Side: Father and Daughter
Tableau’s Perspective
“HEY THERE, TROOPER,” I called out to Priya when I spotted him walking on Main Street.
“Hi…” he sighed.
“Are you tired?”
“Oh, you know youngsters. They just keep causing trouble. What about you?”
“Pith started to whip the trainees into shape.”
Priya made a sour face, but I couldn’t blame him. Whenever Pith got in a mood, half the trainees would quit. I could sympathize with their impulse to run away, but I wished they’d give it a chance. Priya’s training is nothing to be… Well, yeah, it’s intense enough to make anyone want to quit. Maybe I should tell him to ease up a bit. We’d be in trouble if all our trainees dropped out.
“I heard Miss Ivy and Mr. Druid are getting ready to hit the road again.”
“Yeah, I paid them for all the magic stones they gave us.”
“Without a hitch?”
Priya’s question made me laugh. “Yes, I finished the deal without a hitch. Would you believe those two? They lost track of how many magic stones they’d provided.”
Priya just stared dubiously at me—my words must have come as a shock to him. And the way he stares at people is rather unsettling.
“Stop staring. It’s creepy.”
“Hey, rude. Wait, what am I saying…? Did they really not know how many stones they gave us?”
“Yeah, when they came to the station today to look over the receipt, they were both stunned to see the total. Like they didn’t even realize how many magic stones they’d donated.”
Priya was in a daze, and I didn’t blame him. Who in the world gives so many high-level magic stones to somebody and then doesn’t keep track of how many there were? I was a bit taken aback by their attitude as well. If it had been anyone other than those two, I would have assumed they’d kept strict records of the transaction. I wouldn’t even be surprised if they tried to convince me they’d provided more than they actually had. Then again, nobody would ever give such high-level magic stones to a struggling village in the first place. Those two were the exceptions.
“Do you think Mr. Druid and Miss Ivy will, um…be okay?”
Yeah, the way they act does make me worry somebody will swindle them. I understood Priya’s concerns.
“I think they weren’t too worried about the transaction because I was the one they were dealing with.”
“Yikes, what a thing to say! You’re making me jealous.”
“Ha ha ha! Oh, I think it’s a fair assumption to make.”
Priya’s face twisted with scorn. He was Ivy’s fan, after all. He probably did feel genuine jealousy. Then again, since I’m also a fan of Ivy’s, I could have screamed with joy when he said that. I suppressed the urge, though, not wanting to start a fight.
“But they’re leaving now… It’s going to get awfully lonely around here,” I said.
“It sure will,” Priya sighed.
“So much happened this winter.”
“Yeah…”
Thinking back, the time between autumn and winter was full of nothing but shameful moments for me. I was inundated with various problems all at once, and I just didn’t have the emotional strength to deal with them all. I hated myself for being so helpless, but I had no choice but to keep pushing—that was the position I was in. When all the reports of the snow blooms arrived, I thought Hatow was doomed. The cave had collapsed, so we couldn’t mine new magic stones, and we didn’t have enough in reserve to make it through the winter. The more my mind raced, the more trapped I felt. I even indulged in the foolish thought that my becoming head watchman was what had doomed this village. That negative thinking gave me tunnel vision. I even took out my frustrations on Ivy and Druid, and yet they provided Hatow with all those magic stones.
“They sure are a mysterious pair.”
“Huh?”
“Their first impression of me must have been terrible. I was sour and passive-aggressive.”
Priya gave me a pat on the shoulder. “Well, you could say the same of me, buddy.”
Whenever I remembered how poorly I’d treated Ivy and Druid in the past, my head ached. I’d had no right to act that way.
“After all that, they still gave us magic stones. The first time I saw how high-level they were, I was honestly terrified. I was worried they came with strings attached.”
“Yeah, when you first told me about the stones, I was sure they were playing us.”
Our worries really were all for nothing. If only we had seen their true selves, we could have realized sooner just how foolish our worries were. But in my line of work, I had to consider all sides of a situation, so I guess suspecting them was something I just couldn’t have avoided.
“I’m really grateful we met them.”
“Yeah. If we hadn’t met them, we’d have been sunk,” Priya said.
I nodded in agreement. We truly owed our lives to them.
“Say, do you wanna go have a drink?” Priya asked. “It’s been a while.”
“Yeah, that sounds good.”
Winter was not yet over, but there wasn’t as much snow anymore. That alone gave us such a delightfully dramatic decrease in work.
“The usual place good for you?”
We usually went to a tavern that was considered the best or second-best in Hatow. It was known for its cheap yet tasty drinks. Since it faced Main Street, it was only a stone’s throw away.
“Come on in, boys!” somebody called out as soon as we set foot in the tavern.
We looked around to see the place was packed with people.
“Hey! Wait a minute, isn’t that Mr. Druid over there?” Priya cried out.
I looked over to where he was pointing. Sure enough, there was Druid, drinking alone. I glanced around the area near him, but there was no sign of Ivy.
“It’s okay if we go say hi to him, right?” Priya sounded genuinely concerned, which was understandable. If Druid wanted to drink alone, we would be imposing. While we were stuck at the tavern entrance, our eyes met with Druid’s by accident, and he smiled and waved. With a little sigh of relief, I lifted my hand to wave back…only to see that Priya had already started eagerly running toward him. Druid looked a bit startled, but he welcomed Priya with a smile. He even pulled out a chair beside him.
I have a feeling the drinks are going to taste extra good tonight.
“Sorry to intrude…” The seat opposite Priya was empty, so I sat there. Now Druid was sandwiched between us at the bar.
“Oh, it’s no intrusion. It’s lonely drinking by yourself. It’s more fun with a couple of friends.”
I didn’t know if Druid was sincere in calling us “friends,” but I was still flattered.
“So, where’s Miss Ivy?”
“Sorry you missed her. She’s back at the inn, probably asleep by now. She was quite tired.”
“Did you do something particularly exhausting today?” I asked worriedly.
Druid shook his head. So why exactly was she tired, then?
“We went shopping for her spring wardrobe. That seemed to wear her out.”
She’s tired from clothes shopping?
“Miss Ivy has grown into a stylish young lady,” Priya observed.
Druid smiled awkwardly, and the two of us sensed something was amiss. Or were we mistaken? It did take women an awfully long time to select clothes, to be sure.
“It’s not quite what you think,” Druid said. “Ivy has a hard time buying anything that isn’t a necessity.”
I gave Druid a confused look. What he was saying made no sense.
“Ivy has had to do without for most of her life, as a matter of survival.” Sadness filled Druid’s eyes.
“Survival, you say?” Stern lines formed on Priya’s face.
“Yes, survival. She’s had to fight all her life, since she was a baby, just to survive.”
She’s had to fight to survive since she was a baby? Was she an orphan? But the guild or the church would help her out if that were the case.
“Um, is Ivy perhaps…?” Priya cut himself off. He wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to ask anything further.
“I can’t give you the specific details without Ivy’s permission, but anyway, because of how she’s had to live her life, she has a hard time speaking up when she wants something.”
“But you folks do have enough money, right?”
What with the payment from those magic stones, they were sure to have more than enough. And there was also Ivy’s reward money from helping take down the crime organization.
“It’s not her wallet that’s the problem, it’s her heart.”
“I see…” Priya frowned, deep in thought.
“Ha ha!” Druid laughed out of nowhere.
That startled me. I didn’t see what could possibly be so funny.
“But Ivy was able to pick out and buy her own spring outfit today. They were beautiful clothes, too, heavy with embroidery. The kind of clothes she never could have chosen for herself before. Well, I say clothes, but it was just one item. I only hope she’s finally learned that it’s okay for her to treat herself now and then. It’s hard for her to change her behavior since she’s not really aware of it. But I want her to learn to depend on others more.”
Druid said there was no blood relation between them, but he really did feel like Ivy’s father. And I’d heard Ivy describe him once as the perfect father. Those two really had forged a wonderful relationship.
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