The Closed City (3)
No sunlight seeps into the Closed City.
Its sky resembles a dark night sea.
There is no sun, no stars, no moon upon that night sea—only a slow, rhythmic heave like waves. The night sea seemed to have no intention of performing any of the roles a sky was meant to fulfill.
A sky that had abandoned its duty.
A city of more than a hundred thousand people abandoned with it.
The woman who stood at the head of those abandoned souls leaned against the railing, smoking. She stood on a boundary so precarious that a single nudge would send her tumbling over the edge, and she exhaled a stream of ash-gray smoke.
“Haaah… fuck.”
And, for good measure, a rough curse to go with it.
“You’ve got quite the mouth on you.”
“Try living a few years in a city like this. You’ll see whether your mouth turns foul or not. I used to be the sort who only spoke pretty words and laughed all soft and girlish—ahaha—like that.”
With a little spin she turned halfway around and rested her back against the railing. Gazing straight at Najin instead of the drop beyond, Yuel let out a long, slow plume of smoke.
“You’ve got sharp eyes, don’t you? Catching the moment I slipped my hand into my coat like that.”
“I’ve always had good eyes.”
“Your sense of tact, though, leaves something to be desired. Does a person really need to go pointing out something someone else is trying to hide?”
She grumbled.
“Are you planning to spread it around?”
“What happens if I do?”
“Well, nothing much. I’m not the kind of dictator who executes people over a little gossip. At worst I’d just scowl every time I saw your face.”
Using power to silence someone, issuing threats, blackmail—she showed no interest in any of those options.
“Don’t spread it. Not that I think people would believe it even if you did…”
Just a request, nothing more.
“It’s a carefully staged terror. It would be a problem if you ruined it.”
“Why stage terror at all?”
“Didn’t I tell you when we first met?”
Arms folded over the railing, Yuel spoke on.
“The difference between a person and a beast comes down to whether you can restrain your desires—whether you can restrain yourself. Humans are beasts that force themselves to fit the laws and norms of society.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“So if you break the law, you’re fucked. Treat the rules like shit, and the one who ends up fucked is you. That fact has to be drilled into people’s heads on a regular basis.”
“…”
“Especially in this city.”
She jerked her chin at Najin, who blinked.
“Najin, was it? You’ve been here about a week now… haven’t you felt anything?”
“Pardon?”
“The people here are impulsive. They’re easily swayed by their own hungers. They throw punches on impulse, and sometimes they kill outright. A petty argument can spiral until whole families are drawn in.”
The self-restraint a person ought to possess grew thin in this place. That was what Yuel was saying.
“Whether it’s magic or some madman’s scheme who dragged everyone here, I don’t know… but the point is this city makes it far too easy for people to turn into beasts.”
“That’s…”
“Reason doesn’t work. A kind, benevolent ruler? My predecessor tried that, and the city went straight to hell. This place doesn’t need that kind of power.”
Yuel pointed at herself.
“What a pack of beasts needs is a trainer—someone who can collar them and yank the leash. The virtues a trainer needs are severity and fear. Nothing educates a beast more reliably than fear.”
“So you’ve decided to be that trainer?”
“More or less. Even if the urge to act on impulse hits, the thought that the crazy bitch of a lord will cut their head off if they break the law makes them hold back a little. It actually works. Crime’s dropped sharply in the three years since I took over.”
Probably, she added with a bitter smile,
“because personally cutting off the previous lord’s head and putting it on display left a strong impression. Ah—he was a good man. Just not a man suited to this city.”
The fingers holding her cigarette trembled. Looking at her own shaking hand as if she found it loathsome, she watched it with eyes mixed with disgust.
“A freak like me is what this city needs.”
“You don’t look particularly crazy to me.”
“What?”
“Your hands are still shaking right now. There’s a difference between playing the freak and being one.”
“…Hah.”
As if she hadn’t expected that answer, Yuel let out a short, empty laugh. She ground out her cigarette and stepped down from the railing.
“So—have I convinced you a little?”
Najin nodded.
Yuel pointed past the railing with one finger.
“Then get lost. Before I hang your head in the square for trespassing on the lord’s castle. Next time you break in, it won’t end with a warning.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Najin shrugged, vaulted the railing, and vanished. Yuel watched him go with a look of pure disbelief. This was the fifth floor, and the man was agile as a spider, scaling the wall with practiced ease. She clicked her tongue.
And then, suddenly—
She tilted her head a fraction. Moments earlier her stomach had been churning; now it felt a little better.
“….”
Pressing a hand hard against her chest, Yuel started walking. She would probably never see him again, she thought.
2.
“….”
“….”
Tap-tap. Najin knocking on the window.
And Yuel, staring at the glass with an expression of utter disbelief, finally opened it with visible reluctance.
“Hey.”
“Yes.”
“Fuck—didn’t I tell you? Next time you trespass, I’d cut off your head and hang it in the square.”
“You did.”
“Then what is this?”
“I haven’t gone inside yet. I’m still outside, see?”
The lord’s private office.
Seated at her desk processing documents, Yuel looked at the windowsill and scowled. It was that man again. Najin was perched there in an almost leisurely posture.
How the hell had he climbed all the way up here? Were the guards not doing their jobs? Or what?
Of course the guards had their own grievances. Even with every restriction piled on him, even with his physical ability reduced to an ordinary man’s level, Najin was still a former Sword Master. Dodging a few guards’ eyes and scaling a wall was nothing to him.
I’ll have to crack a few of those guards’ joints later.
Not that Her Lordship would ever appreciate their efforts. Chin resting on her hand, Yuel gave Najin a look.
“So what is it this time?”
“Ah, nothing much.”
When someone starts with “nothing much,” it’s usually something. He’d already found her weak spot; now he’d come to make some heavy request—a job, a favor, the usual. That was how people lived.
With a sigh, Yuel opened her mouth.
“Go ahead. What’s your busi—”
Before she could finish, a roasted potato was thrust under her nose. She had seen the food a few times herself: a potato skewered and roasted, the kind sold on every market street. Steam still rose from it in soft curls.
“What is this?”
“What do you mean? It’s a roasted potato.”
“I mean why are you giving it to me?”
“It tastes pretty good.”
Najin waggled the skewer. When Yuel reluctantly took it, he seemed to consider the errand finished and simply dropped from the sill. In an instant he was gone. Yuel blinked after him.
Minutes passed with no sign of his return.
So he had truly infiltrated the lord’s castle just to deliver a single roasted potato? As if he’d been out for a stroll? From Najin’s perspective it might as well have been a stroll—but Yuel had no way of knowing that.
A genuinely trivial errand.
Blinking, she muttered,
“…Is he insane?”
The roasted potato was delicious.
Tap-tap.
“….”
Tap-tap.
“….”
Tap. Tap. Tap-tap. Tap. Tap.
“Ah, fuck!”
Yuel shot to her feet and flung the window open. There was Najin, hanging from the railing with absurd ease.
She had clearly ordered the guards to tighten security—so why? Amid a flicker of genuine astonishment she fixed him with a stare that asked, What do you want this time?
Expressionless, Najin held something out. She took it: a shop ledger. As she tilted her head to examine it, her eyes narrowed.
“What is this?”
“Picked it up at a tavern.”
Picked it up? To Yuel’s eye it was not the sort of thing one simply “picked up.” It looked like a ledger, but a closer look revealed it was a roster of criminals.
One of the several organizations operating in the city—specifically, a crime syndicate she had been keeping an eye on. The names listed matched the ones only she knew about. She looked at Najin.
“This… is solid intelligence. I don’t know how you got it, but it’ll help. So? Is there something you want from me?”
Najin pointed at the window.
“How many counts of illegal entry into the lord’s castle am I at now?”
“Five, you madman.”
“Then write them off.”
With that he turned to leave; Yuel hastily caught his sleeve. Clutching the fabric without quite meaning to, she moved her lips, searching for words—who the hell are you, what is all of this supposed to mean—
“…?”
As if he couldn’t understand why she had stopped him, Najin cocked his head, then murmured a short “Ah.” He pulled another roasted potato from his coat and held it out.
“You should’ve just said you wanted one.”
“What? No, that’s not—”
Whoosh—he was already gone over the sill.
Dumbfounded, Yuel let out a hollow laugh. Chewing the roasted potato, she left the office. She needed to start an investigation based on that roster. Walking through the castle with her aide in tow—
“M-My lord!”
Soldiers came running. They needed her to see something, they said, and led her out to the front courtyard…
“Mmph—mmph!”
“Please spare us, we were wrong, we’ll turn ourselves in, from now on we’ll really—”
“Hnnnnngh!”
There, several wanted men lay bound, while a man who looked like the boss of their organization knelt with his hands clasped, begging for his life over and over. Yuel blinked at him.
…And similar things kept happening afterward.
Every time that man appeared, a few more criminals would be waiting in the courtyard—always with one limb or another broken, faces pressed to the ground, repeating the same plea for mercy.
“What the hell are you, exactly?”
Flutter.
“Stop flapping that coat. You’re kicking up dust.”
“Ah, so you still don’t get it.”
“…What?”
Of course Najin never explained. He only fluttered his free-knight’s coat and looked faintly aggrieved, as if the lack of recognition itself were the real insult.
3.
No matter how tightly you weave the net of the law, no matter how harshly you punish those who break it… crime still happens somewhere. With more than a hundred thousand people crammed together, it was only natural.
Thanks to Najin’s advance work, a number of offenders got away with mere detention. Not all of them, though.
There were those who crossed the line into murder. Those who had blood on their hands. And Yuel had a duty to punish them.
“The charges are as follows.”
In the center of the square.
Yuel raised her sword once more.
“Death.”
No matter how many times she performed an execution, she never grew used to it. Swallowing the nausea that rose to her throat, she moved her hand.
She did not want to do this.
But she knew it was effective. Better to keep the eyes of the city fixed on her, to cultivate fear, than to appoint a separate executioner and dilute the focus.
In this city every emotion was amplified.
Fear was no exception. She needed to become the most terrifying presence here. Maintaining a blank mask, Yuel impaled the severed head on a spike. She scanned the citizens gathered in the square, then turned and walked away.
The stench of blood made her gorge rise. Her blood-sticky fingertips began to tremble; she hastily shoved them into her pockets. The cold sweat running down her nape she hid beneath her long hair.
And as she walked, voices rose behind her.
Monster. Madwoman. Stickler for rules… voices laced with fear. She listened as she kept moving.
Back up into the lord’s castle, into her office.
She shut the door with a heavy thud. The moment she was alone she sank to the floor. She lifted her blood-smeared hands and shook. Hugging her knees, she clenched her teeth until they chattered.
She could never get used to it. Biting her lip hard, she buried her face against her knees. Just a little—just a little rest. There was still so much work waiting. While she steadied her breathing and her shoulders trembled—
Tap-tap.
A sound from the window.
Yuel slowly raised her head. And the instant she saw the glass, she let out an involuntary, empty laugh.
The man hanging from the window frame.
She had laid thorns along the sill so he couldn’t sit—so now he simply clung to the railing with one hand. For a brief moment she felt something like gladness at the sight.
Yes. He’d come again today.
She hated to admit it, but right now she was glad to see him. Staggering to her feet, she opened the window.
And then—
She reached out, pulled free the trap she had set on the sill, and tossed it outside. It was useless anyway; right now it was only in the way. The moment Najin set a foot on the frame, blinking, Yuel seized him by the collar.
With a hard yank she hauled him inside.
Until now she had never allowed him past the threshold of the office. Today, apparently, was the exception. Pointing the startled Najin toward the sofa, she said,
“Sit there.”
She started to put on her usual act, then gave it up.
He already saw through everything, didn’t he? Yuel undid a couple of the tightly fastened buttons of her shirt.
It felt a little easier to breathe.
Settling on the sofa across from him, she fetched several bottles of liquor from a corner of the room. She set them on the table one after another with solid thuds, then gave a crooked grin.
“Drink with me tonight.”
She lifted a glass and tilted it toward him.
“I’m in a shitty mood, so I’m going to drink.”
Between strands of white hair that had slipped free, her red eyes wavered, precarious and bright.