Escape (16)
Escape (16)
Levina said Rineta's funeral would be a small, quiet affair.
The next morning arrived.
She walked into my room as if nothing had happened, set down my meal the way she always did.
"I sent word to that commoner you were close to in the village.
She ought to see her off."
"She'll probably draw a blade the second she gets here."
I stared blankly out the window. My voice bounced faintly off the glass.
Levina snorted.
"So some commoner's a little talented, has a few people around her. What can she possibly do to the Edelgard family?
Unless she brings her old master along, it means nothing.
This isn't the capital, Ravin. And dragging a handful of people here won't let her do a thing."
She walked over and kneaded my stiff shoulders, the touch clumsy but clearly meant as comfort.
At least, that was how she seemed to frame it.
"Still, your sister worries about you. Isn't that what matters?"
I said nothing.
I just endured her hands in silence.
An awkward stillness settled into the room.
She no longer worked at my shoulders, but her hand stayed there, resting motionless.
Her presence behind me pressed down like a weight.
"Why did you kill the villagers?"
"There was no other choice."
She answered from behind me, her voice utterly serene.
"Relics that only heretics use were discovered in that village.
What choice was there? I simply requested a bit of cooperation from the nearest church."
She stepped closer, pressed herself nearer, and whispered.
"Letting that maid live was already a fairly merciful gesture, don't you think?
I kept her alive all this time—for your sake.
She's the one who took her own life in the end."
She turned me gently toward her.
"But you don't need to worry anymore.
Everything that was unsettling is gone now.
Things are going to be all right from here on."
Levina was smiling.
A smile that said everything had been resolved, that I should feel at ease.
"...What, exactly, is going to be all right."
I looked her straight in the eye.
"What in this situation is supposed to get better?
No, scratch that. Is there anything left here that can even become more horrible than it already is?"
The smile dissolved from her face the moment she heard me.
Her pupils wavered, almost imperceptibly.
I seized the wrist of the hand that held mine and yanked.
Levina offered no resistance. She toppled forward onto the bed.
Squeak.
The soft mattress gave under her weight.
She lay there a moment, then slowly pushed herself upright. Her face was visible through her disheveled hair.
Seated on the bed, she looked up at me.
There was no shock, no fear in her expression.
Just an oddly subdued gaze, fixed on me.
I stepped forward and stared down at her.
Slowly, I brought my hand to her throat.
My fingers met the slender column of her neck. Beneath the skin, her pulse beat steady and even.
Levina's own hand rose and gently covered mine where it rested on her throat.
She stroked it, barely.
"Can you go through with it?"
I squeezed.
A faint, choked sound leaked from her. Her body twisted. Both hands grabbed at my arm and tried to push me off, but there was no real strength in them.
Her face reddened. The whites of her eyes went bloodshot.
She thrashed. The sheets crumpled and tangled around her.
"We've done this before, you know."
My voice shook a little.
"Remember? No, of course you don't. It's always just me."
Even as she struggled, her eyes never left my face.
Then, slowly, she lifted the hand that had been clutching my arm.
She touched my face—gentle, careful, as if handling something precious.
Her fingers grazed my cheek, brushed the corner of my eye.
I felt the strength drain out of my entire body at that touch.
I loosened my grip on her throat.
"Kgh—kraagh! Hhaap! Huhh, hoooh..."
Levina hacked and gasped for air.
Tears ran down her face.
At the same time, she was smiling—barely.
"Cough! Ravin, you— haah— you like me. You do."
"That's why you came back to this estate. That's why you agreed so meekly when I told you to move into the annex."
"That's why you pushed that godforsaken Serepina away when she tried to cling to you again. Why you stayed in my annex, in my family."
"That's what it is. Tell me it is."
Levina clung to me, sticky and desperate. Her neck bore the vivid, dark-red mark of my hand.
Was this the kind of love I had wanted?
Not this form of it. Not this feeling.
But I couldn't push her away.
A thought crept in: I could hold her back. I could stay like this, arms around her while she clung to me.
Maybe at this point I'd accept anyone who came to me and said they liked me.
The thought made my skin crawl. I reached for the revolver on the table.
I leveled it at Levina.
She looked at the muzzle and still wouldn't let go of me.
I pulled the trigger, aiming for her chest.
Bang!
The sound shoved her backward. She collapsed onto the bed without even a scream.
Red spread fast across her white blouse.
"If you were going to... if you were going to come to me like this,"
I stared at Levina where she lay bleeding.
"If you liked me that much, if I'm your younger brother—then why? Why the hell did you do it?"
Levina clutched her chest, forcing her mouth open with visible effort.
"You... weren't beside me."
"I was beside you! You told me to go to the annex—I went to the annex!"
She had no reply for that. She hesitated.
"But now—the great Heir Apparent, the person who tormented me so viciously—you can get rid of your mother now too, can't you?"
"I was... going to deal with my mother... once I became Family Head. Believe me..."
"What good does that do!? Fuck—Rineta is dead! I nearly died!"
I grabbed my head and screamed.
"Rineta is dead! Aaaagh!"
Levina seemed to be saying something more, but a ringing filled my ears.
What difference could any of it make now?
I was just a useless piece of shit who couldn't do anything.
I hated this version of myself.
But I didn't want to accept that I was the problem.
I needed someone to blame.
Someone bad. Someone to fault, to hate, to kill.
And it looked like there were at least two or three such people around me.
The villagers died, so Rineta died.
Rineta poisoned me because the Duchess must have threatened her.
The woman who had abused me since childhood, who had very clearly killed my mother.
Every thought I followed ended at her.
If I killed the Duchess, it felt like everything would resolve.
I crouched there for a long while in front of Levina, head in my hands, staring at nothing.
The moment my thoughts stopped, I left Levina where she was. I opened the door and walked the familiar corridors of the mansion.
I remembered being dragged to the Duchess's room as a child, beaten like a dog. Sometimes forced to eat nauseating kitchen scraps.
So I knew exactly where her room was.
I was carrying the gun. The servants I passed in the hallway fled without meeting my eyes.
I reached the door. I stopped. I took a breath.
Then I kicked the Duchess's door in.
Bam!
The door burst open, splintering inward.
I walked into the large room. Inside, Levina's uncle and the Duchess Edelgard were scrambling to dress themselves, faces frozen in shock.
"Ra—Ravin? You—you've lost your mind. I swear I'll do to you what I did to your mother—"
I didn't let the Duchess finish.
Bang!
A hole appeared in Levina's uncle's head—my uncle too, technically. He dropped soundlessly to the floor.
I swung the revolver toward the Duchess.
She was too terrified to speak. She just slumped to the floor, trembling violently.
The realization that I'd spent my life entangled with such pathetic vermin crashed over me. Memories of my mother dying when I was a child surged up, and my throat tightened.
My hand was shaking.
I pulled the trigger anyway.
The heavy muzzle dragged the shot low. The bullet punched into her chest instead of her head.
She spat blood, struggling to breathe.
She raised a hand toward me, straining.
I fired again and again until the cylinder was empty.
Blood spattered around the room.
Red flecks dotted my face and clothes.
The walls and floor were a mess of gore.
I wiped at my face. My palm came away sticky.
Still holding the gun, I leaned against the wall. My head drooped as I stared at the floor.
Blood that had pooled farther away crept across the floor, spreading toward where I stood.
I became aware of another presence.
I turned my head. Kyle stood in the doorway, looking utterly hollowed out.
She must have come for Rineta's funeral.
"It's been a while."
The smell of blood felt too thick. I pushed off the wall and walked over to the window.
"Sorry. You've got plenty to deal with already. No reason to get dragged into this."
The moment I opened the window, cool, sharp air poured in.
"Right now, I'm not sure I even know what I'm doing."
"What are you..."
"Still. I'll try to do better next time."