The rain gradually eased. The air was clear. Gene slowed his pace a little. The alley was dark, but he was hardly in a position to fear that. Rosa spoke.
“Give me your hand.”
Wondering what this meant, Gene held it out. Rosa took his wrist instead, checked his pulse, and spoke.
“That’s all right. Your temperature too. I was wondering whether you’d caught a cold.”
“I only ever had those as a child.”
“You’re a patient now.”
“That reminds me.”
As Rosa tried to release him, Gene moved his hand instead and caught her wrist. Turning, she wore her old expressionless face. Gene asked,
“Why did you risk your life to save me?”
Rosa turned to look at him. Despite Harat’s constant insistence that he eat, his jaw was still sharp enough to cut, and his color was poor. She remembered their first meeting. Then the time Gene had asked her to stay at Hawk House, the time before that when he had asked her to wait five days, her belief that she could endure any circumstances, the moment far back in her past when she had decided to protect her little sister, and the resolve she had made on leaving Daeior. Each came to her in turn.
When she abandoned her homeland, she had thought there would be nothing to miss. But that was not true. Her grandmother and cousin had not chosen to defend their castle merely because they knew nothing of the wider world. Rosa too had a castle she had chosen for herself. One she had decided to protect, one she could protect. The words came out of their own accord.
“Once I’ve decided to protect something, I don’t give up on it.”
Gene frowned as though taken aback and blinked several times. She did not know how he had understood those words. In any case, Rosa herself did not know their full meaning either. For a moment they simply looked at each other. After thinking through all manner of things, Gene was just about to speak when Rosa abruptly said,
“This isn’t the best moment to bring up something like this, but…”
She took something from inside her clothes and offered it. When he accepted it, it proved to be an envelope of sturdy, fine parchment. Its seal had already been broken. It was a suspicious object, but honestly, he was not especially curious about it just now. Instead of looking inside, Gene asked,
“What is it?”
Rosa smiled bitterly.
“An invitation.”
When Gene and Rosa returned to the masons’ house, most of the men were loitering in the yard. Some had been discussing whether they should go out to look for him. Harat ran out and shouted,
“Captain, you’re safe. We were worried when we heard you’d gone out alone…”
He glanced at Rosa and corrected himself.
“No, I mean we’re glad the young lady went with you.”
“Were you afraid I’d get lost on my own?”
Gene was a little irritated, wondering when they would stop treating him like a child. But for now, he decided to endure it.
“Tahyang’s inside, isn’t he? Luke too?”
There was much to discuss. As he headed straight inside, Hal approached.
“Captain, you have a visitor.”
“A visitor?”
“Well… They say they’re a relative.”
A relative? That word brought Gene not the slightest good feeling. Taken aback, he hurried past Hal into the room. Tahyang, Luke, and the visitor in question sat inside. The visitor wore a hooded cloak suited to the weather, and white hair showed beneath it at the shoulders. As Gene entered with Rosa, the visitor spoke.
“If you’re taking walks with a young lady, you must be healed.”
It was a familiar voice. Relaxing, Gene went over with a delighted expression.
“Ma’am, what brings you so far?”
Sara Izram pushed back her hood, and one corner of her mouth twitched.
“They said my grandson was dying, so I came to pray for his soul. But he’s alive again, so it was a wasted journey.”
At the word grandson, a smile spread over Gene’s entire face. It meant Sara had accepted the last thing he had said to her.
“The rumor reached all the way there, then. Have you eaten? Please stay a few days.”
The others did not know who this person could be, to make Gene welcome her so warmly. Sara answered.
“Here you are living off someone else’s hospitality, and you’re inviting guests? What impudence. I’ve seen your face intact. I’ll go now.”
But she did not rise at once. Gene looked around at his friends and spoke.
“This lady is my old teacher’s wife. She’s like a grandmother to me.”
They all nodded and greeted her. Then Luke’s eyes suddenly widened.
“If you mean Gene’s teacher, c-could it be Garon Vendigate?”
Sara turned and gave him a mildly displeased look. Swallowing, Luke looked at Gene. When Gene nodded, his eyes nearly popped out.
“Wow. To think even a murderer like him had a wife.”
Tahyang and Rosa reached out at once to cover Luke’s mouth, but Sara burst into hearty laughter.
“Well, absurd as it sounds, it happened. I can scarcely believe it myself. I don’t suppose it’s easy for you to believe either.”
Then Luke suddenly stood, crouched before Sara’s chair, and asked to shake hands. When she did so without thinking, he spoke.
“Excuse me, but could I speak with you privately later? Oh, I’m a poet called Lucius Quinto, and someday I mean to write Garon’s story as a play. If you’d tell me a little about the old days, I’ll repay you with box seats. Ten tickets would be possible. You could even sell them as a bundle…”
Gene quickly rose to stop him.
“I’m sorry. This friend of mine can be rather persistent…”
But Sara chuckled and answered.
“What a fellow. Ten box seats? Don’t try your tricks on me. Do you think I don’t know you? You wrote The King of Mea, didn’t you? How much must that have earned? And here you are trying to get important material for nothing, as though snatching candy from a snot-nosed child?”
“Ah, I’m terribly sorry, but I only write plays. I don’t earn very much. It’s the sad reality of Delphinad’s theater world, but most of the takings have nothing to do with me. What I get is a script fee that disappears after a few drinks, and a few complimentary tickets…”
As Luke poured out his lengthy complaints, Tahyang unexpectedly responded.
“Is that true? You are being treated unfairly.”
“Exactly. Shall we visit Leonis’s office sometime? Bring Huka too.”
Sara looked at Gene again.
“It’s no boast for someone of my years to take up the young people’s time. Will you go to avenge yourself?”
That was what she had come to ask. A self-mocking smile came over Gene’s face.
“Yes.”
“Why? Are you bitter over losing? Because it was unfair?”
Perhaps that was part of it. But there were many other reasons. According to what Rosa had heard from Luke, Sing’s followers intended to bring destruction to Delphinad. To that end, they had drawn Hanbun’s group outside the city and were preparing a ritual to obtain still greater power. And in an absurd turn, they had invited Gene to that ritual. As though to confirm his defeat. He had meant to discuss how they should respond, but in truth he had already made up his mind. No, he realized now that he had.
“Because it isn’t over.”
Sara looked at Gene’s face. A little haggard, but still young, a face that would enjoy life’s favor for some time yet. That would end one day. He would be worn down by time rather than broken by an ordeal. It was foolish to hope that day would never come, and foolish too to break before it arrived. If youth and life were not endless, when should one heed that call, if not now? The call that it was not over. To challenge again.
Sara spoke.
“I do not regret the days I’ve lived.”
Knowing her past, Gene felt respect at those words. He straightened.
“I always sought life. So did Garon. Not once did we seek to die. Garon died anyway, of course. I will too. But that doesn’t matter. Why should death be such a great thing? Until the moment before it comes, I’ll struggle to live. Even if that makes me die sooner. Isn’t that how one should live? Dance while the night lasts, for day must break in the end.”
Perhaps not everyone’s life was like that. But Sara had lived with death always at her throat. Born among the Children of the Billin, she had endured countless things before finding herself alone in the far south, so distant from home, as a poor tenant farmer. The reason she had avoided death and raced madly toward life was more than understandable.
Perhaps that was why Sara had overflowed with life, and Garon too, until just before his death. They were people who did not die easily.
Rosa spoke.
“You mean to risk your life so that you don’t die.”
A smile came to Gene’s lips. He had known Rosa would understand. Then Luke spoke.
“That’s rather different from what an ordinary grandmother would tell her grandson.”
“That’s why I’m a murderer’s wife, boy.”
Luke winced, but Sara calmly took something wrapped in cloth from beneath her cloak and tossed it to Gene. It felt heavy when he caught it. He laid it across his knees and removed the two layers of cloth. A sword appeared. An odd presentiment made Gene look at Sara.
“This…”
“Why? Does it remind you of something?”
It was a one-handed sword, with a slightly long hilt and a slender blade. From just below the tip all the way to its end, a fine pattern spread across the surface. It was irregular, like lightning, and red. A faint dark stain lay in the gap between blade and hilt.
His companions’ eyes were fixed on the sword too. Luke frowned, twitched his cheeks from side to side, narrowed one eye, and finally could not hold back his question.
“Could this be… Ganax?”
Discover more from Lilly Translations
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.