A Girls-Only Night

But still.

But…

As for me, I had figured that in another two days or so, Shitoen would finally be able to relax.

It was not as though I had spent all that time looking at other people’s wounds during frontier duty and skirmishes between knight orders for nothing. I was no match for Shitoen, but even I could more or less tell how something would heal from instinct and experience.

Mone would suffer from fever and pain for two days.

After that, I thought Shitoen would be able to sleep in her own bedroom again.

Of course, her bedroom was separate from mine, but I had been hoping I could come up with some excuse or other to go to her room.

That was what I had been thinking, and yet…

“Why is Shitoen still in the other room over there?!”

I shouted, feeling like I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs. On the other side of the single wall between us was the treatment room for Mone and Roze.

And from there, for a while now, I had been hearing cheerful squeals and happy laughter.

“Isn’t that fine? Her Highness Shitoen has made friends around her own age. And now that Eaton has been commandeered by the kitchen, she needs someone to talk to as well.”

Raul, sounding exasperated, ran his quill across a ledger. Apparently he was calculating this trip’s expenses. Naturally, Luminous would provide the lodgings and meals, but anything we had bought or prepared along the way still had to be recorded and billed later. I did not like the sound of that… That dream had better not turn prophetic. What if we come up short by 153 darin?

“How much longer is Eaton going to stay in the kitchen anyway?”

“She really does look lively there. And she’s a good cook too.”

Raul had been clicking away on the abacus, but at the laughter that drifted through the wall, he lifted his face.

I remembered how apologetically Shitoen had asked me about an hour earlier.

“Um… They said since tonight will probably be the last night we all stay together, they want to push the beds together and sleep side by side…”

“Prince-sama, shove the beds together, the beds!”

What the hell do that brat think my monstrous strength is for?!?!?!

I had almost thought about punching her, but then Shitoen quietly said, “There are some things I want to ask while getting a little closer to them. Is that all right?” so…

…Well, I figured there must be some reason for it, in Shitoen’s mind.

“Still, it’s good those sisters got better, isn’t it?”

Having taken off his order uniform, Raul was dressed in just a shirt and trousers, which was actually fairly casual for him.

Leaning back in his chair, one arm draped over the backrest, he looked at me.

“How far do you intend to have them travel with us?”

“Hm? Up to the border of the Kingdom of Tania should be enough. We can’t very well take them all the way to the royal palace.”

“Well, if that’s the case, fine.”

“What?”

“Be careful, Commander.”

“What are you talking about?”

“That younger sister, she’s after you.”

He said it so flatly that I could only stare at him with my mouth hanging open.

“As if.”

I laughed before I could stop myself.

“She’s just a kid.”

“It’d be nice if she thought of herself as one, but she probably doesn’t. Besides, that older sister too, well…”

Just as Raul let out a sigh, Shitoen’s voice came through from the other room—“Eek! W-Wh-Wh-Wh-What are you doing?!”—and I shot to my feet on reflex.

Instinctively, Raul and I both moved closer to the wall, and then…

“Lady Shitoen’s skin is so smooth! What is this? What is this?!”

“Eeeek! Th-that tickles, Roze-chan!”

“And you’re so small too. You’re like body-pillow size…”

“W-w-w-w-w-wait… Mone-san, please let go… mgh!”

“Sister! Lady Shitoen is going to suffocate in your chest!”

“My, my♡”

At the voices I heard, I began trembling violently.

“What in the world are they doing in thereeeeee?! Raul!!!!!”

“It’s a girls’ night.”

“My Shitoen is going to get devoured!! By those carnivorous beasts!”

“They’re girls.”

Raul answered in a fed-up voice, but honestly, what kind of man was he? Have some sense of crisis, some sense of crisis!

That is exactly why you still don’t have a wife!

And Shitoen too, talking about getting closer… What kind of closeness was she trying to build?!

“I, um… don’t have any siblings myself, so I may not be the best person to say this… but you two really are very close, aren’t you?”

At last the excited squealing died down, and I heard Shitoen’s voice.

I pressed myself against the wall and listened closely. Raul, exasperated, went back to the ledger again. Could he at least use the abacus quietly?

“It’s just the two of us, after all. Right, Sister?”

“That’s right.”

“Have the two of you been running your business by yourselves all this time? Did any relatives help out, perhaps?”

“Our mother passed away when my younger sister was little. Our father handled the management, but there were some rather complicated circumstances… For about the last five years, it has been me and Roze. And also Evans, who betrayed us this time, took charge at the center of operations.”

“If it was about ten years ago… then Mone-san would still have been around seventeen, wouldn’t she? That must have been hard.”

“And yet… Lady Shitoen, such things are common enough in the world. Besides, I could hardly leave my little sister to fend for herself.”

“And I couldn’t leave Sister all alone either.”

“My, this child.”

After that, laughter followed, and then silence fell for a few seconds.

“Um… I’m afraid this may sound insensitive coming from someone as ignorant of the world as I am, and I would be terribly sorry if I offended you by saying it…”

Shitoen spoke softly.

“If there is ever anything I can do to help, please talk to me about absolutely anything, all right?”

“There is nothing more I could possibly ask of you, Lady Shitoen…”

“The fact that we met at all must also be some kind of bond. My father taught me that bonds are things one can tie or sever. Tie the good bonds, and cut away the bad ones. That is how we go on living, tying and cutting our bonds as we go, he said.”

“Then, Lady Shitoen, you severed your bond with Crown Prince Arios and tied a new one with Prince Saryu, didn’t you?”

“Th-that… that is… yes… I suppose so.”

“Eeeek! Lady Shitoen, you’re bright red!”

Roze’s gleeful voice rang out, and Shitoen’s flustered protest followed: “Th-that’s not it, Roze-chan!”

And then more laughter followed, but…

In a low murmur.

I heard Mone mutter something.

“And yet there are rotten bonds too, the kind you cannot tear apart.”

“Eh…?”

It sounded like Shitoen asked her to repeat that.

“It was nothing. More importantly, Lady Shitoen. Your skin really is so smooth♡”

“I know, right?! Especially here…”

“Eek! Mone-san, Roze-chan! W-w-w-w-where are you touching…?!”

“That’s iiiiiit! I’ve had enough!”

I roared and stormed out of the room.

Then I burst straight into the next room, and a loud chorus of “Eek!” rose from the bed.

The three girls were all tangled together in a heap, but—

I marched straight over, pulled Shitoen out from the middle, and swept her up into my arms.

“I am forcibly retrieving her!”

“Prince-sama, you’re the worst!”

“How outrageously overbearing!”

“Say whatever you like! Tonight, Shitoen will sleep with Eaton! By princely decree! Raul! Drag Eaton out of the kitchen!”