The Plan.

The Plan.

Aspara worked to puzzle out the intent behind the lady’s gaze. At a glance the eyes were venomous and dangerous, yet beneath them, instinctively, she could feel a deep affection and passion.

There was no denying they were dangerous eyes.

“Profit and loss! That is what stirs feeling. It is only when another’s well-being is bound up with one’s own profit and loss that empathy at last comes into its power. Do you see? Trade with the south is no mere matter of commercial development. It will be the first step toward our country being recognized as a country of human beings.”

“That’s quite a leap.”

“That’s the sort of thing one only sees once it’s done.”

Aspara turned it over carefully. Setting aside whether the lady’s argument was right, it was not such a poor bargain. A tunnel, was it. Over the long term, this was the sort of state-policy work a castle lord ought to undertake at his own expense someday. And the lady was wheedling for it as the price of having her debt waived.

It doesn’t seem there’s anything to lose…. But something is….

“Boring out a tunnel may be quick enough… but trade is a matter of much further down the road. It will be quite some time before you see the result you want, madam.”

“Hoho, I’m a woman who lived as a mute until her husband finally croaked.”

The lady laughed, with a very bright and happy expression.

“Waiting is rather a woman’s specialty, wouldn’t you say.”

“However….”

That a woman of this temperament had been so very quiet at their first meeting astonished her more, the more she thought of it.

“…Why did you send the castle lord away from this discussion? Surely it would have been better to negotiate among the three of us.”

“Why else — the principal in this enterprise is yourself, is it not.”

Something didn’t quite sit right. There was nothing logically wrong in the lady’s words, but —

“I think… I shall have to consult on this a little.”

“Of course. I understand.”

The middle-aged head of the merchant house answered her with one beaming smile after another.

“But remember this.”

The lady tapped tap, tap on the edge of the map with her fingernail.

“The castle lord, you see, seems to like you a great deal more than you imagine.”

“Well — more than I imagine, perhaps. I’m the type to expect the bare minimum, after all.”

“No, truly. So please — do persuade him well, with your own lips.”

She smiled and spoke as though whispering.

“To have a spouse whose power is overwhelmingly greater than your own is a thing that wounds the pride. But you must also know how to use that.”

“….”

Aspara made no answer.

The parlor where the two men were waiting.

The room was quiet. Volmo only sat with his legs crossed, click-clacking his foot and prodding poke, poke at his sweets with a fork.

The grain of the north has no stickiness. Sweets made from this region’s wheat tended, when stuck with a fork, to crumble around the holes left by the prongs, so the usual way of eating them was to ball them up in bite-sized pieces and toss them into the mouth.

These sweets brought out as a snack, however, were thick and squared off, and clung to the fork to the point of being sticky. It was not the moisture of butter but the gumminess of sugar.

It was a northern food made from southern ingredients.

《Erm, we—》

《Don’t speak with food in your mouth.》

《Ah.》

《Oh.》

The two of them murmured in surprise at the same moment.

Volmo was startled at having been called out on his manners by the king of the barbarians, and the castle lord was startled at himself, hearing his own words slip out reflexively. That was, beyond any doubt, etiquette he had picked up from Aspara.

A pride he could not quite name, a touch of embarrassment, and a kind of joy welled up in him, and the castle lord broke into a small smile.

This bastard’s got a damn scary look in his eye…. Eyes drawn into triangles like that, just because I broke one tiny rule, really.

Volmo grumbled internally, but cowed all the same, he cleared his mouth out clean. After washing the last crumbs from between his teeth down with his tea, the young man opened his mouth.

《So — about my mother.》

《The head of the merchant house, you mean.》

《Yes, her — that, you see… last time, I sneaked a look at her letter, didn’t I.》

The young man drew in a deep breath and spoke as though hesitating.

《It said, plainly, that I had not been taken as a hostage at all — that she had entrusted me to you. Something to that effect was clearly written.》

《Uh….》

The castle lord stared into space for a moment, impossible to tell whether he was choosing his words or simply not listening.

《That’s right.》

《Is that really how it is?》

《What did I tell her when I brought you in, again.》

《“A gift for my wife — for Lady Aspara!” you carted me off! Kidnapped me in the back of a wagon!》

《Ah, that’s right. A gift.》

《And that was a thing you did with my mother’s consent?》

《Polite speech.》

《—Sir?》

《At the time, the truth is I brought you in meaning to kill you. The negotiating came a little later.》

The big-built man sipped at his tea, perfectly unconcerned.

The rose-shaped teacup gripped in a hand the size of a bear’s paw made for a comical sight, but Volmo hadn’t the wits to spare for that sort of thing.

《Why?》

《Your mother…》

The castle lord paused and stared quietly at the trembling surface of the tea.

《Our country… no, this world is not a particularly easy place for half-bloods to live in.》

《….》

《The southerners look down on the northerners, and the northerners despise the southerners. That isn’t something that can be put right at the present moment.》

For the first time in a long while, Volmo looked the man straight in the eye. He was a man whose expression was hard to read. And yet something deep ran within those eyes, damp and lukewarm, whether melancholy or guilt he could not tell.

《The head of the merchant house has been pouring no small effort into setting that right.》

The castle lord’s gaze was not in this room. His was the look of a man speaking of someone with his eyes turned somewhere far away.

Is he thinking of his wife? Does this man, perhaps, know that she’s being subtly slighted by the castle servants? Volmo wondered.

《Can you not do something about it on your own authority?》

《There is a difference between an authority and a leader.》

The castle lord answered as he picked up a paste-cake on the tip of a fork no bigger than his own little finger.

The young man, who had heard a lifetime’s fill of sidelong glances and behind-the-back chatter, understood well enough what that meant.

《….》

《I do feel a little sorry for you. Not very — only a little.》

《Why didn’t you tell me honestly?》

《A wealthy young master sent in to serve as the queen’s personal attendant for the sake of his upbringing — would have a harder time getting on with the castle folk than a young pup picked up off the road, wouldn’t you say?》

《Just for that—!》

《Have you made any friends?》

《Th—!》

He pressed his teeth together as though about to retort, then let out a sigh and dropped down into his seat.

《…Well, a few….》

《Good for you, then.》

The castle lord sliced his portion of sweet in half with his fork and set the half on his friend’s plate.

[24.]

The discussion did not end until an hour or two later. A long time, if you called it long; a short time, if you called it short.

“You must have been waiting a great while.”

The head of the merchant house spoke up with an apologetic look, tilting her head to one side.

“As you’ve come all this way I should very much like to offer you a meal…. Sadly, the cooking isn’t yet finished. I’m afraid you’ll have to wait a little longer — what shall we do.”

“It’s quite all right, you needn’t go to the trouble of a meal—”

“Lady Aspara.”

The lady spoke with a beaming smile.

“How would you and your husband care to take a stroll? We have a really lovely walking path behind our estate.”

“No, there’s really no need—”

“I don’t mean simply that you should take a walk.”

In a low murmur, the lady whispered close to Aspara’s ear.

“While you’re walking, do bring up the matter of the tunnel with him. These things, by their nature, ought to be raised not across a desk but along a path of flowers.”

Aspara hesitated a moment, then nodded with a less than enthusiastic expression. The lady’s voice carried a powerful persuasiveness.

“At this season a migratory bird called the –– comes to the woods.”

The lady spoke, looking at the castle lord. As if suddenly coming to himself, Volmo translated and conveyed her words.

The lady then turned back to Aspara and continued.

“A scarlet little thing, a beautiful bird — a famous good omen up here in the north. It’s said that the first person to spot a –– in a given year will have happiness come to them. How would you two care to go and have a look?”

“Well, if the castle lord says it’s all right….”

“How does the castle lord feel about it? 《— - ――- ―-?》”

《— - ――- ―-….》

“The castle lord says he’d like that! Now then, now then. Off you go. The weather is far too lovely to spend in the parlor.”

〈If my wife is happy with it….〉

Such was the castle lord’s reply.

The pair of vacillating spouses thus ended up walking through the woods until the meal was ready.

We didn’t really have to take the meal here, either….

The castle lord, unable to bear the awkward atmosphere, let out a small sigh.

…Still, it’s not so bad.

He stole a quiet glance to his side and thought it over. His wife, too, did not seem terribly displeased at this sudden walk; she was strolling slowly along, taking in the breeze.

Gus drew back a few paces from his wife and whispered to the interpreter-attendant trailing behind.

《Look here, Volmo.》

《Yes?》

《You can head back now.》

《Yes? What will you do without me.》

《I’ll manage.》

He spoke with a smug expression.

《I do speak a bit of the southern tongue myself by now, don’t I.》

《You don’t. You’re at the level of a small child.》

《No. I can tell. I do a fair bit now.》

《I’m telling you, you don’t.》

《Did I not bleed for my training.》

《Coming back from the battlefield bloody and muttering over a vocabulary list isn’t generally what one calls ‘bleeding for one’s training.’》

《In any case.》

《No, in the first place, when you can’t even hold a proper conversation with a woman in your own native tongue, where does the confidence—》