The Sun and the Dead Alchemist
The Sun and the Dead Alchemist
Kiyomune Miwa
The sun was bright in my eyes.
“Blinding,” I muttered.
English sunshine in summer was surprisingly harsh. Even as far north as this, it felt like the light was stabbing me.
But as I spent nearly all of my time holed up in my underground room, this pain was a rare pleasure. My body didn’t allow me to enjoy the outdoors on a daily basis, but I could handle it from time to time.
How long had it been since I’d last stood under the sun?
Two months? Three? Or maybe it had been years, not months.
My memories were so imprecise.
One part of me felt like I hadn’t left my room in ages, but another part swore I’d climbed a mountain just a few days ago in order to perform a ritual.
Didn’t matter. Rather than be distracted by faulty memories, I decided to enjoy the scenery.
A field of green grasses and proud, colorful summer flowers bloomed before me, all bathed in sunlight.
This season was so full of life.
As far North as England was, summer was really the most bountiful time.
Though England was warmer than other northern countries, the winters were still brutally cold. When spring arrived, the country’s famous rains arrived with it. The weather could change on a moment’s notice. One minute it would be sunny, the next raining cats and dogs.
But in summer the storms abated, and nature sang with life.
Everything turned green, and the insects buzzed busily from flower to flower.
Alongside that parade of life, they danced to their heart’s content.
“…………”
Sensing their presence, I turned.
As I did, they noticed, reacting with revulsion and a hint of fear.
“Oh? Again?” one muttered.
“Yes. Looking at us.”
“No way! Eww.”
“I don’t like this smell! It stinks!”
Couldn’t blame them.
They—the faeries—saw me as an enemy.
I was used to this reception, but while I might not hold it against them, their reaction was never exactly pleasant.
“…………”
I focused on the hateful stares that surrounded me.
I felt the faeries flinch. The ratio of loathing and fear flipped.
“Iron Rust! Iron Rust is here!”
“Iron Rust!”
“Run! Iron Rust’ll turn you into jam and eat you!”
“Iron Rust smells like rotting mud!”
Scattering like newborn spiders, they rushed off.
Some of them convulsed and needed the other faeries to drag them away to safety.
Oh dear. Perhaps I’d put a bit too much force in that look.
I had the evil eye. A single glance from me could bring misfortune, which was decidedly inconvenient. To skirt around the problem, I never quite focused my eyes on anyone. But still…
Perhaps that had been a little childish of me.
“Not good. Shouldn’t disrupt their domain.”
I regretted it a little.
I might be scolded for it later.
Though I no longer needed to breathe, I gave a sigh. Sighing often straightened out my thoughts.
“Doesn’t matter,” I said.
If I got scolded, I got scolded.
For now, I needed to see him, the mage named Elias Ainsworth, and the girl he’d made his student and partner.
***
“May I ask your name?” the girl said.
I’d rung the doorbell, and she’d answered.
She was a slender child, with reddish hair like autumn leaves and eyes as green as those same leaves in summer.
Those who saw the world through ordinary eyes might think her frail, but I perceived her to have a strong will, a quiet resolve.
I smiled faintly.
Yes, this girl was definitely a sleigh beggy.
This girl could see things that weren’t human and loved them according to her nature. A rare being, she was able to befriend all of the natural world and harness its power as her own.
“……”
I felt the urge rising and forced it back.
This was rough.
I’d thought I was ready for it, too…
“Um?” she asked, hesitantly. She gave a worried look.
My silence must have concerned her. Perhaps I looked like I’d suddenly taken ill. Based on her manner, she had not perceived my real nature.
“Oh, sorry,” I said, getting a hold of myself.
Then I saw a large black dog at her feet. The dog growled, already on guard against me.
A bodyguard? Didn’t belong to Elias. Must be her familiar.
This familiar’s aggressively protective stance delighted me. The girl was well guarded, safe unless she ran into something beyond the pale.
After all, this was clearly a Black Dog. I caught a whiff of a graveyard on it, meaning it was likely a Church Grim.
Church Grims were hounds that had once served the goddess of death. With such a pedigree, they feared little. The perfect watchdog, and this one seemed devoted to the girl. He would protect her to the bitter end, even if it cost him his life.
With that thought in mind, I smiled.
“That’s a good familiar,” I said.
At this, the black dog stopped growling. Instead, he seemed confused. The girl appeared equally at a loss, unsure how to respond.
Hmm. Perhaps she had not the best of social skills.
Or perhaps I was at fault, and my words inappropriate. I was hardly the social type myself.
For a moment we both stared, neither of us sure what to say.
What now?
As I pondered, the girl gave me an out. Thank you.
“Um, what brings you here?” she asked.
This was, honestly, a huge relief.
I couldn’t imagine Elias would have taught her this grace, so it must have come naturally to her. I could tell from her tone she was trying to help.
Relaxing somewhat, I was finally able to state my business.
“Right, I should have said that first. I’m here to see Elias Ainsworth. Would you tell him that Iron Rust has arrived?”
With a clink, someone placed a cup of tea before me.
I sat in Elias’s parlor. It was a lovely room, well looked after.
“Thank you,” I said, addressing the female faerie.
I could feel the heat rising off the tea. Its fragrance indicated her skill had not declined in the least.
“It’s been a while, silver lady. No changes, I assume?” I asked.
The silver lady nodded.
Her name was Silky. She was a house faerie, a type of brownie that took care of all the housework.
So both the tea’s enticing scent and the parlor’s pleasant feel were her doing.
It had once been her job to meet visitors at the door, but apparently the girl had taken on that role.
Unlike that girl and her black dog, the silver lady still didn’t trust me. Perhaps she was on guard against my evil eye. She kept her eyes downcast so as not to meet my gaze.
Didn’t blame her.
Hostility from faeries was like a chronic disease, something I just had to live with.
At least this one didn’t bombard me with loathing, which made it easier to keep my temper.
If she’d genuinely disliked me, she would never have taken the time to make me a cup of tea. After all, I couldn’t eat or drink the way others did. She might not trust me, but I was still welcome.
And that was enough.
But my next sensation, the feeling of being watched, was not so pleasant.
“Um, could you not do that?” I said, not even turning to face the problem.
With this kind of incivility, it was better not to feign humanity.
“Sorry.”
As I’d hoped, the sleigh beggy readily apologized, sounding remorseful.
She entered the parlor as she spoke, bowing her head.
At this, I finally turned to face her.
“No, I understand. It’s just that having my true form perceived happens to be rather painful for me. For that reason, I ask that you not look at me through that.”
I pointed to the round stone hanging from her neck, the one with a hole in it.
This stone had been formed naturally and served to protect her. It held the flow of the river, the blessing of the sky, and the power of the earth within it. The stone divided the other side from this one and simultaneously linked them together.
In ancient China, they fashioned gemstones into this shape for use in rituals. They called the gems bi.
If you peered through the hole in the center, you could perceive the true form of something, no matter the disguise it wore in the real world. The girl’s stone would definitely allow her to see through my illusions.
I imagined Elias had given it to her.
The natural power made it both easy to use and extremely effective.
“I’m like them. The ones you call neighbors? Same thing. Some of them just abhor being looked at. Perhaps you’re so used to being seen that this is difficult to understand.”
This girl was a sleigh beggy. By her very nature, inhuman things noticed her.
But normal humans were unable to see faeries. On occasion, and usually with the aid of tools or drugs, ordinary people might catch a glimpse of them. But when discovered, the faeries would often fly into a rage. The human who steals a glimpse may end up paying for it with their life.
But that rule didn’t apply to a sleigh beggy.
Faeries viewed sleigh beggy as one of them. So if a sleigh beggy saw them, they would not get mad. Instead they would approach as friends, teeming with curiosity.
Although to an unprepared human, their definition of “friend” could prove disastrous.
Likely, this girl was so accustomed to seeing non-human things that she was unprepared for the act of merely looking to provoke hostility or anger. Of course, hostility and anger were not the only dangers. Dangers of which I was sure she was fully aware.
Elias would almost certainly have taught her that first thing. He was pretty good in that department, at least…
The girl informed me that Elias was still in bed.
She had woken him, and he would be down as soon as he’d made himself ready.
I was aware that he was not a morning person, so this was expected.
“Will you keep me company until he arrives?” I asked.
The girl hesitated but then accepted my request. At first I’d thought her quite shy, but maybe that wasn’t the case. She was definitely not the most talkative.
But she was still far better company than Silky.
Silky was one of them, hostile to me. I could barely communicate with her at all, and the silver lady never spoke to begin with. Until Elias came downstairs, there would have been a long, awkward silence. I may be tactless and have no sense of time, but even I have my limits.
The first thing I asked for was the girl’s name.
Before she could answer, I held up a hand.
“Oh, hold on a second.”
I glanced at the silver lady. Already ahead of me, she placed a notebook on the table between the two of us.
“Let us avoid using sound in introductions. I deal in such magic, you see. I don’t want Elias scolding me for it later,” I said.
Names held power, especially the first time a person gave their name. That defined them, decided the form that person took. I was skilled in magic that used names to control others, and Elias was well aware of my talents.
So I was making a show, demonstrating that I had no intention of placing her under my control.
It was a well-known fact that my magic would work on a sleigh beggy. This justified the extra caution.
Names define us.
Even without intending to control her, I wished to know what sort of being she was.
I told her to go ahead and use the kanji. She hesitated, glancing up at me. Hastily I shifted my focus, making sure our eyes did not meet. If the evil eye affected this girl, it would be extremely bad!
“So you are Japanese?” she asked, cautiously.
“I was born there. I return from time to time. What gave that away?”
“Um, your clothes…”
Only then did I remember that my outfit resembled kimono.
I had forgotten.
“Oh, that’s right. Sorry. My memories can be terribly vague.” A question occurred to me. “If I may ask, how do I appear to you?”
“Huh?”
This rattled her.
She spent some time searching for the right words. Perhaps she had learned that saying the wrong thing to beings like me could be costly. For those who deal with our side of the world, caution is a necessity.
I felt my opinion of her improving by the second.
“Um, you’re quite beautiful,” she stammered. “Black hair and pale skin…and red lips. Well-suited to the white kimono.”
As she spoke, she wrote her name in the notebook.
Chise Hatori.
Two kanji for the surname and two for the given name.
No clan name, no occupational name, no titles of that sort. Of course, they’d changed the law and done away with everything but family names.
“Hatori Chise…a bird that flaps its wings, and one who knows the world. Then your hair is less autumn leaves and more a bird’s feathers.”
In my mind’s eye, a bird with red wings soared over a forest the same color as her eyes.
“A good name,” I said.
“Thank you.”
She seemed faintly embarrassed.
“I should return the favor. I am Iron Rust. An alchemist, I suppose.”
“You suppose?” the girl asked. Good question.
“I never quite became a mage. I’ve dabbled in quite a few things. In that way—although I’m not sure it makes sense—I fall on the border of what an alchemist is.”
This was true.
I had not become a mage. You couldn’t become a mage simply because you wanted to be one.
Alchemists were different. In a sense, mages were born with talent, and alchemists became so through practice and technique. No amount of hard work could ever erase that difference.
We might look the same, and an ordinary human often perceived no functional difference, but the two jobs were unrelated.
Chise seemed to somewhat comprehend the difference but did not quite follow what I was saying.
I didn’t blame her.
I might as well have said I was a whale that enjoyed flying.
“There are more beings than you think who dwell on the lines in between worlds. Wouldn’t you agree, Elias?”
I turned to the presence in the hall.
As if summoned, we heard his footsteps. The owner of the place, Elias Ainsworth, appeared in the parlor. He seemed a little put out.
“Been a while, Thorn,” I said, making a conscious decision to smile.
At a glance, it was difficult to glean any expression from his long animal skull of a head. Dressed like a gentleman, he had a presence like an ancient tree. In fact, he was a type of spirit, one that had lived for many years. At least, that was my understanding of him.
But for some reason he lived in proximity to humans. Not as a spirit, but as a mage.
Honestly, I didn’t understand him, but we had known each other for some time. As a hermit with precious few acquaintances, he had become one of the few people to whom I could talk.
“I do not believe enough time has passed to justify that phrasing, dead alchemist.”
He was in an even grumpier mood than I’d thought.
It seemed he suspected I had done something to the sleigh beggy girl.
“You don’t say? I never had much sense of time. You know that, Elias.”
Hoping to clear up the misconception, I spread my hands in an attempt to appear harmless. He would be aware of how much effort this took.
As if catching my intent, he gave me a long, evaluative stare. The suspicion did not entirely leave his eyes, but he did seem a tad inclined to believe me. With a sigh, he settled into the chair across from me.
“So what brings you here?” he asked.
“First, I offer a gift for your glad tidings.”
I waved a hand in the air and produced a box I had kept hidden on the back side of space. The silver lady saw the size of it and quietly cleared the tea cup. Such an ideal housekeeper.
Once the table had been cleared, I set down the box. It was a clothes chest made from the princess tree, one I’d had specially designed.
“What is this?” he asked.
“I heard the news, Elias. You haven’t had the wedding ceremony yet? That will never do.”
I lifted the lid of the box.
Inside lay a bridal kimono so white it seemed to glow. In the country from which Chise and I originated, this garment was known as a shiromuku.
I could tell Chise was quite surprised by the sight of it. Ha ha, well? Beautiful, isn’t it? I was quite proud of my work.
Elias stared at the kimono as if caught off-guard, so I pressed the point.
“All girls look forward to their weddings. You’re duty-bound to make the occasion a memorable one.”
Even he couldn’t have predicted this.
He’d better be surprised. I’d spent a lot of time working on this.
Discerning expression on Elias’s bony face was difficult. To be able to interpret his feelings at a glance required either years of practice or a genuine connection to him. The ability to read his moods was, in a sense, a particularity of those who do not see with their eyes.
As that thought crossed my mind, I realized Chise, who was seated next to him, also reacted to his mood. It seemed she, too, could tell he was surprised.
Ah ha. Apparently my skill was no longer so unique.
The mage’s bond with his partner was already stronger than I’d anticipated. I continued my explanation.
“You recall that silkworms make for popular familiars in my field of magic? That’s how I was able to weave the fabric using such top-class silk.”
As his initial surprise wore off, Elias checked to see if the bridal gown housed any sort of alchemical trap. I did not blame him for his caution. After a few moments, Elias sighed. He’d clearly determined there was no danger.
“I’m grateful for your generosity, but I can’t accept this. We have our own thoughts on the matter. We would prefer you not involve yourself.”
His surprise gone, Elias was grumpy again. I found it rather amusing.
“Ha ha, sorry to tease you like this. I just wanted to see the look on your face.”
The glint in his eyes only grew steelier. Perhaps I had pushed things too far?
“This is a sample. Naturally, any couple must discuss what to wear to their wedding and choose what is best for them,” I said.
I reached out into the back side of space once more. Producing introductions to a clothier and a tailor, I handed them to Chise.
Hesitantly, she accepted, holding the cards up for Elias to see as well. The mage looked them over and seemed to relax at last. “Well, I can trust them, at least,” he muttered.
“So what actually brings you here?” Elias said, having sent Chise away.
“…………”
“I know you genuinely did come to congratulate us, and to tease me. But there’s another reason.”
Whew. He was certainly clever. Saw right through me.
I let the expression on my face fade. I considered expressions fundamentally unnecessary. In fact, moving the muscles in my face required conscious effort. This rule of concentration applied to my entire body as well.
“Just checking,” I replied.
“Checking what?”
His tone sharpened.
Clearly if this “check” would place him—or rather, that sleigh beggy girl—in danger, I would not get off lightly. This mage’s destructive abilities were formidable.
I’d long since lost the capacity for fear, but I certainly couldn’t afford a mistake.
At the same time, I felt that Elias was the one backed into a corner.
In the old days, he would never have threatened me so obviously. It seemed he was no longer that same person. He had changed.
“The sleigh beggy…that girl. I wanted to see how the two of you were getting along. How it differed from my own relationship.”
“Iron Rust,” he said, tensing.
“When you have someone you don’t want to lose, human or not, that changes you. Don’t worry. I have no intention of harming her.”
“You may not now, but what about a moment from now? Can you even remember an hour ago?”
An hour ago? An hour…
I tried to remember. But my memories were hazy, and I wasn’t sure in what order they went. An hour ago, I imagined I’d been headed here, but…
I may not have been able to remember an hour ago, but I recalled what happened before that. I had anticipated this question.
“I certainly don’t remember an hour ago. That’s why I obtained some insurance before coming.”
I held up my right hand, showing him the thread wrapped around my finger. Enchanted silk, tinged green where the light caught it. One look at the silk and the knot, and Elias calmed down.
“You bound yourself so you could not harm us?” he asked.
“I don’t trust myself any more than you do. Elias, you are right to be concerned. Once something important is lost, it cannot be recovered.”
The silk wrapped around my finger was a binding spell I’d cast upon myself, one which prevented me from harming Elias or his family. Special thread tied in a special knot limited what I could do.
Naturally, I could never render myself completely powerless. If attacked, the binding would be immediately released.
“Elias, I appreciate why you’re on guard. Judging from her reaction, you’ve already had several adverse encounters. And I admit, she is fascinating.”
I paused for a moment. My next sentence required some courage.
“As you know my true nature, it’s only natural you’d assume I had come to take her away. Or perhaps you fear I’m here to steal her life?”
“Indeed I am, Iron Rust. The only reason I did not cast you out immediately is because of Ruth’s demeanor. If he had shown even a trace of uncertainty, you would have been long gone.”
Ruth? Oh, the Black Dog. Certainly, he would have picked up on a threat to his master.
I found Elias’ explanation rather comforting.
Yes. This is how it should be, Elias.
If you love that sleigh beggy, that is how you should act.
“That’s correct, Thorn. I’ll admit it. I am jealous of you…of both of you. I might even hate you for it. You should be prepared,” I said.
“…………”
“But at the same time, I find myself hoping you can be happy. My desire to congratulate you is equally valid. Two opposing emotions clash within me. It seems I have not yet managed to completely escape the shackles of humanity.”
“If you say so.”
“That’s the long and short of it. You seem to be in a similar state of mind. Her presence has troubled you greatly, has it not?” I said.
“It has. Even now, I have much to consider. I’ve spent hours wondering what to do.”
“Then let me offer some advice. No matter what those around you say, prioritize your mutual happiness. Never let go of that. You may be separated from time to time, but never make a choice that will force you apart for good.”
“Iron Rust.”
“Don’t let it end for you like it did for me.”
Those words dredged up memories.
Don’t be like me.
Don’t lose your sleigh beggy the way I lost mine.
***
When I first met her, my memories were already hazy.
She—not Chise, a different one. My sleigh beggy. When had I met her?
Oh, right.
When England and Russia were at war over central Asia.
I was living in that part of the world then. An English diplomat had invited me to help ensure peaceful negotiations with the leader of a powerful local tribe, so I did what I could. I gave advice on what gifts to bring, explained local customs and manners, and, where needed, eliminated those who would interfere.
As a result, England gained an advantage over Russia.
As his way of thanking me, the diplomat brought me a sleigh beggy—her.
He knew a number of other alchemists back home and was well aware of their value. At the time, I’d needed a sleigh beggy to make up for my own shortcomings.
My memories are often unclear, but my memories of when I first met her are an exception.
She was like the sun. At the time, I had been living in a dark underground tunnel, yet it seemed she lit up her surroundings.
Skin pale as snow. Red lips. Hair black as ravens.
She was so very beautiful that I grew embarrassed, unable to say a word. I remember hastily retreating to my quarters.
Yet the very next day, showing no signs of fear, she came to wake me up.
I couldn’t believe it.
I was an alchemist. I had never even spoken to her. Yet here I was being dragged out of bed without the least bit of consideration. Before I could even grasp what was happening, I found myself seated at the table, food in front of me. “Let’s eat together,” she said.
I didn’t understand.
I had already lost track of how long I’d been alive. I spared no consideration for human life at all. I was like a walking disaster, something capable of destroying a small settlement or two any time a bad mood struck.
And yet she treated me as she would anyone else.
This forced me to communicate with her properly.
“I can’t eat what you eat,” I said, and she smiled.
“So you do talk,” she said.
I think.
I mean, I’m not sure, but I believe at that moment I had already begun to care for her.
In that dark underground room, seated at a table lit only by a single lamp, I genuinely felt like the world had grown brighter. I had never felt like that before.
And she wanted me to sit with her at the table, even though I couldn’t eat normal food.
She said her name was Uruk. Said it meant “apricot.”
She came from a land far to the north of where we were, in the mountains. She had many siblings and once tended a large flock of sheep with her parents. Before winter fell, they’d always thrown a festival for friends and family.
I said very little, but she spoke of herself at length, the words flowing like water through the karez.
And I listened to it all. I imagine I had fun just listening to her talk.
My greatest pleasure came from having her alive and at my side.
At the time, though, I hadn’t understood that.
If I could meet my past self now, I’d have some choice words.
“You’re in love,” I’d say. “Think what you should do to avoid a tragic end.”
But at the time, I was such a fool. I didn’t understand a thing.
“Over here! The flowers are blooming!”
One day, she took me on a picnic, declaring I should get some sun.
To be truthful, neither of us knew the word “picnic” at the time.
But the diplomat who’d brought her to me had mentioned that picnics were a summer custom back home. Uruk had taken to the idea more than he’d ever suspected.
It was late spring; winter’s chill had abated, and summer was fast approaching. It was the perfect day to go out. As accustomed to the underground as I’d become, the light of day was hardly welcoming. But Uruk wouldn’t hear otherwise.
I folded first.
“Don’t rush me! My body is not terribly strong.”
I picked my way slowly along, while Uruk rushed ahead of me.
I saw flowers as medicinal ingredients, useless other than as a catalyst for magic. But flowers meant something more to her. Colorful flowers made her smile. She chased after the insects darting happily from flower to flower—and she chased them as they danced around the blooms.
Uruk was a sleigh beggy, and the local faeries welcomed her.
Some danced from flower to flower, and some rose up from the ground. Some flittered with the wind, and some lived between beams of light.
Every one of these played with her in their own way, and all seemed to enjoy themselves.
Until they saw me, and their manner changed.
“Iron Rust!”
“The dead alchemist!”
“The corpse stealer!”
“Spreading that foul scent!”
The wind, earth, flowers, and light all turned on me. They whispered protectively in her ear.
“You can’t be with that thing!”
“You’ll wind up dead, too!”
“Run before you get eaten up!”
“We’ll help! Come with us!”
One after another, they tried to tempt my sleigh beggy away from me.
Rage darkened everything in my vision.
They would try to steal her from me? Take her where my eyes could not reach?
Raising my voice, I attempted to use my power. But a quiet voice whispered in my ear.
“I’m not going anywhere! Nothing bad has happened to me.”
It was a gentle embrace of a voice.
My anger vanished on the spot. The tension they’d raised dissipated.
We all looked at her, surprised. None of us understood what she was saying. None of us knew why she would say that. Even now, I don’t believe I’d done anything to earn those words from her. Yet she spoke them.
One of the faeries recovered first.
“B-but…Iron Rust takes power from you. Doesn’t that hurt? Don’t you hate that?”
“Hmm. But that’s my job,” she said.
She put her fingers to her lips, tilted her head.
She accepted what I did to her as if it were normal.
Sleigh beggy collected magic power. Using certain techniques, alchemists could do the same. However, these were mere techniques. Practices. Sleigh beggy achieved the same result unconsciously without any difficulty.
They functioned on a completely different level.
In principle, the magic an alchemist used carved away the alchemist’s energy and life. Techniques to gather magic helped but not enough to overturn that core principle.
But the alchemist could use the magic power a sleigh beggy gathered. With such power, it became possible to perform spells far beyond what we could manage by ourselves.
An alchemist needed a sleigh beggy to surpass their limitations, so most alchemists wanted one. Naturally, sleigh beggy were incredibly hard to find.
Uruk was the first live sleigh beggy I had known. Even a dead one was valued for the sheer quantity of magic left behind. People would fight and kill to possess even a sleigh beggy’s corpse.
It was pure luck that I’d been given Uruk.
With the political upheaval going on across Asia and Europe, there was no way to guarantee the sleigh beggy’s safe passage. The diplomat had received dirty goods and needed to be rid of them before his superiors found out. And said diplomat owed me, afraid of what would happen if he didn’t pay me back.
Had any one of these elements not been in place, I would never have gotten the girl.
But now that she was with me, Uruk was like a canteen filled to the brim with magical energy. I lapped that energy from her day and night, any time I needed it. It must have caused her pain beyond anything she’d ever experienced.
It was likely far worse than your average form of torture.
And yet.
She smiled and called it her job.
How astonishing this was, both to me and to them. I had previously wondered why she didn’t seem to hate me for her suffering, and I continued to wonder even after this. Yet she displayed no hesitation at all.
I don’t remember how we got home that day, but those events took root deep inside of me and remained.
“Do you want to become a mage?”
“A mage?”
This was winter, some time after she’d come to me.
Something had been preying on me for some time, and I was trying to explain it to her.
Sleigh beggy were rare beings, but rare things often led very short lives. Many sleigh beggy passed on before reaching the age of maturity. Even if they grew up, they did not grow old.
Perhaps some sleigh beggy led long lives, but I’d never heard of any.
But during a visit to India for some tools, I’d happened to meet a mage from northern Europe who was traveling the world. If what that mage had told me was true, then sleigh beggy had the talent to become mages themselves.
And if one became a mage, they would be able to escape the short life to which their power had doomed them. A mage could control the problematic parts of that power themselves.
The path to becoming a mage might bring difficulties, surprises, and troubles of its own, but it would clearly solve the biggest problem: impending death.
With Uruk’s help, I had achieved a number of previously impossible things. The results before and after her arrival were like night and day. It felt like I’d accomplished a hundred years of work in these few short months.
I could no longer do without her.
Just the thought of losing her, of going back to the agonizingly slow method of research filled me with something rather like terror.
Of course, if she became a mage I could not use her as freely as I had. If I made use of her sleigh beggy powers while training her, it would hardly make for efficient proceedings.
But in the long run, teaching her would be to my advantage.
And at this point, I still had not achieved my real goal. Uruk simply would not last long enough for me to achieve it.
At the time, that’s how I interpreted my motivations. Or perhaps I was simply trying to convince myself.
Either way, Uruk was a clever girl.
She asked if learning magic would interfere with her “work for me,” providing magical energy.
“Yes, it will slow things down a little,” I said.
“Then the way we have been doing things will be more useful to you.”
“No, I thought about that, and I believe this way would be better. I’ve never mentioned this before, but I’ve always wanted to be a mage,” I said.
Mages borrowed help from things that were not human, causing miracles. Alchemists studied the rules of the world and used techniques to create similar results.
They were similar but also very different. And I had always wanted to be a mage.
But no one could simply become a mage. Only those with the natural capacity could make that talent bloom. Those without such gifts could never bridge that divide.
But I was scrambling to overcome that barrier, even if I had to violate taboos.
“I imagine you’ve noticed this by now, but I am not alive. I am already dead,” I said.
I exposed my own true form and nature to her. In hindsight, perhaps this wasn’t necessary, but I did it anyway.
My true form was that of a horrible, shapeless monster. I resembled bubbling black mud, a cluster of obsession that had long since lost all form and simply floated there in that murk. The core of me had consumed the hearts, souls, and spirits of countless others. Eventually, I’d become an evil thing that no longer remembered its original appearance.
That was who I was.
“Mages create miracles with the help of those that are not human. I have learned arts that allow me to take the dead into myself, to merge with and use them as my arms and legs. I believed that doing so would allow me to become something like a mage, however false.”
But I had been wrong.
For all my conviction, ambition, wickedness, and desire, all I’d managed to do was turn myself into something inhuman: the dead alchemist.
Iron was the metal found in the land of the dead, and rust could kill even that iron.
That was I—Iron Rust.
“Uruk. If you become a mage, that might allow me to find a way to become a mage myself. Will you help me with this?” I asked.
“Okay. If this is what you need.”
She hesitated, but in the end she consented.
I would come to regret this exchange later.
I should have warned her that sleigh beggy led short lives. She would have accepted my request even with that knowledge, yet I feared even the slightest chance that she would leave me.
My feelings made no sense.
If I feared losing her, then why had I allowed her to know what I was? What would I have done if she’d been scared enough to run?
It took awhile to notice this inconsistency.
Only when I considered it did I realize the truth of my own heart.
Only then did I understand that I loved this girl, and however foolish such an impulse might be, I had wanted Uruk to accept my true nature.
When I first realized it was love, I was furious.
I was dead. I’d lost my flesh. I should no longer have been able to feel nauseated, yet I did.
My current body was just a puppet, an appropriate corpse controlled and operated with magic. I needed sleep to process memories and maintain bodily functions but could eliminate everything else as I pleased.
If I did not wish to feel nauseated, I would not. In theory, at least.
But now I couldn’t bring myself to eliminate the nausea. Or the anger.
I loathed my own vapidity, loathed the weakness that left me unable to face the truth.
If I told Uruk that sleigh beggy were doomed to short lives, would she leave me? There was almost no chance of it, yet that possibility so scared me that I hid the truth from someone I treasured.
And yet I wanted her to accept me? Accept me not as I appeared, but as my true self?
How stupid was I?
I was a complete fool! Of course I felt sick about it!
I’d never known I was this horrid! Transforming myself into a cluster of obsession was one thing, but love?
I’d forgotten that I was filth writhing in the earth’s bowels. I’d let myself fall for that girl who smiled like the sun.
True, I was but a sad mass of evil thoughts. If I weren’t, I would not have presumed to feel this way. I was as vulgar as I was pathetic. I was wretched.
But at the same time, even as I raged at myself I still could not tell her the truth.
I was scared.
So scared that my body, one that should never have trembled, shook like a leaf.
I couldn’t.
I couldn’t!
Not ever!
I couldn’t bear the idea of losing her.
The very idea of her absence terrified me.
I was too scared to even imagine what might happen, to plan against it.
Naturally, there was no predicting the future.
Even ripples on the water’s surface seemed like the premonition of hopelessness. I could not look at them. I feared I would glimpse a future without her dancing in the hearth’s flames, so I dared not peek.
In my terror, I hid my love from her.
The harder I worked to conceal my feelings, the more frightened I became.
I convinced myself that if Uruk knew how deeply I loved her, it would drive her away.
Many times I imagined it would be better to kill and eat her than to remain so fearful.
I knew how to convert the dead into energy. Maintaining my own consciousness required regularly consuming the thoughts of a living human. I was far past feeling guilty about this.
And around us, tribes and countries warred bitterly. Countless people died every day. In a world filled with death, how could killing and eating someone be painful?
No.
I couldn’t.
It was impossible. I didn’t think I could bear a world without her in it.
I considered analyzing her personality, converting it to data that could be recreated within me whenever I pleased. But she was only herself as long as she lived in that body.
I loved more than her personality. Her soul, her spirit, her heart, her flesh…I loved them all.
Uruk as I knew her was a combination of these things.
I knew that. I recognized that knowledge.
Yet the urge to kill her returned again and again. Again and again, I thought better of it.
Tortured by my one-sided obsession, I was still, in my way, happy.
Even as I was overwhelmed by impossible love, she remained at my side and smiled for me.
Until…
Probably.
It was probably always impossible.
I was an alchemist. Just an alchemist.
Though we achieve similar results in our work, an alchemist is not a mage. An alchemist trying to train a mage was hubris of the highest order.
Perhaps I should have studied how to teach properly, gained the assistance of more mages and alchemists.
Or perhaps I could have sent her to the school for alchemists, far off as it was. Perhaps then we might have found a way.
But I feared someone else would steal her from me.
I feared that she would leave me when the slightest distance opened up between us.
Like a bird that had learned to fly, I feared she would be free to never return.
Uruk learned to use a few charms.
Taking advantage of her sleigh beggy connection to inhuman creatures, she even developed a few tricks that weren’t based in alchemy. They were likely magic.
But we never achieved our ultimate goal of extending the sleigh beggy’s short life.
She began eating less. Spent more time in bed.
She wasted away before my eyes and requested spirit medicine I would never have touched otherwise. I even tried medical techniques from the far East. These were effective in the short term, but we soon ran out.
I knew.
I knew there was nothing I could do.
Who could I ask for help?
Should I have released her long before this point?
It should have been enough to know she was alive and happy, even if she was happy with someone else.
As she lay there, breathing heavily, with me nursing her as best I could, I regretted everything.
But as much as I regretted it, I did not ask anyone for help.
Centuries of study.
Experience that had lasted beyond death itself.
Knowledge and magic power harnessed through killing and eating countless others.
All of that, and I was still powerless to save her life.
And yet…and yet even then I was selfish.
Because I loved her—just because I loved her—I tried to reach out and take that sun-like smile.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no…
I was such a fool.
And yet.
As I lamented and suffered, unable to do anything…she smiled.
It was a weak smile, lacking her old strength. Still, she smiled at me and said, “Thank you.”
And…
And those were her last words.
After that I believe I went mad for quite a while.
I have no memories of that time. I expect my consciousness wasn’t human, but rather something closer to nature. I melted into the chaotic spirit’s obsessions, capable of nothing but howls of madness.
The next thing I knew I’d abandoned my previous body and had found new flesh to inhabit.
Needless to say, it was her body.
The pale skin, red lips, and raven hair I’d admired for so long became my own flesh.
And in that body, in her brain…I found her memories.
These showed me things I had never known, things she had never told me. Her past. Her feelings.
“Oh, God…”
The words came unbidden.
Uruk’s happy family no longer existed. An opposing clan backed by a powerful country had slaughtered them before her eyes.
Her father. Her mother. Her brothers and sisters. Her family. Her friends. Even her livestock.
Blood and fire and gunshots stole them all.
Orphaned, she’d survived by pure chance. If a slaver hadn’t been passing through the area, she would likely not have survived long.
The slaver had sold the homeless girl to that diplomat, who had given her to me. He’d said to her, “If you do your job right, then this could become your home.”
Only now did I understand what she’d meant by “job.” Mine had been her last chance at a home.
“No…”
Her life with me had given her far more joy than I could ever have imagined. Ordinary days, her simple routine with me…to her, every one of these had been like a precious jewel.
And for good reason.
She’d known.
She’d known sleigh beggy lived short lives.
Before the diplomat had even bought her, an alchemist had recognized her ability and told her what she was. He’d told her how long sleigh beggy usually lived.
I have no idea what that alchemist’s intention was, but when she learned the truth, she’d resolved to live without regrets.
How like her.
Of course she would react like that.
That’s why she’d never feared me. She’d always been ready to die. And because of that, she’d always faced forward, treasuring each and every moment.
When we sat together at the table… When we saw the flowers… Chatting with me about nothing in particular…
All precious to her.
And…
“Please tell me this isn’t true!”
She had loved me.
Not just any love, either. The same kind of love I had felt for her.
And of all things, she had realized that I was in love with her, too.
Until the bitter end, she’d waited with bated breath for me to tell her how I felt. That emotion was carved deep within her flesh.
“It’s too late. It’s all too late. What…what was I even doing?”
I’d been so selfish.
Frightened.
I had never even considered her feelings. I’d been so scared of a hypothetical loss that I had lost her for real.
If I was capable of feeling despair, I felt it then.
If I’d had but a little courage…
If I’d been but a little wiser…
If I’d just faced the truth.
Then maybe…
Then maybe she’d still be smiling at me.
We might still be sitting at that table together.
We might still be able to go outside and see the flowers together.
But I had lacked that courage. I was a fool. I had never faced the truth.
What was lost would never return.
I would never see her smile again.
This was my punishment, and it would be mine until the day I ceased to exist.
***
My tea had gone cold. I looked up at the mage’s face, that long animal skull.
“I look in the mirror every morning. I see myself wearing her face, and I say, ‘Good morning.’ I whisper to the girl in the mirror that I love her, but she does not answer.”
Elias would have to do better than I had done.
I had never told him of my failure, but he would have known the story.
That was the way of mages.
If they knew one thing, they knew everything.
I had never tried to hide my failure, and that was all he’d needed to know it.
To know what had happened, what had gone wrong, and what I should have done.
“I am an evil spirit, resentment roiling around a core of obsession. I had a name once, but the human who bore that name no longer exists. Memories from the time people addressed me by that name are hazy now. Memories of the people I’ve eaten or the ghosts I’ve swallowed are far more vivid.”
Memories of lives from times and places I had never lived sometimes came to me. Occasionally, I mistook them for my own life. Most people would have started worrying about their identity.
But that was just the fact of my existence.
To me, several hundred years ago was as vivid as yesterday. Time’s flow no longer held any meaning.
“So the time I spent with her was everything to me. I am the only remaining proof that she ever existed, and so I will continue to exist until the world ends. That is what I am.”
I looked down at the cold tea, which no longer gave off that pleasant aroma.
“That’s not true,” Elias said.
Mmm?
The mage’s flat denial drew my attention back to him.
“That’s not true, is it, Iron Rust? You’ve turned your back on the truth again.”
“……”
I was at a loss for words. He was right.
I had turned my back on the truth.
There was a price for everything.
That’s all this was, a price.
I should have known that. With the truth laid bare before me, I was briefly silenced.
“Fair enough. Because I could not be happy, I want for someone else to be happy. I hope to take comfort in that. I am jealous as well, for the same reasons.”
Yes.
I envied Elias, who had a still-living Chise.
My girl no longer existed, but Elias’s sleigh beggy lived happily with him.
I hoped their happiness would last forever, yet I envied it.
I wanted to see Elias cry when Chise died.
I wanted to see Chise cry when she realized she and Elias could never live together.
I wanted to believe that such heartache was the way of things.
If not, then why had my girl died? Why must I live, cursing the world from within the prison of my own failure?
Yet I wanted them to smile.
A sleigh beggy, just like mine, living with a mage who, like me, was not human.
“Even so, Elias. All the more so. As someone who failed, I do not want to see you make the same mistakes. That much I can say for sure. Your happiness lies beyond what you fear.”
Have courage.
Don’t fear happiness.
Unlike me, you still have the opportunity and the right.
“You’re leaving?” she called as I left Elias’ home and was nearly at his front gate.
It was Chise. The Black Dog stood by her feet.
“Yes. My business here is done.”
I stared at the girl a moment.
Physically, they did not resemble each other, yet she reminded me of Uruk. Was it because they were both sleigh beggy? Or was it the color of their souls?
“Um, is something the matter?” she asked.
“No. Excuse me. I just remembered something from long ago. If you’ll forgive the question, are you happy?”
The girl was briefly silent before she answered.
Not silent because she was at a loss or due to hesitation.
This was resolve.
“Yes. I’m happy.”
“Good.”
They were similar.
“Goodbye. Be sure to invite me to the wedding.”
“Y-yes…”
This time her hesitation was born of embarrassment.
I turned my back and walked away.
Yes. Have a beautiful wedding.
Make me even more jealous. Make me curse you.
And I’ll celebrate with you.
I’ll wish for your happiness.
I’ll hope you two reach the place we never could.
Those feelings were not a lie.
The End