Chapter 100

PROLOGUE The translated scripture lying open before Col scarcely registered in his mind. Perhaps that was partly due to the lingering echoes of the grand jousting tournament. Another possible reason was the preparations for the printing of the scripture, which had started in earnest after the tournament concluded. Either way, there was one clear cause. And that would be the girl beside him. Her swishing tail, her shining eyes, and the way her quill flew across the page. “Myuri, you are sitting too close.” Despite how many times he pressed a finger to her forehead to bring her face back up, she sank back down a few moments later without fail. The recent jousting tournament turned out to be the perfect inspiration for the rambunctious girl who loved nothing more than spending all her time writing fantastical tales of knights. No matter how much she wrote, it was never enough. She was hunched over the page as though all those joyous memories would fade if she did not write them down fast enough. When the excitement of the tournament had reached its peak, she completely forgot she was supposed to be acting as a saint and leaped over the barrier that surrounded the seats of the most distinguished guests, waving her arms around and generally making a big fuss. Col remembered staring up to the sky in bewilderment—she had finally started acting like a proper young lady before this latest uproar. He also distinctly recalled the color of the sky being dulled from all the dust. But perhaps it would not be so terribly awful if Myuri concentrated on her tales of knighthood. As she sat folded over the page, looking like she was ready to leap into the paper itself, her silver hair threatened to spill onto the still-wet ink. Col reached to brush it away, but sighed—the cord around his wrist caught his eye. The cord drooped from his wrist, and if he were to follow its trail, he would find the other end tied to Myuri’s sash. Myuri had at first attempted to tie the cord around his neck, but he eventually managed to get her to fasten it around his wrist instead. She refused to remove it—not during meals, not during sleep, not even for baths. If anything, she insisted on clinging to his clothes whenever her hands were not otherwise occupied by quills or food. Col stared at her as she thought of nothing but writing down her wild knights’ tales, and thought of the moment she tied the cord to him. “The second I take my eyes off you, you’re going to get kidnapped by more shady people.” This was a line an elder brother would typically say to their younger sister, but he had absolutely no room to argue. Though it was the result of a simple misunderstanding or perhaps just bad timing, Col had been kidnapped from their inn, which caused Myuri plenty of undue worry. No one would tell him how frightened she had been at the time, and everyone managed to dodge the question with vague replies. And so he allowed Myuri to do as she pleased, thinking of it as his recompense. At the same time, he still was not used to this arrangement. It brought to mind the phrase “bonded pair” and Col could not help but recall how Myuri had constantly demanded he take her as his wife at the very beginning of their journey. To think they would one day be literally bound together… Myuri, whose sash was also tightly bound to the cord, seemed rather pleased by this arrangement. “Good grief.” Col did not know if what he said was meant for Myuri, or for himself in a roundabout way. Then he noticed the way Myuri’s forehead was practically touching the paper, so he used his finger to bring her back up again.