"So what’s the answer?” he asked, whereupon Holo regarded him with an angrier face than her positive answer had led him to expect.
"I must say it seems a bit unfair, given the conditions you proposed."
Lawrence shrugged. It seemed she didn’t really know the answer after all.
"You should have said so in the first place,” he said.
"I suppose so...” Holo gazed vaguely at the floor as though thinking something over.
It had been a simple bet, so even the clever Holo had no room to maneuver with her typical quibbles. The simplest contracts were always the strongest.
"So the answer?” Lawrence asked again. Holo’s face suddenly showed total defeat. Though it was mean-spirited of him to think so, he couldn't help feeling but that he wanted to see this face a bit more often.
But it was only for a moment; just as that thought crossed Lawrence’s mind, Holo’s expression shifted to one of triumph.
"I don't know the name of the creature, but it’s a large rodent tail, is it not?”
Lawrence had no words.
He was stunned.
"I told you it seemed a bit unfair,” said Holo with a malicious giggle as she began to open the package, "Y-you knew?”
"If you'd accused me of opening the package and sneaking a look, I was thinking of ordering so much food for dinner you’d break down in tears, but I suppose I shall show mercy.”
The food within the cloth wrapping had been carefully rolled in strips of bark and tied with fine tendrils; it would be nearly impossible to peek inside without disturbing the contents.
And in any case, looking at the finished meal did not make the original form any easier to guess. Holo must have somehow been familiar with it.
“I’m a wisewolf, don’t you forget it. There’s nothing in this world I don’t know,” she said, flashing her fangs.
It was an obvious exaggeration, but her conviction was so strong that it was hard to dismiss.
As she undid the tendrils and removed the tree bark, steam rose up from the food. Holo narrowed her eyes in pleasure, wagging her tail.
“It’s not quite accurate to say I knew,” said Holo, mimicking Lawrence’s tone. The meat had been cut into small slices, and as they were, there really was no way to discern their origin. Holo picked up one of the pieces, tilted her head back, and slowly lowered the bite into her open mouth. She closed her mouth and her eyes and chewed languorously.
It must have been delicious.
Yet there was something different about her manner.
“Mmph...yes, indeed,” said Holo. Instead of her usual, hurried devouring of her food, which gave one the impression that she was worried it might be taken from her at any moment, Holo ate slowly, savoring the flavor as though it made her remember something. “The master of this inn said something like this, did he not?” she continued, licking the oil from her fingers and looking at Lawrence. “The months and years weather even stone buildings."
“To say nothing of memories,” finished Lawrence
Holo nodded, satisfied. She then gave a small sigh and looked at the window, squinting a bit at the brightness. “Do you know what lingers longest in memory?”
Another strange question.
Was it a person’s name? Numbers, figures? Images of one’s home?
These notions appeared one after another in Lawrence’s mind, but Holo's answer was completely different.
"’Tis scent, you know, that stays longer than all else.”
Lawrence cocked his head in confusion.
"We forget things we’ve seen and heard so easily, but scents alone remain clear and distinct.” Holo looked at the food and smiled.
Her smile was what seemed so upsettingly out of place to Lawrence; it was soft, almost nostalgic.
"I had no memory of this town,” she continued. “To be quite honest, it was a bit worrisome.”
"You weren’t sure whether you really had ever come here?”
Holo nodded, and she seemed entirely truthful.
Now that he thought about it, Lawrence felt like he finally understood why Holo had been so constantly playful.
"But this food—I remember it vividly. It’s such a strange creature all, so even in the past, it was considered special. They’d put each one caught on a spit and roast them magnificently.”
Holding the food in her hands like it was a favorite kitten sleeping on her lap, she looked up.
"I wondered if that’s what you brought back, but when I smelled it I nearly cried from the memories—and that was the turning point."
"So you did this on purpose?”
Now that he thought about it, the idea of Holo actually doing something so shallow as to sneak a look inside the package while his back was turned seemed a bit strange.
And when he looked away again, perhaps she had been crying “Are you saying I’m the sort who would take advantage of anothers goodwill?”
“You take advantage of me all the time,” shot back Lawrence, and he saw Holo flashing her usual fanged grin.
“So then,” said Holo, beckoning to Lawrence.
Harboring a bit of suspicion, he approached her guardedly until she grabbed his sleeve and pulled him in close.
“I shan’t forget this scent, either.”
He’d expected words along those lines.
But Lawrence found he could not manage his usual comeback as Holo had buried her face in his chest, unmoving.
She was no mere traveling companion.
He could look at her ears and tail and work his own form of mind reading on her.
“Nor will I,” he replied, and with a soft sigh, he stroked her head with his hand.
Holo rubbed the corners of her eyes on his clothing and smiled awkwardly. “You sound a dunce when you say it so. I’ll not forget that, either.”
Lawrence gave a forced smile. “Sorry.”
Holo smiled, rubbed her nose, then smiled again—and was back to her old self. “So it seems I have indeed visited this town.”
“Then there must be legends of you left here.”
He didn’t add “in books somewhere,” but Holo would certainly notice and appreciate his consideration.
On the other hand, if he didn’t take such care, it would be impossible to avoid accidentally stepping on her tail.
“So then, what news did you manage to hear tell of?" asked Holo, like a mother asking her child to boast about some new knowledge he had acquired.
She never stayed frail for long.
"This time around is going to be a lot of fun,” began Lawrence. Holo listened closely as she ate the tail meat.
In the end, they had two reasons to meet Rigolo, the town chronicler and secretary for the Council of Fifty.
The first was to ask if any legends of Holo remained and to have him show them the records where such legends might be found. The secondwas to discover the particulars of how the town came to be in the situation it presently faced.
The latter reason was purely a result of Lawrence’s occupational sickness, and given the precedent set on their travels thus far, Holo listened to his explanation but was none too pleased.
In point of fact, if Lawrence had been asked whether it was really necessary to risk the danger involved in performing the financial alchemy it would take to suck money through the cracks in the current conflict, the answer was no—it was not. Given the profit he had managed to make in the pagan town of Kumersun, so long, as he continued to quietly ply his trade for a while longer, the day when he would be able to open his own shop was not so very far off. In which case, he would do better to use his time frugally, carrying his goods and turning his profits, rather than to risk sticking his neck out in dangerous speculation. In the long term, spending his time in town quietly and carefully making business connections would be much better for Lawrence’s future profits.
Not being a merchant, Holo didn’t use terms like future profits, but her gist was the same: You’re not short on money, so relax
.
Simply standing there in the room was cold, so as they talked, Holo crawled into her bed and eventually started dozing off.
Lawrence sat down on her bed as they spoke, and Holo had—with as particular intent—slowly grasped his hand in hers.
Having sat there on the bed and passed the time quietly talking, Lawrence had to admit that Holo was absolutely right. The fact was, though, that no traveling merchant was so easygoing as to idle away his time in a town, particularly not while they were mid-journey.
He wanted her to understand that, but it was probably impossible.
It was perhaps fortunate, however, that Lawrence couldn't do anything immediately.
Given the situation in Lenos, none of the members of the Council of Fifty, including Rigolo, would casually meet with a foreign merchant.
Since the affair centered around the fur trade that was the town’s lifeblood, meeting with a merchant of unknown background would be deeply suspicious and tantamount to societal suicide. No, Lawrence would not be able to see a council member.
Which meant that if he wanted to engage one, he would need a mediator.
Yet when Lawrence rethought the question of whether that would really be necessary, it was hard to convince himself of it. And if he were to force the issue and make a bad impression, they would never see the records of Holo.
Though outwardly Holo pressed Lawrence to hold back and not get involved, deep in her heart there was no question that given an opportunity to see those records, she would want to. He couldn't risk anything that would endanger their ability to do that. As he thought it through again and again, he eventually became aware of the sound of Holo’s breathing as she slept.
When she was hungry, she ate, and when she was tired, slept.
Indeed, she was as free as any beast, and those who spent their days constantly toiling to keep their bellies full had dreamed of such a life at least once.
Lawrence couldn’t help but feel a bit jealous of the life Holo took for granted. He extracted his hand from hers and lightly brushed her polished porcelain cheek with the back of his index finger. Once she had fallen asleep, even a tap wouldn’t wake her. At Lawrence's touch, her expression clenched in irritation, but her eyes stayed closed as she buried her face in the blanket.
It was a quiet, happy moment. Nothing happened save for the passage of time itself, but this was one of the things Lawrence wished for when he drove his cart alone. The merchant knew this for a near certainty, and yet in the bottom of his heart, he felt a distinct impatience, a feeling that he was wasting this time.
He couldn’t help feeling that if he wasn’t making money or collecting information for his business, he was sustaining a loss he would never be able to recover.
The merchant’s spirit is a flame that never goes out, his master had said, but that flame might very well have been hellfire, charring his flesh.
When one was alone, the flame provided warmth, but with two...with two, he felt it was too hot.
Holo’s smile especially was very warm.
The world did not go as one wanted it to.
Lawrence stood up from the bed and paced around the room.
If he wasn’t going to get involved in the happenings of Lenos, then he at least wanted to understand the details for his own enlightenment.
The best way to do that would be to meet directly with a member of the Council of Fifty, and in order to get unbiased information, a. witness who didn’t represent any particular interested party would be still more desirable.
It was the chronicler and secretary Rigolo who best fit that description.
But no council member would have any interest in meeting with an outsider.
The problem began to seem intractable.
Lawrence would have to take a different approach, but at the moment his sole source of information was the barmaid. Widening this to include more information from the town merchants would involve significant effort.
There was certainly any number of people using this machination or that to collect information, and Lawrence sincerely doubted that his own intellect and tactics would be enough to give him any advantage over the rest. Who knew how high the price for that information might rise given the scope of the demand?
Had it been a town where Lawrence had some old acquaintance, he might have been able to get nearer the essence of things and to make something happen. If it was goods you wanted, money could buy anything, but for information, you had to have trust.
In the face of this fascinating situation, Lawrence would just have to watch and wait.
Feeling like a frustrated dog pacing back and forth in a room while eyeing a piece of meat he could see through a tiny crack in the wall, Lawrence finally heaved a sigh.
He felt as if he was moving further and further away from the merchant he wished to be.
Even worse, the logic and prudence he should have long ago developed seemed to be gone. It was as though he had regressed to that period when he had just come of age; his head full of ridiculous get-rich-quick schemes.
His feet were restless.
He repeated the problem to himself, glancing at Holo.
Was it because this cheeky wolf girl was constantly pulling the rug out from under him?
It seemed possible.
He enjoyed talking with Holo too much.
That’s why he had begun neglecting other things.
Lawrence stroked his beard, murmuring to himself that shifting the blame might not be a bad idea.
It was a wasted opportunity, but the fur problem would have to wait.
Which meant that the next action would be to seek out information that would set them on the road to Nyohhira, still farther north from Lenos.
If they were fortunate, the road would not yet have been rendered impassable with snow, and they would move forward.
Information on furs...can be collected after that, Lawrence told himself as he left the room.
Lawrence came down to the first floor where there was a rustling sound coming from the corner of the clutter-filled room.
There was neither lock nor lookout, but a good number of merchants still used this storehouse, it seemed.
The rate was not too high, and some used it as a relay for their peddling while others stored goods when their price fluctuated with the season. Lawrence would not have been surprised to learn that the odd smuggler or thief kept items there, too.
Though he heard the sound of someone tampering with goods in the storehouse, the person was in shadow, and Lawrence could not tell who it was. But Arold the innkeeper did not appear to think for one moment that one of his guests was opening someone else's luggage. He only poured a bit of water on the fire, which had grown slightly too strong.
"A road to the north?”
While Arold had reacted to Lawrence’s question about chroniclers this morning as though a child had asked him a difficult theological question, he seemed to be much more used to this sort of inquiry.
He nodded slightly, as if to say, “Well, in that case,” then paying the flame no heed, he cleared his throat and spoke.
“Not much snow this year. I don’t know where you’re headed, but I don’t reckon it’ll be too hard.”
“I’m making for Nyohhira, as it happens.”
Arold’s left eyebrow went up, and the sharp blue eyes buried in the deep folds of his eyelids glittered.
Behind his merchant’s smile, Lawrence flinched a bit, and Arold continued, brushing a bit of ash that had flown up when he poured water on the coals a moment earlier.
“Heading all the way into pagan country, eh?...Well, I suppose that’s merchants for you, carrying money bags over their shoulder and heading off anywhere.”
“Aye, and we throw them away on our deathbeds,” Lawrence said, trying to lighten things up with the devout Arold, but the innkeeper only gave a derisive snort.
“So why bother earning it in the first place? Gaining it only to throw it away...”
It
was something that many merchants pondered themselves, But Lawrence had heard an interesting answer to this question. “You don’t ask the same question when you clean a room, do you?”
If money was trash, then profit was the collection of trash.
A famous merchant in a southern country had repented on his deathbed, saying that collecting and throwing away the money that polluted the world God had given man was the ultimate virtue.
The clergy heard these words and were moved, but the merchants hid their uncertain smiles behind their wine cups-because the more successful one became, the less one’s assets were concrete things, and the more they were numbers on certificates and entries in ledgers.
Thus if these written ledger entries and figures polluted the world, then the written teachings of God were no better, and so the irony was that those scriptures, too, should be thrown away for the betterment of the world—such was the view of most merchants.
Lawrence felt much the same way. He felt bad for Holo, but he would take the business of a successful merchant over prayers to gods that never answered any day
"Heh,” Arold chuckled. “Fair enough,” he said in an uncommonly amused tone. His mood had improved.
He seemed more cheered by the irony behind Lawrence’s words than by the words themselves.
"Are you leaving soon? I seem to recall you giving me a good amount of coin for your stay...”
"No, I expect to wait until the Council of Fifty has finished their meeting.”
"...I see. You wanted to see Rigolo. You asked about a chronicler this morning, as I recall. That’s a word I’ve not heard in some time. Hardly anyone looks to the past these days...” said Arold, narrowing his eyes as he stared off into space.
Perhaps the old man was looking back on his life thus far.
But his gaze soon snapped back to Lawrence. “Well, if you’re heading north, ’twould be better to leave sooner. Your horse should be able to get you part of the way, but beyond that...you’d want a longhair and a sleigh. If you’re in a hurry, that is.”
"There was a longhair in the stable, wasn’t there?”
"Aye, its master is a man from the north. I reckon he knows the route quite well.”