Chapter 166
For a long while, he silently stared down at the tip of the pen that had stopped moving. Ink spreading from the nib was forming an ugly blot on the surface of the letter.
As he carelessly crumpled it and pushed it aside, the man continued worriedly.
“But it seemed that unpleasant rumors about Her Highness the Grand Duchess were circulating because of that wolf. It also appears to clash frequently with the grand ducal house’s vassals.”
Varkas, who had opened the drawer and was taking out a fresh sheet of paper, frowned.
“Clashes?”
“Ah, it wasn’t a conflict serious enough for you to be concerned about. It’s just that the wolf is so aggressive...... The soldiers seem to be frightened of it.”
He scratched the back of his head and replied ambiguously.
Varkas’s gaze sharpened.
“Has that magical beast harmed anyone nearby?”
“No, it hasn’t. I watched it closely while I was staying in Kalmor, but it merely bared its teeth and frightened those around it.”
The man hurriedly denied it.
“It has an extraordinary protective instinct and possessiveness toward its master. Fundamentally, it seems to absolutely hate anyone approaching Her Highness the Grand Duchess. As long as no one went unnecessarily close to Her Highness, it was perfectly docile. It obeys Her Highness extremely well, and it is remarkably intelligent, so it didn’t appear likely to attack people indiscriminately.”
The man, who had rattled off the words as though defending it, paused to catch his breath before adding quietly.
“However, since it’s so enormous...... the problem is that those around it feel their lives are in danger from its growling alone.”
Varkas looked down thoughtfully at the pile of letters stacked on one side of the desk.
He, too, had already suspected to some extent that the direwolf was causing problems. Reports containing tactfully worded complaints about the direwolf had begun arriving from the subordinates he had assigned to protect her.
And his reply to them was always the same.
If it showed signs of becoming a threat to her or directly harmed anyone nearby, they were to subdue it by force. However, if it caused no actual harm, they were to leave it alone.
The fact that the wolf’s head was still attached to its body meant that, at least so far, it had not attacked anyone.
If so, he had no intention of taking any action for the time being.
He could tolerate all the priests and vassals complaining about her raising a magical beast. If it made her happy, what did it matter even if she raised the spawn of a demon rather than a magical beast?
As long as Talia recovered.......
At that moment, the image of her sobbing in the rain flashed through his mind like a burn scar.
He hurriedly shook off the afterimage flickering across his retinas and dismissed the man in a somewhat cold tone.
“If you’re done chattering, leave. Don’t you need to get out of the gorge before nightfall?”
“No, you were the one who asked me......”
The man, grumbling in dissatisfaction, let out a resigned sigh and turned toward the entrance. Then, as though something had suddenly occurred to him, he stopped and held something out toward Varkas.
“I nearly forgot. This is what I came here to deliver.”
He narrowed his eyes as he looked down at the rolled parchment in the knight’s hand.
“What is it?”
“A telegram sent by His Highness the Crown Prince.”
He accepted the scroll with an expressionless face.
Written in a scribe’s characteristically neat handwriting was a rather direct proposal requesting his participation in the campaign to capture Blodar.
Varkas impassively skimmed through it, then stopped at the words written at the very end of the document.
[Remember the oath you made.]
After staring intently at the sentence, he held the letter over the candle flame. Then he jerked his chin toward Edrick Rubon, who was looking at him in surprise.
“If your business is finished, leave now.”
The man’s lips moved as though he wanted to say something, but he soon left the barracks.
Varkas loosened the collar of his uniform, which felt like a noose tightening around his neck.
The letters on the parchment, slowly curling above the candle flame, writhed like tiny insects.
After watching it for a long while, he dipped the quill, its tip now dried out, back into the inkwell.
There would probably be no need to wage a siege against Amasek. Once the Emperor proposed negotiations, the Northern Alliance would throw open its gates and welcome the imperial army.
Even so, to placate the whining Gareth, he would have to show at least enough sincerity to move his army.
At the end of the letter he was sending to his vassals, Varkas wrote that he intended to return before the end of this summer, then sealed it with wax.
By the time this reached Laedgo Castle, the course of the war would already have been decided. He intended to make certain of it, one way or another.
* * *
Pale light poured down upon a world faded to ash-gray. Toward him, standing alone at the entrance to a pure white garden, a woman with the pallor of a ghost extended a white hand through which her veins were visible.
“Why are you standing there without moving? Hurry and come here.”
He looked up at the black-haired woman standing with her back to the sunlight. No. Perhaps her hair was not black.
He had never once seen this woman’s true colors. Even within a world stained in black and white, he could only clearly perceive that she was a figure of unusually stark light and shadow.
With an affectionate smile on her lips, the woman gently urged him on.
“There’s no need to worry. It’s safe here.”
Her voice sounded as though she were soothing a frightened animal.
He slowly stepped into the garden. After following her for a while, a marble pavilion (gazebo) appeared among the neatly trimmed shrubs.
On the long bench beneath it, two small children sat pressed close together, staring at him with large eyes.
The woman wrapped both arms around the children’s shoulders and said proudly.
“Say hello. These are my children. I suppose that makes them your younger relatives.”
Varkas approached the pavilion and silently looked down at the young brother and sister. Both had dark-colored hair and large eyes, but the impressions they gave were completely different.
The boy looked furious about something, while the girl with her hair tied into two pigtails looked ready to burst into tears at any moment.
He examined the girl’s tearful face with a puzzled gaze. Then the child’s plump cheeks twitched, and she suddenly let out a shrill wail.
“Aila.”
The woman hurriedly lifted her daughter into her arms and patted her small back.
As he stared blankly at the sight, something sticky struck his body with a wet splat.
He turned his head. The boy, his face darkened with rage, was grabbing pieces of soggy cake from the table and hurling them wildly.
“I hate you! Get out!”
“Gareth! What do you think you’re doing!”
At the woman’s shout, the maids waiting on one side of the garden rushed over, surrounded the boy, and began trying to calm him.
Covered in sticky lumps of sugar, he waited for the chaos to settle.
At last, when the girl’s crying subsided, the woman handed the young Imperial Princess to a maid and approached him.
“I’m truly sorry, Varkas.”
Then she took out a handkerchief and wiped the sugar syrup and cream from his face. Her dark eyes glistened with tears directly before his nose.
“What am I going to do? I’ll make sure Gareth is properly scolded.”
“......I’m all right.”
The woman seemed excessively apologetic, so he parted the lips he had kept firmly closed.
Her eyes widened in surprise, then curved into narrow crescents.
He found her reaction strange. What was she so pleased about?
“You’ve finally started speaking. I was worried you might never be able to speak for the rest of your life.”
He frowned. He had merely kept his mouth shut because he had felt no need to speak. He had not imagined she thought he had become mute.
“Now, follow me. I’ll give you some new clothes.”
With a guileless smile that made it difficult to believe she was the Empress of the Empire, the woman took his hand and pulled him along.
With every step he took after her, he saw his once-small shadow gradually lengthen. His formerly light footsteps also grew heavier little by little.
Before he knew it, he was standing in front of the door to a spacious bedroom, dressed in a surcoat embroidered with the crest of the Imperial Knights.
After straightening his clothes, he lightly knocked on the door with the back of his hand. A familiar voice soon came from inside.
“Come in.”
When he pulled the handle, the cozy bedroom decorated with aged wooden furniture and carpets unfolded before his eyes.
His gaze, sweeping around the room as he walked, stopped by the window.
The woman who had been sitting before the terrace and staring blankly into the garden turned toward him, a sickly smile appearing on her lips.
“Thank you for coming.”
At that moment, he smelled death.
“I heard you tried to take your own life.”
At the accusatory words he spat out, the smile vanished from the woman’s face. He added harshly while looking directly at that bloodless face.
“Why did you do such a thing?”
“Why I did it...... I don’t know either.”
The woman murmured with a vacant expression.
“Everyone says I did...... but honestly, I don’t remember anything. When I came to my senses, I was lying on the bed.”
Her empty eyes turned back toward the window.
“Why did I do it? Did I hope that person would regret it after seeing me dying? Or did I want him to realize my worth only after it was too late?”
The woman, murmuring as though speaking about someone else, let out a hollow laugh.
“The maids surrounded me and wailed their hearts out...... yet even then, I was searching only for his face. How foolish, isn’t it?”
He gave no reply.
Reading condemnation in his silence, the woman’s face crumpled as though collapsing.
“You could never understand me. When I first rescued you from that place, I felt so terribly sorry for you. I wanted to heal you somehow, after you had become unable to feel anything.”
“.......”
“But now...... I envy you so much.”