Intermission: Back at the Border Province
Intermission: Back at the Border Province
ROUGHLY twenty years ago…
It was the day of the year the margrave welcomed students visiting Wallum for their field trips. The front lawn of Margrave Wallum’s estate was jam-packed with students, as it was on this day every year.
“We finally made it! I’m doing my training at the port office, so I’m headed that way. What about you, Joshua?”
“I’m supposed to go to the magical tool workshop to help out with overseeing manufacturing and importing materials.”
“Whoa, that sounds fun! I’ll be an apprentice interpreter, so maybe we’ll be able to work together. Oh—I see the margrave!”
Just as Joshua’s friends and the rumor mill had said, Margrave Rudolf Wallum was every bit as intimidating in person.
He had short silver hair and sunburned skin. With a body so solid it could very well be made of steel and a ferocious-looking face, it’d make much more sense if he were a pirate captain—not an aristocrat.
Even though he was laughing, it didn’t look like there was a single weakness in his vigilance. Joshua was convinced he could strike any one of them down in an instant the moment they turned their backs. The other students started talking among themselves.
“That reminds me—I heard the margrave has an only daughter.”
“Yeah, Miss Isabelle. She’s gonna be fifteen and doesn’t even have a fiancé yet…”
“That’s rough… Well, if she looks like the margrave, it probably would be difficult for her to find a partner…”
The other students painted the margrave’s daughter in a very rude light in their imaginations, despite never having seen the poor girl. Whether or not the margrave could hear them, Joshua didn’t want anything to do with their conversation. He picked up his bag and started to head out.
“Oh, Joshua! I heard about a great store from one of the older guys. Loads of cute girls do their shopping there. Wanna go soon?”
“Not interested.”
“You dweeb! You can’t make a girlfriend out of magical tools, you know! …Wait, who’s that?”
The student’s eyes zeroed in on the dainty girl standing behind the margrave’s massive frame.
She was a spectacle to behold, with a cerulean dress the same color as the ocean and elegantly waving sandy-blonde hair. Both of these, however, paled before her glittering eyes, golden like a wildcat’s.
This lady suddenly turned toward Joshua’s group with wide eyes, looking almost startled…then suddenly, she lit up in a smile.
“Whoa… She’s beautiful…,” one of the boys muttered.
“She must be visiting from a foreign kingdom…,” another said. “Huh…? Is she coming over here?”
The young lady dashed straight for them…
And then threw her arms around Joshua’s neck.
As the students around them stared, mouths agape, the bag in Joshua’s hand fell to the ground with a thud.
“I had a feeling you were here, Hitoshi!”
“Yumiko…”
According to his friends’ report of the night, it was like a scene out of a storybook. They could almost see giant roses blossoming around Isabelle as she ran up to him, giant confetti raining from the sky as they embraced each other, and her father, the margrave, standing behind them in the distance, the spitting image of a savage god of the sea.
That was the moment the Margrave of Wallum’s daughter finally decided on her future husband.
🐾🐱🐾
“YOU know, gushing over your own parents’ love lives isn’t exactly my idea of fun…,” Harold grumbled.
“Yeah…,” said Amy. “Although I suppose objectively it’s a romantic story.”
“Hal! Amy! Give me a break! I only told you about it because you two said you wanted to hear it!”
Isabelle was totally spellbound by the memories of her magical first meeting with Joshua. She was shielding her warm, pink cheeks with both hands. Opposite her, Amy and Hal looked like they’d rather be somewhere else…
“Uh…so…then you and Dad got married, right?” Amy asked, hoping the story was over.
“But there was trouble with Grandpa, you know!” Isabelle giggled. “Do you want to hear about that, too?”
“Ah… I’m all right, actually,” said Hal, standing up. “I feel like you’re just going to start blubbering on about Dad…”
“I-I was going to go on a walk with Tigger!”
“You don’t have to beat around the bush, you know!” Isabelle called after them.
After fondly watching her children leave the living room, Isabelle walked to the window. She looked down on the expansive front yard of the estate, where on that day twenty years before, two lost souls had been reunited.
“Hitoshi… I wonder if he’ll come early.”
Late that night, Joshua Northland finished his journey from the royal capital and arrived at his wife’s family home in Wallum.