Gained and Lost (4): Hope?
Kilika let out a scornful “ha” from inside the cart. “Hope, you say?”
When Nathan asked in return, a smile rose on the vagrant’s rotting face.
“You’re no politician. Do you not understand why the Eleim world tried to take your life in such a public place?”
“It’s probably the same reason one puts down a dog that bites people.” Because in the Heavens, humans are treated like beasts. Nathan answered in a daze. He had no leisure to seriously contemplate anything. Inside the arena he had been too busy surviving. Now he was too busy carefully watching the crows that had flown on ahead.
Kilika, groaning as he twisted around, glared suspiciously at Nathan, who was walking after the path the crows had taken. Had he possessed the strength, he would have leaped from the cart that very instant.
“Putting down a beast? Is that deceptive humility, or have you truly never given it any thought?” The vagrant raised his hoarse voice. “Do you know what is the second most exalted and important law in the Heavens after the Celestial God’s own word? ‘Eleim above, all the rest below.’ The good flows to the Eleim. The dregs fall to everyone else.”
“That’s what the long-ears do,” Nathan nodded as he listened.
“Eleim are the agents of violence. They must never become its objects. That has been an unchanging rule for fifteen hundred years. Therefore your very existence was, to them, a challenge to the system itself. Given that, what do you suppose the fact of your survival meant to the rest of humanity?”
Nathan imagined a dog. In some fictional country where dogfighting had become culture, a hunting dog that had broken out of the pit. The dog slips past the soldiers trying to recapture it. The city falls into panic at the news of a mad dog on the loose, and the fear becomes reality when two princes of a neighboring kingdom are bitten to death. In the end, one barking beast sparks a war with the adjacent nation. At least on the surface, that is how it appears. No matter how loudly the dog might bark that the truth is somewhat different, there is no one anywhere who will listen to a mutt’s defense.
The politicians promised harsh punishment for the dog. They packed the grand theater with citizens, then had the executioner beat the collared animal to death in the center of the stage. And that dog, in front of everyone, bit the executioner to death. Every single person who stepped forward claiming they would cut the dog down met the same fate. A dog like that would have earned the hatred of the entire nation and still had plenty left over. Thinking of it that way made it easier to understand. Why they hated Nathan so fiercely. Of course he felt no sympathy. He had not the slightest shred of intention to die obediently simply to satisfy such a pathetic excuse for desire.
Because he had been too busy killing in order to survive, Nathan’s thoughts reached only that far. The dog that had bitten the executioner to death still did not know what the other abandoned, diseased strays felt when they looked at him.
“To us beneath that vault of heaven, what do you suppose your existence looked like? You who insulted an Eleim noble, beat an Eleim executioner to death, and drove Eleim gamblers into bankruptcy?”
“I think I understand.”
“You think you understand. That is no different from admitting you know nothing. Then, conversely, what do you suppose our existence—our human race—is in the Heavens?”
Aside from the Peres family, he had met few humans up here. He had his guesses, yet whatever the sick man meant to say would surely go beyond them. Nathan shook his head.
“Do you know how many girls, how many fathers of those girls, how many wives of those fathers, how many sons of those wives have been executed, massacred, butchered?”
Nathan could feel bright red blood gushing along every syllable. The leper’s words burst out like the bleeding of a decapitated convict.
“You did not say they were killed. You said executed, massacred, butchered. They are all different. Propaganda meant to serve as an example, cleanup that discards what has lost its use, the work of stripping flesh from bone for consumption—each carries a different meaning.”
The sudden surge of rage left him stunned for only a moment before the phrase “stripping flesh from bone” sent an icy shiver down his spine.
“Kilika.”
“What.”
“Do the Eleim eat human flesh? Aside from the berserkers of the north, in other regions as well?”
“You want honesty?”
Nathan gave no answer to the counter-question. The leper continued, struggling to cough as far outward as possible.
“I heard that for one week you are free of all interference. That no matter what atrocities you commit, they will not be judged crimes. Yet even in that week you cannot kill every long-eared master, nor can you snatch lightning from the Celestial God’s hand. Once that week ends, they will eventually try to kill you again.”
“Let them try. There is no lion that lives forever, but neither is there a lion that dies for a pack of rats.”
“Of course they may fail even at their final attempt. But even then they are not defeated. Time is on their side, and they will stop their ears and endure until you are dead.”
“Then I’ll have to leave them an unforgettable memory.”
“The immortals will erase your records. Once you die, the small hope that lit the shadows will soon be forgotten. In the Heavens, which has carried on fifteen hundred years of history, a human lifetime—no matter how beautiful—is no more than a midsummer night’s fancy. It lingers a moment, then departs.”
Bloody tears spread once more inside the bandages.
“Still, I am grateful. Probably everyone except a handful of Eleim lackeys wanted to see it. Someone striking the long-ears across the cheek. Lifting them up and slamming them down, smashing them with fists, cutting their throats with a sword. For the great cause of humanity. For the people who have vanished. For the value you believe in—the value we have never possessed until now.”
“For that. We’re almost there.”
“No. You must not say it that way.”
The patient suddenly began to thrash as though trying to get off Nathan’s back. When Nathan set him down, the sick man tried to limp away.
“…What are you doing?”
“I know where you mean to take me. It must be that place. That unknown place that everyone who has experienced it keeps silent about.”
“I don’t know how this will sound to you, but it isn’t a bad place.”
“I know. If it were a bad place for humans, everyone would already know its identity. They would have risked everything to whisper warnings.”
The leper shook off Nathan’s hand as violently as he could. Nathan wondered whether he should forcibly lift him again.
“A place where an orphan dying of fever returns healthy as if nothing happened. A place that makes a limping old man walk again. That is not where I belong. My place to die is on the wretched street.”
“The owner of that place would disagree.”
“What if I talk? Wouldn’t that secret miracle of the shadows collapse the moment it is exposed to the light?”
It was a keen observation. After all, every one of Benny’s medical acts was illegal. He had heard that in the Heavens all treatment had to pass through the Medical Association. Yet he could not simply leave this rotting man to his fate. Staying close to the patient, Nathan shrugged.
“Then you simply keep silent as well. If the owner of that place believed that adding one or two more people who shared the secret would ruin everything, they would have shut down long ago.”
“What if I am a traitor to the marrow, Sir Knight Nathan Maia? What if my survival until I rot and crumble was bought by trampling on the blood of my own kind and my comrades? What if it is the result of selling out those who shared my ideals to the Eleim?”
The red fluid leaking from beneath the bandages spattered onto the cobblestones. When Nathan’s eyes widened, the leper quickly kicked dirt over it to erase the stain.
“If anyone sees you—who are known to have been taken in by Galarhorn—leading me there, they might inflate the story and pin suspicion on someone. On Galarhorn, on the secret clinic, or on you.”
Nathan reached out once more. If he did not take the man by force, it seemed unlikely he could guarantee his life. But Nathan recoiled in surprise. The vagrant traced a seal with his bandaged hand, emitted a vivid blue light, and began to fade.
“Do not carelessly offer goodwill. And convey this to the petal-colored saint. The last fifty years may have been endured with goodwill, but that time is over. And I will say this to you as well. Cherish yourself. You who speak the words ‘My name is Nathan Maia’ in such a casual tone do not understand how heavy a burden you carry.”
The leper’s form melted into the dawn light and vanished.
“…In the Lower World, people like him were called heroes.”
Nathan stared for a long time at the spot where the mysterious figure had disappeared. Kilika, who had been lying inside the handcart, muttered.
“If he was going to leave like that, why follow us all the way here?”
“Why did you go out alone? I’ve never heard of anyone doing ‘Galarhorn pruning’ or whatever it’s called out there.”
Nathan had heard it from the errand-boy Eleim youth. Pruning. A series of acts—threats, assaults, disappearances—targeting those connected to Galarhorn. Real threats carried out with the backing of other powers. Kilika was no fool; he could not have been unaware of the situation. Knowing this, Nathan asked again anyway.
“What did you think would happen? Benny is going to ask eventually, so you’d better come up with one or two excuses in advance.”
Kilika, sprawled in the corner of the elevator, pulled out a small green bottle he had hidden in his clothes. He stared straight at Nathan and gulped it down in loud swallows. It was a rather fierce declaration of his right to remain silent. Nathan shook his head and said nothing more.
When the elevator reached the underground level and the doors opened, Nathan forcibly lifted the struggling Kilika. He handed him off to the first convenient person he saw and headed for his own room.
“Huh? Nathan? Where have you—aaagh, what the hell!”
That “convenient person” turned out to be the Ba-eleim boy whose ice-cream theft Nathan had interrupted. The boy, who had taken the staggering Kilika without thinking, panicked when Kilika began to retch and screamed for help. Nathan ignored him. Call it revenge for the ice cream.
Back in his room, Nathan let out a sigh of relief. The scrap of cloth he had wedged in the door crack was still there. No one had opened the door to check. Yet the moment he reached for the handle, Nathan froze. He hunched his neck as far as possible and slowly opened the door.
His senses, sharpened to the extreme on the border between life and death. Although repeated physical shocks had dulled his sight and hearing, Nathan had reached a realm where he mobilized all five senses to feel and interpret even more acutely. Thanks to that, he managed to dodge the pillow Benny hurled without even looking.
The small pillow that flew past the railing drew a mysterious scream from whoever it struck below.
“…Sorry.”
“Sorry?”
The one who answered was Aspen. She sat in the armchair that, only hours earlier, had belonged to a Conclave priest. Every time Aspen quietly wiped the blade she held like a cane, Nathan felt the flesh at the back of his neck crawl.
“Where did you go?”
“You already know, don’t you?”
“Your situational awareness has improved quite a bit.”
“Can I speak honestly, Aspen? I really missed conversations like this.”
It was not an attempt to change the subject but a plain statement of fact. Yet it did not seem to sound that way to Aspen.
“I actually came secretly, planning to stay by your side all night. Benny wouldn’t have liked a patient like me staying up all night, but still.” Aspen tapped her eyepatch. “I kept thinking about the nights you must have fallen asleep alone, trembling with fear of an ambush. I thought someone should stand guard over you. But when I arrived, you were gone. I thought my heart would stop. Not until Benny told me you had slipped out.”
Nathan shifted his gaze to Benny. She lay on Nathan’s bed, pretending to be ill. Staring out the window beyond the headboard, Benny spoke weakly.
“When that leaf falls, I suppose I’ll die.”
Outside the window a blue magic tree glowed. Even a glance at the leaves of the great tree grown underground showed how lushly they hung.
Nathan muttered, “At that rate you might live forever. Typical elf.”
“We were anxious the whole time. Worried about what might happen to you. Weren’t you anxious at all?”
Nathan pointed outside the door and shrugged. A protest that he had brought Kilika back. But Benny lightly ignored it.
“You should be anxious. That would be proper. Did you think we would stay exactly the same through those four years? Aspen may be single-mindedly staring at you alone, but I am not. I’ve changed. In my two-hundred-year life, you are merely a three-year-and-one-month relationship. If you intend to keep disappointing me like this, switching to someone else is simple enough.”
“Is she serious?”
Aspen, facing Nathan, frowned and shook her head.
“Nonsense. Why is it that neither of you can be serious even at a moment like this?”
“No, I’m completely serious. Say hello to the lover who protected me while you were gone.”
From beneath the blanket Benny pulled out something that looked like a nutcracker doll.
“Magnet-Nathan. He has advantages the human Nathan lacks.”
Benny’s new lover, whose proportions looked rather unfortunate, flailed its limbs like a wind-up toy. Nathan frowned with pity.
“Advantages I don’t have? Does it stick to the refrigerator?”
“No. Instead of leaving to pick fights somewhere, it stays by my side. By Aspen’s side too.”
Benny threw Magnet-Nathan to Aspen. The two-dimensional Nathan flew lightly and stuck fast to Aspen’s steel right arm. Aspen could not hold back and burst into giggles.
“The two-hundred-year-old is the most childish. Anyway, stop doing things that make us worry for no reason, Nathan. Thank you for coming back safely.”
“I know. Pruning. I’ll be careful.”
Aspen’s hand, which had been cleaning the blade, paused.
“Who told you? Never mind, it doesn’t matter. If we had known you would slip past the staff trying to stop you and run off, we would have told you from the beginning. Now that you understand why we worry—”
“Which brings me to this, Benny, Aspen.”
Nathan’s eyes darted back and forth between them as though reading the mood. Aspen tensed, sensing something ominous. The corner of Nathan’s mouth was twitching. It was the expression of a man who knew the words he was about to speak would utterly destroy the atmosphere. And a smile that seemed, somehow, to enjoy that fact.
“I’ve decided I want to enter the Gladiator Fight.”