Chapter 9: Crybaby

—Felix Argyle.

Subaru knew that was the real name of the person standing in front of him. He'd heard it secondhand before, and more to the point, the man himself had just introduced himself by it. Subaru had even thought once that it had a manly ring, at odds with its owner's dainty looks. Yet now, faced with him actually giving that name, Subaru couldn't make the fact and what he was seeing line up.

That was how completely his way of living had been built on the image of the nickname "Ferris."

"Dismissed as a knight...? You mean..."

"I mean I quit. Well, it can't be helped, you know~. The Church of the Divine Dragon could save Lady Crusch... From the moment I decided to take their hand, I was ready for this. —Ah, and don't you go feeling responsible, Lady Emilia, 'kay?"

"Ferris..."

"When you came by that time, it was really reassuring. Besides me and Old Man Wil and the rest of Lady Crusch's allies, there were people who were happy she was safe, and it let me think, oh, so what I did wasn't wrong after all."

Folding down the cat ears on top of his head, Ferris gave that answer with a soft, drooping look in his eyes. Emilia, who had stopped halfway in rushing over to him, kept lifting her hands and lowering them again, as if she couldn't work out what to say. Bewilderment and confusion: Emilia's reaction was the right one. —But looking at Ferris, his arms in the sleeves of a tailcoat, breezily claiming he'd quit being a knight, Subaru's answer was different.

"Hold it! Subaru-kun, where do you think you're going?"

"—Ngh, where do you think? To Crusch. This is way too far."

Grinding his teeth, called back just as he turned on his heel, Subaru raised his low voice. He could guess what had happened. The Dragon's Blood eating away at Crusch's body: to take that agony away, they had borrowed the Church of the Divine Dragon's hand, and as a result, Crusch's Faction's standing in the Royal Selection had become shaky. And that had been Ferris's decision, made in Crusch's place while her mind was clouded.

Ferris's call had saved Crusch, but it had made winning the Royal Selection a hard fight. It must have been a decision Crusch, with her strong reasons for wanting to become king, would never have chosen.

"But you did all of it for Crusch's sake, didn't you? And she fires you for it... That's wrong!"

"Subaru!"

Beatrice cried out as Subaru, unable to hold in his anger, shook loose the hand she'd been holding. But Subaru didn't stop. He meant to run straight back to Karsten Manor and get in Crusch's face if that was what it took to make her take back what she'd done to Ferris. But his very first step was blocked by someone who stood in his way with her arms spread wide: Rem.

"Rem, don't stop me. I don't want you guys watching me go off yelling like a total emotional mess."

"If you're aware you'll get excessively emotional, then stop right there. Besides, before you go rampaging like that, why not take a proper look at the other person's face?"

"The other person's... face?"

Rem, having cut off Subaru's impulsive charge before it started, nodded and jerked her chin. Turning as she indicated, Subaru took in Emilia and Beatrice watching him anxiously, and beyond them, at the mausoleum's entrance, Ferris looking down at him. That Ferris, the very fuel of Subaru's anger, wore an exasperated look at his outburst, and turned his eyes to Rem first.

"Thanks, Rem-chan... This is the first time I've seen you up and walking around, but you're a way nicer girl than I expected, huh~. Is it just your taste in boys that's off?"

"...I've heard you looked after me too while I was asleep, Ferris. Since you're my benefactor, I'll keep my answer restrained... but that is a terrible misunderstanding."

"Kay. If that's how you see it, Rem-chan, fine by me. Still, I'm glad you woke up~."

Rem and Ferris traded those words over the head of Subaru, stuck in between them. Hearing that, Rem pursed her lips with a complicated expression, and Ferris switched gears with an "Anyway." Narrowing his eyes as he looked down at Subaru, he said,

"You know, Subaru-kun, you're seriously arrogant~."

"Arro—!"

"I don't think it's quite the same thing as selfish, so I'm actually choosing my words here, okay? It's not like you do everything for yourself. You do it for someone else, but it spins its wheels like crazy, or it's butting in where nobody asked, or something."

"Hey, putting it like that..."

"—And so, if Subaru-kun's arrogant, I figured I'm probably arrogant too, you know~."

In that instant, seeing his smile, Subaru felt as though he'd been doused with cold water.

"—"

Subaru caught his breath and stared back at Ferris, who had just run himself down every bit as hard as he'd railed at Subaru. Ever since Ferris had noticed them at the mausoleum, his manner hadn't shifted once: elusive, or rather, far too composed, as far as Subaru could tell. A hushed, windless sea, you might call it. —But that couldn't be right. Given everything that had happened to Ferris, he should be caught in the middle of a raging storm, nowhere near a calm sea.

Subaru narrowed his eyes, searching Ferris's face for some sign of that storm. Ferris, though, didn't seem inclined to play along. He shut one eye in a wink, then let out a small "Oh," and said,

"I know. If you'd like, why don't you and the others pay your respects too, Lady Emilia?"

"Pay our respects... You mean in the mausoleum behind you? We're allowed in?"

"Yep, I've got the key from the caretaker, all nice and proper, and besides, I'm qualified as a proxy mourner, so I come here pretty often."

"Proxy mourner...?"

"Wow, Subaru-kun, you really don't know anything, do you? Keep that up while you're playing First Knight and you'll embarrass Lady Emilia, you know~"

Ferris gave a little laugh and stuck out his tongue, and Subaru shut his mouth. It wasn't so much being called ignorant. Hearing the words "First Knight" come out of Ferris's mouth felt like stepping onto extremely delicate ground, given the situation. Of course, judging by the mischief in his eyes, Ferris had brought it up on purpose.

Keeping Subaru and the others off balance like that, Ferris laid a gentle hand on the half-closed door of the mausoleum he had just stepped out of.

"Let's catch up on everything inside. —I was just thinking His Highness might be getting lonely with only me visiting."

△▼△▼△▼△

Even within the Royal Cemetery, the mausoleum's presence set it plainly apart from everything around it. Built from white marble handpicked from every corner of the kingdom, with dragon motifs, the emblem of the Dragon Kingdom, worked into it throughout, the building had a stature that overwhelmed anyone who so much as laid eyes on it. Its outer walls caught the sunlight and gleamed with a sacred radiance that seemed to bar the way to anything wicked, and the dragon carving that spanned the closed doors as a single image seemed to stand unending guard over the dignity of the royal dead.

Step inside, and the tombs of the sleeping royals lay at intervals along the white corridor that stretched ahead. The stone coffins, arranged in orderly rows, were each adorned with carvings and ornaments befitting the royal within, so that simply looking at them seemed to call up the dead as they had been in life. The tomb they had come for, the Fourth Prince's, gave that impression more strongly than any other.

"This is His Highness's... Prince Fourier Lugunica's grave."

Ferris, who had led them across the polished floor with his heels clicking, came to a stop and gestured toward a tomb that stood out from all the rest: the stone coffin of Fourier Lugunica. Within the mausoleum, kept by a stern and hushed order, that rule faltered just slightly here. After all, for a place where the dead lay sleeping, the Fourth Prince's tomb was far too colorful.

"Are these offerings? Letters and knitting, and little carved wooden animals..."

"None of it really looks like offerings for royalty, does it? Then again, the ones who asked me to bring these were mostly folks who've never had much to do with upper-class manners and all that, so it can't be helped."

"Never had much to do with... Wait, you mean these are gifts from ordinary citizens? Don't things like that get inspected or confiscated on the way in?"

"Of course, if it were some kind of prank, they'd never let it through. But I make sure it isn't when I accept them as the proxy mourner."

Crouching in front of the coffin as he answered, Ferris narrowed his eyes at the assortment of objects laid out there. Those offerings had surely been prepared by people who had adored the Fourth Prince sleeping here, whatever their station, each with their own feelings poured into it. A proxy mourner was someone granted, by special exception and with the cemetery caretaker's permission, the right to bring in offerings like these on behalf of those who could not visit in person. As the Fourth Prince's proxy mourner, Ferris had been entrusted with all those people's feelings.

"To begin with, the Royal Family of Lugunica were all good-natured, or, well, a lot of them were kind and really good at getting people to spoil them, but Prince Fourier was exceptionally cheerful and just so much fun. And he was always sneaking out of the castle to go mix in and play with the people of the Royal Capital, you know."

"...Wow. That's a classic in manga and stuff. But if somebody actually pulled that, it'd turn into a huge problem, right?"

"Well, yeah, it did. They'd send the Royal Guard Knights out searching for the missing prince, things like that. And then it turned out His Highness had joined a soup kitchen in the slums, and since it just so happened to be a Church of the Divine Dragon soup kitchen, the castle and the Church nearly ended up at odds. Total uproar."

"That's a hard one to laugh off as a joke right now, in fact."

Over Ferris's hunched back, Subaru looked at the grave of Fourier, a man so many people had loved. Ferris's reminiscences, laced with smiles, overflowed with an affection for their subject that made no attempt to hide itself, and even from those scraps of anecdote Subaru could tell that Fourier had been the kind of person everyone loved.

"...Did I ever mention His Highness to you before, Subaru-kun? Just in passing?"

"...Yeah. That there was someone like that, and he was close with you and Crusch. Didn't you also say he and I were kind of alike?"

"Huh? Why would His Highness be anything like Subaru-kun? I'll kill you, you know?"

"Pretty sure you said the exact same thing that time too!!"

Ferris's voice had taken on a seriousness that didn't sound much like a joke, so Subaru hurried to defend himself. In truth, that was about all he had ever been told about Fourier. Of course, even someone as slow on the uptake as Subaru could tell that the man's death had something to do with why Crusch had resolved to enter the Royal Selection.

"Then did Crusch enter the Royal Selection for Prince Fourier's sake?"

"...That's Lady Emilia for you. You go straight for the hard questions, don't you~"

"Oh, I'm sorry. But you invited us to visit the grave because you wanted to tell us about that, didn't you, Ferris? I was thinking I'd hear it first, and then decide what I should do next."

"What you should do next? Meaning?"

"Mm. Subaru stole my thunder earlier, but I'm going to go ask Crusch to reconsider too. Subaru and I will talk to her together, really hard. What do you think?"

"Sounds like a great idea... Ow, ow, ow!"

"Don't just blurt things out on impulse. Where do you think we are?"

The moment he backed Emilia's plan, Rem pinched his side, and Subaru writhed. Ferris gave a wry smile at the sight of them and got to his feet.

"Like I said before, I'd really rather you didn't go to Lady Crusch and tell her this and that. I went into this ready for it to end up this way from the start."

"But...!"

"I've already made my peace with it. I said I was dismissed, but I was the one who told her I wasn't fit to be at her side anymore. Besides..."

Ferris raised a finger to his lips and broke off, letting a beat pass, then used that same finger to point first at Emilia, then at Subaru.

"Lady Emilia, what would you do if somebody else, me, or the 'Council of Sages', or honestly whoever, told you to reconsider being Subaru-kun's master?"

"Huh? I thought really, really hard before I decided things with Subaru. So if anyone said that to me, I'd feel sooo frustrated, and I'd think, who do you think you are... Oh."

"Exactly. That's what you're trying to do right now, Lady Emilia."

Big, unwanted meddling from an outsider. With Ferris spelling it out that plainly, Emilia visibly deflated, her shoulders drooping. Faced with that reaction, Subaru couldn't take much joy in hearing Emilia say she wouldn't let anyone interfere in her relationship with him. More than anything, the argument had worked not only on Emilia but on Subaru as well.

Ferris, who surely knew that, shrugged at Subaru too, over the dejected Emilia's head.

"As for your question earlier, Lady Crusch isn't someone with such narrow vision. So Prince Fourier was one part of why she entered the Royal Selection."

"...But not a part small enough to ignore, right?"

"Oh my, aren't you good at twisting people's words. You've gotten so unlovable, Subaru-kun."

All the same, he didn't seem stung by it, and went on.

"I won't deny it. His Highness's death was a really huge thing for Lady Crusch... and for me too. It hurt us deeply, and I cried what felt like a whole lifetime's worth of tears. Well, I'm a crybaby, so I've done plenty more crying since then."

"..."

"Lady Crusch never let it show, but she was hurt, over and over, and she suffered. —But what hurt Lady Crusch the most came after His Highness died."

"Huh...?"

"His Highness and the rest of the royal family passed away one after another, and everything was thrown into chaos. As Duchess Karsten, Lady Crusch attended the councils at the castle as one of the Upper Nobles... and that's where she realized it. Everyone at those councils was tearing their hair out over the covenant with the Divine Dragon possibly being broken, more than over His Highness and the others being dead."

He spoke quietly, taking care to keep as much feeling out of it as he could. But that very effort threw the grotesqueness of what he was describing into sharper relief. How warm the people of the Royal Family of Lugunica had been, how dearly they had been loved, anyone could see just by looking around this mausoleum: not only Fourier Lugunica's, but every grave marker here bore offerings from someone praying for the peace of the dead.

Even the deaths of people loved that much were taken lightly when set beside the covenant with the Dragon.

"So that was why."

It slipped out like a breath, Emilia's murmur, as she arrived at the same understanding Subaru had. She laid a hand on her chest, her violet eyes narrowing in pain.

"That's why Crusch decided that when she became king, she had to make the country stronger, so it wouldn't lean on its covenant with the Dragon for everything."

"—That isn't the whole of it, but yes, pretty much."

"Not the whole of it, meaning..."

"She hated it so much, Lady Crusch did. ...The idea that if she hadn't been close to Prince Fourier, she'd probably have thought exactly the same way as everyone else."

No one could know that without actually living it, and since it could never actually happen, it was no reason for Crusch to blame herself. However you looked at it, Crusch had met Fourier and come to think the way she did. Hating a self who had never met him, a self who didn't exist, would only hurt.

Even as he thought that, though, Subaru realised that Crusch's situation was about more than simply having made a choice that contradicted her platform in the Royal Selection.

Crusch, who had declared she would end the covenant with the Dragon, had been saved by the power of a sacrament from the Church of the Divine Dragon, the very people who worshipped the Dragon. —And that wasn't all.

"Crusch swore she'd bring back a world where the Royal Family of Lugunica... where Prince Fourier would be mourned from the heart, and she was working to make that happen, and now she can't."

"...And on top of that, the Church of the Divine Dragon never saved His Highness. But Lady Crusch, they saved."

"—!"

Those hoarse words of Ferris's were what truly crushed them. Until a moment ago, Subaru had been fully set on going to tell Crusch that dismissing Ferris as her knight was too much, even allowing for the poor state she was in, body and mind. Now that he knew the resolve and determination she had carried, the ideals and vows she had held high, had been shattered in the worst way imaginable, what could Subaru possibly say to her?

If only Subaru had offered up an arm, a leg, whatever it took, and taken Crusch's curse on himself—

"See, this is why I keep saying you're arrogant, Subaru-kun."

"Wha..."

"Anybody could tell, just looking at your face. No wonder Beatrice can't let go of your hand. And okay, maybe it'd be a teeny bit better, but it wouldn't fix anything. You know that, right?"

Head tilted, Ferris spoke as though talking sense into a child, rebuking the shallowness of Subaru's idea without letting it turn emotional. Subaru knew. What he'd been thinking was pie in the sky, and just as Ferris said, it was pointless. Even if her saviour changed from the Church of the Divine Dragon to Natsuki Subaru, Emilia's knight, Crusch still couldn't escape the black mark of having relied on a rival faction to solve her own problem. And in a Royal Selection already past its midpoint, that was far too heavy a price.

"Pushing your own problems off on someone else to solve... that's failing before you even get to being king, huh..."

"—. Ooh, harsh. But yep, that's about it."

"...I'm just repeating what I was told."

And what he was repeating had come from none other than Crusch herself. Back when the Witch Cult had targeted Emilia, when Subaru had gone to Crusch begging for help with nothing to bargain with, Crusch had cut his ugly plea down with gallant finality. That had been a lesson Subaru needed to learn. So he held no grudge against her for it. He held no grudge, and yet to watch it flip around onto her like this was too cruel an irony.

"Hey, Ferris, I don't know if this is okay to ask, but..."

With Subaru staring at the floor, unable to find words, Emilia spoke to Ferris in his place. She stepped up beside Ferris to stand before Fourier Lugunica's gravestone, looked at the many offerings laid there, then clasped the magic crystal at her chest and closed her eyes. Behind her, Subaru saw, Beatrice and Rem had lined up and were each offering their own prayers for the dead. When she had finished, Emilia looked at the most vivid bouquet of all, the one Ferris had crouched to straighten, which he had surely brought himself, and asked.

"Were Crusch and Prince Fourier in love?"

"—"

At that question, Ferris's eyes widened faintly, and then he gave a small laugh. And then—

"That's not something I could say, now is it? —It'd be far too tactless."

△▼△▼△▼△

The mausoleum doors shut with a heavy sound, and Subaru found himself meeting the eyes of the dragon carved across the double doors as a single picture. He could tell it was probably modelled on the Divine Dragon Volcanica, the same one engraved on the coins, but now that he had heard the sad love story surrounding Crusch and Prince Fourier, his feelings toward that Divine Dragon had grown even more complicated than before.

"I ran into the real thing up on the Tower, too, but with that empty head of his, all this about covenants with the kingdom and being worshipped by the Church of the Divine Dragon just isn't very convincing..."

"Maybe it's the type that snaps to attention when it's needed, I suppose. The rest of the time it runs in energy-saving mode, like Otto when he's got no work, in fact."

"Even for Otto with no work, calling him empty-headed is going too far. ...Wait, the comparison's the Divine Dragon, so would someone from this kingdom take that as an honour?"

Following Beatrice's theory, Subaru tried running a simulation of his mental Otto in the role of the Divine Dragon, but Otto with no work was an idiot giddy with the freedom of having finished his work, so he didn't get much useful input out of him. Easy on the drinking, Otto. Anyway—

"Ferris, what are you going to do after this?"

"After this?"

"Yes. Because you can't go back to Crusch's right now... it'd be hard to, wouldn't it? You've always lived at the same mansion, I'd think, so do you have somewhere to go?"

Emilia asked him this on the way to return the mausoleum key to the cemetery's caretaker, and Ferris, his brows drawn into a troubled look, scratched his cheek with a finger, unsure how to answer. Judging by that reaction, Emilia had hit him right where it hurt. Wilhelm telling Subaru and the others where to find Ferris must have been an agonising decision too, made out of worry for what would become of him.

Whatever the circumstances, Crusch and Ferris had dissolved their bond as liege and knight. In that situation, Wilhelm, as Crusch's retainer, couldn't act against his mistress's wishes. Having someone he trusted check on how Ferris fared afterward was the most consideration Wilhelm could show there and then. And if they meant to answer that consideration as fully as they could—

"What Emilia-tan's saying is, why not come stay with us for now? Just for a while."

"Yes, exactly! What do you think? Of course, I don't mean forever. It'd be sad to say goodbye like this, and I think some things just need time. Even I needed about a hundred years to accept that I'd frozen everyone from my home."

"That seems a bit too patient, even so."

"For the record, it took Betty four hundred years to accept Subaru's love, I suppose."

"That seems a bit too pitiful, even for this man."

Thanks to the misleading remarks out of the long-lived pair, Emilia and Beatrice, Rem had started looking at Subaru with something close to pity. He'd clear up that misunderstanding properly later. At the very least, the offer to Ferris was meant in earnest. But Ferris, hearing it, put a hand to his forehead with a sheepish "Ahh, jeez,"

"I kinda had a feeling you'd say that, and you actually did. I mean, I get it, I'm such a capable, top-notch healer that of course everyone's fighting over me~"

"Mm, I'm not saying it as a joke..."

"Yes, yes, of course, I know you're always serious, Lady Emilia. And I'm happy you'd invite me like this. Really, you know?"

"...But when you answer like that..."

"—Right. It's a lovely invitation, but I can't say yes."

Shaking his head slowly, Ferris gave a wry smile and turned down Emilia's offer. Subaru badly wanted to keep pushing, but he understood why Ferris couldn't agree. Because—

"Even if we're apart, Lady Crusch still matters to me, you know. Even if my decision is what made the Royal Selection hopeless, I can't just cut my ties like that and start cheering for someone other than Lady Crusch."

"Y-you can hate me, that's fine. As long as you don't go wandering off somewhere, and you let us know you're really okay..."

"I'd never hate you. —Oh, that's a lie. Actually, I do hate you. Lady Emilia, I've hated you from the very start, always and always and alwaaays."

"What?! You do?!"

Emilia, who had pressed so hard she'd even offered a bargain so unlike her, was crushed. Nodding a "Yep" to her, Ferris pointed the mausoleum key at Subaru and the others,

"Not just Lady Emilia. I hated all the Royal Selection candidates except Lady Crusch, and their knights too. I hate Beatrice, and I hate Rem-chan even though we've practically only just met. And Subaru-kun I really hate."

"The way you say that, it sounds like I'm the only one you hate for real..."

"What makes you think I don't hate you for real?"

Faced with that comeback, Subaru was shut down with nothing to say.

"...You really won't change your mind?"

Even Emilia could tell that Ferris's "hate" wasn't sincere. That Ferris had used likes and dislikes as an excuse to turn down her offer. And that no matter what anyone said to him, no matter how he was treated, his support for Crusch would not waver.

"Don't worry about me so much. The Royal Guard Knights... I don't know if I'll stay on, so I'll talk it over with the captain, but clinics or wherever, I've got offers coming in from all over, you know~"

"...You're not gonna do anything desperate, right?"

"Desperate? You mean, like, despair of the world and end it all...? Me? The person who hates people dying more than anyone else in this world?"

"...Sorry."

For once there was no hint of a joke in it, and at Ferris's flat declaration, Subaru apologized. Even if he left Crusch's side, Ferris would never do anything that bent his nature as a "Blue" and a healer. Subaru would believe that.

"Ahh, but still! This sucks! I can't go say anything to Crusch, and if Ferris won't even let us take him in for a while, there's nothing I can do...!"

"Isn't that exactly the arrogance Ferris was scolding you for?"

"Oh, yes, yes, just like Rem-chan says."

"But, Rem..."

"...No matter what, there are problems only the people involved can solve."

They were watching a tragedy of two people missing each other, and they had no right to set it straight. When Subaru voiced that frustration, Rem lowered her eyes and let out a small sigh.

"The same way outsiders have no say in the master-and-servant relationship between you and Emilia, or the contract between you and Beatrice. Between you and me..."

"Rem?"

"...What relationship is there between you and me, anyway? What exactly are you to me?"

"Don't just snap back to your senses like that! Me, you, important!"

"Same for us! Us, Rem, so, so important!"

"...Thank you, Emilia."

"What about me!?"

Brushed aside as though he didn't exist at all, Subaru's voice cracked, and Rem demurely ignored him. With that exchange playing out behind her, Beatrice called out "Hey, you" to Ferris. Still pinching the hem of Subaru's clothes between her fingers, she said,

"Betty isn't as worried about your future as Subaru and the others are, in fact. But Betty owes you an enormous debt, I suppose."

"Lady Beatrice-chan owes me? Since when do I have anything owed to me by a Great Spirit?"

"You saved Subaru when his Gate was about to break from all his reckless stunts. Unfortunately, Subaru ignored your warning and broke his Gate anyway, but you bought him time, I suppose. Without your power, Betty and Subaru's contract would never have happened, in fact."

"Um, that makes me happier than I expected."

"Savor it all you like, I suppose. And Betty is the type who always repays her debts. So if anything happens to you, Betty will lend you her strength anytime, in fact."

"Even if Subaru-kun is about to fall off a cliff?"

"Betty will pick Subaru up first, then come running as fast as she can, in fact."

Hands on her hips, Beatrice gave a proud little snort. At her answer, Ferris's eyes widened slightly, and he put a hand to his mouth and laughed, "Ahah." The urge to laugh grew stronger, until at last tears welled at the corners of his eyes.

"Aah, no fair. Don't make me cry, Lady Beatrice-chan."

"Just like you said yourself, you're a crybaby, I suppose."

At Beatrice's words, Ferris's laughter bubbled up again in small bursts.

△▼△▼△▼△

"If you change your mind, come visit anytime, okay? I'll tell everyone so somebody's always there to greet you! It's a promise, okay? Can Ferris keep promises?"

"I'm catching stray fire here!"

"Deservedly."

And so, right up until the moment they parted, Emilia and the others did their very best to invite him. He knew perfectly well there was no malice or scheme behind it, and every refusal clouded Emilia's face a little more, which piled on the guilt, but it couldn't be helped.

"It's not like I have anything against Lady Emilia and the others, you know."

Even if he had given up the right himself, Ferris had been Crusch's knight. Someone like that could not take shelter from the rain under the umbrella of any royal candidate other than Crusch, not even for a little while. If word got out, it would only start unkind rumours about Crusch, and more than anything, he was afraid of what Crusch would think of him.

"...In that respect, you were amazing, Your Highness. Weren't you ever scared or anything?"

In the mausoleum, before the gravestone and the sarcophagus, he had meant to confess for as long as time allowed. Even so, only a moment had to pass before new regrets welled up, more things he wanted heard. Moping, moping, round and round: he had changed into men's clothes, and still the weakness at his roots wouldn't peel away one bit. Honestly, he was sick of himself. If there was one thing someone like him could claim to have judged rightly—

"I'm glad I was the one who said it."

As he had told Emilia and the others, the dismissal had been Ferris's own idea. From the moment the Church of the Divine Dragon held out its hand and he decided to borrow the power of Filore's sacrament, he had been prepared to lose the right to stay at Crusch's side. But his soul could not sit still and wait for Crusch to be the one to say it. So he said it first, and spared himself from having Crusch cut him loose with her own words. —Ugh. He'd meant to praise himself for making the right call, and here was that weakness he hated, showing itself again.

"All I ever do is lie, huh..."

He'd thought he made the right call. A lie. He'd asked as if Fourier had never been scared. A lie. He'd said he had nothing against Emilia and the others. A lie.

The dismissal had been to protect his own fragile heart, and he knew perfectly well that even Fourier had to screw up every ounce of courage whenever he invited Crusch somewhere. And there was no way he could feel nothing about the triumphant advance of Emilia's camp, who had stacked up achievement after achievement from an overwhelmingly disadvantaged start and were giving the Upper Nobles no end of grief over her half-elf birth. Least of all about the exploits of Subaru, who had stood in the same place he had, as a knight.

In fact, Ferris hadn't asked Subaru about his right hand, the one he'd taken the glove off. Since Subaru hadn't brought it up himself, Ferris could guess it was probably a method that would be hard to put to use treating Crusch. But a guess was only a guess. He hadn't made sure. The reason was obvious: he had run from the possibility that there had been an answer other than relying on the Church of the Divine Dragon.

It almost seemed that in everything, he put running from his own pain first.

"Do I really, truly care about anyone, I wonder...?"

If he truly cared for someone, shouldn't he have treasured the very feelings they could never give up? Knowing the prayer Crusch had sworn before Fourier's grave, shouldn't he have searched for a path where her wish wouldn't be cut short, even if she went on being tormented by pain that would never heal? Wasn't it that very anger, at being made to face a reality she couldn't accept, that had made Crusch remember Fourier, and made her, of all people, understand how heartless Ferris had been?

What if the confusion of Crusch's "Memories," the confusion in which she remembered Fourier Lugunica, had been called up by anger at Ferris for trampling on her vow? Then perhaps it wasn't only Crusch who hated Ferris, but Fourier as well.

"—Ngh, stop, stop. This is pointless."

He realised he was, once again, putting on a show of self-reproach while hunting for words to comfort himself. If he had time to waste on something so petty, he should be deciding where he would stand from now on, so that he wouldn't worry Emilia and the others, or Wilhelm, whom he had left caught between himself and Crusch.

As things stood, he had lost his reason to go on being a knight. He still held the title of "Blue," so if he turned up at a clinic or a magic research institute, they would welcome him with open arms. Finding work would be easy, but simply drifting along would mean nothing. Going on saving people with these healing hands went without saying, and beyond that, he had other hopes too.

Even if Ferris—no, Felix Argyle—had thrown away, with his own hands, the right to hope for them.

"—Ah, thank goodness. I was worried we might miss each other."

On the way back from the cemetery, as he glared down at the cobblestones of the Noble Quarter, Ferris's ears twitched at a voice speaking to him. He stopped and looked ahead. Directly in front of him, in the middle of the road, stood a lone figure. —Someone he recognised.

A man with dull gold hair and deep blue eyes. His tall, slender frame was clad in a finely tailored suit, his hair and beard carefully groomed, and he carried an air of quiet elegance. Given the man's line of work, there was nothing strange about that at all. After all, he was—

"—Russell Fellow, was it? You're with the Merchants' Guild, right?"

"Yes, that's right. I'm deeply honoured that you remember me. And how should I address you? As Sir Ferris? Or as Sir Felix?"

"...Whichever. Call me what you like."

"Then, taking you at your word, Sir Felix it shall be. In my line of work, addressing people by their proper names rather than their pet names spares one all manner of inconvenience."

"Hmm."

Ferris shut one eye at the man bowing with such courteous poise: Russell Fellow. He was the shrewd head of the Royal Capital's Merchants' Guild, famous as exceptionally capable even among the capital's battle-hardened merchants. In fact, they had relied on him to supply and deliver provisions during the White Whale Subjugation, so he was hardly a stranger to Crusch's Faction.

"Still, I can't exactly get in on any money-making schemes right now, you know~? Shame, but..."

"Your contract of service with Duchess Karsten has been dissolved. Yes, I'm aware."

"...Your ears are so quick it's scary."

He'd brought it up himself, and still Ferris regretted how stupidly he'd opened. Russell had obviously been lying in wait for him. That had never happened once before, so if he was doing it today of all days, it could only mean some reason had arisen to make him act. And on top of that, there was one more stupid thing Ferris had been slow to notice.

"...Was this street always this empty? It's only evening."

"—"

Russell stood in the middle of the street, about ten metres from Ferris. Around Russell, around Ferris, there was no sign of anyone approaching anywhere along the Noble Quarter's road. In the dead of night or at first light, maybe, but at an hour when the sun had not yet fully set, it was impossible. And when the impossible happens, there is always a reason. In this case, the one responsible for that reason was—

"Sir Felix, there is a matter I very much wish to discuss with you. If it would please you, might I invite you to dine at my house? That is, if you have not yet decided where you are headed."

"Already trying to recruit me now that my collar's off? Sorry, but that's—"

"—No, this is not recruitment. I'm afraid, in fact, the talk is compulsory."

Slowly, Russell shook his head as if in lament. —In that instant, someone appeared right behind Ferris and laid a cold blade against his slender neck.

"—!"

Ferris caught his breath, pinned where he stood. It had happened too fast for him to do anything. All he could tell was that the blade was a thin, deeply curved sword, and that whoever stood behind him was considerably taller than he was. —No, that and,

"...You're not just a merchant, are you?"

"Who can say? I do wish I could be."

Russell closed the distance one step at a time. With the blade at his throat and nothing he could do, Ferris resolved at least not to look away, and found himself sick of himself all over again. Why had he ever taken someone capable of eyes this cold for an ordinary man?

He bit down hard on his lip, holding back so that no weak word or groan would slip out. That was the most he could manage right now, Ferris told himself sternly. Watching him from up close, eyes still cold, Russell said:

"Now that you are no longer the duchess's knight, I need have no qualms about questioning you. You will tell me. —About the 'Sacrament of the Undying King' passed down in House Argyle."