Side Story 5: Alde’s Day in Court

— Alde’s perspective —

I was walking one of the castle’s endless corridors, headed for my next training ground, when a woman knight coming the other way called out to me.

“A-Alde Rama?!”

“Huh…?”

Having my name called out of nowhere threw me—but the other party was a knight. Tisli’s authority covers me inside the castle, sure, but ignoring a knight still isn’t an option.

So I gave a light bow and asked,

“Um… have we met somewhere?”

“‘Have we met,’ you say?!”

The knight made zero effort to hide her surprise.

“You don’t remember me?!”

“Er, yeah… sorry.”

Hm… back in my guardsman days, I wasn’t allowed inside the castle proper, so I never crossed paths with any knights… and she’s quite a beauty, besides—if we’d met, I’d remember.

While I tilted my head, she introduced herself.

“I am Cruse Bruge! Member of Her Highness’s Princess’s Guard, and eldest daughter of House Bruge!”

“R-right…?”

The Princess’s Guard—that makes it even less likely we’ve met. Ever since I came back to this castle, Tisli has flatly refused to let me meet any Guard member besides Rahful, for reasons unknown.

Not that I’m dying to meet some stuck-up knight—but she knows my name, so we must have met somewhere.

No point making waves; I took the humble road.

“I’m sorry, I’ve got no memory of it… where did we meet?”

“U-unbelievable! When the outrageous rumors I suffered were all your fault!”

“Rumors…? Uh… now I’m even more lost…”

“I am the one who was disguised as a maid—when you were rampaging through the royal castle!”

“Rampaging… wait. Ah—?!”

And there it finally clicked.

I wouldn’t call what I did “rampaging”—but right after I met Tisli, I did get thrown into the castle dungeon.

And after I slipped out of the dungeon and was creeping around the castle, I ran into this girl.

Right—the kitchen maid. Which makes her—

“—You! The one who tried to poison me!”

“That’s right!”

Oh, I remember now, crystal clear. Starving, wandering the castle depths, I found her cooking beef stew—and she shared it without a flicker of hesitation, and I was so moved I nearly dug in… and the stew was poisoned!

“You’ve got nerve—after what you—”

“W-wait! That was an order—I had no choice, did I?!”

“‘No choice’—do you know what I went through after that?!”

“That is my line!”

“Haah?”

By any sane accounting, I—the almost-poisoned party—am the victim here. And yet for some reason this woman—Cruse, was it?—is the one openly furious.

“The memory of the disgrace you dealt me—I will carry it to my grave!”

“Haah? What are you even talking about?”

“Though thanks to it, the bond between Rahful and me deepened beyond measure—for which… I suppose I thank you!”

“Again—what is any of this?”

“In any case! Your disgrace, I never forget—that is what I am telling you!”

“Don’t be ridiculous! I never did any—”

And right there.

From behind me: a truly monumental wave of bloodlust!

“?!”

I leapt clear on instinct. The bloodlust alone was enough to set off the Ring of Guardianship—a barrier snapped open around me!

S-someone radiating this much murder, inside the royal castle?! An assassin from the Four Great Houses?!

I spun around—and there.

There stood Tisli, horns of fury all but sprouting from her head.

* * *

So, anyway.

I had been escorted to the courthouse that stands on the royal castle grounds.

Trussed head to toe in coarse rope.

“This tramples every right I have! At least untie the ropes!”

“The accused will speak only when granted leave.”

From the judge’s bench, Tisli looked down at me with a gaze of absolute zero… but I am not losing this one!

I have done absolutely nothing to feel guilty about, after all!

“Quiet, you! And another thing—you’re always condemning me, and every single time it’s your own misunderstanding and your own jumping to conclusions and—”

“Silence — Silentium.”

“—Mmph?!”

Wha—my mouth won’t open—magic?! Who even goes that far?!

I growled my protest from the back of my throat, but Judge Tisli rolled on, brooking nothing.

“Then let us begin the trial.”

“Mmph-mmph-mmph! (Then get me a lawyer!)”

“The prosecutor… does not exist, so I shall read the indictment myself.”

“Mmph-mmph-mm-mmph! (No prosecutor and you’re calling this a trial?!)”

Yes—this courtroom held exactly three people: me, Tisli, and Cruse, theatrically dabbing at dry eyes.

Meaning every procedure that makes a trial a trial had been thrown out the window. I’d been rope-wrapped the instant Tisli found us and frog-marched straight here, after all.

This isn’t a trial or anything like one! It’s a glorified public shaming that happens to be using the courthouse!!

Ignoring my rage completely, Tisli read out the so-called indictment.

“The accused, Alde Rama, did on a past date, in the kitchens beneath the royal castle, by means of intimidation commit indecent acts upon the person of the victim, Cruse Bruge, inflicting grave injury upon her in both body and mind. The conduct of the accused therefore constitutes forcible sexual assault under Article 118 of the Penal Code.”

“Mmph-mmph-mmph!! (Oi, you have got to be kidding! I am completely innocent!)”

“It appears the accused denies the charges.”

“Mm-mm-mmmph!! (Of course I do!!)”

“If he insists on denial, then we proceed to the examination of evidence. First—testimony from the key witness of this case, the victim herself: Cruse Bruge.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

And Cruse took the witness stand. Her expression and voice were tuned precisely to draw tears—though the only ones in the courtroom were the three of us.

“I shall now conduct the direct examination, in my capacity as prosecutor.”

“Mmph-mmph-mm-mm-mmph! (Again—why are you running both sides?!)”

“Cruse Bruge, as the victim: tell us of the day in question. What terrors did Alde Rama inflict upon you? Testify in detail!”

“Yes, Your Honor…”

And Cruse—no tears anywhere in evidence—dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief and began.

“To begin with, the accused was at that time prowling the castle underlevels as an escaped prisoner.”

“Mm-mm-mmph!! (The imprisonment itself was a false charge!!)”

“Accordingly, the order handed down to me was: poison him. And it could not be helped. He carried a magical device powerful enough to blow the royal castle off the map.”

“Mmph-mm-mmph!! (False charge, and then ‘it couldn’t be helped,’ and I’m just supposed to die poisoned?!)”

“And yet, somehow, the accused saw through the poisoned stew… and I was taken captive…!”

“Mm—mmph?! Mm-mm-mmph?! (H-hey, wait! I never took you captive, and you know it!)”

The testimony had left fact so far behind that I was thrashing—but the spell held, and not a word got out. Cruse drove on unopposed.

“Whereupon I was forced to disarm…”

“…!”

Tisli—silent till now—was leaning out over the bench as the story closed in on its core (a fabrication)…!

“And subjected to torment upon torment—all of it verbal…!”

“…?!”

Tisli leaned so far out of the judge’s seat she looked ready to fall from it—and at that exact moment,

Cruse delivered the decisive word…!

“And then he—did not ravish me!”

“…Eh?” “…Mm?”

Tisli’s question mark and mine landed in perfect unison.

Neither of which Cruse noticed in the slightest. Arms sweeping like a stage tragedienne’s, she thundered on.

“So I asked him! ‘Have I no charms?’! And the accused kept feigning indifference! When by rights he must have been enormously interested in my body! And so the accused, laying not one finger on me, sent me away! After requesting me, specifically, no less! Is that not cruel?!”

She turned to Tisli for agreement—and Tisli didn’t move a single muscle in her face.

Cruse, registering none of it, pressed her performance to full pitch.

“And for all that, the rumor spread about me anyway—’the woman knight ravished by an escaped commoner’—infamy without limit! I was never ravished, and still my name was dragged through the mud! But Rahful—Rahful worked herself to the bone stamping that rumor out—and her devotion, to me, is—no, that is not the point at issue—but for all her devotion, the next rumor was ‘the woman knight even an escaped commoner wouldn’t touch’! Is that not too cruel for words?!”

Again she appealed to Tisli—and Tisli had simply frozen. Though a waterfall of sweat had started down her face.

Cruse, blind to the state of her own judge, wheeled on me with battlefield intensity.

“Do you understand now, Alde Rama! The sheer weight of humiliation I have borne because of you! Weigh the humiliation I have suffered, and the only fitting sentence is the highest one—death!!”

………

………………

…………………………

Okay. So.

Does she seriously think an argument like that holds water…?

Well… Cruse… whatever. I’m past caring…

Nobles. Truly, they’re a breed that leaps to conclusions and never lets go. No defense I offer at this point would reach her ears anyway.

So I turned my eyes instead to the chief of that entire breed—the reigning champion of leaping to conclusions.

Who, from her elevated judge’s bench—flicked her eyes away from mine the instant they met. Waterfall of sweat still going.

“Mmph. (Hey.)”

“………”

“Mm-mmph-mmph, mmph-mmph-mm-mmph? (For starters—the rope and the spell. Off?)”

“………Dispel — Exeugratio.”

Communication somehow achieved, Tisli murmured the incantation.

The rope slithered off me, and my mouth was mine again.

Seeing it, Cruse let out something close to a shriek.

“Y-Your Highness?! Why have you released Alde Rama’s restraints?!”

“………Th-that is…”

Tisli—flustered as I’d rarely seen her, sweat streaming the whole while—could not produce a single next word.

As for me, it goes without saying—

—I was furious.

“Now then, Tisli…”

At my call, she kept her eyes anywhere but mine—while both her shoulders jumped.

“This is a courtroom, after all.”

“………”

“So let’s hear it. Your defense.”

“………”

A long silence followed.

I waited, patience fraying by the second—

—and then Tisli, for some reason, looked at me with frustration on her face.

“Gh… today, and today only, I will let you off!”

“That’s my line—wait! You’re running?!”

No sooner had she tossed off that baffling parting line than Tisli bolted from the courtroom!

“A strategic retreat!”

“Knock it off! Every single time, with these absurd misunderstandings! This time I’m not forgiving you—no way!”

“You two?! What about my humiliation?!”

And so the chase was on—soon graduating to hide-and-seek across the entire royal castle—and it took me until dawn to finally run Tisli down and extract an apology, grudging to the last.

Honestly, that girl…

Day to day she apparently trusts me—and yet, for some reason, the moment a woman enters the picture, my side of the story ceases to exist.

Enough is enough, I thought—

—but then again, I got to see Tisli apologize, utterly mortified, for the first time in ages…

So I’ll let it slide.

(And that’s that. To be continued in Volume 6)

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