FSW Chapter 6

Failure

"Sir Russell."

"I present myself before Your Highness."

"I'm sorry for being late. Walking was hard—no, that is, class ran a little long. Did you wait long?"

"I did not."

He shook his head, and his eyes were still cast downward as always. But Nishina noticed the change in him easily. As though he intended to honor the request, he was no longer hanging his head as he had before—and when he answered, briefly, he met her eyes.

She was so genuinely proud of him for the effort that her mood lifted all at once. Enough to shave off the stress she'd accumulated through Carlos's lesson, and the fatigue in her body along with it.

Of course it was only her mood that had lifted—the actual fatigue in her body had not decreased.

"I'm glad."

"…Then let us begin with stretching."

When Nishina smiled brightly, Lavis Russell quickly started in on leg stretches. She followed his lead, spreading her legs and pulling one foot toward herself to extend the back of the leg, and pulled her toes up with full enthusiasm.

"Ow!"

She'd been too eager. She should have just gone through the motions.

She'd clapped a hand over her mouth quickly, but the cry that had already escaped couldn't be taken back. She met Lavis Russell's gaze head-on. His red eyes were wide and round with surprise.

He'd find out she had pitiful stamina. The plan she'd laid out last night would fall apart. Nishina shrugged as though nothing had happened and continued her stretches. Every time she tried to loosen her muscles it made her want to loosen her composure as well, but she summoned tremendous willpower and made it through the stretches unscathed.

The trouble was what came next. She was drained before they'd even started. She was pretending to be fine, but her legs were trembling badly. He seemed to have noticed her precarious state.

"Your Highness, are you alright?"

"Hmm? Of course. What would there be to be not alright about?"

His expressionless gaze rested on her trembling legs. The moment his eyes landed there, she focused all her remaining strength into holding still—but it was no use. After a long silence, he spoke with a face that showed not even a flicker of trust.

"…Then for today—ten laps, no, two laps—one lap. We will do one lap."

"…Alright."

She couldn't bring herself to say she'd run two laps like yesterday. Her body was in far too poor a state to bear that kind of bravado.

That was probably just her imagination—the sound of the second plan snapping apart like a cracker.

She started off after Lavis Russell as he turned his back and began to run. And immediately regretted it. She should have let him think her lazy rather than come at all.

Wasn't that better than exposing the full depths of her pathetic fitness? If he looked at her the way one looks at a hopeless underachiever, she wasn't sure she could take it without flinching.

He was running at a pace far slower than yesterday, clearly in consideration of her condition—but the distance between them kept growing. She gritted her teeth and chased after him. Then, just like that—when she inevitably ended up kissing the dirt, Nishina understood. The plan was thoroughly ruined.

The sound it made must have been fairly dramatic, because Lavis Russell quickly closed the distance.

"Are you alright?"

She absolutely was not, but she nodded vigorously. Her scraped knee stung; tears pricked at her eyes involuntarily. But the embarrassment was twice as large. He retrieved her shoe that had come off and crouched down beside her. The utterly wrecked state of the shoe in his hand made the embarrassment double again.

"We will need to have you fitted for shoes suited to movement."

Lavis Russell said it plainly, looking at the footwear—obviously not suited for running—that he held in his hand.

Nishina, who had no exercise-appropriate shoes to speak of, had worn something that wasn't exactly high-heeled but wasn't proper training boots either. Lavis Russell dusted the dirt from the shoe and fitted it onto her foot himself. With the extreme care of someone handling glasswork.

But for all his effort, Nishina's foot was already in bad shape. When his hand touched her foot—scraped raw and covered in marks from the shoe—her brow furrowed on its own.

"Mmph."

"Ah—I'm sorry."

At the pain-laced sound, his hands pulled back as though burned. They hovered in the air, at a loss, then dropped—just settled, quietly, against the ground.

By the way it looked, one of them was completely the perpetrator and the other the victim. He hadn't even done anything to hurt her! Nishina pulled the corners of her mouth up with deliberate effort and insisted she was fine.

"I'm fine!"

She tried to prove it by pushing to her feet, but that, too, failed. Whether from a cramp or simply exhausted muscles, she couldn't put any strength into her legs at all.

Honestly. Of all things.

At his expression, which had gone one shade darker, Nishina cursed herself internally and looked about ready to cry.

She didn't want to cause him any more trouble—but the pain of her muscles twisting was greater than she'd expected. All she could manage was to grip her own leg and groan.

She must have looked quite miserable, because his hand reached toward her.

"Allow me to work out your leg—"

But it couldn't quite reach, and was pulled back. He couldn't simply lay his hands on an imperial princess without leave. He had touched her briefly when fitting the shoe, but massaging her leg was an entirely different matter.

"I'm fine. I think if I wait a moment I'll be able to stand."

Nishina said it with forced composure, biting her lower lip lightly. But knights dealt with cramped muscles as a matter of daily life. He almost certainly knew this kind of pain well.

Something resolved in his face—the agitation disappeared. Lavis Russell's hand reached out and took hold of Nishina's leg, gently.

"Forgive the liberty."

"Ngh!"

Every time he pressed firmly, repeatedly into the muscle, her spine went involuntarily straight. She was almost annoyed enough at the pain to resent him a little. But the care dripping from his fingertips was so evident she couldn't bring herself to pull her leg away.

The decisiveness of his action matched the sureness of its effect. The pain subsided with startling speed. With the ache gone, mortification rushed in to fill its place.

She'd made quite a spectacle of herself. Just today alone: she'd been late; her pathetic fitness had been exposed; she'd fallen ungracefully and inconvenienced him on top of everything.

'This isn't going to end with him pitying me—I might end up being genuinely disliked.'

She imagined him cutting her throat with evident willingness and gave her head a quick shake. She still had the almond cookies in her pocket, meant for him. She eased her leg away and managed, at last, to stand.

"I think it's better now. Thank you."

"Not at all."

"Then shall we continue the lap?"

Her foot was better—but that didn't mean it had restored itself to its original state. Nishina sized up the remaining distance and barely managed to swallow a sigh.

She'd spoken boldly, but honestly, with this foot, getting back to the palace immediately seemed doubtful as well.

"No. I think it would be better to stop here for today."

"…That's fair, isn't it."

Nishina had realized belatedly that there was no further image left to salvage, and agreed readily. The plan was ruined anyway—no point in pushing through.

"Then shall we part here for today?"

She'd managed barely a fraction of a fraction of a lap and was calling it off—embarrassing enough—but there was nothing to be done. Nishina stood, listing slightly to one side, and asked. Contrary to her expectation that he would agree immediately, no answer came.

Whatever he was deliberating, his red gaze rested on Nishina's feet.

"Sir Russell?"

"Your Highness—may I impose once more?"

"Pardon? Ah—wait, j-just a moment—"

Instead of an answer, her body was lifted into the air. The sensation of being airborne was shock enough—but the position was even more so. Of all things, the princess-carry. She was a princess, yes! Sir Hilton had done it too, yes!

In the original work, he had been one year older than Aiden—so only one year older than herself.

The height of a fifteen-year-old boy wasn't so different from her own—no more than the width of a finger. And here she was, being carried by him. It wasn't exactly that she felt her heart flutter—she was too mortified to know what to do with herself. What was fortunate, at least, was that his sturdy arms held her body steady and secure. Only then did she release the fistful of his clothing she'd been gripping for dear life.

"I—I can walk—"

"Can you, Your Highness?"

He asked a question that was entirely too valid. Honestly speaking, walking was out of the question. She'd planned to send him on ahead and wait for Sir Hilton, who would come looking for her eventually.

"Well—I can't, exactly, but—"

"If you permit it, I will escort you to the palace."

His consideration was genuinely appreciated. And simultaneously worrying. What if carrying her all the way there planted a death flag for him? Even if that meant leaving bloody footprints with every step, she thought she could find a way to walk—

Nishina's hand fumbled its way to her pocket. She heard the soft rustle of the cookie bag, and only then did she answer in a voice barely above a whisper.

"Then—please."

Was there some method for rapidly reducing one's weight—not over days or weeks, but by the second?

Being carried in Lavis Russell's arms on the walk back to the palace, Nishina was occupying herself with this thoroughly useless concern.

If instant weight reduction wasn't possible, what about distribution? She considered looping her arms around his neck, then gave up on the idea.

The closeness she could set aside—but any movement at all would only make things harder on him. She locked her body rigid as a statue and moved only her eyes, carefully. She looked around as best she could from this position—but the palace entrance was nowhere in sight. All the fault of the imperial grounds being unreasonably, absurdly large.

'It'll probably be at least five more minutes at this pace. Should I ask to be set down now?'

Even though she was small for her age, the guilt grew heavier with every step. Nishina sent an anxious look his way. There was no sign of strain—that same expressionless face, unchanged—but there was no knowing. Perhaps he was enduring it in silence.

"Um—"

She called out to him in a tiny voice, and his gaze—which had been directed straight ahead the whole while—dropped down.

This was the first time she'd been face-to-face with him at such close range. With two hand-spans between them, Nishina realized: his features were strikingly fine.

The camellia-red of his eyes had been so striking she'd never thought to look at anything else. And come to think of it—hadn't the original novel described him as having a beautiful appearance? There had been no detailed description beyond that, so she'd let it pass without much thought.

She could have stood to write a bit more, frankly. His face wasn't yet angular in the way of a grown man's—his lines still carried something youthful—but even at this angle, there was not a single flaw to be found. The long lashes, the same color as his silver hair, were especially beautiful. Every time he blinked, it was like a white butterfly alighting on a petal.

Knowing it was rude, Nishina stared at him openly anyway. Until the eyelid of his eye that couldn't quite look away trembled, finely—and kept going.

"…Your Highness?"

"Ah, I'm sorry. It was just—Sir Russell is so beautiful…."

His arm, which had been perfectly still, gave a sudden flinch. Worried she might fall, Nishina reflexively tensed. But he only kept walking, gaze fixed forward with stubborn persistence.

She hadn't said it expecting any particular reply—but it wasn't so incoherent a thing to have said that it deserved to be ignored, either.

Nishina hadn't noticed his ears, burning red enough to burst. She let her head drop, a little deflated.

Feeling oddly self-conscious now, she carefully drew the cookies out from her pocket. Then she unwrapped the packaging herself and held one out to him.

"Would you like some?"

Carrying someone is hard on you = you need energy = cookies are full of sugar = therefore you must eat a cookie. An act based on entirely sound and legitimate reasoning. And yet.

But he had stopped in his tracks, making neither a refusal nor an acceptance, just a strange expression. Nishina tilted her head and slipped the cookie into his slightly-parted mouth.

He closed his mouth with a look of bewilderment. And stayed that way, without moving, for quite a long while.

'I thought he'd stopped because he wanted me to feed him. Was that not it?'

The atmosphere had gone somehow stranger. She fidgeted with her fingers in anxious circles—and soon, his jaw began to move.

In the peculiar silence, only the sound of almonds being chewed rang out, starkly, with nowhere to hide.

Only then did Nishina feel a wave of relief, and smiled—soft and pleased with herself.

She was thoroughly, privately pleased with herself for successfully delivering the bribe.