Uninvited Guest.

Uninvited guest.

Gus spoke without turning his eyes.

《Attend to your own task.》

Volmo did not answer. The very next moment Sebinya’s chipper voice rang through his head, and his head began to ache.

“Ah, isn’t it romantic? It isn’t the law, of course, but it’s a convention of mercy and romance. If there’s resolve enough to throw everything aside and go off to the frontier to live just among themselves, then adultery, infidelity — it’s all forgiven. Love isn’t a crime, is it?”

“My lady, just a moment…”

“In romance novels there are quite a few stories that end that way. Have you perhaps heard of a penny romance series called ‘Lord’s Wife’? In that one too—”

“Um, my lady…”

《Relay it.》

That stiff voice prodded Volmo on. Never had he so deeply regretted his knowledge of both languages as he did now.

Truth be told, he himself had harbored some suspicion from the moment he’d first heard the circumstances of Aspara and Jack. Still, he’d told himself surely not, and so had refrained from poking at the subject, and now here he was, being made to bring it up like this.

“What is it?”

Sebinya Gobir meant no ill by it. No, she was a person who meant no ill by anything in this world. That was precisely the problem. It never occurred to Sebinya that anyone might take offense at so romantic a tale.

“Um, well… if you say such things… Lady Aspara and Jack are likely to be misunderstood.”

“Misunderstood?”

“They might be taken, the two of them, to have come into exile for… for that reason…”

“It’s all right! It’s not a misunderstanding — it’s the truth, you see.”

“P-pardon?”

“Oh my, did you not know?”

“Th…”

《Volmo.》

The poor half-blood youth, unable to bring himself to answer, dithered in his misery. The kindhearted Sebinya stepped in and did her best to answer on his behalf.

“Perhaps you didn’t know either? Aspara. Ja—ack. The two of them — um, is there even a word for ‘love’ in the northern tongue? I wonder whether the people here can grasp abstract nouns…”

“Um, pardon me for bringing this up just in case, but… that large gentleman is Lady Aspara’s new husband.”

“New husband?”

Sebinya laughed brightly, a tinkling ripple.

“Even so, surely that’s only a pretext the two of them have to keep up so they can set off for new lands together. I’d heard anyway that ‘barbarians’ keep multiple wives, so I thought no one would mind if they freeloaded off him a little — everyone thought so.”

In that instant the air in the room went frostily still.

The south and the north do not share even the roots of their languages. Word order, intonation, grammar are all different. And yet, as trade between the two cultures had grown, little by little, a handful of words had come to be shared. The northern tongue that southerners commonly knew consisted of words like “please,” “danger,” “I’m sorry.” The southern tongue that northerners knew consisted of various names for newfangled goods, “get lost,” “fire” — and—

“Barbarian.”

No — if anything, “barbarian” was a word the northerners heard more often than the southerners themselves spoke it. Which was why there was not a soul in that room who did not know it.

“Er…”

Of course, everyone knew perfectly well that the new madam’s knight let the word slip from his mouth often enough too. That was how commonly southerners spat it out.

But never could it be said to be a word fit to be dropped casually by an outsider in front of the “King of Barbarians” and his attendants, on top of an already taut atmosphere.

As the silence dragged on, even Sebinya realized she had done something wrong, though not precisely what she had done wrong, and began to glance cautiously about her. The servants, each with their own quiet pretext, were slipping out of the room.

《…I will explain.》

《That is for me to decide.》

The last servant left the room, and the door shut with a thud. Only a while after the sound of footsteps had faded entirely into the distance did the castle lord, at last, barely, find his voice.

“…”

“…”

《…Do you know why it is that I use the largest room.》

《Pardon?》

《Relay it.》

Volmo passed the castle lord’s words on, stammering.

《She says she does not know.》

《Do you know why it is that I eat first, why it is that I wear the finest clothing, why it is that I do not hoe fields or mend fences.》

The chestnut-haired young lady shook her stiffened head in small, timid strokes.

《Do you know why it is that I cannot remain at my wife’s side the whole day, why it is that I cannot kiss my wife’s brow whenever I please, why it is that I cannot carry my wife on my back but must make her walk to the dining hall on those small feet of hers.》

My Lady’s room is one minute from the dining hall, though…

Reading the room, Volmo trimmed the pointless asides and relayed only the words. Once again, Sebinya shook her head.

The castle lord stepped toward Sebinya and, with one sweep of his boot, kicked over the tea stand that sat between them. A dish shattered with a clatter, and precious sweets scattered across the floor.

Under the sole of his great military boot, the hard fragments of confection splintered to dust.

《Because I am, in my person, the nation.》

Volmo reflexively dropped into a sword-drawing stance. But he had not brought his blade, so for the moment he stretched his arms out to their fullest and positioned himself between Sebinya and the castle lord.

《Stand back!》

《…》

《Friend of my wife’s.》

The half-blood interpreter was plainly brave, yet he could not stop himself from shrinking back, a step at a time, as the castle lord advanced, a step at a time.

《I do not harm my wife’s friends — nor even a single one of the rats my wife holds dear.》

Volmo’s fear-frozen tongue could no longer carry the words across. Even so, the castle lord went on speaking. He seized the ornamental candlestick that stood nearby and hurled it against the wall, cracking the plaster with a tremendous noise.

To anyone listening outside, it was surely the kind of uproar that would raise fears that someone was dying in the room. And yet no one came to look in on the situation.

《But before I am my wife’s husband, I am the pillar and the banner of my people.》

《Sit down, please, and let us talk.》

《I wish to treat you, my wife’s friend, with proper courtesy. I wish to laugh off an insult of that order as a joke. I wish to hold you dear, and to help my wife enjoy a good time with her friend. However…》

Sebinya realized she had been driven against the wall. The wall at her back was so peculiarly cold that it felt as though she were standing on the edge of a blade.

《However — one who has disgraced the nation before my subjects, I cannot simply let walk away.》

In Gus’s eyes, as he spoke those words, there lay regret and sorrow. Volmo understood that the castle lord’s threat carried hesitation, and that, all the same, to hesitate any further would be to truly do Sebinya harm.

《My lord.》

《Yes — I am the lord of this castle.》

“Eeek!”

Gus seized Sebinya’s shoulder in one sudden grip and tore the outer fabric of her coat. A one-hundred-twenty-count silk lining no arrow could pierce came apart beneath his bare hand, and ornamental beads went pattering across the floor. The young lady’s body was not so much as grazed, but with her clothes and hair dishevelled, the woman looked, in an instant, as though she had just been beaten.

《Volmo. What I say from here on, relay it properly.》

《Y-yes. Yes.》

《…Your carriage — out that door and to the left, that is where it stands.》

Volmo, stumbling a little, passed the words on.

《Run out from here this very moment, cut straight across the castle courtyard, and flee as though escaping. Shouting, weeping, as though you had barely gotten away. And do not ever return.》

“Th—”

《Do you understand.》

It was not a question. Sebinya nodded her head swiftly, terror-stricken, before Volmo had even finished relaying the words.

《And—》

Just before the terrified woman bolted from the room, Gus spoke in a voice that sounded as though he were forcing it down.

“…I am sorry.”

It was an apology in the southern tongue. Perfectly pronounced, as though practiced over and over.

Whether it reached the ears of the young lady who had bolted away like a frightened deer, however, was anyone’s guess.

[16.]

Sebinya ran.

She could not fathom what on earth had just happened. What was that, why was he so angry? They had certainly been having a delightful conversation — she’d been explaining what a very romantic escape Aspara had made all the way up here!

Truly, there was no helping barbarians after all. Terrified out of her wits, she could only run, and run, in the direction she had been pointed.

“My feet are freezing…”

Snow had gotten into her shoes, but the young lady, who for the first time in her life had felt the fear of death, made it to the carriage house in no time. Only then did she turn to look back and check whether that monster was in pursuit.

“Carriage, carriage…!”

She made her way to her own carriage, parked at the very front. But there was something the King of Barbarians had forgotten to account for. The servants! While they’d been chatting and idling away the time, the servants had been separated off to hand out gifts throughout the castle.

The young lady stamped her feet in place. She had to leave at once. She couldn’t go back into the castle, and without someone to open the door for her, she could hardly commit the unthinkable breach of hauling herself up into the carriage by her own hand.

“Is… is anyone there? Sasha, Kiki!”

Sebinya began shouting the names of her coachman and her servants.

《Who’s — — —?》

“Help me…!”

Startled by the voice from above, Sebinya jerked her head up to look.

《Ah.》

“Ah.”

The tall figure leaning its head out from the hidden space at the top of the carriage house, the moment its eyes met Sebinya’s, scowled.