Then, a week after that happened—
“…Why?”
—I was penniless.
I stood in the street as my stomach growled and grumbled. Too much had happened, and I felt like I might lose my mind. I looked from the back alley I was standing in over to the main road and saw soldiers and shady men going every which way, looking for me. They were going around asking everyone they passed if they had seen a child with ash-gray hair.
“How did this happen…?”
For a little while, everything had been going well for me in that country.
I knew the money I had been given would only be enough to survive on for about a week. I needed a place to live, food to eat, clothes to wear. I would need a lot of money to keep on living.
First things first, I would have to find work.
Cafés, restaurants, inns, clothing shops, bookstores…there were lots of different businesses lining the streets. I wondered what kind of place I could work to get some good experience. I wondered who would employ a ten-year-old mage.
Carefully scrutinizing each shop, I walked down the street.
“You! Hey, you! You over there!”
That was when someone called out to me. When I looked in the direction of the voice, I saw a man beckoning to me from a small alleyway right beside a roadside stall.
“You, by any chance are you looking for a job? I’ve got a good job for you!”
Well! Can he read my mind?
I was very surprised when it happened, and I walked over giddily, as if being drawn into the narrow, gloomy alley where the man was standing.
“What’s this good job?”
I suddenly got excited, thinking I would be able to quickly gain some valuable experience.
“I want you to walk around handing these out to the people of the city.”
The man handed me a small basket. The inside was packed with lots of candies.
According to him, he had built a candy shop on a corner of one of the streets in town. His shop was going to open in a week. He said he wanted me to go around handing out the candies as advertising.
I had been walking around looking for a job, and the man had been looking for a publicist. Our interests were aligned. I readily agreed and walked off holding the basket full of candy.
For the next few days, I walked around handing out candy to people on the street.
“A new candy store is opening! Please come check it out!”
Every day, I did my job, shouting enthusiastically.
The man kindly prepared meals for me every day. I was incredibly grateful not to have to worry about food expenses, when I was using up what little money I had every day just to stay at an inn.
As the shop’s opening day approached, the man talked to me about his dreams. He told me how difficult it had been to get to the point where he could open a shop of his own and how happy he was to be able to open his candy shop.
However, a week later—
The very first people to open the door of the candy shop, the shop the man had always dreamed of opening, were some rude, shady-looking men.
“’Ey, you! You didn’t forget about the money you borrowed from us, didja? Before you relax an’ open up a shop like this, first you oughtta pay us back, don’cha think?”
The suspicious men pressed the shopkeeper.
Apparently, the shopkeeper had borrowed money from these shady characters.
“S-sorry…! I’m sorry! I don’t have the money right now—but once the shop takes off, I’ll definitely pay you back! I just need a little more—”
“What makes you think we’re gonna wait? Pay us now!”
One of the vulgar-looking men grabbed the shopkeeper by the collar. He was angry, and he threatened that if the man didn’t pay up, they would get their money by selling his organs.
At that moment, I remembered the man’s tale of hardships.
I was sure the reason the man didn’t have any money on hand was because he had been paying me a daily wage and preparing meals for me. My chest ached. Once I realized that, I stood up in front of these criminals.
“W-wait, please! If it’s money you want—if it’s money, I’ll pay it!”
Then I handed the shady man all the money I had.
I was penniless again.
But it was all right. Because I had been penniless before I entered the country and penniless right when I started my journey. I was sure this, too, would be an important life experience—
“Hey, hey, don’chu treat me like a fool, missy. Your pocket change isn’t gonna cut it!”
……
Huh? It’s not enough?
After frantically shoving all the money I had into his pocket, the vulgar fellow looked at me like he was appraising me.
“Missy, now that I get a good look atcha, you’ve got a real pretty little face. I could get a good price if I sold ya!”
……
I had a bad feeling.
“In exchange fer you not payin’ us back, we could just take her. That’d work fine.”
A really bad feeling.
In the threatening atmosphere, I gave the shopkeeper a look asking for help.
“……”
He immediately averted his eyes from me.
He said only—
“I’m sorry. All right then, please sell the child.”
That’s when I became convinced he was scum.
After that, everything happened so fast. I promptly pulled out my broom and escaped the shop. Just like when I had left my hometown, I fled with all my might.
“Ah, wait a second! Hey, you guys! Chase her, chase her! Don’t you dare let ’er get away!”
I knew I would attract a lot of attention, flying down the main avenue on my broom. So as soon as I managed to slip into the crowd, I put my broom away and started walking.
I had been walking away for a little while when I saw some of the country’s soldiers speaking to passersby.
That’s it, I’ll ask the soldiers for help.
“Mister soldier! Help me, please! Some scary people are chasing me!”
I clung to one of the soldiers.
“Hmm? Oh really…?” The soldier raised his eyebrows, looking a little surprised at me after I suddenly appeared in the middle of his conversation. Then he placed his hands on my shoulders. “Is that a true story, I wonder?” he asked. “Where might those scary people be now?”
“Um…”
I turned back to look around.
My frantic escape must have been effective, because the criminals were nowhere to be seen.
I wondered how on earth I was supposed to explain my current situation. I thought about it, with my young brain.
“But this is actually perfect. I was just out searching for you, too. You must be the little girl who’s been walking around handing out candies for the past week, right?”
“Uh, ah, yes…I am, but…”
“Do you know what was in those candies you were handing out?”
“…Huh?”
“When we examined them, it turns out that the candies you were giving out had an addictive substance in them, bordering on illegal, and we have no idea where it came from. Where did you get those candies, I wonder? I’d like to ask you a few—”
I see. This isn’t going to work.
I ran off.
“Ah, hey! Waaaaaait!”
And so, on top of being penniless, I found myself being chased by both the soldiers and the criminals.
I wasn’t sure whether my luck was bad or whether I’d simply had exceptionally good luck before then. But I had lost everything in the blink of an eye. I was reduced to sneaking through back alleys, trying to escape.
I was afraid I would have to live my life huddling up next to garbage forever, or at least until they forgot all about me.
But my pursuers easily outwitted a ten-year-old girl, even if she could use magic.
Almost as if the criminals and the soldiers had conspired to work together, they organized a search of all the back alleys. In no time at all, I was caught.
The one small mercy was the fact that the soldiers and the criminals had not in fact been working together to chase me down.
“Hey, what’re you soldiers doin’ here? This little girl is our valuable property! Don’t you touch her!”
Apparently, I had already become property in the criminals’ eyes.
“We should be the ones asking you. We have a number of questions we want to ask the girl. We’ve received multiple complaints about the dodgy candies she made. We have to bring her to justice!”
Apparently, I had already become a villain who made poison candy in the soldiers’ eyes.
Ahh, this is bad.
“Um, um, I-I’m not—”
How on earth am I going to explain this?
All I could do was stand there, utterly terrified, surrounded by the adults. Though I was a mage, I was only ten years old. When it came down to it, the only thing I could do was to break into tears right there on the spot.
But it was only natural that a large group of adults surrounding a young girl and shouting at each other in the street would attract attention from the public.
It was also only natural that someone should appear to protest against them.
“What on earth is going on here?”
Wedging her way in between the soldiers and the criminals who were fighting over me was a woman with hair so white, it was nearly see-through.
She was wearing a robe that was the same bright white as her hair, and upon her breast was a star-shaped brooch.
She looked like she was about in her late thirties.
“Do good people have fights over little girls in broad daylight?”
Her tone of voice was calm, but there was a forceful drive behind the mage’s words. The soldiers took one step back and straightened up, and the criminals dejectedly backed down.
One of the soldiers opened his mouth to speak to the mage who had suddenly appeared. He was probably going to try to explain the situation.
However, before the soldier’s voice could come out, the mage shook her head and said, “Regardless of the circumstances, your approach was all wrong, wasn’t it? The child is frightened, can’t you see?”
Then the mage ordered the soldiers to withdraw and drove the criminals off. “Away with you all,” she said. “I shall take charge of this child.”
And then, after she had cleared away all the dangerous people who had been around me, the mage looked down at me.
“I don’t know what happened here, but it looks like it is a complicated situation. Come with me,” she said, and she took my hand.
The woman who whisked me away from that place said her name was the White Witch.