireworks earlier?”
“I did. The way the green light spread out was quite beautiful.”
“...There were green fireworks?”
As far as I remembered, there hadn’t been any such firework. When I turned to ask her that, Irene only kept looking at the sky without a word.
It must have just been a mistake. She had probably been distracted and confused the colors of the fireworks overhead.
For a moment, the green eyes reflected in my mirror flashed through my mind, but I shook my head and looked back up.
The sky, now strewn with stars instead of fireworks, was still beautiful.
#
“Young lady, where have you been?”
Carrying a skewer in one hand and Ropena asleep on his back, Sir Chris strode toward us.
Had Ropena enjoyed the festival properly? Watching her sleep so soundly while hanging from those broad shoulders made her look like a little bear cub.
“I was just walking around with Evan, that’s all.”
“...You should’ve said something before you vanished. No matter how much Evan was with you, he’s not your official escort knight.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
With a sigh at the face that looked like it would never, ever keep that in mind, Sir Chris glared at me.
He already had a scary face to begin with, and lately he’d been looking at me like that every time our eyes met.
I shrugged, and he pointed at Ropena dangling from his shoulder.
“You carry her.”
“...Yes, sir.”
Ropena was so small that she was surprisingly light.
Even with her on my back, I could barely feel any weight at all, and I had no idea where all those sweets she ate every day were going.
“Are you all right? Moving around while carrying Ropena like that?”
“She’s light, so it’s fine. Fortunately, Ropena’s on the lighter side.”
Irene, who’d been watching me quietly, turned her head away and started walking again.
People were beginning to head home one by one now, and a few of them were fanning the air with cloths to chase away the smoke drifting up into the sky.
It was time to return to the ducal estate.
The thought of the estate brought to mind the stack of documents sitting on her desk, but I shook it off before it could settle.
It wasn’t as if I could help her with them anyway, though I did hope she’d rest tonight.
She’d spent the whole day walking through the city without even really looking at anything, so even if she seemed fine now, the fatigue she’d piled up would likely catch up to her later.
I didn’t want to see her force herself through more papers and collapse again.
“You should go to bed early tonight and deal with the work you had tomorrow morning.”
When I said that, Irene glanced at me briefly before speaking.
“You say that so easily. I’m the one who has to deal with it.”
“...I’m telling you because I’m afraid you’ll collapse again. If you fall asleep at your desk, you could catch a cold.”
That’s why I even covered you with a blanket.
When I added that, Irene narrowed her eyes, then turned her head away again.
What exactly was I supposed to do with her? She was my charge, yes, but she was a difficult woman indeed.
I shook my head, and Ropena, still on my back, mumbled sleepily and rubbed her cheek against me.
Was she talking in her sleep? I gave a small laugh at the soft sensation against my back, and hearing it, Ropena muttered something and twitched her hand on my shoulder.
Had Ropena enjoyed the festival in her own way? Seeing that Sir Chris still had a skewer in one hand made it seem like he’d listened to all of her complaints.
For all his rough appearance, he had a warm heart, and the way he treated Ropena made him look almost like he was dealing with his own daughter.
Perhaps sensing that I was looking at him, Sir Chris glanced at me for a moment, frowned, and spoke.
“What are you staring at so hard for?”
“I was just wondering what you did at the festival.”
“What do you think? Ropena kept whining that she wanted something to eat, so I ended up spending money for no good reason.”
Looking at his face, twisted as though he found the whole thing irritating, I snorted.
If he’d really hated it, he wouldn’t have spent the money in the first place. He’s stingy with me, but for some reason he’s soft when it comes to Ropena.
When I laughed, apparently unable to stand the sight of it, Sir Chris started glaring at me fiercely.
Looks like he was taking his irritation out on me again. But that angry stare lasted only a moment before Sir Chris gave a dry laugh and turned away.
Chirr—
Before long, silence spread in every direction. A medieval silence I could never have felt in modern times.
The wind blowing between the roads, where there were no tall buildings and no neon signs blotting out the stars, felt cool against my skin.
There was no exhaust, no smell of cigarettes strong enough to make me frown on its own.
The scent carried in from the forest was grassy, and now and then a faint fishy tang told me there must be a river beyond those hills.
The chirring of insects, the rustle of wind brushing through the grass.
Every time my foot struck the ground, the sound of gravel crunching beneath it carried a strange rhythm, and the white noise of the quiet seemed to settle my mind.
The bustle of the festival had been nice too, of course, but this stillness wasn’t bad either.
For a while I walked, feeling the wind stroke gently across my face, until a huge manor came into view in the distance.
A manor painted blue, probably the one closest to the sky in all this area.
When we finally reached the main gate, what waited there was the captain of the guard, and the less-than-pleasant memory I’d had before came back to me.
So I handed Ropena back to Sir Chris and followed Irene.
Perhaps noticing that I was beside her, Irene spoke when I had almost reached her.
“...Are you tired?”
I had no idea why she was suddenly asking that, but when I shook my head, Irene stared at me intently.
As if she had something to say, she worked her lips a little, then stopped in front of her door and let out a sigh.
“...Haah.”
“Young lady?”
Had she forgotten something? But she hadn’t carried anything with her separately, so that didn’t seem likely.
When I looked at Irene in concern, she turned her eyes to me and spoke.
“Now go inside and get some rest.”
“Huh?”
What was that supposed to mean?
When I frowned, Irene narrowed her eyes in obvious displeasure, rubbed her forehead with one hand, and went on.
“...You worked hard today.”
Her blue eyes, visible through the thin slit of her lids, flickered for a moment before hiding behind shut eyes.
As if she were embarrassed.
“You kept talking to someone who never answered you. You kept worrying about me while I was walking all over the place. That’s what I’m saying when I say you worked hard.”
So she’d noticed the way I’d been the whole time.
And at the same time, the fact that she’d recognized it made my chest tighten with warmth, so I could only stand there and look at her in silence.
I said nothing until she met my gaze directly.
At last her closed eyes opened slowly, and those blue eyes, no longer trembling, met mine.
“I’m fi—”
Just as I opened my mouth, Irene cut me off firmly and answered.
“I’m not fine. Stop making people worry about you and go get some rest already.”
After saying that, she cast me one last cold look, then turned her back to the door.
I was still stunned by how completely her attitude had changed, as if that had been the end of everything she meant to say, when she opened the door, stepped inside, and looked back at me to mutter softly,
“You can go now. Ropena will be here soon.”
Thunk—
And the door closed.
Without even hearing whatever I might have said, the door had shut with a ruthlessness that left me staring at it in disbelief.
A passing maid kept stealing glances at me, and those looks felt uncomfortably sharp.
What exactly was I supposed to do now? I couldn’t just go back like this, not while Irene still weighed on my mind.
What if she was still buried in those documents? What if she collapsed and fell asleep again?
Worry rose up before I could stop it, and in the end I carefully knocked on the closed door.
After a moment, Irene’s voice came from beyond it.
“...I’m going to bed early too. So just relax and rest.”
When I heard that, a sigh of relief escaped me at last.
The tightness inside me loosened by just a little, and it finally felt as though I could breathe more easily.
But because my feet refused to move away from that door, I smiled bitterly and stared blankly at the room where she was.
“Stop making people worry about you and go get some rest already.”
The words she’d spoken—don’t make people worry—kept strangely echoing in my ears.
Why did that sentence make me feel so good? Was it because her attitude, once so harsh, had softened into something gentler?
Or because I was simply happy that Irene had said she was paying attention to me?
It should have been a meaningless line, and yet for some reason that drowsy voice kept seeming to drift down the hallway and circle around me.
I have no idea what’s wrong with me.
After dragging a dry hand across my face once, I let out a sigh and started walking.
It was probably just because I was tired.
After a little sleep, I’d forget this feeling in no time.
Definitely.
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