He was just like a grown-up trying to keep a child safe.
Sophie felt something sway and stir within her as a gentle feeling caressed her heart. After all, to Sophie, it was only normal for her to stand up to adults who had more knowledge and experience than she did or to reach higher to try and stand on equal ground with them. She wasn’t used to having an adult stick up for her. And that was why her heart felt so, well, fluttery.
It definitely wasn’t love or the surge of some thrill, so what was it? What was making her heart flutter and fidget like this?
“Nrmph!” Sophie said, unwittingly making a terribly odd noise as she clutched her chest.
“Such insolence! Shall I flatten him ’neath my forepaw?”
Startled herself by the creature’s own startled voice, Sophie looked up only to see the big, blue-eyed bear giving a rich, hearty chuckle.
“Thou seemst happy now, so what is this knave to thee? Thy brother? Thy teacher taking thee upon a field trip?”
A teacher taking her on a field trip?!
Well, that was...one way you could put it, actually. Sophie couldn’t help but laugh.
After all, Vyce sat furthest in the back, stirring the pot as he kept a watchful eye over a bunch of teenage brats doing this and that. He’d stood up to a god, even though it wasn’t even his problem. If something were to befall him, his kingdom would be shaken in turn, so any insightful observer would be quick to label it as a terrible lack of foresight. But after having seen the turn of events so far, Vyce was carefully tiptoeing along the line of risk.
Such was indeed fitting for a king—and even a teacher taking students on a field trip.
“Mr. Vyyyyyce, Sophie picked up a god!”
“What? Can she take care of it? Hell, I might as well be teaching at an orphanage then. Unfortunately, I don’t plan on having her take care of the thing from the other side, so that’s going to be a ‘no.’”
“He’s neither my brother nor my teacher, but he is an adult I respect,” Sophie answered.
“You talking about me...?”
Sure enough, seeing Sophie chuckle, the bear gave a pleasant laugh. “Is that so now?”
“Thou hast saved me,” the bear continued. “I seek only to lend thee my aid as thanks. Eternity is a boring thing to live through; the life of a human child is naught but the blink of an eye to me.”
“So...in other words, you’re just killing time?”
“Thou couldst say that.” The bear laughed again. Sophie spun around to her teacher—no, Vyce—behind her.
“He says he’ll kill some time and help us out as thanks for saving him.”
“So long as that’s no lie,” Vyce replied. “Do whatever you want.”
Sophie looked up again as the bear nodded. “To us, vows art both tether and tie. Thou hast my word—my vow I shall not break.”
The bear was saying he’d accompany them on their journey as thanks for their help. Any adult would be entirely correct to doubt the veracity of such a happy coincidence in the first place. Had it been “Sophelia” before she’d made her escape from the castle, she almost certainly wouldn’t have approved.
But Sophie had already given up on tossing her thoughts over and over in her head. She’d had her fill of just watching everything from a distance. She’d believed Lunetta and the light she saw.
Sophie stared into the creature’s blue eyes.
“Why don’t we call you...Azuello?”
“Well now...”
“‘Blue one’ in the ancient tongue of the mages,” Lunetta said.
“That’s right,” Sophie replied with a smile. To be honest, Sophie probably wasn’t that much of a fan of the color blue. Perhaps it was a bit of an overstatement to call the color “traumatic” to her?
After all, her ex-fiancé’s eyes had been blue.
As far as Sophie herself was concerned, the prince’s eyes could’ve been blue or sewage brown for all she cared, but since he had been her fiancé, it had been expected that she would wear blue in public—blue earrings and blue necklaces and the like. And had the prince worn, in turn, an accessory or brooch the color of Sophelia’s eyes or hair? Not quite. It was positively infuriating, but that was just how it had been. Sophelia’d had neither the resolution nor the standing to oppose him.
Thanks to that, Sophie’s free-spirited fiancé had found himself with an obedient and proper lady. It had gone so far beyond being uncomfortable that it had actually become a source of amusement for her. How those rumors must’ve positively blossomed after that! Far from just flowers, the rumors could’ve practically grown into fruit or such. Hmm? So, then the seeds would drop to the ground, a tree would grow there, and then it’d flower, huh? Now that I think about it, rumors are like the circle of life! Whoa. How grand.
And none of that was funny in the slightest.
Nonetheless, blue had been the symbol of Sophelia in her wretched and pitiful station.
“I’ve probably always been infuriated by the color blue,” Sophie explained. She’d always wanted to run away from that color. In truth, Sophelia had always wanted to throw all of it away—her blue earrings, necklaces, hairpins, and bracelets.
“Truly?” the bear uttered in a low voice, freezing up in shock.
“Which is why I want to learn to like blue,” Sophie laughed. “I’ve just started a new life for myself now, you see. Could I ask for your help?”