The Dark Cabal (2)
The night market of the Grand Duchy of Carpatia, which had once thrummed with vibrant, teeming crowds, was now nothing but an obstacle to Yona.
"Rubinaa!"
Screaming Rubina's name until her throat threatened to tear, Yona wove through the crowd without pause.
She started at a half-jog and quickly broke into a run, twisting her head back and forth as she searched desperately for any glimpse of the girl.
I'm insane. I've completely lost my mind...! I should have just brought her with me...!
It was far too late for regret, but that didn't stop her from shouting Rubina's name into the night as she combed the market.
Of course it had to be nighttime, and of course Rubina's hair was black, making her uniquely difficult to spot — and the plain, nondescript brown dress she wore was no help either. Finding her by her clothes alone was out of the question.
So Yona did the only thing she could: whenever she spotted a child of roughly the same build, she charged over and shoved her face right in to check—
"S-sorry...!"
Apologizing over and over, she kept calling Rubina's name at the top of her lungs.
"Agh!"
She failed to notice a curbstone running across the square into the main street, caught her foot, and went sprawling. The freshly scabbed scar on her face was torn open by the fall, and blood began to trickle down her cheek; the toe of her shoe split wide open, and blood seeped from there as well.
The blood soaking through the leather stained a vivid red, carving a deep mark into it.
The first foreign substance to soak in always leaves the deepest trace.
Then, little by little, it spreads its territory.
Yona stared down at the bloodstain for a moment, then gritted her teeth and forced herself upright.
"Hk—!"
Even so, the pain throbbing up from her foot made her groan and collapse back down before she could stop herself.
No. No.
I can't sit here.
She clenched her jaw hard and drove strength into her legs. A searing pain shot up her spine as if it meant to burn it alive.
She ignored it.
She took one step.
The split toe of her shoe was already soaked through with blood—
but it was bearable.
Why did I do that.
I shouldn't have.
Yona muttered the words to herself over and over.
"Rubinaaa!"
Her voice spread out, then drowned beneath the din of the night market, scattering without a trace.
- Rubinaaa!
Alec, who had been sprawled in bed about to fall asleep, bolted upright.
The voice carrying from far away was unmistakably Yona's. There was no mistaking her voice, and Alec scrambled out of bed at once.
A voice searching for Rubina.
Hearing Yona calling for Rubina in a night market like this could point to only one conclusion.
Without a moment's hesitation, Alec slung his shield over his back and hung his hammer at his waist. There was no real need to arm himself, but the near-instinctive ritual moved in one smooth motion, and on the heels of it he kicked open the door and ran.
Finding Yona was not difficult the moment he dashed down the inn's stairs.
Her hair, bare of any veil, hung in disheveled tangles. Her eyes were puffy — she'd been crying — and the blood streaming down her face had clearly wiped away the scab entirely.
Worse, the toe of her leather boot was stained vivid red where she'd evidently smashed into something, and together it all spoke plainly of a mind that was anything but sound right now.
"Yona!"
Alec grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her.
Yona turned limply in his grip, all strength gone from her body, her gaze empty and unfocused — then she recognized him, and the light came back into her eyes.
"Rubina, Rubina's—!"
"Breathe. Breathe. Deep breath in, and out!"
At Alec's words, Yona broke off mid-sentence and sucked in a huge gulp of air. She let it out, repeated the cycle several times, and only then did she seem to claw her way back to something like her senses.
"You lost Rubina?"
Yona nodded slowly.
"Rubina was crying... she was crying so much, and then she was gone... I just went to buy her something to drink... I left her with a gate guard, and...!"
Even through the jumbled torrent, Alec sorted the words into order as he listened. When you came back from an expedition, hearing this kind of incoherent rambling was a daily occurrence, so the listener simply had to develop the habit of organizing it themselves — it wasn't as if that was the hard part.
"A gate guard. Which gate guard?"
"The, the one who... the one who asked why you don't have any hair, remember..."
It came back to him.
The guard who had peppered them with endless questions as they went through entry procedures at the Grand Duchy of Carpatia.
She'd left Rubina with that guard — and now both of them had vanished...?
Alec took a long, slow breath as well.
He already knew Yona was like this. Faced with anything important, she always panicked and made bizarre decisions, or failed to think of things that should have been obvious. That very streak in her had pulled them through by the skin of their teeth more times than he could count — and had landed them in disaster just as many.
But he'd been traveling with her for three years now, so whenever Yona worked herself up like this, he had long since learned to be the one who stayed calm.
"—Let's go to the guard post. That guard might have taken her to the guardhouse, right?"
A duchy of this size was bound to have proper facilities for its guard force.
There'd be no controlling a place this vast otherwise.
Fortunately, the temporary guard barracks were not far from the square. They were set up whenever the night market opened, and when Yona and Alec stepped inside, several guards were clustered together eating something.
"Evening, gentlemen."
Yona's eyes were swollen and her throat too hoarse to manage much speech, so Alec offered the greeting. One of the guards glanced over, rose smoothly, and approached.
"What brings ye here?"
"We've lost a child."
"Ah, a missing child report. And yer relation to the wee one would be?"
"I'm her father, and this is her mother."
By anyone's assessment, Yona looked exactly like a mother who'd lost her child — a mess of a mother who'd run herself ragged searching. Precisely that kind.
"Aiyo... ye've been through the wringer, haven't ye, mother. Now then, we've no missing children in our care at the moment, and no word's come in from the other posts either. Does the child have any distinguishing features?"
"Black hair and black eyes. She's wearing a brown dress. Oh — and the mother says she left the child with one of the guards for a moment, and when she came back, they were both gone."
At that, the guard's pen, which had been scrawling across a sheet of paper, stopped dead. His eyes lifted to Alec.
"Ye left the child with a guard? Do ye happen to know which one?"
"I'm afraid I don't know his name... but, er, he had a black mole on his forehead. With a hair growing out of it."
"Ah, ye mean Neri. Ye left the child with him?"
"Yes. So his name was Neri... I didn't know."
"Hm. Though that's strange, come to think of it."
Stroking his chin and murmuring to himself, the guard made Alec's stomach slowly begin to sink.
"Neri took leave today. Said he was heading down to his hometown. And ye're telling me he was at the night market in the dead of night? Certain of it?"
"C-certain! I saw him with my own eyes! The black mole on his forehead, with the hair — it was him, I'm sure it was him!"
"Strange, that. Well, understood. We'll look into it ourselves. Where might we reach ye if we find anything?"
The two of them gave the name of the inn where they were staying and stepped back out of the barracks.
By then Yona's panic had settled somewhat, and she had regained that familiar, razor-sharp glint in her eyes.
"Alec."
"Yeah."
"Rubina. ...You don't think she's been kidnapped?"
"I'd be lying if I said the thought hadn't crossed my mind. But what would anyone want with Rubina?"
"...Because she's cute? Maybe they wanted a daughter."
"Well, making jokes — looks like you're back with us."
This time it was Alec who delivered a solid smack to the back of Yona's head.
Just hard enough to sting. Not a whit more.
"We search. Even if it's just us."
At Alec's words, Yona nodded.
"Luckily, when it comes to Rubina, we've got someone in the party who'd throw themselves into this without being asked. Someone born for it. So that's a stroke of luck, too."
"Yeah. A real stroke of luck."
Yona pressed her mouth into a firm line.
When they arrived back at the inn, Yona stopped at the door and looked up toward the second floor.
The window of a room, shut tight, with the faint glow of candlelight leaking through the gap.
James and Kayak's room.
The magnificent chandeliers held a luminescent stone the size of a fingertip embedded into every sculpted glass arm. Considering the price of a single one of those stones, a single chandelier alone was worth enough to feed a large family for a year — and three of them hung in what was, in its entirety, a single dining hall.
When Vigrind had first stepped into that dining hall, she had gasped inwardly.
In her days serving as a priestess in Evian, six of them had shared a single table. Here, there were ten tables, each one larger than that.
Not a single chair accompanied them. Instead, a chef stood at each table, each presiding over one dish apiece, working through their preparations with practiced ease.
And at the far end of the hall stood a wine cellar, its every shelf lined with orderly rows of bottles, each one swathed in its own label.
"It seems Her Holiness the Saintess has quite the interest in wine."
A smooth, clear voice sounded at her ear.
She turned in a hurry to find a breathtaking beauty in a red gown, milk-white hair gleaming, crimson lips curved in a bewitching smile.
"Lady Regent."
"Oh my, surely that is not a title worthy of your esteemed usage, Saintess. Please, simply call me Ceres."
"I couldn't possibly. It would be presumptuous of me."
"With a Saintess so humble as yourself, the Heavenly God Church will surely know boundless growth in the years to come."
It was praise not merely of the Saintess herself, but of the entire faith she embodied.
That single compliment lifted Vigrind's spirits wonderfully.
"I do hope the garment I sent suits your taste?"
"O-of course!"
By a doctrine Vigrind found rather hard to grasp — the more skin revealed, the greater the Heavenly God's favor — the official saint vestments were rather excessively revealing. Even setting aside how her undergrown figure made her sigh every time she had to put them on, the simple truth was that even now, having grown somewhat accustomed to them, she would gladly wear something else if given the choice.
And that had been when this pure white dress arrived.
No exposure whatsoever — a simple, elegant gown that wrapped her whole body, adorned with only the faintest touch of lace. It had won Vigrind's heart completely.
"Thank you truly, for sending even a dress for me."
"Think nothing of it. Though — where is the Hero?"
"Ah—! My apologies for being late!"
At that booming voice, Vigrind's face creased slightly.
She had told him, explicitly and repeatedly, to visit the privy before entering — and Ludwig had thundered back that it was no trouble at all. But the moment he laid eyes on this dining hall, he'd worn a gawping expression, announced he was off to the privy, and now here he was, finally returning.
"My, my, Hero. Ever the stalwart one, aren't you."
"Wow—, well now. I came up as a Gold-Rank Adventurer, so I've seen plenty of fine places in my day, but this is the first time I've seen anything on this scale. This is truly remarkable!"
Ludwig beamed.
What refreshing, easygoing charm, Vigrind thought. Truthfully she wished he'd filter himself a little — but even she had sensed it at a glance. This was a man through whom thoughts and words passed without any kind of sieve. Whatever entered his mind came straight out of his mouth, just as it was.
"To have both the Hero and the Saintess so pleased — well, it makes all my preparation worthwhile. Oh, but look at me, keeping my guests standing like this. You must be famished. Let's get you seated and eating right away. I did make my own arrangements, though I can't promise they'll fully satisfy you."
Ceres showed not the slightest hint of being put out. If anything, her smile only deepened as she guided the two of them toward the dining table.
"At any table you like, you may take and eat freely of whatever dishes you desire. Plates are laid out before each table, so please use them at your leisure. As for the wine... hmm."
Ceres turned to Vigrind and smiled slyly.
"For our noble Saintess and our stalwart Hero, I shall pour the wine myself."
What a good person, they thought — and in that instant, Ludwig and Vigrind were thinking the very same thing.