I Will Make It So
But Alpheus never got the chance to finish.
"Hahahaha!! Ha—haha! Haha!!"
The Emperor burst into crazed laughter. He went on that way for a long while, laughing as if he were sobbing, then cut the sound off all at once and raised both hands.
"Duke Pancrazio. Truly magnificent."
Then, as though offering his congratulations, the Emperor began to clap—slowly.
Clap. Clap-clap. Clap—!
The chamber held its silence, and only the Emperor's applause rang out, uncanny, through the vast Imperial Palace.
Clap-clap-clap—clap-clap!!
Little by little the applause turned violent. Attendants who looked upon the Emperor's madness trembled where they stood, scarcely daring to draw a breath. Then the hands that had been clapping against that chilling face stopped dead.
"The acting was so flawless I very nearly let myself be fooled."
The Emperor smiled.
"Now that she is dead and gone, you mean to play the tragic fiancé, bereaved of his betrothed?"
"Your Majesty."
There was a barb in the words. Their meaning was plain enough: why, only now that she is dead, do you pretend to cherish Isabel?
"Was the broken betrothal not everything you so desired? Duke, I congratulate you—from the heart—on having carried that annulment through to such success."
For he was the Emperor, yes, but before that he was father to the vanished Princess Isabel. Who, told that their own child had been reduced to nothing but bones inside a zombie's belly, could remain in their right mind? One only pretended to be sound.
The madness his laughter had veiled rose into the Emperor's eyes. Those blue eyes shone, wet and bright.
"Then may I bestow a single blessing upon that brilliant road ahead of you?"
"……."
"Duke. The next time. Without fail."
And for the first time, the Emperor showed his naked face. The look of a man who wanted to tear the Alpheus before him to shreds that very instant made Michel shut his eyes, and the attendants could not dare open theirs against such killing intent.
But the Emperor's resentment was not aimed at Alpheus alone.
His grudge against himself—the man who had pushed his own child into the flames—seemed every bit as fierce. Deep regret was carved across his face.
"You may go."
With that the Emperor turned his back, and Alpheus quietly bowed his head in courteous respect. The moment the Emperor was gone, Alpheus seized the garment in his hand and left the Imperial Palace at a tremendous pace.
"Your Grace—Her Highness's clothes—!"
Michel called after him in alarm, but Alpheus only kept on, walking as if he were running. So swift was that pace that even Michel, who had set out after him, gave up.
"Your—Your Grace?"
"Move."
Levin, waiting outside, had his mouth hanging open for only a moment at the sight of Alpheus looking like some wrathful demon. It fell open wider still when that terrible face made straight for the carriage, intent on leaving at once.
"Your Grace! Where are you going?! Your Grace!!"
Alpheus ignored Levin crying out desperately behind him. He only drove the carriage onward, eyes fixed ahead.
"I will find her."
So Alpheus thought.
She isn't dead.
How could a dead woman stir a feeling like this in him? A sinister light flared in Alpheus's eyes, and he drove faster still.
"She isn't dead. She is not dead."
People do not vanish so easily. People do not return to dust so easily. Yes. It has to be so. I—I—
"I will make it so."
The Village Market to which Chesian and the zombie had come was packed tight with an enormous crowd. Even amid the chaos, one man seized every gaze—a man who stood well above the common height.
"Isn't that Chesian?"
"Oh my. Handsome again today."
It was Chesian himself. The strange color of his hair—now seeming violet, now a deep purple—already stood out, but more than anything, his looks were exceedingly fine.
"What's he doing without a hat today?"
"I know, right?"
In truth, Chesian knew perfectly well the effect of his own face. He disliked the way eyes gathered on him, and so he always went about with a hat pressed low—but today he had yielded that hat to the zombie, and could not wear it himself.
"Wear it properly."
"I said wear it."
Lest the zombie's hat slip, he pressed it down firmly with his hand. She squirmed as if uncomfortable and shook her head in protest, but Chesian ignored her with ease.
"Take this off and there'll be real trouble."
The reason he forced the hat onto her was the zombie's eyes. In the forest, with no one nearby, it had been fine—but they were standing now in the middle of a market crammed with people. If the hat came off and those golden eyes, which only a zombie could possess, were laid bare, there would certainly be an uproar.
"Quit talking back and wear it."
"Put it on while I'm still asking nicely."
The zombie could not, for the life of her, fathom why she—who was strong—should have to wear this helmet of a hat. For a while the two kept their heads together, whispering and bickering. Wear the hat. I don't want to.
"Is that Chesian's lover?"
"You think so? He's never once brought a woman with him."
Their squabbling was perfectly made to invite misunderstanding. Chesian had never, not once, brought a companion into the village. The women had occasionally seen him speak with other women, but almost never seen him getting along with one like this, and so they leapt to the conclusion that the stranger was his lover.
"And how is he so gentle?"
"I know. I think he's trying to shade her from the sun."
To eyes already clouded by infatuation, Chesian looked like a tender lover blocking out the sunlight, and they were in an uproar of envy.
"Oh my, oh my, oh my!"
Then Chesian broke into a bright smile and laced his fingers with hers, as if soothing a sulking lover, and gasps escaped them before they knew it. At a sight so sickeningly sweet, people who had been sneaking glances while pretending not to look envied the woman of unknown identity, bundled tight in her clothes. A face that handsome, a temperament that good, and he treats his lover well besides.
But the reality was something else entirely.
"Don't do the zombie voice."
"I told you to be quiet!"
Far from a pleasing pair of lovers—whatever one chose to imagine, the truth was nothing like it.
"Who could she be?"
"You don't think it's Ella, the daughter of the manager at Latium Restaurant?"
"Please. Her build is completely different. Unexpected, though. Ella likes Chesian so much I thought the two of them had finally started seeing each other."
Just then a woman of dazzling appearance slipped, perfectly naturally, in between the two who were chattering.
"That isn't me, though?"
"E-Ella?"
"Yes, sisters. What are you talking about so happily?"
It was Ella herself—the very person they had just had on their tongues. That she liked Chesian was already famous, even within this village.
"Mm. It's nothing, dear."
"W-we were only talking about why the Imperial Knights have been showing up in this village lately."
They turned the subject in a hurry, but the awkwardness was plain on their faces. Because Ella—her nature was extreme. Truly, extremely—
"Chesian has a lover, you say? My, my."
—foul.
"What a well-matched pair."
A sound came from inside Ella's mouth, as if she were grinding something between her teeth. The two women looked at her in alarm, but Ella only wore a placid smile, as if nothing at all had happened.
The place I had followed the ball of fur to was another world entirely. Wonders filled every direction, and I did not know where to put my eyes.
Fish, grass, shining stones…….
Why were there only two eyes? I wanted to look at this, and at that as well. There were so many things I wanted to touch and to taste that my head spun.
After I had stared for a long while, it began to irritate me, subtly, that the ball of fur had for some time been walking out ahead of me, faster than I was.
Why do I hate looking at that back?
I puzzled over it, then grasped the cause and nodded.
It's because the frail ball of fur is walking all alone.
Weak in body, and yet huffing along out in front by himself. Worried for him, I tugged.
"What."
"……Why are you like this?"
The ball of fur looked at me with a crooked gaze, but I led him on, resolute.
My ball of fur seems especially weak.
Last time, too, he hadn't even managed to eat properly what I caught and gave him myself.
I, who am clever and strong of body, ought to protect him.
Thinking so, I looked at the ball of fur—and his expression was a little strange.
What on earth is that face supposed to be?
It seemed like bewilderment, and also like a face that could not understand……. While I was working out what the expression pointed to, I broke into a wide, beaming smile.
He's moved!
He must have realized I meant to protect him, and felt grateful. So cute I could die.
"Are you an idiot."
The ball of fur had greeted me with thanks. His fluffy violet hair fluttered in the air.
Saying such a thing, of all moments. When I tapped his shoulder as if embarrassed, he narrowed his eyes.
"Something's off……. What is this uneasy feeling? What did you take me as saying?"
"You're not smiling while you curse me, are you?"
Even the ball of fur's greetings were truly cute, I thought. Thinking so, I looked at him and smiled brightly—and he suddenly whipped his face away.
"Damn it……."
The ball of fur's ears had turned bright red. Red? Red was a bad thing.
I leaned in with a worried face and peered up from beneath his chin, and he pushed my face away, pressing it back.
"Don't shove your face in."
The ball of fur kept trying to push me off, and I kept trying to cling to the ball of fur. We were making a commotion that was not quite a commotion when, all at once, a new human popped out in front of me.
"Cher? That you, Cher?!"
The human called my ball of fur that, and gave him a poke. Hearing it, I thought carefully.
Is my ball of fur's name Cher?
But when I actually tried to say the name Cher aloud, it was not easy.
"Teh-teh."
……Close enough?
Telling myself it was a little off, I kept practicing the sound with my mouth, but it would not come out as I wanted.
"Teh-eh-teh-eh. Tehh-euu?"
Muttering to myself, I crumpled my face. Our ball of fur has an extremely difficult name to call. For such a frail little thing, he is fussy—extraordinarily fussy.