Chapter 77
“Why?”
“……”
“Does he really have three of those things or something?”
Exion bared his teeth as he spoke savagely. But Arzeletta simply blinked those pretty eyes of hers and looked up at him blankly.
“……”
Even as he reached out an arm beside her, the woman didn’t say a word, lips tightly sealed. Arzeletta, half-cornered, flinched her shoulders. She could run away anytime if she wanted, but she showed no sign of doing so.
Merely holding her breath and waiting for the moment to pass—this was the exact way Arzeletta had survived among the villagers who looked down on her.
And that made his head feel like it was about to explode even more. Exion stared at Arzeletta’s black tunic with eyes that looked as if fire might fall from them.
Ironically, it was a garment that only those of the highest or the very lowest standing in the territory could wear. A robe symbolizing death on the side of God and the most wretched of deaths—it grated on Exion’s nerves.
The clothing he had prepared for Arzeletta had never even had its wrappings undone and was thrown away in the corner of her room.
The death robes she now wore symbolized the direction she had chosen for her life. Not the clothes he had given her, not those with lace from someone like Madame Florentain Florin or whatever her name was, but the black robes sewn by hunchback Yoseph, waiting for a woman amid all that mockery.
A hunchback’s marriage sacrament could be carried out even as a joke. Whether it had formalities or not didn’t matter. The villagers wanted to make Arzeletta the butcher’s bride as soon as possible. That way, they would have a publicly accepted justification to wield her as they pleased.
No one found it strange if the butcher’s bride bore a child with no known father. She was treated like livestock. Because that child would then inherit the slaughterhouse and continue to be despised for generations.
She couldn’t possibly not know all that. And yet, Arzeletta looked up at him with eyes that seemed to question what there even was to explain.
Even in a moment like this, the woman’s eyes were clean and transparent like jewels. A face that felt even wiser for seeming overly ignorant. Or maybe it was the opposite. There was no way to know the truth.
“…Stop this right now. There’s no guarantee something like last night won’t happen again today.”
Even if she stopped now, there was no recovering the status she’d thrown away. Just like how a woman who sold her body once would carry that label for the rest of her life.
Still, this was the only way Exion could speak.
Any moment now, Arzeletta might be pushed toward Yoseph. Everyone in the territory hoped for it with one mind. Whether man or woman, elder or a three-year-old child—it didn’t matter.
At that moment, Arzeletta’s lips parted. The black hair that flowed down her white neck was startlingly vivid. Exion unconsciously clenched the hand that had begun to reach for that soft hair.
“Then how am I supposed to live?”
At the sudden question, Exion faltered. It was true—he was a little surprised by the way the sentence ended so clearly, without hesitation or uncertainty.
“…What?”
“Other than living like this, what choice do I have?”
“Hey, Arzeletta. Are you seriously thinking of actually marrying Yoseph—”
“I can’t marry anyone anyway.”
Arzeletta spoke quietly. There was no sadness or resentment in her voice, which made it even harder to grasp the meaning behind her words.
“No man would ever want to marry a monster.”
Exion lost his words as if something had clogged his throat.
But only for a moment. The irritation that rose again soon slipped out without restraint in his voice, laced with sarcasm.
“Ah, so now you’re thinking you might as well marry the hunchback? Is there really some reason you have to cling to this goddamned territory and keep living here?”
“……”
“Damn it, just leave. Go somewhere—anywhere—and start over. Without even trying, without courage, without even making an attempt…!”
Exion stopped mid-sentence.
Arzeletta didn’t explain anything, but in her silent eyes, Exion read the answer.
In that brief silence between them, someone’s laughter-filled singing floated through.
Arzeletta’s becoming the hunchback’s bride, cooking maggot soup every morning…
“……”
Exion looked down at the insignia gleaming on his uniform. He pressed his lips tightly together.
Discussion
1 CommentHilale