Come to think of it, it had been strange — being allowed to use the bathing room the servants used, and being given new clothes.
“Are you surprised that it’s less than you expected?”
“…Ah—”
Uriel gasped at the sudden voice. A door set into one of the walls had, at some point, been pushed half open. Moist air was drifting out through the gap, which told him it was a bathroom.
Just as Uriel had guessed, Avelos had come straight from washing up in the bath. Draped loosely in a wide-cut black robe, idly shaking the damp from his hair, Avelos stepping out like that was like something out of a work of art.
He’d done nothing wrong, yet the sudden appearance of Avelos caught him off guard and Uriel stepped back several paces. At that, Avelos tilted his head to one side and smiled, the corner of his mouth curving upward.
“Do you — know how to drink?”
“I, I’ve never had it before…”
Uriel answered on reflex, then shut his mouth. In that moment of fluster he’d given Yuri’s answer without thinking. Did Uriel drink well? No — before that, had Uriel ever drunk at all? He searched his memory belatedly.
No one had ordered him to perfectly perform as Uriel just because he had possessed him — and yet, strangely, standing before Avelos, he felt as though he ought to act like Uriel. If asked to explain why, he couldn’t have found the words. It was simply the instinct of Yuri, who had grown up reading the room for as long as he could remember.
“You’re quite skilled at lying.”
“I’m sorry. It’s been so long since I last had any… I couldn’t quite remember.”
Uriel answered carefully, watching Avelos for any sign of reaction. Fortunately, despite pointing out the lie, Avelos didn’t seem to be in a bad mood over it.
Avelos’s hair, always neatly groomed, had fallen forward to curtain his forehead in its damp state. Like this, he bore a fair resemblance to the adolescent Avelos Uriel had seen when he first possessed this body.
When Uriel had seen him again after ten years, he had grown so much that recognizing him at a glance had been impossible. Not just for Uriel — even the original Uriel would have struggled to recognize him. But now, with his hair hanging loose like this, some trace of that younger face still seemed to linger.
A scrawny boy, barely scraping 170 centimeters. Those violet eyes that glared up at him with the look of a wounded animal. The memory came back to him. The boy with stray-cat eyes — full of fear, dread, and wariness toward an Uriel whose behavior had shifted — had returned, and in his place stood a man fully grown.
Watching the protagonist of the original story, shaped by his influence, behave differently from the source material and move with his own will — it made this place feel real, not like fiction.
“How long are you planning to stand there?”
“Pardon?”
Uriel snapped out of his reverie at Avelos’s voice. Seeing Uriel frozen stiff, several times more tense than usual since stepping into the bedroom, Avelos smiled faintly and gestured with one hand.
“Come sit down.”
He gave the chair in front of him a light pat.
“I didn’t call you here to devour you — if you stay that tense, I’ll feel like I ought to do something to live up to the expectation, don’t you think?”
“N-no, that’s not—”
At Avelos’s words, Uriel hurried into the chair. Watching Uriel sit with wide, startled eyes like a young animal spooked by its own name, Avelos let out a low laugh. Then he settled into the chair on the opposite side of the small table between them.
As Avelos leaned back in the chair, the robe loosely tied at the waist with nothing more than its sash fell open at the front. Avelos, who always kept his clothing in order, had never looked like this — and Uriel’s eyes went there of their own accord.
Through the gap in the robe, the firm lines of his chest rose and fell in shallow breaths. When he was young, he’d been so much thinner and more fragile-looking than this — ten years had changed his body a great deal.
Uriel had been staring absently at Avelos’s body when their gazes met. The instant their eyes locked, Uriel’s breath stopped entirely.
Thud, thud — a loud, lurching beat rose from somewhere around his chest. Had he made some kind of mistake? Avelos’s violet eyes were more coolly settled than he had ever seen them.
As befitted an Emperor who reigned at the summit of the world, Avelos had a particular atmosphere about him, a weight and pressure all his own. He generally spoke to Uriel in a tone that felt light, accompanied by formal speech. And yet, because of that particular atmosphere and because of what the original Uriel had done, Uriel’s body locked up and went tense every time he encountered him. But feeling genuinely frightened of Avelos the way he did right now — that was a first.
If looks could kill, Avelos would have torn Uriel apart piece by piece. When he blinked slowly, he could just make out Avelos’s expressionless face pulling into the faintest frown.
With the atmosphere flowing in this direction, Uriel even found himself thinking he’d rather Avelos just hurry up and brand him and send him back. The three times before, there had never been this kind of unnecessary stretch of time.
He’d already seemed to be in a bad mood since the stables. Maybe something else had gone wrong afterward too, and he was taking it out on me. He also wondered whether Avelos was putting him through this unnecessary process hoping he’d let his guard down and make some mistake. That thought came at the same time as another: and what would a mere slave matter that much to him, anyway.
Hadn’t he already committed enough crimes against him? He had kidnapped a Crown Prince barely past ten years old and kept him locked in his own home for eight years. He didn’t know the details, but there had been abuse as well, apparently — the sins were already more than enough. Even if he dragged Uriel out and killed him on the spot, there would be nothing wrong with it.
“Hic.”
Perhaps because he had inhaled wrong while so tightly wound, a hiccup escaped him. As they continued coming without pause, Uriel raised both hands and pressed them over his mouth. He knew perfectly well that hiccups came from a contracting diaphragm, not from the lips, and that covering his mouth was useless — and yet he did it anyway.
With his hands still pressed to his mouth, Uriel carefully watched Avelos’s expression.
“Hm?”
Avelos seemed to find it absurd — being watched so closely for a reaction — and let out a short, exhaled sound caught somewhere between a sigh and a laugh.
“Are you doing that on purpose? To see how I’ll react?”
“Pardon? Hic.”
He’d lowered his hands to answer, then quickly raised them again to cover his mouth.
“You really are…”
Knock knock knock —
A series of knocks from outside the door cut off Avelos’s words. Along with the knock came the sound of the palace steward announcing himself. Avelos’s gaze, which had been clinging to Uriel with stubborn persistence, finally pulled away. At Avelos’s permission, the door opened and the palace steward entered alone.
On the tray carried with perfectly upright posture were an elaborately carved glass bottle, glass cups, and a light assortment of refreshments.
The palace steward approached without making so much as a footstep and set the items on the table between Uriel and Avelos. Offering Avelos a courteous bow, as though Uriel were invisible, the palace steward withdrew from the room as soundlessly as he had entered.
“You said it’s been so long you can’t quite remember.”
Uriel was certain the moment he opened his mouth a hiccup would burst out loud, so he only nodded.
“It can’t be helped, having earned the title of Mage. Once mana begins to circulate through the body, alcohol and drugs stop having any effect — so I’ve found myself drinking less as well.”
Again, Uriel only nodded. It was a brazen enough response that anyone would be justified in calling him out — but Avelos showed no sign of caring. In truth, if he’d wanted Uriel to behave like a proper slave, he wouldn’t have been speaking to him in formal speech at all.
Avelos reached out and pulled the stopper from the glass bottle on the table. The moment it was open, the sharp bite of alcohol spread through the air. The scent alone was enough to gauge just how potent what was inside that bottle was.
“To get even the faint sense of having had a sip or two, you have to pour down something this strong — and at times like this, knowing how to handle mana is…”
Avelos let his words trail off and smiled, slow and languid.
“…Quite a shame, isn’t it. Don’t you think, Uriel?”
Even though they were sitting face to face, he somehow gave the impression of looking down at Uriel from above. That particular ease of his, that languor and world-weariness, made it feel that way. Or perhaps it was simply that Avelos himself was like a born predator — a born sovereign — and that was why.
Again, Uriel’s head nodded reflexively, but Avelos’s gaze did not leave him. It felt as though he were waiting for an actual answer.
Under the quiet weight of his attention, Uriel lowered his hands carefully and answered.
“…I thought so too.”
At that answer, which sounded very much like agreement, Avelos smiled — openly, and with full brightness.
