Together
That evening, after finishing her meal with Rui, Ian returned to her room and went back to studying the magic formula.
Just give up on the Holy Fire Festival.
No matter how carefully she read the complex equations, Rui’s expression and the tone of her voice kept rising unbidden in her mind. Ian propped her elbows on the desk and hung her head low.
She knew full well that her temper ran hot, but reining it in had never been easy. Friction came often, and changing that part of herself was harder still.
If only she had calmed down a little sooner…
Rui.
A bitter frustration welled up at herself—for failing to be any kind of strength to the girl who had always stayed by her side.
The memory returned of the day they had been rejected by Eline and had even gone to the boy who would become her lover. If only she had smothered her temper then. There had been no ill will at that first meeting, yet Rui had pleaded with him so desperately that Ian’s habitual flare of anger had slipped free again.
…It wasn’t Rui’s fault.
He had done nothing wrong, and neither had Rui. But because she could not kill her temper, she had ended up lashing out.
“Hah.”
Today she had done it again—snapped at Rui.
…
Self-loathing settled over her. Why did she keep doing this?
Knock-knock—
Quietly, a soft rapping sounded at the door.
Despite my stubborn resistance, Eline clamped both hands firmly around my face and turned it toward the dormitory.
“Hurry up.”
…Yeah. Same as always.
If Eline said so, then that was what we would do. I settled her properly onto my back again and started walking. She let out a languid, satisfied breath against my shoulder.
On the path toward my dormitory, she spoke.
“About Rui.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you think we can bring her over all right?”
“…Her friend?”
The conversation from just before we parted with Rui floated back to both of us.
“If… you still need more teammates… would my friend… be okay?”
She had glanced at me as she asked. I already knew perfectly well who that friend was, even without her saying the name.
Ian.
My first impression of her had not been a good one, but right now every single person counted. There was no room to be picky.
“If it’s Rui, she’ll manage to bring her over just fine.”
Of course we would still have to settle things properly later.
That…
I would think about that later. For now, Eline came first.
Before long we reached the front of the dormitory, and I set her down. Unlike the white stone buildings of Alpha Class, this one was a wooden structure steeped in an old, distinctive atmosphere.
“Have you ever been here before?”
From Eline’s perspective, this was probably her first time.
“Once.”
“Really?”
She turned her gaze to me.
“When I came looking for you.”
…Ah.
A month ago. The day we had faced each other in the alley just before I reached the dormitory.
When she asked me to go out with her.
A month that felt both short and long had passed since then. A great deal had happened, but the biggest change was this: the world that had always revolved around me was gradually letting Eline seep into its center. No—by now it felt as though everything was beginning to revolve around her.
“Lutes.”
I came back to myself and found Eline already looking at me.
…
“What is it?”
I gave her a faint smile and squeezed her hand tightly. Time flowing with Eline at its center… I didn’t mind it. In fact, I rather liked it.
“Let’s go in.”
“Yeah.”
I started walking naturally, then stopped.
“…Where to?”
Eline answered as if the question itself were odd.
“Your room.”
…
I had expected as much from the moment she suggested going to the dormitory. I understood perfectly well what she meant by it—just studying together in the dorm, nothing more. Even so, I could not stop my heart from pounding.
Keep it clean…
In my entire life, the only women who had ever set foot in my room were the maids who came to clean, or that rotten little sister of mine barging in to trash the place. I shook my head hard.
Just think about Eline.
It was still early evening; the housemother would almost certainly be away. And I had seen couples walking freely through the corridors before.
It… should be fine, right?
I steadied my breathing and stepped into the dormitory with her. Being a weekend evening, most students seemed to be inside already; we met no one on the way up. We climbed all the way to the fourth floor. I walked the familiar corridor and stopped in front of my own door.
“Just a second.”
I blurted the words and pressed my forehead against the wood. My heart was racing past any reasonable limit. No matter how I tried to organize my thoughts, inviting a girl into my room was a complete first.
…
I kept taking deep breaths.
“Just a second—I’ll tidy up.”
“Okay.”
In a voice that barely escaped my throat, I managed to ask her to wait, then slipped inside. To my own eyes the place looked neat enough, but that was only my standard. Right now I had to care about every single detail.
Calm down.
Desk, bed, wardrobe, window, ceiling, floor. I swept my gaze over each one in turn, straightening anything that looked even slightly out of place. The desk mattered most. Hoping nothing strange would turn up, I scoured it with my eyes as if sweeping with a broom.
…That should do it.
This ought to be enough. I opened the window for a bit of air and looked out at the deep indigo night sky.
Stars, lend me strength.
“Haa…”
I could not stall any longer. Slowly I went to the door, took the handle, and opened it. Eline was still standing motionless in the corridor right in front of my room.
“…Come in.”
At my words she gave a small nod and stepped inside.
Tap, tap.
She walked to the center of the room, stopped, and slowly turned her head up and down. Academy dorm rooms were fairly spacious. I had heard the knights’ academy down south had tiny rooms, but perhaps that was because magicians themselves were rare. Even with her inside, it did not feel cramped.
“…Eline, sit down for now.”
“Okay.”
I managed to steady my voice and offered her a chair. She sat without a word, then slowly pushed the chair forward until she was at the desk.
The sight of Eline sitting in a room that until now had only ever held other men felt utterly foreign.
She looked over the books on the desk and carefully picked one up—one of the volumes she herself had once borrowed for me from the library.
“Have you read a lot of them?”
“Most of them.”
Eline flipped through the pages with a soft rustle, her eyes racing down the text as if she had already read it dozens of times.
Amazing.
Books I had groaned over for ages, and she was skimming them like that. Admiration rose unbidden.
“…Ah.”
I had been staring blankly; I forced myself back to the present.
“Want something to drink?”
Even while concentrating on the book, she nodded at my question.
“…Please.”
The sound of the door closing reached her. Eline closed the book she had been reading.
Once his footsteps faded, she quietly let out a breath.
“…”
She rose from the chair again and slowly looked around the room.
So this is it.
Lutes’s room. The comfortable scent she had always associated with him hung thick in the air. Through the open window she could see the Alpha Class dormitory where she herself lived.
“…”
Had he noticed her cheeks coloring? Had he heard how loud her heartbeat had become?
Every single action was a first for her, and she worried it might make him uncomfortable—yet she could not stop the desire that kept rising ahead of every other thought.
Her gaze stopped on one place. The space that took up a full third of his room.
The bed.
This was the fourth floor. To fetch drinks he would have had to go all the way down to the first.
She carefully perched on the edge of the mattress; it gave a soft creak.
…
It felt good.
Eline closed her eyes. One month. She let the time she had spent watching Lutes drift through her mind.
At first she had even wondered if something was wrong with her. Only three meetings, and she had fallen this hard? Perhaps it was merely a misunderstanding born of failing to define a brand-new emotion.
But over the past month, every time they met—the way he worked so hard for her sake, the way he kept moving forward, the way he always concentrated on his studies yet still made room to care for her—
It had not been a misunderstanding after all.
Lutes was a good person. And the feeling that she liked him settled into something even more certain.
If time allowed, she wanted to stay by his side. The future was unstable and hard to foresee, yet this feeling alone she wanted to carry with her no matter what came.
…Yes. Always.
She opened her eyes again. Looking out the window, she saw the academy buildings small in the distance, and beyond them the stars beginning to show themselves as night settled in.
If we’re together…
Even if it was not the path already laid out, she wanted to walk it.
Thump—
Something brushed her hand. Eline looked down and saw the pillow resting at the foot of the bed—a soft cotton pillow covered in white cloth.
“…”
She glanced toward the door again. No footsteps yet, but judging by how long the stairs usually took, he would be back soon.
Eline carefully lifted the pillow. She looked at the door, then back at the pillow, repeating the motion a couple of times. After a brief hesitation she drew a short breath.
And then—
Squeeze—
She hugged it with all her strength.
“…”
She closed her eyes. The pillow, stuffed full of cotton, squashed softly against her; she exhaled a shallow breath. She held on as if she would never let go unless someone forced her hands open.
Thud.
Faint footsteps and a vibration began to reach her from far away.
…!
She startled and hurriedly set the pillow back down, smoothing it as flat and ordinary as possible before returning it to its place. Then she sat at the desk again as if nothing had happened.
The footsteps stopped outside; the door opened. Lutes stood there holding two glasses of cool tea.
“I didn’t know what you’d like, so I just brought something ordinary.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
Determined not to repeat the same mistake as last time, Eline carefully covered her ears. Lutes would not have seen. Eline never made the same wrong answer twice.
All that earlier tension felt almost embarrassing now; Eline calmly pointed out the parts I did not understand and explained them one by one.
Hmm.
I had expected her to do exactly that, yet I still felt a little ridiculous for having gotten so worked up.
“…Are you listening?”
“Yeah, I’m listening.”
Eline looked at me for a moment, then closed the book. She handed me a blank sheet of parchment and a quill.
“The Purification formula—want to try drawing it now?”
“Right now?”
Instead of answering she simply nodded. I took the quill and began reconstructing the formula in my head on the empty parchment.
Purification.
A high-level support spell. It restored mental confusion caused by monster attacks and purged harmful substances as virulent as deadly poison—an important piece of magic.
At a glance the formula looked complicated, but it was really just an application of basic concepts…
Was it like this?
I dug through my memory as thoroughly as I could and wrote the formula down. Whenever I hit a blank spot I paused, then somehow dredged up the next piece and connected it. The result was rough, but it still looked more or less correct.
“I’m done, Eline.”
Almost before I finished speaking she began scanning the formula with her eyes, checking it over. Every time her gaze paused I flinched without meaning to, but she continued without any real hitch and finally nodded.
“Well done.”
Praise always felt good, no matter how many times I heard it.
Yeah.
What kind of atmosphere did we even need? This quiet, comfortable way of talking with her was already more than enough. Sitting in this wide room with her felt far more at ease than all the times I had been alone in it.
But time never waits forever.
“I should go now.”
When the hour came, Eline rose quietly. A glance at the clock showed that early evening had already slipped into deep night.
“Come to the second training ground tomorrow afternoon.”
“Got it.”
In the morning I would have to meet Valrod and try to persuade him. I wanted to believe he would listen, yet I remembered how lukewarm he had been when I roughly mentioned the competition last time.
…Tomorrow’s going to be a little worrying.
As Eline opened the door to leave, I stood up from my seat.
“Don’t come out.”
She spoke firmly.
“Huh?”
“You’ve been walking around a lot today. Just rest.”
Was that so? …Well, I had spent the whole day searching for Rui. Eline had walked with me too, and I had carried her part of the way.
“I’ll just walk you to the entrance.”
“…All right.”
That much seemed acceptable; she did not argue further. On the way down we passed a few students in the corridor, but none of them paid us any particular attention. We descended quietly to the first floor and reached the dormitory entrance. Eline turned her head.
“Go back in now.”
“…Mm.”
Ordinarily I would have turned around and gone upstairs. But the path stretching out behind her looked long and far.
…
I stepped closer and took her hand.
“Lutes.”
Her voice rose a little, startled.
“Just to the dormitory entrance.”
“This is the dormitory entrance…”
It might have been the first time, but I wanted to speak firmly to her.
“Just to the entrance of your dormitory. Let’s go together.”