Defeated

“…So you’re the one.”

Kalada knew the moment she laid eyes on the woman.

“That boy’s woman. It’s you.”

The woman who had introduced herself as Pai wore her hair loose to her chest, platinum blonde near enough to silver. Her fair looks alone might have passed her off as the daughter of some noble house, but Kalada caught the air of a kindred sort about her. A certain wildness, in other words. She had toughness enough to plunge an elbow into a half-frozen river. And she had an energy pointed at something ahead of her, massing like rainclouds on a far horizon, certain to arrive one day.

She was the sort who brought a storm with her.

Kalada’s wide mouth split wider still. For the first time in an age a warrior’s blood came to a boil in her, and she pressed the excitement down before she asked.

“Does that boy ‘know’ you?”

“He knows what there is to know.”

“A tongue as cunning as a snake’s is nothing but poison before me.”

“Then the two of us won’t suit each other very well, will we.”

“…”

Kalada shot a sidelong glance at the child clinging to Pai’s calf. Wavy golden bob, violet eyes taut with nerves. Her gaze softened, surprisingly enough. She was fond of children, and she loathed anyone who caused them pain.

“And what’s this little peanut?”

“Ari’s not a peanut.”

Ardine snapped it out. Kalada, face itching to tease, shot back.

“No? A booger, then?”

“It’s Ardine!”

“Right, right. So you’re that Ardine Booger Paragon.”

“N-not a booger!”

“Right, right.”

‘Booger’ landed harder than ‘peanut.’ Ardine seized a fistful of Pai’s sleeve and shook it wildly.

“Go, Pai! Teach her a lesson!”

“I’m a nanny, though, not a dog.”

“Th-this is one of a nanny’s accomplishments too.”

Pai smiled at such a splendid deployment of the word.

“That’s fair. Bite when I’m told to bite, bark when I’m told to bark. It’s my first time as a nanny, so I got mixed up.”

She stroked the round crown of Ardine’s head and nudged the little shoulders gently toward the door.

“Would you go and play with the knight outside for a bit?”

“Mm. But come back quick.”

The young lady nodded instead of digging her heels in about staying together.

Pai opened the door and handed Ardine over to the waiting knight. She whispered, ‘I’ll go bite her bottom good and hard for you,’ and Ardine shot up a thumb.

The instant the door closed, an aura rose so thick and violent it was a wonder she had kept it in this long. Even someone who could not sense mana would have felt the fine hairs rise all over their body, like a physiological reaction to some phenomenon whose source could not be named.

“Now, then…”

Kalada rose to her feet, slow and unhurried. The robe draped over her shoulders slid down, and the black dress beneath it showed off a body of pronounced curves. The shimmering silk was proof of the guild’s wealth. Who, out at the empire’s far northern edge, went about in nothing but a dress that thin?

“Shall we kindred sorts have ourselves a serious little talk, then?”

Kalada was grinning slyly. The excitement swelling in her chest leaked out of her as laughter, the way a fruit gone fully ripe gives off its sweet scent.

“Here I come!”

Having courteously announced herself, she sprang up onto the desk and kicked off.

— CRASH!

The massive desk toppled backward with a roar. Empty-handed only a moment before, she somehow had a longsword in her grip already, and she shot toward Pai like a cannonball.

— Whish!

Pai did not simply stand there, either. She pressed herself to the wall, tore down the metal helmet hanging there, and flung it. The silver helmet flew hard and true and struck Kalada’s sword.

— CLANG…!

A clear, hard peal rang out. Before the sound had stopped trembling, Pai snatched up a tall candlestick and swung it like a spear. The sharp spike meant to hold a candle in place took dead aim at the vital point of the throat, the carotid artery.

“Kh—!”

— CLANG! Skreeeee—!

In midair Kalada twisted her sword and turned the candlestick aside. Her boot soles struck the floor with a thud, and pale dust bloomed up.

“Whew.”

A sigh slipped out from between lips slow with pleasure, more whistle than breath.

Pai had not a single breath out of place, as though none of that violence just now had happened at all. She only twirled the candlestick round and round at her leisure.

“Hah.”

Panting for breath, Kalada raised an eyebrow as though her pride had been stung. They had crossed blades a single pass, and already beads of sweat stood on her brow.

A true master is one who knows herself and knows her opponent. When sword and candlestick met, Pai had registered clearly that Kalada stood a rank beneath her, and Kalada had likely realized it as well.

And yet Kalada lunged again, giving off a killing intent fiercer than before.

— Fwoosh!

The sound of splitting wind.

Pai twisted at the waist and slipped the sword with ease. In the same instant she dropped low like a frog, shot out one leg, and swept a hard boot into Kalada’s ankle.

“Guh—!!”

Kalada’s knees buckled, and in one unbroken motion Pai drove an elbow into her belly.

— Crunch!

The sound of solid bone shattering.

Kalada coughed up blood and just barely kept her grip on the sword she had nearly dropped. She forced strength back into her knees and caught her balance. And then…

— Cling….

Kalada let the sword go of her own accord. The longsword rolled across the floor like a bit of dust, and she raised both arms to shoulder height as though in surrender and spoke.

“Defeated.”

Pai answered the crisp declaration of defeat by tossing the candlestick to the floor, just as Kalada had.

“I’ll accept it.”

“Good grief. What sort of monster is this.”

“Thank you.”

“Yes, it’s a compliment. You monster.”

Kalada went over to the toppled desk and drew a small bell from a drawer sprawled across the floor. Jingle, jingle. A clear, bright sound rang out.

“Carrying around a monstrous aura and hiding it so well. Sly little thing.”

“Well, that’s how I was able to seduce Lord Keith, isn’t it.”

“Why did you go near that boy at all? What’s a Sword Master of real attainment want with some scrap of a warrior?”

“His face?”

“…”

Pai leaned at a slant against the wall beside the door and folded her arms.

From deep in her chest a murmuring rose. For the first time in an age she had matched strength with a proper warrior, and her blood too had come to a boil. But it had not satisfied her, no more than a single mouthful of water satisfies someone wandering a desert.

Thirst surged up in her. She wanted to pour her aura out to the very last drop, to rampage until her whole body was soaked through with sweat.

But she must not. She drew a deep breath in through her nose and reined herself in. The energy she had failed to put away turned into an impulse, and the impulse opened her mouth.

“Because I want to keep him alive.”

“…”

“This time, I’m going to save him for sure.”

Pai did not look away from Kalada’s eyes as they weighed the truth of it. There was no reason to. Because she meant it.

At length, Kalada spoke.

“…I’ll believe you, then.”

“Thank you.”

The door opened and a servant came in. Not a flicker of surprise crossed his face at the sight of the wrecked study. He murmured a spell under his breath, and the objects rose smoothly into the air one after another and found their way back into place.

The desk, the helmet, the candlestick, the pencils…

“Wowww, magic!”

“Argh, my lady! You have to wait just a little lon—!”

Ardine, on the verge of dying of boredom, came pattering in the instant the door opened.

The White Castle kept no mage in residence, so chances to see magic were few. The most she ever got was a mage called in for her birthday party, and mages hired that way were only of the lower grades.

“Soo amazing…”

Ardine’s eyes shone bright, and at such an ardent response the servant summoned the folk dolls displayed in the cabinet down to her eye level. Dressed in the traditional costumes of every region of the continent, the dolls broke into a twitchy little dance. The child clapped her hands in delight.

Kalada settled her backside into the now-mended chair and put both feet up on the desk. She set a pre-rolled cigarette between her lips, then remembered there was a child present and spat it straight back out.

“…”

The child’s delighted shrieks neutralized the bitter taste of defeat. The excitement had still not left her.

Beat me? Beat the great Kalada herself? And in a mere few passes, at that?

She was a worshipper of strength. Before a greater power she grew humble, and she craved it without end.

“Say, sweetheart.”

“Yes?”

“There’s something I want to ask you.”