APIBAGS Chapter 31

It wasn't the familiar nun's habit, so I hadn't recognized her at first—but the face checked out. That was definitely Daisy.

This wasn't anywhere near the orphanage. So why was Daisy sitting in the rain looking absolutely wretched?

"How did you spot her?"

Rain, distance—it should have been nearly impossible.

"Jelly noticed."

Ah. I nodded. That tracked. Last time, when I'd almost gotten us completely lost in the temple, Jelly had been the one to find the way. He'd probably tracked her by scent this time. Werewolves—it was always the nose.

So was this an event, then? Jelly spots despairing Daisy in the rain, goes out to her, and they start building something between them—of course. Daisy must have been set up for a minor sub-couple appearance with Jelly, maybe in the later chapters or a side story. And right now I'd become the obstacle standing in the middle of their love story, because I'd wrecked the original plot.

Well.

"Jelly. Go bring her in."

"Me? It's cold. I'd rather not."

Jelly burrowed deeper into a fur coat that had not been in the carriage when we'd gotten in. Where did that come from? Actually—had he snuck one into the pile at the clothing shop? That seemed exactly like him. Not that I minded buying him a coat, but—

Too cold. That was a bit rich, wasn't it? This was allegedly the sub male lead? Werewolf, sorcerer, and absolutely rakish about it—and his person was sitting in the rain, and he was making excuses about being chilly? No—I shouldn't blame Jelly. This was my fault. I'd monopolized all the routes and tangled everything.

Fine. I'd go myself. I wanted to get on Daisy's good side and clear out the past anyway.

"Miss, let me go instead."

"It's all right. Stay with Pudding."

I lifted Pudding off my lap, handed him to Kanna, climbed out of the carriage, and opened the umbrella. I was genuinely grateful to that clothing shop owner now. I hoped she'd made it home all right.

I walked straight over and stopped directly in front of Daisy. She'd been out here long enough that her lips had gone blue. She'd be running a fever by tomorrow. I tilted the umbrella toward her.

Daisy must have taken me for a passing stranger, because she started to apologize and make to move out of the way.

"Daisy."

Something about my voice reached her—or maybe just her own name—but the half-blank look on her face slowly resolved as she looked up.

"Evangeline... Miss Evangeline. How... how did you—"

She'd been trembling last time too, and here she was again. What exactly was pre-possession Evangeline like? She just walked around installing trauma into perfectly ordinary people? The cleanup left to me was genuinely unfair.

"I was looking for you."

Which was frankly a miracle. If I hadn't brought Jelly, I'd have been sitting at the orphanage waiting pointlessly while Daisy spent the entire day on this pavement in the rain. One step off and the principals in a romance fantasy careened completely off course. The setting felt very real to me just then.

Now I had to get Daisy talking. First: into the carriage with her, then better to head toward Rohanson Manor than anywhere else.

I moved to help her up—and Daisy grabbed my skirt with both fists.

"I have a request. You said you'd grant me a wish."

Right. I had. Before we'd parted last time, I'd definitely said something like that. My intention had been to offer compensation for what Evangeline had put her through and quietly reach some kind of agreement about keeping things quiet.

I'd been about to ask what the request was—when a thought struck me. Not a good thought. A bad one.

I had been planning to offer first. But Daisy had come to me. And she'd already gone to both Henna and Gabriel. The scales weren't balanced.

So rather than granting the wish with no conditions: tell me what you said to those two, and then I'll grant the wish.

"Sure. But there'll be a price."

That felt almost like living up to the Evangeline name for once. I abandoned my conscience some time ago. I'm perfectly fine with this.

"You know what I want, don't you?"

Of course she doesn't. Just a line to fill the space, really. The obvious Evangeline request would be something like mountains of gold or become my permanent servant. So the idea was to imply I wanted something enormous, then scale back later and just ask for the details of the conversation—make it seem like such a small concession that she'd hand it over without a second thought.

"You can... you can have me."

I nearly choked. On nothing. That was—big. That was certainly big.

But why? She was still frightened of me—so why was she offering herself? Surely this wasn't the suspension bridge effect tangled up with some romance fantasy mechanic—

"So please. Please help me."

Whether Daisy's face was wet from rain or from crying, it was impossible to say. The raw desperation in her voice shut down whatever I'd been preparing to say.

"Alright. I'll grant it."

I held out my hand. Just get up first. After a moment's hesitation, Daisy took it.

"Get in the carriage first."

Daisy climbed in, saw Kanna, and her eyes went wide. When her gaze reached Jelly, she appeared to have exhausted her capacity for surprise entirely and folded herself quietly into the corner.

Kanna had been watching Daisy sideways—but when she saw me climbing in after her, she started fussing.

"Goodness, you're soaked through."

By my count I'd gotten maybe a few drops on me, while Daisy looked like she'd been retrieved from a river, but Kanna's sympathies seemed somewhat unevenly distributed. Probably residual friction from whatever Daisy had said to Henna—affecting how Kanna treated her without Kanna even realizing it.

Kanna pulled the fur coat off Jelly and held it out to me. I took it and put it over Daisy instead. Jelly watched his coat pass through several hands and land on Daisy, and let out a short, humorless laugh.

"Well. Good times are behind you now, kid."

"Shut it, Jelly."

—What? Did I hear that wrong? I stared at Kanna. Kanna looked back at me with the composed expression of someone who had absolutely not just said something like that. I must have misheard.

"Long time no see?"

Jelly spoke to Daisy. Watching someone else's romance start to build from the sideline was making my heart beat oddly fast. Daisy didn't answer.

"Is that how we're doing this? Ignoring each other?"

We, he said! We! I kept my eyes pointed studiously elsewhere while every single particle of my attention converged on those two.

"There's not much of a 'we' to speak of."

"We ran away holding hands. The two of us."

"I never held your—!"

Daisy had been winding up to shout, and then she sealed her mouth shut. Last time I'd seen her she'd been terrified nearly witless, so I'd been worried—but watching them now, she was actually a perfect match for the sub-couple setup. Flustered, feisty female; smooth, easygoing male. A pairing with a long and distinguished history.

I'd expected them to keep bickering, but Daisy went completely quiet and no further conversation came, so I moved us to the actual subject.

"So what's the request?"

Daisy's clasped hands tightened.

"I'm... an orphan."

Right. Daisy's backstory opening up. This is what draws her and Jelly closer. It was still running on its own momentum even with me in the picture, then.

"I was abandoned young enough that I don't remember it at all. I grew up in an orphanage. The director was a good person—good enough that even now, living independently, I still visit her sometimes."

All of this the butler had already told me, so I didn't know what expression to make. I had you investigated would do nothing helpful for my villainess-rehabilitation image. I kept my mouth closed and tried to look like someone hearing this for the first time.

"So I went to the orphanage today, and—everyone was gone. All of them."

Gone? Why was there suddenly a disappearance case in a romance fantasy?

There was one thing I could guess. Daisy and Jelly had escaped from a slave trader together. There was a real possibility the same operation had come back around.

"Miss Evangeline. That's my wish. Please find the director and the children."

"Wow, that sounds annoying just hearing about it."

Jelly, you bastard— Why was he stomping all over a perfectly progressing romance route with his own feet?

—Actually, thinking about it: Daisy had a deep backstory, but the actual female lead was Kanna. Sub-couples didn't properly get entangled until much later in the story. Jelly was supposed to be nowhere near interested in Daisy yet. Jelly. You're going to regret this one day. Genuinely, deeply regret it.

"Fine. I'll find them."

I glared at Jelly and answered for him. He was a freeloader here; when I said do something, he did it. Don't feel put upon. This is for your own future. You'll thank me eventually.

I felt responsible for destroying Kanna's romantic storyline. The least I could do was make sure the sub-couple got properly tangled up with each other. For Kanna, I'd find the most remarkable person in this world and make the introduction myself. As for Gabriel—my survival was tied to his, so...

Although. Was Kanna even looking for romance? Watching how she'd been lately, she seemed more like the original female lead type who got attached to the villainess and went around shouting "Friendship over love!"

"Do you have any suspicions?"

"Troy."

"Troy?"

I'd half-expected the name of a slave trading ring. I'd asked because I thought she might have a lead—and instead I got a person's name. Was Troy the name of the slave trader?

"He's the director's son. Her biological son. He's the one behind this. He has to be."

Daisy explained.

The director's otherwise kind nature had apparently not extended to her son. He had been difficult and erratic from childhood—and because the director gave equal love to the orphanage children as to him, his inferiority complex had run unusually deep. He hadn't hesitated to turn violent on whichever children she gave particular attention to.

"One time, he poured hot stew over a girl's arm right before she was going to be adopted. It left a scar. The adoption fell through."

He called the heavier children pigs, refused to let them eat, tormented them. Any time a visiting noble came to look at the children, he'd elbowed his way to the front and taken every favorable position for himself.

"And he'd say he was the director's son, so all of this was acceptable. She scolded him endlessly. It never changed."

What kind of person was this.

"As he got older, the director and the children eventually couldn't tolerate it anymore and drove him out. He kept coming back even then—making scenes, calling what they were doing 'this kind of thing,' demanding the orphanage be shut down entirely."

By romance fantasy internal logic, Troy almost certainly had deep ties to a slave trading operation. The children's disappearance might well have his fingerprints all over it.

Wait for me, Troy. I'd never seen his face. But he was about to receive the full villainess treatment.