A Midnight Tryst
Click. Click.
Step. Step.
In the corridor of a mansion where everyone else lay asleep, the chief maid's footsteps sounded, soft and low.
"..."
"..."
Two minutes had passed since I left my room, and in all that time neither of us had spoken a word. Measuring the distance between my room and Esmela's office, I figured that at this pace we still had another five minutes of walking ahead of us.
"...Excuse me."
In the end I was the one who broke. I couldn't stand the silence.
"What is it?"
She answered without so much as a glance back, in that flat, colorless tone of hers.
"Um... where is Lady Arit right now?"
"Lady Esmela gave her one of the empty rooms in the main house. She is staying there."
"..."
The conversation died on that, and silence settled between us again.
Black hair—rare, if anything, in the world of Loina. I watched her black bob sway lightly up and down in time with the chief maid's steps, staring without quite meaning to.
Elina, the chief maid. To the eye she looked like a cold beauty in her early twenties, with a sharp gaze. The other servants knew nothing about her perpetual lack of expression beyond her name and her post. Ask anyone around the household and you got nothing but guesswork. No one knew her true age, her birthplace, or her station. Even when she had started working at the mansion was unclear. Question the gardener who had served House Herta longer than anyone save Chief Butler Zikhaim, and all you received was the vague reply that she had simply been there one day, already at work.
The chief butler, or the Herta father and daughter, might know something about her... but the chief maid's identity wasn't important enough to justify the trouble, and prying would only make me feel as if I were digging through someone else's past. I had given up on asking them.
"...Excuse me."
I called to her again.
"What is it?"
She answered exactly as before.
"..."
This next question was harder to get out.
"...It's about what happened after we returned to the mansion with Lady Esmela. I don't remember much of anything after that. If you don't mind, could you tell me?"
My memory from the moment I stabbed Gillot onward was a blur. I had opened my eyes in my own room, which meant I had either walked there from the main house myself or someone had carried me...
"Immediately afterward, you sheathed your sword and simply stood there beside him. Only after Lady Esmela ordered you to return to your quarters did you go back to the annex. I do not know what you did after that."
So that was it. I had come back to my room, lain down on the bed without even undressing, and slept straight through until now.
"Then could you tell me what happened in the mansion after I left?"
"Afterward, Lady Esmela briefly explained to the gathered servants what she herself had been through on the way back from the wedding square. She also explained those things called zombies. Among the servants who witnessed what you did, a few at first believed you had murdered Gillot. Lady Esmela told them that anyone bitten by a zombie becomes one of them, and in doing so she cleared up their misunderstanding to some extent."
Thank goodness. Esmela had done everything in her power to settle the situation.
"Did Lady Esmela say where she learned about the zombies?"
"One of the servants asked her where she had come by such knowledge. Lady Esmela answered only that she had found it in an old text on Black Magic."
She had even hidden the fact that I knew about the zombies. When I saw her, I would have to thank her for looking out for me.
"..."
And one last question.
"Did Lady Arit happen to say anything about the zombies?"
"Yes. Lady Arit told us that she had already encountered these zombies while carrying out a quest for the Hunter Guild."
"She did?!"
My voice rose before I could stop it.
"Lower your voice."
The chief maid halted, turned her head, and cautioned me, her face as expressionless as ever.
"Ah... I'm sorry."
She took in my answer and started forward again.
"Did Lady Arit say anything more than that?"
I fell in behind her and kept the questions coming.
"She said only that the Radaine Theocracy and the Hunter Guild were already aware of them and working on countermeasures, and that we need not worry. Beyond that, she made no remark worth noting."
"I see..."
With that, our conversation ended.
Passing through the connecting corridor into the main house, I sank into thought. The fact that Arit had already met the zombies was no small piece of information. So that was why she had known their weak point was the head—she had faced them once before. Then I would have to speak with her tomorrow.
...A question had come up that I absolutely had to put to her.
"We have arrived."
The chief maid's voice pulled me back, and I found myself already standing before Esmela's office.
"Then I will take my leave."
She turned as she was and started off the other way.
"Ah...? Wait a moment."
I called after her as she made to leave in a hurry.
"What is it?"
"Is the young lady alone in the office right now?"
"She is."
"Then shouldn't you come in with me?"
An unmarried noble lady summoning a man to her room in the middle of the night was already more than enough to invite misunderstanding. For the two of them to be alone in the same room with no one else present was worse still—a dangerous thing, the sort that would cast doubt on a woman's virtue.
"..."
But instead of answering, the chief maid simply stared at my face.
"Um..."
"Hah."
"?!"
She sighed.
Her face was as blank as ever, and yet she looked somehow exasperated, with the faintest air of finding me pathetic. For the first time, she had let an emotion show.
"You."
"Y-yes?"
"It seems you will need to be educated all over again."
The chief maid said something that came out of nowhere.
"About the psychology of women, in particular."
Leaving those incomprehensible words behind, she walked away into the darkness of the corridor.
Knock, knock.
"My lady, it's Renit."
"Come in."
At Esmela's answer, I opened the office door.
After the chief maid left I had turned her remark over for a moment, but I hadn't found any particular answer. If the chance came later, I would simply have to ask her what she had meant.
Now it was time to speak with Esmela.
I closed the door, bowed toward the room, and lifted my head again.
A candle on the work desk lit the office beneath the night's shadows. A lavish red carpet lay underfoot. One wall was given over to shelves crowded with books of every kind, and before them stood a great desk whose front panel bore House Herta's salamander crest in gold. Aside from being a little smaller, Esmela's office was very much like the family head's.
What was different from usual was a small table I had never seen in this room, set by the window with a pair of chairs facing each other, and on that table a bottle of wine and two glasses.
Esmela was sitting in one of the chairs.
"What did you call me for, my lady?"
I asked from where I stood by the door.
"Come here."
The voice that called me was a touch lower than her usual high tone, soft and coaxing.
I walked toward the window as instructed. Esmela was not in one of her usual splendid dresses. She sat in a plain everyday one, with little ornament to it. It was still red, of course.
"Sit there."
She indicated the opposite chair with a glance. I sat as I was told, and found myself facing her across the single small table.
Candlelight fell dimly across the right side of Esmela's unpainted face. The red-gold hair that was always curled into twin tails now hung long and straight, spilling down over the bare skin of her left shoulder. There was no red lipstick, no heavy eye makeup, and still she was beautiful. No—her bare face, the one I never got to see, stirred a man's heart even more than she did when she was dressed to the nines.
Thump. Thump.
My heart had begun to beat in a strange way.
"Renit."
"Yes?"
Nerves, maybe. If anything, my voice came out a little higher.
"How are you feeling?"
That languid voice tickled my ear.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
This was different. From the way she looked to the way she carried herself, Esmela was nothing like her usual self. Far too different.
"I'm fine. Thank you for worrying about me."
"That's a relief, then."
Slowly, she reached for the wine bottle. The cork was already out, and with a practiced motion she poured two glasses at once.
"Take it."
She held one in her left hand and offered it to me.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Why on earth was my heart racing like this?
"You won't take it?"
A faint smile touched her lips.
I thought my heart might burst. That unfamiliar look of hers was driving me mad. Even so, there was one thing I absolutely had to say to her—
"My lady."
"What?"
"I... I'm a minor, so I can't drink."
"..."
The heat that had been choking me drained out of the office in an instant, and the air went cold.