“So when I heard this Twilight Cardinal guy was translating the scripture into the vernacular, I felt so relieved. Those who know anything about the language of the Church keep that knowledge to themselves, are stingy about sharing it, preferring to profit off it. So you have no idea how good it felt to watch them get their knickers in a twist when word got out that soon anyone would be able to read the scripture.” The carefree nature of Lutia’s smile only showed Col how tough things were in the city. “You said you’re looking for paper to make copies for the scripture, right? That’s fantastic. I give you my unconditional support,” she said, her tone brighter than it had been, as though shaking off the gloom that came with the story of her past. “Which means you were searching for me because of all this nonsense about the textbooks. You want an ordinary book to be chosen as the textbook so the copies don’t use up all the city workshops’ paper, am I right?” “Precisely.” “That’s not a problem. We want a regular book to be chosen as well. It’d be more difficult to raise prices on a book that’s everywhere, and that means fewer poor kids who’ll be forced to copy those books so there are more to sell.” The boy Lutia and her group saved the night prior was one of those victims. It was likely he had been locked in a room and forced to repay a “favor” by copying books until his arms could no longer move. “And I think I’d be able to help the Twilight Cardinal find allies. We want to do something about how it costs so much to get an education now. Unfortunately, that means we don’t really have money of our own.” “I understand all too well.” Students needed textbooks of ever-fluctuating prices in order to request lessons from a professor. Those students paid for the professor’s basic needs, and were even required to send them gifts of appropriate value once their degrees were granted. The professors were not altruistic clergy—they formed guilds, sold their knowledge, and were, in a way, merchants in their own right. “We want to do away with the textbook betting and the expensive gifts needed to secure degrees. That would mean doing away with vested interests; there are eccentric students out there who agree with us. I bet those people would by sympathetic to your fight against the Church.” Lutia looked to Col, then smiled at Myuri. “And the language of the desert, right?” Now that she knew why Lutia was here and why she was studying, Myuri seemed a little overawed. Lutia continued in a collected tone that suited a girl who looked older than Myuri. “Your brother’s objectives don’t sound bad at all, of course, and neither does your wild idea of making a country just for people like us. Which means our interests align.” The look on her face was that of the Wise Wolf of Aquent. “Our enemies are the rich students who love making a quick coin and the professors who collude with them.” With a defiant smile, she turned her gaze back to Col. “The professors favor the rich students because they want those tuition fees and the gifts that come with degree conferment. With their financially powerful backgrounds, the rich students can influence the professors with the textbook selection. With the information they get, the rich students milk profit from the textbook market, and then turn around and offer the professors even greater tuition and gifts. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship for both parties.” The poorer students’ role in all this was simply being stripped of what little money they had. “If we don’t dismantle this mutual relationship, then we’ll only be given failing marks, no matter how good our grades are. Those gifts, especially, are a problem. Ecclesiastical degrees demand greater gifts than any other subject. And the present professors’ guild is controlled by a particularly greedy bunch. If we don’t change things, then all the paper stores that you need will just end up as needlessly expensive learning material so those guys can make a quick coin.” She was like a lord who had looked across the battle lines and was giving orders to her soldiers. She had called the place in which they stood a vault. That was incorrect. This was an armory. The mismatched sheaves of paper crammed into the misaligned shelves were weapons that had been scraped together by those who could not rely on cash to survive an unfair battle. “Will you help us, Twilight Cardinal?” This lone wolf was trying to change the torrential tides in this city consumed by greed. Lutia extended her hand, but it was no mere entreaty for help. It was as though she was gesturing to the exit, telling him that if he decided not to, he was encouraged to leave. But it was Myuri who reached out and grasped her hand, as though she was taking it from him. “We’ll help you, Lutia. Our interests align after all.” She spoke as though reciting a line from a war epic, but her mind was mostly filled with tales of swords and knights anyway. And she was the main character. “Heh-heh. Not bad for a temporary hunting pack,” Lutia said, and smiled brightly. Myuri turned and looked at Col expectantly. He did not handle theatrical situations like this very well, but he placed his hand over the wolves’ regardless. Because it was as they said—their interests aligned. “So whose rear are we sinking our teeth into?” Myuri asked, her tail swishing and eyes shining. Their main goal was to break down the alliance of the rich students who called themselves the southern eagles, and the professors guild that monopolized knowledge to make themselves rich. This was not something that could be easily accomplished, and they had seen a part of that in the scuffle the night before. “It’s not only those with benevolent hearts who reach out to help the kids, of course.” After they had shaken hands, Lutia continued to speak calmly, like a wolf. “All the southern eagles have loose purse strings. You’re staying at the Steel and Sheep, right? You’ve seen the racket they cause at night.” Alcohol and violence suited hot-blooded boys very well. “It’s the allowances sent to those guys by their rich families and the earnings they take from those poor kids that fund the parties, and the city council wants to do something about this pseudo–slave trade they’re conducting—they want to keep the peace in the city, after all. But their wanton spending habits are also supporting the city’s merchants, artisans, and the region’s farmers.” That left the city council in a dilemma. The most they could do was step in whenever a fight broke out. “In that regard, if we, the northern wolves, can save the kids, then the southern eagles lose a major source of income while we gain allies and can strengthen our presence in the city. Even the professors who won’t teach us when we give them our dirtied coins will eventually cave when they see just how many coins we have.” Academic knowledge was traded like a product in this city, too. At this point, Myuri spoke up. “It’s obvious what we need to do, then.” Col was only unsettled by the way her eyes shone and her tail whipped happily. But what she suggested was something they could, in fact, do right away, regardless of Col’s apprehensions. As the excited Myuri and Lutia ironed out the details of what to do next, Col returned to their inn to tell Le Roi about their plan to work with Lutia, but he was not there. Col left a message with the innkeeper, asking Le Roi to come to the Green Gourd when he had a chance. When he returned to Lutia, the two swift hunter wolves had already gone, leaving him with a message. He followed Myuri’s poorly drawn map and somehow managed to reach the destination, where he found Myuri fully ready for battle. “…I would like to believe this is going to be okay…,” Col murmured as he watched her hurriedly hide her hair beneath a hood, then cover her mouth and nose with a cloth. The silver wolf girl wore frayed, moth-eaten clothes that made her look like a traveler from a faraway land. The red eyes he could see in the gap between her hood and her face covering shone brightly. Lutia explained her disguise. “In the desert, there is a family of assassins whose sole job for generations has been to take out those in power. It’s normal practice for them to inhale the smoke of a certain herb that helps them erase their fear before walking straight into the jaws of death. They’re named after that herb, and they usually dress this way.” Lutia immediately saw how much Myuri liked adventures. When she said this in the manner of a professional storyteller, Myuri likely insisted that she wear the outfit, no matter what anyone else said. And since they could not get their hands on an herb that could take away the fear of death, Lutia instead suggested that she hide her wolf ears and tail beneath the cloth. Because if she did that, then no group of students could ever defeat a girl with the blood of wolves in her veins, just like the ancient orders of assassin. “The southern students keep the kids locked away somewhere and make them write and write and write. Those books they’re writing are their primary source of income. So we have to save the kids, but first we need to find out where they are.” “That is right. You are only finding out where they are. Do not try to save them on your own. Do not resort to violence,” Col said forcefully. He knew that if he did not say anything, Myuri would do anything to save the trapped boys, even take down the older ones left on watch. But this time, her worrywart brother was not alone—Lutia was the same. “The most important thing is finding out where the kids are, and that our companions use human means to get them out. That way, we chip away at the enemy’s forces while also building the pack’s teamwork. I’m sure that must be frustrating for you, though,” Lutia said while checking to make sure none of Myuri’s distinctive hair stuck out from her hood. Even if Col’s scolding fell on deaf ears, Myuri let Lutia’s thoughts sink in. “The reason I don’t go around biting all of my enemies is not only because I want to keep my true nature hidden, but because I want to stand alongside the students as a human, not a wolf.” Though Lutia had used the word pack several times, she was not commanding a pack of wolves in the city. The pack would not stay together if the one who stood at the front was a wolf. “I’m fine. Both you and Lutia worry too much,” Myuri said, clearly losing momentum. Lutia smiled at her like an older sister. “I trust you.” Myuri huffed at her words, then turned to Col to scold him while that remained the theme. “And you need to do your job, too,” she said. “Don’t get lost in your thoughts the moment you see a book.” Myuri stuck the dagger Lutia gave her into her sash, punctuating her sentiment and refusing to entertain any other arguments. “I know.” Myuri raised her shoulders, skeptical, and Lutia laughed again. “Once the noon bell rings, students at lectures will come back to their bases for lunch. Those sleeping off their hangovers will wake up around then. It’s the perfect time for reconnaissance.” “Okay. But shouldn’t I ask the mice I know? They’d get this job done super quickly.” The mice she knew were Vadan and his crew, whom they had met during the ghost ship incident. They were mouse avatars who constantly hitched free rides on ships, and they could handle this sort of work with ease. “This is an academic city. You can bet there are countless mousetraps everywhere to keep pests away from the books.” And unlike ships, the city was filled with the natural predators of mice—cats and stray dogs. In the end, perhaps the safest offense and defense was to have wolves take human form and sneak in. “But if this job is too difficult for you, Myuri, we’ll consider it.” Lutia knew what made people tick. Myuri took offense to the suggestion; she would hold on to her pride and see this through without Vadan’s help. “People know me. I can only work at night, so I haven’t really been able to get results. But having someone on my side that can sneak in during broad daylight will bring me more than good enough results.” The thought of working at night sent a shiver up and down Myuri’s spine. She shuddered, and beneath the thick cloak wrapped around her waist—a very northern thing to do—she wagged her tail. Perhaps it would be best to keep her on a leash so that she would not sneak out at night. “I’m counting on you,” Lutia said, and Myuri nodded. “May God watch over you. But please do not overdo it.” Myuri turned a cold eye to Col’s prayer and scolding. And he watched as she dashed off, entranced with her mission. Col idly thought about how the reason he had been neglecting to send reports on this journey to his second home of the Nyohhira bathhouse was because there was too much he found impossible to write down. “I guess it’s time we also get to work.” The two of them saw Myuri off to the districts controlled by the southern eagles from a miserable, neglected chapel at the end of an alleyway. Its benefices had long since run dry; it was cared for by a blind, local old man, and Lutia used this as a secret base. Every night, she let her wolf tail loose, searching for the whereabouts of poor students. She occasionally shared weak ale and a chat with the old man, but he was blind—she did not have to worry about him seeing her ears and tail. This was a valuable place for her to catch her breath as a wolf. From what Col had heard, during the day she complemented her studies with work as the Wise Wolf, and at night she helped her fellow wolves who were assaulted by the southern eagles in the drinking districts and worked on resolving conflicts with other gangs. He had no idea when she slept. That meant she had very limited time to find where the captured kids were, and even Lutia and her wolf nose could only carry out her strategy at a snail’s pace. That was why it was invaluable having a silver wolf on her side who could dedicate all her efforts to searching for the kids and was not being watched by the southern eagles. Myuri was enthusiastic about finding the captured boys; Lutia found her enthusiasm reliable, yet did not seem particularly pleased when she smiled. There was a reason for that, of course. “There are generous nobles who give us donations, but we’d go bankrupt if we suddenly took on more people than we can care for.” Lutia and her boys had set up camp at the Green Gourd, but they reportedly did not keep everyone there. There were a considerable number of boys who slept on the streets, saying it was much better than the villages from which they came, where starvation was rampant. But those who lived this way were much more likely to fall prey to the southern eagles. Even if Myuri somehow managed to find all the captured kids, the ones Lutia could not provide for would simply end up back in the hands of those awful older boys before long. So Col suggested selling the books slumbering in her armory at a high price, and to enlist Le Roi’s help as well. But the weapons being kept in the Green Gourd were actively being used for studying, and the number that could be sold without too much trouble were few in number. Lutia, who would agree only if they had the knowledgeable bookseller’s help, then pointed out one more secret to this secret base. “Hold that board. Yes, now lift,” she said to him, and they pried open the floorboard. In this small, run-down chapel, forgotten by even the humans of this city, an old man who had lost his sight due to excess reading had hidden away all the books he had transcribed over his lifetime. But these were not books that were battle-ready weapons like those in the armory at the Green Gourd—they were all old, obscure books, with a value unknown to most students. But one of them could prove to be a rare gem; so when the blind old man heard Lutia’s story, he offered them up, hoping they might be of use to the students. “But who is this bookseller Le Roi?” They peeled back the wooden board, and as Col flinched in the whirl of dust and smell of mold, Lutia asked her question and pulled out the bundles of paper from beneath the floor; these could scarcely be called books. “When we first met, he had been dealing in books like technical texts detailing how to develop mines—the sort the Church might ban. And when we reunited over a decade later, he asked me if the Twilight Cardinal would pen a book criticizing the Church. I hope that tells you what sort of person he is.” Lutia paused and gave a smile that made it seem she was about to sneeze. “He loves dangerous books.” More than his own life, on occasion. “I see. Someone like him might be able to find a treasure among all this stuff.” “The Church’s list of banned books changes daily, and the ignorant public’s interest is fickle.” And so there was a chance there was a ripe treasure among all these copied books that had been shut away. “…His knowledge and connections with buyers could earn him so much money.” Had Lutia and her gang asked the booksellers of Aquent to take on the same job, they would take advantage of their weakness without a second thought, because they knew the troubles that plagued the students from the north. But if they were to tell Le Roi, it was very likely he would fairly offer his help. And Lutia, who had become far too accustomed to living in Aquent, was obviously wary of a bookseller who might not be wholly avaricious. “I have a feeling that what he’s most interested in is reading these books. We had come across an old ruin for unrelated reasons not long ago. There, he fell head-first into a hole that led to a canal, because he thought it might then lead to an underground storage room.” “…I guess not everyone’s normal.” “Some people live their lives hiding their wolf ears and tail, don’t they?” Lutia lifted her brows and drew a smile taut across her face. “I guess he’s a lot like them, whose eyes were shining with curiosity when I found them, despite being on the verge of starvation. That they didn’t fear my fangs or claws made them look like idiots.” That was the noble couple who had given Lutia her name. They must have been kind, big-hearted people, if a bit childish. “Well, let’s hope we find something just as interesting as a forest spirit in here.” Lutia folded her arms before the stack of books they pulled from beneath the floorboards. Then together, they wrote down any titles or author names they could find, noted the contents of ones they could not find names for, and wrote down anything that might seem like a lead. The old man had been slowly accumulating these copies over a lifetime. He had come to Aquent as a child, and had remained here in the academic city ever since. One could call this collection a compilation of one student’s lifelong learning, but most had not withstood the test of time. New professors arrived in this city every day and many expressed their views as facts. In the margins, beside the crammed text on the poor-quality paper, were notes made by the old man when he was young. They noted what was a new theory, what contradicted what footnote—at this point, ten, twenty years later, even longer than that, all of these notes were considered disproved facts. The people the author was firmly insisting would one day be candidates for cardinal were names Col had never heard of. As they did this, he understood that all the books that sat on the shelves of the city council’s library were ones that had been carefully selected. And because of this selection process, most books, written by very smart people who shed blood, sweat, and tears to put them together, would fall into oblivion and fade to dust without ceremony. It was a rare thing for a book to survive into the future. This was the moment Col suddenly recalled what Lutia said, about the sadness she felt upon hearing no response to her howls. The reason Col thought of Myuri enthusiastically rushing off every time he closed an unbound sheaf of paper was because he was glad she was not here. Perhaps he was being overprotective, but he thought it would still be too painful for her to see adventure stories that never came to fruition. It would only be when she was old enough to drink ale that she would understand the appeal of such tales. “Anything stand out?” After going through them, Lutia brought back a handkerchief she had wetted at the well near the chapel. “Not to my knowledge, no…” “You’re so nice.” After wiping off the mold and dust stuck to his face, Col wet his fingers, dried from handling paper. Lutia stood nearby, gazing at the mountain of texts that represented an entire lifetime. “The people who come here are wanderers.” Even those called professors, who shared their knowledge, were seen as drifters in society. Very few received benefices in churches and abbeys; nothing was better for them to make a living than being an adviser to the nobles and great merchants who paid for their knowledge. Not many could speak of what happened to these people after their long days spent in contemplation. Only a handful of scholars were stellar enough to leave behind biographies or other works. “They come to this city one day, and howl to let everyone know they’ve arrived. And sometimes, surprisingly, their howls draw people in. But that can’t last for very long.” Lutia closed her eyes, brushing her finger over the faded paper. “What I really learned when I first came to this city, was that the wolves aren’t the only lonely ones here.” “………” Spirits with fangs and claws were mostly said to have died out in the battle against the Moon-Hunting Bear. Col considered telling her about the wisewolf in Nyohhira, but he decided that would have to be Myuri’s job. And perhaps, he thought, the reason Lutia was commanding this group of students from the north was not solely because she was being spurred on by indignation. It was also because she had learned what loneliness was during her life in that castle. “But putting an end to it is not easy, either.” “…I once heard from a poet that finishing a story is much more difficult than starting one.” Lutia’s shoulders shook as she laughed. And that reminded Col of how Myuri, when she was young, would retrieve toys from her storage, then get upset when they did not fit back in place when she tried to put them away. “Memories only grow in proportion when we look back on them.” Lutia turned to Col, the corner of her eyes crinkling, just as there was a knock on the cathedral door and the bookseller poked in his head. As the bookseller looked over the list Col and Lutia had put together, his expression grew sullen. “Hmm…” “None seem to be viable products, I suppose?” Col had figured as much, but he had the faint expectation that one of them could have been a rare gem that he was not aware of. But that small hope was quickly snuffed out by reality. “The one who collected all these copies must have been a very diligent person.” What Le Roi said was not necessarily a compliment. “There are some here that could be sold, but when taking into consideration the cost of copying and transportation, I believe the sale would just break even. None of these are the sort the eccentrics would salivate over and spend all their savings on. But I do see some that are not in circulation, yet could make for good textbooks. It would not be impossible to turn them into treasure maps.” If they could turn the original texts Lutia and her gang were hoarding into textbooks, then the copied manuscripts could fetch them a pretty penny. “But that would be…” “Yes, the same as the dirty textbook trade you are hoping to do away with in this city.” Bards often wryly sang that the main difficulty of living a virtuous life was that lofty ideals often became an ever-tightening noose. “Then…we don’t have to sell these books, right?” Lutia said, her tone not disappointed, but relieved. While that could be seen as consideration to the bookseller who came all this way to help them, it was clear that she did not want to believe that a student’s lifelong learning should be measured in coin. “I believe we should allow these books to remain in their slumber,” Le Roi agreed, and Lutia laughed. But her laugh was a dry one, meant to encourage herself. “But that leaves the problem of our keep.” While they were having this conversation, the agile Myuri was dashing between alleyways, writing down where the young students were being held on her map. “How do you normally earn money, besides donations?” Le Roi asked. Lutia replied tiredly, “In the end, most of it comes from manuscript work. It’d be nice if we got more scrivener work for letters and contracts and the like, though. Some are teaching the children of poor merchants who are hiding in the professors’ guild how to read and write, but the rest of the students are earning their keep through regular day jobs. Apprenticeships at the bakers, persisting through awful smells at the leather workshops as they help with tanning, and the like.” The reason they wore what they did when they faced off against the southern eagles was because they had rushed over from their beds at the workshops. “If we can keep the kids safe, then the townsfolk will hire them, but that would leave us strapped for cash in the end. A lot of these kids really want to learn…” “Hmm. That’s a pity. Earnest students who can read and write would be in great demand in any other city.” But one needed to go to a city where professors gathered in order to get an education, and it was precisely because this was a city where so many people were able to read and write, so it was difficult to turn their specialties into money. There was no point in memorizing a logic textbook while working at a bakery. And that was why, even if they were to save all the kids at once with Myuri’s help, a very realistic problem stood in their way: they still did not have the means to feed them. Solving one problem only created another—this was beyond their control. But as that thought crossed his mind, he suddenly recalled their nickname: the northern wolves. And that inspired him—had he not solved a similar problem in the past? “We may be able to solve the question of money.” Both Lutia and Le Roi turned to look at him. He had once come under the tutelage of a former traveling merchant, and the basis of their trade was to align the goods and demand of those who had traveled from far away. “Not every student here wants to be a high-ranking member of the clergy or a theologist, correct?” Not long after Lutia and Le Roi looked to each other, the noon bell rang in the distance. Myuri had certainly been excited. Of that, there was no doubt. It was after noon before she finally returned, her body covered in soot, with cobwebs still clinging to her here and there. She had likely squeezed her way through tiny gaps in the walls that even the stray cats would refuse to crawl through, and snuck into dirty attics that even owls would avoid. The map she handed to Lutia was crammed full of charcoal writing, and Lutia, too, almost felt awkward praising her. “But the kids weren’t being treated as badly as I thought they were, so I’m a little relieved, I think.” They received hot water when they returned to the inn, and Col wiped Myuri’s face with a damp cloth. He then cleaned her hands, feet, and—since she pestered him—he combed her hair, and finally the tension of her infiltration mission drained away. She had been tense moments earlier. But when she spoke, she did so with a sigh. Hearing this about the kids was good news; the boys controlling them were likely also wary that treating them too harshly would cause them to run straight to Lutia and her gang. “I think I was treated a lot worse when you were teaching me how to write.” Col had had his hands full with Myuri, considering she would always slip away when she had the chance. He had literally had to tie her to the chair. “But it is because of all that, that you can now write all the stories you like,” he scolded her, and she thwacked his hands as they gathered her hair with her wolf ears. “You’re not kind enough, Brother.” “………” Then why have I washed your hands, feet, combed and braided your hair? It was tempting to ask this, but when he saw how delightfully her tail swished, he knew she simply wanted to play. She had concluded her first adventure in a long while, and she was in high spirits. He sighed—she was the rambunctious girl she always was—then took the ribbon draped on her shoulder, and tied her hair. She had apparently gotten this from Hyland. It was red to show one’s noble status, and it reflected boldly on her silver hair. “There, done.” “Hee-hee.” Myuri cheerfully ran a hand over her braid, like a pup who had noticed their own tail for the first time, and stretched. “And you sent a letter to Mister Hilde, right?” When Myuri handed the map detailing the locations of all the kids to Lutia, she insisted they save them immediately. But Lutia then explained to her the problem of feeding them all. Though Myuri typically wanted to do things right away, she accepted reality fairly easily, because she knew how difficult it was to manage Sharon’s orphanage. The trapped children easily numbered around thirty, and it would cost the same amount as building another small orphanage in order to feed, house, and clothe them all. Lutia was the one fighting in the city; though she lamented just how powerless she was, Col and Myuri had connections and experiences they had gathered over the course of their journeys, and they could support her. “The problem of feeding, clothing, and housing the orphans is a lot like how we solved Miss Sharon’s problem. Honest boys who left their poor villages and came to Aquent on their own to learn how to read and write should be spoiled for choice when it comes to employment.”
Chapter 106
27 min read