Ten Years Is Enough
The resignation letter in his breast pocket felt heavier than his armor. Kael stood beside a pillar in the banquet hall, weighing that burden. A single sheet of paper. Three lines of text. It was an object that had no business carrying any weight at all. Yet his shoulder seemed to tilt to one side beneath it.
The grand banquet hall of Wallenstein Grand Ducal Castle was packed tonight as if it had swallowed half the empire. Nobles from the capital, vassals from the North, and the imperial guard in their white cloaks. Chandelier light shattered across every wineglass. It was the engagement announcement banquet for Northern Grand Duke’s daughter Elise von Wallenstein and Crown Prince Leonard. They called it the greatest celebration of imperial year 612.
“Hey, you.”
An old viscount beside him crooked a finger. Kael turned his head.
“My wineglass is empty.”
“I am not a servant. I am Her Highness the Grand Duke’s daughter’s escort knight.”
“Escort?” The viscount looked Kael up and down. The worn sword belt. The plain uniform without ornamentation. The empty space on his chest where a family crest should have been.
“Ah, that commoner escort. I’ve heard of you. Your name was… Karl? Kel?”
“……”
“Well, it doesn’t matter. Still, you should have some sense. Standing there while a glass sits empty on a night like this?”
The viscount returned to his group with a laugh. Using a commoner as an escort was only possible in the North. In the capital they would have made him a stable hand. His companions laughed along with him. Kael picked up the empty glass, refilled it, and brought it back. It was what he had done for ten years now—polishing swords, filling glasses, and having his name forgotten. All three tasks were familiar to him.
A trumpet sounded from the dais.
“His Highness the Crown Prince enters!”
White and gold. Crown Prince Leonard looked as if he had been woven from light itself. With every step, nobles bowed like a wave. And beside him, Elise von Wallenstein descended the stairs. Her silver hair blazed white beneath the chandeliers. The Star of the North. The youngest aura user in the empire. A name spoken by high society with equal parts jealousy and awe.
Kael lowered his gaze. An escort did not look directly at his master. That was one of the rules etched into his body over the past ten years. Instead, the previous night came to mind.
“At tomorrow’s banquet, stand where you cannot be seen.”
In the office, Elise stood with her back to him. Snow fell beyond the window.
“This is in front of His Highness the Crown Prince. If something like you stands at my side, it lowers my dignity.”
“Understood.”
“Is that all you have to say?”
“I have nothing else to offer.”
Elise turned around. Kael did not look at whatever expression lay on her face. He had learned long ago that not looking was easier.
“…You’re always like that.”
“I apologize.”
“You apologize, yet you don’t even blink? Don’t you have any thoughts about me becoming engaged?”
It struck him as a strange question. For an escort, his master’s marriage was merely a change in patrol routes. He was not paid a salary high enough to entertain thoughts beyond that.
“I offer my congratulations on Your Highness’s bright future.”
At that moment Elise swept the documents off her desk. Papers scattered like snow.
“Get out.”
“Yes.”
“No—wait.”
Behind Kael as he gripped the door handle, a voice sharp as a blade flew and embedded itself.
“Just so there is no misunderstanding.”
One beat.
“If you thought something like you meant anything in my life, it only means I have been too good to you these ten years. You are a sword. When it grows dull from use, it is discarded.”
Kael turned the handle.
“I will keep that in mind.”
As he walked down the corridor after leaving the room, strangely enough, he felt no anger. Anger was an emotion that required expectation. That night, Kael sat at the desk in his quarters and unfolded a sheet of paper. Three lines were enough. Once the resignation letter was written, the only task left was packing.
A narrow room in the corner of the annex. He had lived there for ten years, yet a single bag was more than enough. Two changes of clothes. A whetstone. The old sword-maintenance oil his master had given him. From the bottom of a drawer came a necklace. A wolf’s fang threaded on a leather cord. It was something thirteen-year-old Kael in his first year as an apprentice had carved himself after subjugating his first magic beast, as a memento.
He had once thought that when he accomplished something worthy, he would proudly receive a knight appointment and wear this as proof. There had been a time when he entertained such childish thoughts. Kael stared at the necklace for a moment, then placed it back in the drawer and closed it. There were things to take and things to leave behind. That was the possession of an apprentice who had dreamed inside these walls, not of a man walking out of them.
As he closed the bag, footsteps sounded outside the door. A young maid carrying laundry paused.
“Oh, Sir Kael. Where are you going?”
“Far away.”
“After the banquet tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“Come back soon. If you’re not here, the young lady torments everyone around her.”
Instead of answering, Kael closed the door. The maid had misunderstood. The Grand Duke’s daughter tormented people whether he was there or not.
The memory broke at the sound of applause. On the dais, Northern Grand Duke Gregor held up a wineglass. His thunderous voice split the banquet hall.
“The sun of the empire and the star of the North stand together! Heaven itself shall witness today’s vow!”
Cheers. Applause. The clink of glasses. Crown Prince Leonard lifted Elise’s hand. His smile was perfect. Precisely measured in every angle. Beside him, Elise was smiling as well. Yet her gaze was sweeping across the hall, as if searching for something. It reached the shadowed spot beside the pillar and stopped the instant it met Kael’s eyes.
A security check. Kael gave a small bow. All is well, the gesture reported. The route is secured and there are no suspicious individuals. What else could that look possibly be asking?
Elise’s lips moved. The distance was too great for him to hear. There was no need to hear. Kael slipped a hand into his coat. Now was the time, he decided. The announcement was over. The engagement was officially established, and the handover documents for the escort position had been submitted to the knight order’s office yesterday. The moment the imperial guard took over, a commoner escort would become nothing more than an undignified ornament. She had said so herself. He was simply doing exactly as she had instructed.
Kael stepped away from the pillar. He walked straight through the center of the banquet hall. Nobles who had been about to dance froze and made way. Murmurs rippled outward at the sight of a commoner wearing a worn sword belt walking directly toward the dais. Two imperial guards blocked his path.
“Insolent. Do you know where you stand?”
“I am the personal escort of Her Highness the Grand Duke’s daughter. I have a report to deliver directly to Her Highness.”
“If it is a report, follow the proper procedure—”
“It concerns my escort duties. It must be now.”
It was not a lie. On the dais, Grand Duke Gregor raised a hand and waved the guards aside. His expression was amused.
“This is a Northern banquet. If a Northern knight says he has a report, what is there to block? Come up.”
Kael climbed the steps. Five paces away stood Elise. For the first time in ten years, he faced head-on the person he had guarded from behind. Her silver eyes were trembling. The face of someone asking why he was there. A natural reaction. She had ordered him to stand where he could not be seen. This would be his final act of disobedience.
“What… report?” Elise’s voice was half a beat slower than usual.
Kael drew the paper from his coat. He held the three-line document with both hands and offered it to her.
“It is my resignation letter.”
The banquet hall fell silent.
“Please accept it.”
Elise looked down at the paper. Then at Kael. Then at the paper again. The simple back-and-forth took a long time.
“…What?”
“As of today, I am relinquishing my position as escort. The handover documents were submitted to the knight order’s office yesterday. I have also included the imperial guard’s security plan, so there will be no gaps.”
“You—what are you—”
“As a free citizen, I require no separate permission for my person. However, having served you for ten years, I believed it proper to deliver my final farewell in person.”
The words came without hesitation. They were sentences he had polished roughly a hundred times at his desk the night before. The Crown Prince took a step closer. His smile remained, but his eyes did not smile.
“What an interesting fellow. Resigning on such an auspicious day. May I ask the reason, Sir Knight?”
“I am not a knight. I am a commoner.”
Kael answered without looking at the Crown Prince. His gaze remained fixed on Elise. The final report belonged to the master.
“The reason is simple.”
Elise’s lips had turned deathly pale. They parted as if to speak, then closed again without producing sound.
“I was taught that a sword is discarded when it grows dull from use. Ten years is long enough for it to have grown dull. I am simply removing myself from the sword belt before I am thrown away.”
It was the first time Kael had ever seen how a person’s face could change when their own words came back to strike them.
“The salary and grace I have received all this time—”
Kael bowed. Exactly the angle he had first learned as an apprentice ten years ago.
“Ten years is enough to have repaid them.”
He straightened. Elise had still not taken the resignation letter. Kael gently placed the paper in her hand. The fingertips that touched her glove were like ice.
“Kael.”
It was the first time. In ten years, the first time Elise had called his name. Not “you,” not “hey,” not “escort.” This was the first time she had used any other form of address. So she had known his name. He was a little surprised, and that was all.
Kael turned. No one stopped him as he descended the stairs. Even Grand Duke Gregor stood frozen, glass still in hand. The banquet hall doors closed behind him.
In the corridor, two apprentice knights stood guard. Having apparently heard the commotion inside, their eyes widened at the sight of him.
“Sir Kael, are you really quitting?”
“Yes.”
“Um, where will you go? Do you have somewhere to stay? For a commoner, an escort career alone won’t…”
“It will be enough to live on.”
The apprentice fidgeted, then bowed. He was one of the boys who had learned the wooden sword from Kael in the training grounds. The formal knights considered learning from a commoner shameful, but the apprentices were different. Kael had been the only one willing to teach them.
“…Thank you for everything.”
“Fix that habit of letting your sword tip waver.”
“Yes!”
That was the last exchange he had inside the grand ducal castle.
Outside, it was snowing. The northern winter wind sliced through his coat. The old stable hand raised an eyebrow at Kael’s bag.
“Shall I bring out a horse?”
“No. Horses are the Grand Duke’s property. I will walk.”
“In this snow? It’s still a long way to the gate.”
“I am used to snow paths.”
The old man asked no more. Instead he pulled a bundle of dried jerky from beneath a saddle rack and stuffed it into Kael’s bag.
“This isn’t the Grand Duke’s property. It’s mine, so take it.”
“…Thank you.”
“Ten years ago when you first arrived.” The old man fiddled with the stable lantern. “You were skin and bones, looked like you hadn’t eaten for three days, and the first thing you did was offer to shovel horse dung. No one even told you to. That’s when I knew—this boy won’t last long here.”
“Why?”
“A man who does more than his share ends up one of two ways. He rises, or he leaves. But a commoner can’t rise here.”
Kael stood silently for a moment, then adjusted his bag.
“Take care.”
“Heading south?”
“That is the plan.”
“Wise choice.”
Once he passed through the castle gate, the snow grew heavier. Kael walked without looking back. They said the South was warm. With a single sword, he could earn a meal anywhere.
He could not know what was happening behind the closed doors at his back. Therefore Kael did not see it—how Elise von Wallenstein stood on the dais clutching the resignation letter, how her hand trembled so violently that the paper crumpled, how the protagonist of the engagement announcement banquet could not manage a single smile that entire night.