Society Debut (3)
People reacted exactly as everyone had predicted.
"I can't believe Marquess Justiha showed up to a ball with a partner."
"For a moment, I thought I was dreaming."
"Is that gentleman the master of that grand estate?"
With every step we took, whispers about us drifted through the hall. It was only natural—the mist-shrouded figures who had existed until now as nothing but rumor were finally taking visible shape.
Even after Duke Peita's brief greeting, the crowd went on observing us like animals behind a fence. But this was a place devoted to the pleasures of society, and such gawkers could hardly remain the only ones there forever.
A young man came striding boldly toward us. He wore a pale green shirt with emerald cuff buttons—dapper and expensive-looking.
He flashed an uncomfortably wide smile in greeting.
"It's been a while, Marquess Justiha. I'm Yuro of House Billone—do you remember me?"
"I've had no occasion to attend balls, save to escort His Majesty the Emperor. You'll forgive me."
It was a polite way of saying forgive me, but who are you? At Irelphi's answer, the corners of Yuro Billone's mouth failed to hold their balance.
It must have taken considerable courage just to approach first, so I felt a little sorry for him.
"My congratulations on your recovery. It feels like only yesterday you were making every man in society swoon at your debutante a decade ago—and now, of all things, you've deigned to attend with an escort!"
Yuro's gaze swung to me. I smiled as naturally as I could manage; my image would become Irelphi's reputation, after all. The one thing I refused to do was cause her trouble.
"Kch."
Despite all that effort, Yuro reacted in precisely the opposite of what I'd hoped. He stared at me with an expression caught somewhere between a scowl and a sneer. I must have made some blunder.
I opened my mouth to recover.
"I'm Nepi Alteon, the Marquess's personal physician. A pleasure."
I held out a hand toward Yuro. But my hand grasped nothing but the warm air of the ballroom—no human warmth whatsoever.
"So you were raised to marquess recently, were you? And granted a grand estate to boot."
Yuro stood with arms crossed, his whole bearing one of cross-examination.
"That's how it happened."
With all record and oral history of the Founding Nobles lost to time, our great mansion remained a mystery of architecture. That was the sense in which Yuro had called it one.
"And yet, as I understand it, you hold no territory, nor any real fortune. Am I mistaken?"
"Well... no, that's quite correct."
In truth, all I'd been given was the title and the house. The servants all belonged to the imperial household, and even my allowance was managed entirely by the palace.
A sum far beyond my station arrived weekly, yet it always piled up unspent—both because Irelphi and I were ascetics by nature, and because we had almost no private time together.
I stayed at Irelphi's side as a surveillance subject, and she was perpetually drowning in work. Surveillance, guard duty, paperwork—even if her days were twice as long, they wouldn't have been enough for her.
"A hollow, honorific title, then."
"That suits me fine."
I meant it. The day I eventually parted from Irelphi would be the day a life of rights without obligations began. I looked forward to that day and nothing else.
Desperate to change the subject, I grabbed at any topic that came to hand.
"By the way, where did you get those emerald cuff buttons? They look rather fine."
"Wh-what? You've a discerning eye. Ahem... Correction—they're not cuff buttons at all, they're communication stones! Really, how ignorant of the world can you be..."
"Oh-ho."
I let my eyes gleam with interest. Honestly, I couldn't have cared less about cuff buttons—I'd only asked out of politeness.
But a communication stone was another matter entirely. Wasn't this basically the smartwatch of this world? I decided I absolutely had to buy one.
"Such ignorance of the world—no wonder you show no courtesy to Marquess Justiha..."
"Haha. Well, that's what these occasions are for, isn't it? Learning as you go."
At my breezy comeback, Irelphi glanced at me with a puzzled look. When I shrugged, her cherry-red lips drifted softly toward my ear.
"Nepi, aren't you upset? Up until four hundred years ago, you were the second-most powerful man in the Empire."
"Hrk."
An undignified sound escaped me at her sudden whisper. Her sweet breath struck straight at my brain—a jolt of sensation. Especially with Netionpis's senses sitting somewhere beyond the human range, the shiver of pleasure hit harder than it had any right to.
A secret, is it?
Thinking the same, I whispered back into Irelphi's ear.
"It's all true, so what of it."
"Hyang!"
She flinched like a snow-white rabbit startled by a snap of twigs. She wasn't used to whispering either, apparently. Flustered, Irelphi seized my ear and yanked.
Passionately, one might say.
"However you meant it, Nepi, the intent is slander."
"Mmf!"
"You could stand to take a somewhat firmer stance... hm?"
Desperate to escape the sweet tyranny of pleasure firing straight through my ear canal into my brain, I pulled back from her breath—and then leaned in at her ear, firing back like a machine gun.
To any observer, it would have looked like a counterattack.
"Anyone who reacts to this kind of thing is an idiot."
"Hik?"
"A person with real class knows how to laugh off a little gossip about themselves..."
Right in the middle of my whispered sermon, Yuro's furious cry finally burst out.
"What are you two DOING? Have some shame!"
What burned in Yuro's eyes was pure, unmistakable jealousy. I honestly could not grasp what the problem was. Had our whispering looked to him like we were ignoring him?
"Ah, that wasn't on purpose, so..."
"Not on purpose! Is it just an everyday occurrence for you two, then? Ha, how hilarious. Fine. Forget it. I'm done!"
Muttering something under his breath, Yuro fled. Irelphi and I both stood gaping blankly at his retreating back.
Then the crowd began talking about us openly. The topic: me and Irelphi. They spoke so loudly that even Irelphi could hear every word.
"Goodness, apparently it isn't a simple physician-patient relationship at all!"
"Such conduct in front of all these eyes...!"
"Ugh, I'm so jealous of that quack."
"Ahh, I envy Marquess Justiha. What must it feel like, whispered to by such a decadently handsome gentleman?"
That was the gist of it—and only then did Irelphi and I grasp the gravity of the situation.
"How did this happen, Nepi? Why is the gossip snowballing?"
"You don't get it...? No—I didn't see it coming either, but this was never the intent, ugh."
"I never thought much of it before, but hearing it stated this openly, I'm rather mortified myself."
"...Same here."
It brought back memories of chatting with a girl who'd been my deskmate as a child and getting mercilessly teased by everyone around us. Was the mental age of high society really that of children...?
And these were people among whom a Founding Noble had ranked only second.
"At this point, we should just work the room and explain ourselves to as many people as possible."
"The rumors about my injury and my physician were already spread by His Majesty himself. What exactly is there to explain, and how?"
"What? If you hadn't known that, we might've managed something!"
If the rumors hadn't already been out, we could have brushed off that little scene as an intimate word between physician and patient. But with the rumors already flying, it now looked as though we'd done such things despite being physician and patient.
The two situations meant completely different things.
"Weren't you some kind of society veteran? Fix this somehow...!"
"Truthfully, since my own debut, I've done nothing at balls but stand guard for His Majesty, lips firmly shut. I'm hardly omnipotent either, you know."
"So confident a minute ago, you selectively supreme being!"
"What was that?"
As I said it, I ran back over everything I knew of Irelphi's conduct: the deadpan question-is-moot attitude, the dad-joke tastes, the utterly oblivious superior.
And that wasn't all. Until recently, she'd kept her mouth sealed at every social function for guard duty reasons. Add in a serious case of princess syndrome, and by my observation, no friends whatsoever.
Hold on—is she actually a massive communications disaster?
It was a truth I'd never once considered. Perhaps she'd solved everything all along on the strength of the name Irelphi Justiha, her beauty, and her power.
Irelphi and I were in the middle of our bickering when salvation came running from across the hall: Sharle Millote, blonde, green-eyed, unforgettable in a red dress.
As always, Sharle flung herself straight into Irelphi's arms.
"Elphiiii!"
"Sh-Sharle?!"
Irelphi was visibly startled—a rare sight. Since we'd been invited to the ball as guests, Sharle's attendance had been a foregone conclusion.
Then why the shock? Because Irelphi had never imagined Sharle would behave so thoughtlessly even on neutral ground.
At court, clinging like that to Irelphi while she stood guard at the Emperor's side would never be tolerated. Today was the special exception, so surely Sharle would behave as usual.
But in the current situation, this was actually a blessing. Given how much she hated me, Sharle would surely deny any connection between me and Irelphi, loudly and firmly.
For a moment there, I even entertained that hope.
"Listen here, Sharle, about what you just saw with Irelphi—"
"Shut your mouth, Marquess Alteon. I have eyes too. What is the meaning of those tender little displays? I should have known the moment you two moved in together and started calling each other by name like the best of chums!"
"Sh-Sharle? I mean, Miss Millote?"
I could tell, with grim clarity, that things had gone thoroughly, irreversibly wrong. Sharle's mouth, once opened, showed no sign whatsoever of closing.
In that instant, a calamity's maw descended upon the ballroom.
"Did affection bloom as you nursed Elphi's wounds? Or is it simply that face of hers—no, yours? Is that Elphi's taste? I... I...! I trusted Elphi... but no. Fine. If Elphi is happy, then I'll bless you, always and however much, heeeek... sob."
By the end, Sharle was grinding her teeth as she spoke. I had neither the wit for a response nor the will to give one; I just stood there, mouth hanging open, watching the disaster unfold.
'Nepi. What do we do now?'
Irelphi signaled with her eyes; I answered in kind.
'Haha. No idea. Me neither.'
So this is how one sheltered young lady shoves the greater good down a sewer... Man proposes, and heaven disposes, as they say?
All I could do was stare up at the ceiling and heave a sigh.
The calamity was not over. As if matters weren't dire enough, the musicians were now inspecting their instruments. The hour of dancing with Irelphi, hand in hand, was drawing near.
Under normal circumstances, not a single problem. But the timing, of all timings. Our dance together would drive a wedge straight into the controversy already blazing.
While Sharle clung to Irelphi, pleading and fanning the flames of scandal, I struck up conversations with a handful of guests. I don't remember a single word of them.
Then, at some point, the music began to flow, and Irelphi came toward me wearing the expression of a soldier marching to the gallows. No phrase could have suited her look of blank despair better.
"Irelphi."
"Yes..."
"I don't know either. Triple axel. We'll divert everyone's eyes with the dance."
"Yes..."
I had no idea what I was saying either. Irelphi hadn't heard a word of it. We were two people operating on pure lost minds.
That night, the full moon hung bright over Duke Peita's estate. It was also the night history recorded the debut of high society's greatest dancing duo.
Two marquesses turned the floor upside down.
That day, under the infamous name of the "Black-and-White Dance," we became legends of high society.