The Mage Who Crossed Time (4)

“If you have business with me, come back later.”

“My business is with that.”

Noi looked where Kardia pointed.

There was a neatly made bed.

(……)

“Eh?”

Noi lifted her face.

She looked from the bed to Kardia, then—“eh”—sprang up again.

“—?!”

Noi panicked. In her fluster she tugged at her clothes, lost her balance, and took a grand tumble.

—THUD!

With an enormous crash, Noi sprawled face-down on the floor.

Kardia, who had been leaning against the door watching her, stared blankly for a moment, then turned away.

“Kh—!”

His back trembled in little shakes. He was laughing!

Only a short while ago—for him, ages ago—he had worried terribly whenever Noi tripped!

(…So embarrassing. I want to disappear…)

Noi could not move, still facedown. As she clutched her clothes in both fists and stayed there on the floor, Kardia, still shaking, scooped the little girl into his arms.

Their faces drew close. Seeing Noi’s sullen expression, Kardia began to shake with laughter again.

Noi reeled and pressed her lips into a line.

“Sorry. I was being mean.”

The way he admitted fault so frankly was, again, infuriating. To her chagrin, when she clamped her mouth shut her cheeks puffed out. She had not meant to—but she sulked like an actual child.

“You became my bride, but that doesn’t mean I intend to do anything right away.”

Still pouting, Noi grabbed a handful of Kardia’s hair. He let her tug it down—hard—without protest, smiling all the while.

(Because—you said your business was with the bed! And you keep calling me your bride!)

Noi was an adult woman, after all. She had common knowledge.

Yes—she knew, at least as knowledge, the phrase “wedding night” and what happened then.

But it wasn’t as if she and Kardia had actually married, and at the moment Noi’s body was that of a child.

(If I’d thought for two seconds, I’d have realized he was teasing me!)

With pride and a dozen thoughts getting in the way, Noi could not fix her mood.

Still holding the sulking Noi, Kardia moved a finger, and the bed’s canopy fell in a sweep. Setting Noi down beside the change of clothes, he then flopped onto the bed.

“Come over after you’ve changed.”

Kardia’s voice came from within the canopy. Noi blinked.

(“After you’ve changed”… huh? Huh??)

Changing at lightning speed, Noi whisked the canopy aside and put a knee on the bed.

“We’re sleeping together?!”

“That’s right.”

“That’s another joke, isn’t it?”

Not going to be fooled this time—Noi clambered up onto the bed. Kardia, lying on his side, she now noticed, had changed into different clothes. They covered an awful lot of skin and looked ill-suited for sleepwear.

“Unfortunately, our place is small. We don’t have spare rooms.”

“That can’t be true!”

Remote as this place was, Kardia bore the title of Magic Count. From outside, the manor had looked quite grand.

“It’s true. You can have Ornis show you around tomorrow.”

Yawning, Kardia closed his eyes as if even talking to Noi now was a bother. The moment he got into bed, his attitude turned shockingly offhand.

Though for an instant she quailed at how irritable he looked, Noi pushed at his shoulder insistently.

“Hey. Isn’t there another bed somewhere?”

Keeping his eyes shut, Kardia only stretched out an arm and curled a finger. The canopy that had draped the bed shifted into the shape of a hammock.

“You can sleep over there.”

His face sank into the pillow—as if to say, so let me sleep.

“Eh! No! I want the bed!”

“So do I.”

Whether guest or child, she did not want to surrender her right (the bed). And as the master of the house and an adult, Kardia was no different.

“If you don’t like that, then be quiet and sleep.”

Being addressed, for the first time, the way an adult scolds a child, Noi drooped. When she fell silent, Kardia lifted his face from the pillow. Propping himself on an elbow as he lay, he looked at her.

“Unless what you want is to be made quiet—if that’s what all the fuss is for.”

Kardia lifted a lock of Noi’s white hair with his fingers.

“Made quiet? With magic?”

Noi perked up, wondering if in the last hundred years someone had invented a spell you could cast on people—but Kardia only deepened his smile without a word.

There was a touch of languor to that deeper smile.

That alone told Noi what he meant, and her face flushed.

Relaxed clothes, drowsy eyes—the allure Kardia carried stood out, and Noi flustered.

“Ah—no! No! That’s not allowed!”

“Then go to sleep.”

When the scarlet-faced Noi yelped, Kardia let her white hair fall and lay down again.

Feeling very much defeated, she grumbled but slid under the covers beside him.

Kardia’s body, sleeping at her side, was large and gave off a faint warmth.

If she moved too much they would touch, so she fixed her arms in front of her chest and could not budge.

(…I don’t actually mind sleeping with Kardia.)

After all, until yesterday they had slept together every night. She had not expected the reversed size difference alone to make her feel this unsettled.

The waves of feeling also made her gently heartsore.

“…Hey.”

“Mm?”

When Noi spoke to him, Kardia answered, sounding sleepy. Encouraged, she turned slightly toward him.

“—Kardia, have you lived a hundred years?”

If Noi had come from a hundred years ago—

If he was Noi’s disciple—

Then it meant he had lived for a hundred years.

(It’s impossible to live a hundred years. And—to look this young all the while—)

The Kardia before her looked no more than twenty-six or twenty-seven.

Living a hundred years, and staying young in appearance—both were impossible in Noi’s understanding.

In any case, she wanted an answer.

“A hundred years? What are you talking about?”

But he would not give her one.

“You talked about your master outside earlier, didn’t you? You said, back then, a hundred years—”

“Did I say that?”

Noi instinctively bristled and started to retort—but held back.

(…I’m keeping a secret myself.)

And for quite a selfish reason, she was not naming herself his master.

Blushing and being teased and being taken for a child—especially in a situation like this—made her all the less eager to declare herself.

(…Kardia is already a fine mage.)

He was no longer the boy who had been her disciple. And if she would not declare herself his master, she had no right to act like one.

(He feels… far away now.)

Though, just like a hundred years ago, they lay side by side in the same bed, the distance felt vastly greater.

“…Can’t sleep?”

When Noi fell silent, Kardia pushed himself up with a put-upon sigh.

“—Ah, right.”

Then, as if something had occurred to him, he brought his face close to hers.

“Eh—w—!”

Ignoring her fluster, Kardia kissed Noi.

To be precise—on the forehead.

“For children, this is what you need, isn’t it?”

As if it were nothing, he said it, then flopped back down.

Stunned, Noi pressed the spot on her brow he had kissed.

(…Wha—wha—?!)

Face burning, she opened and closed her mouth like a fish.

It was true that until yesterday, Noi had given Kardia a good-night kiss. She was the one who had given him that habit. But that had been because he was a child.

(…Right—and I’m a child now too…)

While Noi sat completely frozen, unable to keep up with it all, Kardia propped himself on an elbow.

“Come on, close your eyes. Good night.”

Keeping his eyes shut, Kardia began to pat-pat Noi’s belly. However young she looked, to be given a good-night kiss and even soothed to sleep!

Propped on his elbow, Kardia began nodding off before Noi did. His face wobbled, sway, sway.

Noi realized for the first time how voraciously Kardia pursued sleep.

Back when he was her disciple, he had stayed up late with her more than once. It must have been hard, and yet he had never shown it.

(He must have been minding me…)

Missing the Kardia from back then, Noi did as this Kardia told her and closed her eyes.

“Good morning.”

Bathed in bright sunlight, Noi opened her eyes.

A silhouette that had woken before her drew the curtains.

When he turned, she was sure.

The lithe lines of his body, the fine bridge of his nose, the twin moles, the well-shaped ears. Black hair like darkness itself, shining under the morning sun.

(Ah—he really is…)

He was Kardia.