Lingering Echo – 1
"You always look at me with that strange look in your eyes. Is there something you wish to say?"
"No. I was simply... a little worried."
An incomprehensible exchange. Words she had never heard, never once spoken — and yet this was unmistakably a conversation between herself and Robert.
The Robert of her memory had been a man more fully melted into the North. He had shed every trace of a central nobleman; she could well have believed him one of her own mercenary company. ...And yet Robert Taylor was a noble of the center. However carelessly he draped his cloak, that refinement never left him. His peculiar air, those eyes that looked ready to crumble at any moment — all of it was quite unlike the Robert she remembered.
Then what were these memories she was seeing? Since Robert had come to the North, these fragments had surfaced again and again, and Adele had gradually become aware that her feelings were twisting out of shape. They were nothing like what she had felt when they first met, or when they crossed paths again at the Full Moon Festival. Something a little more tender, perhaps. Whenever their eyes met, an entirely different emotion would bloom, and she had dimly begun to suspect that these memories were sowing confusion in her.
Hallucinations. Phantom voices.
"How long do you intend to stay in the North? You can't remain at my side forever."
"I will leave when you die, Your Grace. Until then, I have no intention of returning to the central region."
The look in his eyes as he gazed at her was quite unlike reality. So was this nothing more than her own delusion? Adele laughed bitterly and rose from the bed. Pale moonlight slipping between the curtains touched her snow-white hair, lending it a faint glow.
This was no phantom sound. It was, unmistakably, her own memory — and yet there were far too many things about it that did not fit. Why would Robert, who was bound for the South, still be lingering here? Why did he look at her like that? But even that was too indistinct to grasp; only a hazy emotion went on circling her. Like the jet-black mark a flame leaves when it scorches a painting, only a voice and a pair of eyes remained within that blackened vision.
The memories surfaced unbidden whenever she tried to sleep, and for several days now she had not slept properly. Was it her own delusion — or had she, without ever knowing it, once shared a bond with Robert? Unable to untangle the thoughts, Adele drew her knees to her chest.
"Hah."
Suffocating. Lately, the one thing turning Adele's mind inside out was none other than Robert himself. A man who would not bend to her will — one who slipped out of reach the moment she turned her attention elsewhere. It would be no exaggeration to call him the strangest man in Adele's life.
She had led a mercenary company and unified the North; she had become Grand Duke and held that seat to this day. To Adele, every existence had been nothing more than something she could control. However formidable a foe, she could lead her soldiers out and cut them down herself. Whatever problem arose, she summoned Lotos, ordered it resolved, and it was resolved. If she wanted something, she took it. She could not speak for other lands, but within the domain called the North, there was nothing Adele could not do. Ever since her childhood, orphaned and drifting, a single sword in her hand had been enough to cow even the local thugs before her.
"I intend to return now."
When Robert had said he was coming to the North, Adele had genuinely thought to keep him at her side for good. He seemed unlikely to accomplish much in the capital, and the skill he had kept hidden went beyond anything the word outstanding could describe. So she had made him her adjutant, intending to watch him distinguish himself through the Barbarian Subjugation. And it was in that very season that these hallucinations had surfaced. Memories that could not exist — and yet had settled into place as naturally as if they had truly happened. It had not taken long for the faint unease she felt whenever she looked at Robert to swell into something larger.
The moment the Imperial Princess had appeared alone, a high-pitched whine pierced her ears. Without even pausing to ready herself, she had bolted straight ahead. Why had she been in such a frantic hurry? Why had she grown so desperate that she ran without making a single sound judgment?
What she had felt upon hearing that Robert was bound for the South was irritation. Partly because her expectation that he would stay a few more days had been shattered — but the larger reason was that this, too, had been something she failed to foresee. The way he had not shown the slightest reaction, even when she pressed a blade to his throat. The way he had turned up in the North out of nowhere in the dead of winter; the way he had gone alone to save the Imperial Princess. And now this, his plan to depart for the South far earlier than expected. Not a single one of her predictions had held. Whether he did it deliberately or not, she had felt, for an instant, a flash of anger at how neatly he kept slipping through her fingers.
There had been no need to lose her temper. The embarrassment arrived only now, unbidden, and Adele rubbed her cheek.
"I don't... understand why I'm acting like this."
This was far too much concern for a man she had met only a handful of times and watched for a mere few weeks here in the North. Whatever he did, there was no need for her to care. True, he shared a few traits with her father — but Robert was hardly so frail as to drop dead somewhere. Left alone, he would manage perfectly well. Without her watching over him. Without her at all.
"Hah."
The sighs spilling out of her were a plea against the suffocation. Robert — perhaps she was half in denial that, looking at him, she was superimposing someone else. Someone on whom her wishes had never come true in the end; someone who, no matter how she tried to keep him close, had left and vanished completely. Just like her father.
She had told him to stay two days in order to sort out this tangled heart. Romantic feelings? Adele scoffed and smiled bitterly. It was nothing of the sort. She had never harbored such emotions, and she did not think what she felt toward Robert resembled them. It was only that he grated on her — that when he was out of sight, she could not stop thinking of him. That she was anxious. Afraid he might vanish — that one day, without warning, she would hear nothing more than that he had dropped dead, like her father.
That was why she was irritated. He had been gravely wounded by the barbarians barely days ago, and instead of lingering here to recover, he meant to march straight to the South. She wished to avoid ominous thoughts wherever she could, but the ones circling her mind refused to be dismissed. When she knit her brows slightly, a hazy light met her eyes. Remembering what she had done, an involuntary laugh escaped her. The act itself, committed in a surge of momentary emotion — the shame of it had arrived only now, a small heat touching her cheeks. Why on earth had she grabbed him by the collar? She could perfectly well have dismissed him as a strange man.
There had been no need for any of it. She and Robert were nothing to each other. A temporary adjutant; someone she had crossed paths with by chance. That, simply, was all.
The self within the vision had been quite close to Robert. Always at each other's side, and at times riding her wolf, the two of them wandering the whole of the North together. So it had to be a delusion born of that. She was convincing herself that this inexplicable vision was real — that she had truly lived it. That these memories were facts she had never known, and that she had fallen into the illusion. That was all it was: merely choosing to believe so.
Adele, who had been staring into the empty air, slowly closed her eyes. Her head slid down the wall until it came to rest on the pillow, and for several minutes— her eyes, drifting open once more, turned toward the ceiling. The pale moonlight blurred and faded, on until the hour just before dawn. ...For a very long time, she did nothing but stare at the ceiling like that.
It was not as though she was so busy that two days should have been impossible to grant. And since it was Adele who had asked, refusing was never an option — nor did I have any pretext to, so I had no choice but to remain in the North. Two days. Hardly long enough to throw my schedule into disarray. If anything puzzled me, it was what she could possibly need to tell me that required two days of waiting.
A day passed, and Adele did not appear. And today, on the second day, she still had not. She was absent even from the office where she worked, leaving everyone merely puzzled — so much so that it was Lotos who came to ask me about her condition. Not that I had much to tell him about Adele's state. All I knew was that she seemed to be sulking at me; I didn't even know why.
Nearly everything I was experiencing this cycle was happening for the first time. It had all begun the moment I first told Theresia I was breaking off our engagement. From then on, there were no variables I knew, no situations I recognized. So this attitude of Adele's felt rather strange to me. Of course, it wasn't the first time she had shown me that expression. This was the third time I had met Adele.
I first met her after dying at Mirajane's hands — after dying a few more times beyond that, when I had come apart all over again. The next time, we decided to begin in the North; our second meeting. And this was the third. Of those three meetings, two had been spent almost constantly at each other's side, and in that time we had built what I can only call a peculiar bond. It was an era when Adele seemed almost like a savior to me. And she, for her part, never looked at me as merely an ordinary adjutant.
She did not speak of her past easily. Even Lotos, who had been at her side the longest, knew nothing of it. The reason I knew her past was, perhaps, owed to the feelings the Adele of that time had harbored toward me.
"...Lovers."
We never went as far as Mirajane and I had, but there had been a time when we each, faintly, held that kind of feeling for the other. Which is perhaps why it remains as regret. I had failed to stop Adele from leaving for the Imperial Palace — worse, I had never even attempted to go with her. That memory remained.
"I won't die, Robert. So wait for me. I will prove your fears wrong."
I had considered going to find Adele, absent these past days, but this thought would always surface and leave me hesitating without quite knowing why. What on earth was she doing, unseen for two whole days? Come tomorrow morning, I would be the one leaving. Night was drawing near now, and Adele's continued absence had begun to quietly worry me. And yet, if I actually went to her, what would I even say? I mussed my hair this way and that, then dragged a hand down my face and bowed my head.
Suffocating. Just as Adele was irritated with me, I, too, was frustrated. Living with memories only I possessed, emotions only I remembered — that kind of existence wears a person's mind down. Watching the same actions play out again and again, watching people make the same choices as the cycles wore on — there had been more than a few moments when I wanted nothing more than to let all of it go. I gripped my wrist hard for a moment, then let out a heavy breath.
If anything, I was the one who wanted to stay in the North. Nowhere else set my heart so at ease; if I had had no purpose, I would have settled here for good. But I could not remain still any longer. To end this regression and die, I had to keep moving — whether I liked it or not. Leave no lingering attachments, leave no regrets. Just as I finished settling my heart, a knock sounded at the door.
Knock, knock—
"It's Lotos. The Grand Duke is asking for you — are you busy?"
"No. I'll come out now."
With that, the sounds in the silent room ceased. I straightened my clothes and stepped out the door, where Lotos stood scrutinizing me with a strange expression. It was the look of a man thinking, what on earth have you done to her? I shrugged and spoke.
"Is something the matter?"
"Hmm. No, not exactly. It's only... the Grand Duke has changed somewhat. I suspected there must be some outside influence at work."
At the word changed, I tilted my head, and Lotos, wearing a meaningful smile, urged me along. Adele was the one who had called for me, so naturally, the place I went was her office. I was reaching for the door, wondering what on earth could have changed, when Lotos drew near and murmured:
"Enjoy your intimate time."
"...I'm afraid I don't know what you mean."
But with those words, Lotos was gone. What could have possessed him to say such a thing? As I slowly opened the door with that thought— the scene revealed before me finally let me understand, a little, what he had meant.
"There you are. I was starting to think I'd called for you too late."
The Grand Duke who always wore her cloak was nowhere to be found. The captain of that mercenary band, sword raised against the barbarians, did not exist here. Nothing rough about her. Nothing cold. A little shy. A little soft. A woman with a faint flush blooming across her cheeks was gazing steadily at me.
Adele, in a dress as blue as her own eyes, looked at me with an awkward little gesture, lifting the hem of her skirt. Hesitant, her lips parted, soft and small.
"...It's my first time wearing one. Does it suit me?"