Chapter 10 Interlude 'Why?'

—When she found the unopened bud in that garden, she stopped in her tracks before she knew it.

It was a garden in riotous bloom, flowers of every kind and color crowding together. She knew little, unfortunately, of the names or varieties of flowers, but she had heard that these were precious blooms, grown from seeds gathered from every corner of the kingdom and coaxed into sprouting and opening their buds. A flower garden this vast and this splendid must have given the gardener entrusted with its care ample opportunity to show his skill. The finished garden was the proof.

To be honest, when she first set foot in the garden, she had not expected much of its colorful beds. She had never had much of an eye for admiring flowers to begin with, and had shown little interest even in the garden at her family's home. Her understanding father had indulged her and let her come here, into the Royal Castle of the Royal Capital Lugunica, but she did not think so highly of herself as to imagine she could join a discussion among responsible adults. So, with nothing else for it, she had wandered out to the garden to pass the time until her father and the others finished their business, and there, quite unexpectedly, she had been captivated by that bud.

"..."

What her amber gaze rested on was a large bud, its head hanging low. She had been drawn to it, a bud keeping its faintly reddish petals closed and not yet in flower, because she saw herself in it, unripe and carrying a restlessness with nowhere to go—though she wondered if that thought was a little too poetic, too self-indulgent.

Still, it was true that among the flowers in full bloom, flaunting themselves as though they already knew every last corner of their own charm, she felt a kinship with the bud whose true nature had yet to unfold.

—What, she wondered, was she capable of, and what was wanted of her?

"I..."

She had the pride of one blessed in her birth, blessed in her lineage, blessed in her talents. And as one who had been given that birth, that lineage, those talents, she had something like a sense of duty as well: that she must answer them with achievements worthy of them. She was aware, too, that this pride and this sense of duty were fatally at odds with what she herself wished for.

"..."

She was, if anything, the one immature seed among all those planted in this garden that questioned the way it was meant to bloom, and so remained a bud. The other flowers, without question and without hesitation, knew their place, understood it, and fulfilled it. And yet she—

"...Just what kind of flower will you bloom into?"

She put the question to the bud, then held her breath in a silence that could never hold an answer. Wrapped in the sweet scent of the flowers, she could not come to an understanding even with the bud she had felt such fellowship with.

Because what this impertinent self of hers wished for was not to bloom into a large flower, beautiful and vivid, but to become a great tree, thick and sturdy, that would shelter those flowers from wind and rain to the very end. Yes, holding such an impossible wish, she seemed to herself a hollow, ridiculous thing—

"Hgwah?!"

—In that instant, with a thoroughly graceless yelp, something fell from above into the flowerbed where the buds swayed.

"—!"

Her eyes went wide at the suddenness of it, and she stood frozen, as if her feet had been sewn to the spot. In her blank, stalled mind there belatedly rang an alarm warning of danger, along with all the lessons and instructions on how to conduct herself should she ever meet such a situation. But before she could drag any of them out from the back of her mind, the person who had landed almost headfirst in the flowerbed in front of her sprang up, and

"Pfft! Bwah! Ptoo, ptoo! Wh-what is this, dirt? Is this dirt?!"

So saying, a boy tossing his beautiful golden hair and blinking his jewel-like red eyes, caked in dirt from head to toe, crawled pitifully out of the flowerbed. That was—

"Oh-ho, but of course, it is I... One would think falling headfirst onto the flagstones would be the end of it all, yet my innate heavenly fortune turns aside even such a crisis, it seems..."

—That was her first memory of the last "Lion King."

△▼△▼△▼△

"—Ah."

A hoarse breath escaped her, and her consciousness woke. Her five senses began to stir, and information of every kind poured into her brain, one piece after another. —In that instant, what pressed hardest upon her body and mind was a ferocious thirst she could not escape.

"..."

Thirst, and not merely the thirst of a dry throat. Not enough. Not enough. Not enough. Everywhere in her body, in every last place, there was not enough water. It craved moisture, starved for wetness. Her nose and throat, the passages for her breath, were parched; the walls of her stomach, there to take in food, were parched; her eyes were parched no matter how she blinked; the vessels that should have carried blood through her whole body were parched; and her soul, crying out at the lack, was parched.

Thirst. It was thirst. Thirst was eating away at her life.

"—Ah-eh, ah."

Her mouth was so dry that her numb tongue could not form a proper sound. Desperate to do something about this thirst, she tried to call for someone. No voice came. Moving on her own would be faster than calling. —No, she did not even have that much of a thought. Like a drowning person who clings to their rescuer and drags them under, her mind was parched and wiped blank.

Calling on her parched body from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes, she scraped together what little strength was left anywhere in it and tried, somehow, to sit up. She sat up. She tried to stand. She stood. She tried to walk. She walked. She tried to search. She searched.

"—Uh."

Desperate. She was desperate. With a mind ruled by thirst, she warned herself that this was her last chance. If her feet stopped, if she carelessly fell, if even one thing went wrong, she would never manage this again. She would not be able to search. Not able to walk. Not able to stand. Not able to sit up. She would sink into this boundless thirst, and never, never, never—

"—"

With all the strength her frail body had, she managed to push open the heavy door and stepped outside. Cursing the thirst of a body that seemed ready to lose even to the faint breeze slipping through, she cast her eyes around. Her vision was murky and hard to see through. Narrow. She soon realized it was because one eye was covered. But before she could do anything about her sight, the breeze carried a faint, sweet scent to her.

Drawn by it, she turned her head and found it—a vase holding yellow and pink flowers.

"—!"

There was no time even to think. She flung herself at the vase, all but falling onto it. She tore out the arranged flowers as if plucking weeds and tipped the vase she held in both arms. Then she drank the water meant for the flowers, pouring it over herself as she drank, drank, drank. The spilled water ran from the corners of her mouth and down her cheeks, wet her neck, and soaked into her black nightclothes. She didn't care. Coughing, she flung the vase away, and the sound of shattering pottery rang out.

"Hack, hack..."

She wiped her mouth roughly with the back of her hand and turned. Vases, placed at even intervals along the corridor. On legs with a little more strength in them than before, she went to one, threw out the flowers, gulped down the water. Threw away the vase. On to the next. Twice, three times she repeated it, drenching her parched body, reclaiming her own existence from the thirst, and on to the next vase—

"—You mustn't!"

A sharp voice called out as someone seized her wrist, and she turned. Holding her wrist was an old white-haired butler, eyes wide and fixed on her as he held her back. Before she could drag the memory of who he was out from beneath the thirst, a thick, sludgy fury welled over.

"Unhand me!"

With her right arm held, she swung her free left hand and struck him with all her might. She held nothing back, quite literally. It was a blow meant to shatter bone or tear flesh, yet the old butler turned it aside lightly with his own free hand, and neither of them came away hurt. Her condition, his skill, his experience: she could see every reason lying between them. —But she couldn't stop.

"Let go! Let go! Let me go...!"

A strike with every word, and with every swing she remembered how to swing, and the blows grew sharper. But however sharp the fingertips cutting through the air, the old butler blocked them with ease. Gradually, the chill of the thirst, closing in on her again little by little, seemed to crawl up from her feet.

"Please, just let me go! I'm, thirsty... so thirsty... thirsty, thirsty, thirsty thirsty thirsty, I can't stand it...!"

"Please calm yourself. I will bring you water at once. And you must not walk about barefoot. Your wounds need tending as well."

"Water... re, really? There's water...?"

"There is. Right away. But before that, let us tend to your wounds."

At the old butler's pleas, the force of her desperate struggling weakened little by little. The thirst was still there. A thirst only slightly better than it had been right after she woke. If there was water to ease it, she would be happy. Saved. Grateful.

"Tend to..."

As the strength slowly drained from her body, that out-of-place word made her glance down. Looking, she saw red marks scattered across the carpet laid along the corridor, at the old butler's feet and her own. They began partway down the corridor and ended at the soles of her feet. —Blood. She hadn't noticed, but it seemed she had stepped on shards of the broken vases and smeared the corridor with blood. It wasn't only shards she had trampled, but the flowers she had flung from the vases too. The petals, crushed and scattered underfoot, had mingled with the spilled blood to form a terribly filthy mottled pattern.

A terribly, filthy, mottled pattern. —In that instant, a sinister pattern of black mottling flashed through her mind.

"—Ah, ahh, aaaaah!!"

A scream tore from her thin throat, and she writhed. Perhaps, with her having almost calmed down, he had let his guard slip. At her reaction the old butler's grip came loose, and she flailed her freed arms, ripped open her wet nightclothes, and looked at her body. Wound bandages, and haggard, pallid skin drained of color—and in the places those bandages hid, across her whole body, hideous black markings spread, venomously cursing this body.

"No, Ferris! Ferris!! Where?! Where are you?!"

Her very body seemed hopelessly defiled, and a scream escaped her. She didn't want to tear the bandages away and see what lay beneath. The ugly black markings hidden under the bandages: she didn't want them on her for one second longer.

She didn't want to see it. Didn't want to touch it. Didn't want to be near it. Didn't want to be defiled.

She would rather just di—

"—Lady Crusch!"

That body, which should have been ugly and repulsive, was caught from behind in a pair of slender arms. It wasn't a restraining hold. Whoever it was hadn't tried to stop her with some trained grappling technique. They had simply, forcefully, on impulse, wrapped their arms around her from behind and held her tight. She could have shaken them off if she'd wanted to. But not even a sliver of that desire came to her.

She simply let herself go, her body wrapped in a faint blue light that welled up softly around her.

"It's all right, I'm here. I'm right here at your side, Lady Crusch, I promise..."

"Fe...rris..."

"Yes, yes! That's right. It's Ferris."

The arms around her squeezed tighter, yet she felt no pain and no fear. Before she knew it she had crumpled where she stood and was sitting limply on the floor. Naturally, the one holding her, Ferris, had sunk down onto the corridor with her. When she tilted her head slightly, his lovely face was right there, close enough to feel his breath. His round eyes trembled with tears, and the way he fought so hard to keep his expression from breaking was brave and endearing. The rejection of everything that had filled her whole body slipped away of its own accord.

"...But I'm scared. I'm still scared. My body... it's still covered in those black blotches, even now."

"Lady Crusch, as for that, it's already been—"

"—Old Man Wil."

Ferris cut off the old butler with that name just as he was about to say something. Meeting Ferris's gaze, Wilhelm... yes, Wilhelm. That was Wilhelm. The old butler was Wilhelm, the "Sword Demon," a peerless swordsman, someone she could rely on.

Wilhelm in front of her, Ferris behind her, and her caught between them.

"I..."

"Please listen, Lady Crusch. There's nothing to worry about with your body. —Excuse me."

"—Ah."

Holding her violently shaking body and soothing her as her eyes wandered, Ferris's hands slowly began to unwind the bandages wrapped around her. She held her breath at that gentle yet frightening touch, and could do nothing but watch as the bandages came loose little by little. Her own hands had torn the nightclothes from her neck down to her chest, and through the frayed gap her skin was laid bare, and the markings she had dreaded weren't there. Her eyes went wide.

"What..."

"It's not just there. Your arms, your shoulders, your legs... The affliction has been removed."

As he spoke, Ferris unwound the bandages at her shoulder as well, and she raised her arm in a daze. It looked dry and rough, but every trace of those black, mottled markings was gone. Only then did she finally realize: the agony, that searing, scalding torment like boiling water poured through her whole body, had ended at some point.

The thirst had been real. Even now some of it lingered. But that had been the thirst of a body freed from that agony, craving life.

"Ferris... Did you take that curse away? From my body..."

"—"

With room in her heart at last to look at herself, she finally arrived at that thought. Through every morning, every night, every day that the unending torment had eaten away at her, Ferris had stayed by her side, bravely, desperately pouring everything he had into healing it. And now that hope had borne fruit, and he had rescued her from that prison of suffering—

"—No. That's not it. I couldn't do anything."

But that question, that hope, was denied by none other than Ferris himself. He shook his head, his yellow eyes clouded with disappointment, with deep disappointment and dejection in himself, and as she caught her breath, he gently touched her arm where the markings had vanished, his lips trembling several times.

He hesitated over what he had to say, made up his mind, hesitated again, over and over, until at last he steeled himself, and Ferris said it. It was—

"To heal your body, Lady Crusch, I asked the 'Church of the Divine Dragon' for help."

"...What?"

"A girl from the Church who calls herself the 'Saint' lent us her power. I couldn't save you, Lady Crusch. ...I'm so, so sorry."

His wavering eyes brimming with tears, his voice shaking, Ferris left her speechless. Slowly, her mind, freed from the pain and gradually released from that ferocious thirst, began to understand what his words meant.

The Church of the Divine Dragon was an organization that worshipped, deeply and devoutly, the Divine Dragon that had guarded the Kingdom of Lugunica since ancient times, both its existence and its grace, and devoted itself to preserving the peace and tranquility of the kingdom's people. To keep its activities from gaining too much influence, the Church was said to forbid itself any involvement in affairs of state. That principle was admirable, and she could nod along to its reasoning. Even so, theirs was not a relationship in which she could readily accept it, because the being the Church of the Divine Dragon revered above all else and the way she and hers had chosen to stand were utterly irreconcilable.

"—The dragon..."

The Church of the Divine Dragon upheld the Covenant between the kingdom and the Divine Dragon, and gave thanks for it. That meant holding the preservation of the Covenant above every other concern of the kingdom's prosperity. It was the same thinking by which the kingdom had treated the members of the royal family, lost to a disease beyond all mercy, as cogs for the sake of the Covenant.

—The same values that had swallowed the death of Fourier Lugunica as nothing more than an event.

"—!"

A shapeless feeling came crawling up through her and stabbed at her chest until she felt sick. The thoughts, images and emotions rising in her mind all assailed her five senses at random: light struck her hearing, smell her sight, pain her taste, voices her touch, flavor her smell, things that were never meant to connect swarming her and battering her senseless.

—Why had that name come to her? —Why had that smile surfaced? —Why could she hear that voice of his? —Why could she feel that face from her memories? —Why did she remember the taste of the blood and tears she had shed grieving that death?

—Why had Crusch Karsten been able to remember Fourier Lugunica?

"—Ah."

Something was coming back to her. Loss and duty, tenderness and sorrow, anger and joy, warmth and cold. The good memories and the painful attachments to the man now forever beyond her reach mixed together and melted into one another.

Only, there was, fatally, one thing, she, understood.

"—The Royal Selection."

At the sound that spilled from her trembling lips, Ferris's shoulders jerked hard, and she could tell that Wilhelm, whose face she couldn't see, had gone rigid as well.

They could not stand alongside the Church of the Divine Dragon. Never. They could not walk in step with it, could not look upon the same things together: they themselves had chosen that, decided it, and declared it. And yet, if she had been saved by the one party whose help they must never accept...

"Ferris—"

"—Yes."

When she called his name, Ferris's voice did not shake. He gave a short nod, his gaze straight on her, his expression stiff, but he did not look away. Whatever she said to him, he had made his choice already prepared for it. That was what his yellow eyes were telling her.

"..."

She had to say it. She knew the reason. Why he had been forced to make that choice.

She knew it had been done to save none other than her. How many days of anguish had he spent at her side while she was eaten away, morning and night, day after day? How keenly had he felt the powerlessness of his healing hands, unable to save the one he wanted to save? She had seen it up close, closer than anyone.

So she had to say it.

"I'm sorry I made you worry. I understand how you feel."

"..."

So she had to say it.

"I forced a painful decision on you. But the responsibility for it is mine."

"..."

So she had to say it.

"Please don't grieve. It's thanks to you that I'm still here like this."

"..."

She had to say it. She had to say it. She had to say it. She had to say it. She had to say it. She had to say it. She had to say it. She had to say it she had to say it she had to say it she had to say it she had to say it she had to say it she had to say it she had to say it she had to say it say it say it say it say it say it say it say it say it say it say it say it—

"—Why?"

It tumbled out of her, spilled over. That. And in its warmth, in its very texture, it was nothing like the words she had told herself she had to say.

"You knew this. Surely you did."

Stop, stop right now. Close your mouth, shut your eyes, blot out your mind. Everything in front of you, everything that happened, the choice that was made: don't look, forget it, turn your back on all of it.

"Ferris, you of all people were supposed to be the same as me."

She must not say it. She must not let him hear it. He must not know. Because he had tried to save her. Because he had offered up his prayers. Because all he had wanted was to take away the suffering of someone he loved.

So she must not say it.

"—Why?"

She mustn't.

"Why did you betray the oath we swore to Prince Fourier?"

—That she would sooner have died than betray him.