The Third Life and Thereafter – 4

　　“It is a pleasure to meet you. My

　　name is Iria Il Machisse.”

　　“Nice to meet you. I’m Soleil Van

　　Nortis.”

　　On the day

　　of our first meeting, Soleil lightly tilted his small head and showed a smile.

　　That greeting that was not directed at me but at my parents standing behind me,

　　watching over the children introduction, was exchanged very easily. Like him, I

　　also introduced myself, but I couldn’t help but feel the difference in our

　　peerage and my countenance became stiff as I was careful of the mood

　　of the other party. However, I think Soleil’s parents didn’t get a particularly

　　bad impression of me. “Oh, what a lovely

　　young lady” said his mother with a smile, and Soleil too turned his sights

　　toward me. When his smile was quickly pulled up, and his face that became an

　　elaborate and beautiful mask like a porcelain doll incidentally turned in my

　　direction, I realized. That person, was wounded. I understood why. I heard that

　　his fiancé had just pa.s.sed away. That they got along extremely well as

　　childhood friends. I had never seen the person who died, but I heard the

　　rumors. Even though she was young, she was intelligent and very pretty. I also

　　had been told by father to become like that person. He said that if I aimed to become

　　a lady, then that girl who was closed in age was a good model. Although it was

　　an unreasonable demand to take someone I had not even the face of as a goal, several

　　persons who worked as my private tutors had also taught that girl, and each and

　　every single one said the same thing about her. That girl, was wonderful.

　　As soon as

　　that person died, because the position of being Soleil’s fiancé was

　　unexpectedly dropped on me, it can be said I became her subst.i.tute like my

　　father told me to be.

　　The first

　　meeting that took place in the Marquis’s garden progress very calmly. Because

　　both our fathers originally had friendly relations and our mothers too were

　　acquaintances in the high society, the conversations seemed to progress lively.

　　Regarding Soleil and I, after having exchanged our introduction we both kept

　　silent, but as I was at a loss, Soleil guided me and nonchalantly taught me what

　　I should do. For example, he showed me at which timing drink tea, eat pastry,

　　how to ask for permission to leave the seat when I felt tired; with his gaze or

　　his gesture, he demonstrated everything for me. That’s why all I had to do most

　　of the time was to smile and wait for time to pa.s.s. I didn’t know what Soleil

　　was thinking, but the time spent meeting each other gazes and watching from the

　　sidelines was not that bad. When our parents allowed us to leave our seat, we

　　took a stroll in the garden together. I wasn’t accustomed to the dress that had

　　been prepared for today introduction meeting, and it couldn’t be said the dress

　　was easy to walk with, but each time my feet stopped, a few steps ahead of me

　　Soleil was waiting for me. He never said “hurry up” or “not done yet?” He was

　　simply waiting. When I chased after him in a hurry, the expression in his eyes

　　that had a trace of sharpness despite its childish features became just a

　　little bit softer. Before long, his small fingers grasped my even smaller

　　fingertips and he said,     

　　“Let’s get

　　along well”. From there on, let’s always, always get along well.

　　Soleil was

　　two years older than me. He was only seven, but his eyes were always gazing at

　　the future. I should naturally be there too, and we planned to become a

　　harmonious pair of husband and wife.

　　… … I

　　wonder where I went wrong.

　　*

　　*

　　            I

　　clearly saw my hand letting go of the cup filled with black tea. The crack made

　　when it collided with its saucer in a clanking sound, surely, was a

　　representation of the relations.h.i.+p between Soleil and me. When I raised my

　　head, my eyes reflected the face of Soleil who was unusually surprised. Next to

　　him, having shrugged her shoulder after being frightened by the sound of the

　　colliding porcelain, stood Silvia.

　　            Now,

　　the two have accomplished their first meeting.    

　　            At

　　that moment, recalled memoires filled my head to the brim. Along with the

　　frightening feeling that the blood in my whole body flew backwards, various

　　scenes flashed pa.s.sed then disappeared. My pa.s.sed life. Its previous life and

　　the one before that, the one before that too, and the one of even before, the

　　previous one of that. I wondered at which one I stopped counting.

　　“Iria, what happened…?”

　　            While

　　looking at Soleil’s doubtful expression, I remembered the lives I went through until

　　now. I am a human who cannot forget anything and everything. It was supposed to

　　be like that. From which point did a hole start to appear in the memories I

　　should be remembering? I remember the previous one, but I can’t clearly recall

　　the one before that. However, I can recollect the one before it perfectly, and

　　I’m forgetting the one from even further before. It means I have repeated the same

　　time that much. 

　　            When

　　I unconsciously looked up at the sky, I saw a small bird dancing high above.

　　But it was not black. It was not Crow.

　　“… No, nothing is wrong. My apology.

　　My hand slipped.”

　　            Al,

　　who was near me, called the maid and watched her skillfully tidy up the broken

　　cup. While I felt my pulse was echoes loudly like it was violently rousing up,

　　my head cooled down and calmly convey the fact that this development was the

　　beginning. If I leave my seat, if at that timing I slowly rise while saying

　　“I’m feeling a bit unwell, would it be alright with you if I take my leave

　　first?”, then Soleil will frown with an increasingly dubious expression. If

　　other people saw it, it’s not a change big enough to deduce this, but for me

　　who have only been watching him since our childhood, I perfectly understood

　　every of Soleil’s emotions. Furthermore, the span of time spent watching him

　　was not limited to this life only.

　　“Big sister, are you alright?”

　　            I

　　noticed that the cup I dropped when Soleil was exchanging his greetings, had

　　cut apart the gentle mood that was flowing between them. My little sister has

　　not sat down yet. “Soleil-sama, please take care of Silvia.” When I said that,

　　his expression immediately slackened and he turned to face my little sister.

　　“I apology”, he said and, in my stand, he lowered his head and pulled the chair

　　for her. “No, that, it is I who should apology” replied my little sister who

　　has become fl.u.s.tered and whose cheeks have been dyed red. While her beauty has

　　s.n.a.t.c.hed away everyone eyes, when I urged Al with my gaze, he took my right

　　hand to escort me. I didn’t think that him, as my escort, would do such a

　　boorish action in front of Soleil who was my fiancé, but in this situation even

　　Soleil probably wouldn’t rebuke him. Besides, there is no doubts he was no

　　longer paying me any mind. While keeping Soleil who was fixedly staring at the

　　round cheeks of my little sister at the corner of my eyes, I left my seat. Not

　　knowing how many times I saw that scene that kept being repeated, I dropped my

　　gaze. When Al whispered “My lady” in my ears, I realized my feet had stopped.

　　            As

　　I grasped my heart that was a.s.sailed by pain similar to a strong cramp, I felt

　　like I could have carved out my chest with a knife. Why am I like this? Why

　　don’t I tire of being hurt again and again?

　　            When

　　I saw the worried face of Al who was looking at me, I suddenly remembered. In one

　　of my previous lives, I took his hand and eloped. At the beginning I stubbornly

　　rejected his hand, but, after experiencing lives where I got relentlessly

　　corned over and over again, I felt into a clear despair and took his hand at

　　last. If it has been a romance novel like the ones that are flouris.h.i.+ng among

　　the commoners, it would have become the kind of love story all young maidens

　　were reading with captivation. A forbidden love with an escort, it would be

　　narrated under that perspective. However, Al and I were not in love. Al was

　　just feeling pity for me. Moreover, he was a person who would carry out his

　　loyalty. 

　　            Right,

　　loyalty.

　　            I

　　knew that if I run away from my parents’ home before marring Soleil, I could

　　never come back. The fact that in each life, we got married after I graduated

　　from the academy was neither out of I nor Soleil’s own volition. Everything was

　　controlled by the marquis house. The earl’s daughter called “Iria”, seemed to

　　be much more capable that what she herself thought, and when she was attending

　　school, other families had tried to b.u.t.ted in and prevent her for joining the

　　marquis house. Due to the reason their peerage didn’t match, there had been

　　houses trying to tear up the engagement with Soleil and tie a new marriage

　　connection with him. That why, before things got more troublesome, the marquis

　　house hastened to take me in and it became a ceremony that had been coercively

　　and hastily advanced under their arrangement. However, I didn’t harbor any

　　particular dissatisfaction with that. Rather, I was delighted to become

　　Soleil’s wife as soon as possible. So, even if I didn’t do anything, the

　　preparations for my marriage with Soleil favorably moved forward.

　　            I

　　wonder why I abruptly thought that if I must flee, it was now or never. I

　　think, I just thought that I had to flee. “My

　　lady, please state your wish. Please, chose to take this hand.” Was it his

　　sincere gaze that moved my stubborn heart, or had that time simply come? Because

　　Al told that I was more important than anything else in this world. I may have

　　thought it wouldn’t be bad to believe these words. Or maybe, my heart had been

　　worn out by those repeating lives and could not make the correct decision. When

　　Soleil’s heart started to incline toward Silvia, I chose to get away from them.

　　Even though I thought I could never do such a thing, but after having made up

　　my mind, all that was left was to polish a plan. It should have been a plan

　　carefully prepared. But an unexpected situation occurred. What Al and I lacked,

　　was probably the ability to ascertain every and any single details with a

　　discerning eye. We run away together in the middle of the night, borrowing the

　　help of several people, we tried to leave the town, and were surrounded. When I

　　learned those people were the proteges of the marquis, I was already in a

　　situation where I couldn’t move. They were thoroughly prepared and payed no

　　attention to mine and Al’s resistance. That’s was natural. They were the

　　so-called marquis’s intelligence unit. The dark side of the nation. Such a

　　thing as capturing Al and me, for the unit mainly in charge of a.s.sa.s.sination,

　　it was even easier than twisting a baby’s neck. It’s not that Al was weak. He

　　worked as an escort knight. His real ability was guaranteed simply by the fact

　　he was serving my earl house. But he couldn’t fight equally with humans from

　　the dark side whom had been killing people as a living. 

　　            As

　　if it was natural, Al stood before me. To protect me. As if to say it was his

　　duty as an escort. And then, in front of me, he was slashed and died.

　　            “At this late hour, if you abandon your

　　obligations, I’ll be troubled.” The marquis’s wife who came to visit me

　　after I returned home said that with the same calm smile she had the first time

　　we met. “It’s not like you’ve grown up

　　this far by yourself, right? It’s not just your parents who have raised you to

　　become the next marquis’s wife. For that purpose, our house has also devoted

　　its power, hasn’t it? Most of your education expanses were burdened by our

　　house. Did you know that?” The marquis’s wife who only stated facts in a

　　detached tone leaned her face that looked at lot like Soleil’s toward me and

　　added, “You have to properly understand

　　that there is no replacement for you.” Indeed, I never thought that the

　　unit called the marquis’s dog would move simply to search for me. In the end,

　　I, who couldn’t foresee that far ahead, had been too swallow. The bride of a

　　marquis eloping was a big scandal in the high society. The aristocratic society

　　was most concern about appearances and dignity after all. 

　　            And

　　then, Al, as the person who had lend his hand for the elopement, was labeled as

　　the main criminal for instigating the whole affair. In the first place, Al’s

　　direct employers were my parents. Al, who tried to release me betrayed the earl

　　house. That’s why he was mercilessly cut down and sacrified. I was not allowed

　　to express the slightest vindication. It was too late to say that I was the one

　　who planned everything, that it wasn’t his fault. Because he had already died.

　　            “Because he died protecting his master, he

　　fulfilled his long-cherished ambition as a knight, right?”

　　            The

　　marquis’s wife laughed with an extreme satisfaction. Her words were right in a

　　sense. Because, he had wished to live as a knight and die as a knight. His

　　wages were indeed paid by the earl house, but he had said that I “was his only master.” He said he had no

　　intention to obey anyone else. In my former life, it had also been the same

　　when I requested him to protect my little sister rather than me. Because it was

　　my command, he reluctantly protected Silvia while gritting his teeth. Since he

　　did it while showing a frustration that came from the bottom of his heart, I

　　think I ended up misunderstanding Al’s kindness. Before I knew it, I came to

　　believe he was existing for my sake. I lost him in my first life, after that I

　　exerted myself to keep him away. Perhaps it was because I had foreseen I would

　　lose him someday. That’s how my former self used to be. And yet, I took him

　　along with me.  

　　            “… … I’m Alfred’s fiancé. No, I was his

　　fiancé.”

　　            A

　　few days after that runaway drama, I, who had naturally been restrained, had a

　　visitor. It was a young woman. From her clothes I could tell she wasn’t from

　　the aristocracy, but probably the daughter of a merchant. Their design was

　　trendy and they were decorated with many frills that were all the rage with

　　town girls recently. However, none of that suited the dark color of the cloth

　　that reminded of a mourning dress. No, it was wrong. That woman was definitively

　　wearing a mourning dress. The reason why it wasn’t clear whether or not they

　　looked like mourning clothes, was because that woman was still his fiancé and

　　had yet to become his legal wife. In other words, she was still a stranger who

　　was only scheduled to become a family member. It was different from grieving

　　over the death of one’s own family member.    

　　            “Were you aware of my

　　existence?”

　　            She

　　was still a young maiden with adorable features. Al is older than me by five

　　years, so she may have been around the same age as I. She should be 17 or 18.

　　Despite it, she was exulting a composed air. It was maybe because of her deep

　　grief. Her little face scattered with freckles stared at me fixedly. It seemed her

　　pair of eyes which contour was tinged with red was blaming and sentencing me. Even

　　though she had asked me if I knew her, she didn’t wait for an answer before she

　　said,

　　            “Alfred and I had planned to get together

　　once your life had settled down. We had such a promise.”

　　            She

　　said she didn’t know how many years it would take but she intended to wait,

　　then she covered her eyes. Her tears gently felt on her hands that were tightly

　　grasped on top of her knees. She took in consideration both my situation and

　　Al’s, anything and everything, yet how deep must have been the determination of

　　the young girl who still decided to wait? Even if she didn’t have the

　　appearance of n.o.bles, from her clothes I could guess she was from a wealthy

　　family. A woman born in such a family bears the duty of connecting two houses

　　through marriage. Al and her probably got promised to each other to gain such a

　　tie. But Al chose the path of running away with me. Because I wanted to. It was

　　impossible for him to reverse the decision of the one and only master he chose.

　　That’s why she also must have made her own decision. She had no other choices

　　but to decide. She planned to choose Al, she planned to abandon her family. That’s

　　how much thoughts and feelings she put into it.  

　　            Ah,

　　dear Lord. I, what did I, do? What the earth, did I do?

　　            I

　　knew that words such as “I’m sorry” held no meaning. I was always on the side

　　of those who got things stolen from them. That’s why I knew such words would

　　not provide her the slightest bit of relief. “Can it be that you, you think that you’re the only one unhappy… … ?”

　　At that moment, I remembered Crow’s words.

　　            “Alfred was pitiful. Because he made you his

　　master, he died……”

　　            Although

　　her tears that kept trickling down looked transient, the strong gaze aimed at

　　me pierced my chest. I didn’t know. I didn’t know the slightest thing. I was

　　not even aware of the fact Al had a fiancé. No, it’s wrong. I didn’t even try

　　to know. Because Al knew everything about me, I was under the impression that words

　　were not needed between us. And then, I rested on my laurels and took Al’s

　　gentle words for granted, and I relied on the hand that must absolutely never

　　be grasped. Because of that, Al died. I stole Al from her.

　　            Ah,

　　I wonder how foolish I am.

　　            …

　　… What happened after that, I don’t remember it well. Just that the high society

　　wasn’t particularly kind toward a n.o.ble woman who had attempted to elope once. Even

　　though I intended to lay low, before I knew it I was in a bed of thorns, and

　　worse than that, the att.i.tude of Soleil who didn’t hide his disappointed look

　　never ceased to hurt me. His cold eyes no longer reflected my appearance, and

　　our line of sight never met. I couldn’t reach out for his hand when we were

　　walking, our fingers didn’t even touch each other’s. 

　　            I

　　recall his voice when he said, “Even

　　though I’m the one that was abandoned, why are you making such a pained

　　expression?” I think in this life, Soleil and Silvia didn’t remain married

　　for life. But, as expected, I can’t remember well.

　　            …

　　… The next one, the next one for sure, I have to carry through by myself. That's what I thought while thinking back on my previous life.

　　            And

　　so, in my life that turned back once again, I planned my elopement.