Sold.

Sold.

“As I said before, it’s only that Sebinya — that woman is so impossibly foolish that someone has to look out for her, that’s all…!”

“Hee hee. What an extreme way you have of caring for others, you know.”

“…Be so good as to call it passionate, please.”

“You really could afford to ease up a little on yourself, you know.”

Without realizing it, Ugli let out a small laugh. He had never imagined himself having a conversation of this sort with anyone. And of all people, with this southern woman.

He was enjoying himself, a little. He wasn’t yet aware of it, but he certainly was.

“…You know, madam, you’re quite the passionate sort yourself when it comes to it, aren’t you.”

“Me, you say?”

“Yes, that time at the estate. You did all sorts of strange things to set that man’s teeth grinding, did you not?”

Ugli said it with a low chuckle.

“Riding a horse indoors, cooking those dreadful dishes that smelled like rotting kitchen scraps…”

“…Did I?”

“Yes — that purple-broth dish, however on earth did you make that? For a moment I was sure a garbage cart had tipped over.”

“Is that so.”

“It really was, that…”

The woman listened along with a faint smile. But noticing that Aspara’s eyes were not smiling, Ugli realized something quite suddenly.

“…Erm, that — “

“Mm…”

“That, by any chance — was that not done to needle that man… was that simply how your cooking actually turns out?”

“…”

“…”

“…I shall be closing the post-room. Once you’ve finished writing your letter, off you go.”

“Ah. Yes. Yes.”

Ugli gathered up the letter and stepped out of the room with an awkward feeling about him. Becoming friends with that woman, he thought, was still some way off.

Ugli made his way to the post-room, with the false letter he had drafted in Aspara’s room.

Or rather, it was less a post-room than a strategy room where dispatches and supplies were managed — but to Ugli at this moment, more important than any of that was the small letter tucked against his chest.

Sending this is — yes, sending it is the right thing to do. That fellow doesn’t know what he ought to do for himself, so it’s right that I should do it for him.

But for some reason, his hand would not move easily.

The false letter, with the words that truly needed to be conveyed, sat in the inner pocket; the real letter, the one filled with idiocies, sat in the back pocket. All Ugli had to do was reach into his inner pocket and hand the letter over to the clerk.

《You there. Are you not sending a letter?》

The clerk, having watched Ugli’s wavering with growing impatience, finally opened his mouth to chivvy him along.

《Ah… yes.》

《What’s the matter? Quickly now, hand it over.》

Ugli hesitated a moment. What was he wavering about? It had already been settled what was the proper thing to send.

《Th-…》

He thought, just for a moment, of what Aspara had said to him.

‘What an extreme way you have of caring for others.’

An extreme one? It belatedly began to dawn on him that perhaps that woman had been making a sly remark about his behaviour. That she had, in her own way, been trying to stop him.

There had been something in that woman’s gaze that he could not bear. The kind of thing that made one want to say to her, what is it you want of me—

《Urgent dispatch!》

At that very moment, someone came running into the post-room in a panic.

《Urgent dispatch — an urgent dispatch for the castle lord!》

《And what’s so urgent about it?》

The man in charge asked it with a hint of weariness, though with a tense edge underneath all the same.

《An invasion. There has been an invasion at the southern border!》

Standing nearby, Ugli was startled for a moment, but he soon settled himself. An invasion. By the word alone it sounded like a great matter, but the truth was that incursions at the border were a common-enough occurrence. The northern country’s borders were vague, and to the people of the south, the very notion that the north was a country with a government at all was a hazy one. Defectors who simply walked over the border to escape taxes and conscription were such a regular event as to count almost as a monthly social-calendar item.

It was certainly not good news, but it was nothing to come bursting in shouting about. As proof, the dispatch clerk responded not just dryly but in a tone of outright indifference.

《Ah, at the border? If word’s just come in now, that’d be — what, a few hours? No, given the weather’s a bit foul, half a day?》

《Four hours. The border was crossed four hours ago.》

《Four hours, you say. Then they’d be held up at one of the midway villages, would they not? Why are you running word straight through to here?》

《That is…》

He paused as if to catch his breath, then said:

《They came straight through to Curtain Village. The intruders, that is, yes.》

Curtain Village was a settlement quite close to the capital. It was nowhere near a four-hour distance from the border.

《…Ah!》

In that instant, Ugli understood. The dispatch clerk would have caught on as well.

《The tunnel.》

《Yes, it seems they came up along the trade route in secret. They did not get caught at a single one of the midway defence walls and have come right up beside the capital.》

That hideous thing, which everyone had cursed and called doomed, had now truly gone and caused a great calamity.

“My lady, the news — !”

“I have already heard.”

Jack burst into Aspara’s room and came face-to-face with Ugli. Ugli had got there first, and was already explaining the situation.

“What do we do?”

“What is there to do, well…”

Aspara spoke in her usual unruffled voice.

“—it has happened, has it not.”

No. It seemed that even Aspara was not, in this case, perfectly composed. From beside her, Ugli — who had been standing silently — added his words.

“This is the first time we’ve had an advance this sudden, so the place is in an uproar. But it’s only that we did not anticipate the speed of their march; they’re a rabble of tax-evaders, that’s all. There is nothing to worry about.”

For once, he was outfitted in full combat gear from helmet to military boots. A bird-beak-shaped helmet and shoulder armour, an outer cloak of thin iron wire twisted at intervals, and the tough boots fitted with spurs. In place of his usual indigo, a white cloak in camouflage colours.

Ugli pulled the helmet that had been tucked under his arm down over his head and went on:

“That said, given the situation as it is, I too must be off shortly. The two of you, please — until the matter is settled, do not, if you can help it, show your faces to anyone.”

“My husband is going off to battle and you’d have me holed up indoors?”

“Public opinion is not in your favour.”

“It will only be the worse, in a situation like this, if I alone am hiding away in some warm room.”

“It isn’t warm in here at all, though. My lady, you’ve been letting the fire go out again, haven’t you?”

“That is not the point.”

Aspara rose from her seat, took up her thick outdoor cloak, and threw it on over the indoor cloak she was already wearing.

“I am going to see them off as well. Jack, you stay here.”

“My lady, but —”

“Lady Aspara, this is not a good idea.”

“Yes, it isn’t a good idea.”

The woman paid no heed to the worry of the two men, only fetching out a thick pair of gloves and a neck-wrap from her drawer.

“But the world isn’t built such that one can act on good ideas alone, now is it.”

“Even so…”

Jack could not finish his sentence. It was self-evident that, however much he tried to dissuade her, his lady would not listen.

“Ugli — “

The woman turned to look at the armoured soldier and asked:

“Teach me one phrase — just one — in the northern tongue.”

Leaving behind Jack, who had insisted that he too would come along, Aspara made her way to the front courtyard, where the soldiers and the castle lord were preparing to set out. Ugli, leading the way for her, had his heart full of nothing but worry.

In the front courtyard, twenty-three horses were being saddled, and an equal number of soldiers were checking quivers and scabbards. It was not a large engagement. If anything, it was an unnecessarily large number of soldiers. And yet, the air among the men was thick with tension and discontent.

Through that grim air Aspara walked straight-backed. To the rhythm of her footsteps, dozens of pairs of eyes traced her trajectory.

But Aspara’s gaze was directed in only one direction. Toward the largest man, draped in the longest cloak.

《Castle Lord.》

Castle Lord Gus. Drawing slowly close to him, Aspara whispered the single phrase of the northern tongue she had learned from Ugli.

《I shall be waiting.》

The castle lord only nodded once and mounted his horse. His expression, hidden beneath his leather helmet, could not be seen.

《— — — —!》

He raised his sword-bearing hand high and shouted. The twenty-three soldiers who heard the shout cried something in answer behind him, and then, one by one, they began to lift their horses’ heads and ride out beyond the castle.

Clop, clop. Clop, clop. The sound of hooves striking the frozen ground rang out. Scrunching her eyes against the bits of ice that struck her face, Aspara murmured once more after the snowstorm vanishing into the distance:

《…I shall be waiting.》

And so, Aspara remained standing in that spot. Long after the snowstorm had vanished beyond the horizon, alone in that very place.

Some of the castle workers, glancing at her uncertainly, gestured for her to come inside, but the woman only shook her head and stood like a stone statue.

The people exchanged awkward looks, then one by one withdrew into the castle, and after a while the only one remaining in the front courtyard was the lady of Fang Castle.

How much time had passed? No, not very long. Less than a quarter of an hour, in fact. And yet Aspara’s cheeks had gone as red as a ripe pomegranate.

“L-Lady Aspara, what on earth are you doing out here!”

Volmo had come up to the woman who stood like a stone statue.

“This is — colder than I had expected.”

Aspara did not turn her head. Whether she would not, or could not, Volmo did not know.

“What are you doing, exactly? Get inside.”

“I will not.”

“You’ll really die out here if you’re not careful, doing this.”

“The soldiers who just rode out might really die too, if they are not careful.”

A brief silence cut between the two of them.