The Only Golden Eyes
How absurd.
"If you're going to waste your breath, go outside and get some work done instead. I want the Phoenix Bank matter wrapped up within the week."
Once Phoenix Bank passed into our hands, I could erase every document connected to Twilight Mansion. Besides, the debts were fabricated lies to begin with — their vanishing wouldn't cost the bank a thing.
I'd scrub Twilight Mansion's records spotless and hand it over to Cassion... and then, what to do about Phoenix Bank?
True, it was a bank I'd bought solely to get my hands on Twilight Mansion, but having bought it, I couldn't just let it sit there gathering dust.
I'd have to run it properly.
Restoring credit and an image that had crumbled into ruin would take a long while, but once it stood on solid footing, the bank would prove a tremendous asset. I needed to root out the people connected to Julia as well — and for that, I'd have to acquire the bank outright, staff included. Hardly a condition I relished, but there was no way around it.
"This and that are such a hassle. Maybe I should just carve the bank up and sell it off."
"No."
Loomdrax reacted to my muttered musing instantly.
"Why not?"
"Where else can you launder money as well as a bank? Round and round it goes until nobody can tell whose money it is — it's simply beauti—"
"Loomdrax!"
There he went again, bringing up crime.
A few days after we'd hashed out a rough contract, Loomdrax and I sat down to fine-tune the details. I asked him to refrain from criminal work while he was with me; for all his genius at disguise and fraud, I wanted to avoid stirring up trouble if I could help it.
Unexpectedly, Loomdrax agreed without a fuss. In exchange for going straight, I'd promised him an astronomical sum. And in the end, I'd even handed over a Dragon's Vow.
"That would be a breach of contract."
When I delivered that one cold remark, Loomdrax shrugged.
"Can't I even open my mouth?"
"You'd better watch what you say, too."
Loomdrax muttered "Strict, all right" — whether to himself or for my ears, I couldn't tell — then tipped back his glass and gulped the milk down in great swallows.
"Oh! That's the young lady's milk!"
Jenice, who had been sitting beside me at her embroidery, flung her needlework down and rounded on Loomdrax.
Loomdrax and Jenice squabbled for a good long while. Ever since he'd arrived, not a single day in the office had known quiet; the man couldn't endure even a moment of silence. At times I honestly couldn't tell whether hiring him had been the right call.
"Oh, right — I'll be gone all day tomorrow."
"Where are you off to?"
Having pried Jenice off him — with Loomdrax's gift for gab, Jenice must have lost — he stubbornly peered at the bottom of the snack plate as he asked. His hand roamed the empty dish, then dropped away in disappointment.
"The royal palace."
Loomdrax straightened at once. Wearing a gravity that had come from nowhere, he dragged his chair over to my side.
"When do I get to set foot in the royal palace?"
"Wait just a little longer. The bank matter comes first. But why are you so obsessed with sacred relics?"
I asked the question that had been on my mind for ages.
"Is there some story behind it, perhaps?"
Loomdrax's eyes went moist.
At the sight of those sorrowful eyes, Jenice apparently decided he must carry some secret, unspeakable past, for she fixed him with a gaze brimming with anticipation.
Loomdrax leaned against the window. Standing with the sunlight at his back, he threw his face into shadow.
What a show.
I propped my chin on my hand and watched him. If nothing else, I had to admit his acting was superb.
"A sad story, is it?" Jenice asked, her voice gone gentle, as if their fight had never happened.
Loomdrax heaved a low sigh and swept his hair back. Jenice clasped her hands together and hung on his every word.
Really — they do say you grow fond of someone through fighting. I'd better rein Jenice in first.
I'd brought him in to deceive the enemy, and now he looked set to fleece my own allies first.
I caught the skirt of Jenice, who was drifting toward Loomdrax, and plopped her down beside me.
"You're making me antsy — stop stalling and tell us already."
Deigning not even to hear my prodding, Loomdrax kept his gaze riveted on Jenice alone.
"To me, the sacred relics are... Do you want to hear, my lady?"
Jenice hung on his lips. Loomdrax drew close and lifted the tip of her chin, and as if possessed, she nodded.
"If the lady wants to hear it, then tonight, come to my room... Ugh!"
Having held back and held back, I finally swung the cushion. It caught Loomdrax squarely in the side and dropped to the floor.
"Hey! Diana!"
At Loomdrax's cry, Jenice snapped back to her senses. She jerked upright and scrambled away, and Loomdrax smacked his lips in disappointment.
"Jenice, don't forget that Loomdrax is a con man."
Realizing she'd been played, Jenice flew into a rage.
"Let's go meet the president of Phoenix Bank right away."
I drove Loomdrax out. Only after he'd left the room, grumbling all the while, did the office finally fall quiet.
The day of Dayson's birthday finally arrived.
I went to the Third Prince's Palace in the small hours of dawn. I'd have liked to sleep in, but I dragged myself up to get Cassion ready.
This time, too, the cargo wagon crossed the palace threshold without a hitch. The scent of straw — steeped in just the right measure of sunlight and moisture — stirred a curious feeling in me. Not bad, but I'd rather not smell it a second time. Wrapped in straw like livestock feed, I felt as though I'd turned into a horse myself.
Let today be the last time I come and go by cargo wagon. I clenched both fists. With my eyes closed, I could feel the steady ridges and dips of the palace floor — the wagon bouncing along with a thunk, thunk, thunk.
Feeling out those uneven palace roads, I recalled everything we had done to prepare for the banquet. Over the past several days, Flac and Jenice, Rebert and Loomdrax had worked themselves to the bone for Dayson's birthday banquet. This was no simple dinner — it was the First Prince's table, and every guest invited would arrive adorned a good deal more extravagantly than they ever dressed on ordinary days.
And yet Cassion had nothing fit to wear to a birthday banquet — no clothes worthy of the occasion, no accessories to go with them. We'd struck an obstacle before the banquet had even begun. The clothes I'd bought him beforehand were high-end as ready-made garments went, but they still couldn't hold a candle to a tailored fit. Having a new design made from scratch, on the other hand, would take more time than we had.
I should have had them made well in advance. We'd met a fair number of times in a short span, yet the thought had never once crossed my mind. A shame — but this time, I settled on buying ready-made clothes off the rack and dressing them up as lavishly as I could.
The designer proposed adding ruffles to a child's ready-made outfit. Cassion was horrified; his objections were overruled. Alterations, done strictly by the book, would have meant a seamstress measuring the wearer and going through fitting after fitting, but that whole cumbersome process was skipped as well. From the measurements Flac had taken and my verbal portrait of Cassion alone, the designer still managed to produce a fairly convincing garment. For accessories, I went through the pieces I used myself and picked out those that weren't bound to either gender.
Jenice, who had never once styled a man's hair in her life, took charge of Cassion's. She promptly threw herself into a frenzy of practice — and Loomdrax became its sacrificial victim.
And Rebert...
"I need a very strong painkiller. He has to keep his mind sharper than usual, so it needs a stimulant in it as well. Can you make that?"
To answer my outrageous request, Rebert compounded and recompounded medicines day and night. And he delivered a result worth the effort. I couldn't vouch for the painkilling component, but the wakefulness effect was beyond doubt.
Two nights before, I had taken that medicine and slept not a wink — and I hadn't merely passed the hours. I'd read an entire scholar's tome, one so notoriously dull it was nicknamed the sleeping pill, from first page to last.
For the people who had pulled off all these feats in a matter of days, there was one thing I could give.
"When it's all over, everyone takes a few days off. I've set aside generous vacation pay."
Vacation and a money pouch. Everyone but Loomdrax waved their hands in refusal, but what ought to be given must be given, and what ought to be received must be received. I had crammed the money into their pouches whether they liked it or not. That had been the business of the past few days.
"It's time to get ready, Your Highness."
I woke Cassion — perpetually stormy in the mornings — and got breakfast and his medicine into him. His eyes grew clearer by the minute.
At my signal, Jenice brought out the garments.
Cassion wore whatever Jenice dressed him in, docile as could be — until he frowned and began pushing her hands away.
"Don't touch my bangs."
"But Your Highness, sweeping your hair back looks far more handsome on you."
Jenice stamped her feet, comb and hair-fixing cream in hand. Cassion shook his head, unyielding.
"My lady."
Jenice turned to me for help.
"Your Highness, let's put your hair up."
"No."
"Why not?"
"It's uncomfortable."
"In what way?"
"Because I'm the only one — the only one with golden eyes."
Cassion knew that unless he gave a reason, neither Jenice nor I would back down, so he answered honestly. But even hearing it, we couldn't retreat.
"That's exactly why you ought to show them off! We must make it plain for all to see that Your Highness is the only person alive with eyes the same color as His Majesty Karman's!"
The kingdom currently had three claimants to the throne. The first was Dayson; the second, Dayson's sister Yumire; the third, Cassion.
Yumire had been born a mere month before Cassion, and that single month made her second in the line of succession. She was a seven-month baby, born before a full term had run its course — delivered just seven months into her mother's pregnancy. Had she been born on schedule, she would have been the younger sibling, junior even to Cassion.
There were rumors that Julia had schemed to deliver Yumire before Cassion could be born. I didn't know whether such a thing was truly possible, but if anyone could manage it, Julia could. What a terrifying woman.
I cut off my thoughts of Julia and turned back to the three claimants. Between them, the three had divided Karman's features evenly: Dayson took after the King's frame, and Yumire had black hair the very image of his. And Cassion — though his overall bearing was nothing like Karman's — had been born with the golden eyes that were the very emblem of the royal house. Julia and Dayson, who despised those eyes, had scowled with displeasure every time they looked at Cassion.
"Today, hold your head high. And while we're at it, shall we trim your bangs a little?"
Perhaps it was the memory of all those cold stares, endured for so long. Cassion couldn't bring himself to decide.
"Give me the scissors."
So I made the decision for him. When someone wavers, sometimes all it takes is a gentle push from behind to summon the courage.