Chapter 9

The Third life and Thereafter – 1

 

“… … My child, where is he?”

 

A voice sounding like it was absentmindedly dreaming rose amidst the sunlight.

 

“Ilya? What’s wrong?”

 

Soleil’s pair of eyes tinged with a trace of harshness seized me.

Silvia, who had appeared much later than the appointed time, had just settled down on the prepared seat.

She tilted her head with perplexity and called out “Big sister?”

While keeping her figure at the edge of my vision, when I blinked once, I recalled the scene of Soleil and Silvia exchanging words while gazing at each other.

The two of them sitting side-by-side and crossing their gazes, I remembered that this made me feel like I was about to cry while thinking it was some kind of mistake.

I just looked on as Soleil’s pupils were reflecting Silvia and he was smiling gently.

 

… … What is this? What on earth are you saying?

 

As if to shake that floating sensation that was lingering at the back of my eyelids, I casually put down the cup I was holding on its saucer.

The porcelains stroked against each other and made a big resounding noise, the overflowing black tea spread on the tablecloth.

Even though it was my own hand, I couldn’t move it the way I wanted. The greatly shaking fingers grasped at the air.

A lady should not conduct herself in such a manner. But I didn’t care about that.

 

“Where is my child? Who took him?”

 

My own voice sounded distant. The scene spreading out in front of my eyes was that tea party where Soleil and Silvia met.

No, that’s wrong. That was already over. I gave birth to a child. Soleil’s child.

I wonder, is it a boy, or a girl? Which one is it? But I’m sure of it, I certainly did give birth.

I, sticking it out through the pain and suffering that were enough to die, I was blessed with mine and Soleil’s child.  

 

“What are you saying, Ilya?”

            

Soleil stood up and seized me by the arm.

No, I hate it, it hurts, let go.

After such a long time I finally have a use.

Leave me alone.

I gave birth to the child by myself.

            

While spitting out incoherent words, I shook off Soleil’s hand and pulled the tablecloth, searching for my child whose name I didn’t even know.

The maids must have taken him.

Even though I told them to not use a wet nurse, was my opinion not taken into account at all?

Or did my parents-in-law put their hands in the matter ahead of time and took him away?

 

I haven’t held that child yet.

I haven’t even seen his face.

 

“Give him back, Give me back my child …  … !!”

            

Confronted with my screaming voice, Silvia lost her bearing and called out “Big sister!” in confusion.

As she was calling me with her usual sickly-sweet voice, she asked me “What happened?” while clinging to my body.

But with her too slender arms, she couldn’t hold me back as I was struggling in madness. 

 

“Let go! Don’t touch me!”

 

Yet, at the moment my swinging arm was about to hit Silvia’s face, my instinct kicked in and told me to not injure my little sister.

While I was still confusingly holding my arm stopped in mid-air, my lips arbitrary words out,

 

“Or is it you, is it you who snatched my child?”

“What are you saying… …?”

“While stealing Lord Soleil from me, you also took my child right…!”

 

Give him back, give him back, give him back!

Give me back everything you stole away from me!

While screaming, I grabbed Silvia’s thin arms. When I reflexively loosened the strength of my fingers after seeing Silvia’s face distorted in pain, this time it’s my arm which was twisted up by Soleil.

Was it Silvia who raised a scream, or myself?

 

“Stop it, Ilya!”

 

“You haven’t been married yet, you haven’t given birth to a child yet. Nobody has ever stolen anything from you either.” The admonishing words Soleil said while looking at my face passed through my ears.

In his eyes that normally shouldn’t have been lit with the desire to clash with me, at some point a color of contempt that I knew well had risen to the surface.

I certainly saw the moment his clever gaze was dyed by hatred.

 

“Give me back my child! My child, this child is mine!”

 

As I was screaming without any concern for my own appearance, somewhere inside my heart, one of me quietly muttered, Ilya died. And then, it started once again. 

 

“… … That’s not true! Different! It’s different! It’s false! That’s not it!”

“… Ilya!”

 

My seized arm made a crisp sound. I remembered that gesture devoid of forgiveness.

In order to silence that shouting mouth, Soleil’s big hand grabbed my neck.

Even if he didn’t squeeze, that violent action was enough to kill my impetus.

 

“… No, I hate it, I’ve had enough, I can’t, somebody, someone.”

 

My voice couldn’t form the words “help me.” Just like that certain day, my sobs swallowed down such words.

It was always the case. I was whole-heartedly screaming, help me!  Someone help me! Rescue me from here!

But that voice never reached anyone.

            

… … That’s right, that’s how it was.  

            

That’s why I died. My words never reached anyone. My thoughts and emotions were entirely crushed.

Without having held my child in my arms, without having bestowed him a name, abandoned by the person I loved, all alone, without anyone at my side, I died… …

           

My voice made a shriek as I swallowed my breath and it resounded among that tea party that had regained its silence before I knew it.

Soleil kept grasping my arm and was staring at me who had suddenly stopped moving.   

 

“… Here is, why, I, on earth?”

 

It should have ended. I should have finished everything. Yet, why.

            

Why am I standing here again?

            

I remember the color of the sky.

And the sensation of the lawn, the full bloomed roses too, the pattern of the tablecloth, and also the tea, and the prepared pastries.

The figure standing closely next to Soleil, the figure of my lovely little sister who had come late, I remember it too.

My eyes are burning these sights into my memory.

It’s “that tea party”. The beginning point. And also, the point that spells my ending.

 

“Why, why?”

 

Those scenes that are not a tiny bit different from my memories, that they could be a dream was maybe no more than my faint hopes.

Illusions seen on the verge of death, perhaps only a dream.

However, my loudly pounding heart thrust on me the reality that I was certainly alive here and now.

At the second I became aware of this, abruptly my body temperature fell. Even I knew my lips had lost all their colors.

 

“… Ilya?”

 

Soleil’s perplexed voice called out to me.

When was it? When was it that I last thought that his voice calling my name was truly lovely?

 

“… Big sister?”

 

I wondered when it was that I became unable to straightforwardly look at the purple eyes of my little sister who admired me.

My memories and thoughts were trying to steal my consciousness.

            

My body staggered violently and fell.

            

In that interval, my escort who has been here since who knows when, appeared without a sound and held me up in his arms while saying “Forgive me for my rudeness.”

Soleil, who had been the one closest to me, didn’t even support my body and readily let go of my arm.

In a tone of voice that didn’t change from usual nor was lacking in calmness, my escort said, “Since my lady seems to be feeling unwell, please grant her the permission to take her leave first.”

That voice sounded distant, as if I was hearing it while diving at the bottom of the sea.

            

Both Soleil and Silvia only watched as I left my seat.

            

Even in my faintly shaking vision and absent-minded state, I kept repeating the words “give me back my child.”

I thought I should stop, but my lips kept assembling words on their own accord.

The hand of my escort which was supporting my back rubbed it up and down in a gentle and soothing manner any number of times.

This was surely reality. It’s the reality. But I cannot recognize it.

            

I couldn’t block the sight of that tea party that was getting away, the view of Soleil consoling the trembling Silvia who was lost in a daze.

It would have been enough to even blink once, only lowering my eyelids would have been sufficient, but I couldn’t do it.

The two people cuddled close together. Their overlapping silhouettes.

Many, many times over I’ve been shown off that scene, and each time it was burnt into my eyes.   

 

“… Al, where have you been until now?”

 

When I muttered this with my eyes opened wide, his answer was returned without a trace of doubt.

 

“…I’ve always been at your side.”

“No, you haven’t. I... called you.”

“If my lady calls for me, I will come rushing even if it’s from the other end of the world.”

“No, you didn’t come. You didn’t come. I... was lonely, I gave birth by myself, and I died alone.”

“… My lady.”

“Nobody was here. Besides me... no one... was there.”

“… My lady, at all times, I am at your side.”

“No, no.”

 

I understood that my escort knight was matching his answers to my words.

Even though they were words devoid of any gist, he conscientiously answered them without advocating a different opinion, without disregarding them.

My head was able to understand this properly.

However, my mouth was arbitrarily uttering words different from my thoughts.

It was a sensation of having my heart and my flesh completely detached from each other.

Ah, I’ve already gone mad, concluded some part of me who has remained clear-headed.  

 

“But that’s not good, Al. You mustn’t be at my side.”

“… Why mustn’t I?”

“Because, cos...”

 

“You’ll die if you’re at my side,” tried to say my mouth, but the past me controlled it.

“I’m a human who should have already lost her life.” It warns me it’s something that mustn’t be said.

If he hears a disturbing thing such as “you might die”, this overly serious and kind escort knight will surely worry about it, there is no doubt.

And then, far from distancing himself from me, he’ll surely commit himself to stay closer than ever.

“If I might be in danger, then my master might be in an even greater peril.” He is a man who would think that way.

A man who, above all, prides himself on wielding his sword for the sake of protecting someone.

That’s why, in my first life, he got unavoidably dragged into his master's troubles.

 

“… My lady?”

“Again, it has started. I, again…”

 

Again, I’m incorrigibly in love with that person.

Although the steps of my escort who is heading to the mansion are constantly getting faster, in the open-air garden, there are no obstacles which would obstruct the location of that tea party.

Despite the fact it was getting away, I clearly saw Soleil’s hand hovering through the air as if to touch my little sister.

Although it should be a scene I’ve already became used to seeing, I got hurt every time.

 

“… My lady is probably exhausted. If you rest in your room, you will get better.”

 

Al’s voice became distant. While I replied “That’s right” and “Since it’s you who said it, I’ll surely get better” like it was somebody else’s problem, I knew a time when I’d be alright would never come.

No matter what, the self-confidence to claim “it’s the third time so this time everything will go well” will never erupt.

My previous life, and the one before too, had been more than enough to overwhelm and beat me down.  

 

“But, if... if it’s not good, then…?”

 

My muttering voice tumbled down on the lawn.

 

“Al.”

“…”

 

My escort who no longer wanted to answer used his fingers to gently brush off the hair that are covering my face.

When I looked up to see his face, it was tinged with a clear anguish.

 

“Al, Al, please.”

“… What is it?”

“If I’m... If I say I’m already no good...”

 

“...My heart, crush it.”

 

“My lady...”

“So that I’ll never feel anything again.”

 

So that, never again, it’s wounded by someone.

 

“… Such a thing, I cannot do it.”

 

I cannot do it, never. My escort’s voice, that muttered so, became hoarse.

Just like that other time, on that day he told me he would take me and run away.

 

 

*******************************

 

My new life that had started this way, was always buried in confusion.

            

I, who had exposed a more outrageous disgrace than at the tea party in my first life, was reprimanded by my parents and furthermore put under house arrest in my room.

While feeling a sense of déjà vu when I gazed at the cold glare mixed with disappointment my parents directed at me, confined in my own room, I simply spent time single-mindedly sorting out my memories.

As I was persuading myself this was reality, I reminisced about my first and my second life and felt like I was watching some dreams, and I hammered into my head the things I must do.  

            

And then, after a week had passed, things completely returned back to the way they were before.

No, I ought to say I succeeded in acting like the me from before.

On the surface, I played the usual Ilya, I behaved as Soleil’s fiancé and served as Silvia’s older sister.

 

“I apologize for the mess I made at the tea party. I am glad you were kind enough to let me atone for it.”

 

Even without making a conscious effort, those words extremely easily overflowed from my lips.

It was probably due to the experience I cultivated in my lives up till there, but I thought I was truly doing it well.      

            

… … On the surface, that is.

           

For example, when I was alone at night, or when I was out of anyone’s line of sight, that irrupted suddenly.

 

“You, you killed Silvia, right?!”

 

My former lives were revived vividly inside my head, blending together.

When I was in a darkness devoid of any light, when I remembered that narrow prison, my body trembled and I shrank on myself, unable to move.

The metallic sounds reverberating from far away were the other prisoners’ voices drawn in madness. It’s the sound of their yells begging to be released from here while they jolt the iron grill.

Suddenly, from head to toe, everything disappears.

I notice that no voice comes out even when I try to raise a scream. Even a pathetic gulping sound vanishes in the dark.  

            

When I think it’s over, the crying voice of a newborn infant echoes from somewhere.

           

Even if I shout, even if I scream, even if I angrily roar, even if I jeer, no matter what I do, the baby crying voice won’t leave my ears.

It’s probably, surely, the voice of the child I lost.

That child must have grown well. But, at the moment I died, I eternally parted with him.

No matter how many times I repeat my life, meeting the child I gave birth to that day will never happen for all eternity.

            

My beloved, dearly beloved child. But I don’t even remember his face.

No matter how loved, precious and desired his existence was, my wish to grasp that child’s hand will never come true.

 

However, sometimes, in my dreams or my phantasms, I’m holding my child in my own arms.

Or maybe I’m just copying the action of holding him.

 

I’m broken.

Somewhere in my head, I clearly comprehend this.

But everything is not broken. I was sane enough to comprehend the fact I was broken.  

 

“That’s right, you are sane. When compared to me, it’s an outrageous sanity.”

 

… … And then, as I kept going back and forth between dream and reality, in that manner, it came along to my side.

Trespassing from the window of my room, at first it imitated the figure of a bird.

It had black feathers, and a body considerably bigger than the small birds you would catch sight of on early morning.

It was an existence which seemed it would melt in darkness if you didn’t concentrate your eyes on it.

At the beginning, it just flew around without a sound under the dark sky.

I didn’t know whether it had an aim or not. But, before I knew it, it recklessly flew in and trespassed in my room.

            

Before long, it walked on the ground, and one day suddenly, it talked like a human.

 

“What’s your name? Ô captive princess?”

 

It spoke to me with the voice of a young boy.

 

“Princess, do you know my name?”

 

“My name is Crow.”

 

With its small head tilted on the side, its yellow eyes were looking at me.

 

“The bird portentous of ill omen.”

 

Chapter 8                                                          Chapter 10