Ride a Bison, You Say?!
"You're going to ride a bison, my lady?!"
I was tidying the books alone in the study when Lady Eliza came looking for me.
"Bielka, the Grand Duchess is asking for you."
The moment I heard those words, at first I thought I'd misheard her — and the next, I thought my heart would stop. The Grand Duchess was calling for me?! I trembled all over, wondering if I'd made some terrible mistake.
On the way to see Her Ladyship, I watched Lady Eliza's back and remembered the stories the other maids had told me.
Lady Eliza, they said, was a special one — a lady's maid who could use magic. And yet, curiously, she serves as the Grand Duchess's maid and advisor both, even though she could hold far more exalted posts.
For plain folk like us, the affairs of our betters are beyond understanding, so I don't know the reason. But word has it that Lady Eliza is the only person alive who can keep the Grand Duchess in check.
And the Grand Duchess — Lady Katerina, that is… about her, everyone told a different story.
Some said she was a terror of a tomboy. Some said she simply did whatever she pleased, whenever it pleased her. Some said she cared nothing for other people.
Ah — though on one point everyone agreed: she possesses truly monstrous strength.
So I was all the more frightened. I thought I might be summoned on Her Ladyship's whim and cast out just as fast.
But something truly astonishing happened. Lady Katerina studied me carefully, and then asked whether the maid's work wasn't too hard for me! For the Grand Duchess to ask such a thing of a lowly maid like me — I was simply dumbfounded.
Though… when Her Ladyship glanced at my body — my chest, in particular — and frowned a little, that truly frightened me. I wondered if she was displeased that I was too plump.
But what she said next went far beyond anything I had imagined. She wanted me to attend her personally!
To be sure, I would begin as an apprentice, assisting Lady Eliza — but even so, a commoner-born maid like me, becoming a maid of the Grand Duchess herself… it felt like a dream. I hear it has never once happened before.
"Henceforth you will assist Eliza and attend to my needs. That way, you'll have no time to be lonely."
Her Ladyship's words were a bit curt, but I could feel the kindness behind them.
That was a truly strange thing, in fact. Of all the rumors I'd heard, not a single one said the Grand Duchess cared a whit about her servants.
Lady Eliza explained it to me later: Lady Katerina had seen me working alone and eating my meals alone, and had decided to help me herself — by taking me on as her maid.
How many people, all this time, have misunderstood Lady Katerina? She was someone who quietly looked after those around her, who helped the weak — she simply never showed it on the surface.
And so, under Lady Eliza's guidance, I began my new life as an apprentice maid.
At first, everything was strange and difficult. I had to learn etiquette from the ground up, how to care for Lady Katerina's wardrobe — even how to pour tea properly.
Lady Eliza is a truly wonderful teacher. She always instructs me calmly, and even when I make mistakes she never scolds me. "Let us try it this way next time," she says, and encourages me instead. Thanks to her, I grow a little every day.
Sometimes I ask myself why I was given this chance. Why me, of all people? Among hundreds of maids, why did Lady Katerina choose an unremarkable country girl like me?
I still don't know the reason. I can only be grateful. Because I am no longer lonely. Because now I have a place where I belong, and at my side there are Lady Eliza and Lady Katerina.
I made a vow. Someday, I will become a fine maid like Lady Eliza, and a worthy help to Lady Katerina. And I will repay, without fail, the grace Her Ladyship has shown me.
Oh… I thought I heard a sound just now. Perhaps Lady Katerina has given up on her studies and gotten up. If so, I must hurry after her. That's all for today!
Several days had passed since I took Bielka on as an apprentice maid. Honestly speaking, she struck me as a slightly slow-witted, easygoing country girl, and I hadn't expected much of her — yet she adapted with surprising speed.
And I was adapting quickly as well. The overwhelming figure of hers that had felt somehow awkward at first became, once the thought settled in that she was mine, something I felt faintly proud of.
To put it a little less formally, I'd caught myself wanting to say, "Heh heh heh. My girl, isn't she something?" — mostly at the lecherous sorts whose eyes kept drifting her way.
'That feeling is probably Katerina's, but still…'
Seen through the eyes of a modern soul slowly acclimating to politics, Bielka was a card that could be played as a kind of Joker.
A body that was practically the dictionary definition of the male ideal, a lowly birth to match, and, on top of that, her fierce loyalty.
She was, in short, the perfect instrument for showing some man who possessed something I needed a "dream of a single night" — and for harvesting all the favor that came trailing after it.
"………."
I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. No idea why.
'Could Katerina's instincts actually be recoiling from my own thoughts?'
In any case, Bielka was learning a great deal under Eliza's tutelage. And I, following the admonitions in my mother's letters, continued to live a steady and exemplary life.
That day was as unremarkable as any other. Having finished my dreary studies in the library, I was taking my rest when I had Bielka keep me company with her chatter.
"Do regale me with an amusing tale again today, won't you?"
"Ah, well…."
Bielka hesitated a moment before continuing.
"Today I heard the strangest story from the other maids."
Bielka, chatting with the other maids. From the days when she'd been quietly frozen out, that would have been unimaginable.
'But things are different now.'
People of the pre-modern world possess something like a superhuman instinct for sensing the power another person carries — power of the back-room variety included. Think of it as a battle-scouter of the sort certain aliens wield.
And those who live as servants in a noble house naturally hone that instinct all the sharper.
For Bielka, taken up as the Grand Duchess's favored maid, her standing in the other maids' senses had swelled more than tenfold — not in battle power, but in influence. It was more than enough to convert sullen exclusion and contempt into fawning kindness.
'Some of them must be green with envy inwardly, but even they have no choice but to grovel to her face.'
Somewhat satisfied by this state of affairs, I turned the question back on her.
"You said you heard a curious tale, did you?"
"Yes. They say Baron Trofimov has bought a bison of absolutely enormous size."
Trofimov. A lesser noble holding lands in the western part of the Grand Duchy's direct domain. His territory wasn't densely populated, but I'd heard his family had grown wealthy through stock-raising passed down for generations.
"But this bison is no ordinary bison — they say it's truly, monstrously huge. He meant to use it as a breeding bull and create a whole new breed."
"Hm. And then?"
"The trouble is, no matter what they tried, they couldn't tame the beast at all. Baron Trofimov is said to run the finest bison ranch in the whole territory, but even his experts failed, every last one of them.
It goes berserk every single day — it's smashed fences beyond counting, more than ten herdsmen have been badly injured, and nearly the whole stable has collapsed…."
The moment I heard Bielka's explanation, the image of one enormous bison rose in my mind.
The Mountain King — the one I'd met at the livestock market.
"Would this bison happen to be… far larger than any other bison, with a black mane hanging all the way down to its shoulders? The one they call the Mountain King…?"
"How ever did you know that?"
"Merely a guess, merely a guess."
I waved off Bielka's wide-eyed question with a smile.
The Mountain King was a northern bison roughly the size of a minibus from Earth, by my best estimate. He'd snapped the chains that bound him, charged straight at Natasha and me, and then taken an uppercut from me that knocked him cold.
"So what does Baron Trofimov intend to do with the creature?"
"At first he tried to sell it. But the Baron set an outrageous price — the bison's cost plus the injured men's treatment, the stable repairs, everything lumped together — and when no one would pay it, he flew into a rage and decided to have it slaughtered."
"Slaughtered…?"
Slaughtered, hm. An ugly word, but I could follow the reasoning well enough.
Ten herdsmen seriously injured thanks to the Mountain King, fences destroyed in droves, the stable collapsed.
For Baron Trofimov, bleeding catastrophic property damage, his choices were to sell the beast at a price that covered his losses — or, failing that, to kill it and salvage at least his pride and standing.
My head understood it perfectly. My heart, however, did not care for it.
"Do you happen to know precisely when the slaughtering is to take place?"
"I heard it would be ten days from now."
"Hmm…."
'Slaughtering that enormous northern bison, just like that…'
It might not have been the wisest course of action — but I found myself wanting to step in all the same.