Spice and Wolf - Volume 13 - Chapter 4.2

TWO

The fresh-baked wheat bread generously dipped in oil tasted like a cloud on the tongue, and the sliced beef, first blanched, then roasted, was luxurious as well. My life was a simple one, but my weakness was delicious food, and I was well satisfied.

The only thing that I found dissatisfying was the amount of food, and I finished mine quickly. My master noticed me licking the dish, and laughing, she gave me another slice of beef.

“Not enough, is it?”

She knew me too well.

I accepted it gratefully and rubbed my head against her leg.

“They say we needn’t worry about the bill for room and board.”

My master did not lick the plate as I did, but is not so dainty as to let the meat drippings go to waste. She sopped them up with a piece of bread and smiled a contented smile.

“Though I heard them saying in the kitchen they’d give us rye bread for dinner,” said my master mischievously, which made me sigh a long-suffering sigh and lie down on my belly. “The town’s in a bad spot, after all. This might really be the last of the good bread they have.”

I only tilted one ear toward my master’s voice. I didn’t bother raising my head to look at her, because I could not imagine her face wore a particularly cheerful expression. Instead of looking up at her, I settled for licking her ankle.

“Hey!” she said, poking me with her toes—my master is ticklish, you see.

It happened often that she would cut her legs on the grass of the fields, and there was never any guarantee that there would be water handy to wash the wound. In such times I had no choice but to lick them clean, which would make her face go red—not because she was trying to bear the pain, but rather because she was trying not to laugh. When she cut her foot on a stone, my licking would be so ticklish that she couldn’t help herself, and she would end up kicking my face away reflexively.

And yet she seemed to enjoy stroking my back with her bare feet. She ate the last bite of bread and chewed it contentedly while rubbing her feet against my coat.

“Now then.” Having enjoyed the lingering taste of the meal, she stood. “We should visit the church first and then maybe the trading house.”

After stacking her dishes she put on her coat, and after a moment’s hesitation she left her bell-less staff leaning against a wall. It was one thing while out in the fields, but walking around with a long staff inside a town was a good way to attract strange looks. People would think her a fortune-teller or a sorcerer—or a shepherd.

While I myself still held pride in the shepherd’s work, I felt something like resignation toward the prejudice the human world had for our vocation. No doubt my master, being human herself, felt that even more keenly, and her face as she left her staff at the wall looked lonely and uncertain.

“Mm…it will be all right,” she finally said, after I nudged her leg with my snout.

Though my master has never said so aloud, one of the reasons she wished to become a seamstress was to have work where no fingers would be pointed at her behind her back. I could hardly blame her; indeed, it seemed quite reasonable to me.

Her only conversation partners had been myself and the sheep, and so it had been only animals to whom she had directed her smiles. This was the shepherd’s tendency, and so perhaps it was inevitable that baseless rumor about shepherds’ children being half-beast, half-human would arise.

And such rumors only made shepherds lonelier, and eventually the resentment between them and the people of the towns only grew.

Perhaps my master had long since grown to hate other humans. I certainly wondered about it.

“It’s fine, it’s fine! Come now.” She smiled and held my face between her hands.

I was well aware of what her stiffened cheeks meant. It was the human way of smiling. But I was not a human and could not so smile.

“…I’m sorry, that was a lie. To be honest, I’m very worried.”

I hardly needed to ask what she was worried about.

She hated being thanked by others so much that she’d made that request of Giuseppe just before entering the town. It had been painful to watch her perform her gratefulness for this inn treating her as an honored guest.

By leaving her staff behind, it meant that she was going into the town not as a shepherdess, but as an ordinary traveler.

But would she be able to act like a normal human?

No one was more concerned about that than my master.

“Still,” she said, her voice stronger as she looked up. “We must keep moving forward.”

A strong person is not one without weakness. It is one who can prevail over that weakness.

I let out a bark, and my master stood.

Emerging into the town of Kuskov during the hours of darkness painted it a ruined, abandoned place, but even after the sun rose, that impression did not change much. The inn at which we’d been so welcomed faced the town’s main avenue, but right or left it was desolate all the same, and buildings’ windows stayed shuttered closed.

There were few people on the street, and every one of them seemed to walk as though trying to hide the sound of their footsteps.

I wasn’t sure if my master could tell, but I caught the scent of death in the air, and a close look at the rubbish heaps in the street corners revealed bones.

In stark contrast to the townspeople here, on the street lounged a fat dog that watched us suspiciously as we passed. Beside it waddled a fat rat. No doubt the truth of what it was upon which they had grown so fat was something none of the townspeople wished to speak.

I could tell my master had noticed, because she walked even closer to me than she did when we were passing through a wolf-filled forest.

The only people on the streets we passed who showed any amount of cheer were those who seemed to be merchants who’d come from elsewhere—men who barely cared about their own lives so long as they were making profit, to say nothing of the lives of others. Small wonder, then, they were able to work in a town beset by such circumstances as though it were any other town.

As I was mulling this over, the sounds of a commotion reached my ears.

I looked ahead and saw a crowd of people gathered around a building with a familiar symbol adorning it. It was the town’s church.

Of course, the assembled had all come seeking some sort of solace. Ironically, from all the pushing and shoving they were doing to get into the church, it seemed unlikely that any of them would be finding peace anytime soon.

“Look at all the people,” said my master, sincerely surprised. She was right—given the circumstances, it would probably be difficult to meet with Giuseppe. “I’d feel bad imposing. We’ll come later.”

That was what I had hoped she would decide. I gave my tail a wag to indicate my agreement.

It was not so very difficult to arrive at our next goal, the trading house. While the town was of a goodly size, the streets were so empty there was nothing to slow us down. We stopped to ask directions only twice, and after not much time at all we were there.

My master had called it simply the “trade house,” but to be precise, it was the house of the Rowen Trade Guild. It wasn’t only horses and sheep that formed flocks—humans did the same thing. People from the same town would form a group and take reasonable actions to ensure their mutual gain.

And then evidently, they had opened up trade houses in various towns, including this one.

When my master abandoned her career as a shepherdess, she had evidently done a favor for another branch of this guild, so in a matter of speaking she had a connection to this flock or pack. She even had something called a “letter of introduction” tucked into her breast. And still she stood in front of the building and took three deep breaths.

How many times had she felt near collapse during the incident that caused her to abandon shepherding?

I prodded her forward with my snout, and my master finally knocked on the door and went inside.

“Ah, welco—” The man did not continue, because my master hardly seemed suited to this place.

But my master had learned all too well how important it was to smile on the occasion of a first meeting like this. To someone like me who knows what her true smile looks like, the one she gave this man was a cold and obvious fake, but it seemed to be enough to fool its recipient.

“How might I help you?” said the man serenely, gesturing to a nearby chair. “The black-furred fellow’s your companion, I trust?” he asked as I followed her in.

“Oh yes, er…”

“Oh, it’s no trouble. I remember now. You arrived in the town yesterday, did you not? It’s dangerous for a woman to travel alone, after all. That fellow might be more trustworthy than a hastily hired guard, truly,” said the bearded man with a smile, which my master returned. “I asked because dogs aren’t regarded particularly auspiciously in this town at the moment.”

When a town is beset by plague, every street and alleyway begins to overflow with corpses. If one hears a crunching sound and opens the window to see what it is, one might see any number of dogs gnawing on the bodies. This is no more pleasant a fact for me than it is for humans.

My master sat down on the chair, and I situated myself beside her as she stroked my head, awkwardly acknowledging the man’s words.

“So, then, might I ask what brings a traveler like you to this trade house?”

The good thing about merchants is that they get right to the point. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who thought so.

Having sat on the chair, my master hastily produced the letter from her breast and slid it across the counter toward the man.

Evidently, a letter can hold a terrible power in the human world. Somehow, my master didn’t need to fear quitting her work as a shepherdess, nor providing for her living expenses, all because of that letter.

“Ah, this is…Ah, you’re from Ruvinheigen? That’s quite a long ways away, indeed.”

“I was in the care of a trader named Jakob.”

“I see. Well, I’ll do what I can not to be bested by that bearded old man, eh?” said the man smiling widely, but then he seemed to notice my master’s troubled expression. He cleared his throat deliberately and shifted in his seat. “Ahem. Welcome to the Kuskov branch of the Rowen Trade Guild. My name is Aman Guwingdott. I shall do what I can to assist you, such that your memories of this town are good ones, and the name of the Rowen Trade Guild might continue to brightly shine.”

Merchants truly were excellent actors.

My master straightened and, bowing politely, she introduced herself. The two soon shook hands.

“Now then, Miss Norah, you wish to become a seamstress?”

“Yes. I have heard that this town is shorthanded right now.”

“Indeed, that’s certainly true. This plague is not enough to crush Kuskov. It will surely recover.” My master smiled an uncomplicated smile upon hearing Aman’s firm statement, but then a shadow passed over his expression, and he continued, “However, your timing may not be ideal.”

“…What do you mean?”

“Yes, well, the people of Kuskov certainly ought to be grateful that you’ve braved the plague to come, but…,” said Aman uncomfortably before seeming to decide that there was nothing for it but to come right out and speak his mind. “While the plague is lifting from this town, it’s still in a wretched state, as you can plainly see. Commerce here has been dealt a terrible blow and is still in a very bad way. Far from needing new craftsmen, the ones that are already here find themselves leaving town to find work. It’s good that you came to call, though, I believe. The town will surely recover, and when it does, there will be a need for workers.”

This was a very different reality from what we had been led to believe, but so it went with information gained from travelers. My master listened as though carefully swallowing each word, and when he finished, she gave a firm nod.

“A seamstress, you said? I’ll write a letter of introduction to the head of the clothiers’ guild, then. It’s the very least I can do.” He followed his words with a lighthearted and clearly calculated smile.

Still, being able to act the way Aman did, in the face of the damage the plague had done to the town, was proof of his courage. My master gratefully accepted the letter and bowed her head several times. She’d made her living by discerning the moods of others and had grasped what was expected of her.

We put the trade guild behind us, impressed by the kindness Aman had shown us despite the difficult times.

After we’d followed Aman’s directions, another building stood before us a short while later. In its stone walls was set an iron plate embossed with the image of a needle and thread, and even a dog like myself could tell that we had found our destination.

My master knocked this time without any hesitation, but it seemed she just couldn’t get away from bad timing. Though she’d managed to get up the courage to promptly knock at the door, there didn’t seem to be anybody on the other side.

“Perhaps…they’re out,” she said, crestfallen, but I couldn’t reply to everything she said.

I scratched my neck with my hind leg and yawned a great yawn.

My master seemed to intuit my reaction to her words from my inaction. She slumped. “I suppose there’s nothing to be done about it,” she said. I barked my agreement, but the moment we turned to leave, my master gasped.

What was it?

The moment I stood and began to turn, my field of vision swam wildly. I’d made a mistake. Something had taken me by surprise.

My back hit the ground, and my forepaws paddled in the air—but not for long. I closed my hind legs and twisted my body, and they bit the earth. The only things capable of surprising me were a hawk on the wing or something using a way of fighting no animal was capable of.

In other words, a human with a thrown weapon—and the thing that impacted my head seems to be a strange tube-shaped object.

“Enek!” shouted my master sharply, and my body went tense—but the tension within me did not burst, because my master’s voice was not meant to set me upon my attacker, but rather to stop me from striking.

I stumbled, and looked up. Master, I was surely attacked!

“Wait, please!” But these words were not directed at me. “We are merely travelers, and this dog is my companion!” My master held me to make certain I didn’t leap and attack, but she could not stop me from growling.

My growl was meant for my attacker, because having met the young woman’s eyes, I did not imagine that mere words would suffice.

“…”

She had dark eyes, dark like a muddy pond, and was tall and thin. Her sharp, unflinching gaze pierced me from behind her unkempt red hair. I could not begin to guess at what thoughts lay behind those eyes, and so I did not stop my growl.

But as my master held me back, she hastily produced the letter from her breast, and the woman’s eyes wavered slightly.

“I wish to speak with the master of the clothiers’ guild—.”

I couldn’t tell whether the woman was listening to what my master said or not. She closed her eyes for a moment, then looked askance, and finally began to walk away.

My master, too, seemed not to know what the woman’s intentions were, and her embrace of me only grew tighter.

But the woman only went to pick up the tube-shaped object she’d hit my head with, not even glancing at us all the while. She walked past us and put her hand to the door and finally spoke.

“So you’re the ‘girl who brought the lamp,’ are you…?” She looked my master up and down in an obviously appraising fashion, then continued, “Are you coming in?”

Her gaze still had that ineffably muddy look to it. It was a scent I’d caught before, something like dark mud mixed with ink. It caught the legs of those who tried to stand, held the shins of those who tried to walk.

Plague did not only claim lives; it also claimed hope.

The young woman’s red hair was bound back like a horse’s tail, and it swayed as she entered the dark building. As she disappeared into the gloom, my ears caught the next words very distinctly.

“I am the master of this guild.”

I wondered if my master had heard as well.

I looked up at her, she who stood right next to me, and it seemed that she had.

Somehow this young woman with her strange gaze had found herself in this lofty position. That was what it meant when half a town died in a plague.

Still, my master stood and nudged me forward, and we went into the building.

The gloom inside the building combined with the woman’s strangeness gave it an unsettling feeling, but upon entering it was found surprisingly neat inside. The furnishings were plain but well made and were fragrant from the oil, with which they’d been carefully polished; likewise, the shelves affixed to the walls were well fitted.

I finally realized that the object that hit my head was a bolt of cloth, just as the woman reappeared from a room farther in the building.

“…So, what is your business here?”

She didn’t even bother with an introduction. My master quickly handed over the letter of introduction she received from Aman, at which the woman scratched her head in irritation, then walked abruptly over to a window. She didn’t seem brusque so much as she seemed to be trying to suppress her own emotions. She was merely opening the window to let in sufficient light to read, it turned out, but her every motion was sharp and irritable.

At the very least, she seemed to harbor hostility toward travelers, which I knew my master felt much more keenly than I.

I saw that the woman’s legs were trembling.

If a wolf’s fangs killed the body, then human hostility was death to the spirit.

“Hmph. A seamstress, eh?”

“I-if I might be so bold,” said my master with haste, just as the woman spoke.

I might not be human, but I knew my master very well. She fears being despised by others more than almost anything else. Her hands were balled up into tight fists as she tried to push that fear down. This must have been what humans call “pathos.”

“…Be my guest.”

“Please, ma’am! I’ve got a bit of an eye for wool, at least, so…er…?”

“Like I said, be my guest,” said the woman in a bored tone as she tossed the letter onto the table.

My master seemed stunned, unable to find the next words to speak. Her mouth opened and closed, and she looked like a mistreated puppy.

“So?” The woman sat in a chair, looking much older than she was. She looked at the table, which was now illuminated by the light coming in through the window. From my low vantage point I could not see what was on it, but I saw the end of a tube poking out from one edge of the table and guessed that it was the bolt of cloth that had struck my head.

No doubt the other tools one needed for tailoring were on the table as well.

“Ah…no…er…” My master evaded the woman’s gaze and stumbled over her words as she tried to find a reply. She seemed on the verge of tears, and I glared at the woman with all the anger I felt.

“What? You want a test, then?” sneered the woman. She had realized why my master was hesitating.

My master’s thin body flinched away, and though I knew she had enough courage to face even the fearsome wolf’s howl, she couldn’t help but tremble at this woman’s obvious malice.

“By all means, go right ahead. Cut cloth, sew seams, thread needles. You could even ready the dye for fur treatment. Shall I see if you have the skill to become a member of the Clothiers’ Guild of Kuskov? I, Guild Chief Ars Vidt?”

My master could not manage any sort of reply when faced with the anger of the woman who’d introduced herself as Ars. She was cowed and overwhelmed and stumbled back awkwardly.

“Sadly, we have no materials with which to work. Oh, certainly, if you want broken buttons, fraying thread, and bent, rusted needles, we’ve plenty of those. Though we can’t test you with those, can we? So what do you suppose we should do, hmm?”

Ars laughed, but not because she was happy. It was because if she didn’t smile, the unbearable bitterness inside her would come rushing out. The wisdom my years had given me helped me to understand just why the woman Ars was acting this way.

But my master did not have that understanding. Despite being overwhelmed by Ars’s sharp tongue, she summoned her courage and tried to press on—without having the slightest understanding of Ars’s mind.

“I-if it’s money, I have—”

I knew Ars’s rage even before it appeared upon her face.

“Money! Hah! You suppose what you need can be bought with money? I suppose so! But listen, you—if all you need is beautiful buttons, beautiful cloth, and beautiful needles, you can have all of that without a single coin!” Ars pounded the table as she ranted. My master shrank away, frozen by the woman’s terrible force.

Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do to help her—because I understood why Ars was so angry.

She continued her raging. “Just turn the scriptures upside down and curse the name of God; then dig up the graves of the dead and scavenge their corpses!”

Such terrible sarcasm.

It was the practice of humans to bury their dead. They were usually buried in fine clothes, along with some valuable object or another. It was said that death was the beginning of an eternal journey, and if the many dead, in their finery, had departed from the town, then in a way their death was itself a sort of plunder.

As the thought came to me, I realized that I was mistaken to be impressed with the neatness of the room. The room was not neat—it was bereft.

The raging, exhausted Ars slumped over the table, then looked up with a thin smile. “But if you have money, how about it? You might at least pay the guild membership fee, eh?”

It was a chilling smile, like she’d taken a short sword in her hands and cut it into her own face. Imagine, if you will, a face more gentle and mild than any beast’s could ever be twisted by such bestial rage.

Nothing good could come of this.

Worried for my master’s safety, I took the hem of her robe in my mouth and tugged. They say a drowning person will grasp even at straw. Who was to say that Ars, drowning in the despair the plague had wrought in her town, would not try to grab my master’s leg?

At the tug I gave her robe, my master seemed to return to herself. That moment, a drop of water fell on my snout. It was very salty.

“Come…you have money, don’t you?”

My master took a step back, then another step, unconsciously touching my head. It was as though she were facing a wolf in a dark forest.

Even if she couldn’t see her surroundings, no matter how much danger lurked, so long as she could be certain I was at her side, she would not fear.

But what faced her now was a human whose hostility was more terrifying than the fangs of any wolf. Ars stood unsteadily. It felt like whatever lurked within her was about to take form and explode. I crouched, readying to leap at her.

The situation was on the verge of explosion.

Then there was a rough knock at the dry wooden door. “Ars! Ars Vidt!” A young-sounding man called Ars’s name.

A frightened, cornered bird finds it hard to take flight. Ars made a sour face and turned away, sitting roughly back down in the chair as she clucked her tongue.

The banging at the door continued, and seemingly hurried by the sound, my master turned and ran toward it. I dutifully followed, but couldn’t help heaving a disappointed sigh.

“Ars! I know you’re in there! The stock purchase advances, get them together and—” The door opened with a suddenness, and the sound of the man’s shouting hit my ears.

My master was just about to put her hand to the door to open it herself, and she drew back in surprise.

“Whoops—” said the man on the other side of the door, his eyes going wide. His face was a rather amiable one. But the next thing he saw after my master was me, and he froze in his tracks.

I was perfectly happy to take advantage of that and slipped past my master to emerge outside.

The man who opened the door was a head taller than my master and fairly young himself. As I moved past him, he recoiled as though from something on fire.

Once outside, I calmly turned around, and at my bark, my master finally came to join me.

The man seemed about to say something to her, but at a glare from me he shrank back; and then, as though to mask his fear, he turned his gaze back inside the building. I didn’t know who he was, but there was no mistaking the unpleasant metallic smell about him. He put his hand to the door and looked back at my master one more time, then fully entered the building and closed the door behind him. I heard no voices after that, and my master and I were left standing in the middle of the street. The only reason I didn’t start walking was because my master still couldn’t bring herself to grasp the series of events that had just befallen her.

Even faced with a sudden, inexplicable accident or encounter, my master had always been able to cling to her staff—her work as a shepherdess. But now that staff was back at the inn.

This left her a simple traveling girl instead of a shepherdess of such skill that some called her a witch.

As it sank into her, she was on the verge of tears, and I did not bark to try and startle her out of it.

Instead, as she started to walk unsteadily along, I nuzzled against her ankles, and when she reached out to pet my head, I was there.

“…Enek,” said my master to me just as the sun was beginning to set. “I’m…awful, aren’t I.”

My master could probably count on a single hand the number of times she had slept in a real bed. And one of those times, she quite literally cried herself to sleep. Her voice was hoarse, so she may very well have been crying while she slept, too.

Just as I was thinking this, my master stepped over where I was lying by the bed and drank some water from a pitcher.

“Half the town died in the plague, after all.”

The copper pitcher was blackened and rusted with age and dented here and there from hard use. I could only be impressed that it didn’t leak.

And of course, I was even more surprised by my master, who, despite being confronted with such hostility, was so kindhearted that she didn’t think ill of Ars.

“…”

She held the pitcher in silence for a while, and just when I thought she was going to go back to bed, she rubbed my back with her foot and came to sit on the bed’s edge.

“I suppose I can’t become a merchant.”

Merchants lie, cheat, and steal as a matter of course. It was a different sort of courage from that of my master, who would gut a sheep if need be. It was fundamentally impossible for her to take advantage of someone else for her own profit.

I sniffed at my master’s nose. It was free of dirt and dust for the first time in a long time, but she pulled it away as though surprised.

“So many people died…and I was thinking only of myself.”

She fell backward onto the bed, and from the sound of rustling fabric that immediately followed, I could tell she was curling up under the covers.

Goodness me.

If she wasn’t so inclined to blame herself, her life would have been a little bit easier.

Still.

“Mm…Enek?”

Still, I cannot deny that I like the way she is. That was the source of her most basic sincerity.

“I’m fine…I’m fine, mm…Eek, that tickles…Hey, you!”

I poked and played with her, and after perhaps three rounds of attack and defense, my master gathered me up in an embrace, nuzzling her face into my neck. “We can’t stop. Can we?”

There was nothing I loved so much as the sight of her profile as she walked a field all by herself. I gave a growl and a bark, and she embraced me again, almost painfully tight, and then released me.

“Let’s go see the bishop.” Her eyes were red from crying, but her smile was a genuine one. “Besides, giving our confession to a priest might do us some good, eh?” she continued, busily making herself ready to leave. She didn’t notice the way I’d curled my tail up, asking her if I was not strong enough for her.

Master!

“Come, don’t give me that look! Playtime is over!”

I have never been more grateful than I was in that moment not to have the ability to speak!

Upon leaving the inn, the sky was red. In our previous life, we would soon have been making ready to sleep.

My master yawned a small yawn as we walked, no doubt the trace of the sleepiness she felt having cried herself past exhaustion. She noticed my glance and turned away, trying to cover up her yawn.

The streets were as deserted as they had been earlier, but bathed in the light of the setting sun, they now seemed somehow even sadder. My master had no love for dusk, and as we walked alone through the empty streets, all the while she kept her hand on the back of my neck.

But I could not blame her for that. I, too, dislike dusk. If you would ask me what about it I find distasteful, I would answer straightaway that it’s the length of the shadows. Atop a small hill and facing the sunset, how long my master’s shadow could grow! Such shadows made it difficult to discern the true size of things and made me pointlessly wary. At sunset, even sheep have shadows of terrifying length.

In these deserted streets the only shadows were our own, and even so, I could not shake a certain unease about them. Eventually I sensed another presence in the street, and there met the wary gaze of a stray dog. My master finally let slip a sigh of relief when we arrived at the church and there, finally, saw the faces of other people. I understood her relief all too well.

“I hope the bishop is all right,” said my master.

I wouldn’t have had an answer for her even if she’d asked me, but given his condition the previous night, only God knew whether he would recover or not.

Human bodies were fragile.

I could hardly fail to notice the deep breath my master quietly took. Her strained expression was the proof of her resolve not to quail, no matter how poorly Giuseppe might be faring.

“Ah, you’re the girl…,” came a voice addressing my master no sooner than we had entered the church.

A group of plump women were gathered inside the open doors of the church, whispering about something.

From what little knowledge I have, given the white cloth covering their arms and heads, they were probably responsible for caring for the two important men who’d come to their church.

With such sturdy-looking people looking after one, it was easy to imagine how the feelings of weakness that threatened to extinguish one’s light might be brushed aside.

“Er, I thought I might ask after the condition of the bishop.”

“Ah, I see. He’s calmed now and is sleeping. Despite that terrible wound, he was up offering prayers until just a moment ago.”

Among beasts and among humans, if there is a group greater than three, there will be a leader. The sturdiest woman spoke, and the others merely followed her lead and nodded.

“Was the wound so very bad, then?”

“It was. When we were awaked and rushed here, we thought it wasn’t too bad at first, but at his age…Still, the bishop has the protection of God, so he’ll surely recover soon.” She smiled a hearty smile as befit her robustness, one that would surely have elicited a smile from and given peaceful rest to a corpse. My master was terrible at false smiles, and even she found herself returning it.

“And, er…what of the other man?” My master stumbled over this question, as she had seen earlier how terrible his wounds had been.

“The wound to his head was not so very great a thing. There was a lot of blood from his head and nose, though, so it looked worse than it was. He still hasn’t woken up, but his color is good, so I think he’ll be awake soon.”

It was not so rare to hear of a sheep falling from a crag or creek, losing consciousness, and quietly dying without ever waking again.

In response to the woman’s relaxed manner, my master nodded seriously. “Might I be able to visit the both of them?”

“Hmm? Oh, certainly. The bishop for his part has been unmovable from his holy duties, but still asked after you several times,” said the woman, then paused and looked at me. “And your black knight here, too.”

That had to be why the women hadn’t seemed afraid when they’d looked at me. I was pleased with that, but for some reason my master seemed uncomfortable with me being called a knight. Master, are you not proud of the praise I’ve earned?

“Enek, a knight…I don’t think…”

“Not at all! It’s said that the actions of this little black knight of yours were very important in bringing the light of hope back to our town. The same is said for the young angel traveling with him, of course.”

“Angel? Oh…n-no, I’m not an…” She blushed red up to her ears and looked down. She’d been called a spirit before, or a sprite, but always with a note of suspicion. Ever since then, she’d been unaccustomed to any sort of praise.

I was starting to become indirectly embarrassed from my master’s own embarrassment, so I gave a bark and rubbed my nose against her leg.

“Ha-ha-ha! See, even your little knight agrees there’s no cause for such humility.”

“…”

She didn’t seem able to put it into words, but as I looked at her still-downcast face, her expression was not displeased.

“Anyhow, feel free to go have a look at the bishop’s sleeping face. They’ve both got rather beatific sleeping faces, you might know.”

She spoke as though she were boasting about her own children, and I felt as though I understood why. The two men had returned hope to the town, and as such, were a source of pride. The good treatment my master and I had received was also due entirely to having brought that light here.

And of course, it was only proper that work be repaid, so we ought to have stood proudly and accepted the honor. But what would they have done if they knew my master had been a shepherd?

I prayed to the God that supposedly lived in this church that they would not ask how my master and I were connected.

“Right this way, then.”

I left my prayers behind as the woman led my master and me farther into the church.

The man who’d employed us as shepherds was also a man of the church, and though we’d sometimes had occasion to enter a church, one could not call this one grand, not even as flattery.

Though it was made of sturdy stone, the lack of maintenance was all too obvious. There were cobwebbed niches where the candles had gone unlit for a duration, which made me wonder how long it had been since anyone had touched these stone walls.

The hinges of the wooden door that led to the room where the bishop lay had evidently rusted away; the door now leaned against the wall, and a simple cloth hung in the doorway in its stead.

Even if the town had deep faith, without a priest there, the items in the church must have been neglected.

“In here,” the woman said in a voice suddenly much quieter than it had been a moment ago. She pulled the cloth aside and gestured for my master to enter. I thought I might be barred, but the woman smiled and let me pass.

I elevated my opinion of her a bit.

“…It’s only been a day, and he’s so—”

I couldn’t help but wonder if my master would have finished by saying “thin.”

The woman nodded and for the first time let a worried-sounding sigh escape.

Evidently we hadn’t mistaken the bishop’s condition, despite the gloom. An injury can be enough to cause someone to weaken and waste away—and the bishop was not a young man to begin with.

My master clasped her hands, closed her eyes, and began to pray. I doubted I would ever forget the way the church had treated her before, so I couldn’t bring myself to feel comfortable there. I sat down and waited. At the very least, Giuseppe bore no responsibility for my master’s suffering. Far from it, he’d held me in properly high esteem, so I could not deny that I, too, hoped he recovered.

“…And may the blessing of God be upon you,” my master finally murmured, then reached out to touch the sheet under which Giuseppe quietly slept. She then turned to face the woman. Humans are very talented with speech, but in such times a simple look was often more eloquent. The woman nodded and placed her hand on my master’s shoulder, and the two of them left the room. I stood and turned to follow them, but then looked back around.

Perhaps it was my imagination, but I thought I felt Giuseppe’s eyes on me.

But his old body still lay asleep and unmoving there on the bed.

I was a sheepdog, who slept under the stars and felt the breath of the land on my body. I had an instinct for the movements of the earth and the heavens. I was glad I could not speak, nor have the wealth of expressions that humans enjoy. Otherwise, I might not have been able to hide my feelings from my master.

On the other hand, his sleeping face had obviously been very peaceful, so perhaps Giuseppe’s heart was peaceful as well.

This was not cause for sorrow.

I left the room and followed my master.

When two sparrows meet, noise follows.

So it should be no surprise that when humans (who are more talkative than any bird) assemble, a great commotion always comes with them.

As she’d gone to visit Giuseppe and his companion, whose name was evidently Rudeau Dorhof, it seemed the villagers would not let my master quietly return to her bed.

“Ah, so you’re from Ruvinheigen, eh?…Where is that, incidentally?”

“I’ve heard of the place! They say the cathedral there is lit all night long thanks to God.”

“Yes, yes! And I’ve heard they tan most of their leather there on tanning stones of gold.”

“Gold?! Well, that’s Ruvinheigen for you. Where was it again…?”

Thus it went, on and on, villagers either peppering my master with questions or talking over her among themselves.

I was lying beside my master and yawned a lazy yawn. The words coming out of their mouths were no different from the baaing of a flock of sheep, as far as I was concerned.

“Didn’t Father Nico say the cathedral in the holy city of Ruvinheigen reaches all the way to the heavens?”

“He did, he did. He said the cathedral was so tall, his prayers were always being interrupted by angels passing by the windows!”

“I wonder how it really is?”

The conversation finally turned to my master, and I glanced up at her. She was smiling, but it was a pained smile, not a pleasant one.

“I suppose…that might be true.”

It was true that the cathedral was tall enough that one had to look up to see it, and perhaps crows and sparrows could be counted as angels.

But if she’d denied that, it would’ve made a liar out of Father Nico. My master had learned these sorts of truths from hard experience.

No matter how dire the circumstances, it was never good to accuse a clergyman of lying.

“Indeed! I remember Father Nico saying he wanted to see Ruvinheigen one more time before he died.”

“But still, Bishop Giuseppe has been there many times himself, and this time passed through it on his way to this very town. And it was Miss Norah, who once worked at the Ruvinheigen Church, who led him here. I can’t help but suppose that God heard Father Nico’s prayers,” said a woman, and all present nodded firmly.

Then they all ardently sought to shake my master’s hand again, saying “Thank you” over and over again.

This all made my master very uneasy, either because she was not used to being thanked or because her experience led her to feel uncomfortable with even the small lie of having “worked at the church.”

Grain millers, shepherds, tanners—all were despised just as thoroughly as executioners and tax collectors. If she was to let slip the truth here, all the smiles she received would be strained ones, and none would have any warmth in them.

And in any case, my master wasn’t lying by saying she worked at the church. She simply wasn’t telling the whole truth.

It wasn’t even untrue that she was to thank for Giuseppe’s arrival in this town. I felt that if the town was going to treat us with such overflowing gratitude, we ought to accept it with all pride…but that was difficult for my master.

For my part, as I participated in this discussion, I received a pork sausage, albeit one that was about to go bad. Thanks are so much more substantial when they come with something more.

“Still,” asked a woman after the questions abated. “Why were you coming here in the first place? Hadn’t you heard the rumors?”

We had finally come to the heart of the matter, I thought, which illustrated the difference in our respective priorities.

My master and I were homeless wanderers. We were less concerned with the happenings of the next town over than we were about whether or not there was someone at our side. For someone who lived in the same place their entire life, the opposite was true.

“Yes, I’d heard.”

“So why did you come? Was it because—did God tell you to?”

The conversation had jumped in a strange direction, and the other women’s expressions were changing.

Unsurprisingly, my master hastily demurred. But in doing so, she would have to reveal her true reason, and she looked down at me. I was certain she was remembering how Ars, chief of the clothiers’ guild, had treated her. If my master admitted she’d come here looking for work, she might be given quite a tongue-lashing.

Until that very moment, even she seemed about to be overwhelmed by the conversation around her; at least it had been pleasant. I couldn’t blame her for being desperate to preserve that mood.

Unfortunately, I was in no position to come to her aid. I curled up my tail and drooped my head.

“Oh, there she is!” came the sole man’s voice, cutting through the voices of all the women. In that moment, the mood of the place changed instantly.

It was as though they were a flock of sheep stunned into silence by the sound of a wolf’s footfalls.

First my master was surprised by this, and only a moment later did she follow all the women’s gazes to their end.

There was the man who’d interrupted us at the guild house earlier that day. He was looking at my master, waving his hand.

“What’re you doing here, you devil!”

It was those words that were the most surprising of all. They came from one of the women who’d been so lively and pleased up until just a moment earlier.

My master winced at this sudden turn, automatically reaching down to put her hand on my head.

“Just where do you think you are? This is a church, the house of God!”

“Come now, don’t scream at me like that. I’m allowed to come to church, too, am I not? It’s not the righteous man that needs God, but the wicked man,” he said, his lip curling up at one corner in a sarcastic sneer.

His expression was clearly hostile, but it was difficult to see at what the spearpoint of his malice was aimed.

Just as I was feeling a certain kinship with that, one of the women ventured to answer.

“Shut your mouth! You usurer! You loan shark!”

The man merely shrugged off the vicious accusation—he raised his hands to about the level of his shoulders, his palms facing the women.

Usurer. Moneylender.

So he was one of us.

“Fine, fine. But I haven’t come after your meager little coin purses today, I’ll have you know.”

The reaction of the women in that instant was indescribably comical. They looked at each other uncertainly. “Well, if that’s so…”

I understood humans surprisingly well for a dog. Their thoughts were utterly obvious to me.

“E-er, do you have some business with me?” said my master, after a few moments of silence.

The women’s body language told her not to talk to this fellow, but my kindhearted master finally met the man’s gaze—whereupon a smile bloomed upon his face, and he spoke in a merry tone.

“Well, we met in such circumstances earlier today, after all! After you left, I heard the circumstances from Ars, and I knew I couldn’t leave the situation as it was.”

“…Ci-circumstances?” asked one of the women finally, unable to restrain her curiosity. It was like dangling a barley shoot in front of a cat.

The man shrugged again and answered, “Listen up, you all. This girl came here in search of work.”

Everyone’s gazes fell upon her, and my master froze in sudden fear.

“She came here to this plague-ridden town that everyone else is fleeing. She came all this way to become a seamstress, and Ars screamed at her and drove her away.”

The silence that followed was surely a long one for my master. I managed to hold back my growl, but my master’s hand gripped the back of my neck with nearly painful force. The tension was like the first step onto the rickety boards of an old bridge across a deep river, and everyone there felt it.

When gazes fell upon my master in a town, they held fear, hostility, and hatred. The same staff that was used to gather sheep in the fields would drive people away when in town.

Witch. Pagan. Shepherd.

All three words carried the same meaning, and my master was always looking down.

Just as I was starting to worry that her grip around my neck was going to choke me to death—

“Welcome to Kuskov!” said one of the women with tears in her eyes, taking my master’s empty hands in hers. My master, not understanding, remained downcast until her gaze flicked frantically here and there as the other women gathered around her to join in the embrace. Since she’d done the same thing to me just a moment earlier, I decided to let her be.

But I noticed that the man was still watching us with unsmiling eyes.

I knew that moneylenders were largely despised. No doubt he was envious of the treatment my master was getting.

“Well, you know Ars—she can be rather stubborn. You might have to wait awhile, but circumstances change. So please, don’t leave town yet. Stay awhile. That’s all I wanted to say,” said the man, even as my master was surrounded by the women. One corner of his lips was still curled up. “And please, do let me know if you’d like to be a seamstress,” he finished with a courteous bow.

The women had silently listened to the man’s talk up until that point, but embracing my master together, they replied for her.

“Have some shame, moneylender! How dare you try to get this girl’s help!”

“That’s right, don’t you dare try to make her suffer the way you have us!”

The man endured these rebukes with that same half smile of his. Perhaps he was used to it. “My name is Johan Erdrich. They say I’m a usurer, but really I’m just a money changer.”

“How dare you tell such an obvious lie in the church!”

“I exchange the money of now for the money of the future, so I’m a money changer.” His expression still didn’t change, but for the first time, his words carried some force.

The women all fell suddenly silent, as though doused in cold water, and it took some time before the strength came back to their gazes.

“That’s all I had to say. Now then, if you’ll excuse me.” His final smile was of a piece with the smiles of all who make their living in trade.

A strange exhaustion lingered, as though a storm had blown itself out in the room. The women held their breath until Johan’s footsteps disappeared.

“W-well, anyhow, if you’ve come looking for work, you’re very welcome here. Kuskov will surely recover.”

“Yes, yes! Just having more people to make the town lively again is a great help.”

Perhaps because this treatment was so different from Ars’s attitude, my master was a bit worried, but once she understood that the women were not lying to her, a smile gradually returned to her face.

It was the smile of one who had spent many days in the field finally catching sight of a town.

When I looked up at my master’s face, she nodded with a smile.

That night, we returned to the inn.

“What a busy day,” said my master as she stroked my back with her bare feet.

How right she was.

Certainly it had been more stimulating than herding sheep.