Crossed Paths
Inside the Cathedral, nothing stirred but the quiet, even murmur of prayer. It was an ordinary morning Mass, one I had repeated time and again since coming to the Academy after the war. I stood before the altar, finished the last prayer, and slowly opened my eyes to the students and nearby residents rising one by one from their seats.
Nothing about the scene was different from any other day. And yet it felt unusually hollow—Lieben had left for the North at first light with the students, and Dorothy had vanished somewhere since morning, not so much as a glimpse of her anywhere.
A week without seeing Lieben was a sharper disappointment than I had expected, but a week would pass soon enough. Once he returned from the North I could see his face as often as I liked, and that thought was enough to keep me from dwelling on it.
I had just finished the Mass, seen everyone off, and was putting things in order when it happened.
Creeeak.
The Cathedral doors opened, slowly. Wondering if someone had simply arrived late, I turned my head without much thought—and the moment I saw the face standing in the doorway, the ease I had felt only seconds before sank all at once. My body locked where I stood.
A face I had not seen once in the months since the war ended, and yet one I could never forget. Golden hair. Green eyes.
Why. Why was Arien here?
The first thing that flashed through my mind was Lieben, but at least today he was not at the Academy. Only after that realization did relief come, belated: the two of them would not run into each other. Not now. I managed to ease a little of the tension locked in my body, and as Arien approached I put on an expression no different from usual.
"Saintess. It's been a while."
"……Yes."
The voice came a little late, but thankfully it didn't shake.
"It really has. It's been a while, Arien."
We were comrades meeting again after months, so by rights I should have asked where she had been, what she had been doing, why she had come all this way so suddenly. But Arien seemed to have no interest in that kind of talk. She looked at my face for a moment, then went straight to the point.
"Saintess."
"Yes."
"You were close with the Pathfinder, weren't you?"
"……."
The smile at the corner of my mouth stiffened, just a little. It wasn't a question I hadn't expected. I already knew Arien had been searching for Lieben since the war ended, and I had thought that someday she might ask me about him. I simply hadn't imagined that day would be today.
"Ah… yes."
I nodded as naturally as I could.
"I was."
Arien watched me without any particular reaction, then spoke again.
"Then you also knew the Pathfinder's name was Lieben?"
"Yes."
This much was a fact I couldn't hide even if I wanted to. On the battlefield I had called Lieben by name more than once, and Arien herself had seen it. Claiming ignorance here would only have looked stranger.
"I knew."
"I see."
Arien gave a small nod, her expression still unchanged. She didn't look angry, nor was she smiling softly the way she usually did—only those green eyes, sunk cold and utterly lightless, kept watching my face, and that unsettled me in a way I couldn't name. The moment I heard the question that followed, I understood the unease had not been groundless.
"Then did you also know he was wearing a necklace?"
"……."
For a moment, nothing came out.
The necklace.
The matching necklace Arien and Lieben had chosen together—the very object that, the instant I saw it hanging at Arien's throat on the day the war ended, had made me realize every truth I had failed to see until then.
Surely not. Had she realized?
Cold sweat seemed to trace down my back, but I couldn't afford to look shaken. I tilted my head slightly, doing everything I could to seem like someone who knew nothing.
"A necklace?"
"Yes."
"Hmm……."
I pretended to search my memory, drawing the silence out, then slowly opened my mouth.
"I knew his name was Lieben, but the necklace… I'm not sure about that."
It was a lie. Of course I knew. I knew Lieben had carried the necklace, and I knew what it meant—even whom he had matched it with. But I couldn't tell Arien any of that. Not now.
If I told her everything at this point. And if she learned that Lieben was right here, at this Academy….
"……Hmm."
Arien made a low sound and looked at me. It was only that—one syllable—and still my throat felt as if it were burning dry.
"Then."
She paused, then asked again.
"Do you happen to know where the Pathfinder is now?"
"……."
This time the answer didn't come right away. Without meaning to, my gaze dropped to Arien's throat, and the moment I confirmed the familiar necklace visible between the folds of her collar, a faint tension gathered in my fingertips. The same necklace Lieben had worn all through the war. Arien was wearing it too.
And Lieben was here now, a professor at this Academy. In a week or so he would come back as if nothing had happened. If I told the truth, Arien would surely stay and wait for his return—a week, or longer.
And then what would become of me….
Little by little, we had been growing closer. We had drunk together, and we could talk far more easily than before. He had even told me his name. I had begun to think that perhaps a place for me was opening in Lieben's heart.
But if Arien appeared again now.
The words left my mouth before the thought had even finished.
"I… don't really know."
"I haven't seen him either, since the war ended."
I lied again. This time it wasn't that I had failed to speak in the moment, or that I didn't know the answer. I knew everything, and still I chose, once more, to hide it.
Arien said nothing. She only looked at me, and the silence was so strangely hard to bear that I found myself bringing my hands together, lacing my fingers.
It's all right. Arien doesn't know anything yet. There's no proof I know where Lieben is, and she doesn't know I recognized that necklace either. I only have to act as I always do.
"Saintess."
"Yes?"
I looked up at the sound of her voice, but her eyes weren't on my face. A little lower. She was looking at my clasped hands.
"But."
Arien slowly tilted her head.
"Why are your fingers trembling?"
"……."
For an instant I felt as if my breath had stopped. I looked down at my hands without meaning to, and they really were trembling—so faintly that unless you looked closely, you would never have noticed.
"That's……."
What was I supposed to say? That I was cold? That I was tired, now that Mass was over? In that brief moment countless excuses rose in my mind, but strangely not one of them would leave my mouth, and Arien's cold, sunken eyes kept watching me.
And right then.
Creak.
"What's everyone doing?"
"……."
"……."
A voice far too familiar came from the Cathedral doors, and Arien and I turned our heads at nearly the same moment. Dorothy stood in the doorway—when she had come in, I couldn't have said—with a half-eaten piece of bread in one hand. She glanced between the two of us a few times, then tilted her head like someone who hadn't read the room at all.
"Why's the mood like this?"
"……Dorothy."
"Yeah."
Dorothy answered as if it were nothing and bit into the bread. She chewed for a moment, then stopped and looked at Arien.
"But why's the Hero here?"
Watching her, I felt a headache coming on. Of all times, now. Being alone with Arien had already been suffocating enough, and with Dorothy walking in as well, one wrong word might ruin everything I had been working so hard to hide.
But Arien herself, perhaps because Dorothy had arrived, let the cold expression she had worn until a moment ago ease, and let out a small sigh.
"I'm sorry, Saintess."
"……Yes?"
"I've been a little on edge."
As she said it, she looked at the hands that had been trembling moments ago, and following that gaze I found myself clenching my fingers once more.
"After months of searching for Lieben… I ended up acting strangely even toward you, Saintess."
"It's all right."
I smiled as if nothing were wrong and shook my head.
"Anyone would."
Even as I said it, something in me stayed uneasy. I couldn't tell whether Arien had truly stepped back because she thought she had been too sensitive, or whether she had noticed something and simply chosen not to press further for now. If anything, the softer expression made her even harder to read.
"Long time no see for you too, Dorothy."
"Yeah. Long time."
Dorothy kept chewing the bread in her hand and answered shortly, as if she felt nothing in particular. It was a greeting far too Dorothy for someone she was seeing again months after the war, but Arien knew her well enough not to mind.
"Have you been well?"
"Yeah."
"Still the same."
"You too."
The brief exchange ended there. Arien looked at me again, and this time, unlike before, she offered a faint smile, the way she usually did.
"I'm a little tired, so I'll be going."
"Already?"
"Yes. I haven't properly rested in days, getting here."
"I see……."
There was no reason to stop her. If anything, I ought to have been glad she was leaving like this. Even so, I couldn't be sure she had truly noticed nothing, and I couldn't bring myself to relax.
"I'll see you again, Saintess."
"Yes."
I answered, forcing a smile.
"Rest well, Arien."
Arien gave a slight bow at the last, then started for the Cathedral doors. Just before she passed through she paused and turned her head, as if something had occurred to her. For a moment my heart plunged—surely she meant to say something more.
"Dorothy."
"What."
"Want to get a drink sometime?"
"If you buy."
"……Yeah. I'll buy."
"Then I'll go."
Arien laughed softly.
"Same as ever."
With that, the Cathedral doors slowly closed.
Creeeak.
Thud.
Even after Arien was completely gone, I couldn't pull my eyes from the closed doors for a while. Nothing had happened. At least, not yet. She hadn't caught that I knew Lieben's whereabouts, and I seemed to have gotten past the matter of the necklace as well. At that, the tightness that had been squeezing my chest since earlier finally seemed to loosen, and I let out a long breath.
"Haa……."
As the tension drained, I even felt the strength leaving my legs. It had been truly dangerous. If I had panicked even a little more—if Arien had pressed even a little harder—I might have said something without meaning to. But I had gotten through it. This time, somehow.
I was closing my eyes in relief at that when it happened.
"Saintess."
"……Yes?"
I turned at a voice that came from far too close. Even after Arien had left, Dorothy had remained inside the Cathedral, looking at me with breadcrumbs stuck to her face—when she had finished the bread, I couldn't say. The same expressionless face as always.
"Is something the matter?"
When I asked, Dorothy looked at me for a moment without a word. And then.
"Why lie?"
"……."
My heart dropped.