The Fool's Sword (2)
Sylvia, the maid who had been pacing back and forth outside his door with her heart in her throat, was beside herself with worry.
He should be awake by now, shouldn't he? Oh— no, unless today, too…
How long had it been since a single knock left her this hesitant?
She only wished, above all else, not to provoke Cariel's temper.
He was already struggling and on edge as it was—if her presence added to his burden for no reason…
It had been just one day, but for someone in the thick of his growing years, refusing all food and drink was hardly a good sign.
Cariel had always eaten less than most, and more often than not he slept poorly through the night. Lately it seemed to be improving, ever so slightly, but…
He's already missed a day of the Academy, so surely he'll be scolded for that alone…
But this time, more than any other, it was difficult for Ermina and Cariel alike to face one another.
As if to prove it, even Ermina—cradling her swollen belly—had not gone to the church as she always did.
It was a regular occurrence, but today she had risen quite late.
Precisely speaking, it had happened yesterday, in the early hours of the morning.
Sylvia had overheard at least part of what Rueld said to Cariel outside the door, if not all of it, and that was exactly why her worry had deepened.
Rueld had plainly told him to apologize to his mother—and his refusal to do so left ample room to be read as rebellion, or stubbornness.
And he doesn't even understand how the young master feels…
When Patina and the young master had suddenly begun fighting, Sylvia had at first assumed it was some form of training, or a sparring match.
But the words they exchanged were unmistakably far from ordinary, and the emotions running through it all were so raw, so excessive for mere practice, that even she could see it plainly.
She had hurried to tell Ermina at once—yet her lady, believing Patina had her reasons, seemed inclined at first to let it pass.
Then, at some point,
her face drained of all color, and she rushed out of the room in a fluster.
What Sylvia witnessed as she hurried after her was a scene that shook her to her core.
If her lady had not been there…
The young master's hands, his arms…
Why did she have to go so far?
Even now, the memory of it made her dizzy enough to squeeze her eyes shut.
"Haah."
What was she supposed to do?
No matter how she turned the problem over and over in her mind,
no solution of any kind came to her.
Helplessness bred a creeping melancholy—
No.
What good would it do for me to be gloomy too!
At the very least, she could keep smiling for him.
Even if she couldn't be a true source of strength, surely she could be a little one!
She was still steadying her heart, gathering her expression into order, when—
the door swung open with a clack, and Sylvia instantly swallowed a gasp.
"Why are you standing out there?"
"Oh, um, that is…"
The sudden situation blanked her mind for a moment, but Sylvia steeled herself once more.
"A-aren't you hungry? You've skipped an entire day of eating!"
"…A day?"
Cariel tilted his head.
"A day. So it's been a day."
"Ah, is… is something wrong?"
"No. Nothing at all."
That aside—
"Judging by the light, it must be early morning. Yes?"
"Yes. That's right."
"…I suppose I'll be getting an earful."
Is he talking about skipping the Academy?
Or about disobeying Lord Rueld's words?
And yet, something about him did seem strange.
"Young master?"
"What is it?"
"You seem… a little different, somehow."
"…In what way?"
"W-well, it's hard to say exactly…"
After a long hesitation, the conclusion she finally wrung from her meager vocabulary was this:
"You seem… a little more grown up, somehow."
"People don't change overnight, Sylvia."
"D-do they not? Haha… I'm sorry."
"There's nothing to apologize for."
……?
Something was strange.
She couldn't put her finger on it, but…
He does seem more mature than before. Or is it just my imagination?
—Feels like my first breath of real air in years, doesn't it?
"……"
He knew, on some level, that it had all been a dream lasting a single night.
And yet, as though he had plunged in with neither beginning nor end, every time he closed his eyes those days of torment—that eternity of them—rose up in him, unbidden and utterly natural.
Not as imagination, not as picture, not on the level of sight—the memory prickled in his very flesh.
"It feels stranger, in fact, that my hands hold nothing at all."
—Your speech's gotten stiff as a stake. Oil that tongue of yours, why don't you?
Does it?
—Given enough years, even grudges and rage settle into quiet. How about yours?
"I felt nothing, at least until I laid eyes on them."
But of course—
"Now that they're actually in front of me, I find myself wondering whether that indifference was a lie all along. A deception I told myself."
The moment the prince's clique came into view, his steps faltered on their own; his shoulders, his whole body, seized up.
His mind might have been calm, but the wariness etched into his flesh reacted before thought could.
"Enjoying your laziness, are we? If you're to be my sister's betrothed, you might at least manage to look me in the eye."
"……"
Red hair. Black eyes.
Handsome features—the kind that, on a first impression alone, should have inspired a certain fondness.
And yet the longer Cariel looked, the more nothing remained but revulsion.
If there existed such a thing as enemies fated never to share the same sky—sworn foes beyond any reconciliation—perhaps it would look like this.
Viewed one way, theirs was a relationship that had never needed a grudge in the first place.
How pathetic.
That boy was pathetic.
And Cariel himself—once battered into helplessness and silent suffering by that same pathetic boy's thuggishness—was pathetic too.
"Haah."
"……?"
At the single sigh, the prince's face curdled—
and so did the expressions of every lackey around him.
For a single sigh.
Nothing more.
And just as expected, the prince's eyes blazed as he thrust his face in close, close enough to grab him by the collar.
Those smoldering eyes.
That venomous glare, layered on top—by sheer presence alone, the man looked ready to burn someone alive.
"I wonder what it takes to be so full of yourself, every single time?"
"……"
If Seras had been here, would she have stepped in to defuse this?
He remembered once nursing that faint hope, now and then, in the old days.
Back then, he had accepted what was done to him as simply what he deserved.
If I just endured, it would end eventually—so he had thought, and simply endured, and endured.
That was why facing reality had been hateful to him, uncomfortable, an object of loathing.
The reason he had counted the hours, waiting for the sun to set and the moon to rise, was—
perhaps because, at least in those hours, the freedom to breathe was guaranteed.
Granted, his mother's endless instructions to keep him awake through the night had caused him no end of trouble.
But it was less exhausting than daylight, less agonizing.
And so, all the more—
through the waning hours of the moon,
he had perhaps hoped, desperately, to stay awake as long as he could.
A coward's logic.
Pitiable, and pathetic beyond measure.
And yet that had been his past. There it was.
How long, I wonder, until I could be free—
even a little—of that shabby, shameful brand?
"That's quite enough, Your Highness."
"What… did you say? Are you talking back to—"
"Your Highness."
Another one of them.
At the man's meaningful glance toward the surrounding crowd, the prince clicked his tongue in irritation.
"We'll continue this somewhere more private later, where we can have a much deeper conversation. A conversation, mind you. A conversation."
The prince jabbed his index finger repeatedly into Cariel's chest for emphasis.
In the past,
he would have been consumed by the urge—the raw, burning desire—to snap that finger in two.
Then, unable to act on it, he would have despaired, surrendered to resignation—and even the thought of avenging himself in mere fantasy had seemed so childish and distasteful to him that he hadn't permitted himself even that.
Call it my narrowness. Call it my stubbornness.
Either way, I don't care for it.
But then—
what about now?
"Do as you please."
Clearly she had been right: it was a dream, and yet he seemed to have festered in that place for quite a long time.
Unlike before, he neither lost himself to the absurdity of it all, nor forced the feeling down until he rotted and broke from the inside.
He was only a little calmer than he had once been.
And from that little alone, he could feel something like peace of mind.
…How very little room I had, once, for even that.
"……"
With the prince's glowering back as his final view of them, Cariel walked on toward the main gates.
Come to think of it—
there was a time I arrived early just to avoid their eyes, or deliberately timed my entrance to the last possible second, teetering on the edge of lateness.
Remembering that wretched display filled him with a fresh wave of bleakness.
But disappointment in himself was, at this point, an emotion of no use whatsoever.
"I'll be waiting. For that grand conversation."
Let's see how healthy it turns out to be.
"Cariel. Are you planning to sit this one out and watch again?"
"……"
Cariel gazed blankly up at the swordsmanship instructor.
Even under that heavy stare, he felt no intimidation now—not even the faintest stir of feeling.
What's different from before?
…Nothing in particular.
Had anyone ever seen a rock or a tree fly into a rage because a man sneered at it?
The resolve within him had, without his needing to murmur or whisper it, already become him.
And so—
"I've decided to put down the sword of the Empire."
"What?"
Perhaps it was because he could now say such a thing openly, without the flinching of before.
"In its place, I intend to cultivate something else. Will that be a problem?"
"…Did Sir Rueld teach you some fancy new swordsmanship, then?"
For all his words, the mockery on the man's face was unmistakably plain.
"Hardly."
Listen to yourself.
When Cariel returned the sneer with exactly that undertone, the man's face twisted in a most satisfying way.
"Are you trying to pick a fight with me?"
"……"
He could have kept trading jabs indefinitely.
But somehow, even that felt like more trouble than it was worth.
The old him would have blazed through to the bitter end the moment a single word left his lips.
…All the more because, back then, I could never manage even that single word.
"Don't waste your special attention on me. Divide your time equally among the other students."
"You call that an excuse?"
"Does it look to you as though I'm making excuses?"
Something was different.
The students who had been watching the drama unfold with relish—the instructor included—were all equally puzzled by his unflinching poise.
"Teacher~! He looks awfully confident—how about a live sparring match right now?"
"Looks like he learned one new trick and now thinks the world belongs to him."
"Throw away the Imperial sword? Did you get it backwards, kid? It's the Empire's sword that threw you away."
Raucous laughter.
Scornful snorts.
Contemptuous sneers.
Not from everyone, perhaps—but even away from the prince's presence, the prince's reach was everywhere.
But so what?
What of it? What am I supposed to do about it?
"……"
And besides—
that refined Imperial Princess wasn't even here today.
I suppose that's why these bastards feel free to bare their teeth.
Unlike him, she could skip the Academy perfectly legally and be met with you've worked hard, thank you for your efforts, we were worried about you—
No. That's misdirected resentment.
There was no need to blame Elhermina.
The reason he wanted to blame her was simple: why, when they had done the very same thing, was she favored and shielded—
while he was scolded and scorned, made to suffer open contempt every single time?
Examined closely, there was a difference.
And—
I have no obligation to go digging for reasons to drag the Princess into the comparison.
Don't mistake the object of your comparison.
If nothing else, he must not mistake who deserved his resentment—or his enmity.
The one who sowed this malice was someone else entirely.
Don't mistake your target.
Don't let emotion sweep you away and squander it in the wrong place.
Churning emotion was, in the end, a waste of mental strength—strength too scarce to spare, when every drop of it was needed for training.
"Then let's do it this way."
Cariel cast a leisurely glance around the training yard.
"Will you teach me a lesson yourself, Instructor?"
As always—as a way to stave off boredom.
To show off. To boast. To flail desperately for the spotlight.
As a tool for that pathetic inferiority complex, that petty spite, that venting of feeling.
Just as it had always been.
"You ought to grant His Highness what he's asking for."
"……"
He knows exactly what's happening. He's simply pretending not to.
But if this was being discussed so brazenly, to his face—had things already passed the point of no return?
So what, though?
It wouldn't be me who was cornered.
If it went badly, then so be it. If he died, then he died.
Kill today. Kill tomorrow.
"Well? Will you do it, or won't you?"
At some point, he had become incapable of feeling fear over things that meant nothing.
Yet he had kept on misunderstanding—bound by the reflexive submission of a lifetime of being on the receiving end.
Must I cower because I am helpless and weak?
No.
His fear had, all along, been—
a nightmare of his own making.
No one else's.
…And realizing it this late fills me with a small, bitter fury…
……
No. Let me correct that.
Not a little. It was deeply… unjust.
Deeply.
So very, very deeply.