If this is

the real end – 6

“My lady… ! What happened?”

            The

one who discovered me sitting down covered in ink was an old maid. Even though

usually no one would enter the archives, it seemed she had come on some whim. As

she entered, she was simply saying “It will soon be time to take a rest…” but when

she saw me, she swallowed her breath and exclaimed in a loud voice, “Oh G.o.d…!”

Then, in a panic, she turned heels and locked the door. As long as my parents

were outdoor, there were no other person that could enter or exit the archives.

But on the unlikely event someone would open the door, she was probably worried

they would catch a glance of my unsightly appearance. Certainly, it was not a

good thing to let the servant see me now. Because needless inquiries would be

made to discover why I ended up like this. As the youngest servants’ loyalty

was little, they had a loose tongue. End even those who have served for a

longer time had moment of carelessness where they could let something slip. If

that were to happen, in the blink of an eye bad rumors about me would spread.

This situation of having stained your body by the spilled ink wouldn’t happen

even to a young child. Because if you were an aristocrat, someone would always

be by your side since your early childhood. If a situation such as spilling ink

and dirtying your body occurred, it would be because of the blunder of the

nearby person and not of the n.o.ble himself. That was what it meant to be born a

n.o.ble. Being under the patronage of someone was natural, being protected,

cherished, and served by others weren’t anything special. It was commonplace, a

natural thing.

“Al is…?”

When I

asked the question that floated in my mind, she answered with an apologetic expression,

“… Alfred-sama has leaved the manor on an errand.”

            …

… I messed up.

            In

such circ.u.mstances, it wasn’t preferable to call someone from the opposite s.e.x.

I have to show the proper reaction. I have to take the suitable att.i.tude as a

n.o.ble. Having reconsidered my thoughts, I shook my head.

“No, that is not what I mean… I am

glad it was you.”

            I am glad it was you who came, when I

said that, the maid lowered her eyebrows and showed a small smile. She probably

didn’t know what kind of expression to make.

            I

was all alone in that place. Even though I was a n.o.ble’s daughter, my figure

smeared in ink offered a miserable sight. If there had been a person wanting to

defame me here… they would probably be pointing their fingers at me while

laughing.

“Is there

anything to wipe with…” Extending a hand to me who was still sitting on the

floor, the maid helped me up without caring about dirting herself, then her

eyes glided across the room. “No, it’s alright.” When I declared so as I

staggered on my feet, I met eyes with her anxious brown eyes. “… My lady, your

face is ghastly pale. Are you feeling unwell?” My back was gently stroked with

sympathy. It made me feel like my wavering and swaying heart was sinking even

more. She had been serving our house for a long time. In fact, she was the maid

who had been entrusted with taking care of Silvia. At first, Silvia’s wet nurse

was supposed to carry that duty. But her physical condition deteriorated and

she went back to her home town. Therefore, because of her long years of service

she was chosen as a subst.i.tute among the several employed maids. My parents had

that much trust in her, and nowadays she was completely serving as Silvia’s

attached maid.

            But

she was originally my exclusive maid.

One day, mother selected her out of

many candidates to employ her as a first-rate maid for me who was to become the

spouse of a marquis. So, she stayed with me since the day I became Soleil’s

fiancé. But despite this, there was no mention of anything. At some point, I

didn’t even remember when exactly, little by little, she distanced herself from

me. Father or mother might have issued the instruction to do so. I didn’t know

what the reason was, nor did I feel like asking. Because at this point I knew

it would be futile. 

            But

when I noticed it, I received a considerable shock. When I took a break from my

studies and rose my head, the maid who should always have been by my side

wasn’t here. Thinking she had some kind of business to do, I didn’t pay it any

mind, but she didn’t come back like usual. After spending several days like

this, as expected I couldn’t continue to ignore that situation anymore, and I

went to look for her. The fact I didn’t ask anyone about her whereabouts was

due to my conceit for being her master. Since I, the master, didn’t know where

she was, how come someone else could know? … That was the thoughts I had. Shortly

after, I realized it was just a misunderstanding. I was reunited with her in

the corridor just as she was exiting Silvia’s room. The maid revealed a guilty

expression just for a moment before covering it up with a smile. “Have you come to see Silvisama? Right

now, Silvisama is resting,” she said. She told me this in an extremely

natural tone. That’s why I understood that she was no longer mine. Unable to

accept it, when I casually appealed to mother, I was gently admonished, “If you are concerned for Silvia, then you

should draw back, don’t you think so?” Because

we’ll hire another maid for you. She was neither angry nor trying to reason

me, rather she warned me like how someone would persuade a little child. Her

gaze was looking at me as if I was a hopeless, foolish child. She took it as if

I was stirring troubles, behaving selfishly to prevent my maid from being taken

from me. Silvia is also important for

you, right? She threw at me a question that didn’t allow anything but an

affirmative answer. There was nothing I could say back.  

            Even

though in these repeating lives of mine, several discrepancies are born, at the

point in time Silvia and Soleil meet, I have already lost her.

“Considering the situation, it is

probably preferable to prepare a hot bath. While I apology for the

inconvenience, but can you fill the bathtub with hot water please?”  

            I

lightly wiped my hands with the cloth I brought to clean the dust from the book

collection. Unable to see this and let it pa.s.s, the maid exclaimed with

criticisms hidden in her voice, “Lady! You mustn’t clean your hand with such a

cloth…!” It’s alright, it’s fine, I

answered blandly, tidying up my skirt and wiping away the ink. A drop of ink

that had yet to dry made a new stain on the floor. “I apologize for dirtying

this place. Cleaning everything is hard, isn’t it?” When I said that with a

bitter smile, the maid creased her eyebrows. “There is no need for my lady to

apologize… Absolutely none.” It was unusual for that everlasting calmed maid to

lose her composure. Being told off in a slightly strengthened tone made a

strained laughed escaped from my mouth. My conduct was probably flagrant to

that extent. It wasn’t like I did it on purpose. But I couldn’t help it because

for some reason the image of the polished floor remained imprinted in my

eyes. 

            I

mustn’t do anything that would inconvenient the servant, I must never take that

att.i.tude in front of a maid. I wasn’t that kind of person and I mustn’t become

such a woman. I must always be calmed, never lose my temper, and always wear a

smile. “Apart from that… I wish we had something to wipe with but…” The dust

cloth I had with me had already been dyed deep blue. But the maid shook her

head a little and whispered, “… That’s not the point, that’s not what matters.”

I really didn’t know what the maid who had lowered her head and was biting on

the corner of her mouth was thinking. “… What happened?” When I asked her, she

suddenly rose her head and strongly stated “Please, accept my deepest

apologize. I will go prepare a hot bath.” For some reason her shoulders fell

down and she had a depressed look. “Please, wait here for a little while, my

lady,” she said that but I couldn’t bring myself to let her go in that state. “…Merge.”

Reflexively, I called her out and she stopped. The maid who turned back with

her shoulders trembling in surprise, opened her eyes wide like she had seen

something unbelievable. “?” I tilted my head wondering what on earth happened

to her, but then she muttered, “You remembered it.”  “I remembered what?” Shaking her head like

she was trying to get ride of her bewilderment, Merge took several steps back

and smiled. “No, it is nothing,” she replied as if truly, nothing had happened.

“… Do not try to dodge the question,

Merge.”

            I

might not have paid any mind to her reaction if I had been in my usual state.

Or if it had been the first me. I would have believed her words. But, I knew

that when she had said there was nothing, it meant there was something. If it

was really nothing, then there would have been not need to expressly say those

words. We stared at each other for a little while, but before long Merge let

out a small sigh and explained, “About my name, I thought that you had

already…” Her last words were left unsaid, probably because she noticed it was

out of bounds for a mere maid to say that. No servants would ask their master

if he or she remembered their name. They shouldn’t mind such a detail, it was

the right and liberty of the master whether to remember or not. That was how the

master-servant relations.h.i.+p worked.

            However,

it wasn’t like the time spent together with her was so little and

insignificant. At the beginning I learnt a lot of things under her constant

attendance. Because around the time when it was decided I would become Soleil’s

fiancé, I was too young. I truly didn’t know anything, couldn’t do anything.

The one who taught me than even when I was simply sitting on a chair, I had to

stay sharp and careful was none other than this maid. “Remembering it, isn’t it

natural?”

            My

voice that should have answered without letting any emotion shown in it

strangely sounded a little cold. I couldn’t stop a self-mocking smile to appear

as I discovered I hadn’t been trusted so far. Did she think I wouldn’t recall her

even her name? Did she stay at my side while thinking so all that time? If that

was the case, then it wasn’t father’s and mother’s fault if she went to serve

under Silvia. She had surely given up herself. I could understand that much.

            If

I had to place the responsibility on someone, then as expected, it would be my

fault.

“…. Lady,”

            She

called me with a slightly shaking voice.

“You were really good to me. That’s

why I am really grateful,” I told her.

Thank you, I added and laughed, my lips drawn in their

never changing arc. It felt like my eyes, nose and mouth were drawn with ink on

a paper that has been stuck to my face. It was a lot thinner than a mask. But

also a lot more suffocating. Experiencing this all too familiar feeling, I

deepened my smile. Merge who was staring at my expression widened her eyes for

a second, but the next one she lowered her head without saying anything. Then

she left the archives in a trot like she was fleeing. No doubts there must have

been something she had wanted to say. But in the end, she didn’t. It made me

realized how empty and vain this so-called relation of mutual trust was.

… … Now

and even in the past too, I often saw her accompanying Silvia in her

stroll.   

As Silvia

wasn’t properly receiving a lady education, the master-servant barrier didn’t

exist between them. It felt more like they were spending time together as

friends. They seemed to laugh and discuss a lot.

“If the maid was a spy… then what do you intend to do?”

            When

I was still a young child, Merge said this to me. At that time precisely, there

had been a maid I was closed to. She was an exceedingly rare existence, someone

who would friendly accost even someone like me, a child who always kept her

distance with all the servants employed in the estate. It could also be said

that because she was still young, she had yet to completely understand the

rules of the master-servant relations.h.i.+p. However, because of her friendliness,

I told her a lot of things about the feelings I had built-up. Like what books I

just read, what I learnt from my private tutor, even up to the content of the

dream I saw. 

            She

was a good listener, and she was also good at getting information out of me. I,

who never had a friend of the same age, told her about what kind of rooms there

were in the mansion proudly. Because she would be delighted when I did so. Because

she would make a happy expression. Seeing me act like this, Merge tried to

offer me an honest advice. “Even if she

isn’t a spy, what if there is such a person among her friends, her family or

her relatives?” Her words that only showed doubts stuck to my mind. I

listened quietly as she told me I had to comprehend and deal with them by

myself. Even though she didn’t teach me the answer, I understood properly. She

was saying I mustn’t be too intimate with the maid.

            It

was only a few days after receiving Merge’s pointing that I learn that maid had

resigned her job and left the mansion.

            Saying

that I wasn’t sad would be a lie. After seeing her off, I cried in my room. I

did it secretly as to not let anyone find out. I cried holding my voice down. I

didn’t want anyone to know I had been hurt by her departure.

            Whether

this maid had truly been an ill-intended person or not, I never knew. However,

I remembered how she had told me, “Lady,

please, cheer up,” when I was about to cry. She had say she had a little

brother quite apart in age from her. He had been suffering from an illness

since many years ago and couldn’t even stand up so they needed a lot of money.

She had frankly narrated her life story. I didn’t know if it was true or not,

but that person who smiled bitterly and said, “My lady and myself might be quite alike,” brought me a feeling of

relief. Even though I had a family, even though I wasn’t all alone in the

world, I never could get rid of a sense of isolation and loneliness. That there

was a person that would understand this saved me to some extent. Even if that

had been a lie. But in the end, what was important here wasn’t if she was an honest

person or a liar.

            It

was how our surroundings would perceive it.  

            Even

if she was telling the truth, even if she was worth of trust. That had nothing

to do. The problem was that she hadn’t work enough to gain the trust of the

surrounding people. If she hadn’t been a maid or a newly hired servant, the

circ.u.mstances might have been different. But, it hadn’t been the case.

*

*

            About half an hour later, I was given a towel by another maid who had

come to inform me the bath was ready. I couldn’t wipe away the ink that had

already dried so I wrapped it around me and covered my whole body. Then I

quickly moved to the bathroom so as to not been seen by other people. Although

I hadn’t done anything requiring a considerable amount of efforts, I was

exhausted. Unexpectedly, worrying about things used a lot of strength.

            While

I was still absentmindedly lost in my thoughts, the maid helped me removed my

stained clothes. Although it was a casual attire, the way clothes for n.o.bility

were fastened was complex and taking them off alone would consume a lot of

time. I quickly undressed and I entered in the bathroom followed by the maid

who intended to help me bath. The room itself was wide, but the bathtub was

barely big enough to allow to people to go in at the same time. It was

overflowing with hot water. After pouring some on my body to lightly wash it

off, I put the tips of my toes in the bathtub. It wasn’t too hot nor too

lukewarm. The water was just at the perfect temperature. I submerged myself up

to my shoulders. The water seemed slightly murky, probably because of the ink

that had remained on a place I couldn’t see.

Somehow, I

was feeling really tired. When I sank until the water reached my mouth, droplets

fell from the ceiling. As I absentmindedly gazed at the fallen droplets float

in the bathtub, they continued to fall and enter my field of vision one after

the other. It almost looked like rain drops. Each time I blinked, I felt that

the amount of falling droplets increased. The water drops that rebounded on the

surface of the water jumped into my faintly opened eyes. For some reason, that

feeling was familiar. When I closed my eyes while twisting my head, trying to

remember it, my right cheek slowly sank into the water. I was thinking I

couldn’t stay like this, yet the darkness cut me off reality.

*potapota**batabata**botabota**jabajaba**zaazaa**zaazaa*…

A scene

rose at the other side of my consciousness. I saw my own arm stretched out.

Because my palms were turn upward, my long nails were extended toward the sky.

… My nails were? Such a trivial detail was accompanied with a sense of

discomfort. A daughter of a n.o.ble doesn’t have long nails. Because one of the

taught subject was how to play musical instruments. Whether it was string,

keyboard or even wind instruments, most needed the performer to cut their nails

short to play them. From childhood I had been learning piano. Therefore, my

nails had never been long. But, right now, at the tip of my gaze, the nails of my

stretched-out hands were long. Rather, they haven’t been trimmed. Here and there

they were chipped, their forms were irregular and crooked.

After

becoming aware of all these details, I noticed that my body almost couldn’t

move. In addition, my eyes too couldn’t see well. Was my eyesight dropping, or

was it physically hindered by something? It was probably both. As I kept

blinking again and again, I realized I was rolling on the ground. The reason I

couldn’t see my surrounding well was because a quite strong rain was falling,

and the street lights weren’t lit. Big raindrops dashed and bounced on the

bared ground not properly paved. The bouncing water hit my cheeks. I lay there

impa.s.sively, waiting for time to pa.s.s as the strong rain nearly drown my whole

body.

… … Ah,

I’m, again… I’m dying again.

I couldn’t

remember clearly what had happened. I might have forgotten why I ended up

rolling in this back alley but my memories from even long before that might

also be cloudy. I wonder if I ended up like this because I was sick? Or was it

because of an injury? Had I been a.s.sault by someone? Or, did I do this to

myself? I didn’t understand anything, but I knew it seemed to be too late now,

I was about to die. Each time I closed my eyelids, the remaining time was decreasing.

The drops of water falling on my lips mercilessly flew into my mouth so

breathing was difficult and painful. But my tongue that stopped moving refused

or couldn’t spit them out.

I wonder how

many times I’ve repeated my life? Even this was vague. I want to take it easy.

I want to throw away this damaged body and go somewhere. And then, never come

back here once again. Even thought that was what I thought… I will surely,

again, return here, to this world.

“… Hel…p”

            I

said a word I didn’t how many times I had repeated. While I knew n.o.body would

hear it, if G.o.d was here, I was praying it would reach them. I tightly shut my

eyes and waited for that moment.

“… It’s fine.”

            The

voice that echoed suddenly made my heart beat relentlessly. When I opened my

heavy eyelids, I saw the tip of black shoes in front of me. For a second, I

thought it was a woman because the clothes coiled around that person looked

like a skirt. But the voice I heard definitely belonged to a man. Besides it

was terribly familiar. What he was wearing wasn’t a skirt, but a black robe. I

recognized it. The hem of the robe that was swaying just above the ground wasn’t

getting wet despite the rain. There wasn’t any mud on the shoes that were

barely visible. Since I had already lost my strength I couldn’t move my head

and confirm his face. But I was already convinced. I thought it was a nostalgic

voice. His single sentence “it’s fine” that got lost in the sound of rainfall was

heartrending. Always, I’ve always been waiting for this. I’ve always been

waiting for him to appear. For him to reveal himself only at the very last

moment when I’m on my death, it was so… He looked down on my face as he slowly

crouched down. Because his head was covered by a big hood I only saw his mouth.

The pale color, the shape of his fine lips, I recalled the days I spent with

him. When was it that I revealed my secret to him? When was it that I gave up

on my life when it was denied, when it wasn’t accepted?  

“… finally.”

            I

wonder which one of us whispered this. The sound of the rain that knocked on

the ground drowned it out, the words that were supposed to follow after this vanished.

            This

body that I couldn’t move even the slightest bit, Crow hold it up in his arms. Then,

he gently whispered something close to my ears. I didn’t know whether his words

held meaning or not. Even thought it was the first time we met in this life, I

was surprised by how he was acting as if we were old friends. But anyway, there

was no longer anything that could be done and it didn’t matter anymore.

            There

was something I wanted to tell him. Crow probably didn’t want to know though.

Somehow, I really wanted to convey this to him.

“There was… a meaning.”

            I

thought my voice would no longer come out, yet my dry tongue spined out those

words. For some reason, that voice echoed clearly.

“There has… been… a reason.”

            …why I wasn’t loved.

            …

… In one of my lives, at some point, Crow said, as there is no reason to love

someone, isn’t there also no reason to not love someone? If that was the case,

then no matter what you do, wouldn’t it be meaningless? If there was no reason,

no meaning for not being loved, it was because there was no room to be loved.

            But

I knew. The reason why I wasn’t loved. The reason why my parents never loved me

and only loved Silvia. In reality, I knew why.

            I

opened my lips to tell him, but it seemed I didn’t have any remaining energy

left. I could only meaninglessly keep opening and closing them. As if to soothe

my chest from which rose a painful whistling sound, Crow tenderly stroked my

back. He gently calmed me, “It’s fine now.” Abruptly I felt that I no longer

cared about anything.  

            It’s

fine now, it’s alright.

            The

repeated words resonated in my heart. It was what I wanted to hear. I always,

wanted someone to. I wanted that to be said. I see, it’s already fine. When I

thought so, my consciousness quickly faded away.

            The

sound of the rain continued to echo in my ears.

            I

was… …        

Nocta’s warning for next week

release:

In terms of length the next chapter

is a monstrosity, so I’ll release it in two parts. Next Sunday will be part one

and the part two will be in two weeks. I won’t upload the chapter on NovelUpdates

until it’s completed, so only in two weeks. Those who can’t wait to read half a

chapter can come next week, the other can just take a break from despair. I won’t

raise both arms to cling to his back.

Also, is there an English onomatopoeia

for the sound of rain? Otherwise, please use your imagination for the *potapota**batabata**botabota**jabajaba**zaazaa**zaazaa*…