Vestige (23)
We lay down together on the bed.
Levina fiddled with my hand, fingers tracing idle patterns.
Her hands were cold, trembling so faintly it was almost imperceptible.
Then she pulled me close and looked at me.
Her face was flushed, a deep bloom of color spreading across her cheeks.
Whether it was the alcohol or just the situation itself — I couldn't tell.
"Truth is, I want to live a little longer."
Levina smiled as she said it.
She shifted closer still.
Our breath mingled, faint and warm.
She started by stroking the back of my hand, then took each finger one by one — index, middle, ring — held them lightly before letting go, and finally gripped my wrist.
The touch was rough and careful at the same time.
"I know it's a little late to be saying this, but I'm aware that the things I said to you, the way I acted — none of it was exactly normal."
"You knew perfectly well, and you did it anyway?"
"I don't think I wanted to put on an act in front of you."
"That's a convenient line. You just didn't need to bother pretending with me."
"Maybe that's what it was.
What would it matter if you liked some version of the Edelgard family head I made up?
How's that any different from wearing a mask your whole life?"
"And what guarantee is there that I like you as you really are?"
"That's the question, isn't it? But you do like me. I'm your sister. Your only family."
"That's some world-class nonsense, no matter how many times I hear it."
"This, from the man who brought his fiancée and that precious Saintess of his here."
"......."
Levina let go of my hand and reached up to touch my face instead.
"I wish you wouldn't die. You're beautiful."
I didn't say much in return.
I just looked into those gray eyes — no light in them, always hazy, always dim.
"What does it feel like, dying?"
"Probably best if it happens all at once, before you even have time to feel anything."
"Maybe. Still, I don't think it'd be so bad — as long as I'm not alone."
We pulled the blanket up to our chins, held each other tight, and fell asleep.
Like a perfectly ordinary brother and sister who got along, the way children do.
* * *
A fair amount of time had passed since the demons began swarming in and attacking in earnest.
Again today, the low blare of a horn tore through the dawn quiet.
The earthen walls and wooden palisades we'd thrown together offered precious little in the way of actual defense.
We were down to fewer than half our soldiers, and most of the ranking officers who could have commanded them had already fled.
Still, Kyle and the rest of the Special Forces remained, plugging every breach and working hard to lop off the heads of any demon that looked particularly dangerous.
We needed to buy time — enough to move supplies, rations, and everything else somewhere safe.
That was why Serepina and Estelle were still here, too.
Both of them seemed to assume I would withdraw on my own.
I didn't bother bringing it up.
If I told them I was staying, they'd break my arms and legs and drag me out by force.
But it looked like everyone was almost finished packing up.
Late afternoon.
The hour when the sun crashed against the earth and bled red, and the sky was still bright but the moon hung there faintly, for no reason I could name.
I stepped into the tent beside the church — the one overflowing with wounded soldiers.
Estelle was inside, reattaching limbs that had been torn off, keeping the thread of life tied to men gasping their last.
I said it while winding fresh white bandages tight around a soldier whose wounds had been downgraded from fatal to merely survivable.
There'd been a time when her touch alone would make new flesh sprout, but now — whether from exhaustion or because her power was running dry — she seemed diminished.
Her complexion was terribly pale.
Cold sweat beaded across her forehead.
"Shouldn't you be resting?"
"I'd like to. Look around.
If I rest even a little, it won't be just one or two people who die."
"You were never the type to care about things like that."
"......Just what kind of person am I, inside your head?"
I followed Estelle around. Where her healing stopped halfway, I bandaged. On wounds that still gaped open — screaming or not — I splashed alcohol on them and sewed them shut with clumsy needlework.
Like that, side by side with Estelle, I helped keep every last one of them alive — all those men groaning on filthy cots that reeked of old blood and rot.
When I looked up at the sky, the evening hour had long since passed. The moon grinned down at me, thin and mocking.
I felt nothing like satisfaction.
Unless they all fled from here, these men would be sent right back to the front to tangle with demons again.
"Estelle."
I called her name.
She answered in a small, worn-out voice.
"Yeah."
"I'm staying here."
She stopped what she was doing and looked at me.
Her eyes widened — slowly, so slowly.
"Then what was I here for?"
I couldn't meet her gaze. Her voice was shaking.
If I looked her in the eye right now, I wouldn't be able to say anything at all. I'd end up doing whatever she told me.
I've always been a man with no backbone, someone who acts on feeling alone.
"Why?"
"Because I have to."
Estelle must have sensed I wasn't going to give her anything more. Her breathing turned ragged.
Her shoulders trembled, a fine tremor.
"I held on here — for you. I endured everything I could. For what......"
She rose unsteadily from her seat, stared blankly at the ground, then lifted her face to the sky and murmured as if to herself.
"What have I been doing here all this time?"
Her voice quivered as she went on.
"Because I love you. Because I want to marry you. Because I want you to live.
That's why I held on."
Her voice slowly sank, submerged.
"If you're going to die here — then what have I been doing?"
Estelle stepped closer to me as I kept my eyes averted. She looked at me and spoke low.
"Hey, Ravin. Tell me. What was I here for?"
"To be with me."
I spoke, and I pulled her into my arms — Estelle, who had begun to sob quietly.
"I'll remember forever, even after I'm dead.
I'll love the fact that you loved me."
"Bullshit."
"If that's how it sounds, there's nothing I can do about it."
"You've never once properly loved someone like me.
I know. Not just Serepina — when you look at me, you're thinking of someone else."
"In the end, that person is still you."
"Then what in the actual fuck......"
Estelle glared at me with her face twisted up, but the moment our eyes met, she lowered her head.
"This time too — this time you tell me you're going to kill yourself and I'm just supposed to act like it's nothing? Pretend I don't care?"
Her face was a wreck.
She looked like someone who hadn't slept in days.
Her lips were bloodless and cracked, dry as paper, faint smears of red across them.
The rims of her eyes were inflamed, and deep shadows had settled beneath them.
Her once-lustrous white hair was matted with dust and blood, sticking out every which way.
Her vestments were so fouled with dirt and gore you couldn't tell what color they'd originally been.
She looked exhausted beyond words.
"Right now I want to break your arms and legs and take you away, but I feel like I shouldn't.
I have this feeling I'm not allowed to drag you around however I please.
It's not my feeling, but it is my feeling. This awful sensation crawling all over me."
Estelle gripped my shoulders as I held her, pushed herself back slightly, and spoke through tears.
"At this rate, you're going to die — and even if I do whatever I want, it feels like you're still going to die."
The sobbing quieted a little.
"Calling you awful isn't enough. I thought giving you my heart, giving you everything I had, would be enough — but you always take what I never even imagined you'd take.
And I still don't want you to hate me.
Maybe some high-and-mighty demon put a curse on me. Wouldn't that be something for a Saintess?"
Estelle grabbed hold of my clothes.
"Even now, feeling like this — I still love you."
"Same here."
"Don't lie."
"I'm not lying."
"What do you even want to do by staying here?"
"There's something I need to find out."
"Even if I ask, you won't tell me anything."
"Probably not."
"All those times you whispered that you loved me — those were all lies, weren't they?"
"Every one of them was true."
"Then you don't want to live with the person you love?"
"If I told you I'm doing this because I want to live — yeah, that does sound a little strange."
"Ravin. Please, look at me. No — only look at me."
"I am looking at you."
"Then stay with me."
"I'll stay with you now."
"Why did I have to fall in love with someone like you?"
"I'm sorry."
"Just let me stay by your side."
"......."
"The Saintess guarantees it — when you die, you're going to burn in hell."
"Burning doesn't sound great."
"I hate you."
Estelle's eyes shimmered as she spoke.
I pulled a cigarette from my pocket, stuck it between my lips, lit it, and then held it to Estelle's mouth, where she still stood in front of me.
She took it between her lips, sank down where she was, breathed in the smoke, exhaled — smoking quietly, then began to sob.
I put a fresh cigarette in my own mouth and lit it.
I went to Estelle, who still had the burnt-out stub between her lips, took it away, put a new one in its place, and lit it for her.
Then I said, low:
"I never said a word to Serepina."
At that, Estelle lifted her head.
Then she looked back down at the ground.
Even though there was nothing there.