3

Fourier arrived in the gallery nonchalantly, making sure no one was around before he climbed up on the railing and began looking avidly through the garden for the girl he sought.

“Hmm. Not today, either, huh? I make such an effort to come here, and all for nothing. To do such a thing to a prince—that girl is fearless. Heavens.”

Unable to find the one he so longed for, Fourier was full of regret. Ten days had passed since he first saw her there. That day, he had run away because the drumming in his chest had seemed dangerous, but now he hoped to see her again exactly because he wanted to experience that feeling once more.

The ache in his heart had never really gone away. In fact, it was renewed every time he recalled her face. He was convinced that the only way he could find relief was to meet her.

Fourier had never doubted the intuition that guided his actions. He would on occasion sense an answer emerge, for no particular reason, from among countless choices. What he discovered this way always led him down the right path. It had been the same whether in arithmetic and history class, or when deciding a move in Chantrange, a board game played with pawns. As an extreme example, several years earlier, he had even foreseen that a wheel would fall off the dragon carriage his father, the king, rode in.

But all of these were dismissed as mere chance; simple guesses that could not be repeated. He told his teacher, but the man grumbled something about nonsense. Fourier was not so ignorant a child as to press the issue of a insight that made him different from normal people.

“No matter. The girl is what’s important now. If I only knew her name, at least, this would be so much easier…”

His only clue at the moment was that she must be the daughter of some family prestigious enough to be granted entrance to the castle. If he told them when and where he had seen her, the guards and serving girls might have been able to help him.

“But I hate needing things from people. I don’t know why, but I feel it would be rather inconvenient if anyone knew I was looking for her. Hmm…”

The palpitations, the unusual sense that what he was doing was not quite acceptable—all of this mystified Fourier. He didn’t even really know what he would do if he ever found her.

“I suppose I can figure out what I should do after we meet. I think I recall some important person saying that thinking too carefully is just another form of cowardice… Mm!”

As he stood there muttering to himself, suddenly something clouded the edges of his vision. Fourier leaned out over the railing, trying with his eyes to follow the silhouette of whoever was passing directly below the open hallway. He saw a hint of a sleeve the hue of fresh grass.

It was the right color, the one he remembered from that girl’s dress.

“Oops…”

The moment the girl’s image floated through his mind, Fourier felt his foot slip from the railing. He had pitched too far forward, lost his balance, and found himself tumbling out of the gallery. The garden was paved with flagstones. If he hit his head on one, it wouldn’t be pretty.

He was going to pay for this little indulgence with his life…

“Hwah?!”

But as it turned out, no such thing happened. He felt his body sinking into something soft, breaking his fall.

“Bff! Bfaaah! Pft! Bleh! What is this? Is this—dirt?!”

Extricating himself from the soft pile of earth, Fourier spat leaves and mud out of his mouth. He had apparently managed to land in a flower bed instead of on the flagstones; miraculously, he was unhurt.

Looking up, he could see the hallway he’d come tumbling out of. Perhaps it was sheer chance, again, that had kept him from hurting himself despite a fall of nearly two stories.

“Wow. That’s my luck for you. Just goes to show that a little good fortune can get you out of even the tightest spot,” Fourier said with a touch of awe, looking at his muddy palms. He ignored the fact that if he had really been blessed with good fortune, he wouldn’t have fallen in the first place. He jumped out of the flower bed and looked around, thinking that he would have to find a maid to ready a bath for him.

“—”

And there stood the girl, watching him with wide eyes.

She had the identical, beautiful green hair, still tied up, the clear amber irises he remembered, and she was wearing that grass-colored dress. She was exactly the same girl who had been burned into Fourier’s memory.

“Oh… Oh! Ohhh…”

No sooner had this registered than Fourier felt his cheeks start burning, and he found he had lost the ability to speak. His confidence that he would know what to say when the time came had left him in this sorry state.

While Fourier stood there unable even to think, the girl, her eyes still round with surprise, slowly looked up. She looked back and forth between him and the railing—once, twice. Then he realized that she thought he had hurt himself.

“Aw, no need to worry about me! See? I’m not injured in the least! I can see I’ve upset you, but you needn’t worry about it. My body is so tough it’s practically a weapon!”

Fourier was still confused, but he held out both arms in an effort to prove he was unharmed. The girl showed no reaction, but she must have at least understood that he was all right.

Fourier very much wanted to continue the conversation, but he was also all too aware that she had witnessed him in a most unprincely moment, and his feet had a strong desire to carry him far away from that spot. Perhaps he would have to be content with having met her a second time.

“Well, I’m quite busy with a great many things, so excuse me! I bid you good day—Huh?”

He waved and was about to step out of the flower bed, when he found his path blocked. The girl was standing in front of him and fixing him with a sharp stare. She spoke sternly.

“—You think you can weasel out of this with such flimsy excuses, intruder?” Fourier noticed how clear and strong her voice was, befitting her appearance. But astonishment soon replaced that feeling—thanks to the dagger glittering in the girl’s hand.

“W-whoa! A woman like you shouldn’t be walking around with a thing like that!”

“My father doesn’t like it, either, but as you can see, it’s good to have around sometimes. Don’t try anything funny. And don’t underestimate me just because I’m a girl. Just wait until you find out what they do to people who try to break into the castle.”

“Huh? Wha? Hrh?”

The girl’s voice had become razor-sharp, and she showed no sign of responding to Fourier’s attempts to calm her down. No hesitation appeared in her eyes. She really did think he was an intruder.

She couldn’t have been older than he was, and yet she had such courage. No, there was something else.

“—”

Her grip on the dagger hilt was so tight that Fourier could see her fingertips turning white. She had no experience pointing a blade at a person. This was simply what she felt she had to do, while trying not to shake.

Fourier had certainly not expected to be spoken to this way. He had never thought that when he met the girl again, it might be like this, or that this was the attitude she would take toward him. But there was one thing he hadn’t been wrong about—

“You are truly a good young woman, aren’t you?”

It was that he cared about the girl in front of him even more than he had imagined.

The girl’s expression wavered, thrown off by Fourier’s murmur.

“…You can’t trick me. My eyes can see right through lies and ruses.”

“An upsetting response, when I’ve revealed my true feelings. What is it you dislike so much about me? I should like to know!”

“…Do you think I’d trust someone who hides his face, just because he asks me to?”

“Hmm…? Oh! Oh, I see, I see! That was my mistake.”

Fourier finally realized that the reason for the girl’s suspicion was his own fault. He touched his head and found the bandanna he had used as a disguise. He hurriedly removed it, and his golden hair fell around his face. At that, the girl’s eyes grew even wider.

“I see I confused you,” Fourier said. “As you can tell, I am no intruder. I am the fourth prince of this nation, Fourier Lugunica! You may gaze upon my visage.”

Fourier wiped some sweat from his brow as he announced himself, trying to reassure the shocked young woman. Surely her suspicion would vanish, and that smile of hers would bloom like a flower…

“My deepest apologies, Your Highness! Even turning my own dagger upon myself would not atone for this!”

…but of course, nothing was ever that easy.