Walls Have Elven Ears

The next morning.

I was sleeping in blissfully when Amelia came in and shook me awake.

“Young Master, it’s noon. Time to get up.”

“Five more minutes, Mom.”

I’d been drilling telekinesis through the small hours and was completely spent.

I tried playing limp, but got no reaction whatsoever.

When I finally dragged myself upright with a show of reluctance, Amelia was staring at me with a blank expression.

“……I may have lost my temper with you more times than I can count, but I’m quite certain I’ve never had a stomachache over you.”

“Mom’s got amnesia!”

“Young Master, please don’t joke like that. I shudder to think if someone overheard.”

Amelia corrected me with a straight face.

I propped my chin on my hand.

“Still, you’re the only one in this house who takes my side. You’ll always be in my corner, right? No matter what?”

“Which is precisely why you must not call me that.”

“Do you know anything about the elf in the annex?”

I changed the subject without warning, and Amelia looked visibly relieved.

She thought for a moment before answering.

“I’ve never spoken with him personally. Even the servants who bring his meals say they’ve never exchanged a word of small talk.”

“How long has he been staying here at the Librata estate?”

“Roughly ten years, I’d estimate.”

Amelia added, with a note of worry,

“Please don’t get any strange ideas. Some of the servants who were curious about him tried to linger near the annex and were caught, and the whole thing turned into quite the incident. The count had to let them go just to smooth things over.”

“Fussy, even for an elf.”

“He is a guest who has chosen to stay here for the sake of fostering goodwill between the elves and House Librata. If you were to give offense and the elf took it badly, it could create serious problems.”

Elves preferred to keep to their own kind.

So why would they plant someone inside a human noble’s household?

Because House Librata was one of the twelve families in contention for the second emperor’s seat.

“A twelve-house race for the throne, then……”

“Young Master, eat your lunch first.”

At Amelia’s prompting, I got up from the bed.

After the meal, I headed out to the training grounds and put in my work. I ran laps until the sweat was pouring off me, rested when my body gave out, then moved on to strength training.

I’d been keeping to this routine for several days now, and I could feel the conditioning starting to accumulate — slowly, but noticeably.

“Excuse me — Young Master……”

I was sitting in the gymnasium wiping sweat off my face when one of the knights approached.

A familiar face.

“Ah — you’re the one I cracked on the head with the two-sword feint, aren’t you? How are you holding up?”

“I, I’m fine. Could I have a word with you, sir?”

I nodded, and he sat down beside me.

“I should have introduced myself sooner. I’m——”

“Knight Garul, right? Uros seems rather fond of you.”

Remembering names and faces was an old habit from my emperor days.

I might give off the impression of someone coasting through life on banter and bluster, but on this count I had never slipped.

People were easily moved when someone above them remembered their name, their face, and took an interest in their affairs.

Garul’s expression was no exception — visibly touched.

“Yes, that’s right. I really did behave terribly that day.”

“I’m the one who hit you. If anything, I should be sorry. So — what did you want to say?”

“If it isn’t too forward…… I’d like to serve as your escort, Young Master.”

“……”

Nobles of rank typically kept attendants and knights in tow. Attendants carried out a noble’s instructions, while knights provided protection and, when necessary, applied force on their lord’s behalf.

It was a way of signaling status.

I turned it over for a moment, then said,

“Ah, I’d actually recommend against that.”

“Pardon?”

“You’re at the stage of channeling magic into your blade, yes? Reaching that level at your age — you’ve got real prospects ahead of you. Wouldn’t you be better off attaching yourself to my brother? Ah, does he already have a personal knight? Even so, if you distinguish yourself at the right moment and catch his eye, it would serve you far better. Or I could write you a letter of introduction, if you’d like.”

“……”

Garul looked genuinely puzzled.

He couldn’t tell whether I was sincerely declining or just deflecting. When someone above you speaks, it’s hard to take the words at face value.

I shrugged.

“You know my reputation. I’m a walking disaster. I’m the youngest with no inheritance coming and no ambitions to speak of.”

“Mm……”

“Truly none. I have absolutely no desire to push my brother aside and claim this house for myself.”

I’d wanted to abdicate from being emperor.

Why would the title of count in some backwater province be tempting?

Garul thought it over, then spoke.

“Then what are your plans going forward, Young Master? Once Roderic inherits the title…… you wouldn’t be able to stay in the Librata household indefinitely, would you?”

“I’ll head out on my own and get by. Planning to live in complete, unhurried ease.”

“In that case, going forward, I……”

Garul set his jaw with a look of resolution, then dropped to one knee before me and lowered his head.

The formal salute of a knight to his lord.

“I will draw my sword for the sake of your easy path, Young Master. Please take me on as your escort.”

Garul’s earnest plea left me a little puzzled.

“I keep telling you there’s nothing in it for you, and here you are anyway. You were burning through magic like it was free back there — aren’t you basically the ace of this whole knighthood?”

“My reputation doesn’t matter to me. Ever since we crossed blades, Young Master, I haven’t been able to sleep.”

“Then go take care of yourself. That’ll put you right to sleep. Just don’t do it while thinking of me.”

“……”

Garul’s mouth fell open mid-sentence.^[1]

“……A-anyway. I want to keep following you and learn whatever I can.”

“I’m weaker than you, though. That bout was a one-time ambush and nothing more.”

“That may be true now — but if we fought again soon, it would be different. I’m certain of it.”

Garul said it with a burning intensity.

Whatever else could be said about this body — no magic, barely any stamina — the techniques and instincts were still there, fully intact.

Garul had felt that when we fought, and it was why he was clinging on like this.

“Well, I suppose……”

Having an escort around wouldn’t hurt.

This body was still far too fragile.

If an assassin showed up at the wrong moment, that would be a genuine headache.

I nodded.

“Fine. You’ve been warned repeatedly and you still want to suffer — who am I to stop you?”

“Thank you! I will serve you with complete loyalty from here on!”

“Then start right now.”

“Pardon?”

“We’re going to have to go into the annex.”

The bright expression on Garul’s face turned to stone.

Late afternoon.

I made my way toward the annex with Garul in tow.

The annex was a two-story building separate from the main house, and the entire structure had been given over to the elf.

Crouching with me in the bushes, Garul tried to talk me out of it.

“……Young Master, wouldn’t it be wiser to turn back?”

“Go ahead and make your case. I’m listening.”

People open up when someone above them actually hears them out.

Garul brightened and pressed on.

“As you know, elves are proud and standoffish by nature. Approaching without permission will put him in a foul mood.”

“This is our house, and our land. He’s been living here as a guest for ten years without so much as coming by to say hello — seems reasonable to check in on him.”

“……Does it work like that?”

Garul blinked in confusion, then tried again.

“I mean, yes, but — he’s an elf. And he’s House Librata’s patron, on top of that.”

“About that patronage……”

I paused to think, then said it plainly.

“What exactly is this twelve-house race for the throne?”

“Pardon? It’s the noble families deliberating over who will become the next emperor, isn’t it?”

“That’s how we humans see it. But why would the other seven races go along with it? They could have put one of their own forward.”

“Well……”

Garul mulled it over at length before answering.

“For the stability of the empire? Immediately after the first emperor passed, everything was in chaos — or so they say. If any one race had stepped up to claim the throne, the others would never have stood for it.”

“Right. And that was a hundred years ago.”

I said it quietly.

“Ancient history for humans — but by elven reckoning, it might as well have been last year. The elf in that annex knows exactly what was discussed back then, and exactly what happened.”

“……”

Garul stared at me, visibly startled.

The look on his face said: The disaster of a Young Master had a thought this deep?!

He had absolutely no control over his expressions.

Not that I minded.

Garul asked, puzzled,

“But Young Master — would the elf actually answer even if you asked? He won’t speak to humans at all — that’s how aloof he is.”

“Relax. Anyone posted all the way out here has to be a bit of a dud.”

“Pardon?”

“You think a proper elf would end up at some human noble’s estate in the middle of nowhere? He’s almost certainly someone the other elves don’t think much of.”

“That……does make a certain kind of sense.”

Garul was nodding along when the annex door swung open.

A young man with golden hair stepped out.

Tall, with pointed ears. Slender limbs, unhurried grace in every movement — even from this distance, unmistakably an elf.

“Good. He’s come out.”

Of course, every word of our exchange had been spoken loud enough to carry.

Elves had sharp hearing — sharp enough to pick up a conversation from inside a building if they focused. This one would have caught every syllable.

The elf at the doorway fixed his gaze on the bushes where Garul and I were hiding.

Garul tensed and hunched down until his chin nearly touched the ground.

“What are you doing? We’ve been spotted.”

I stood up.

Garul lurched forward and tried to grab my leg, but I shook him off.

I addressed the elf directly, without missing a beat.

“I know it bruises your pride to introduce yourself to a human first — so I’ll go first. I’m Rigen Librata, the youngest son of the family whose house you’ve been living in.”

“And?”

The voice carried cold fury underneath.

Elves were acutely sensitive to insult.

Garul must have felt the hostility too — he quickly stepped in front of me, planting himself as a shield.

I shrugged.

“I’ve come with something worth hearing. I couldn’t very well walk into your space uninvited, so I got you to come out instead.”

“You what?”

“Elves take the customs of invitation and visitation very seriously, don’t they?”

Elves were meticulous about propriety.

Unannounced visits in particular were something they despised with genuine intensity.

An uninvited guest knocking on the door was enough to earn their irritation — or their wrath.

That was precisely why the servants lurking nearby had set him off.

“Ideally I should have sent a letter, chosen an appropriate time, and formally requested a meeting — but I’m not working with that kind of time. Still, you came outside on your own, so there’s no breach of protocol here, is there?”

“……”

As I walked through the specifics of elven etiquette, a flicker of surprise crossed the elf’s face.

It was rare for a human to speak of elven customs and ways of life so fluently.

“So?”

Not that surprise translated to goodwill — not yet.

I kept my voice even.

“I know how to get you back to the spirit tree. Back home.”

“……What did you say?”

“Ten years isn’t long for an elf — but living here with none of your own kind has to grate on you. No music, no spirit rings to enjoy. Just one dreary day after another, feeling like you’ve been sent into exile.”

“……”

He said nothing, but his face said it all.

I smiled.

“So I’ve brought you a way to go home. Want to hear it?”

“This had better not be nonsense.”

“I swear it on the spirit tree.”

The moment I invoked their form of oath, the elf went quiet for a long stretch.

Garul glanced back at me.

With a gaze that seemed to ask if something was wrong, I explained.

“He’s thinking it over. Elves can deliberate for a long time before making a decision. Just wait.”

“……I am Melius, of the line of Condar. Rigen — and your companion. Come inside.”

The elf’s introduction. An invitation into his home.

It meant he was willing to hear me out.

He was still guarded — far from fully trusting — but that was fine.

I had governed an empire that included his entire race.

I knew their customs and their ways of thinking down to the bone.

Their weaknesses, too.