Duality

People setting out on a journey generally leave with every last belonging packed to bursting.

Among them I saw, more than once, travelers for whom a bag or two was still not enough, and who brought along a third hand — one that answered to the name of servant.

To someone who had crossed the sea with nothing but a single bag, it all looked rather ostentatious. Even now, the whole of my luggage was one leather traveling bag with a handle. Spellbooks, identification papers, a change of clothes, and the like — everything inside had a use of its own. Part of it was simply that I had no money to spare for anything new, but I was keeping the arrangement in what seemed its optimal form, and if it worked, that was good enough.

Even so, a few things had found their way in that were a long way from useful. The clothes and scarf I had been given as New Year's gifts. And the letter Mrs. Dieman had left behind.

As the train slowed for its stop, I was sorting through my things when I began turning that letter over, studying it from every angle.

"Hmm."

Even now, looking at it brought her request back with perfect clarity. It's all right if you never deliver it to my family. Just take it. That's all I ask. Mrs. Dieman had, in all likelihood, already been sent back. Whether I carried the letter for the rest of my life or tossed it by the roadside, she would have no way of knowing. Of course I would not do that. But it was equally true that resolving, I'll deliver it to her family, felt strangely hard to commit to.

And no wonder. All that was written on the envelope were the names of her husband and her son. Finding someone by a given name alone, without even a full name, would be no easy matter.

"......Time will sort it out, I suppose."

Shhhhhk— My body pitched slowly forward, and in the same instant a fierce blast of steam hammered at my ears. In the third-class carriage the dozing passengers woke one by one and gathered their bags with a peculiar air of expectation. It was an atmosphere I had grown used to, after several such arrivals. The feeling of having arrived.

Beyond the window, the noisy, bustling expanse of Fraussen Station spread out to greet me. I lifted my bag, waving back at the children who ran alongside the train and waved at every window. Today was the twenty-seventh of August. The weather was brilliantly clear.

At last!

The moment I stepped off the train, the urge to punch a fist at the sky and cheer took complete hold of me. I did not act on it. Fraussen was a place out of a dream to me, but to most people it was the hometown where they had been born and raised, and the workplace they went to every day. As if to prove the point, the great majority of those who got off scattered toward every corner of the city wearing expressions that looked bored, or dry, or both. It was a sight that had continued without a break at every station since Oris — proof that the railway was a practical means of transport even for the people who lived here.

But I saw them. A few young men besides myself, glancing about with flushed, excited faces. They had surely come from elsewhere, harboring the ambition of becoming magic scholars.

The fountainhead of magic. The Federal Magic University, founded by Jean-Pierre Ochelimet, the Father of Magic Theory — the city of learning where that historic institution stood. Whatever anyone might say, Fraussen was that kind of place.

"All right."

I set my hat straight and neatened my clothes. I made no particular effort to hide my gray hair. I was someone who had pored over spellbooks all the way from the distant lands of the Empire. I had finally arrived in the city of magic, and I could dream of becoming a magic scholar; a penalty on the order of hair color was trivial beyond measure. If anything, I made a vow.

"I'll become the first gray-haired magic scholar there ever was."

Of course I would have to hide, thoroughly, that I came from the Empire. It seemed wise to hurry and have a new identification card issued, one that listed a Federation address as my place of residence. With that, I left the station and stepped into the streets of Fraussen.

The city's first impression could be summed up in a single word: tidy. Port cities like Oris, or Lehman back in the Empire, gave a strong sense of having swollen outward to fit the lay of the land. Fraussen, though, had set its foundations on a vast plain ringed by low hills. A thoroughly planned city. Plots carved into neat rectangles, and avenues cutting straight across the urban grid, affirmed as much.

"Finding my way ought to be easy."

Relieved that I probably would not get lost this time, I set off from Fraussen Station and began walking the grandest boulevard of all, the one that ran through the middle of the city. A road linking the station, the square, and the Federal Magic University in a single straight line. The three landmarks, visible clear down that line, seemed to lay the whole history of Fraussen out at a glance.

I walked slowly toward the center, sunk in thought. I still had not settled on a destination. There was a single line of an address in my hand, and yet I could not quite bring myself to decide whether I ought to go there.

The place it pointed to was none other than Benjamin's family home — where his wife, Susan Oslo, and his four daughters, all of them but Dorothy, were said to live.

"I know I ought to call on them at least once."

What tangled me in doubt was the question of whether that once had to be now. Benjamin had said he had written his ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠family in the Federation to tell them I existed. He would not, though, have told them I was coming. With no foundation for a life here yet, turning up out of nowhere seemed likely to do ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠nothing but startle them, and that worry came first.

"Maybe I should find work somewhere in Fraussen before I go."

I was turning the problem over without end when a distinct rumble rose from my stomach. Grrgle. Only then did I remember that, over the month I had spent in the coal mine, my meals had been nothing short of the worst.

Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle.

"Your steak, with Bordelaise."

"Th-thank you."

A waiter in neat clothes and gloves set the plate upon the table. His gaze, unlike the elegance of the motion, was not particularly kind — but what did that matter? There was meat in front of me.

I had been hungry. So I looked around the neighborhood, walked into the largest restaurant that caught my eye, and ordered as if possessed. To think that was all it took to eat meat. For a month I had survived on lumps of stone disguised as bread and strips of leather disguised as jerky, and for a moment I had forgotten the plain truth that if you ordered food, food arrived.

I took up a fork and a knife that gleamed silver, one in each hand. Meat, as everyone knows, is the king of all food, and roasted meat is the king of kings. Upon the plate a king crowned in blood lay in languid, indecent repose. I could not hold back any longer. A slice, a sweep — I cut the steak, heaped it with sauce, and put it in my mouth.

"...!"

A faint tartness, and then a powerful savor of meat, and a texture that bordered on violent. It felt as if my thoughts were going numb. Was this not the most delicious thing I had eaten in my life? From that moment I did not stop my arms. Cut, sauce, eat. The room on the whole was given over to people enjoying their food slowly while talking at their ease, but the only companions I had to converse with were a fork and a knife. I cleared the plate in the blink of an eye.

"Haaaah......"

A satisfaction beyond words. If my memory was right, though, the menu had carried a separate heading for dessert. Should I order some? I was agonizing over it even more fiercely than I had over whether to visit Benjamin's family when ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a crowd of young people poured into the restaurant and took the table nearest mine.

I glanced that way by reflex. I could not help it. There were about eight of them, and they were dressed in nothing less than school uniforms — and more than that, their topic was not the sort one could simply let pass.

"Thank you all for joining today's Dining Debate for Intellectual Youth. I'll set out the proposition in advance."

The oldest-looking of the group seemed to be leading them. What he said next made me forget all about dessert and fix on their conversation.

"Is light a particle, or a wave?"

I set down my cutlery and gave the talk my full attention, and before long I had a rough sense of who made up that bizarre little society calling ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠itself the Dining Debate for Intellectual Youth. Six ordinary students. One girl who might have been called a secretary, or a recorder — she took no part in the debate, but kept writing something down. And one young man who looked to be a student of the magic university.

Setting aside the way his eyes kept drifting toward the girl, it was rather interesting that a debate on the theory of magic should be held in an ordinary restaurant in the middle of the city.

"Light is... just light, isn't it?"

"I think light is a particle. Everything is made of maso particles, isn't it? If you look closely enough, light will be too."

"I wonder if light might be a wave. The way sound is. It seems to have the character of a wave more than of matter."

The level of the debate could not, even as flattery, be called high. Those students knew even less than I did, and I was painfully slow to absorb the latest theories. The university student, of course, was plainly another matter.

"Thank you for the fine opinions. The answer is that it's a wave. In the double-slit experiment carried out decades ago, they sent light through two slits, and an interference pattern appeared. That's a property of waves. The experiments continued after that, and they proved the wave nature of light."

"Ooh!"

"Lena. Did you get that explanation down properly?"

A neatly ordered account flowed smoothly from his mouth. While the students sank into admiration and applauded, he smiled all the more unctuously and cast the girl a flirtatious look. Her expression resembled my own.

So light was a wave. Was that really a question one could settle so easily? I was calming my gaze and idly twirling my fork when it happened. From the seat right beside me, a man who had likewise been eavesdropping on the debate slowly got to his feet.

"I'm not listening to some theorist's nonsense."

He muttered it as he rose.