It was a word he never imagined would come from the Commander’s mouth.
But even as Fay was startled, he simultaneously felt as if the answer to the doubt he’d sensed a moment ago had finally been resolved.
‘So it was, after all. The Commander had been watching me and Matten from much earlier.......’
If, as Glowe had guessed, the Cavalry seniors had reached that place that day after a long pursuit of Matten and the merchants, then there was no way the Cavalry Commander wouldn’t know it.
A subordinate who, calling those who were the targets of pursuit “friends,” went out to meet them without a thought. From the Commander’s standpoint, how would that have looked?
“Were you... watching me in case I was in league with Matten? Because I might have already been in cahoots with them even before entering the Cavalry.......”
Kishiar accepted it cleanly.
“That’s right.”
“In that case, perhaps that day wasn’t the first time you were watching me.......”
“Yes. I had my eye on you a bit earlier.”
A different shade of surprise than before appeared on Glowe and Elpokin’s faces as well. Kishiar calmly took in the faces of the three, shaken as they were, and continued speaking.
“The merchants we captured this time were people who had been traveling around the entire North with ‘a certain ill purpose.’ To explain briefly for security’s sake—let’s say they pretended to sell ordinary goods while planting within them seeds capable of causing a disaster similar to the one in the South.”
“My God... Is such a thing possible by human hands?”
“Has it been resolved now?”
Glowe and Elpokin asked cautiously. Kishiar nodded.
“Fortunately, we noticed early and were able to stop it. In order to sell their goods more easily and in greater quantity, they forged the name of a certain famous trading company based in the North—unfortunately for them, that firm happened to be one with deep ties to me.”
“Ah....... Truly, th—that’s a relief.......”
“Fay. Did you know this?”
Kishiar turned the question. His eyes were steady, as if they already knew the answer. Drawn by that gaze, Fay slowly shook his head.
“......No. Not at all... I truly... did not know.”
“Yes. I thought as much.”
“I thought as much”—even hearing it, it was a plain reply almost unbelievable.
“Y—you really believe me when I say I didn’t know...?”
“I watched how you fought that person called Matten, and with what intent you decided on a voluntary attempt. I have no choice but to believe.”
The red eyes quietly declared it.
“I can’t praise that you tried to cast yourself aside so easily without using your ability even once; but the effort you made in that moment to find a way to catch Matten off guard, and the heart with which you tried to protect the Cavalry even if you had to offer yourself—that, I understood was surely sincere.”
“.......”
“So you will remain a Cavalry member, as you have until now, and going forward as well.”
Ah.
For an instant, from deep within Fay’s heart, a powerful thrill surged like a wave.
Yes. Right. Those words were right. Kishiar la Orr was the only person who had seen from beginning to end all of Fay’s tearful, desperate struggle that day.
‘He understands?’
That fight that had been a solitary desperation.
The choice he’d made because he hadn’t wanted to bring shame upon the Cavalry.
The courage he’d wrung out to fight for the things he’d come to love anew even while being mocked and rolling in disgrace.
Kishiar la Orr knew that he had wanted to make amends for his mistake even at the cost of his paltry life? That one so exalted did not laugh at Fay’s feeble thrashing, as insignificant as dust, but understood it—was such a thing truly possible?
Good heavens. How could he possibly express this astonishment?
It was the same statement as when Glowe and Elpokin had just told him, “Since the Commander has acknowledged your innocence, you won’t be expelled,” but it felt utterly different.
The Commander believes in Fay.
He understands Fay.
And so he had decided he would not expel Fay. That is to say—
It felt as if Fay’s existence, so faint it wouldn’t have been strange if it vanished at any time, had finally been recognized as allowed to remain in this world.......
“.......”
“Fay?!”
“Why are you suddenly crying?”
Glowe and Elpokin reached out in sudden alarm. Only then did Fay realize he was streaming tears. Leaving the tears to fall as they would, he staggered to his feet and knelt before Kishiar.
It was an act he performed almost without awareness. If he didn’t do so, he felt he would not be able to bear this feeling and would howl like a beast.
“......Th—thank you. For watching over me... for believing me.......”
“My. I had thought you might curse me as a fearsome Commander cold to the core... This reaction I did not expect.”
“Why would I do that?”
Fay cried out through his tears.
“You, Commander, decided to believe me rather than call me a shameful subordinate who couldn’t even use his ability properly, who kept falling for the enemy’s ploys and chose a voluntary attempt. Since I chose to die on my own, even if you had left me as I was, no one would have said anything—but you did not.”
Had the Commander rescued him before he decided on and carried out the voluntary attempt, Fay would have awakened with only the memory of having been horribly toyed with by Matten and unable to resist at all. If that had happened, even if he’d heard that he could remain in the Cavalry, he would never have felt as he did now.
Because the reason Kishiar la Orr decided to let Fay remain in the Cavalry was not simply because he pitied Fay, nor for any other impulsive and emotional reason.
It was because he judged that Fay’s voluntary attempt had not been a foolish decision made at the end of being one-sidedly manipulated by Matten, but a “decision made to fight for the Cavalry.”
And so at last Fay felt truly accepted here.
It felt as if he had stepped away from being someone who loved the Cavalry alone in aching one-sidedness and become someone genuinely belonging.
While Fay quelled his tears and calmed down, Kishiar continued, slowly, to speak on.
“I doubt the merchants’ objective was to target you from the very start, Fay. Did they themselves not admit it? Finding you, an Awakener, by chance, and seeing you even enter the Cavalry, they became greedy. Ordinarily, if one means to plant a collaborator within a group in that fashion, the proper way is to work over several years... That they chose to feed poison and use coercive means means they were in that much of a hurry as well.”
“.......”
“In many ways, this time we were lucky. But we cannot be certain that the black hand reaching for you ends with this. In that case, next time you must make a better choice than throwing your life away, must you not?”
“Yes. Your words are correct, Commander.”
Within Fay now, Kishiar la Orr had become all but a god, beyond respect. He felt that if the Cavalry Commander told him to jump from this spot, he could jump.
Seeing that gaze of blind loyalty, Kishiar softened his brows and let out a faint, long sigh.
“As I see it, Fay, your ability holds extremely varied possibilities. That would mean your aptitude and vessel are that good. If you do not hone and polish it, then no matter how fine the material a sword is made from, it will only grow dull; but you now have a second chance, do you not?”
“Yes.”
Fay did not truly understand all the Commander’s words. Even so, he did not miss the phrase “second chance” and received it with rapture.
“Among the first-batch Cavalry members, some had abilities that could proceed down various paths, and after sufficient training and much deliberation, they chose one of those paths. Did you know there were many such people among your seniors in the Northern branch?”
“Ah, n—no. I didn’t know.”
“I think you, too, will soon stand at such a crossroads. From deciding what you wish to reflect in the mirror, to what you will place on the scale—perhaps that is where the crossroads may begin.”
Decide what to place on the scale? Turning over the Commander’s words, Fay, with a troubled face, asked carefully,
“Do you mean... you think that’s something I can decide?”
“If you wish it, probably.”
Kishiar’s answer was unambiguous.
“What you need is to think about what kind of ability you want to have going forward. Do you remember what you ardently desired before you awakened? Is seeing your mother again still your greatest wish?”
Is seeing his mother again his greatest wish? Fay quietly recalled something he had never thought through until now. It might also have been the first time he recalled, without fear, the memory of that day when he first summoned his mother.
And.......
“......No.”
The conclusion was no. Fay absentmindedly spoke aloud the thing he had most ardently desired then.
“I... for my mother... wished that a miracle would happen so that she wouldn’t be in pain. She had been in pain for so long....... Even now... I miss her, but what I most... wish is that she is happy in a place without pain. To wish now to bring her back to life again, to summon a cold duplicate form of her...... I do not want that.”
A smile a little different from any he had shown thus far touched Kishiar’s lips.