The next morning, in Marjorika’s house...
Cecily had tended to Zeke all night since they had returned to the witch village, barely stopping to rest. In actuality, she had long since finished fixing up his wounds back on the mountain and Zeke was merely sleeping off his exhaustion, but she wanted to remain by his side.
After soaking a cloth in a bucket of fresh water, she wrung out the excess liquid and gently wiped his brow. She set the cloth back down, then returned to her seat by his bed and held her hands together in a praying motion.
Zeke... Open your eyes.
There was a knock at the door.
“Come in,” she said.
Although she heard the door open, no one answered. She turned around slowly, expecting to see Alphonse or someone else who was worried about Zeke—but it was Cain.
“Cain...”
“Cecily, you surprised me. I didn’t realize you slipped out of the village to save him.”
Cecily almost found herself apologizing, but kept quiet and simply stared back at Cain.
“But it’s fine now. You’re my girlfriend, aren’t you? So I’d prefer if you stopped tending to some other guy.”
Cain spoke as if berating a lover for their infidelity, but Cecily was not swayed in the slightest.
“I cannot. The only man I’ll tend to like this, now and forever, is Zeke.”
Cain’s thin lips trembled at Cecily’s blunt reply. He supposed that the effects of the love potion must have worn off. This must have been due to something stupid like “the power of love”—there was no other explanation.
Although this had been the first love potion Cain had ever made in his life, he was a talented wizard, so he was certain it had been an effective concoction. And yet it’d only had middling effects on Cecily. Even when she’d been under its spell, the love that Cecily had felt for Cain had only amounted to the kind of love reserved for friends—a far cry from romantic love. Now that she was back in her right mind, Cecily was sure of it.
After all, I know what true love feels like.
The emotions she had felt due to the love potion were not the usual feelings of love that she was familiar with. That uncontrollable emotion of loving someone so much that you couldn’t bear for them to leave your sight for even a moment... Having your heart race from excitement or happy embarrassment, every day being a rush of emotions, just being in pure bliss by their side... That was what Zeke, her love, meant to Cecily.
“Cecily... Has the love potion worn off, then?” Cain ventured.
“It seems so. My head is full of only Zeke. There’s no space for anyone else.”
It may have been a painful truth for Cain to hear, but Cecily bravely announced this indisputable fact.
“Cain, there is something I need to ask,” she went on, changing the subject as she stood up. “I don’t actually remember that promise we made. I remember we spoke in the flower field ten years ago, but it was so long ago that I can’t exactly remember what happened. Did I actually promise to marry you?”
“You did. Of course you did,” Cain replied. But his voice was quavering. “The love potion may have worn off, but that doesn’t matter! You said that you would marry me back then. Do you really intend to break a promise?”
“I...”
In the next moment, there was a bang as the door slammed open.
“I’ve heard enough! I’m sorry to say, Cain’s loins, that although you may be able to smooth-talk your way into tricking Cecily or the captain’s loins, while Detective Lottie’s eyes are emerald green, you have no chance of tricking me and my gray matter!”
“Lottie?!”
Cecily was almost lost for words at Charlotte’s sudden appearance, and how the girl had rattled off this spiel with no pause for breath. Behind Charlotte was Alphonse. The pair entered the room, and Charlotte continued in a conclusive manner.
“Cain’s loins. Your statement that you agreed to marry Cecily was a lie, was it not?”
Huh?
Barely believing Charlotte’s remark, Cecily looked over at Cain. There were signs of stress in his expression.
“Well now, my dear detective, what proof do you have of that?”
“A matter such as this isn’t even a worthy puzzle for a detective like myself,” Charlotte said, wagging her forefinger with a tutting sound. She even shook her head as if to express her complete disbelief. “We must first consider Cecily’s personality. Cecily here is a young maiden whose heart is absolutely obsessed with ideas of romance. If she had made such a romantic and heart-racing promise with any pair of loins, then I’m certain she would not forget it.”
“But our promise was ten years ago. It’s not a huge leap to imagine that she merely forgot.”
“I think not,” Charlotte said before producing a confident smirk. “A romantic maiden who would forget a promise like that is no maiden at all! Cecily would never forget such an important promise. It’s unthinkable!”
“My lady, your line of reasoning here seems a bit...forced to me.”
“Silence, assistant!” Charlotte snapped at Alphonse, who had dared to interrupt. “Now then, I’m quite ticked off that you would even dare to force my best friend to drink a love potion, so I’m not going to go easy on you in the next part of my deduction.”
Cain audibly gulped in the face of Charlotte, who was exuding an aura of danger.
“This hinges on an if—a big if, mind you. If Cecily had promised to marry you ten years ago...then the fact that she forgot that promise shows just how little you meant to her.”
Silence filled the room for several seconds.
“Whew... Now that’s gotta sting,” Alphonse muttered sympathetically.
This, perhaps, was the moment that time started to move for Cain. He pulled an awkward smile, and his head drooped in shame.
“Your methods are certainly cruel, Miss Detective.”
“Oh, I’m not done. After you were forgotten, and she found a lover when you didn’t, you did the most petty, uncool form of revenge you could by using a love potion. In situations like these, you’re supposed to sit silently by and just be happy for her! You’re meant to go home with your wedding cake and cry as you eat it all alone! That’s what loving someone really means!”
“L-Lady Lottie, I think you should leave it at that...” Alphonse said.
Charlotte’s verbal assault tore into Cain as if he were no more than a dirty rag. But he listened to every word, refusing to storm off or shy away from it.
“I’m uncool, huh...?”
“Yeah. Very. But as long as you’re aware of it, you can always try again. Life is long.”
Cain finally raised his head. Cecily felt she saw something melting away from his expression—something that had been haunting him, controlling him.
“Thanks, Miss Detective... I’ve seen the light thanks to you.”
“If that’s so, then I’ll take my leave without rubbing salt into the wound. A good day to you.”
“I think you rubbed quite a bit of salt in his wounds, you know...”
“Silence, assistant!”