No Need to Know
He doesn't need to know. There's no reason for him to.
What I told Evan was a lie.
This time an entire group of elves had been taken whole. A scout or two I could simply kill and be done with, but ten was a little much. The Wardens who had been hunting, killing, and retrieving corpses until now had never once reported anything with this kind of urgency. And three Wardens dead—that, too, was a first.
I had thought they would be strong. Bodies sheathed in black carapace, hands that could harden into blades… and yet they had been brought down somehow. The confusion of it still sat heavy in my mind.
"You. And you. Guard Evan."
I sent the two Wardens I met lingering in an alley straight to the house where he waited, hoping the uneasy feeling would ease a little. It didn't. Three of them already watched him from the neighboring houses, and still my head spun with the certainty that something would go wrong.
…It will be fine. It has to be fine. This time the god I serve is watching over me—and over Evan. If anything happens, He will do something. He must.
What else am I staining my hands with blood for? What else am I dismantling and crushing corpses for, day after day, just to feed that "curiosity" of His? If anything happens to Evan…
A crow with three eyes. Even a glance was enough to make its twisted beak and eyes crawl under the skin, but the chill lasted only a moment.
A sudden rush of wings filled the sky; I flinched and looked up—
A vast flock of birds settled onto every branch around me in an instant. Their yellow eyes glowed from the shadows, and when I met them I saw myself already dyed purple, smiling faintly in the dark. How could anyone look at that and not feel fear?
The power in those words, the vision this god laid before me—this was the divine strength that proved the worth of every sacrifice, every act of faith, every thing I had done. This was a miracle.
The birds scattered again with a rush of wings. I stared after them for a moment, then stepped once more into the shadows. The longer I walked, the more the image of those birds settled into my mind, and the more familiar their shock became, the more natural it felt to think that all of this was nothing compared to losing him.
In truth, even the act of killing itself had begun to feel a little dull. I was far from ordinary now. The woman Evan remembered would be very different from the one I had become. And yet he still loved me.
Even when the thought that I was treating him so wrongly—chaining him, collaring him—tormented me without end, he simply held every one of my selfish demands and every one of my moods and smiled. He was the only sanctuary left in this nightmare of a reality. He had shown me blue sky and trees again, and let me breathe their scent without flinching. I was not fully healed, but the day I could move my body again he had given me a memory I would never forget, never let go of—warmth that erased half a year of agony in a single moment, saliva sweeter than anything I had ever eaten just to stay alive, and a face flushed with shyness more beautiful than any landscape I had ever seen.
"Anything for you… Evan, that is such a terribly lovely thing to say."
Not even a full day since I got you back, and already you make me ache like this? Do you have any idea what I will do to you when I hear words like that? What if I lock you in a single room for the rest of my life and pour every last second I have left into you? What if I tell you I want enough children to fill this empty village with our blood? What if I ask you to grant the wish that I know every thought inside your head? Or the wish that even in death we stay together forever?
Hmm? Evan.
That iron certainty that you will love me for eternity—no, the proof of it—the way you smiled at me even after tasting the terror and pain of death… did you truly understand every last piece of me when you said those words?
I draw a breath and my heart hammers so hard it hurts. Every time I hold you, every time I shamefully leave my tangled hair in your hands, the dazed, intoxicated look on your face is so captivating I can barely stand it.
All that nonsense about our time flowing differently. Those pathetic faces that laughed and told me to think of the age gap. Could any of them dare say such things if they saw you now? The hundred years of time and experience between us? The difference of race between human and elf? Even now I feel with absolute clarity how worthless those things are—and still every long-eared bastard looked at me and said the same thing.
A low, stupid short-lived creature. A woman so base she wanted to mix her body with one, not even fit to be called an elf.
I cut off my own ear because I hated it, and still the mockery never stopped. It still claws at me. After you died they insulted me even more viciously, and those faces are still vivid. …Right now, without you, those thoughts keep rising, Evan. Without you everything feels wrong. My body shivers as if cold.
I want to go back. I am tired of walking deeper into the dark. Can't I just stay by your side? I want to spend the rest of my life next to you without a single thought in my head… Your short lifespan is so hateful that I almost wish you had been an elf, or I a human. It would have been so much better.
But I have to face reality, don't I? In the end you cannot live long with me without the Outer God's help, and without that help you cannot even give me a child.
It's all right. You can stay knowing nothing. The ten invaders lined up and bound, the death waiting for them, the countless filthy interlopers still to come—you can remain ignorant of all of it. That is the greatest repayment I can give the man who loved me.
…And since you already gave me permission, it's all right if I look forward to just a little more love, isn't it?
"…What are you waiting for? You should have cut every last one of their throats already."
Even the fact that these loathsome creatures were still breathing sat wrong with me.
"I came here with a message to deliver. Exile Thea."
So that was why they had forced the one in front to kneel. The other nine were either vacant-eyed or weeping, yet this one—the largest, the sturdiest—
"Why would a front-line swordsman be here?"
That crest. That symbol. And the broken greatsword. Only the elite of the elite were granted a blade and sent to the battlefield. Why had this man come all the way here…?
"By the god's command, as a messenger to convey His will, I kneel before you."
"The god's will? Ha… heh heh heh… heh—"
I have nothing left to hear from the one who abandoned me and Evan.
To be dragged out here for creatures not even worth continuing a conversation with… pure waste of time. I need to get back to Evan—
"Everything was a mistake."
What?
What did I just hear? Did he just say mistake?
"That your parents never gave you their attention, that our kin heaped insult upon you, that the one named Tolfen—now imprisoned in the underground cells—did what he did to you… all of it was unintended. So He has spoken."
"…"
"Those who desecrated your lover's body have all been stripped of rank. Tolfen, who sought to defile you, has lost every title and been cast into prison. Of those who aided him, the survivor Orek has been forcibly banished. And the High Priest who failed to protect you, who failed to lead the clan, who failed even to take responsibility for his own bloodline, has likewise been made to answer. Therefore cease all of this, He commands. The blood and flesh already spilled will be forgiven—"
"Forgiven?"
"Yes. Forgiveness. An oracle delivered by His own hand. Miracles of this sort are rare."
I could not stand listening any longer.
…Forgiveness. Forgiveness? An oracle delivered in person? A miracle?
"Don't make me laugh. What? Forgive me? Stop? Who does that so-called god think he is, to decide something like this on his own? Did he think I would just swallow it whole? Do you think every agony I had to choke down after losing him will simply vanish? Hmm? You don't even know me. You have no idea what kind of life I lived, what humiliation and rage I had to force down my own throat—and still you dare speak of miracles, miracles, miracles… I don't need a god like that. A miracle like that is worthless to me. You can't even bring back the dead, and you talk to me of miracles?!"
I could not contain the rage. To stand in front of me and speak of miracles, oracles, divine grace—things like that—
"A miracle? Fine. I'll show you myself what a miracle looks like."
I drove the blade straight through his heart in one motion and let a thread of power from the staff flow into him—
"Guh… u… uuuuh… w-what are you doing to m—"
The words twisted into a scream. The face he had once been so proud of became a ruin, inside and out inverted, a living monster. And more than that—a monster that still possessed its reason, and would use that reason only to tear its own comrades apart.
"Uuuuh… grrrk."
"This is a miracle. The power to reach into the living world—that is a miracle. Not smearing useless blessings and holy oil on Evan's already-dead body while abandoning us both to every horror that followed."
One gesture freed every bound invader. I struck the staff against the ground to draw their eyes, and they naturally found themselves staring at what had once been their leader—nothing of the old face remaining.
"…C-Captain?"
"Run from your captain as hard as you can. If that precious miracle of yours is real, maybe salvation will come for you too…"
Whatever happened next I could leave to the Wardens.
"You—do you think you'll walk away clean after something like this?"
That single line stopped me. The sheer spite packed into the words sparked a fresh flare of anger; I was already swinging the staff when the name reached me.
"Th-that man Evan—do you really think he would love the thing you've become?!"
…I see. I see how it is.
Why do they keep forcing me through this? Why does Evan's name have to come out of garbage like that?
No. No more. I won't care. One order is enough.
"Cut his ankles. Let's see if he can keep that smug look while his own comrades eat him alive."
"W-what are y— AAAAAAGH!!"
…And yet, when I thought about it calmly, it was a stupid question. Evan will live with me without ever knowing what I have done, what I am doing, what I will do. How could he possibly know any of this? Why show something so ugly to a man who will live looking only at me? Why would he ever need to come to a place this foul? He only has to stay in the village, smile, and be happy with me. Compared to the man who died for me, this is nothing.
Ah. Then there's no reason to feel heavy at all, is there?
Just the knowledge that Evan is waiting for me at home is enough to change every thought. I feel happy. I feel glad. I never imagined my steps home could feel this light.
Is it all right that the world looks so bright just because today I went out with Evan, talked with him, kissed him?
Yes. Evan has no need to know what I do, and no reason to. He only has to be happy at my side. The way he made me this happy, I will become happiness for him. That is enough.
There was never any need for guilt in the first place.