“I’m kidding. Come on, let’s eat. It’s a hot day, so we need to hurry before the food spoils.”
She set down the basket and pulled out a large white cloth, which she proceeded to whip open and place on the flattest available bit of ground. Kirito immediately leaped onto the blanket, his shoes already off, followed by Eugeo. The starving laborers watched as more and more food appeared before them.
Today’s menu was a shepherd’s pie of salted meat and stewed beans; thin sandwiches of black bread, smoked meat, and cheese; several types of dried fruit; and fresh milk that morning. Aside from the milk, they were all long-lasting types of food, but the hot July sun was assuredly doing its best to steal away the meal’s life.
Alice held the ravenous boys at bay as though she were ordering dogs to sit, then drew the appropriate sigil in the air to open a window for each item of food, starting with the milk in its bisqueware pot.
“Yikes, the milk only has ten minutes, and the pie, fifteen. And that was after I ran all the way here…You’d better eat all this quickly—just make sure you chew properly.”
A single bite of bad food whose life had expired could cause stomach pains and other ailments in all but the extremely hardy. Eugeo and Kirito gave a brief thanks for their food before tearing into their pies.
For a while, all three ate in silence. The two hungry boys were one thing, but it was surprising just how much food Alice could pack away in that tiny body of hers. First went the three slices of pie, then the nine black-bread sandwiches, washed down with the pot of milk. Finally satisfied, the trio sat back for a breather.
“And how was the flavor?” Alice asked with a sidelong glance.
Eugeo answered in as serious a tone as he could manage. “Today’s pie was good. I think you’ve gotten much better at it, Alice.”
“D-do you think so? I felt like it was still missing a little something,” she said, turning away to hide her embarrassment. Eugeo shot Kirito a glance and they shared a secret smile. Alice had supposedly been making their lunches for the last two months, but it was very clear which days she’d secretly received help from her mother, Sadina. No skill was attained without long years of practice—but Eugeo and Kirito were just old enough to recognize when it was best not to bring that up.
“So anyway,” Kirito started, grabbing a yellow marigo from the fruit container, “it’s a shame we can’t take our time eating such a delicious lunch. Why does the heat make the food go bad so quickly…?”
“Why?” Eugeo scoffed, shrugging. “Because all life drops quicker during the summer, of course. Don’t be weird. Meat, fish, vegetables, fruit—it all goes bad if you just leave it around.”
“I know that, but I’m asking why. During the winter you can leave raw meat outside for several days and it’ll still be good as long as it’s salted first.”
“Because…the winter’s cold,” Eugeo answered. Kirito’s mouth twisted into a childish pout. His black eyes, rare among the northern territory, sparkled with defiance.
“That’s right, the food lasts because it’s cold—not because it’s winter. So if we can keep them cold, our lunches should last longer, even in the summer.”
That caused Eugeo to lose his patience for good. He stretched and kicked at Kirito’s shin. “You make it sound so easy. How do you make it cold when it’s the heat that makes it summer? Are you going to use the forbidden weather-altering arts to bring snow? The Integrity Knights will swoop up from Centoria and take you away the very next day.”
“Hmmm…There has to be some way…Something simpler than that,” Kirito muttered, thinking hard.
Alice, who was twirling her long bangs with her fingertip as she listened to their conversation, interjected, “That’s interesting.”
“Wh-what? Not you, too, Alice!”
“I’m not suggesting using the forbidden arts. Why go to the trouble of freezing the entire village if all you need is to make the inside of this picnic basket cold?”
It made a lot more sense when she put it that way. Eugeo and Kirito looked at each other and nodded together. Alice, now smug, continued. “Some things are cold even in the summer. Like deep well water or silve leaves. Maybe putting things like that into the basket will cool it down?”
“Oh…good point,” Eugeo noted. He crossed his arms to deliberate.
Right out front of the church was an incredibly deep well that had been there since Rulid was founded, and its water was cold enough to bite the skin, even in the summer. The leaves of the rare silve tree that grew in the northern forest emitted a piercing scent and a chill on the skin when plucked, and they were treasured as a treatment for bruises. Now that he thought about it, putting well water in a pot and wrapping the pie in silve leaves seemed like it would be enough to keep the food fresh in transit.
But Kirito shook his head slowly. “I don’t think that will be enough. The well water goes tepid just a minute after it’s drawn, and silve leaves don’t give you more than a brief tingle. That won’t be enough to keep the basket cold from Alice’s house all the way to Gigas here.”
“Are you saying there’s a different way?” Alice snapped, unhappy that her idea had been shot down.
Kirito ran his hands back and forth through his raven hair for a while. At last he said, “Ice. If we had a lot of ice, that would keep the lunch cold.”
“Oh, come on…” Alice groaned. “It’s summer. Where are you going to find ice? There isn’t even any in the market at Centoria!” she lectured, like a mother to her stubborn child.
But Eugeo felt foreboding creeping over him, and he watched Kirito in silence. When his best friend had that look in his eyes and spoke in that tone of voice, it always meant he had some dreadful idea in mind. He recalled countless misadventures from the past: the time they went to get emperor-bee honey in the mountains to the east, the time they broke the hundred-years-expired jar of milk they found in the church basement…
“W-well, who cares? All that matters is to eat the food quickly. If we don’t get started on the afternoon work soon, we’ll be late returning home again,” Eugeo urged, trying to divert the topic away as he returned his empty plate to the basket. But the glint in Kirito’s eyes told him that his fears were about to become reality, whether he liked it or not.
“…All right, what is it? What have you thought of this time?” Eugeo asked, resigned.
Kirito grinned and said, “Hey…remember that story your grandpa told us ages ago, Eugeo?”
“Hmm…?”
“What story?” Alice asked. She was curious, too.
Eugeo’s grandfather, who had returned to Stacia’s embrace two years ago, had been an old man with countless old tales stored in his beard that he liked to share with the three children as they gathered around his rocking chair. He had hundreds of stories—mysterious ones, exciting ones, scary ones—so there was no way for Eugeo to guess which one Kirito was thinking about. His friend cleared his throat and held up a finger.
“There’s only one story about ice in the summer. ‘Bercouli and the Northern White—’”
“Oh, please. You’ve gotta be kidding!” Eugeo interjected, shaking his head and hands.
Of all the founders of Rulid, Bercouli was the most skilled with the sword, and he served as the first chief guard of the village. Given that he lived three hundred years ago, a number of stories about his exploits had been passed down and inflated in the telling, and the one Kirito mentioned was easily the most fantastical of them all.
One midsummer day, Bercouli saw a large transparent stone rising and sinking in the Rul River, which ran to the east of the village. He fished out the object and was mystified to learn that it was a hunk of ice. Bercouli followed the river upstream until he reached the End Mountains, the very boundary of the human realm, where the river narrowed down until it met the mouth of a massive cave.
Bercouli made his way inside, pushing against the freezing winds that blew out of the cave, and, after braving many dangers, he arrived at the grea
t chamber in the very deepest part. In it, he found an enormous white dragon, which was said to protect all the borders of the human world. When he saw that the beast was sleeping atop an immeasurable mountain of treasure, Bercouli boldly snuck forward and chose a single beautiful sword from the pile. He carefully picked up the sword so as not to wake the dragon and was about to scamper off for safety when, dun-dun-dun—so the story went. It was called “Bercouli and the Northern White Dragon.”
Even mischievous Kirito couldn’t intend to break the laws of the village and cross the northern pass to search for a real dragon, Eugeo prayed. “So…you’re going to stake out the Rul and wait for ice to flow down it?” he hedged.
Kirito snorted. “The summer will be over by the time I see anything like that. I’m not going to copy Bercouli and try to find a dragon. Remember how in the story, there were huge icicles right inside the entrance of the cave? Two or three of those should be enough to test out my idea.”
“You can’t be serious…” Eugeo groaned, then fell silent. He turned and glanced at Alice, pleading her to scold the ne’er-do-well in his stead. But the look of excitement in her blue eyes turned his consternation into despair.
Much to their outrage, Eugeo and Kirito were considered the two biggest troublemakers by the elderly in town, receiving scoldings on a daily basis. But few people knew that the driving force behind their many bouts of mischief was the encouragement of Alice herself, the village’s perfect little sweetheart.
Alice put a finger to her plump lips and pretended to think it over for a few seconds, then blinked and said, “That’s not a bad idea.”
“Come on, Alice…”
“Yes, children are forbidden from crossing the northern pass on their own. But remember the exact wording of the rule: ‘Children must not cross the northern pass to play on their own without adult supervision.’”
“Uh…is that how it goes?” Eugeo asked, and shared a look with Kirito.
The laws of the village, officially titled The Rulid Village Standards, were recorded on an aging parchment two cen thick that was kept in the village elder’s home. When children started going to school at the church, the first thing they did was learn all the laws. Parents and elders always droned on and on about “the laws say this” and “according to the laws that,” so by the age of eleven, every child had them thoroughly beaten into his or her head—but in Alice’s case, she had memorized the exact wording of each and every law.
She can’t have memorized the Basic Imperial Laws as well; those are twice as thick as the village’s…Much less that other thing, which is twice again as thick as that, Eugeo thought, staring holes into Alice. She cleared her throat and took on a fussy, officious tone.
“Do you see? The law forbids us from going to play. But going in search of ice is not playing. If we can extend the life of our lunches, it will help not only us but the other workers in the barley fields and pastures, won’t it? Therefore, we should interpret this to fall under the category of work.”
Eugeo and Kirito shared another look. His partner’s black eyes seemed hesitant for a brief bit, but that soon melted away like their fabled ice in a hot summer river.
“Yep, exactly. You are correct,” Kirito declared, crossing his arms. “It’s work, so it doesn’t break the village law about crossing the northern pass to the End Mountains. Remember what Mr. Barbossa always says? ‘Work isn’t just what people tell you to do. If you have free time, find something you can do on your own!’ If they get mad, we can just trot out that line in our defense.”
The Barbossas had the largest barley fields in the village. Nigel Barbossa was a stout man around fifty years old who, unsatisfied with having over double the income of anyone else in the village, would complain that Eugeo hadn’t felled “that infernal cedar yet” every time they crossed paths. Rumor said that he was petitioning the elder to give him first priority on cleared lands after the Gigas Cedar was removed. Whenever he heard it, Eugeo thought to himself, Your life is going to run out well before that happens.
Kirito’s idea to use Nigel’s words against him if they got in trouble was very tempting, but Eugeo was always the first member of the trio to invoke a “but,” thereby holding back the others.
“But…it’s not just the village laws that forbid going to the End Mountains…There’s that other thing, too, right? Even if we cross the pass, we can only go to the foot of the mountains and not into the cave…”
Alice and Kirito both sobered, if momentarily. What Eugeo mentioned was not The Rulid Village Standards or the Norlangarth Basic Imperial Laws but an even more absolute, far-reaching set of laws that covered all the residents of the human world—the Taboo Index.
The Index was upheld by the Axiom Church, residing in its tower in Centoria that stretched nearly to the heavens. The heavy books, bound in pure white leather, were given to every single town and village in not just the northern empire containing Rulid but to those in the east, west, and south as well.
Unlike the village rules and imperial law, the Taboo Index contained well over a thousand entries of forbidden actions, starting with general things like rebellion against the Church, murder, and theft, and going down to specifics like caps on the number of animals and fish that could be hunted in a year or which types of feed were forbidden to give to livestock. Aside from learning letters and numbers at school, the biggest priority was teaching children all the entries of the Taboo Index. As a matter of fact, the Index forbade not teaching the Index in school.
But the absolute authority of the Taboo Index and Axiom Church did not extend to all corners of the world. Beyond the End Mountains that surrounded everything was a land of darkness—what was called the Dark Territory in the sacred tongue. Naturally, the entry that forbade going to the End Mountains was listed quite early in the Index, and that was why Eugeo said they could go to the foot of the mountains but not into the cave.
Eugeo stared at his old friend Alice. Surely she would not dare challenge the Taboo Index. Even considering such a thing was a taboo.
Alice thought for a while, her long eyelashes dazzling in the sun like fine golden threads. Eventually she raised her head, and her eyes still had that adventurous gleam in them.
“Eugeo, your reading of the Taboo Index isn’t entirely accurate, either.”
“Huh…? N-no way!”
“Yes way. Here’s what the Index says. Book One, Chapter Three, Verse Eleven: ‘Thou shalt not cross the End Mountains that encircle the Human Empire.’ When it says cross, it means climbing over. Going into a cave doesn’t count. Besides, our intention is not to go beyond the mountains but to get ice from inside them. There’s nothing in the Taboo Index that says, ‘Thou shalt not search for ice within the End Mountains,’” Alice noted, her crystal voice like the tiniest bell at the church. Eugeo had no response. In fact, what she said was making a certain kind of sense.
But the farthest we’ve ever been are the twin ponds along the Rul, well short of the northern pass. We don’t know what lies beyond that point, and this is the season where the itch-bugs come out along the water…
Kirito roused Eugeo out of his hesitation by slapping him on the back, just softly enough not to damage his life, and shouted, “Alice studies more than anyone else in the village, so if she says so, it’s fine, Eugeo! That settles it—next rest day we’re searching for that white dra…The ice cave!”
“I’ll need to make our lunch with ingredients that last longer.”
Eugeo looked at his friends, their faces sparkling with excitement, and could offer only a reluctant “sure” under his breath.
2
The third rest day of July was shaping up to be a beauty.
Even the children over the age of ten who had been given their Calling returned to their younger days and were allowed to go out and play until dinner. Normally Eugeo and Kirito would go fishing or have play swordfights with the other boys, but on this rest day they were out of their houses before the morning dew was gone, waiting
for Alice beneath the old tree at the edge of the village.
“She’s late!” Kirito grumbled, conveniently forgetting that he had forced Eugeo to wait several minutes, too. “Why do women always put their own preparations ahead of being on time? In two years she’ll be like your sister and claim that she can’t go into the forest because it’ll get her clothes dirty.”
“She can’t help it; she’s a girl,” Eugeo said, even as he considered where they would be in two years’ time.
Given her status, Alice was still considered one of the children without a Calling yet, so the village tacitly accepted her activities with the boys. But she was also the village elder’s daughter, which essentially guaranteed that she would serve as the standard for the other women of the village. It would not be long before she was forbidden from cavorting with boys and forced to learn not just the sacred arts but the proper manners and bearing of a lady.
And what would happen after that? Like Eugeo’s eldest sister, Celinia, would she marry into another family? And what did his partner think about this…?
“Hey, stop spacing out. Did you get enough sleep last night?” Kirito wondered. Eugeo nodded vigorously.
“Y-yeah, I’m fine…Oh, here she comes.”
He pointed toward the village, where the sound of light footsteps was approaching.
Just as Kirito had groused, Alice appeared through the morning fog with her pristinely combed blond hair tied up with a ribbon and spotless white apron dress swaying. Eugeo looked at his friend and stifled a smile. The boys greeted her in unison: “You’re late!”
“No, you’re too early. Honestly, when are you two going to grow up?” Alice retorted, handing Eugeo the basket and Kirito the canteen with her nose in the air.
Once they automatically took the items, she turned to the path leading north out of the village, crouched, and plucked a stalk of high grass. She pointed the plump, fuzzy end of it toward the distant mountain and announced, “And now…we head off in search of summer ice!”
Eugeo shared another look with Kirito, wondering how it was that they always ended up being the princess and her two servants, and started trudging after Alice.