Elos carried Ella back to the room and changed her clothes herself. She was a proper duke's daughter, so naturally she had never dressed anyone before, and what Ella ended up in was rumpled and rather askew.
While she was doing it Elos naturally saw everything there was to see, and her fingertips kept unavoidably brushing certain places.
Her face went a little red. She had been given the basics early, and because of House Beaumont's particular circumstances she had also been taught how, between two women...
"Ahem..."
She was still very embarrassed about it. With nobody watching, she looked something like the young girl she was.
Ella's long hair was still soaked. Elos dried it with magic, thinking that dull, useless magic was only good for this sort of thing.
Holding the jade pendant that hung on the clothes she had taken off, Elos turned the small green-and-white object over in her fingers.
"Cheap-looking thing. Feels all right in the hand, though. Decent workmanship."
The pattern meant nothing to her and she didn't care for the material, but Elos could tell the craftsman who made it had known his trade.
"I wonder who gave it to her, that she keeps it on at all times and treasures it like this."
Mildly curious about where the thing had come from, Elos's mouth twisted. She hesitated, wondering whether to hang the little trinket on Ella's new clothes.
She didn't hesitate long. She was not so far gone as to steal an ornament she considered cheap.
She hung it back where it belonged, then propped her chin on her hand and looked quietly at the sleeping girl.
Clothes and hair were dry now, the cold gone out of her, and Ella's skin was less pale, carrying a thin flush instead. That wasn't recovery. That was pure fever.
"Nn... mm..."
Her eyes stayed shut, long lashes throwing a shadow in the sunlight, and the girl's bloodless lips parted slightly around one or two small sounds.
Elos rather liked her like this. The usual Ella was always bickering with her, not remotely afraid of her, and in fact rather inclined to look down on her.
Of course, most of that was Elos's own doing.
"Hoo..."
She let out a breath and got up, and only then noticed that she had carried Ella into her own room without thinking about it.
"When she wakes up, do I hold her responsible or not?"
Turning it over, Elos decided that yes, she did.
"Katherine."
She called through the door.
"Milady."
"Bring me two of the healing potions I brought back from the royal capital."
"Yes, milady."
Katherine left, and returned before long. She set the potions on the bedside table, and her gaze rested a moment on Ella's face.
"You may go."
Elos noticed it, and felt an unaccountable displeasure.
"Yes, milady."
Katherine left, and there were only the two of them in the room again.
Elos fed Ella the medicine. She was not especially gentle about it; she was the young mistress, after all.
Looking after someone herself was only because the person in question belonged to her.
Once the medicine was down, waiting for the girl's condition to turn, Elos thought back to the expression on her face when she realized she had been tricked.
"Magic, honestly... no idea why she wants to learn that awful stuff so badly. I suppose I'll teach her a bit later... ahem. She is a Beaumont wife, after all. She can't be too much of an embarrassment."
Elos got up and walked to the castle library.
Unconscious, Ella was very well behaved, but with her unconscious, Elos was back in the boredom of having nobody to talk to.
She used to invent excuses to punish the servants for entertainment. Today she had something else to spend the time on.
"That green stone. What is it called again?"
Elos searched the library's section on minerals, and found an old book quickly enough.
"Jade... a jade pendant?"
From a country on the far side of the sea, brought over by merchants a thousand years ago. It had never been popular here, and not much of it had come in.
"Tch. And here I thought it was something."
Elos sat down on a sofa.
There were a great many nations on this continent, but the world held more than one continent. In distant places there were other civilizations, though since demonkind descended eight hundred years ago there had been no more contact between the peoples of different continents.
The world's main theme became the struggle against demonkind and the magic beasts, and war between one nation and another almost never broke out.
Elos's Empire lay on the Sisso Continent, and was the strongest nation on it. The castle they were in now sat in the Empire's east, charged with watching for magic beast surges and demon incursions.
"Damned magic. Damned magic beasts."
Elos had no interest in world history and no wish to take part in any war. She was still young and had never thought about shouldering the family's responsibilities. All she knew was that the family curse meant she would not live past thirty, and that it had left her isolated from everyone.
Compared with those vague, far-off words, she cared a great deal more about whether her own days were enjoyable.
Elos didn't stay long in the library. She took a few books off the shelves more or less at random, all of them about magic and the elements.
She had no patience for explaining anything so basic. These were for Ella to read.
***
When Elos got back to the room, Ella had already opened her eyes. The healing potions from the royal capital really did work very well.
"..."
Ella said nothing, only staring blankly at the foot of the bed.
Elos wasn't used to a quiet Ella. She had several books in her hand, and she made her footsteps heavier, sat down in the chair by the bed, and tossed the books aside.
"What do you want now?"
Ella's mouth opened. Her voice was hoarse.
Elos rubbed her nose. Good. Ella's tone was still the same as ever. Elos felt oddly awkward, and thought she was probably just relieved Ella hadn't died. That would have been no fun at all.
"You broke my staff. How do you propose to make it up to me?"
Difficulty in the very first sentence out of her mouth. Elos ran a hand over the cover of one of the books.
Ella closed her eyes. As she had been saying: this person was awful.
"You're the one who caused that."
Ella really wanted to put a fist through this person's face.
"Tsk."
Elos's mouth twisted. She hadn't decided on a punishment yet either; it felt as though going on tormenting Ella would kill her.
"Magic. I'll teach you tomorrow."
Elos was silent a while before she said it.
"Once wasn't enough for you?"
Ella was genuinely exhausted, in mind and in body. Anyone, however lively, would tire after that much torment. A protagonist was no exception.
She needed a few days' rest, she thought, before she could get back to the way a protagonist ought to be.
"I'm not so short of ideas that I'd use the same lie on you twice."
Elos threw the books onto the bed.
"A noble who can't use magic, and a Beaumont wife at that. If it got out, people would laugh themselves sick. It would be an utter disgrace for me."
She swung both legs up onto the bed, small feet in clean white ankle socks.
"If you want to learn, how about rubbing my feet?"
"You..."
Ella forced her eyes wide, and lifted a hand. Even moving her fingers felt like work.
"Asking a sick person to rub your feet. You really can say it out loud."
"Oh, and that cheap ornament of yours. What do you keep wearing it for? It's hideous. One of these days I'll have a proper set of jewelry made for you."
Elos ignored the complaint entirely and went on talking to herself.
She didn't actually want her feet rubbed. She only wanted to humiliate her.