Engagement Period (5)
“Hwaah—what the hell. You scared me.”
The princess gave a few light smacks to the man still hiding behind her.
“Come out from back there. This is ridiculous. Are you seriously using me as a human shield right now?”
I stayed plastered to her back all the same. I could feel the slim line of her body, and even through her clothes, the warm press of her skin.
“I-is it gone?”
“The ghost, you mean? Yes. It disappeared.”
Relieved, I lifted my head again—
“It didn’t—it didn’t leave!”
—and ducked right back down.
That face was still there at the corner of the window, staring straight at us.
“Pfft! Such a coward. It’s fine. It always just stares like that for a while and then vanishes all of a sudden.”
Encouraged, I stepped out from behind her. The face was still watching us. Ordinary-looking enough, except for the missing eye and the unmistakable air of a corpse.
“You’re more of a scaredy-cat than I expected. Quite the contrast with how you handled the maid earlier.”
“The maid was a person. Ghosts are… a bit different.”
“So you’re still all wound up? Relax. It just shows up like that, hangs around for about an hour, and then it’s gone.”
“You mean it creeps slowly closer for a whole hour and then vanishes?”
“What? No. It just sits still.”
“It’s coming closer right now.”
“What are you talking—what? Why is it coming closer?”
In an instant, Elizabeth went pale with fear.
“W-why is it approaching? It’s never done this before…”
The face that had been stuck to the window was drifting slowly toward us.
“What do we do?”
“I-I don’t know. This is a first for me too.”
Flustered, Elizabeth hesitated, then flung out a hand and—
Clack.
—shut the window.
“Th-that should do it, right?”
As if a ghost was going to be stopped by a pane of glass. Of course it would just come right through. I was already halfway to abandoning the princess and bolting when—
Thud.
The ghost bounced off the window.
“What the hell.”
The princess and I traded blank looks.
“…But Sir Henry. When did you get all the way over there? Don’t tell me you were trying to run—”
“Your Highness! In front of you!”
Crash!
The ghost smashed through the window and came pouring in.
“Eek!”
I seized the princess by the scruff of her neck and hurled her backward, then swung my fist at the diving ghost.
Please.
If it could break a window, it had physical force. That meant I ought to be able to punch it—fair is fair. With that thought, I swung.
Thwack—BOOM!
The ghost was driven into the floor so hard the stone cracked in a spiderweb beneath it. Limbs twisted at wrong angles, it lay there twitching.
“Oh no. You killed it—you actually killed it…”
Elizabeth stared at the wrecked ghost, looking genuinely shocked.
“It was already dead.”
“Well, yes, but… Sir Henry. Are you sure you’re human? How does a person’s hand make a sound like a cannon going off…?”
“It’s nothing. Get further back. It’s getting up.”
The ghost contorted its broken arms and legs with a grotesque series of cracks and pops, then rose to its feet. Definitely not human, then—not if it could stand looking like that.
I settled into a stance and waited for it to charge. It lunged toward me—
What?
—then spun around and fled. With that same unnatural motion it vaulted the window, dropped from the tower, and ran for its unlife with everything it had.
“Wow. It really can move.”
Elizabeth had somehow appeared at my side again, offering that useless observation.
“I’m going after it.”
Confirming the kill was important. Or, since this was a ghost, maybe a triple-kill? Either way, you don’t let an enemy walk away.
Boom!
I couldn’t manage the ghost’s uncanny movements, so I simply smashed through the wall and jumped from the tower.
“My room…”
I heard Elizabeth’s small murmur behind me. Not important.
I hit the ground in a roll to bleed off the impact, then tore after the ghost. It zigzagged across the castle roofs, but it couldn’t shake me. I stuck to it like a shadow.
In the end, unable to lose me, it slipped into a corner of the castle. I followed it in.
And there, waiting, was Queen Mary.
“Your Majesty? What are you doing in a place like this?”
It was not, by any stretch, a room that suited a queen. Skulls littered the floor on every side. Scattered bloodstains completed a thoroughly unsettling atmosphere.
In the middle of it all, she reclined sideways in a chair.
“Who can say, young lord. What do you think I’m doing?”
The queen smiled, wicked and sweet. I take back what I said a moment ago. This room didn’t suit her? It suited her perfectly.
Smile like that and anyone would call her a witch.
The kind from fairy tales—the ones who bewitch people.
The ghost drifted to her side and whispered something against her ear. Queen Mary’s smile deepened another shade.
“Young lord. How could you.”
Her way of speaking was nothing like the court manner she used in the audience chamber. This, apparently, was her real voice.
“How could I what?”
“What else? You’ve been in Elizabeth’s room all this time, haven’t you?”
“I have.”
“My, how shameless. That’s grounds for divorce, you know. Looking to break off the engagement?”
“I don’t know that the grounds for divorce are only on my side.”
I jerked my chin toward the skulls and bloodstains strewn everywhere.
“Hiding a criminal record is probably a problem too.”
“Heh. Fair enough. Caught red-handed, I suppose.”
Queen Mary stretched with languid ease—still completely unbothered at being found out. Then she propped her chin on her hand, leaned forward, and looked at me.
She was wearing only a thin nightgown, cut very low across the chest. When she bent toward me, certain things became… frankly visible.
“Sit beside me. Let’s talk a little more. We’re engaged, and yet we hardly know each other.”
“I’d rather do it from here.”
I had no interest in closing the distance. No telling what she might try.
“Well, fine. Then we should settle this first, shouldn’t we? Do you mean to keep the engagement?”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“Why? Because I’m a witch? Because I’m sitting here among all these skulls?”
“No. I’m a pirate myself—what’s a witch on top of that? And your looks are still very much my type.”
“…My.”
“And personally, I rather like the skull décor.”
“Ahaha. You do have unusual tastes.”
The witch laughed, bright and ringing.
“Then why the hesitation?”
“That ghost earlier. Why did it attack me?”
“Ahh. So that’s what was worrying you. You needn’t worry about that.”
She gave the ghost at her chair a casual shove.
“It wasn’t after you, specifically. I just left standing orders—kill any man who enters Elizabeth’s room.”
So that was it. Now I understood why a ghost that normally only stared had suddenly come for me. If Elizabeth ever had a child, Queen Mary would be the one in trouble.
“Hmm. What to do? What would be best…?”
The witch tapped a finger against her lips, thinking, twisting her body as she considered. Every little motion dripped with coquetry.
I wound my tension tighter. If she were an ordinary woman, I could snap her neck without effort—but every scrap of evidence said she was a witch. I had to be ready if she struck first.
If I’d known, I would have brought my sword.
I could have thrown it and been done with her by now.
“Yes. We’ll do it this way.”
She’d reached a conclusion. I kept myself coiled to spring and fixed on her mouth.
“You confessed the moment you saw me, didn’t you? Was it love at first sight?”
“Yes. It was.”
“I thought so. Truthfully, when I first saw you, I felt the same.”
The queen’s red tongue traced slowly across her lips.
“I don’t know what love is supposed to be, but if love at first sight feels like anything, I imagine it’s something like this.”
So I was her type too, apparently.
“And after today, I find I like your personality as well. Looking at it this way… we almost seem made for each other, don’t we? Truly too good to kill.”
Made for each other, my ass. Her looks were very much my type, yes—but when it came to personality, Elizabeth suited me far better than the queen ever would.
“So we simply go our separate ways, then?”
“No.”
Her voice was firm.
“We can’t just leave it like that. If all we do is watch each other, what kind of marriage is that? I have expectations of my own.”
Her eyes curved into smiling crescents.
“So I’m simply going to make it as if none of this ever happened.”
Damn it. Whatever that meant, a cold premonition swept through my whole body. I launched myself like a shot.
CRASH!
The flagstones under my feet shattered with the force of the leap, and in a blink the witch was right in front of my face. I was about to strike when—
“Shit.”
—the earlier ghost threw itself into my path. I punched it to pieces, but that tiny gap was enough.
Lurch.
Something hit me—or rather, something passed straight through my body.
“Kh—”
Dizziness crashed over me in an instant. I couldn’t stay on my feet. I bit down hard on my lip, trying to stay upright, but I could already feel my head hitting the floor.
“There, young lord. Take a little nap. Sleep a while, and when you wake, you’ll have forgotten everything about today.”
The witch whispered close.
“That’s it. Good boy. Close your eyes… and sleep.”
Hot breath brushed my ear, and I sank into sleep.
I woke with a mild headache. When I opened my eyes, the ceiling above me belonged to the room I’d been assigned.
I sat up on the thoroughly luxurious bed.
What did I do last night?
Elizabeth. I’d gone to Elizabeth’s room. In the middle of the night, no less.
Why did I go?
The memory was hazy.
I remembered the two of us sitting there awkwardly. And after that we—ah. Right.
I’d seen something. Elizabeth in her nightclothes. Yeah, that had been quite a sight. No—not that.
The ghost.
I’d seen a ghost. Chased it, ended up in some strange room. Met the queen there.
And the queen had cast some kind of strange magic on me. First a wave of nausea, then something about making me lose my memories. The nausea had definitely worked. As for the rest of the spell… well.
I remembered everything from last night, perfectly clear.