TSROTRATBP Chapter 11

Today was a more special day than usual. Ahin—who, oddly enough, still hadn't left the bedroom though morning had long since broken—scooped me up and climbed into the carriage.

A short while later, Iverin arrived and rode along as well.

CLANG. The estate's front gate groaned open with a heavy clatter. It was my first time leaving the grounds since arriving here, and scared as I was, I couldn't help the excitement bubbling up anyway.

...Wow—!

Iverin held me up to show me the view outside, and the scenery beyond the window shifted quickly by.

It was a street lined with towering spires and green rooftops. Even from just this glimpse of the city district, I could easily grasp how far the black panther territory's standing outpaced other territories.

...Incredible.

The small world I'd known was breaking apart. For someone who could count her experiences of the outside on one hand, a moment so happy, so achingly wanted, it was almost too much to hold.

After a moment's hesitation, I stretched a paw toward the window.

Would a day ever come when I looked at the world with my own eyes, instead of always being carried through it by someone else's hands? The crisp wind, somehow, felt strangely warm and slow, like something simmering.

"There. Can't catch it—you get eaten."

Once the sightseeing was done, a small doll tied to a string floated in front of me.

You little—Eyes bulging, I swiped—swat, swat-swat—paw flying at it again and again. But maddeningly, every time I thought I'd caught it, it slipped away.

"It's because your legs are short."

"……"

"Fat rabbit."

The way Ahin jerked the string, needling me on purpose, had never looked so hateful.

Watching from across the seat, Iverin let out a soft breath.

"My lord, you were putting her on a plate this morning as well. Keep this up, and Miss Rabbit may well come to genuinely hate you. Even now, she's giving you a look laced with hatred."

At Iverin's words, Ahin stopped moving the string and studied my face. Between the strands of silver hair draped over his forehead, his red eyes blinked.

Then he smiled, crooked, and answered in a satisfied voice.

"That's a pretty good look, actually."

"I see. Miss Rabbit, please continue to hate my lord as much as you please."

"That's good too. Sounds thrilling."

"Well. So he says."

Even by my limited standard—I hadn't met many beastmen—this exchange fell well outside the range of normal.

My irritation spiking, I gave up trying to catch the thing and lunged at the doll instead. Thwack. Thwack-thwack. In an instant, the doll turned into a punching bag.

"An invincible rabbit."

"This might be the birth of the world's first rabbit fighter."

Iverin, wearing an extremely serious expression, leaned his face in close. Furious, I shoved my hind leg against his forehead. These black panthers had some genuine talent for making a person furious just by speaking.

"Iverin, looks like she really can't stand you."

"Ah. Miss Rabbit, please have mercy on my delicate heart."

Delicate, my foot. Ahin pressed my cheek flat with a finger and stuffed me into his jacket pocket. Ow! His merciless handling showed no sign whatsoever of easing up.

"We'll arrive shortly."

The coachman's voice came through the small window connecting to the driver's seat. The carriage was gradually slowing, which meant we were nearing our destination.

Before long, I stepped down from the carriage and found myself facing a massive stone building, and my face went pale. I had few memories of being outside, but this shape of building—impossible to forget, that one. Their destination was, in fact, a temple.

No.

I didn't have any particular fondness for temples, and if anywhere, this was the one place I never wanted to set foot again.

Why the temple—?

While I thrashed in the pocket, a single hypothesis flashed through my mind like lightning.

Occasionally, young beastmen who had not yet undergone humanization would visit a temple, have holy water poured over them, and receive a blessing. I'd been through that process myself, more than once.

But even after my coming-of-age ceremony had finally come and gone without humanization taking place, I'd been brought back again, this time to request a priest's diagnosis.

There was no question that Ahin, despite my looking like an ordinary rabbit, had come to the temple to determine the truth of the pheromones I carried.

Unable to calm myself, I began thrashing again inside the pocket.

"Behave."

When my kicking grew more violent, Ahin pressed his hand firmly against my head.

Unable, this time, to keep from resisting, I gnawed at the pocket fabric over and over. We don't need to be out here—can't we just go home? I hate the temple.

I looked up at him desperately, but Ahin and Iverin walked into the temple's interior without the slightest hesitation.

After several rounds of verification, presenting identification plates as we went, we finally arrived in a place where a single priest stood, inside an ivory-colored sanctuary.

Peeking my face just barely out of the pocket, I let my eyes wander. Murals covered the walls here and there, and flames burned atop beacons, lending the space a sacred air.

"House Grace. Welcome."

The priest, his beard trailing long over a gray-white ceremonial robe, bowed his head.

From the moment I laid eyes on him standing at a distance, I couldn't think properly at all. My heart began to pound. My head grew hazy, and one bad memory after another kept slamming through.

'This is a filthy curse!'

A voice loud enough to sting the ears. If that priest, by some chance, said the same thing—and if Ahin and Iverin heard it. The anxiety I'd been forcing down all this time reared its head, fully formed.

"Wait here for a moment."

Ahin took me out of his pocket, set me on the floor, and poked my cheek. Looking up at him with anxious eyes, he demanded, slow and flat.

"Answer."

Nod, nod. Reluctantly, I moved my head. Ahin smiled faintly and rose to walk toward the priest.

I watched his back retreat, my pupils shaking. His back, in that ink-black formal coat, looked unusually broad and far away today.

"It's been a while. Three years, is it?"

"Not since the Beast God's rite. It is an honor that House Grace would personally seek this humble one out."

The longer the priest traded pleasantries with Ahin and Iverin, the more my stomach churned. It was some distance away, but reading their lips carefully, I could make out two words.

Rabbit.

Beastman.

As I drew a breath, an old, ugly nausea I'd felt once before came surging up. Through my tangled thoughts, the priest's voice echoed once again, like a memory replaying.

'This is a filthy curse!'

My throat clenched, sudden and thick. If even that priest, out of everyone, said the same thing to me again—

'What a pitiable little lamb, abandoned by the Beast God!'

By the time I came back to myself, I was already running, like something had come loose in me, toward nowhere in particular.

Something darting between their feet made the priests startle—"Eek!" "Wh-what is that?"—and stumble back in alarm. Dodging the legs that flailed in confusion, I pushed harder off the ground. My blurred vision changed rapidly around me.

'Regrettably, there is no other course.'

Ah, but the black panther had told me to wait quietly. If I broke that promise, maybe I really would end up eaten this time. That thought was ridiculous, and I knew it, but my feet kept moving anyway, against my own will.

'There is no precedent for this, either.'

Stop. The anxiety that had been eating at me all this time was rising to the surface.

'The priest himself has already ruled it a curse from the Beast God. It does leave one rather uneasy, doesn't it.'

After a long stretch of running, I arrived in front of an enormous statue. The towering figure represented the Beast God, the deity beastmen worshipped, its form a fusion of many different animal shapes twisted together.

Staring up at it blankly, tears spilled from me in a sudden rush. Beast God. Why can't I turn into a human. Am I really cursed.

Questions with no answer kept surfacing, one after another. My vision blurred so badly the statue barely registered anymore. My chest ached, more than merely tight—it throbbed, raw.

…Why only me.

Why. Every other beastman went through this before they were even old enough to register it happening, and yet only I—

My younger brother, born three years after me, had already been a boy for years now. My half-siblings were no different.

The resentment I felt had nowhere to land. There wasn't even a clear target to resent. By the time I'd cried myself hoarse, all the strength had drained out of my body.

Just as I was about to let myself go slack, a large hand reached down and picked me up. Silver hair, already familiar to my eyes, fell into view.

"Hey."

The call came low—far too low. Ahin, breathing shallowly, wore an expression that wasn't his usual smile or his usual blankness, but something closer to genuine anger.

"This time you actually pissed me off a little. You."

He raked a rough hand through his hair; the silver strands rose and then drifted back into place.

Unable to say anything at all, and frustrated by it, I only thrashed, trying to get free of his hand.

I didn't run off on purpose either. And I still don't want to go anywhere near that priest.

"Why are you crying."

Like you wouldn't cry in this situation. I really don't want this. Let go.

In the end, claws bared, I raked hard across the back of Ahin's hand. Though the scratch rose red almost immediately, the hand holding me showed no sign of loosening.

A few seconds of silence passed before Ahin asked, his voice a little softer.

"You hate the temple?"

Before he'd even finished, I nodded as hard as I possibly could.

I hate it so much. I hate the temple, and I hate the priest even more. Still nodding over and over, I glared up at Ahin through tear-blurred eyes. And you're no better, today.

"My lord!"

Iverin's voice, flushed with urgency, rang out from behind. He must have been running around searching—his usually neat black hair stuck up in every direction.