Sarg handed the baby to Hyderlin. He himself took the broom and swept inside the abandoned chapel, pulling weeds from various spots in the cemetery.
“You quit being a holy knight just to work as a gravedigger?”
Sarg didn’t answer. He roughly washed his hands and moved on. Hyderlin followed leisurely behind him.
“Where are you going this time?”
“It’s none of your business.”
Sarg answered coldly and walked ahead. The sound of his footsteps striking the ground seemed somehow angry. Hyderlin chased after him with the baby in her arms.
“I asked where you’re going.”
“……”
“Can’t you hear me?”
Sarg stubbornly ignored her. The baby Hyderlin was holding started whimpering, perhaps hungry. Sarg suddenly stopped and thrust his hand into his pocket. What appeared was a key.
“Stop following me and go back to watch the house.”
“That sounds like something a very conservative breadwinner would say. You should treat your wife better.”
“You’re the first person whose every word makes me angry.”
“I’m honored, Sir Knight.”
When Hyderlin curtsied in court fashion, Sarg let out a sigh like a lament. He put the key in the pocket of her outer garment.
“…You said you were outside all night. Go in and get some sleep. You won’t be able to sleep much with the baby, but still.”
Regardless of what he said, Sarg was fundamentally a good person. She didn’t really need to sleep, but she decided not to refuse this kind of consideration.
When Hyderlin nodded, Sarg turned and walked away, leaving her behind. In a moment of her chronic mischievousness acting up, she shouted at Sarg’s back:
“Honey! Come home early!”
The gazes of passersby suddenly converged. As Sarg turned the corner, she thought she could hear him cursing.
Hyderlin giggled with laughter. Once Sarg was completely out of sight, she went up to his house.
After feeding the baby well and laying her down on the bed, Hyderlin lay down beside her. She buried her face in the bed and sniffed. The smell wasn’t as bad as she’d thought.
Actually, the household items were old and worn, but not dirty. Hyderlin bounced up from the bed. And she began to rummage through Sarg’s belongings one by one.
The floor creaked but was clean, and the dishes were well-washed. There wasn’t a speck of dust between the window frames. This was practically mysophobia.
“He looks like that but cleans his house well? He should take better care of his own hair first.”
Muttering with a disgusted face, Hyderlin flung open the wardrobe. And she was seized by slight bewilderment.
There were only a few clothes in the wardrobe, but they all hung neatly without a single wrinkle. Old monk’s robes distributed to clergy and the formal uniform of the holy knights occupied their places. On the floor were old but well-polished boots and a belt. There was even an obsessive neatness in the arrangement of the items.
But this wasn’t what bewildered Hyderlin.
Two swords stood at an angle inside the wardrobe.
Hyderlin knew those two swords far too well.
One was Sarg’s sword. The hilt was pale white, and the pommel had exquisite laurel-pattern silver filigree. Even the blade hidden in the white scabbard was a dazzling pure white. It was a sword that suited Sarg remarkably well.
Hyderlin looked at the second sword. Its hilt was jet black. A dark leather scabbard swallowed the blade.
Hyderlin gripped the hilt of the second sword. When she pulled it halfway from the scabbard, a black wavy-patterned blade revealed itself.
It was still beautiful.
Having completely removed the scabbard, Hyderlin aimed the sword’s point at an imaginary opponent.
Familiar grip, familiar weight, familiar balance.
The wave pattern glinting in the faint sunlight.
It was the sword her father had given her on her sixteenth birthday. It was also the sword she had treasured and used most.
“Why is this here?”
All of Count Biche’s property had been forfeited to the royal family. So her sword should have been too. There was no reason for it to be in Sarg’s house.
“A war trophy?”
Hyderlin shook her head.
“He tried so hard to clear my name. There’s no way he’d take a trophy like that.”
Then what was this?
Was that man keeping Count Biche’s belongings?
Like someone who carries a pendant containing their dead lover’s hair? Like a daughter who wears jewelry her dead mother cherished in life? Like a son who can’t throw away his father’s armor?
“Really?”
Hyderlin was seized by confusion.
The sword tip that had been aimed at an imaginary enemy drew a semicircle upward toward the ceiling. Holding the sword upright before her eyes, Hyderlin stared intently at the blade’s wave pattern.
Hyderlin was seized by a strange feeling upon confirming that the blade that should have long since rusted was sharp and blue.
Like someone who often opens the pendant containing their dead lover’s hair. Like a daughter who carefully polishes the jewelry left by her dead mother. Like a son who oils his father’s armor.
She was facing proof that Sarg had frequently looked at and maintained Hyderlin’s sword until recently.
5 . Eyebrows 1
Sarg walked with long strides. Every time he walked on the ground that was entirely muddy, the mud soiled him up to his shins, but Sarg didn’t care.
Wife, what nonsense.
He thought about the woman who bore part of Hyderlin’s name.
He thought about the woman who had revealed herself as Hyderlin’s double.
He thought about that woman who had a face resembling Hyderlin, spoke with a tone resembling Hyderlin, and acted like Hyderlin…
At some point, rain had begun to fall again.
A raindrop that ran down Sarg’s forehead settled on his silver eyelashes. His vision blurred. Sarg blinked a few times to shake off the raindrops. The water beaded on his eyelashes ran down his cheek.
It had rained on the day she was executed too.
Sarg threw open the door of the tavern and dropped a handful of coins on the counter.
“Something strong. Anything.”
The tavern owner counted the coins. It was enough money to pay back half of the outstanding tab. The owner prepared the drink without complaint.
Sarg slumped down in a corner seat. After shaking off the rainwater from his face, he swept back the hair stuck to his forehead.
His vision blurred again. Sarg blinked to shake off the raindrops still beaded on his eyelashes. Water ran down his cheek. But his vision was still blurred.
What had beaded on his eyelashes gradually swelled and overflowed. It ran down his cheek and wetted his angular chin. Sarg thought as he let the pouring tears flow unchecked.
Hyderlin’s double?
Hys, who had introduced herself as Count Biche’s double, truly resembled Hyderlin. Except for her hair color and voice, everything was like Hyderlin.
Her mischievous smiling eyes, her sharp nose, her arrogant smile at the corners of her lips, her leisurely way of speaking.
That woman was Hyderlin Biche herself.
So when Sarg met the double in front of the grave, he had this thought:
Foolish woman. If you had such a similar double, you should have put your double on the execution platform instead of yourself.
It was an utterly selfish thought. So Sarg quickly brushed it away.
But seeing the double lying nonchalantly in bed, pretending to be his wife, Sarg was seized by that thought again.
If the double had died in your place, you might have been the one lying in that spot using the name Hys Gloriosa. Then, we…
He wanted to cut off his own head. He felt like going crazy from being so pathetic for having such thoughts, even for a moment. Every time he saw the double, self-loathing surged up. He had no face to show the double.
Everything before his eyes wavered. The tears showed no sign of stopping and flowed endlessly. Sarg buried his forehead on the table. A dull pain rushed to his forehead.
You stupid bastard.
You filthy bastard.
You dirty bastard…
Sarg remained with his head buried on the table for a long while. He waited for all the wretched tears to drain out. If he could die dried up from all the damp sadness draining from his body, he would gladly do so.
But Sarg had something he had to do before dying.
“Here you go.”
The table where Sarg was lying face-down vibrated. The owner must have set down the glass. Sarg raised his creaking body. When he wiped his face wet with rain and tears, moisture beaded on his rough beard fell in drops.
He asked in a low voice:
“Any new information about ‘that woman’?”
“None.”
“What about ‘that man’s’ weaknesses?”
“None of those either.”
“I see.”
“If you need anything, just say so. You’re a regular, so I’ll do you that favor at least.”
The owner sent a pitying look at Sarg, who was still clinging to a case from long ago. But it quickly disappeared.
Sarg poured the hard liquor into his mouth. It was hot as if his insides were burning.
He who needed to be seen as a pathetic drunk periodically poured alcohol into his stomach. For him, drinking was not a purpose but a means, not pleasure but penance.
It took three years for everyone who knew Sarg to regard Sarg Gloriosa as a pathetic drunk.
At some point, he began drinking not as a means but as a purpose, not for penance but for pleasure. Surely Sarg’s soul must reek terribly.
Now Sarg could no longer distinguish whether he was a knight acting as a pathetic drunk, or just a pathetic drunk.
Before he knew it, the glass was empty.
Sarg ordered another glass. It was empty.
He ordered another glass. Already empty.
He ordered another glass. Empty again.
He ordered another glass. It was night before he knew it.
His mind wandered outside his body and the world was spinning madly.
Sarg stood up staggering. He went outside dragging his feet. The ceiling and floor seemed to rush at Sarg as they undulated.
A hulking figure blocked Sarg’s way as he tried to leave.
“Hey. Sir Knight.”
The hulk had once been a holy knight of the Kroitze Order. So the hulk knew that the identity of ‘drunk Sak,’ who spent all day drinking in a corner of the tavern, was Sarg Gloriosa.
Then again, Sak’s identity wasn’t much of a secret. Anyone who knew anything knew about Sarg’s current state.
The former holy knight asked the former papal candidate with a smirk:
“I heard you’re living with a woman. You even have a kid and you’re not even married. I thought you couldn’t function as a man, but you’re something else.”
Why do rumors like this spread so fast?
