APIBAGS Chapter 42

So he had starved to death—unjustly, because of the original director and Merai—and twenty years later, when Merai was about to commit the same wrong again, he had possessed an ownerless body in order to stop her.

My nose prickled.

What the hell, he was a good ghost! He got stabbed trying to protect the children.

The fear had eased a little.

And at the same time, something complicated settled in its place.

I thought I'd found a fellow transmigrator. All I did was hand over the fact that I'm a transmigrator, for absolutely nothing. Daisy, Kanna, Pudding, Gabriel—and now Melek. At this point it wasn't even a secret. At this rate, the whole estate would know by next week.

"I'm sorry. Being this kind of body, I—"

I'd gone gloomy, and Melek had gone gloomy right along with me. Not really his fault.

"It's fine. I told you we're in similar positions."

When you got down to it, I was in the same situation as Melek. Right, fine. I'd made it this far without knowing the original work. And I had the big data. I'd be fine.

"Is that everything you had to say?"

Melek nodded.

Time to treat him. I picked up the holy water bottle and stopped.

Melek was a ghost. Could I just pour this on him.

Was that exorcism.

Oh. That's why he told me before I could start.

I set the bottle back down. I'd have to call a doctor then. It wouldn't be as clean as holy water, but the body was beastfolk—it might heal quickly regardless.

But was the blindfold because his eyes were also injured.

Wait. Wait.

What if his eyes had rolled back because of the possession.

A credible theory. I looked away from the blindfold and opened the door.

"Can you come in now?"

Jelly and Pudding, who had been curled up outside the door, leapt to their respective spots—sofa and bed. Pudding launched his kneading operation on the mattress.

Oh my god so cute, my baby.

"Did you give him a name? What'd she say?"

"Meringue."

Pfft—puh-HAHA—"Meringue? Meringue? That Melek guy's body and the name is Meringue?"

Dog bastard—no wait, wolf—sprawled across the sofa was absolutely losing it.

Pudding: adorable. Meringue: also adorable. Jelly: not adorable in any capacity.

These two must have had quite the spectacular bad history when Melek was alive. Maybe because he hated being called Jelly himself, he found it enormously satisfying to see Melek saddled with something even worse. Watching him, I got annoyed.

"I'll just call him Melek."

"What?"

Melek's face went exactly like a child who'd had a toy taken away. His eyes were covered. Why was his expression so readable.

"Just like I'm Evangeline Rohanson, you're just Melek."

"I see..."

Young Melek accepted this readily enough. Which meant now it was Jelly who had his back up. His tail hit the floor. Tap. Tap. Clearly displeased.

My decision was not changing.

"Have you figured out what to feed him?"

Recognizing I wasn't going to budge, Jelly conceded the point and changed the subject.

Right—he said he was hungry. Being a ghost rather than the body's original owner, he apparently didn't know what would actually fill him. You can't feed a lion carrots and call it a meal. But if the original Melek was beastfolk—

"Can't he eat the same things as you two?"

Jelly and Pudding generally went out for their main meals beyond what the estate provided. They came back with blood on them sometimes and got scolded by Kanna—apparently they hunted and ate raw.

Jelly shook his head.

"He eats differently."

Different diet. An herbivore, then?

"What kind is he? You're a wolf, Pudding's a cat."

"Oh. Melek is a cow."

Cow. Herbivore—confirmed. That would make shared mealtimes somewhat awkward. He wasn't going to be hunting. If anything, he might go out with them and come back as the hunted.

So under that blindfold was a pair of cow eyes. I almost asked to see them. Then I remembered the rolled-back-eyes theory and decided I was perfectly fine not knowing.

Cow, though. Would he want hay? Or since he was beastfolk, would greens do? The estate didn't serve much in the way of grass, and that probably wouldn't be sufficient volume regardless.

I'd put in an order first thing tomorrow. If that was too much trouble, I could have a small patch of the garden cultivated.

The problem was what to feed him until then. I couldn't leave him hungry overnight.

I was scanning the garden for anything edible when my eyes landed on the cherry tree. All those petals hanging in clusters—that seemed like the kind of thing a cow might reasonably eat. Cows consumed enormous amounts, and the blossoms had the most sheer volume of anything out there.

"Do you think you could eat those?"

"That tree?"

Melek's eyes went wide. Suddenly being told to try eating flowers would be alarming. But flower pancakes existed—I'd had cherry blossom tea before—it couldn't be inedible.

"Want to try some?"

Who knew. We'd find out together. I'd never in my life heard of a cow having a flower allergy, so it was probably fine.

I took the glass jar from the table. When I'd mentioned once on a walk that catching a falling cherry blossom meant a wish would come true, Kanna had collected petals and given them to me as a gift.

Our heroine.

Too kind. I could cry.

I shook a few petals into my palm and held them out for him to taste. Melek considered for a moment, then buried his face in my hand.

Not—I held out my hand so he could take the petals. He used my hand as a bowl.

Melek chewed his way through them. He looked uncertain. Not a hit?

"...They're good?"

Nice.

A hit after all.

"Those are good?"

A scandalized Jelly, declaring he had to verify this for himself, grabbed a petal and put it in his mouth.

"Oh, they are good. Why?"

A positive verdict from a carnivore. Were these actually a delicacy? Curious, I tried one.

Just a strange grassy taste.

Whatever Kanna had done to clean them had made them taste even stranger. Like underripe persimmon. Maybe it was only palatable to beastfolk. I was, of course, a magnanimous person who respected all dietary preferences, and so I said nothing about it being unpleasant.

"Eat those for now."

Didn't matter. If it suited him, that was enough. I couldn't give away what Kanna had given me—I'd ask someone to collect fallen petals instead.

"I'll sort out a room for you, then. Follow me."

"What? I don't get to stay here with you?"

I nearly lost my composure. Did this unrelated man think he was going to share a room with an unmarried noblewoman? Granted, Jelly and Pudding were also technically unrelated men, but Pudding was a kitten and Jelly stayed in wolf form most of the time, so it never quite registered that way.

But Melek's other form was a cow. Sharing a room with a cow was a bit much. This was, admittedly, slightly discriminatory on a species basis.

"There's nowhere to sleep in my room anyway. Unless you want the floor, I'll give you a room with a proper bed."

The sofa was Jelly's territory. The bed was mine and Pudding's. That left the floor carpet. Melek appeared to find the floor unappealing, because he nodded quietly and followed me out.

Oh, right—before sorting out a room, I needed to go to the butler first. Ask for a doctor, tell him about the houseguest, discuss Daisy's reinstatement.

And tell him Gabriel was coming tomorrow.

I was dreading it.

Tomorrow could just not come.

Whether it was the particular length of that day or the relief of getting out after several days trapped underground, the children fell asleep with untroubled faces. The Countess's bed was large enough for two adults to lie in with room to spare, so three children fit easily.

Daisy stroked the hair of foolish, fearless Mary—the girl who had declared she was coming to Rohanson Manor without a second thought.

"Thank you for looking after the children."

No answer came. Henna was staring at the empty air with hollow eyes. The look of someone who had lost the will to live. Someone breathing only because not breathing would require a decision. Daisy's heart clenched tight.

The real young lady had looked exactly like this. That was why, when Evangeline had died by her own hand, Daisy hadn't been particularly surprised.

"Henna."

Daisy was beginning to say something when the door flew open. There were very few people in this estate who could enter that way and go uncorrected.

"Henna! Oh—Miss Daisy, you're here too."

The flower tended by a monster smiled shyly.

"You're late."

"I'm sorry for worrying you. I'll always tell you from now on—so don't avoid me, either. Agreed?"

Unlike Daisy, who had gone straight to the children the moment they arrived, Kanna had attended to Evangeline first, and kept Henna waiting—enough that Henna had gone looking with Sir Gabriel, awkward as it was.

"Yes. I will."

Instead of pointing out that she had, in fact, mentioned going out, Kanna simply pulled Henna into her arms. She understood that Henna's overreaction came from the trauma of having been kidnapped.

"I'll just be a moment."

"Now? Where are you going?"

"My lady needs cherry blossom petals. I have some I collected, so I'm going to bring them to her."

There had been three bottles of petals in total. One had been given to Evangeline; the remaining two, Henna and Kanna had divided between themselves. Kanna was going to give her portion to Evangeline. Her own wishes had already come true—she had no particular need for them.

Having dutifully stated her destination, Kanna left.

One person had left the room, and yet it had gone unusually quiet. Henna was still looking at the door her sister had walked through when she spoke.

"My sister spent her whole life in bed. She was dying, and holy water let her recover miraculously—it hasn't even been that long since she started walking and running and laughing like that."

Henna's voice was so low it was nearly a murmur, and Daisy realized only a moment later that it hadn't been addressed to her at all. It was addressed to no one. To Henna herself.

"I've decided to love Kanna no matter who she is."