#94

“Uh, yeah. As you now know, so our married life… was… not so smooth, and anyway, I… so… it seemed like there was really no way… Out of frustration, I threw words I didn’t mean at Henrik just to provoke and mock him… Yeah, that’s all. It’s not like I didn’t call for you and wait… I didn’t truly intend to run away with Henrik.”

“I see.”

“…Really?”

“Yeah.”

Johannes’ response, accepting it more readily than expected, was suspicious. Feeling somewhat anxious, I turned my head to look at him.

Our eyes met. His arm, which had been pressed against my body, stretched out to encircle my waist. Johannes twisted his shoulder to cover my body and gently overlapped his lips on mine. Then, in a calm and low tone, as if he just wanted to confirm something, he whispered to me.

Open.

At that moment, I couldn’t move an inch. I was a little… chilled.

The intention was clear. Even without him asking, I would have accepted him, and he should know this. The intention of speaking as if commanding. However, like someone enchanted by his voice, I parted my lips without even closing my eyes.

Johannes immediately delved into me, gently exploring the inside of my mouth. He entwined himself with my dazed tongue and slowly withdrew as if he would never let go. Then he gently pushed up my jaw, which I hadn’t managed to close, with the bridge of his nose. The sensation of lightly sucking on the flesh of my lips, as if leaving a final seal, followed like an afterglow.

My heart pounded, thump thump, thump thump. His subtly forceful attitude is like some magic that binds me, both then and now. It strangely shakes up one’s heart completely. Even now that I’ve realized the reason, I often become numb to this.

Every time that happens, Johannes’ insides must surely be burning black.

“Ah, anyway, so…”

I carefully took a deep breath. Feeling the breath brushing close from the front, my gaze naturally fell downward. Hoping that Johannes wouldn’t notice my embarrassingly flushed skin, I barely managed to continue the previous conversation.

“Thanks to that, I’m grateful that I can be with you like this, but really… Who could it have been? The person who sent you the letter.”

“Actually, I suspect Griselda or Winfrid.”

Johannes answered as he suddenly hooked his arms under both my knees and sat me on his waist. I opened my eyes wide at his unexpected response.

The day before, having finally not sent Johannes away, I had explained in detail the reasons why I had decided to part. Of course, I left out the incident where Winfrid, who had noticed our relationship through Griselda, had threatened me, but since there weren’t any particularly illogical aspects, Johannes seemed to understand more or less. But now…

“Why those two?”

“Well… Setting aside the priests who are good at feigning indifference, Griselda is the only one who could know the lyrics that can only be heard by your side, and she was always worried about you. And that day… Winfrid delivered the letter to me instead of the head servant. If it’s him, there’s a possibility he was asked by Griselda. No, but it still doesn’t quite add up…”

Johannes let out a long sigh. He added that he couldn’t imagine how Griselda, who couldn’t read, could have written the letter, and if it was Winfrid, it was an action completely unlike him. What could they have wanted? I was equally puzzled.

Yes, Johannes’ speculation that Griselda might have deceived him out of concern for me wasn’t entirely unreasonable. However, it was also a speculation possible only because he didn’t know that Griselda was the very person who noticed our relationship and tried to dissuade me. I had never thought she would be someone to regret her choice. And Winfrid?

“At least it won’t be those two.”

I muttered quietly. Feeling his gaze fixed on me, I hesitated. Should I tell him even now, after all?

That the person who most strongly urged our separation was none other than Winfrid. And all the accusations that child hurled at me, the stories he laid out almost like curses, saying it was the rightful end I would face alone. I felt my tongue go dry.

But soon I steeled my resolve. Let it be. I shouldn’t.

The reason for not changing my mind was the same as the day before. Because they were brothers who might not be able to reunite happily again for who knows how long. It seemed that as the person who was practically responsible for separating the two who were usually so close, it would be utterly wrong of me as a human to create unnecessary rifts. I slowly shook my head.

“Of course Griselda worried about me, but she seemed to think that a somewhat difficult married life was something I should naturally endure…. Even if Winfrid had heard about my married life somewhere, would he worry about me with his personality? It would be fortunate if he didn’t just sneer. Moreover, he wouldn’t send such a letter even as a thoughtless prank when you might be in trouble. You know how much he follows you.”

“…The youngest son of Valdemar does care for his elder brother a bit.”

Johannes spoke as if reciting a rumor he had heard somewhere, treating it like someone else’s business, and then laughed like a sigh. And perhaps, that was why that child kept coming up in our conversation.

It was then that I suddenly recalled the legend I had heard from Winfrid in the underground palace. The origin of the devil with an unusual appearance and the curse associated with it. Johannes might know the answer.

“Hey.”

I parted my lips almost unconsciously. But I hesitated for a moment, unable to continue. Johannes’ calm gaze turned to me again. If I missed this moment, I didn’t know when I would be able to ask again. Seeing Johannes’ quiet gaze, I gathered a bit more courage. I swallowed dry saliva inside my tightly closed mouth.

“I told you yesterday what I was worried about when I left you, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Actually, there was one more thing I was worried about…”

“What is it?”

“There’s something I heard from Winfrid.”

“…”

“It was… you know… a legend about the devil of our maternal family.”

Silence. It was a reaction I had somewhat expected. Johannes, whose eyes had instantly sunk as soon as Winfrid’s name came up in the reasons for separation, eventually closed his mouth tightly. Fortunately or unfortunately, he didn’t seem particularly angry.

Rather, it was a mild melancholy. Further, it was an atmosphere that even felt like some kind of chronic sadness. When I, unable to press him further, was just looking down at my toes gathered to the side.

“What did that kid say?”

Johannes asked me. It was a calm voice. I quietly swallowed once.

The night was quiet.

Only my softly murmuring voice and the occasional crackling sound of sparks from the brazier at our feet slowly echoed through the room.

Johannes, dissolved into the silence, listened to my belated confession without a sound. Even the smallest piece of furniture in the inner room seemed to be lending an ear to me. Even the window, well-locked to not let the warmth escape, felt like some stranger turned away pretending not to know, secretly listening. Only the few candles left unlit in the room flickered indifferently, melting their own bodies.

I detailed the legends I had heard from Winfrid. Afterwards, I said that I was anxious and uneasy, feeling as if your body had become like that because I broke the sarcophagus. And I also said that I was terribly afraid of the chains of curses that might be binding us without our knowledge.

“…I just couldn’t bring myself to tell you. I thought that if I just retracted my empty wish to the sarcophagus, everything, that is, you… would return to normal. I’m sorry. I should have asked for your forgiveness earlier…”

“…”

“Anyway, seeing you now, I can clearly imagine how worried Winfrid must be.”

I finished the story with a shallow sigh. But there was no particular response. I glanced up from where my gaze had been fixed down. By now, Johannes was resting his elbow on the armrest, chin in hand. From the side of his face, as expressionless as an inanimate object, I could read nothing.

“It could be called that.”

“Huh?”

I, who had been restless as Johannes’ silence lengthened, raised my head at the sudden voice.

“…A curse.”

Our eyes finally met as Johannes had been staring at me for some time. I showed a puzzled expression. Johannes, who had been quietly watching me, soon adjusted his posture, and his upper body that had been tilted to one side came up towards me. I leaned my head on his shoulder, waiting for an answer. And what followed was…

“…Having been left in a diseased state for a long time, the limbs were becoming necrotic.”

It was a story I couldn’t make heads or tails of. Johannes, who had closed his mouth again, whether knowing or not that I was surprised, was silent for a while, then opened his mouth again with a much calmer look than before.

“Unable to receive other treatment, he set out on the journey home loaded on a cart. With no one to cover him with even a straw mat, he watched his own limbs gradually rot away as he was carried. Though that sight wasn’t particularly pleasant to look at, he was in no position to blame anyone, so only the fact that he had to face his father again in such a state tormented the man. He felt ashamed. In fact, he was almost out of his mind with fever.”

“…”

“The man arrived at his family home in a dying state. His father, seeing that state, continuously cursed while attaching parts of the devil he had collected to prove his hypothesis to his son’s body. Ah… you all. May you all be miserable. May all the paths you walk lead to ruins.”

“…”

“May you meet the most wretched end of all.”

“…”

“They say he filled three whole days with such curses… So perhaps that has become entangled with the devil’s power and manifested in this way as the curse Winfrid spoke of. Now that I think about it, it was a successful curse.”

There was a light sneer mixed in at the end of the quietly continued story. However, the faint smile that had hung on his lips was soon erased by the painful light that came, as if washed away by water. His gaze settled on the empty space below. His head fell slightly.

“…Whose story is this?”

I asked, clutching Johannes’ lapel. A brief silence.

“A knight from a past era.”

Johannes answered slowly, closing his eyes.

“A coward who abandoned his family. A pathetic bastard who mixed his flesh with an ancient beast and is now a complete monster in one body.”

“…”

“The devil of Dücomeng.”

“…”

From the beginning.

The voice I recalled first was Johannes’ that I had heard in the forest. ‘From the beginning’. So, are you now confessing that you were the devil itself? I was completely at a loss for words.

A single membrane wing. Limbs that seemed to mix predatory birds and beasts. A huge horn piercing through the temple. And the silver whites of eyes that had stared at me, devoid of any reason…

However, I can assert that the fact that Johannes was a devil was not important to me. In fact, I didn’t care what he was. The only reason I was so confused was that Johannes’ words and actions that I had seen and heard so far, and his attitude as if talking about someone else’s business, were far from the conclusion I had drawn at the time.

“Lady Valdemar, who was in a desperate situation, happened to awaken him. Three times.”