Back when Angeline had answered the summons of Archduke Estogal, the journey to the city of Estogal had taken half a month. As an adventurer, she was accustomed to travel, but long trips still left her considerably fatigued. Given that, it was rather amazing to her in hindsight how her previous journey had taken her as far as the Earth Navel in Tyldes and then to the imperial capital after that.
Angeline leaned against the bartop with her head propped up as she nursed the wine that was brought out. “Do you travel often, Mr. Ishmael?”
“Ever since I started gathering my own materials for my research, I’ve been to quite a few places. You know how it is—once I head out, I start thinking, ‘Well, I’m out anyways, so I might as well go there too.’ As a result, I’m often away from home for very long stretches of time... I only ever plan for small journeys at the outset, but I can’t help myself.”
Angeline giggled. “You’re surprisingly spontaneous. I took you for the type to plan things meticulously.”
Ishmael scratched his head embarrassedly. “Ha ha ha... Well...” He took a sip of his beer for want of an answer to her pointed observation.
“I’ve been practically everywhere around Orphen...” Angeline said around a mouthful of salted beans. “But the last time we met was the first time I’d ever left the dukedom of Estogal.”
“I’m not much of a world traveler myself. Lucrecia is as far as I would usually go... And even then, only to outlying towns near the border.”
Lucrecia was Charlotte’s homeland, situated just south of the Rhodesian Empire. She recalled hearing that it was a temperate land blessed by bountiful seas. The roads connecting from the empire’s borderlands into Lucrecia were well maintained, making for a relatively easy journey. “It must be pretty warm in the south.”
“Yes, and it’s quite cold in the north. This will be my first time going anywhere farther north than Estogal.”
“It’s even colder in Turnera...”
“That almost sounds like a threat,” Ishmael joked awkwardly.
Angeline grinned gamely. Before she knew it, she had drained her wineglass. Forgetting that she had only intended to have a single drink, she soon ordered another.
“You have all sorts of encounters when you’re on a journey. Some of them are good, but...”
“There are bad ones too?”
“Yes. One time, I made a rather painful mistake that resulted in what you might call a betrayal. There was someone I was working with to earn my way... He was a very warm and genial fellow, and I trusted him implicitly.” Ishmael shook his head.
“So what happened...?” Angeline asked, drinking from her new glass.
“We were working together. He seemed to be very knowledgeable, and he had a way with words. I trusted him, and I trusted him to manage the work we took. We were supposed to split our earnings fifty-fifty, but he was shrewdly taking a larger portion. Just a little at first, and then a little more over time, and still more... This went on for a while, and by the time I realized that something was amiss, he had vanished altogether along with my wallet. I had essentially worked for free and was left destitute. It was quite terrible.”
“Blech, that’s a nasty piece of work...”
“Do you remember how I was a little wary of your party when we first met in Istafar? Ever since that time, I’ve been a little cautious whenever I work with others... Well, I knew there was no way an S-Rank adventurer was going to get up to that kind of petty scam, so I dropped it quite quickly with you.”
“Hmm...” Angeline mumbled through pursed lips, still slouching with her head propped up against the table. There really are some bad people in the world... Back when her whole world had consisted of good people, she would get to thinking that the world at large wasn’t so bad. But inevitably, there would be a certain proportion of people who came into her life with malice in their hearts. Perhaps it was just her good fortune that she had never fallen victim to such a person.
“I’ve never met anyone like that... I’ve mostly come across good people in my life,” Angeline said, idly rolling a salted bean between her fingers.
“Yes, in the short time I traveled with you, I experienced that firsthand. Mr. Belgrieve in particular had a shockingly good nature... Honestly, I couldn’t believe he didn’t have any ulterior motives at first. In fact, I feel more at ease around people like Mr. Kasim and Mr. Percival—the kind of folks whose eyes are always shadowed by a touch of wariness.”
Angeline beamed at the sudden compliment for her father. “That’s why everyone loves dad...”
“I can imagine.” Ishmael finished off his beer. He seemed a bit reluctant, but he eventually ordered another. “I’m surprised he hasn’t been used by any bad people when he’s like that. He does have a good eye for character, though, so perhaps he simply avoids people who have ill intent...”
“Dad had his share of trouble when he was younger... I think he’s discerning about who he associates with...”
“Indeed... Betrayal can be very painful. The more you think you know someone, the the more painful it can be. Worse yet when it’s someone you love and trust deeply... A party member, for instance, or perhaps even family.”
Could dad ever betray me? Angeline cocked her head as she tried to picture that, but the idea was truly unthinkable to her. “I can’t even imagine it.”
“Yes, you’re much better off not having to experience that. It’s no laughing matter... Have you ever heard of a bird called a cuckoo?”
“Yes, I know about them... What of it?”
Ishmael took a rather large gulp from his glass of beer. “A cuckoo’s egg is laid in the nest of another bird. The cuckoo chick hatches faster than the other eggs in the nest, and it pushes all the other eggs out of the tree—the eggs of the birds that belonged there.”
“Huh... That’s morbid...”
“And it settles into the life that the other chicks should have had. The parent birds will diligently raise the cuckoo and watch it grow none the wiser. I don’t know if birds are capable of conscious thought... But consider the parent’s perspective: they’ve raised an impostor. They think of it as their own, unsparingly showering it with care and love. But it is not their child—the cuckoo is the one who killed their children.”
“Yeah...”
“The child they held so dear turned out to be an impostor who took on the role of their real children. Well, I’m sure that would never happen with humans, but what do you think? What would happen if it did?”
“I don’t know... I’ve never thought about it...”
So she said—but Angeline could hear her heart beginning to beat rapidly even as she drank her wine. That would certainly be terrifying if it happened. For some reason, she saw herself in the image of the cuckoo, and the notion that it wasn’t the bird’s real child felt like a dagger through her heart.
But her father had no natural children of his own, and Satie had actually given birth to her. She was different from a cuckoo—there was merely a similarity in that she had been raised by different parents. Angeline shook her head. “I’m thinking too hard about this...”
“Really? Do you honestly think that?”
“Huh?”
“You were having those nightmares, weren’t you?”
“I did... But I can’t remember them now. I’ve been feeling quite good lately, even.”
“Ms. Angeline, it really is foolish to delude yourself like that.”
“What...?”
“And it’s absurd. Why don’t you come to terms with it already?” His voice was so gentle, but it had a peculiar sharpness to it.