The Gloves He Threw
Three years ago, Enya took the Academy entrance exam without so much as asking her father, Count Campbell, for permission.
On the day her acceptance letter arrived, she presented herself before the Count with the tuition bill in hand. His reaction upon receiving it was exactly what she had expected.
“You dare sit for the Academy exam without my permission?”
And with top-tier scores, no less.
It was hardly an honorable accomplishment for a noble daughter. The visible trace of a girl scrambling to claw her way out of poverty was precisely the sort of thing Darkel's aristocratic society loved to mock.
Count Campbell burst into one incredulous laugh after another.
“So you've decided to make a fool of me, have you?”
You make a fool of yourself all on your own. The words climbed all the way to the back of her throat, but Enya barely swallowed them down and stared at him in silence.
When she showed no sign whatsoever of contrition, the corners of the Count's mouth twisted.
“It seems my permission wasn't particularly necessary after all.”
Now that rumors were circulating—the Campbell daughter took the Academy exam, and scored remarkably well—the Count could hardly afford to ignore the bill.
If she posted such disgracefully high marks and then failed to enroll, it would amount to announcing that the Campbells' circumstances were so dire they couldn't even cover tuition.
Ironically so.
Enya recalled a philosopher's adage—that forgiveness is easier to win than permission—and opened her mouth at last.
“I'm sorry for acting on my own, Father. But I couldn't go on living like this.”
“What did you say?”
“Forget parties—I don't even receive invitations to a simple tea. That's the position I'm in.”
“…….”
“If I keep being shunned by society like this, I'll never secure a match, either. So I judged that I needed to mingle with peers my own age. And then, at the very least, I might come to know the young lord of a decent family, mightn't I?”
At the level tone of her voice, the Count's face tightened into an uncomfortable silence. He was not ashamed of having given his daughter nothing. He was worried he might not be able to sell her off at a proper price.
He had been persuaded, to some degree, by what she'd said.
Enya read that realization in his face without difficulty, suppressed the venom rising in her, and drove the wedge home.
“I made this choice for my own future, so I ask that you support me in it.”
When she stressed the word future, the Count gave a reluctant nod. To him, his daughter's future was bound directly to his own—he could hardly have done otherwise.
“…If that's your will, then so be it. But next time, you tell me first. This is the only time I'll let something like this pass.”
At her father's grudging consent, Enya smiled brightly for the first time in ages.
She had just taken the first real step toward Eberdeen, and she could not contain her joy.
Regrettably, however, Enya's life at the Academy was far from smooth from the very start.
The Campbell daughter, arriving at the dormitory without a single maid, riding in a shabby shared carriage.
Everyone who saw her trudging along with her own luggage in her arms, looking so pitiable, shunned her.
Had it been mere condescension, that would almost have been a mercy. They wanted Enya driven out of the Academy altogether.
And so began the childish campaign of torment.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Lady Campbell, can the Campbell family really afford the Academy's tuition? If you have that much to spare, surely the proper order would be to repay the money you've borrowed first.”
To exaggerate only slightly, she crossed paths with someone like that once every ten steps. Men and women alike, as if they had coordinated in advance, they all offered Enya more or less the same words.
Mostly remarks about the Campbells' finances.
“My father says he intends to collect every coin he lent for the honor of Count Campbell's name. Lending to a fellow noble is insultingly condescending to the recipient, wouldn't you agree?”
Though of course, if the party concerned doesn't mind, a donation could be considered. The woman who added this studied Enya with barely veiled condescension.
“If learning is what you're set on, the Academies of Science would hardly be a bad choice. If you choose that fine option even now, I'll ask my father to forgive the Count's debt—quietly, of course, so that the Campbells can keep their honor.”
Leave the Academy, and I'll make your debts disappear.
Frankly, she thought it a rather generous offer. The family's debt was swelling by the day, and she could earn the degree she needed at the Academies of Science all the same.
To cover this round of interest, I'll have to sell off more of the estate.
The fertile land that would have fetched a good price had long since been sold off below market value. What remained was hardly fertile at all, so to sell quickly she would likely get barely half its worth.
And so she was tempted to accept the woman's proposal, but…
Count Campbell would never permit her to enter the Academies of Science.
After all, hadn't she won her enrollment at the Academy under the pretext of 'networking with the nobility'? If she announced she intended to attend an institution where most of the students were commoners, she might well find herself locked in the estate.
So Enya offered the woman a gentle smile.
“…Why are you smiling?”
And to the woman's sharp question, she answered with an air of wide-eyed innocence.
“It's my first time hearing a lady speak of money so plainly. My father never talks of such things around me…. Baron Schultz must share all sorts of conversations with his daughter, I see.”
In other words: it is vulgar for a lady to discuss money outright. The pawn the woman had meant to wield as a weapon had become her own self-destruction instead.
Understanding the barb at once, the woman's face flushed scarlet.
Enya smiled at her once more, at the girl trembling with humiliation.
“You came to the Academy because you have a passion for learning too, didn't you, Lady Schultz? Then next time, let's talk about our lessons instead of money.”
At that crisp, breezy voice, the woman's expression turned visibly venomous. It seemed desperately humiliating to her that a penniless daughter who rode shared carriages would dare stand up to her.
Had she been holding a fan, she would doubtless have snapped it shut with a crack.
“…Mind your words, Lady Campbell.”
To the warning threaded through her voice, Enya replied with perfect calm.
“The same to you, Lady Schultz.”
In that manner, Enya cut down the provocations aimed her way. Troublesome as they were, she didn't think them bad enough to make Academy life impossible.
It was a conclusion she could reach only because she didn't yet know that the Academy was far more lawless than she had imagined.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Day by day, the torment escalated.
Her books vanished or turned up defaced; she was excluded from class-wide notices and missed an exam as a result. By the time the first semester drew to a close, outright physical assaults—dousings of filthy water—had become frequent.
Not the sort of conduct one expected from nobles who claimed to prize dignity. And yet they behaved as if it were all great sport. Then again, perhaps it was no wonder: to them, the Campbell daughter had never been someone worth observing decorum for.
It was in the midst of that season, while she endured the torment in silence, that Enya met Raphael.
The Young Duke of Pembroke.
A prospective powerbroker, fated one day to stand at the very center of Darkel's aristocratic society.
A man who had everything.
Coming of age had lent his features a certain settled maturity, and her first impression of him was one of profound ennui.
And yet he was kind—and that kindness extended even to Enya, an outcast.
Raphael Pembroke raised an eyebrow at the sight of Enya sprawled on the ground, drenched in filthy water, with the bucket rolling to a stop nearby. He had apparently just returned from a hunt, for he wore riding clothes instead of his uniform, and he did not ask if she was all right.
Instead, those jaded blue eyes traced the trajectory from which the bucket must have flown. Before long, with a short, contemptuous laugh, he peeled off one glove and hurled it with all his strength.
At the ones who had dumped the water from the second floor of the building and were now giggling over their handiwork.
The recipients of this rather unorthodox challenge to a duel recognized Raphael's face, stuffed their heads back through the window, and scuttled away.
Raphael clicked his tongue briefly at the empty window on the second floor, then extended a hand to Enya without the slightest hesitation.
“Take it.”
“…I'm quite all right.”
Gloved or not, she could not bring herself to rise by gripping a man's hand. So when she refused the offered hand, he abruptly stripped off his remaining glove as well.
Then, without a moment's ceremony, he knelt down before Enya and held it out to her.
“Should you find yourself in the same situation again, throw this instead. Any gentleman who receives a challenge to a duel from a lady will retreat out of sheer shame.”
It was absurd. Enya, who had expected at most a word of concern, frowned without meaning to.
Doing her best to ignore the patter of filthy water dripping from her body, she answered a beat too late.
“…I'd think they'd laugh at me instead.”
Not to mention she could hardly throw anything clear up to the second floor. Enya swallowed those words and tried to put strength into her trembling knees.
The man, graciously pretending not to notice her looking like a newborn giraffe, said:
“No, I rather think I'm right. There are plenty of fools in this world who would be more ashamed of tormenting a lady smaller than themselves than of fighting her as an equal.”
And what does that make you, then?
Something in the corner of her heart twisted. Perhaps it was his kindness—the alms-like offering of a glove from a man seated at the center of power—that she found so distasteful.
Enya managed to pull herself upright, then looked down at him and asked:
“And which side are you on?”
At the crooked question from the wretched girl dripping with foul water, a faint smile touched his lips.
“The side that throws gloves at fools, as you can see.”
Enya's gaze was caught, quite against her will, by the shallow dimple carved into the cheek of the man as he slowly rose.
“Should the opportunity arise, I'll teach you the technique as well. How to throw a glove in a properly insulting manner.”
He added it lightly, as though joking, and held the glove out to her again.
Enya could not refuse it.
A fine, luxurious glove laid atop her hand, still wet with filthy water. Watching her hold it awkwardly, the man made a casual offer.
“I'll show you somewhere you can rest.”
“…….”
“Stay there only until my valet can summon your maid.”
At those words, Enya's mouth pressed firmly shut.