Her True Heart, Drowned in Wine — 2
I was handed a glass of strange wine. The color was all wrong. Nothing that fermented naturally would ever come out looking like this.
Elysia was smiling at me, all warmth and affection. For all that she looked like this, she was fortunately a cleric by profession — and she'd told me herself that you weren't supposed to harbor any impure feelings while offering prayers to Astasia. The one problem was that she was, for some reason, carefully avoiding my eyes.
If embarrassment and shame had been the undercurrent just a moment ago, I could now say with certainty that a dash of guilt and a splash of moral conflict had been added to the mix — and that, despite all of it, excitement and affection were still unmistakably swirling through.
...No matter how I looked at it, those were impure feelings.
Full of deep misgivings, I took the wineglass she'd handed me and asked her.
"Elysia."
"......Yeah?"
"Just checking. This is... okay to drink, right?"
"Huh? You don't want it? Wait — do you not like wine, Gray?"
"No... it's not that..."
"Then just have one glass with me. That way Lady Astasia can enjoy watching us laugh and talk."
I had my doubts about whether I'd still be laughing and talking after drinking this.
I waited until Elysia wasn't looking and whispered to Tina.
"...Tina. You remember those little bottles in Elysia's room last time?"
"Tina remembers. You mean Big Sis's treasures? Besides perfume, Big Sis studies alchemy in secret. That's why she always sleeps in."
"Any idea what kind of stuff she makes? Even roughly?"
Tina paused for exactly three seconds. The clever little brat had sized up the situation in an instant and arrived at a very particular possibility.
"...T-Tina doesn't know anything about that."
Even looking at this in the most optimistic light possible, I was pretty sure we had a serious problem on our hands. I immediately sought a second opinion from the Saintess.
"...What's your take, as a Saintess? Is this another one of those things we should work out through conversation?"
The Saintess had definitely said she was going to help Elysia. She clearly knew something. But she wouldn't meet my eyes. She fidgeted with her fingers and spoke in little sideways glances.
This half-baked cleric couldn't lie to save her life.
"I-I don't think it'd be bad for your body if you drank it, i-in various ways... it might even be... healthy? Especially for gentlemen, that is. Ahem! I-If you can just keep a hold of your reason..."
Meanwhile, Elysia quietly took the seat beside me. And the Saintess and Tina peeled away from us with suspicious naturalness.
These people. Instant betrayal. Especially the Saintess — she'd been going on about conversation and all that...!
"Hmm? Gray. What's wrong? You're not drinking? Are you feeling okay?"
"Elysia. My wine looks like a slightly different color. Mind pouring me another?"
"Ah... that?"
Elysia blinked at me, her face perfectly blank.
"It's not spoiled. It's the same wine. The lantern light is probably making the color look a little different. See how dark it is around here? It's just your imagination."
...So depending on your mood, red wine can just... turn black, is that it.
With a grave heart, I picked up a piece of cheese first. The novice priests, of course — and even Boris and Lucia — had all figured out what was going on and were watching me with bated breath.
They all had this look of quiet anticipation, too. Anticipating what, exactly?
"............"
I wet my lips with it, just barely. It tasted like wine, but my instincts knew better. This was the kind of thing you were not supposed to drink. I thought fast.
"It's good. Want a sip too, Elysia?"
"Me...?"
"You too."
"...Th-the glass Gray was drinking from, I would..."
A normal person would have refused on the spot. But her eyes were already losing focus.
"...No, wait... Get a grip, Elysia! You can't lose your head over one wineglass he drank from...! There's an aphrodisiac in there... but it's the glass Gray's lips touched... no that's not the point right now but an indirect k-k-k-k-k... k... k... i... ngh..."
Steam exploded from the top of Elysia's head.
Wait. More importantly. She just said aphrodisiac. She just said aphrodisiac.
"Time out! Strategy meeting!"
The Saintess shot her hand up and bellowed, then grabbed Elysia and vanished with her into the dark underbrush.
A strategy meeting...?
I could only sit there, frozen, and watch Elysia and the Saintess disappear into the distance.
"You're a cruel man, Lord Gray. Play with a woman's heart like that and one of these days you'll get burned — badly."
"That doesn't mean I'm going to drink wine spiked with an aphrodisiac."
I let out a faint sigh and set the wineglass down.
"I wonder what she and the Saintess are plotting."
"Who can say. All we know is that the Saintess wanted to get closer to Lia. She doesn't have any peers around her who wrestle with this kind of problem, so I imagine she's all the more excited about it."
"Still not a single saintly bone in that girl's body, no matter how hard you look."
"Though I suppose it was that very purity that earned her Lady Astasia's favor."
Boris gave a short laugh.
"And the same is true of Lia."
"...What?"
"My wife and I have watched over Lia for the past ten years. And ten years is no small stretch of time. As for the heart with which Lia has waited to be reunited with you, Lord Gray — I, Lucia here, and everyone at this temple know it better than anyone."
"That's right. Lia puts her whole heart into everything. She's been that way since the day she first arrived. We told her she didn't have to lift a finger, but she still helped out — cutting her hands on kitchen knives, those hands that had never done a day's hard work — and then she went and started studying alchemy without a single lesson... Who do you think she did all of that for?"
It wasn't just Lucia. The novice priests and even Tina each had something to add.
"Um... Lord Gray? We don't know what happened between the two of you, but the fact that Priestess Lia has always been longing for someone is famous even among us apprentices."
"That's true. Honestly... she can be a little intimidating, so she's hard to approach, but she's just as honest as she is intense. She's not the type to take her feelings lightly, or to mistake them for something they're not."
"Big Bro is an idiot. Big Sis waited ten years, and you won't even drink one little bottle of medicine?"
I found myself with nothing left to say.
But more than anything else — Tina... you were the one who freaked out when you saw the color of that wine...
"If you're all going to put it that way, I suppose I'd better go after them."
"If you don't move quickly, Lord Gray, the liquid in that glass may not stay a simple dark-red wine for much longer."
Meanwhile, halfway up the hill, the Saintess and Elysia were catching their breath. Both of them had lived lives that had nothing to do with exercise. Chronic stamina deficiency. They hadn't gotten far before they had to stop.
"S-Sister... Sister...?"
"A-an an an indirect... indirect k... kiss... d-does that mean I... I can finally try one too...?"
"Sister! Oh, honestly, Sister! You're not a seven-year-old! Are you really going to lose your mind over a little indirect kiss? Sister! Look me in the eyes! You cannot surrender to something that trivial!"
"But Saintess! An indirect kiss...! His lips...! His lips...!"
"That's exactly why you can't! I told you earlier, didn't I? Be bold! Come on, take a deep breath!"
"Be... bold?"
"Follow my lead. You remember the conversation we had earlier, right? You want that 'a little cherry like you belongs right in the palm of my hand' energy — go aaahn~! You have to be so sensual that an indirect kiss looks like nothing more than a cute little kids' game!"
".................."
"Sister? You're listening, right?"
Even earlier that day, while the sun was still up, there had still been a distance between the two of them. The reason they'd gotten so close so fast was almost entirely thanks to the Saintess's efforts.
"You like Teacher, don't you, Sister?"
It had been while Gray was briefly helping Lucia. The Saintess had approached Elysia. That conversation between women she'd mentioned — this was what she'd meant.
"In that case, I'll help you for certain. We'll make sure you completely capture Teacher's heart!"
In truth, it had been less the voice of a saint and more the whisper of a devil. The distilled essence of the alchemy Elysia had honed over the past several years — an aphrodisiac so potent it could make even the ugliest person look like a peerless beauty — and it was the Saintess who had given Elysia the courage to use it.
In truth, Elysia had wrestled more than once with whether or not to use it. Every time, the ethical problem had stopped her in her tracks. If Gray ever found out she'd harbored such a wicked thought...... Elysia's heart... ah, there would have been no way to recover from that. None at all...
"Take your eyes off her for one second and she causes an incident. Don't you think the title of Saintess is wasted on you?"
"Kh...! Teacher?! How did you get here...?!"
Yes. Just like this.
"............"
He'd already caught them. There was no point pretending otherwise. She knew perfectly well there was no taking it back now.
Elysia swallowed hard, her throat dry. What she held in her hand was the leftover aphrodisiac she hadn't mixed into the wine. She erased from her mind any thought of feeding it to Gray. From here on, she would have to compete fairly.
This feeling of hers......
"...Gray. I'm sorry."
"............?"
"The Saintess gave me courage, but I wasn't the kind of person who could live up to it."
So.
"This is my resolve."
"......? Hey, Elysia! Wait. That bottle...!"
Gray reached for her, but Elysia was just a fraction faster as she tipped the aphrodisiac into her own mouth.
"Wh-what are you drinking right now?!"
"......glk.... mmph..."
"Hey! Elysia! Spit it out! Spit it out now!"
"Nn... nnghh...! mmpphh...!"
"Don't just shake your head — what on earth possessed you to just drink that?!"
Gray immediately pulled Elysia's head forward. In truth, the moment it had entered her mouth, the choice of whether or not to swallow had long since passed to Elysia. But Gray didn't give up. He pressed down on her cheeks.
Elysia, as if in protest, gently parted her lips and showed him the medicine she was still holding inside. The liquid pooled on her tongue and in her mouth, mixing with her saliva, clinging sticky and warm against her lips.
"Blehhh..."
".....No... what are you..."
Blehhhhh...
This should be enough. Elysia worked her mouth again.
"I-if you keep... m-moving... I'll... just... swallow it..."
"Are you serious...?"
"Mmph... blmph..."
"A-all right, I get it, just calm down!"
Gray pressed down on Elysia's cheeks. Squish.
It had only ever been a gesture. A way to show her resolve. Nothing more. Elysia, too, had certainly... she hadn't meant to drink it. She wouldn't have.
She was sure of that. She was.