Spice and Wolf - Volume 9 - Chapter 8

CHAPTER EIGHT

Just as there are any number of paths to reach the summit of a mountain, there were many ways to contact Eve. Strangely, Lawrence had been directed to meet her at the same plain inn where Holo had brought Col for her drunken ramble.

There were no customers on the ground floor, but the innkeeper seemed mostly unconcerned, as someone from the north had rented out the entire inn. Every inn and tavern on the delta would be like this today.

Lawrence handed over a weathered copper coin with the face of a long-gone king on it, and in return, the innkeeper placed an empty cup on the counter and indicated the inn’s staircase. “There you are.”

He was being told to take the cup upstairs.

Lawrence did as he was told, climbing the staircase, and at the end of the hallway, he saw the form of a merchant speaking to someone. He would have overlooked the person, but for the fact that no good merchant ever forgets a face.

Despite the fake beard and the cotton he had stuffed his clothes with in order to change his figure, one of the men was clearly one of Eve’s lookouts.

Lawrence faced him yet again, which earned him a sharp glare.

“How’s business?”

Lawrence stopped for a moment, but overcame his trepidation and walked up to the men, greeting the one he hadn’t met before. He realized he was being asked for some sort of password, so he calmly turned his cup upside down. “So bad I can’t even drink,” he answered.

His interrogator grinned and indicated the door next to him. The nails on his hand were twisted and deformed, probably because he was used to hard physical labor.

Lawrence gave a friendly smile and knocked at the door, entering only when he got a reply. Upon stepping inside, he found the smell of ink was almost overwhelming and mixed with that scent was something more pungent.

It turned out to be the scent coming from an old man in the corner, who was melting candle wax to use for seals.

“Have you any idea how much it saddens me to see you here?”

Physical and mental exhaustion were not the same. Eve’s face wore the exhaustion of having read too much, and she smiled, leaning her cheek against her hand, which was propped up by her elbow on a table that overflowed with letters and documents.

“Was it time for your nap?”

“Exactly so. Look how much I’ve been talking in my sleep.”

Lawrence stood in the entrance, yet even there were papers scattered about his feet.

He took a casual look at them—the ones he could easily see included two threats, three unverifiable accusations that such-and-such a person on the north was secretly connected with so-and-so on the south, three invitations of alliance, and one invitation to flee to a foreign country.

Lawrence picked up that last one—it seemed the most amusing—and brought it to Eve.

“Once I was crossing the sea out there, and I happened to be on a ship with a group of pilgrims. We had the rotten luck to be attacked by pirates.” Just as Lawrence wondered what Eve’s sudden speech had to do with anything, Eve took the letter from him and began to neatly fold it up. “At first the cowering pilgrims prayed to God, but once several sailors were killed and it seemed all hope was lost, what do you think they started doing?”

“I’m sure I don’t know,” said Lawrence, and Eve continued, amused.

“Those pilgrims finally started just going at it! I watched them do it and thought to myself what strange, powerful creatures humans are.”

A poet had once said that fear for one’s life was the greatest aphrodisiac.

But a question remained.

“So what did you do, Miss Eve?”

Eve tossed the neatly folded letter into the fireplace. “I went through their belongings to collect the money I’d need to buy my own life back.” Her dry lips did not move, but her eyes crinkled in a smile.

Lawrence shrugged and produced a piece of parchment from his breast pocket. “I was told to give this to you.”

“There’s no need for me to see it,” said Eve, which made the old man who was stirring the molten wax look up at them.

Eve turned to him and made a gesture with her finger, and the old man turned his attention back to the wax.

It seemed the old man was deaf. Either that or they wanted Lawrence to guess as much and thus feel free to speak.

“All I’m interested in is whether you’re my ally or not.”

“Or more accurately, whether I’ll listen to what you tell me to do in the end or not.”

Eve really did smile with her eyes, not her lips. Not replying to Lawrence’s statement, she instead held her hand out. Lawrence handed her the parchment, which she read as though it were a letter of no particular consequence.

“Hmm…it’s so close to my expectations it’s a bit unnerving. Almost as though you told them about our secret meeting.”

“You jest,” Lawrence answered with his best merchant’s smile, and a bored-looking Eve set the parchment down on the table.

“So, he’s finally come to the table, has he…?” she murmured, closing her eyes.

At the very least, she seemed to be considering the parchment Lawrence brought her for longer than the other.

“What do you think?” Eve asked, her eyes still closed.

It was still too early to bargain.

“Given that you’ve received my message, my job’s been completed without incident.”

“The northern landlords exchange a note of deed transfer of their land for the narwhal. I split the profits with the northern traitor, and your guild gets the profit from having bested their competitors.”

“Everybody’s satisfied,” said Lawrence, which made Eve sigh and rub at the corners of her eyes.

“It’s a hard thing, not being able to see the hearts of others with your own eyes.”

The only people who could trust in their partners and be sure a trade would go smoothly were those who had never seen betrayal. And those that planned to cheat another—who could also boast that their own trades would go well?

“Do you know who Kieman is connected with?” Eve wasn’t testing Lawrence. It was a simple question.

“No.”

“Does it seem realistically possible to secretly steal the narwhal?”

“Perhaps by bribing the guards on watch.”

“The deed transfer will be written by the landlord’s son, who has no actual authority. It may not carry any actual weight. What does Kieman plan to do about that?”

“The third-generation head has already paid his respects to the nearby landlords, and jurisdiction of the town is shared by the council, the Church, and the landlords. So long as they have grounds to assert their rights, things should work out.”

“I see. And you believe what Kieman says?” From her sitting position, Eve looked down her nose at Lawrence like a noblewoman regarding a piteous commoner. She spoke as though she was sure that Kieman waited to spring a trap on her.

“I do not believe his words, but I am going along with him.”

Eve turned her gaze away from Lawrence. “A perfect answer. But not enough to bridge the distance that separates us.”

Did this mean that she could not accept Kieman’s proposal? Lawrence hardly believed the entirety of the man’s plan, but it didn’t seem like such a bad trade for Eve.

Lawrence put a question to her. “What would be the best choice for you, Miss Eve?”

“I told you, didn’t I? To betray one and all and take all the profit for myself.”

“You couldn’t possibly—” Lawrence blurted out in spite of himself.

Eve smiled, amused. She seemed to want him to continue.

“Why would you be so childishly selfish?”

If Eve proposed the same detail to Kieman that he was bringing her, he was certain to accept on the spot. He would have been delighted.

So why did Eve insist on being so stubbornly persistent? Whatever her reason, it still seemed strange to Lawrence.

Or was it just as simple as that—that she absolutely did not want to share any of her gains? Was it really something so utterly unreasonable as that?

“Childish? That’s right, it’s childish.” Eve laughed and breathed in. When she exhaled, her breath was strong enough to move some of the papers on the surface of her desk. “When a child burns herself in a fireplace, she fears it even when the fire is out.”

“…If that were so, then merchants would have no choice but to sit alone in empty rooms, trembling and afraid.”

Merchants were burned, deceived—then went out to seek profit again. And wasn’t Eve herself the exemplar of that ideal? Wasn’t her being the lynchpin of events that would determine who controlled an important port town like Kerube the proof of that?

Lawrence advanced on Eve, half-angry, and found her wary gaze directed right at him.

“I wasn’t always a merchant.”

“—”

Lawrence flinched at her suddenly meek, pathetic voice.

Eve flashed a quick smile at Lawrence’s reaction, then flopped forward onto the table. Paper went flying.

The deaf, old man hurried to his feet, but Eve, still lying on the table, gave him a faint smile. “Don’t you think it ridiculous? That by exchanging a few slips of paper and a few of the formless words that come from our mouths, we can gain such money as can buy a human life.”

Eve picked up a sheet of paper and dropped it. She then slowly directed her gaze at Lawrence. “Have you ever been betrayed by someone you completely trusted? Whom can you trust then? The only one I trust is myself when I’m betraying another.”

A beast’s fangs could be used to attack, but also to defend one’s self. So was the reason Eve kept her fangs so sharp because she felt she needed to defend herself that much?

“When your own life was on the line, you asked me, didn’t you? What lies at the end of my road of greed? And I answered, didn’t I? What I’m looking forward to…” Eve slowly closed her eyes and then slowly opened them. “…Is that someday I’ll be satisfied, and I’ll be able to reach a world with no worry, and no suffering.”

Lawrence took a step back because he was truly frightened.

Aiming for a world without worry and suffering but trying to reach it via constant betrayal—it was like being shown the source of human sin.

This was no act.

It was not a trap.

Eve slowly sat up, reluctantly leaning back in her chair.

“Fine, then. I accept Kieman’s proposal. You tell him that for me.” She paused for a moment, smiling a snakelike grin. “You tell him.”

Eve was a genius.

How could her words be trusted? What was he supposed to report to Kieman?

His gorge rose at the possibilities and doubts, but he swallowed it and slowly straightened himself. She had told him to pass the message along, and he had no choice but to do so.

“…Understood.”

He bowed politely, then turned to leave.

For a moment, Eve seemed to Lawrence like the red, many-armed monsters of the deep that occasionally devoured ships and haunted the dreams of sailors.

Eve truly didn’t trust anyone. It was hardly surprising then that she was willing to betray anyone for her own gain. But it was also true that without trusting someone, somewhere, trades could not be completed, and thus no profit could be gained.

So who would she trust in the end? And after all was said and done, who would be betrayed?

When Lawrence put his hand to the door, Eve spoke as though to stop him short. “Hey, why not join me?”

She looked at him expressionlessly. She seemed to be at once sincere and deceptive.

“What, to join you even knowing I’d been fooled?”

“Exactly.”

“I don’t want to believe I’ve been fooled,” Lawrence answered.

Eve smiled. “I suppose not.”

Lawrence had no reply to follow that. If he replied, he’d be taken. Humans were all too easily led astray by the mermaid’s song.

He quickly stepped out of the room and down the stairs. The whole way, he felt as though Eve were watching him go.

Kieman was to be contacted via a messenger.

The designated location was a busy little street filled with stalls, two blocks away from the spring of gold. The best place to hide a tree was in a forest, after all.

He sent the note via messenger not just because it was difficult to meet with Kieman in person, but for another reason as well.

Lawrence was under strict orders to tell Eve only those things he had been specifically told to tell her. This was probably to prevent her from using Lawrence to deliver misinformation to Kieman.

Lawrence had to admit that the precaution protected him as well. It was impossible to tell which parts of his recent exchange with Eve had been accurate.

What was the truth and where were the lies? He felt his own trust in people wavering.

“The boss says, ‘Understood.’” It was a small, hunchbacked man who delivered Lawrence’s message and brought back this reply.

“What should I do?”

“The meeting will be in recess soon. You’ll get your instructions after that.”

“I understand.”

“Right, you’ll pick up your next message from us at the prearranged location.”

No sooner had the messenger said so than he left—probably to pick up other pieces of information from other places.

They were certainly taking every precaution, but Lawrence still didn’t know how effective it would be.

The delta was always full of merchants coming and going, so an unfamiliar face wandering around the town was hardly a strange sight—but everything had its limits.

At this particular moment, a merchant wandering idly around or standing beneath the eaves of a stall, looking to and fro as though waiting for someone, would look extremely suspicious. And suspicion bred more suspicion.

If Holo had been with him he would have been at ease, but having become used to her presence, it was frightening not to have her around. Lawrence grinned in spite of himself and made for the tavern where he had been told to receive his next reply.

“I’m sorry, sir. We’ve no seats left! Will that be all right?”

There were few taverns on the delta, and most of them had been rented out, so things were especially crowded.

As a result, Lawrence was informed of such before he could enter the place.

He could tell just by looking that the place was packed with people. It was obvious that they would run out of wine if they didn’t start diluting it with water, and anticipating that, Lawrence ordered some stronger liquor.

Though he would be reduced to leaning against a wall to drink it, the positioning was just right to give him a good view of the tavern’s interior. He hadn’t participated in the meeting, but it would be no trouble to learn what happened there, and he wouldn’t even have to do anything in particular to do so.

In the time it took him to receive his liquor and take three sips of the stuff—it was just right—he was able to understand the outlines of what had transpired.

The northerners accused the southerners of stealing their ship, but the southerners contended that such had been the wish of the fisherman aboard.

The lines of reasoning were parallel and would of course not lead to any sort of resolution.

According to the loudest merchants in the tavern, odds were that the northerners would withdraw in the night and relinquish their claim on the narwhal in exchange for a share of the profits from its sale. Lawrence agreed with the notion.

Had the southern elders wished to destroy the northerners, they had but to sell the narwhal to one of the landlords and, after grasping military power, threaten all of them into capitulation. Since they hadn’t done that, it meant they still hoped for a peaceful resolution. If they hoped to continue to hold the reins of the northerners, they would have to give them a reasonably generous offer, which would leave the northerners satisfied. The landlords’ resistance came from their desire to protect their own influence, as well as their simple wish to be able to bargain for some of the profits from the expansion of the delta marketplace.

And even that would not be decided at this meeting, but rather in negotiations behind close doors.

But those negotiations would take place unbeknownst to Lawrence, and the only people who had a full grasp of the situation were the lead characters in the farce.

Because he stood between two people—Kieman and Eve—whose power in the town was uncommonly profound, with the narwhal at the center of events, Lawrence had the false sense that he was somehow crucial to all of this. But in truth he was a mere tributary.

When he considered that his only role was to convey information, he could only smile. And Eve had had him under her thumb all along.

Even the power of liquor wasn’t enough to let him calmly consider their last exchange. He felt very keenly how simple it truly was to deal in the exchange of goods for money.

If he’d passed his days in this kind of environment, there was no telling what sort of monster he might have become. When it came to regrets and ambitions, he lived in a different world.

He could only smile at how lucky he was that Holo wasn’t here to see him now.

“Sir,” a voice called out to Lawrence as he was lost in thought, his cup at his lips.

Any merchant who forgot a face or a voice was a failure. Of course, Kieman’s messenger had a rather memorable face.

“You’re quite swift.”

“Certainly. The boss’s work needs quick resolve.” The messenger’s face wrinkled in a proud smile.

The more information one had, the more accurate one could be, but this required reach. That is what traveling merchants dealt in. By contrast, Kieman dealt with goods that took months to transport by ship. At distances like that, there was no way of knowing whether the information one had was reliable, and indeed, it was often impossible to have any information at all. In such situations, one still had to make trading decisions regarding goods of incredible value, and to do so, no small amount of decisiveness was necessary.

To say nothing of the fortitude it took to wait out the months it took said goods to arrive.

That was how Kieman possessed the pluck to come up with a plan to trade a narwhal for control of the delta, thereby shifting the balance of power in the town.

And that was why his messenger smiled so proudly.

“So, here.” Lawrence found a piece of paper slipped into his hand, as though it had been there all along.

And if Lawrence himself was nearly fooled, there was no chance that any onlookers would have noticed the message change hands.

“Indeed,” Lawrence murmured, and the messenger disappeared just as he had arrived.

What he had been given wasn’t even in an envelope.

Did they not think he would read it? Or did they not mind?

Either way, Lawrence did not look at the paper. If he had, he might find himself taken in by the information it contained, and thus easier for Eve to trap. Even the sharpest-clawed cat could not find purchase on a smooth stone. The less he knew, the harder it would be for him to be drawn in.

There was a huge difference in the amount of information each of them had, so this was the best way for him to protect himself. He needed to resist acting before things were truly within his grasp and to avoid exposing his true thoughts to anyone.

It was a contradiction in terms, of course—being fully aware that he was trying to act naturally. But only those who could keep their minds open and their emotions fully under control could truly call themselves merchants.

Lawrence reminded himself of that, as though he were a young boy venturing into a dark forest, telling himself that demons didn’t really exist.

Following the same sequence he had performed not long before, Lawrence again delivered the letter to Eve and received her reply. This time she said nothing, only giving Lawrence a look that seemed to invite his pity.

But if he could act normally, Eve could certainly do likewise, so there was no way of knowing how much of her expression was an act. Yet the tired messiness of her hair and the wrinkles here and there on her face were clear enough, and even more papers littered her desk.

When he left the room, the image of Eve dealing with all of those letters alone at her desk somehow stayed on his mind.

Lawrence had Holo.

He had her both as a source of simple support, but also as a trump card—if the situation turned bad, she could wipe the slate clean.

But Eve was alone, and she faced this conflict without anyone she could call an ally. Her situation was unquestionably dangerous, and if it were discovered she was communicating with Kieman, imagining what sort of revenge the northern landlords would exact was deeply worrisome to Lawrence, even though the risk was not his.

He felt his resolve starting to fray.

“What’s the matter?” asked Kieman’s messenger, when he came to deliver the reply

“It’s nothing,” said Lawrence, shaking his head, and the messenger asked him no further.

Lawrence melted into the crowd on his way back to Eve’s place and realized he was running. Something was making him feel hurried.

He was carrying mere slips of paper, and he reminded himself that nothing further was required of him, but still his anxiety rose.

He could make no excuses.

The messages he was carrying could easily decide the fates of human lives.

“Please wait here.” Was it his fourth visit?

When Lawrence arrived to hand over the letter, the guard only confirmed the password and accepted the letter. He did not lead Lawrence inside.

Any torture would lose its efficacy once it was repeated enough, but Lawrence found his worry suddenly worsening.

The guard, of course, explained nothing to Lawrence, and after handing off the letter to Eve in the room, he returned to still silence.

The two guards exchanged no words and did not so much as look at each other. Time crawled by, and the sounds of the commotion outside only served to emphasize the silence in the inn.

It seemed as though Eve’s replies were taking longer and longer for her to write, and Lawrence wondered if she found herself having to consider her answers more carefully.

Was she thinking before putting pen to paper? There was no document that would tell her the correct answer and no one around who knew what it was. And yet she had to find a solution to this problem, on which her whole destiny hinged. It was no small feat. Lawrence was reminded of a time when he’d been pursued by thieves in a dark forest and happened upon a fork in the path.

One of the forks would lead deeper into the forest and eventually to a dead end. There was no time to choose and no one to hear his cries of help, so his only choice was to press on ahead.

The quill in Eve’s hand must have felt like it was made of lead.

The door finally opened, and the possibly deaf old man emerged from the room bearing a letter. He looked Lawrence over, then slowly handed it to him.

The letter itself was slightly wrinkled and had drops of sweat here and there on it. Eve’s pains were quite obvious.

Lawrence handed the letter off to Kieman’s messenger, then received the reply.

“The boss is getting impatient,” said the man. “He says the current is growing stronger. And that we must row faster in order to keep up with it.”

Eve was surely not the only person that Kieman was dealing with. The current he was talking about surely involved secret dealings with dozens of merchants, with Kieman holding the rudder.

It was a basic principle of commerce that the faster you could deliver information, the better. Perhaps the reason the most recent letters had been unsealed was that they couldn’t afford to wait for the wax to set.

Lawrence nodded and ran to Eve.

Yet again, the guard at the door passed only the letter on into the room, and Lawrence was unable to see Eve, which meant he couldn’t urge her to hurry.

Although urging her on was no guarantee that she would actually write her response more quickly.

Eve was not stupid; she must have noticed the changes in flow and had to know that regardless of whatever plans she might have, slowness to act would invite only loss.

If the current was fast enough to make Kieman nervous, then the volume of the letters flowing toward Eve must also have been increasing. No matter how great the potential of Kieman’s plan to reverse the situation, Eve was not in an easy enough position that she could just sign on. On the contrary, secret deals had to be carefully hidden in between legitimate ones.

Eve was surely just as desperate as everyone else.

Lawrence reminded himself of that over and over, as he waited in the hallway and pretended to be calm

If it was to their own profit, good merchants would wait two or three days until their scales balanced. But waiting could also mean missed opportunities.

When the old man finally returned with the reply, Lawrence gave a perfunctory thanks and immediately left. He no longer knew whose side he was on. Was he hurrying to help Kieman or to buy just a little bit more time for Eve to think? Or was he simply caught up in the moment? He had no idea.

Kieman’s messenger was beginning to look grim, with sweat breaking out on his brow. In the short time it took the messenger to deliver the note to Kieman, Lawrence overheard from passing merchants on the street and in the tavern that there had been progress in the meeting.

It seemed that there would be a conclusion more quickly than anticipated.

The moment consensus was reached, the grand reversal Kieman was planning would turn to so much foam.

And Lawrence doubted that such an opportunity would come again.

The messenger began to use stronger language to speed Lawrence on, and over and over Lawrence prodded Eve’s guard.

But Eve’s replies continued to take longer to come, and from what he could glimpse of her handwriting, it seemed to be turning messy, almost drunken. Amid the stomach-churning tension of the exchanges, Lawrence visited the inn over and over again, again, and again.

As he was handing yet another letter to the door guard, he felt a strange unease and froze.

“…?”

The guard looked at him warily.

Lawrence looked at the guard, dumbstruck, but hastily tried to smile.

His heart was hammering in his chest.

It couldn’t be.

The words danced madly around in his head.

The guard took the letter into the room with Eve.

“…It can’t be,” Lawrence whispered to himself.

Why were Eve’s replies taking so long? Kieman was participating in the meeting and probably even busier than she was, and yet his decisions and replies came quickly every time.

It certainly wasn’t as simple as a difference in their personalities. Eve was the kind of person who could draw a knife on someone without a single hesitation if she needed to. She wasn’t the sort of person who would find herself assailed by indecision.

It was when he began to wonder if Eve was somehow even busier than Kieman that Lawrence felt a pang of unease.

When he’d been allowed into Eve’s room, there had been letters scattered everywhere. And every time he’d visited since then, there seemed to be more, such that even just reading them all would be quite a chore.

But he had overlooked something important.

Each time he delivered a letter, he had been made to wait outside the room for some period of time.

And during that time, what had he seen?

Had anyone else brought a single letter to the room?

After being made to wait a fair amount of time, Lawrence was finally given his reply. He was able to look around with eyes as clear as the skies after a storm. When the old man opened the door, he caught again a glimpse of the room, scattered with letters as usual.

But then he thought about things.

What need was there to scatter them around like that after reading them? And if there was a reason to do that, what was it?

Lawrence tucked Eve’s reply into his breast pocket and hurried out of the inn.

This exchange had had inscrutable aspects right from the start. The oddest was Eve’s childish insistence that she simply had to monopolize all the profit. And yet the words he had exchanged with her and the general mood of the place made it seem like it was reasonable to say such a ridiculous thing.

It wasn’t as though she had always been a merchant and ready to jump into this world of ready betrayal—Lawrence could imagine the hardships she’d weathered in getting to this place. It would hardly be surprising if she chose to walk the evil path of betrayal if she thought it would lead to her world without suffering.

It wouldn’t be surprising, but where was the need? Choosing the path that allowed her to hurt others simply because she was also in pain was a mere excuse.

But what if it really was all an act?

Lawrence’s mind raced, and the blood rushed from his head. Sometimes waiting led to greater gain, but sometimes quick action brought the largest profit. And this deal most likely fell into the latter category. Once an agreement was reached at the meeting, Kieman’s turnabout plan would no longer be viable.

If Eve wasn’t working for her own profit, but instead for someone else’s, that would explain why her replies were taking so long.

She was trying to buy time.

In more or less any town, there were men like Kieman, who would always attempt to outwit their rivals given half a chance. How could the elders, who had gained all their experience on that very same road, fail to be reminded of their own youthful days?

Were they using Eve as a tool to thwart Kieman’s mad plan?

Letting him waste his time with an idle partner, the elders would skillfully avoid the spearpoint of this unavoidably intergenerational conflict.

It was all starting to make sense.

The letters scattered unnaturally all over the floor.

And the existence of so many letters, despite Lawrence never once seeing anyone carrying them.

And Eve never once giving the impression that she would waver in the face of any difficulty.

Lawrence delivered the letter to the messenger. As the man turned to hurry back and finish the delivery, Lawrence grabbed his shoulder and spoke.

“A message for Mr. Kieman.”

The messenger frowned, but Lawrence didn’t care and continued.

“There is a possibility that the wolf is a decoy.”

That much of a hint would be more than enough for a man like Kieman to understand.

It was even possible that Chief Jeeta had set a trap in order to teach the upstart a lesson. After all, given that Kieman had no qualms playing Lawrence as a pawn, it would hardly be surprising if the powers above him would take a similar opportunity to legally crush a troublesome subordinate.

But if it came to that, Lawrence would suffer, too, and whether or not he could borrow Holo’s power to escape, his place in the guild would be gone.

The messenger only made a pained face at Lawrence’s desperate words and ran off without replying. He had probably been ordered not to accept anything other than letters from Lawrence, in order to prevent Lawrence from making any decisions on his own.

But the situation required immediate action.

If Eve was really trying to trap them, the sooner they retreated the better. As long as this was still the entrance to the trap, they could still escape. But once the door closed, it would be too late.

Lawrence waited anxiously in the tavern.

Since Kieman’s replies had been so much quicker than Eve’s, this was the first time Lawrence had felt impatient at having to wait for one. And really, it didn’t seem as though he had to wait so very long—yet he couldn’t help thinking, Finally! to himself upon the return of the messenger.

The messenger brought the same thing he had brought before—just a letter.

“Please deliver this.”

“—”

Lawrence was stunned into silence, and for a moment he didn’t know what to say. “Did you not tell him?” he said, grabbing the man by his shoulders.

The man looked aside, his mouth closed.

He hadn’t told him.

But rather than become angry, Lawrence felt only urgency. “I’m not saying this for no reason. And I know why your orders are so strict. But they’re not all-knowing gods, and no human can draw a picture of a town they’ve never been to. They say seeing is believing, and that’s the truth. There’s still time. You have to tell them—”

“Enough!” said the small man, who was so perfectly suited to his job. His voice was low and thick.

Lawrence released his shoulders in spite of himself. This wasn’t the voice of someone who walked the straight and narrow path.

His pronunciation had a whiff of blood and dirt to it.

It was hardly surprising that Kieman would employ a former criminal.

“We just have to do as we’re told, you and me.”

For the first time, Lawrence understood the meaning of the word loyalty—a word that had no place in the world of the traveling merchant.

It was a foolish concept, and there were countless stories where it caused the death of many a knight and mercenary. Merchants were among the few people who were supposed to be able to avoid such problems using logic and reasoning.

Unafraid, Lawrence replied, “Everyone makes mistakes. Sometimes there are things you have to be there to see. It’s the duty of the people on the bottom to fix those mistakes, isn’t it?”

The messenger frowned at Lawrence’s words and looked down. Surely even this loyal man would regret that loyalty if it caused his master’s death.

Lawrence had to convince him. He had to.

The moment he found the nerve to continue, the man looked up and pretended to spit. “You forget yourself, merchant. We’re just tools. We don’t think. Arms and legs don’t have their own heads. Do you get that?”

The man’s quiet voice was nonetheless rough, the harsh tone of someone well used to threatening others from the shadows. But that wasn’t what stole Lawrence’s breath.

It was the man’s words that stopped Lawrence dead.

“If you understand, then take this letter. I have orders from the boss. And so do you,” said the man, slapping Lawrence’s shoulder, then running off as though trying to regain wasted time.

Not a single person nearby betrayed any evidence of having noticed their exchange—the conversation had seemed brief and unimportant, and indeed it was unimportant.

Lawrence was Kieman’s tool. That much was certain, and as such, thinking about the situation or coming to conclusions was not his duty.

He knew that, and he knew he had to tolerate this until the right chance came. But as a lonely, independent traveling merchant, he had his pride, so such tolerance was terrible to endure.

Though he knew he was insignificant, he couldn’t admit to himself he was a mere cog.

Though small, he had his own name, he had his own thoughts, and he was a merchant who could take his own actions. The more he thought about it, the more agonizing it became to deny himself this way.

He knew he was just a small part of a complicated machine. But the reality of that felt like a physical blow to his head. But then, the moment after the flames of rage welled up within his chest and he felt nearly compelled to cry out from it, he suddenly understood—he understood the reason why Eve insisted on acting so childishly selfish, why despite the situation that presented itself to her, she still wanted to keep all the profit.

Eve wasn’t trying to buy time, nor was she planning anything.

Lawrence was certain of that.

If this was a trap, he might as well raise his hand and surrender on the spot.

There was no logic to Lawrence’s conviction; it was entirely emotional.

When he arrived at Eve’s room again, for some reason he was allowed inside and found himself staring her right in the face.

It was possible to know a person’s plans from the actions they took and from the expressions they wore.

Eve had an elbow on her desk and a pleasant, innocent smile on her face.

“You seem pleased,” said Lawrence.

But the wolves that lived along the Roam River did not smile with their faces.

Lawrence produced the letter from his breast pocket and spoke. “You truly are planning to keep all the profit from the narwhal, aren’t you?”

Eve’s smile vanished, and the corners of her eyes narrowed ever so slightly. It seemed like a sort of frown.

But for a wolf who could laugh the whole world off, it was the perfect smile.

Her family had been sold for money, her fate tossed to the winds, and she had to use everything she had just to swim through a sea of sulfur and acid. And all the while she had no doubt been used in other ways, too.

When she was recognized by others, was it because she was the head of the Bolan family, or was it simply because she was a beautiful woman? There was certainly no one who would say her name with any sort of affection or familiarity.

Perhaps that was the real reason why she no longer used the name “Fleur Bolan.” If those around her could see her only as a tool to be used, then she would create a mask to protect her true self.

Even if it was a sentimental notion, Lawrence guessed it wasn’t far from the truth.

Eve looked over the paper Lawrence gave her and slowly closed her eyes. She then smiled slightly and spoke.

“You’re really not cut out to be a merchant.”

“And I doubt you’re cut out to be a wolf.”

The abbreviated conversation seemed like something between a priest and his God.

Eve turned her gaze to the fireplace and narrowed her eyes before continuing. “I had planned to survive, no matter who I had to use to do so, but it seems I won’t be able to ignore reality for much longer.” She put her finger to the left corner of her mouth, as though she were about to make a joke. “When the trouble in this city first started, the furs I’d put most of my worth into were confiscated. Arold, who’d fled Lenos with me, was arrested. Under circumstances like these, I haven’t the courage to be a wolf any longer.”

It was clear that the northerners were having a difficult negotiation. When cornered, people would try to shift the threat to those weaker than them. It seemed all too likely, Lawrence thought to himself.

Eve had probably been thus used all along. But this time they were making a mistake, for her forbearance was reaching its limit.

“My name has always been a convenient tool. Only my grandfather and a few eccentrics have ever called me by it. Of them, probably the only one still alive is Arold.”

Lawrence couldn’t even begin to imagine what it would be like to live one’s entire life as a tool, valuable only so long as one was useful. It made him feel as though people were both more complicated than he had guessed, yet also simpler.

With but a few signs, a person who had lived a life he could scarcely imagine would be able to know exactly which hill she had reached.

Lawrence slowly spoke. “So you’re saying that you wish to be called by your name?”

The hill was a lonely one and surrounded by enemies.

“…When you put it so plainly, it’s embarrassing. No, please don’t be angry. I’m happy. I’m pleased we’re friendly enough now we don’t have to fight with knives and hatchets. I’m surprised myself, truly. I had thought it wouldn’t be so very difficult to manipulate you. You’re an awfully soft touch, after all. And yet…”

There were many details in Eve’s rapid banter that Lawrence didn’t want to forgive, but to merchants the tongue could bring both riches and calamity.

If she was being so casually insulting, it had to mean she wasn’t speaking as a merchant.

“But I couldn’t stand you not knowing. Of course, I won’t mind if you don’t believe me.”

Lawrence didn’t know how to answer. It seemed like no matter how he replied, Eve would wind up being hurt.

“When this is all over, I’m leaving this rotten place. So in the end…,” she said, smiling an amazing smile.

Lawrence wanted to keep the memory of how beautiful he found this in his heart forever.

“In the end, you’re going to make sure they say your name. Is that it?”

Eve’s lips curled. Just like a wolf’s. Her fangs bared, she smiled a sad smile. “That’s right. In the end, I’m going to betray them magnificently, and I shall make them call my name.”

Lawrence could only reply in the soft tones of someone seeing a knight off to a battlefield where he would surely die. “Even if they cry out ‘Eve Bolan’ in rage?”

“Even so.” In that moment, Eve’s face was back to the woman he knew. “Now then, let me ask this of Kraft Lawrence, who so kindly calls me by name.”

Kings speak to only a few chosen people within their palaces, but not because they have been chosen by God to govern nations with only a few words. It is because they, too, are mere humans and can trust only those close to them.

When she had first met Col, Eve told him that it was a kind of fate to be liked by others. And this was surely what she meant.

“Will you betray them with me?”

Eve had a painful-looking bruise at the corner of her mouth, and in that moment her face was worthy of the wolf.