“Mage, why aren’t you eating? It’s not that fishy.”
When Karen held out the stew with unidentifiable chunks floating in it, a few drops splattered on Riario’s robe. He grimaced and shook off his robe in disgust.
“I’m a vegetarian.”
“What? Then what about everything you’ve eaten until now?”
“I had no choice but to eat it to survive. Since there’s no way you people would make delicious vegetable dishes, I just forced it down. After all, there isn’t a single scrap of grass beyond the wall anyway.”
“I didn’t know… you loved animals.”
Karen tilted his head, recalling the mysterious smoke rising from Riario’s laboratory located at the top of the castle. For someone who loved animals, he sometimes conducted merciless experiments.
“It’s more that meat just doesn’t agree with my constitution.”
“Riario has a weak stomach.”
Evernight added while gulping down cheap wine. At the sudden additional information, Anya rolled his eyes with a fork in his mouth.
“Really? Was that so?”
“He drank poison as the price for losing at Redcoast.”
“Ah, Captain! That story!”
Riario jumped up from his seat in agitation.
“I heard the two of you met at Redcoast… did the mage lose? In a match?”
“Miserably… he lost.”
“Ha… please stop.”
Riario muttered while holding his forehead. A thick, unbreakable bond of solidarity seemed to surround them. Anya, who was precariously balanced with one foot between them, suddenly felt an intense desire for belonging.
“Um….”
A voice that hadn’t yet completely shed its boyishness suddenly interjected among the whispering voices. Three pairs of eyes focused on Anya.
“Um… c-can I go outside n-now?”
“……”
“Ah… n-not right now… I was w-wondering if I could go out and h-help a little now.”
The sound of the back door leading to the back courtyard slamming shut in the wind could be heard several times from afar. Anya looked up at the blue eyes with an earnest heart.
“D-Duke Evernight….”
Before he could be surprised at the title he’d called out in a daze, the answer came back quickly.
“No.”
Evernight’s eyes were firm. Is this really something to be so firm about? Anya’s eyes blinked slowly.
“Wh-why?”
“When I say no, it means no. Don’t talk back.”
He touched the area around his eyebrow bone and indifferently turned his head away like someone who didn’t want to get involved in any more troublesome matters.
“B-but before, you s-said I was a p-person of T-Tildyen.”
An aggrieved feeling burst out. When they arrived here at Northernmost, his husband had clearly spoken directly, telling him to fulfill his duties. And yet… clearly and yet… Anya’s gaze unknowingly turned a bit fierce.
“You are a person of Tildyen, but not a ‘trustworthy’ person of Tildyen. Some people help by just staying still.”
It was a merciless harsh criticism. He was a mage now. Of course, he was a ‘beginner’ mage who didn’t know any magic yet. He had won against a Tildyen knight in an honor duel. Of course, it was Evernight who killed him in the end, but still.
“Th-that doesn’t make sense. It’s b-better to go and p-put magic into even o-one orb. N-now they say a snowstorm is c-coming too… e-everyone is very w-worried. E-every day at the inn, people are f-filled with fear and t-talk about it.”
Every single person who stopped by the inn brought up the snowstorm as a topic. There were times when he heard heated exchanges where someone asked if they couldn’t take just a little of the wall materials since they urgently needed timber to repair their houses immediately but didn’t have any, only to be scolded.
“It would be… best to stop now.”
Riario said from across the table, touching the area around his eyebrows. He knew Evernight better than anyone after ten years together. The superior he served had been consistent since he was a gladiator of commoner origin ten years ago.
He absolutely hated troublesome and messy things. No family, no friends, not a single person he loved. He was a man so indifferent to everything and without any emotion that it made one wonder if it was even possible to enter this man’s boundary.
That’s why he knew. Evernight was acting quite permissively toward Anya, calling him his companion. He hated troublesome things, but he was someone who somehow finished what he started. If Anya hadn’t been his companion from the start, he wouldn’t have cared whether he died or was humiliated somewhere. He probably wouldn’t have even had this argument. Riario couldn’t gauge how long Evernight would be patient.
“L-Lord Riario. You m-may not trust me, but… I w-want to help too.”
With even Riario saying that, it felt like all the strength was draining from his body. Doing nothing is painful. I want to clink glasses while facing each other like you all do someday too.
Anya swallowed the rest of his words inside. The unspoken sorrows piled up layer upon layer, becoming stones.
“Since he wants it this earnestly, wouldn’t it be okay for him to at least transfer magical formulas onto parchment? Your Imperial Highness doesn’t look pale anymore.”
Karen watched for signs and added a word.
“No. You all know this type well. Those who don’t know their own limits and show off ignorantly, running wild, and end up dying in the end. And that too, after causing shitty damage to everyone. You’ve all seen it countless times beyond the wall, so you’d know.”
At his words, Karen immediately shut his mouth. At the raw criticism heard in front of everyone, Anya felt like he might actually have difficulty breathing. Anya blinked his eyes blankly.
“This is my territory. On the day you make a mistake, your head will fly off without mercy too, Anya.”
It seemed like murderous intent flickered momentarily in Evernight’s blue eyes. Anya trembled finely and recalled the terror of the first day he came here.
After that, the dinner completely flowed into a funeral atmosphere. After returning to the bedroom, Anya was greatly dismayed by the fact that he shared the same room with Evernight.
“I-I’ll… sleep on the fl-floor.”
“Do that if you want your mouth to go crooked. There’s no healer here, so your mouth already stutters, and your mouth will go crooked too?”
At those words, Anya was horrified and climbed back onto the bed. He closed his eyes after pressing his body as close to the wall as possible, but sleep wouldn’t come easily. Through the window, the nearly full moon cast a faint light through the snowfall.
* * *
From morning that day, the weather was very overcast. Like the calm before the storm, a sense of solemnity even flowed through the streets of Northernmost. The wind intensified, old wooden buildings creaked, and the shutters that seemed about to fall off made loud noises several times. Once, the snow piled on the roof slid off, making dull sounds echoing here and there.
After passing noon and entering the afternoon, the strong wind blew hard enough to make one stagger while standing.
“Let’s all meet alive.”
Inside the inn, several people embraced each other and exchanged greetings. The old drunks who always drank until evening left early today.
“Brother! The widows’ houses are short on hands—can you help?”
Once the drunks left, only flies buzzed in the inn. It was the first time it had been this quiet since coming here. Just then, someone visited the inn.
“Those kids’ houses, you mean?”
“Right. Since there’s no man, how easy is it for women to climb on the roof and add wood by themselves? Well, there are men, but they’re still young kids, aren’t they?”
Anya, who had been quietly stroking Haebing at a corner table to briefly avoid the strong wind, became interested at the words “those kids.”
“Ah. When will I finish all those houses by myself?”
“Then how about calling that chef over there too?”
“Hey! You fool. If his hands get injured, will he ruin the business? Finding a chef here is like picking stars from the sky.”
“Then just stop talking and go help quickly. The mage is operating a defensive magic circle, so at least this year will be livable.”
They gathered tools from a closet that looked like a storage room and quickly left the inn.
“Mistress. If you need any help, please call a servant.”
What, mistress? The laborer who came asking for help turned to look at Anya, took off his hat, held it to his chest, and bowed politely. Perhaps because of the incident with the kids a few days ago, rumors about Anya spread quickly in Northernmost. They didn’t seem to be bad rumors.
After they left, Anya’s mind was in utter confusion. Those kids must be Joel and Ronan’s bunch. Those kids didn’t have fathers and were raised by their mothers alone. But he couldn’t accompany the innkeeper. On the off chance Evernight caught him accompanying someone, the innkeeper could get into trouble.
“C-can I take my p-portion of dinner in ad-advance?”
Then it was right to go alone. They said that when a snowstorm started, they’d be isolated in their houses for as short as two to three days or as long as a week. The children always went hungry. Anya wrapped the food the servant prepared in cloth so it wouldn’t spill, then quietly slipped out the inn’s back door.
The boy, who had been quietly staring at the fence that came up to his chest, soon took a deep breath and stepped back. Then he vigorously ran and vaulted over the fence with his hands.
