The Principle of Good Faith
Thirty minutes before opening.
Blow had told her that people were massed outside like a cloud, and Jane still hadn't believed him—until she drew the curtain aside once and found she had nothing left to say.
The students were chattering eagerly among themselves. At the very front of them stood Redprine, a student of Caipol Magic School and a reporter for Magic Inside, eyes lit like fire.
One look at that manic face drained the color from Jane's. She clutched Blow's collar, close to tears.
"...I want to go."
"Where?"
"Anywhere..."
"There are lots of people? We'll sell so many potatoes on the first day!"
Melo, beside herself with excitement, shouted it and set to peeling. Blow patted Jane's shoulder and spoke as if there were nothing else for it.
"For now, you and Melo peel the potatoes. I'll handle the outside somehow."
"Okay."
The firmness in his voice left her nothing more to say. She took a seat beside Melo.
Meanwhile Blow, who was beginning to think the marketing had worked a little too well, glanced at Hans standing next to him with cold sweat on his face.
"Hans, let's clear the chairs first."
What he wanted was as much room to sit as he could wring out of the place. Thinking of the pubs from that other world, he hauled the chairs aside and dragged every usable table out of the inn's storeroom. He grew the hall from three tables to eight, then nodded as if that would do.
"Hans, we're going to run short on potatoes, aren't we?"
"Yes. I think we will."
"Contact Hervena and have her bring potatoes. Contact Egg Bottles and tell them to send two more casks of Caipol ale. And scrounge up as many plates as you can."
"Yes, understood."
"As fast as you can."
"Yes. Don't worry."
He answered with force and started for the front door. Blow caught him at once and pointed to the back. Only then did Hans start, bow deeply, and slip out the rear.
While the sound of the back door closing still hung in the air, Blow drew a long breath and put his thoughts in order.
...Well. I'm not going to die. I just have to steel myself and treat them like difficult customers.
Then he threw the front door open.
"Blow Deblique...!"
Every mouth outside snapped shut. They only watched his face. But Redprine, standing at the very front, lifted both corners of her mouth in a sinister smile the moment she saw him, and pushed up glasses that didn't seem to have any prescription at all.
"Senior Blow, it's been a while! You look well! I'm here from Magic Inside."
"I know."
"Since you know, shall we skip the preamble?"
Redprine Blueos. Back when he was at the height of his scoundrel days, she had eagerly turned his scandals into articles, and now she was grinning wide enough to split her face, as if she could die happy.
The Blow of now studied her and turned over what she might ask.
...She'll print anything, but she'll ask something ordinary. Why I'm running a restaurant. That sort of thing.
Relieved, he nodded with easy composure. The question that left her mouth was nothing he had expected.
"I heard there's a child between you, Senior Blow, and Jane, the student on leave. Is that true?"
At that outrageous line he nearly shouted, without meaning to, what kind of bullshit that was. But he could already see her hammering at the keys under the logic that a fierce denial is a fierce confirmation, so he picked his words with care.
"On what grounds are you saying that?"
The old him would have slapped her across the face. His lukewarm answer set the crowd murmuring. Redprine tilted her head as if she didn't understand either. Then she cleared her throat and put the sinister smile back on.
"Come now... I came here already knowing everything."
"It isn't true, so there's no way to prove it. What am I supposed to do about that?"
"Classmates saw a girl at this inn this morning."
"You're not talking about Melo, are you?"
"I wouldn't know the name. But Hervena, your right hand, didn't deny it either."
"Melo is the child of a servant of House Deblique. Romang Greenhill's."
An answer that missed her aim entirely crumpled Redprine's brow like paper. Blow laughed inwardly at the sight.
"What? A servant? Show me proof!"
"She's twelve. So what—I had a kid when I was five?"
Redprine's face had just gone blank when the front door burst open and Melo poked her head out.
"Young Maaaster! The potatoes are all peeled—should I start boiling them nooow?"
"Yeah."
Every gaze in the place snapped to Melo at once. The students began to mutter, every one of them, in the tone of people whose fun had been spoiled.
"What, it's not true?"
"Aww."
"If it were Blow's kid, there's no way it'd be that cute."
Something hot rose in him, and he glared that way. They all found somewhere else to look.
Redprine rolled her eyes this way and that, then spoke to him as if nothing were wrong.
"Aha. So it wasn't you. What a relief!"
"...A relief?"
"If it's not, then it's not! See you next time!"
A moment ago she had been interrogating him. Now she was excessively bright, and she vanished into the crowd before he could get a word out.
...What. The mood's dead. I got Hans worked up for nothing.
He was thinking it while he watched the crowd that would probably scatter, and he was about to step back inside when a single voice popped out.
"When do the potatoes come out?"
"What?"
"The potatoes."
"Yeah."
"Potatoes!"
"Butter-roasted potatoes!!"
Heat rose through the crowd in an instant. Meaning to settle them, Blow climbed onto the oak barrel he had set out front. Only then could he see how many had gathered. White uniforms packed the alley so tightly it seemed everyone in the Dusk Block had turned out.
"We open in thirty minutes, and I don't think everyone here will be able to eat. The hall is too small!"
"Oh, come on!"
"Do you know how long we've been waiting!"
He thought for a moment, let out a deep sigh, and spoke.
"Right now we only have eight tables. So we'll let eight parties in at a time, and the rest..."
"Is takeout not an option?"
"We don't have disposable containers set up yet for you to carry food out."
⟨ Kinesis ⟩
The book in the fifth-year's hand rose and hung above his head. Blow's eyes flashed.
"We'll carry it ourselves. Can't you just make it?"
"Yeah!"
"Give us the potatoes!"
"Potatoes!!!"
The air went loud in an instant, the upper years at the center of it. Crisis and opportunity aren't spelled the same, and turning one into the other takes more than shuffling a few letters—but Blow felt in his skin that this was the moment.
"If you want to come inside, stand on the left. If you want takeout, stand on the right."
The moment he finished, the upperclassmen cheered, floated whatever they were holding into the air, and began to form a line.
"Yeah!"
"Potatoes! Potatoes!"
"Nothing but potatoes!!"
Watching them, Blow swallowed dryly and calculated what he needed most. What flashed through his mind was hands. Melo and Jane would have to stay in the kitchen the whole time, and even if Hans came back, running the place would clearly be too much.
His eyes were darting fast when they caught on Riné, who had come to the inn earlier as the first customer.
Their eyes met. She hid her face behind her curly green hair and tried to slip away, but Blow was already down off the barrel, and he called her to a stop.
"You!"
"...Y-yes? M-me?"
"Yeah, you with the green hair. Come here a second."
...This is bad.
She had already been seen. She hid her trembling hands and approached him. His face was nothing like what she had expected. The corner of his mouth twitched as he spoke.
"Could you work for me? Just for today?"
"What!? S-suddenly?"
"I didn't know until a moment ago either. You saw what just happened, so you get it. I'll pay you well for the day. Help me out, just for today."
"H-how much would you give me?"
He glanced around, then leaned in and whispered at her ear.
"Fifteen silver."
His gamble: even if the margin shrank, just get through today. At a sum more than double an ordinary day's wage, Riné's eyes spun. She seized his hand without a second look.
"I-I'll do it! What should I start with?"
"Before that—what's your name?"
"Riné Planche."
"All right, Riné! First, get a line formed... You don't happen to have a friend, do you?"
"I do! Rowbedi, same year as me!"
Blow swept a look over the boy—lost for what to do with his face—and then over his body. Thick arms that looked like they'd work, and, even under that scrutiny, a gaze that never lost its calm: gentle eyes that might have belonged to a cow.
"You're hired."
"Uh, hey, I was going to study tonight..."
"...Fifteen silver."
Rowbedi looked once at his friend, swallowed, and nodded.
"What should I start with?"
Opening day.
Jane peeled potatoes without a moment's rest. Melo, still smiling, with strength to spare even after the morning service, roasted them. Riné served the beer, and Rowbedi managed the people outside.
"Potatoes are ready!"
In the middle of that frenzy, Blow pushed potatoes out to the upperclassmen. Whether they took them from his hands or sat in the hall drinking beer and putting potatoes in their mouths, the moment the food touched their tongues every face soaked itself in happiness.
"It's really good!"
"How can a potato be like this?"
"It's so fluffy!"
"The seasoning is insane."
Those reactions became a butterfly effect. The line, already long, showed no sign of shrinking.
Even so... can we actually pull this off?
He was remembering the mornings he had rung up wave after wave of customers at a convenience store, cold sweat beading along his spine, when the voice he had been desperately waiting for arrived.
"Young Master! There are so many people!"
"Hans! Report fast, then stick to Melo!!"
"I've secured plates for now, and they said the beer will be here within two hours. And the potatoes—"
"Hm?"
Sacks of potatoes were floating in the air. Beneath them stood Hervena, surveying the surroundings with a haughty look.
"I-it's Senior Hervena!"
"Senior Hervena!!"
"She's floating something that heavy like it's nothing!!"
Kinesis—the basic magic every first-year at the magic school had to learn, the spell that levitated objects. A finicky art that grew stricter the more you used it: you had to float heavy things in large numbers while applying less pressure, so the form didn't deform. None of that applied to Hervena, who was letting out a yawn.
"Young Master, business is going very well, isn't it?"
"Hervena. What exactly did you say about me and Jane?"
"Oh dear. I only said two syllables."
She said it playfully. Blow swept a look over the crowd, then caught her hand, his voice urgent.
"Hey. Hervena. You watch the hall too."
"Don't joke. I've never done anything like—"
"There's no time to joke."
At the thoroughly serious look on his face, she set the potato sacks down nearby and began inching backward.
"Potatoes are ready!"
Riné, her whole face soaked from rushing about, had barely set them down before he split them into four portions.
"One portion per person?"
"Yes."
"And the money?"
"Put it in this glass."
A little later coins dropped into the glass with a bright clink, and potatoes trailing wisps of steam began to fly.
By then Hervena was quietly blending into the customers, on her way back to school. She had a feeling that if he caught her at something, it would become tiresome.
"Hervena! Where are you going?"
"...Are you serious?"
Her lips barely moved. He answered with a bright smile.
"I'm always serious."
"I have a lot to study."
"You remember your retainer contract, don't you?"
"Why are you bringing that up all of a sudden?"
The meaningful smile made her uneasy. Her brow drew tight.
"Recite what's written on the fourth line from the bottom."
"Keep going."
"I just have to do it, don't I. I'll do it."
Only then did he smile with satisfaction and nod at her. Hervena found herself thinking that his face looked fresher than usual.
...One day won't kill me.
She went inside, pretending she had lost the argument, and his shout followed her again.
"Go in and ask Jane and Hans what needs doing!"
"...I'll figure it out."
"And wash your hands!"
"Ugh, seriously! I said I'll handle it..."
She turned, lips pursed. Blow was wholly occupied dividing the potatoes Riné had just brought, and seemed not even to hear her.
She was angry that it had happened so suddenly, and she didn't think she would hear a thank-you from him either. Even so, Hervena decided his changed self wasn't so bad, and she went into the washroom to wash her hands.