If You Saved Me, You Must Take Responsibility
The one whose execution had been postponed was supposed to return to prison.
The Condemnation Recorder was supposed to return to the record room.
That was the normal procedure.
“Why have I been made the surveillance officer for Lady Rochard?”
I asked Bishop Hadrian, keeping my voice as calm as I could manage.
I’m not sure it sounded calm. The sensation of Evelyn’s grip still lingered on my left wrist, and the people at the execution ground were still staring at the two of us.
Hadrian stayed silent for a moment. His gaze wasn’t on me; it was on Evelyn’s bearing as she stood at my side.
“The one who requested the re-examination was Candidate Lucia.”
“Correct.”
“Since you raised the possibility of evidence tampering, it is only reasonable that Candidate Lucia bear responsibility for recording the re-examination as well.”
“Recording responsibility and surveillance responsibility are not the same thing.”
“Criminal Evelyn Rochard is currently under suspended execution. There is a risk of flight, and she is in a position to claim that imperial evidence was manipulated.”
Evelyn let out a low laugh.
“Flight, is it?”
She only turned her head toward me.
“With the Saintess Candidate who saved my life standing right here, where could I possibly run?”
The words sounded strange. The content was cooperative, yet the tone was anything but. It felt like a public declaration, pulling me to her side in front of everyone.
I swallowed quietly.
“Lady Rochard.”
“Evelyn.”
“Pardon?”
“If you’re going to address me, that’s too long. You’re my surveillance officer, aren’t you?”
Someone in the spectator seats cleared their throat.
I stiffened my expression.
“We are in the middle of official proceedings.”
“Then I’ll say it officially. I designate Candidate Lucia Bennett as the surveillance officer for Evelyn Rochard.”
Hadrian’s eyes narrowed.
Evelyn did not flinch from that gaze.
“A prisoner with a postponed execution requires protective surveillance. Thanks to this person, I was spared only moments ago. Therefore, I will trust no surveillance officer except her.”
“There is no procedure allowing a criminal to choose her own surveillance officer.”
“Nor is it common for the person who pointed out a recording error right before execution to become that officer.”
The air between them stretched thin and sharp.
I stood trapped in the middle of it.
I wanted to run.
Truly.
But if I ran, Evelyn would fall back into the sect’s hands. If the surveillance officer came from Hadrian’s faction, the re-examination would become a mere formality. The silver cup could vanish, and Evelyn would climb the execution platform once more.
I bit my lip.
Evelyn eased the gaze she had fixed on me, just a fraction.
Enough for me to flee.
Or enough to force me to choose.
That small mercy was what finally moved me.
“I will take responsibility.”
Hadrian turned to me.
“Candidate Lucia.”
“Until the re-examination is complete, I will assume protective surveillance of Lady Evelyn Rochard and the re-recording of the condemnation documents.”
Only after the words left my mouth did I fully register what I had said.
Evelyn’s gaze settled on my left wrist.
She wasn’t smiling.
She simply watched me in perfect silence.
“Very well,” Hadrian said. “But all responsibility falls on Candidate Lucia.”
“I understand.”
“If the criminal escapes, if evidence is damaged, or if falsehoods surface during the re-examination, Candidate Lucia will bear that burden as well.”
“I understand.”
Before I could answer a third time, Evelyn withdrew her gaze.
Even after it left me, the feeling of it remained like a brand.
The execution ground was cleared. The crowd dispersed, and the sect priests carried away the silver cup and record plates. Evelyn was not returned to prison but placed in a separate escort carriage. I was required to ride with her.
The carriage was narrow.
Far too narrow.
It was clearly meant for nobility and should have felt spacious, yet the moment I sat facing Evelyn the space seemed to shrink by half.
I pressed myself against the window.
Evelyn noticed but said nothing. She only rubbed her wrist—the left one where the chains had bitten deep. The red marks stood out vividly.
“Does it hurt?”
I regretted the question the instant it left me. It was far too personal.
Evelyn answered without lifting her eyes from her wrist.
“Not the sort of thing you ask someone who just stepped down from the execution platform.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You apologize quickly.”
“If you need one, I can call a healing priest—”
“Unnecessary.”
Evelyn raised her head.
“You do it.”
“Me?”
“You’re a Saintess Candidate, aren’t you?”
“I am only the seventh seat and a recorder. My holy healing arts are rudimentary at best—”
“Then use the rudimentary version.”
I studied her for a moment.
She was doing this on purpose.
Of course she was.
In the original story, Evelyn had been arrogant, quick-witted, and careful never to expose weakness. Yet here she was, deliberately offering her wrist to me.
Refusing would be strange.
Accepting would be even stranger.
I took her wrist with careful fingers.
Her skin was warm.
A faint silver light bloomed at my fingertips—the basic healing technique taught to Saintess Candidates. It could not erase the wound completely, but it could ease the pain.
Evelyn remained perfectly still.
Her stillness made me more nervous than anything else.
“Why do you trust me?” I asked first.
“I never said I trusted you.”
“Then why choose me as your surveillance officer…”
“Because you stopped my death.”
Her crimson eyes watched my fingertips.
“People don’t usually do something like that for no reason.”
“I will explain that reason later.”
Evelyn’s eyebrow rose slightly. She seemed surprised I had not repeated that the records felt wrong.
“There are more urgent matters right now.”
I kept my healing hand in place as I continued.
“Whoever swapped the silver cup would not have left an entry in the import log. Therefore the blanks themselves are the clue. Once we reach the annex, I will begin by examining the empty spaces in the warehouse access records.”
Evelyn was quiet for a moment.
Then she smiled, and this time there was no mockery in it.
“Good. That is something you’re better at.”
I kept my eyes on the light at my fingertips.
When the healing light faded, the marks on Evelyn’s wrist had lightened but not vanished. The red lines still remained.
She did not pull her hand away.
“It’s finished.”
“I know.”
“Your hand…”
“Lucia Bennett.”
My name sounded different this time—lower, closer than it had at the execution ground.
“Prove my innocence.”
“That is what the re-examination procedure is for—”
“No.”
Evelyn turned her hand over. What had been me treating her wrist became her holding mine.
“You do it.”
“Why me?”
“Many people wanted me dead.”
Her eyes curved, though they held no smile.
“You are the first who tried to keep me alive.”
My breath caught.
This was not a confession.
Of course it wasn’t.
This was merely a conversation between a prisoner with a postponed execution and her assigned watcher. A political transaction. The beginning of an investigation. That was how I had to see it.
Yet Evelyn did not release my hand.
And I could not pull mine away.
The carriage did not leave right away.
The sect priests delayed outside, claiming they needed to reconfirm the escort procedures. They left the two of us alone in the narrow space. It might have been deliberate—an attempt to overhear whatever we might say—or it might simply have been chaos. Either way, it was uncomfortable.
Even after Evelyn let go of my hand, her gaze remained. I opened the record plate and pretended to read. The words refused to focus.
“Staring that hard—do the letters change?”
“It would be inconvenient if they did.”
“They’ve probably changed quite a lot already.”
I looked up from the plate.
“What do you mean?”
“From the moment you stopped the execution, everyone will start tampering with the records.”
Evelyn gazed out the window.
“People trust what is written far longer than what they saw with their own eyes. Even if hundreds of people watched my neck remain intact today, if tomorrow’s record reads ‘the criminal caused a disturbance and the execution was delayed,’ that is what they will remember.”
Her words were cold.
But they were not wrong.
It had been the same in the original story. The villainesses were always killed a second time through records after their defeat. Evelyn remained an arrogant poisoner, Seraphina a witch, Kasha a rebel, and Noette a heretic.
What they had been like while alive was never recorded.
“That is why a recorder is needed.”
Evelyn looked at me.
“I need you.”
I tightened my grip on the pen.
“I will record only the truth.”
“Good.”
“I will not record only what benefits you.”
“Even better.”
It was an unexpected answer.
Evelyn leaned forward slightly. The narrow seat brought us closer.
“Many people lie on my behalf. Many lie in order to kill me.”
“…”
“But very few say they will look at the truth because of me.”
Her red eyes held mine.
“So I like you.”
I nearly dropped the record plate.
“That kind of phrasing could cause misunderstandings—”
“With whom?”
“The people around us.”
“Right now there are only the two of us inside this carriage.”
It was an accurate observation.
The fact that we were alone somehow made the carriage feel even smaller.
I cleared my throat.
“Lady Rochard is currently under suspended execution. This sort of conversation—”
“Evelyn.”
“Lady Evelyn—”
“It got long again.”
She was clearly enjoying my reaction. It was obvious. Was it normal for someone who had just stepped down from the execution platform to be this composed? Or was this simply how she kept herself from breaking?
My eyes drifted to her wrist.
I had healed it, yet the red marks remained. The chains had bitten too deeply. She slowly covered the wrist with her glove, a deliberate motion now that she knew I was watching.
“You don’t need to feel sorry.”
“Did I make that kind of expression?”
“Yes.”
“I…”
“It wasn’t you who did it.”
The words were calm.
Strangely, they made me feel even more apologetic.
“Still, if I had known sooner…”
“Then you would have saved me before I ever reached the execution ground.”
Evelyn spoke as if it were nothing.
“But you came today, and you stopped it today. That is enough.”
That is enough.
I held those words for a long time.
The original story I had broken, the fate I had touched, the responsibility I had to carry—all of it crashed over me at once, stealing my breath. Yet Evelyn had said it so simply. You came today, and you stopped it today.
Perhaps, for now, that was all I needed to think about.
The carriage door opened.
A priest spoke from outside.
“We will depart.”
The carriage lurched into motion.
Evelyn turned her gaze back to the window.
I wrote a new entry on the first page of the record plate.
Evelyn Rochard: She herself recognizes the contradiction in the silver cup’s reaction location.
Right beside it, in very small letters, I added another line.
Do not become emotionally too close.
The moment I finished writing, I regretted it.
Because Evelyn had seen it.
She smiled slowly.
“It seems a little late for that.”
“Nothing has happened yet…”
“Yes.”
She cut me off.
“Not yet.”
The carriage wheels rolled over the stone path.
I closed the record plate.
But that short phrase lingered in my ears for a long time.
Not yet.