“The secret…you say?”
Kanalayka turned to Fiarca with a puzzled look.
“That’s right,” said the silver-haired princess. “Putting aside the stories for the time being, what I’m interested in is how she knew Ras’s name. Do you have any ideas, Ras?”
“None whatsoever. I didn’t even know who Princess Tishna was until about two weeks ago.”
Fiarca chuckled. “It was me who asked you to make contact with her, after all. I suppose I’ll believe you, for now.”
“How gracious.”
Ras scowled bitterly in response to Fiarca’s playful words. The princess’s violet eyes remained trained on him.
“So then, what did you two talk about?” she asked.
“She whined about me entering the country illegally and told me to piss off.”
“And so you came back with your tail between your legs. Did you mention why you were there?”
“I told her about the assassination plot. She said she had enough muscle, and for me to get lost.”
Ras felt bitter all over again as he recounted the events of their first meeting. He was curious as to why the princess had been so forceful with him, but as a soldier of a foreign state, he’d had no choice but to comply.
“Didn’t she believe you?”
“I…don’t think that’s it,” Ras replied. “In fact, I think she already knew. It’s more like she didn’t want my help…or she didn’t need it.”
“She didn’t need it?” repeated Kanalayka, her eyes wide with surprise. “Even when she knows there’s a secret organization after her that even we don’t fully understand?”
For generations, an intelligence group known as the Silver Fangs had aided the empire in its espionage efforts. It was only thanks to them that the plot against Tishna had been discovered at all. For her to be aware of it as well, Charlgia would need to have access to an intelligence network as formidable as them.
Suddenly, Fiarca’s countenance turned grave.
“The Silver Fangs have concocted twenty-seven hypotheses as to how Princess Tishna could have access to such information,” she said.
“Twenty-seven?”
Ras frowned. Fiarca gave him a weak smile.
“Of those, three stand out as the most likely explanations. The first is that Princess Tishna maintains an information network equal in magnitude to the Silver Fangs.”
“So some large organization we don’t know about is on her side?”
“That’s right. However, there’s one glaring flaw in this theory. It fails to explain why such an important asset would fall under the purview of the fourth royal princess and not someone higher up on the chain.”
“Couldn’t it be something to do with her mother? Isn’t she a queen or something?”
“Of Lumede, the country next door to Charlgia,” replied Fiarca, nodding. “Princess Tishna’s only seventeen, and she couldn’t possibly have built up an organization like that by herself. With that in mind, what you said is the obvious conclusion. There’s one problem with that, however, and it’s the fact that nothing she’s done has ever contributed to Lumedian national interest.”
“…You’re right.”
Ras thought back to the stories. Forcing impossible demands on a merchant who came to the palace. Bullying a classmate until she left the academy. Even if those actions eventually worked out in her country’s favor, they were petty in the grand scheme of things. With a network of spies like the Silver Fangs on her side, Tishna should have been capable of so much more.
“Plus,” offered Kanalayka, “isn’t it unthinkable that such a large organization should be able to operate undetected by our own spies?”
Fiarca tipped her head. “Maybe.” It didn’t sound like the imperial princess herself was too convinced by this intelligence agency hypothesis.
“Then what are the other theories?” Ras asked.
“If there’s no organization supporting her,” said Fiarca, “then that means all this information must come from the princess’s own abilities.”
“Abilities?”
“Perhaps Princess Tishna has the power to read minds,” Fiarca suggested. “Then she would know all about the ill intents of the people visiting the palace, and finding out your name, Ras, would be child’s play.”
“Reading minds? Is that even possible?” asked Kanalayka in shock. Fiarca smiled and shook her head.
“Not for me, at least. I think if I met her, I would know if my mind was being read or not, though.”
Fiarca turned her gaze to Ras.
“What do you think?” she asked.
“I don’t think she can read minds,” he answered. “At least, that’s not the way it felt.”
Fiarca raised an eyebrow in surprise. “What makes you say that?”
Ras’s answer was immediate.
“Because she knew about the dragon,” he said. “Princess Tishna started recruiting mercenaries just days before setting off. She knew precisely when and where it was going to appear. You can’t explain that away just by saying she can read minds.”
“That’s true. You can’t read somebody’s mind to find out when an event like that is going to happen.”
Fiarca nodded as if convinced.
“So then, what if we say she can see the future instead?”
“Is that theory number three?” asked Ras.
“Precognition…,” muttered Kanalayka. “Is that like star-reading, I wonder?”
Star-reading was the practice of analyzing the movements of heavenly bodies in conjunction with the flow of aura to predict the future fortune of people or places. Out in the desert, every few centuries or so, there appeared figures with such outstandingly accurate predictions that they came to be known and worshiped as prophets. If Tishna had a power like that, it would explain how she knew about the dragon’s coming.
But did revealing the corruption of nobles and ministers really fall under the purview of an ability like that?
“It’s a little different from mere astrology, I think,” said Fiarca. “She can’t just see the future, she knows it, as if she’s experienced it once already.”
As Fiarca went on with her explanation, Ras noticed a strange confidence in her words.
“What makes you so sure?” he asked.
“Her reputation as the Wicked Princess.”
“What?”
“If Princess Tishna really had powers of precognition, she wouldn’t have to go out of her way to disguise her interventions as callousness. It’s the same with the dragon, too. If she had told the king, she could have borrowed an army. There’d be no need for all that shifty recruiting of mercenaries and whatnot.”
“Well…I suppose. Even if it sounds like a tall tale at first, she’d have no trouble convincing the king of her powers if she pointed to her track record.”
“And yet, she stays silent. She can’t tell anyone about it. Why?”
“It sounds like you’re about to tell me.”
“That girl cannot change the past,” Fiarca stated. “If history strays from how she remembers it, her ability to predict the future will disappear.”
With that, Fiarca smiled a defiant smile.
“That’s why Princess Tishna is limited to petty interventions that won’t majorly alter events,” she explained. “Exposing a criminal just a little earlier than they would be otherwise, or keeping the victims of a dragon’s appearance to a minimum, that kind of thing.”
“Then that means,” said Ras, “the reason she knows my name and title…”
“Correct. I’d wager that in the history that Princess Tishna remembers, it was still you that fought the dragon. The only difference is that in that timeline, the losses were much greater.”
Ras fell silent. Fiarca’s logic seemed sound, if only it hadn’t been predicated on such a ridiculous premise. He was finding it difficult to accept, and so, apparently, was Kanalayka.
“You’re saying Princess Tishna has witnessed the future personally and come back in time? I’ve never heard of such a thing being possible, even with auramancy!”
“Nor I,” said Fiarca. “Which is why this might not be auramancy, but a unique power of Princess Tishna’s. Perhaps some hidden art passed down through the Lumedienne line.”
“If I can be frank, Your Highness, I’m not sure I believe that.”
“I think that’s best, for now,” said Fiarca, unhurt by her legate’s doubts. “It’s just a theory, after all. And even if Princess Tishna can return to the past, we still don’t know what her goal is.”
While Fiarca sadly shook her head, Ras appeared skeptical as he considered her claim.
“Her goal, eh?”
Princess Tishna was reliving events she’d already experienced. And to change how they played out, she was willing to besmirch her own good name, all while keeping collateral damage and ripple effects to a minimum. Because if she altered history too much, the path of events would stray from what she remembered.
Ras grasped all that. To him, it was the explanation that made the most sense.
So then, why doesn’t Tishna want the future to change?
Is it because what she really wants to stop is yet to come?
Perhaps some devastating event was just around the corner. Perhaps preventing that was Princess Tishna’s true goal. When Ras thought about it that way, all the pieces started to come together. To change the future, Princess Tishna needed Ras out of her way. That was why she had sent him back to the empire.
“Hold on,” said Ras. “So Princess Tishna has witnessed the future once already?”
“It might be more than once; we don’t know,” said Fiarca with a gentle smile. But Ras was starting to realize something.
“Right. So that’s why she said what she said…”
“Ras?”
“Fiarca…I think I know what Princess Tishna is planning to do. She’s planning to die.”
As soon as he said it, Fiarca’s eyes narrowed.
“What do you mean by that?” asked the ever-serious Kanalayka.
“The princess knows about the assassination attempt. That’s why she sent me away.”
“To prevent you from trying to stop it,” muttered Fiarca, her mind as keen as the edge of a blade. “Do you have any proof of that, Ras?”
“I remember what she told me,” he said, his voice growing more forceful by the second. “She said she was glad to see me once more. Dammit, the kiss—it was her way of saying goodbye!”
At the mention of a “kiss,” Fiarca froze. Even Kanalayka was shocked by the sudden coldness that seemed to seep from the princess’s every pore.
“Oh, so you kissed her, did you? Keeping that to yourself, were you?”
“Uh… Fiarca?”
It was only upon seeing the princess’s puffed-out cheeks that Ras realized his mistake. Instead of acknowledging her wrath, however, he could only think about how cute and pokable her cheeks looked.
“I see,” said Fiarca. “Even though it was your first time meeting her, she’s met you before in her memories of the future. That makes sense. What doesn’t make sense, Ras, is this: How did some strange woman manage to land a kiss on you, the Black Blade’s disciple? Are you sure you’re not going soft?”