Ella hurried out of the keep. Crossing the courtyard, the evening sun was less harsh, though it was still hot.
Anxious, worried the visitor might already have left, Ella was almost jogging by the time she reached the outer bailey.
At the outer gate she saw the girl the guards had stopped.
A linen top, a plain skirt.
Long brown hair worked into a single plait, square-framed glasses, and behind them a pair of pale green eyes with not much liveliness in them. A country look about her.
Ella knew her at a glance.
"Sephone!"
Seeing her from a distance, Ella waved.
That was the girl she had once saved, the one a crowd of them had been beating.
"...Mm?"
Hearing her name, Sephone tilted her head.
Only when Ella reached her and saw the blankness in her eyes did she remember she was nothing like she used to be.
Not just her face. Even her sex had changed.
"Ah... Right."
Ella glanced down at the encumbrance on her chest and smiled bitterly.
"Do we... know each other?"
"It's me. Ella."
"Big Brother Ella?!"
Sephone's eyes went wide. She didn't believe it at first, but then she saw the jade pendant hanging at Ella's waist, and she did.
Nobody but Ella would treat a stone like that as though it mattered.
"How did you end up like this?"
"No idea. The young Duke's version is that a girl's body suits magic better? Something like that. I look awful now, don't I."
In fact Ella knew perfectly well that she was beautiful now, but she didn't feel this was really her body, and so she set about running it down.
"Anyway, Sephone. Why are you here?"
"I heard you'd sent Uncle a letter. I was so worried about you that I came."
Looking at the pale girl in front of her, Sephone's gaze dimmed.
She had always liked Ella, and every friend in the village knew it. When she learned Ella was to marry someone else she had been miserable, and had cried more than once.
But there had been nothing to be done. Sephone had no power to stop it.
"I see. Ahem. Don't worry, I'm fine. Mm. Perfectly fine."
God knew what she was thinking. Perhaps only that she didn't want the girl in front of her to worry. Ella tried to cover over what she had been put through.
Well, Sephone was only a little girl. She couldn't help. Pouring out her misery would achieve nothing except making Sephone wretched.
"Big Brother Ella..."
Sephone's head was down. Ella was nowhere near recovered and her voice was thin, and listening to her cough, Sephone felt worse and worse.
She noticed the gauze wound around Ella's arms.
"Your arms."
She caught Ella's forearm.
"Ngh!"
Before Sephone could get a proper look, Ella cried out and tried to pull the arm back.
Sephone froze for a moment, then rolled the sleeve up. Underneath were the same rounds of off-white gauze.
"You're hurt? And... you're so thin now."
Ella took another step forward, wanting to hold her, but a guard blocked the way and would not let her come any closer.
"...I'm all right."
Her voice weakened a little, and her eyes slid away.
"I'm fine. Mm... there's no telling how long it'll be before I can come back. Sephone, when you get home, study properly. And look in on my mother for me, would you?"
Ella did not let herself hope that Sephone could stay.
"Big Brother Ella, this must be so hard... But weren't you supposed to be marrying the ducal heir? How did it come to this? Is she bullying you? That bastard!"
"Shh. Don't."
Ella clapped a hand over Sephone's mouth.
This was Elos's ground. It didn't matter for herself, but Sephone would be made to suffer horribly for it.
"Go on, it's getting late. If you leave now you should reach the town before dark. Remember what I said. Go home and study. From now on I probably can't protect you anymore."
Ella smiled bitterly. What right did a body this frail have to stand in front of anyone? All right, she hadn't been up to much before either.
"Big Brother Ella..."
"Go. Be good, all right?"
Ella reached out and touched Sephone's head.
She realized she seemed to have gotten shorter. Under a meter sixty, probably?
"...All right, Big Brother Ella. I'm going. Don't worry, when I get back I'll tell Uncle what state you're in. He'll definitely get you out."
Sephone had already concluded that Ella was being abused here.
"Ha. Let's hope so."
Ella smiled bitterly and shrugged.
Sephone probably didn't know what her father's reply had said.
Ella stood at the gate a long while, watching Sephone go, step by reluctant step. The girl kept turning back, and even across all that distance Ella could see the ache and the clinging in her eyes.
"Goodbye!"
Ella waved hard.
"Achoo!"
The word had barely left her when she sneezed.
"Finished talking?"
Behind her, Elos spoke out of nowhere.
"?! When— when did you get here?"
"I was here the whole time."
Elos turned.
"If you're finished, go back."
***
All the way back to the room Elos was ice-cold and said nothing, which was not like her at all.
If you had to describe the usual Elos, she was the chattering sort of venom-tongued brat-girl who never stopped picking holes and going for the soft spots.
Instinct told Ella that Elos was angry.
Unable to make sense of it, and with no intention whatsoever of coaxing anyone this insane, Ella went back to her room.
She had only been out a short while and the cold, which had been improving, had flared up again. She meant to wrap herself in the blanket and sleep in with a vengeance.
Elos followed her into the room, and as Ella was about to get into bed there was a click behind her.
Elos had locked the door.
"What are you doing?"
Ella got a bad feeling.
"That one just now. She's the one you protected when you were a child, isn't she?"
Elos came to the bedside and looked at her levelly.
"She is not."
Ella wasn't stupid. Knowing Elos was in a mood, only an idiot would give her a truthful answer.
"I'm going to rest. Elos, if there's nothing else, go back too... hgk! Cough, cough..."
Ella sat down. She had just started to ask her to leave when a pair of slender, strong hands closed around her throat.
"'Big Brother Ella, you're hurt~.' How sickly-sweet she sounds. Whether or not she's that little girl from back then doesn't matter anymore. But from now on, you are not to go near her."
The slender throat under her palms had a fine texture to it, oddly pleasant. Turning the person you took a liking to into a woman: the original purpose had been to make the life force easier to draw off, but it really was an excellent idea.
"Hff... There really is something wrong with your head, isn't there?! I only said a few words to someone."
Elos's mind had wandered and her grip had slackened, and Ella got a breath in.
She shoved at her, trying to make her let go.
"Ergh—?!"
The result was that Elos snapped back to herself and squeezed harder.
Her vision doubled. She couldn't get air, and Ella could feel her strength draining fast.
"Whatever else, you belong to me now! I will not allow you to speak to a commoner like that. Do you hear me? You are mine."
Elos was frowning.
She had clearly seen that damned commoner trying to embrace Ella, and Ella hadn't even moved away!
Ella's eyes went wide. Elos was beyond all reason.
"Ergh... nghh..."
No full words would come out of her mouth anymore, only a rasping from her throat, and involuntary tears welled at the corners of Ella's eyes again.
Her body went limp and tipped backward, and Elos came down on top of her with it.
At last the pressure of her hands stopped.