Unable to fathom his intentions, she felt all the more burdened.
“Come, Ayesha.”
Kirix urged her on.
Ayesha quietly placed her hand on his elbow. During the short walk to the general store, so many thoughts echoed in her mind that she had to suppress and suppress again the urge to let her breathing run away with her.
The owner of the general store was a young man who looked barely past twenty. In years, he was roughly the same age as the two of them. Perhaps because of that, the young man did not recognize the new lord who had visited his shop.
Ayesha inwardly pressed a hand to her chest in relief, but apart from that, the young man seemed curious about today’s unfamiliar customers. Then he blurted out something that could have caused a disaster.
“Are you a married couple?”
Ayesha’s eyes went wide, and she hurriedly denied it.
“No!”
Ayesha quickly pulled her hand away from where it rested on Kirix’s arm.
“Ayesha?”
She felt a gaze from just above her, looking down at her with displeasure, but Ayesha deliberately ignored it.
The young man tried again to place them.
“Oh, then you must be siblings. No wonder—both of you have such splendid features, the kind you don’t see just anywhere……”
“No, he is my employer. I am unfamiliar with the area, so as a gentleman he has specially accompanied me just for today.”
Ayesha reined in the young man’s curiosity so that no misunderstanding would arise.
“For that, the gentleman cannot take his eyes off you…… ah, ah.”
The young man also belatedly noticed the contrasting attire of Kirix and Ayesha. A man perfectly turned out in an expensive new suit, and a woman in an ordinary skirt with no particular adornment—by any measure, they could not be of equal status.
“One dozen quill pens, please.”
Ayesha approached the counter and placed her order.
“Yes, just a moment. I came out to help my father with his work, so I still do not know well where things are.”
The young man rummaged through the shop shelves and made a sheepish excuse.
“Ah, here they are. Shall I give you right-handed ones or left-handed ones?”
The young man, having searched through the dust-covered goods and found two bundles of quill pens, asked Ayesha.
“Left-handed.”
“Oh, a blessed left-hander.”
“Is that so? Well, it is good when buying quill pens. Left-handers are rare, so I can buy them cheaply.”
“Seeing you buy a whole dozen quill pens at once, you must be a teacher? Or perhaps you write?”
Perhaps because he was a merchant, the young man had a good eye. Of all the many professions, she had not expected him to see through at once that she wrote.
“No, I simply have a habit of writing letters often to family and friends. Sometimes I copy books as well.”
“What a wonderful hobby. Then let me lower the price a little. There is only one general store in the village, so if you write a lot, we will likely run into each other often—in the sense of let us be friendly.”
“Thank you. How much is it?”
Ayesha leaned close to the counter to ask the price. At that moment, the young man glanced back and forth between the two of them, then whispered low so that only she could hear.
“And, um, I am saying this because you seem like a younger sister to me—I have seen many women who played with fire without thinking of the consequences, only to be ruined and discarded. Also, growing up as a merchant’s son, I have met many people, so I am rather good at reading faces, and that gentleman is not someone a person like you should be carelessly seen around with. Miss, the kind of people you must never trust most in the world are gentlemen. They mostly hide a sinister nature, and they are terribly persistent and dangerous.”
It felt as though cold water had suddenly been poured over her head.
The young man had not believed Ayesha’s explanation. He must have taken it as a well-off man from some household playing with fire with a woman who looked like a servant—a maid or a governess, perhaps.
“Why not look for someone among ordinary village folk instead? There are many solid people, and your circumstances would be similar, so you could dream of a future together. I myself will inherit this general store, after all.”
But what on earth was he judging people by to say such things?
“It is not like that……”
It was the moment Ayesha opened her mouth to refute him.
“You have a great deal of useless meddling for people you will never see again. For a mere merchant who does not know his place.”
A cold voice cut in between Ayesha and the young man.
The young man was startled, and so was Ayesha. It was amazing how he had heard a whisper so quick and small that even standing right beside them one would have had to strain one’s ears to the utmost.
A gold coin dropped onto the counter with a clink.
“I will settle it with this.”
The young man’s eyes went wide when he checked the amount.
“Wait, just a moment. This is not an amount I can give change for……”
“Keep the change. Ayesha, is there anything else you need to buy?”
“……No, the quill pens are all I need.”
“Then let us go.”
Kirix, holding the wrapped bundle of quill pens in one hand, put his other hand around Ayesha’s shoulder and walked out of the general store. The young man, cowed by his freezing air, could not even see them off.
***
The man fell in love with immortality, a being belonging to God, and thus was cursed by God.
Does this man have feelings for me?
“No, wait. What am I saying? I am thinking something terrible.”
She was startled by what she herself had written. Ayesha erased the inner voice she had unconsciously put down on paper. The sharp tip of the newly bought quill pen scratched across the paper with a rasp.
Does this man have feelings for me?
Even after crossing it out, she was not reassured. She simply blacked it out entirely until the letters were completely gone.
It made no sense. Why would Kirix Eseldor, a noble, hold a commoner like her in his heart? There was a limit to delusion.
Because he showed her a somewhat warmer side than he showed others?
Because whenever they moved between the dining room and the bedroom, or got in and out of the carriage, he escorted her each time without showing any sign of annoyance?
Even so, for the lord of Eseldor to be interested in a spirit medium who had given nothing but a name, and whose background was entirely unknown—that was too far-fetched to even guess at.
“Then Ayesha, you should call me Kirix as well.”
“I will gift you one that suits you, Ayesha.”
“Because Ayesha looks like a fairy.”
“I am hoping Ayesha will stay a long time.”
“Walk arm in arm with me. You may lean on me, if you like.”
But for simple consideration, his kindness seemed a little excessive…….
Still, that man was Eseldor. House Eseldor had barely kept its line going all this time—surely he would not take up with a woman who was nothing at all, like her. A family like this would place tremendous importance on the value of bloodline.
And Ayesha had absolutely no intention of becoming deeply entangled with Kirix Eseldor on a personal level. Even now, she was worried about how she would handle the consequences. Her goal was to extract a suitable article, then quietly, safely, and swiftly vanish from this manor without causing a commotion.
She must think only of that. Only that.
Ayesha covered one ear with her hand.
Clink.
The trajectory and sharp resonance of the gold coin rolling onto the counter as it interrupted her conversation with the general store young man were still vivid. She shook her head to try to shake off the memory, but the more she did, the more intense the afterimage became.
Clink.
Even covering her ears, the metallic echo would not fade.
“Wow, what do I do……”
It seemed that for a while, facing Kirix would be burdensome.
***
But Kirix Eseldor was not a man one could avoid simply because one did not wish to meet him.
“This is the chapel of Langfield Manor. The weddings and funerals of all the generations of House Eseldor were held here.”
Kirix still sat with her at every mealtime, and now he was guiding her around the manor.
Today she had come with him to the manor’s chapel. It was called a manor, but in scale it was a place that had once been a royal castle. The grounds were vast, and the more she learned, the more complex and difficult the building’s structure became—if she had wandered about alone without a guide, she would surely have gotten lost.
“Weddings and funerals?”
Weddings were joyous occasions, so that was one thing—but if this was a place where funerals were held, should she pretend to see or feel something now? What should she do?
