351 - The Scent of Flowers and a Quiet Recovery
I woke to the scent of flowers tickling my nostrils. The fragrance wafting softly through the canopy was one I recognized.
...What flower was it? I had definitely smelled it before, but...?
Half-asleep, I lifted my arm. A sharp sting shot through it. I hurriedly lowered my arm, but then the impact against the bed sent another jolt of pain through me.
...Huh? What was that?
The bed bounced slightly from the impact of my arm falling. In the corner of my vision, something green fluttered with the movement.
There was something on the bed. This time, I lifted my arm carefully. It still hurt a bit, but I noticed that several of the leaves on my arm had fallen off.
...Huh? Why were there more leaves?
A few of the leaves from where they had been last night had fallen, but new smaller leaves had increased. The only person I knew who treated wounds with leaves was the Divine King, so maybe while I was sleeping, he remembered he had forgotten to finish the treatment and came back again. Thinking that, I reconsidered, taking in the floral scent filling the canopy.
...Somehow, I felt like a different spirit had come to treat me.
The Divine King had examined me once and judged the wounds did not need treatment. I did not think he would come back just to treat me again while I was sleeping.
...Where was the string?
I tried to signal that I was awake to whoever might be waiting outside the canopy, and ran my fingers over the bed. Moving my arm still hurt, but it was considerably better than last night.
...Ah, there it was.
My fingers touched a cloth (a ribbon) that was clearly different from the bedcovers, and I looped it around my finger. This was a device Kalisa had made last night. A bell was attached to the end of the ribbon, and when I pulled the ribbon, the bell placed on the bedside table would fall to the floor. It was prepared so that I, who could neither speak nor thrash about in bed right now, could send a signal outside the canopy.
Clatter, went the bell as it fell. Because of the carpet, the sound did not carry as much as I had expected. Still, it seemed to have properly conveyed that I was awake to those outside the canopy. Heavy footsteps approached at a brisk pace, followed by smaller footsteps, and then a loud noise came from just outside the canopy.
...Leonyaldo-san never learns, does he.
Judging from the footsteps, the same thing as last night had probably happened. He had approached his newly-awakened little sister's bed, and been stopped by Kalisa or Solana. The two ladies-in-waiting were young ladies from good families, so they did not use physical force against Leonardo. Well, in terms of being a young lady from a good family, Solana was also a noble daughter, but her senses had been numbed by the fact that she served as Alfred's maid. Solana's "if words do not work, use force" approach was actually gentle in that she at least warned him verbally first. Kalisa used force without a word.
Even if he was family, if you approached your just-woken little sister's bed, getting repelled was only to be expected.
I did not want Leonardo to see my messy bedhead either.
"Good morning, Tina-sama."
After I waited a little inside the canopy, the face that appeared was Kalisa's. Behind her, I could see Leonardo holding his head.
"...What is that smell?"
Kalisa, who had come inside the canopy, also seemed to have noticed the floral scent. She tilted her head after making a slight gesture of sniffing the air.
Kalisa arranged a cushion behind my back and helped me sit up. Now that I was sitting up, I could see the bed better. Leaves were scattered here and there on the bed. The small wounds that had not even been treated by the Divine King's assessment had already scabbed over into thin lines. Even the wounds that had been hidden under the leaves until last night had formed scabs. When I tried removing the bandage, more leaves fluttered down. The leaves that were still stuck to my skin would not come off when I tried to peel them, but once the scabs formed underneath, they seemed to fall off naturally. That way, I would not accidentally touch them and peel them off.
For the areas that still had many leaves, I had the bandages rewrapped just in case. After having my hair tied up neatly, the leaves on the bed were cleaned up and the canopy was opened.
Outside the canopy, as expected, Leonardo was waiting. He looked somewhat tired, perhaps because he had not slept a wink. I had suddenly vanished from before his eyes, returned covered in wounds with my hair chopped to shreds. It was certainly something that might make him afraid to look away even for a moment. For a while, he would probably stay by my side even more than usual.
"Good morning, Tina."
He asked how my wounds were, so I showed him my arm with the fallen leaves and the bandage that covered a smaller area. Though he frowned, as I lifted my arm, Leonardo let out a small sigh of relief.
Because I had wounds on my throat, since last night my meals had been soft, mushy things. I did not know what state my throat was in, but I was glad it did not hurt when I swallowed. It also helped that Kalisa had thoughtfully prepared porridge for me, though I wondered about Leonardo being the one to help me eat. I felt that this kidnapping had really triggered some strange switch in Leonardo. Or maybe it had carved trauma into him. Without a doubt, his overprotectiveness had worsened.
...Well, he would probably calm down eventually.
Even though this morning was better than last night, it was still painful and troublesome just to lift my arm, so I gratefully let myself be looked after.
Kalisa had tied my hair up nicely, but that day I spent the whole time lying still in bed. I could not wave my arms around to stave off boredom, nor could I scream that I was bored, so this was truly tedious. There was almost nothing I could do, so I just ate and slept, and the day ended.
When I woke up the next morning, the pain when I lifted my arm had decreased even more. Many leaves had also fluttered off. It seemed the leaves in my throat had finally started to fall too, a few of them.
Now that I could move a bit, I tried removing the bandage myself. There were still wounds where the leaves had not fallen, but even so, the number of leaves had decreased considerably and the scabs were becoming more prominent.
Though it still hurt occasionally, I sat up on my own and rang the bell. Solana came inside the canopy. It seemed Leonardo had not been stopped from entering this morning. She cleaned up the leaves scattered on the bed and tied my hair. I could eat by myself now, but Leonardo, who had been taking care of my meals all yesterday, looked somewhat dissatisfied. He said it must still hurt a little and wanted to help me eat. I felt like I was being hand-fed a bit, though at this point, it might have been too late to complain about that.
When I told Kalisa I wanted to take a bath, Leonardo was chased out of the room. My nightclothes were removed and the state of my wounds was checked. Kalisa's answer was "let us wait another day." I felt it had gotten much better, but apparently there were still many leaves in places I could not see.
...I had not bathed in two days already, so I wanted to take a bath.
After all, I had cuts all over my body, so there was absolutely no way I could enter a bath where the water would sting my wounds. And because the treatment had been performed by the mysterious Divine King, no one wanted to risk what might happen if the leaves came off in the bath. I had been making do with having my body wiped down with a damp towel.
...Would I be able to take a bath tomorrow?
After having my nightclothes changed, Leonardo, who had been chased out of the room, was let back in. The pain that had kept me from moving had subsided, so it seemed I could spend today in my house clothes. If I could move my arms and legs, I could read books, or I could have Leonardo play board games with me.
...But I had a feeling I was probably healing faster than normal.
I thought vaguely as I ate the porridge that had been made again today so it would be easy to swallow. The wounds treated in a decidedly abnormal way did not itch at all despite the scabs forming. Every day, the number of leaves simply decreased.
Then, the next morning, all the leaves on my arms and legs had fallen off. The leaves on my stomach and back seemed to have fallen too, and I was happily given permission by Kalisa to bathe. I slowly soaked in the bath with a body that no longer hurt as long as I did not run or thrash about. The leaves stuck to my body had fallen off, but the leaves on my throat were still clinging, of various sizes both large and small.
...If I lost the ability to speak, that would be serious.
So I accepted that he was probably being thorough about the treatment, and the leaves on my throat were taking their time to fall.
The last leaf stuck to my throat finally fell a full week after that. My body could now move completely. I could jump, I could run around the garden with Kokumaro the black shiba, and nothing hurt. Even the wounds that had not been treated at first had all their scabs fallen off.
"Ah, ah, ah."
I confirmed in the mirror that all the leaves were gone, and had Solana check as well. When I tried speaking to test if they had truly all come off, my voice felt a little tight. There was that, but nothing else. I could finally speak normally again. A slight tightness would probably heal with time.
Once I had fully recovered, Alf came to visit. After talking a little and confirming that I had truly recovered, I received a summons to Christoph's castle. Escorted by Alf, when I arrived at the castle, Christoph and Timon were waiting.
"See? I told you. Christina has no intention of harming me, the King. She was thrown into that place by spirits."
"But Your Majesty, even if the young lady Christina had no harmful intent, a hearing is necessary."
Timon did not seem to fully grasp that I had been taken by spirits. I would doubt it too, if I had not actually been taken myself. Christoph had seen me suddenly appear before him, and Leonardo had actually seen me disappear. As for Alf, this was the second time I had vanished before his very eyes. People who had witnessed inexplicable phenomena firsthand accepted "being spirited away" as just that, but Timon, who had only heard about it, probably could not accept the phenomenon so readily. Timon knew my honest and straightforward personality, so he did not seem to think I had truly intended any harm when I intruded, but he insisted that a hearing was necessary even if only for formality.
Pushing past the exasperated Christoph, the hearing covered almost the same content as I had answered in writing. It also felt like they were just cross-referencing what had been discovered through investigation since then.
"What? Nothing remains?"
"That is right. That massive crystal has vanished without a trace."
Mixed in with Timon's questioning, I was able to hear about the current state of the Spirit's Seat. The Spirit's Seat had been a massive crystal that could be seen as somewhat resembling a seat. I remembered falling onto it and smashing it, but my memory after that was hazy. I felt like the Divine King's remains had come out of it, but I did not remember what became of the shattered crystal. According to Timon, not even a single shard of the broken crystal remained at the scene. It seemed that the Spirit's Seat I had destroyed had vanished along with its purpose fulfilled.
...Wasn't that itself a mysterious phenomenon?
Still, it seemed Timon could not accept it as a phenomenon. With a clear frown etched between his brows, Christoph, perhaps to change the subject, ordered a maid to replace the tea.
"...Regarding the new information Christina has brought us this time, I have decided to send a formal letter to the Divine King's territory through the Itsurateru Church."
Saying he wanted to hear more details about the contents, Christoph cleared the room. Only myself, my guard Leonardo, Alf, and Timon remained. He apparently intended for Timon to hear this as well.
"Why go through the Itsurateru Church to send the letter?"
"Because you vanished from the Itsurateru Church. That church is a bastion of faith in the Divine King. The saintly woman who is famous for having an audience with the Divine King must have had another audience with the Divine King, they pry, and it is troublesome."
It seemed that at the Itsurateru Church, I had unknowingly become a saint. This seemed to be partly due to Remihio, the acting king of the Divine Kingdom Quebia, pulling strings, rather than just the fact that I had been taken by spirits. Apparently, Remihio had sent word without my knowledge, telling them to lend me a hand if I was in any trouble.
"If we entrust the formal letter to the headquarters in Quebia, they should quiet down for a while. What Quebia does with the information afterward will depend on their acting king."
Christoph said that matters concerning the Divine King's succession were too significant for a mere king of one country like himself to judge. It sounded like a wise king's prudent decision, but really it was just passing the buck. The matter was too big, he could not handle it himself, so he was dumping the responsibility and judgment onto Quebia's acting king.
"I would think that information would be something Quebia would desperately want, but you are not using it for any kind of transaction."
"There is no tyrant foolish enough to take such action against the Divine King's territory."
The Divine Kingdom of Quebia called itself a "kingdom." However, countries outside Quebia did not call Quebia a "kingdom" but a "territory." In their dealings with each other, both sides called themselves "kingdoms," but the idea that the Divine King's Territory was the Divine King's direct domain and that the other countries were part of the ancient Divine Kingdom still remained. That was why countries other than Quebia called Quebia the "Divine King's Territory" and considered themselves "part of the Divine Kingdom." Both sides called themselves "kingdoms," but they were part of the Divine Kingdom. At a glance, it seemed like "kingdom" versus "territory" lowered Quebia by one level, but it was actually the opposite. The Divine King's Territory of Quebia was a country more special than any other.
Time is up.
Will fix typos and errors at a later date.