“Mm… her body should be fine now. The trouble’s in the mind… and that’s beyond me. She may need a period of convalescence.”
When Berli came for a follow-up, he brought his medicine chest, yet in the end prescribed nothing. He only said to Nolan:
“By the way… have you figured out where she came from?”
“Not yet…” Nolan hesitated. “I was thinking—maybe she’s from a nearby village.”
“Well… I can ask around, see if anyone’s lost a daughter.” Berli scratched the back of his head.
“Then I’ll trouble you for that.”
“Oh, it’s nothing, nothing—hardly an effort. I should be thanking you for mending my fence.” Berli packed up the chest, exchanged a few pleasantries with Nolan, and hurried off.
“Brother—so what do we do? It’s already been three days. That girl doesn’t talk all day, doesn’t eat either; she just sits there blankly, then sleeps when she’s tired—did she hurt her head?”
Watching Berli go, Diya spoke in worry.
“Uh, Clytia—she should be fine. Probably.” Nolan scratched his head with a wry smile.
“Clytia? How do you know her name is Clytia?” Diya muttered.
“She said it herself…”
“Nonsense. I’ve been with her day and night these past few days. How come I never heard her speak?” Diya shot back. “Brother, you must’ve dreamed it.”
Dreamed it? Was that it? Nolan thought. What happened that night really did feel like a dream—he’d believed she’d recovered enough for normal conversation, yet at first light the next day, Clytia had returned to that muddled, shut-in state.
“Maybe it really was just a dream…” He lifted his eyes to the gray-haired girl half-covered by a quilt, sitting at the bed’s edge and staring out the window.
Diya neatly prepared lunch—a mixed stew of peas and sweet potatoes. She carried a bowl to the bedside, lifted a spoon, and held it to Clytia’s lips.
“Ah—”
Like feeding a small child, Diya made coaxing sounds and managed to get a few spoonfuls into Clytia. Then she went back to the table and ate with Nolan.
After the two finished, Diya took up a basket to go out.
“Brother, I’m going to Berli’s to study letters.”
She put on her shoes, threw a windproof felt over her apron, and stood at the door.
“Alright, I’ll handle dinner,” Nolan said—then noticed his sister’s hesitant look.
“Brother… Berli said, if you’re willing, you can come too…”
“I already know plenty of letters—enough for me. Berli’s is advanced coursework; I don’t really need it. You’re different. The Preparatory Knights Academy’s written exam is soon. Listen carefully,” Nolan replied with a smile.
“But… Brother, I just think even if you can’t go to the Preparatory Academy, learning a bit more wouldn’t hurt.” Diya faltered.
“Mm… another time. I still have work today. I set snares in the woods—I need to check them,” Nolan said without changing his expression.
“Alright… I’m off then.” Seeing she couldn’t sway him, Diya turned and left the cabin.
Nolan cleared the dishes, then put on his coat and left as well. He wandered the nearby pine grove, checking his snares. Not a rabbit or pheasant—there wasn’t even a mouse. Disappointed, he headed home.
At the door he suddenly remembered—he’d left Clytia, that young lady whose wits weren’t quite clear, alone in the house.
He flung the door open—only to find his worry unfounded. Clytia sat exactly as when they’d left, at the bed, gazing out the window as if in a daze, who knew what she was thinking.
Realizing he was being jumpy, Nolan coughed twice. Then he went to his bedroom and quietly drew a small book with a parchment cover from beneath the bedboards.
He looked at the booklet, hesitated a moment, then went to Clytia’s bedside.
“Um, Berli said hearing people talk more might help your mind recover. And you look bored. I’ve got a book here—do you want me to read to you?”
Clytia blinked blankly. Nolan took that as assent, sat at the foot of the bed, opened the book, and began:
“Ahem… alright. This is an epic about a hero slaying a dragon—I’ll start.”
“…In that hour, hero—thou shouldst know,
with the hilt of the god-forged blade, thou treadest the hill of… jagged… dragon-bones; its edge mirrors the torn light of stars and moon.
That fell dragon… crouches in the abyss where brimstone… boils.
It usurps the realm of the ancient kings, uh… and breathes… the breath of calamity…”
After only two lines, Nolan started stumbling. His grandsire, once a feoffed knight, had owned many books, and Epic of the Ancient Dragon was the one his grandsire had read to him as a child. It was the only one he’d secretly kept, up to this very day.
But after so many years, he could no longer recognize half the characters. His grandfather’s pronunciations, too, had faded in his mind…
He could only grit his teeth and push on:
“Uh… the hero thundered like the storm, swore an oath by his bloodline, to sunder thy thousand-year… e-evil deeds.”
“Yet none may know, the dragonslayer shall… the dragonslayer…”
Sweat beaded. Faced with swathes of characters he couldn’t read, Nolan broke into a cold sweat. He’d thought he could rely on memory and the few basic letters he knew—only to make an utter mess of it.
“The dragonslayer, seeing the scythe descend, must recall the ancient prophecy—whosoever makes the dragon bleed shall at last inherit its curse, and with iron and fire… self-slay…”
Nolan jerked his head up. The girl’s lips were moving, picking up the verse where he’d stuck.
“Ah! You spoke—you, you’ve read this poem… Sorry for making a fool of myself.” Heat rose to Nolan’s cheeks—the feeling of an affected show being laid bare.
At last he drooped and muttered:
“Sorry. I just really liked this poem, and then I forgot it.”
“Keep reading…”
What? Nolan snapped his head up. The gray-haired girl was watching him in silence. He wondered if he’d misheard, but in Clytia’s green eyes there was a firm intent, urging him on.
…
Clytia did truly love the Epic of the Ancient Dragon—or rather, any poem with strong narrative.
I know it clearly: whenever that pedantic Literature Teacher lectured on heroic or love epics, her mood brightened like a shaft of sunlight piercing the chapel’s dome; by sharp contrast, when the lesson turned to the Church’s commissioned verse, her mind would seize up as if her very soul were sinking into a dead, airless tomb.
And the boy before us—this flax-haired village lad, around ten—barely literate, yet bold enough to read the tongue-twisting Epic of the Ancient Dragon aloud.
Still, it seemed Clytia’s spirit had been roused a little. Whenever the boy erred or stalled, she quietly corrected his pronunciation, or told him directly how to read a line, even what the passage meant.
At first he blushed, but soon he settled into focus and stammered onward. In truth, it was less him reading to Clytia than Clytia teaching him his letters.
Time flowed in the cadence of verse. Unnoticed, evening came. The boy looked up by chance, saw the slanting light spilling through door and window, and suddenly remembered his other chores.
“Ah… sorry, I have to make dinner.” He snapped the book shut, stood, then looked to Clytia.
“Right… don’t tell my sister, alright?”
Seeing Clytia’s faint puzzlement, he explained:
“I don’t want her to worry…”
Worry? Why would reciting a poem make his sister worry? The question rose in me, but Clytia neither nodded nor shook her head—she only said softly:
“It isn’t finished yet.”
“Then… next time.”
Nolan smiled, then turned toward the kitchen.