APIBAGS Chapter 73

The window had been left open, letting the voices outside carry inside—though the words were blurred at the edges, hard to make out. Turn? Was he telling us to turn around? Ah, maybe the coachman didn't have an invitation. Henna called to the guard, redirecting his attention.

"If it's the invitation you need, here it is."

"No—it's not about the invitation right now. The coachman, the coachman's neck—. What? Did I see that wrong? He looks fine."

"What are you talking about?"

Henna asked, and the guard tilted his head in confusion but accepted the invitation. He looked at the Rohanson family name on the card, and then asked in a pointed tone:

"Rohanson County? Count Rohanson has already come through."

"Count Rohanson departed ahead, and this carriage carries Lady Rohanson, who is making her debut tonight, and her chaperone, Marchioness Toten."

"Lady Rohanson…?"

The guard looked into the carriage with evident doubt—and met my eyes. I tried to smile in greeting. The guard went white, dropping into a deep bow so fast it looked like a reflex.

"F-f-forgive me for the intrusion!"

How far had Evangeline's infamy spread, exactly? She'd have no trouble earning the title of the capital's most notorious villainess—and honestly, it would be well-deserved. The sight of people cowering at me had become something I was used to by now. At least this guard wasn't pressing his face into the ground like the estate maids—just eyes down. A passing grade, comparatively.

We cleared the checkpoint and passed through the gate, then drove a short distance to the banquet venue.

"It's stunning."

"Isn't it."

A castle wrapped in light. The palace looked as though it had been built from gold itself. The river caught the glow and spread it wide, making the whole thing even more overwhelming. No electricity in this era—how is the lighting like this? LED is centuries off. Magic, then.

And at last the carriage stopped. They'd said tonight's venue for the Crown Prince's birthday banquet was the Lion Palace—true to its name, a lion sculpture gaped its stone jaws in greeting.

Henna stepped out first to assist me, but another hand appeared ahead of hers. Long knuckles, fingers straight—I could already deduce the owner from that alone.

As expected: when I raised my eyes, a different shade of deep blue-black met me. I hadn't seen a clear sky in weeks with the rain going on—but looking at Gabriel's eyes made it feel as though the clouds had parted. Well. The rain actually had cleared.

"Sir Gabriel."

"A fine evening, Lady Rohanson."

We hadn't parted on the best of terms last time, so it felt as though far more time had passed than it had.

Long lashes flickering. Whether it was the styling, he looked exceptionally striking tonight—his hair swept back beautifully, leaving his features clearly on display. Being a male lead, he was outrageously handsome.

Admiring the view, I accepted Gabriel’s escort and stepped down from the carriage. The entrance was crowded, carriages jostling for space, but we weren't drawing any loud, red-carpet attention. Our surroundings had gone dead quiet around us, if anything.

A relief. It occurred to me as fortunate that debutante dress required white gloves. Through the thin layer of fabric, Gabriel's hand was cooler than usual. Had he been standing outside this whole time?

"Have you been waiting long?"

We'd stopped at the Toten estate on the way, arriving much later than the time I'd given him. He couldn't be this cold just from waiting outside all this time—could he?

"I was watching from the distance when I saw the Rohanson family's lucky omen approaching, and waited."

Auspicious bird. Bad omen, more like.

For the record, the Rohanson family crest was a phoenix split cleanly down the center—a mirror-image pair from one original. The reason it was one phoenix split in two rather than two phoenixes, Dolly had explained, was that a phoenix is singular in the world: there can only ever be one. She'd taught me that.

"You are more radiant tonight than ever. I thought a star had fallen."

Using the lines Misha had taught him right here, was he? I'd expected him to be subdued after I'd pushed him away—but today he was plying charm with remarkable ease. Gabriel really did have nerve. I'd practically nailed it into him that I had no intention of courting his feelings, that this was strictly a keep-him-on-the-hook arrangement, and yet here he was. Content.

"You do remember what I said, don't you?"

We're just keeping things at arm's length. You know that, right?

"Yes. I remember. But there are many eyes on us tonight. And above all, the temple knows I admire the young lady."

What? He'd been spreading that around? Gabriel had no shame whatsoever. Cheerfully, constitutionally shameless. No brakes, this man knows only the accelerator....

Though to be fair, the original plan was always to have Gabriel nearby as a way to neutralize the more damaging rumors about me and deflect the temple's suspicion. A secondary benefit: using my catastrophically low spirit affinity to identify anyone misusing my stolen summoning circle.

"Then I'll be happy to play along."

Last time I pushed—so today I pull. Just enough push and pull to keep Gabriel on the hook without letting him swim off. Time to put Dolly's intensive lessons to use. Let’s see if my dusty rofan expertise can finally prove its worth.

I curved my eyes into a smile. After seeing her look shocked by my smile the other day, I’d spent two days of brutal mirror practice grinding smile drills. Hard. I'd asked Daisy whether I looked like Evangeline when I smiled, and Daisy had hesitated before saying she'd never actually seen the lady smile. Was it because she was a villainess and didn't go around smiling? No wonder the facial muscles are this stiff.

Whether it was the face he was partial to or the occasion, Gabriel went rigid and lost his words. Oh, this face-struck disaster, I thought, tapping his arm twice, and redirected his attention to the figure stepping down behind me.

"Sir—Lady Toten has arrived."

Gabriel looked at Lady Toten stepping down from the carriage and greeted her warmly, without visible surprise.

"It has been some time, Lady Toten. I was concerned when you didn't respond."

"I'm sorry. There were…circumstances."

Gabriel, showing consideration, didn't press for what those circumstances were. Either that—or, going by Gabriel's settings as someone who was only warm toward his own female lead, he genuinely might not have cared what had happened to Lady Toten.

"Now that Lady Toten has arrived, I won't need to accept Bishop Marik's offer."

Since Lady Toten was here as my chaperone, I no longer had to take my chances with the exorcist as a traveling companion, worrying about my life the whole evening. I was technically a romance-fantasy possessor and therefore categorically different from Melek as a ghost-in-a-body—but that was only a hypothesis. I didn't want to find out the hard way.

"Is Bishop Marik inside the banquet hall?"

"No. She left before you arrived."

"She left?"

"It seems the Archbishop sent for her. She said that since a chaperone was coming with you, she would find another opportunity."

"…Bishop Marik already knew Lady Toten would be my chaperone, then."

So that was why Gabriel hadn't seemed surprised to see Lady Toten. Marik had known.

How had she known? I had surveillance on me—or I'd thought I did, but Jelly and Pudding had been routing anyone who appeared near the estate. How had it gotten through their net? Either Marik had surveillance I didn't know about—or the surveillance wasn't on my side at all, but on Lady Toten's.

Lady Toten had been in seclusion at the Toten estate. Marik had known about that too. And she'd known Lady Toten had agreed to be my chaperone.

"Bishop Marik…?"

Lady Toten repeated the name quietly.

"Are you acquainted?"

"Rather. It was that woman who ordered no one to sell me holy water."

Not what I'd expected. Lady Toten made no effort to conceal her hostility—not even a thin veneer of social courtesy. She'd held her composure even when Diess was swinging an axe around, and yet the name of Bishop Marik brought a venom to her voice that left nothing to interpretation.

"Bishop Marik ordered the holy water prohibited?"

"Yes. The moment the bad rumors about Ryder spread, she said the temple could no longer provide holy water to one cursed—what would the public think, and so forth."

I'd heard a simplified version of this from Gabriel before. So it had been Marik who cut off the supply. It confirmed what I'd inferred from her character: a suspicious, uncompromising exorcist who extended no mercy toward anything touched by the wrong kind of darkness.

Lady Toten's visceral reaction to Marik's name made complete sense. Every artifact and religious ornament lining the walls of that estate, every desperate temple offering over eight years—and the person who sat at the top of the institution that dispensed healing had looked at a child and stamped him cursed rather than examining the truth.

"In hindsight, I suppose Bishop Marik's judgment was correct. Ryder, in the end, ended up—"

Lady Toten had been murmuring to herself in self-deprecating grief when the name slipped out—and she caught herself, startled, glancing quickly at Gabriel. Saying "no longer needing holy water" was tantamount to saying Ryder had died, so she'd caught the error.

"Ryder ended up not needing holy water after all—he's going to be perfectly healthy. Isn't that right?"

"Yes, yes…. That's right."

I covered the slip quickly, and Lady Toten fell in step. We'd discussed it in the carriage: news of Ryder's death couldn't be allowed to reach the public yet. And that meant keeping it from Gabriel as well.

Honestly, I'd briefly considered whether to tell Gabriel. But Lady Toten had wanted as few people as possible to know, so I'd agreed to stay quiet. More practically—Gabriel was a holy knight, and the story of a ghost inhabiting a child's body—he'd seemed unlikely to just take it well….

Gabriel's blue eyes were perfectly still, impossible to read. He'd been quiet. Then he opened his mouth.

"Ryder—"