Secrets of the Silent Witch - Volume 3 - Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10

A Little Squirrel Soaring Through the Night Sky

Isabelle was walking down a stall-lined street in Corlapton, her wildcat-eared hood pulled up, quite satisfied with the baked treat she’d bought just moments ago.

“I’m happy you were able to get one before they sold out,” remarked Agatha, her servant and secret escort for the night.

“Yes,” replied Isabelle, a big smile on her face as she nodded.

She’d snuck out to festivals before, back in Kerbeck. However, most people in her hometown knew her appearance and would casually call out to her, saying things like, “Oh, Lady Isabelle. Out in secret tonight?” or, “Hey, have one of these treats on the house!” In other words, it was hard to say she was really “sneaking.”

This time, however, she was genuinely incognito.

“If only Monica was here,” she said. “It would have been even more fun…” Then she shook her head as if to banish the thought. “No, I mustn’t be selfish. She’s working very hard on her important mission!”

If Monica couldn’t come to the festival, Isabelle at least wanted to buy her a souvenir. That was why she was currently browsing the stalls.

The first thing she’d bought upon arriving was one of the traditional round baked sweets adorned with patterns. According to the legend, if you broke it in half and shared it with a friend, you’d be friends forever.

But just as Isabelle was thinking about going home and splitting it with the “sister” she so adored, she heard children arguing in front of her.

“Liar, liar, pants on fire!”

“I’m not lying! I saw it! Really!”

It was a boy of about ten and another boy who looked several years younger. Their faces were so similar, she was almost certain they were siblings. The younger brother was pointing to the sky.

“I really saw it! It went, shoooom! A huge squirrel! It flew over that building there!”

“Squirrels can’t fly. You must have seen a big bird or something.”

“It was a squirrel! It had squirrel ears!” Tears began to form in the younger boy’s eyes.

Isabelle couldn’t bear to watch any more, so she hastened over and interrupted them. “Enough! We’re at a festival. You should be enjoying yourselves, not fighting.”

The younger brother’s eyes widened at her unexpected intrusion, while the older brother raised his eyebrows and stared at her.

But Isabelle wasn’t deterred. Boldly, she took out the traditional baked sweet, wrapped in its paper bag. Then she split it in half and smiled—an especially sweet, pretty smile.

“Eat this and make up, okay?”

The brothers, both red in the face, accepted the baked treat and mumbled their thanks.

A little ways off, Agatha watched over the scene with a warm smile.

The Silent Witch Monica Everett shot through the sky like a speeding bullet, soaring over the colors and lights of the town.

As she wailed and blubbered pathetically, she kept a tight grip on her ash-wood staff, just barely managing to stay conscious. The cold winds roared, pelting her exposed cheeks. She was very glad she’d borrowed those gloves. Otherwise, her hands would have gone numb with cold and dropped the staff.

Eventually, the bell tower came into view ahead of her. But at the speed she was hurtling through the air, she was almost certainly going to collide with it. Hard.

Without chanting, she cast a wind spell to dampen her momentum, then attempted to ease herself down…but the fear brought on by her current altitude and speed jumbled her thoughts. While she’d normally have been able to cast the spell with perfect precision, the formula warped in her mind, and she wasn’t able to initiate it correctly.

“Eeeeeee, wah, wah, wah, ahhh-ahhh-ahhh-ahhh, hyawah-wah-wah-wah-waaah!”

Mere moments before ramming into the tower, she managed to get the wind spell to work. As she flipped her body around to get her head away from the structure, her vision spun. She used her boot soles to kick off the tower, changing the direction of her fall and ultimately avoiding a headfirst collision.

Nevertheless, Monica was now keenly aware that using magecraft in such an unstable position was a completely different challenge from using it with her feet solidly planted on the ground. She hadn’t been able to focus at all.

Thankfully, the space behind the bell tower—where she was going to land—was a flat area devoid of people.

In that case, if I shoot a wind spell toward the ground, I’ll be able to cushion my fall!

She constructed the formula in a frenzy. But just as she was about to unleash the wind toward the ground, she saw the nearby foliage rustle and a man come bursting out.

Tumbling through the air, Monica screamed, “Nooooo! Mooooooove!”

“Oh, oh, my beloved! Take me somewhere far, far away…!”

“Uh, I’m pretty sure you’re the one carrying me far awaaaaay?!”

Starweaving Mira, still attached to Bartholomeus’s right hand, continued to drag his body forward. To anyone else, he would seem to be advancing with his hand in the air and his legs basically not moving at all. Some of the passersby mistook him for a street performer and tossed a few coins his way.

And while he would have loved to pick up the bronze coins rolling at his feet, Starweaving Mira didn’t seem to care. It just kept tugging him ahead.

When he’d crashed through the chapel window earlier, shards of stained glass had become lodged in several parts of his body. To make things worse, the item would occasionally pull him quite violently, and he was now covered in scrapes and bruises. Starweaving Mira, however, seemed indifferent to his plight.

“Hey, could you be a little more considerate here?! You’re wrecking your beloved’s good looks!”

“Ah, my beloved. You’ve suffered such a beating, and all to allow me to escape this place…”

Unfortunately, while the magic item appeared to have the ability to speak, its conversation was rather one-sided. This is really bad, thought Bartholomeus, cold sweat dripping down his skin. At this rate, they’re gonna arrest me for stealing this thing!

All he’d wanted was a little peek—to make replicas as souvenirs and profit off them!

At this point, his only choice was to avoid being seen, destroy the bracelet somewhere deserted, and tear it off his arm. While his right hand was under the item’s control, he could still move his left freely.

Bartholomeus fingered his tool pouch with his left hand, then spoke to Starweaving Mira. “All right, all right. I get it. Why don’t we go somewhere without anyone around and talk about our love? I’m too embarrassed with people nearby…”

“Oh my! A place without anyone around, you say? How bold you are.”

“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha.” Bartholomeus managed a fake laugh as Starweaving Mira dragged them away from the crowds.

Right in front of them was a bell tower. The item took him through the greenery planted around the building, aiming for somewhere out of the way.

Bartholomeus was now covered in leaves from crashing through the brush. He spit a couple out of his mouth, then used his left hand to reach for his tool pouch.

“Now we are alone—just you and I, my beloved.”

“Great. Perfect. Now we have all the time we need to talk about…love!”

But just as he pulled out a chisel and swung it down at Starweaving Mira, he heard a shriek from overhead.

“Nooooo! Mooooooove!”

“Eh?”

Bartholomeus looked up and saw the silhouette of a squirrel gripping a staff against the full moon—no, not a squirrel, a small girl. He gaped up at her until a powerful wind from above knocked him away.

“Gyaaah!” he yelped as the wind sent him crashing back into the brush.

Then he saw the girl’s body fall from the sky and bounce a little, as if off an invisible cushion. It was wind magecraft. It would have looked pretty cool if she’d nailed the landing, but she didn’t—after bouncing off the wind cushion, she tumbled to the ground with an “oof!”

“I…I was so scared…,” the girl cried, beginning to sob and whimper as she slowly rose to her feet.

The girl was short, wearing a hood. And when Bartholomeus got a closer look at her, he realized she was the lost little runt he’d helped out earlier that night.

“Wait, you’re that runt,” he said. “…So you’re a mage, huh? But why did you fall from the sky…?”

After executing her wind spell in the nick of time and barely avoiding certain death, Monica looked at the man buried in the foliage.

He had black hair and wore a bandanna—it was Bartholomeus, the same man who had helped her when she’d gotten lost.

She was about to apologize for getting him wrapped up in this, too, when her eyes went wide, and her mouth fell open in surprise.

On the man’s right hand were a bracelet and a ring, attached by a chain. Its golden sheen and the large gemstone on the chain at the back of his hand weren’t things you could find just anywhere.

On a hunch, Monica used her detection spell again—only to see a powerful reaction right in front of her. And it was still absorbing the surrounding mana and expanding.

“Starweaving Mira!” she exclaimed.

Bartholomeus went white.

A woman’s voice came from his right hand. The voice had a uniquely cloying, clinging lilt to it, which took on a pathetic cast as it cried, “Oh, how terrible! A pursuer has arrived. Let us flee, my beloved!”

Then the man’s right hand lifted up as though it had a mind of its own. He swore and grabbed a nearby tree branch with his left hand to hold himself down.

“Please help me out!” he shouted. “I’m no thief! This thing just attached itself to my hand!”

“Huh?!” cried Monica.

“I’m serious! I’m the victim here!” he screamed, face red, spittle flying. He looked desperate.

He didn’t seem to be lying, but Monica still wavered for a moment.

Suddenly, the man’s right hand fell limp to his side.

“…How awful…” The voice sounded like it was about to cry. “Why would you say something like that, my beloved? …Oh, oh, I can feel my heart tearing apart…”

Bartholomeus’s face lit up at the words. “Finally bored of me, eh? Gotcha, gotcha. Then why not just release me now, and—”

“I suppose our bond cannot be fulfilled in this world…”

His hand slowly rose. As he looked on in shock, his body was pulled upward once again by his right hand—higher and higher into the air.

“Let us die together, my beloved.”

“Gyaaah?! It’s so high! Too high, too high! Wait, wait, wait! Okay, it’s my fault! It’s my fault so please reconside— Gorf!”

Bartholomeus’s wailing abruptly cut off. Apparently, as he was flailing his limbs, he’d hit his head against one of the decorative pillars on the bell tower. His eyes rolled back, and his head lolled limply to the side.

Monica was flabbergasted at this string of unexpected developments, but then she recalled what Louis had said.

“Starweaving Mira is one of those items with an interesting story—if its owner is male, it kills him.”

But then, could this be…what he meant?!

Her face blanched. At this rate, Bartholomeus would be killed.

“Wait!” she cried, quickly forming a barrier around the man without chanting.

But a moment later, as Bartholomeus floated there unconscious, several arrows of golden light shot forth from his right hand—from Starweaving Mira—destroying Monica’s barrier.

“Wh-what…?!”

Monica’s barriers weren’t as powerful as Louis’s—he was called “the Barrier Mage” for a reason—but they were still incomparably tougher than an average mage’s. And yet a few of those light arrows had been enough to easily puncture it.

She was dealing with a magic item capable of absorbing mana from the surrounding land, and having witnessed firsthand how powerful its mana arrows were, Monica felt a cold droplet of sweat trickle down her cheek.

“Hee-hee. Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee. A fall from this height is sure to send you to the goddess of the underworld painlessly… However.”

Starweaving Mira had a ruby embedded in the chain that rested on the back of its wearer’s hand. On the ruby was a white star pattern, and to Monica, that star felt like an eye—glaring at her.

“If we are to die, it should be somewhere quiet, somewhere private… So let us be off, my beloved.”

Bartholomeus’s body hovered up to the level of the bell tower’s roof, then flew off toward the edge of town.

Oh, what now, what now, what now…?! Monica stood there, at a loss.

Shooting down Starweaving Mira alone with an attack spell would have been a piece of cake for her. But ancient magic items contained technology that was impossible to replicate in modern times. If she destroyed it, they’d never be able to fix it.

Could there be a way to disable an ancient magic item without destroying it? I’ve never heard of anyone doing such a thing… And since Starweaving Mira could absorb mana, it wouldn’t be possible to exhaust its supply.

As Monica ran out of options, her thoughts wandered further and further. It has a mind like a human. If I could talk to it, maybe I could persuade it…

That would be a tall order for Monica, though, who was withdrawn and terrible at speaking. To make matters worse, Starweaving Mira harbored strong, persistent feelings of love for Bartholomeus.

Monica’s mind went back to the flowerpot incident at Serendia Academy from when she’d just enrolled. Lady Selma Karsh had committed that crime for the sake of her beloved fiancé. But she’d also been manipulated using mental interference magecraft, so she hadn’t been in much of a state to talk down. Starweaving Mira was probably no different.

…Oh, wait… Just then, something occurred to Monica. If Starweaving Mira has a mind of its own, then…maybe…

Monica calculated the magic formula in her head.

Theoretically, it…should work. But nobody’s ever tried something like this, so I’d say my chances are about fifty-fifty. She decided to give it a shot anyway. She knew if she let Starweaving Mira get away, she’d regret it.

I can’t use that kind of spell from a distance. I need to get close…

The magic item—along with Bartholomeus—had flown off through the air, and they were already beyond her reach.

Should I turn back and ask for Miss Ryn’s help? But then the prince won’t have anyone guarding him, and they might get away in the meantime… Which means there’s only one thing to do.

Hand trembling, she squeezed her ash-wood staff and looked up at the sky. And then, in her mind, she pieced together the formula for the spell she hated so much.

Flight magecraft… How long has it been since I tried this?

She was honestly terrified. If there had been any other option, she would have taken it. But letting Starweaving Mira escape and ruin the festival would be even worse.

Her hand grasped the staff even more tightly as she braced her core.

“Yah!” she cried.

Wind whipped up around her, jingling the bell on the end of her staff.

A moment later, she was up higher than the bell tower. Much higher.

“It seems it’s begun.”

Mary Harvey, the Starseer Witch, looked out the church window and up into the night sky.

The sky was full of light from the festival lanterns below, and it was harder than usual to see the stars. Still, she continued to focus her eyes and read their patterns.

The stars told her that this night would be a major branching point for the kingdom.

Something shone brightly next to the bell tower. Starweaving Mira had finally begun to absorb mana.

Mary picked up the staff she’d set against the wall, looked out into the night, and chanted. It was an airy, songlike chant, and as she continued, a silvery light began to emanate from the staff.

Fine particles of light, like silver grains of sand, danced upward, seeming to meld into the night sky as they covered the air around Corlapton.

This was illusion magic. She’d re-created the town’s skyscape to keep Monica and the out-of-control Starweaving Mira from being seen.

The Starseer Witch gazed at the stars every night, so her illusion was perfect, blocking all view of what was happening above.

She jingled the adornments on her staff as a thin smile formed on her lips.

“It’s time to see what you’re made of, Monica Everett—Silent Witch.”

Monica’s body, thrown into the air by her flight spell, hurtled upward at more of an angle than she’d intended. Her current course was going to send her in a completely different direction from Starweaving Mira.

“Wah… Wah, wah! Wah!”

She flailed her arms and legs like someone drowning in a river, trying to correct her course, only to lose her balance and plunge straight toward the bell tower.

“Eeeeeee?!”

By flapping her legs in midair and twisting, she just barely managed to avoid a head-on collision, instead zooming past the tower.

Monica’s throat squeezed out more frightened whimpers as she tried to follow Bartholomeus and Starweaving Mira. But her body, still tilted to one side, wouldn’t move in the direction she wanted it to.

This is scary—no, terrifying! Balance! I need to get my balance… Balance… What does balance mean agaaain?!

Glenn’s mastery of flight magecraft allowed him to slip and glide freely through the air no matter his posture, but Monica couldn’t even maintain an upright position.

To put it simply, she was dog-paddling. She was tipped forward slightly, flapping her arms and legs, looking for all the world like she was being carried away by a river.

As she flailed in midair, Bartholomeus grew smaller and smaller in the distance. They were getting away.

Balance, balance, how do I get my balaaance…?

Monica looked back over her short life, trying to recall any memory she might have about regaining one’s balance.

She had lots of knowledge to draw on regarding magecraft and mathematics, but when it came to how to handle herself physically, she knew embarrassingly little.

What needs balance…? Oh, right! Horseback riding!

She fought her way to the top of the ash-wood staff in her hands and straddled it. When she did, she could envision a little more easily the posture she had when riding a horse.

Leaning forward makes me more prone to falling. Leaning backward makes it harder to balance. I need to concentrate on staying upright at all times…

Keeping in mind what Felix had taught her in riding class and correcting her posture, Monica was able to stop shaking so much from side to side. She had to work hard to maintain her concentration, but she was now traveling at a decent speed compared to her earlier dog-paddling.

Her position straddling the staff had her constantly bouncing. Was this what it felt like to ride a horse running at full speed?

When your horse is running, you use a binary system… One, two, one, two. Sit, stand, sit, stand. That way, you avoid the shaking, and it’s easier to balance…

That was the technique Felix had taught her for trotting. She couldn’t do the exact same thing on her staff for lack of stirrups, but she concentrated on moving up and down anyway.

At first, she was just clumsily shaking herself, but as she continued, timing her movements to the shaking, she thought she could feel her balance improve somewhat. As long as she didn’t have to turn, this might work out after all.

Once her flying had stabilized a little, the distance between her and Bartholomeus began to shrink.

“Silent Witch.”

“Hya-wah?!” Monica cried in surprise at the sudden voice in her ears. It was Ryn, most likely directly vibrating her eardrums to speak to her.

“Congratulations on learning flight magecraft.”

To be honest, Monica didn’t feel like this qualified as having “learned” it at all. She felt like a baby deer just starting to walk but even more precarious. As Monica worked, breath ragged, to maintain her balance, Ryn continued.

“A wide-area illusion has been constructed in the skies above Corlapton. I believe it to be the Starseer Witch’s doing. I am maintaining the soundproof barrier as well, so you will not need to worry about the townspeople witnessing you.”

“Th-thank y-hoowooohaaahhh?!”

Before she could finish, Starweaving Mira flickered eerily, then fired ten golden, glowing arrows of light at her.

Monica immediately put up a defensive barrier to block them. The barrier stopped the hail of arrows, then shattered. A moment later, more of them flew at her. Her miserable flight skills meant she couldn’t dodge them—all she could do was continue to guard herself using barriers.

She tried narrowing the size of the barrier in order to increase its strength, but once again, it simply shattered. Monica shuddered to imagine Starweaving Mira’s offensive capabilities. It could fire fast, and it could fire hard.

Monica was capable of maintaining two separate spells at once, but now that she was using flight magecraft, she could only cast one. It wouldn’t be enough.

“You wretched, hateful, detestable thing, interrupting our elopement like this… This time, I will shoot you out of the sky for sure.”

Starweaving Mira shone much more brightly than before, then sent another volley of light arrows at Monica. This time, they spread out into a dome shape to cover her from every angle.

Surrounded by the magic item’s attack, Monica told herself, These are all numbers. The light arrows, myself, everything—the whole world is made out of numbers.

Her mind sank into the world of numbers, and she banished all her emotions, converting the arrows around her into digits.

First, she calculated their firing speed. Her awkward flight magecraft wouldn’t allow her to avoid them.

Next, she calculated the strength of her barrier. If she used it to cover herself from all angles, it wouldn’t stand up to the attack, but if she made it the size of a shield, she could manage to block several shots.

Finally, she calculated the arrows’ trajectories. They didn’t have homing capabilities, so that one was easy.

All right, then…

The shower of arrows fell toward her. And just as it did, she disengaged her flight spell.

By falling, only the arrows above her would still be on course to hit their mark—which meant she could focus her defenses overhead.

And by disengaging the flight spell, she could create two barriers.

When the first broke, she would use the second to defend as she created a third. Rotating sets of two shields like this, she perfectly protected herself from all the arrows.

It was an insane scheme no ordinary mage could’ve pulled off—only Monica, with her unchanted magecraft, could have managed it.

After warding off the volley of arrows, she recast her flight spell, again without chanting.

She’d been counting as the attacks hit. It should take at least 3.5 seconds for Starweaving Mira to fire more.

Monica accelerated to full speed. She abandoned any ideas of evasion or defense and simply flew toward her target as fast as she could.

“Stay away! Stay away! Stay! Away!”

“There are…a whole lot of people…who want to see your magical dedication!” cried Monica, still straddling her staff as she grabbed on to Bartholomeus’s right arm.

“No! No! I want to be wed to my beloved. I want to be with him forever, in the care of the goddess of the underworld…”

Monica’s words probably wouldn’t reach Starweaving Mira—not as fixedly obsessed as it was. But there was something she had to say.

“I want…to make this festival a success!”

Ringing the bells and mourning the dead would be like a healing salve for so many people—Monica included. Starweaving Mira was being selfish, so Monica had decided to be selfish right back.

And then her fingers touched the starred ruby. She constructed a magic formula without chanting, forming a swarm of countless butterflies, all shining white, dancing through the night sky. As their glittering scales scattered around them, they began to attach themselves, one after another, to Starweaving Mira.

Then Starweaving Mira dreamed.

She stood in a beautiful field of flowers. She was no longer a piece of jewelry but an ordinary young girl.

Ahhh. She sighed, using her legs to walk through the field.

Flower petals danced into the air. Standing just beyond them, holding out his hand, was her beloved.

His face was backlit, not visible to her, but that didn’t matter.

“Oh, oh, how I’ve missed you. From now on, I will always, always be at your side, my beloved…”

Together forever with the one she loved most—that was the perfectly ordinary, happy dream that Starweaving Mira had always wished for.

Once she saw that Starweaving Mira had fallen completely silent, Monica heaved a sigh of relief.

“It…it worked…!”

Monica had used a mental interference spell to show the item a dream.

Spells interfering with the mind were meant to be used on humans—nobody had ever tried using one on an ancient magic item before. But Starweaving Mira possessed such a powerful ego that it was very much like a human.

Monica’s idea had been this: If it had the same sort of mind as a human, wouldn’t magecraft that interfered with the human mind affect it as well?

Ultimately, she had been right, and Starweaving Mira had gone quiet. That much, at least, went according to Monica’s plan.

But a moment later, Bartholomeus’s body, which had been floating until now, grew suddenly heavy, as though it had just remembered the concept of gravity.

Panicking, Monica tried to maintain her flight spell. Unfortunately, she wasn’t practiced enough to support his large frame.

She tried to use wind magecraft to support both their weights as she maintained the flight spell, but she didn’t have much mana left. Flight spells really gobbled it up.

The moment she used a wind spell, her reserves would run dry.

“Eek?! Wah, oowah, hyaaaaahhhhh!”

As a result, the two of them got tangled up and began to plummet. Beneath them were the bustling festival streets. If they fell here, it would be a horrible tragedy.

Oh no. I can’t ruin the festival like this—not after I managed to get Starweaving Mira back!

Just as her vision began to grow black with despair, a gentle, soft wind materialized below, catching them. Then they were pulled, bobbing through the air, before being slowly brought down to a spot near the middle of town—a deserted alley.

Deserted except for one “person”—a maid with an owl on her head. Before them stood the high wind spirit Rynzbelfeid.

“Miss Ryn!”

Ryn had used her power over wind to save them from certain death.

Monica tried to get out a few words of thanks, but just then, Ryn’s beautiful face clouded over.

“I find myself with many regrets,” she said.

“…Huh?”

“I believe this would have been the ideal situation for me to princess-carry you, Silent Witch.”

Monica found that a rather ridiculous regret to have.

The owl hooted peacefully atop Ryn’s head as the spirit continued. “The princess carry is said to have its origins in a certain royal family’s wedding tradition, in which the betrothed would carry the princess in a sideways position across his arms to the wedding venue. It is an esteemed and honored tradition, and I have gathered it is a standard way of transporting humans. I’ve also heard that when one performs this ‘princess carry’ on another, it makes the carried’s heart ‘flutter.’”

Monica had been a human for seventeen years, and yet much of this was news to her.

“I had wished to princess-carry you, Silent Witch, and ask you if your heart ‘fluttered,’ as they say… What a shame.”

“Ummm… Errr…”

As Monica tried to think of a response, Ryn quickly walked up to her. The spirit’s face was just as impassive as always, but it exuded an unusual intensity.

“May I have a redo?”

A redo? thought Monica. Is she asking me to go back up and fall again? She really didn’t want to go through all that a second time, so she hastily changed the topic. “Um, more importantly, is the prince all right?”

“Yes. If you go out onto the main road, he’ll be right there. He seemed to be searching for you.”

A significant amount of time had passed since she’d parted ways with Felix. He was probably worried sick.

Monica pointed her right index finger at Bartholomeus—who lay asleep on the ground at her feet—and quickly explained, “That’s Starweaving Mira. Um, I put a mental interference spell on it to get it to behave… It should end in twenty minutes.”

Mental interference spells were semi-forbidden—permitted for use only under very specific conditions. This was clearly making Monica uneasy.

Ryn answered plainly. “The Starseer Witch strikes me as the considerate, flexible sort. I am sure she will overlook your usage of mental interference magecraft, given the situation’s urgency. I will hand this burglar over to her as well.”

When she heard the word burglar, Monica’s eyebrows drooped, and she started playing with her fingers. “Um, he said he was just a victim who got possessed by it…”

She couldn’t tell if Ryn heard her or not. The spirit hefted Bartholomeus’s body across her arms horizontally—holding him in a princess carry. She must have really wanted to try it out.

“I will be going now,” she said. “I’ll be waiting in the ceremony venue, so when you wish to return, you need only call.”

Ryn gave a slight bow, then launched into the sky, holding Bartholomeus in her arms like a princess and with the owl still on her head.

Monica watched for a few moments as they left, then quickly turned and exited onto the main street. She found Felix right away. He seemed to notice her immediately, too. He pushed through the crowd and ran over to her.

“Monica! Thank goodness.”

He was a little out of breath—he’d really hurried to get over to her. Feeling pangs of guilt, Monica stammered, “U-ummm, I’m really sorry. Something, uh, suddenly came up, so…”

“Something came up? …I see. You do look like you were rushing around.”

Felix leaned over a bit and fixed Monica’s bangs. They were all over the place thanks to her soaring across the sky with that flight spell.

Even Monica could tell he was trying to figure out what she’d been up to. He wasn’t trying to hide it; he knew Monica was weak to silent pressure.

As she trembled and tried to think of an excuse, Felix removed the mask covering the upper half of his face.

“Or…,” he said, his eyebrows drooping and his usual gentle smile taking on a lonely cast. “Did you just not like being with me?”

He sounded hurt.

Ever since they’d run into each other, Felix had been doing everything he could to help Monica enjoy herself. When he’d realized she was afraid of people, he’d told her to think of him as a ghost and stayed with her.

And yet Monica had never even bothered to thank him—instead, she’d disappeared without warning.

Her face paled. I’m the worst, she thought. Bernie’s expression of disgust flashed in her mind. “You’re a dishonest cheat. You only ever think of yourself—you don’t care one bit about anyone else or what happens to them, do you?”

He’s right, she thought.

Monica had always hated being scared, hated being hurt. All she ever thought about was running away and hiding. In doing so, she’d spurned all the goodwill others had shown her.

And the person standing in front of her had been reaching out to her ever since they’d first met.

If she said she was sorry, Felix would probably smile and tell her not to worry about it. He’d treat her the same as always… But…, she thought, gripping her ash-wood staff and looking up.

Still smiling sadly, Felix joked, “I’m a ghost—I don’t exist. If you’re scared, you can run away, little squirrel. When a living person spurns a ghost, the ghost disappears.”

“U-um!” she cried out in an unusually loud voice.

That seemed to genuinely take Felix by surprise.

Monica felt herself begin to hunch and straightened her back before looking up at Felix.

She was embarrassed. She was scared. She didn’t know what she’d do if he gave her a strange look. But she pushed all those fears and anxieties aside to squeeze out just a few more words.

“Right now, I’m a ghost!” she said. “I don’t exist. I’m just a ghost named Monica, so…!”

She wasn’t the Silent Witch Monica Everett or the student council accountant Monica Norton. She was just a girl named Monica right now, without any title to speak of—and it was as simply Monica that she reached a trembling hand out to him.

“Let’s enjoy the rest of the night as ghosts together, I-Ike!”

The prince’s eyes widened a little. He blinked slowly, his long golden eyelashes moving down and then up, his blue eyes shining like starry gemstones.

He grasped her hand, then gave it a light pull. When Monica put her foot down to stop herself from tipping over, her hood came off.

Felix brought his lips to her now-exposed ear and whispered, “Thank you.”

The corners of his eyes had turned down, and he was smiling. Not that radiant, princely smile he usually wore but the unaffected smile of a regular young man enjoying the festival.