Back when Lawrence had yet to sprout a single hair on his chin, a traveling merchant came to his village. He became close with the man, and they left the village together.
His master had been an eccentric person, and though he had not taught Lawrence every trick of the trade, nor had he been a particularly kind benefactor, the treatment Lawrence received had not been as horrible as what the errand boys in large companies endured.
When he thought back on it, he likened the relationship to a stray cat taking in a puppy and raising it entirely on a whim. And the reason his mentor had been so strange was because his outlook on life was unique, formed after years of living on the road.
As he grew older than his mentor was at the time, Lawrence had now found himself gazing out over the autumn festival in Salonia, a town he had so happened to stop by in his first journey in a long while. It was strange how those memories suddenly came back to him.
From his window at the inn, he watched over the plaza; he watched as the people built a large stage, as the important folk from both the city and the church held some sort of celebration, and how the people reveled in one last party before winter came.
Salonia had no stand-out religious events, so the highlight of the autumn festival was the drinking contest, where people competed to see who could drink the largest amount of the distilled spirit made from the local wheat. He could hear them call out different names, and the most muscular dock boys from the river port and the most confident young clergy from the church came to the stage. It was, all in all, a very relaxed atmosphere.
As Lawrence looked down at the plaza, he found himself smiling because he spotted among them one small girl.
Her hair, colored in a way that would make her impossible to find if she were to slip in among the wheat fields, was braided today, which was unusual. Her petite stature and slender frame made her seem like a highborn lady, but the way she carried herself made her seem more imposing than anything else.
Sitting by the window, he smiled and thought: There’s the wolf.
On the outside of the plaza, grilled sausages and freshly baked bread—and no alcohol—were being handed out to the spectators, and it was turning out to be a party full of song and revelry. As Lawrence watched Holo knocking back drinks right in the center of it all, he planned their journey to come.
The reason his mind went to his mentor, someone he had not thought about for a very long time, was because the thoughts had happened to spill forth after he opened his mental drawer of travel memories. Or perhaps because he had been rifling through that very drawer for a clue.
As he made his plans for their journey, there was something he needed to think about.
Along one’s travels, a person would likely experience more than joyous occasions. That was still the case when they were allowed to spend their time freely in such a lively city, too, as odd as it sounded. Perhaps the more enjoyable something was, the more pain it could potentially produce.
That was because a life on the road meant trading certainty and routine for flexibility—and stability for freedom.
“Once the festival is over, I believe I will be returning home.”
It was yesterday that the priestess Elsa, the one who had spent quite a lot of time with them as of late, brought up the topic. It happened after they convinced the church and the lumber merchants to come to a compromise over the Salonia tariffs and were on their way back to their lodgings.
Holo had no interest at all in the tariff meetings, so she had gone ahead to the taverns at the town square, leaving Lawrence and Elsa to walk back together. Lawrence understood that she had been waiting for a moment like that to bring up their parting, but there was one thing he still didn’t understand.
“Why not tell Holo first?”
Unbeknownst to him, Holo had come to speak with Elsa while he was occupied with the tariffs. Even when he watched Elsa scold Holo, and how Holo would ignore her, he noticed a closeness between them that he had not seen before.
And so he wondered why the conscientious Elsa did not tell Holo about this beforehand.
It was that thought that brought Lawrence to ask the question, but after giving him a faint smile, she directed her gaze forward again.
“I think we’ve grown too close.”
Elsa was a servant of God who followed a strict set of rules to the letter.
Though that was Lawrence’s impression of her, in that moment, he got a glimpse of her true self.
“I am not used to traveling. I was shaken by a sudden onset of homesickness, that’s all.”
Elsa originally lived a quiet life in a town called Tereo, watching over a church her father left for her. But as the world started turning a harsh gaze on the Church, she had been summoned to help with other churches here and there with managing their assets and privileges, which is how she came to a land as far north as this.
In her hometown, she apparently had three children with a man named Evan, who, in Lawrence’s memory, was still a good-natured milling boy.
“Miss Holo is so sharp. I doubt I can hide my urgency to return home. But…” Elsa gave a long sigh, one that almost made her look smaller. “…I would seem cold and distant if I did not, wouldn’t I?”
It was a common sight when traveling.
One could meet another person who would soon become a delightful drinking buddy; someone they could open up to and feel a deep sense of camaraderie with. But the person might suddenly leave one day, citing family reasons. To them, we are nothing more than another guest in a long stream of guests, and they have a firm routine to which they must return.
They would go back to the warm lights of their hearths, and homes filled with laughter. But those who spent their lives on the road would have to return to their inns alone. And when dawn broke again, they would move on to the next town.