Luman was sharp enough to guess what Ren was thinking just from the way his back flinched. He was probably curious what Temar and Luman were talking about. But this time, Luman decided to pretend he didn’t notice. It was a little disappointing that Ren was only curious about his brother. A bit of sulking on his part. Ren, of course, had no idea.
“Ren! They’ve got tanghulu here!”
“What’s tanghulu?”
“My God, you don’t know what tanghulu is? Come here!”
Jepeto caught Ren by the hand and dragged him over to the stall selling tanghulu. Without even asking what the others thought, he ordered four of them, and before long each of them—Ren, Jepeto, Temar, and Luman—had a skewer in hand. The strawberries had been coated in hardened sugar, and when they gripped the wooden sticks, the sugar stuck tackily to their fingers.
Apparently it looked good enough that Ren didn’t need Jepeto to talk him into it. He bit into the tanghulu with his front teeth, crunching down eagerly. The sticky sugar clung to his teeth and stretched in strings. Jepeto and Ren looked at each other’s front teeth and burst out laughing. Temar, who had only been watching, finally took a bite of the sugary sweet after Luman pressed him into it. It was far too sweet for his taste, but he didn’t show it and finished it cleanly. It was a time sweeter than tanghulu.
The four of them ran all over the festival.
The only reason they were able to enjoy it so thoroughly that day was Jepeto’s enthusiasm. He had carefully looked up the events, the times, and all the famous food stalls in Tempesto Village that you absolutely had to try, so all they had to do was follow him around. Even Ren, who had seemed oddly sullen at first, started getting swept along by Jepeto and trying one delicious thing after another, and once he got excited enough, he even started tugging Jepeto along first.
Luman and Temar stayed solidly behind the two of them to make sure they didn’t get swallowed by the crowd. Whenever someone looked about to stumble into them, they caught the person and set them straight again. When anyone tried to sidle close and pick a pocket, they sent them off in silence after one vicious warning look.
Whenever Ren showed any sign that his legs were hurting, Temar slung him onto his back. At the sheer forcefulness of doing that without so much as asking Ren first, Luman whistled. Thanks to that, Ren spent the whole time with his face bright red. There was even a brief little commotion when Jepeto took Ren’s temperature for a moment, but since it had only gone up from excitement, Ren was able to enjoy the festival to the fullest.
It was the first time Jepeto had ever seen Ren smiling the whole time without getting irritable once, and though he didn’t make it obvious, he felt deeply proud and strangely amazed inside. Luman and Temar felt exactly the same.
Jepeto, who knew all sorts of random things and had a mild temperament but was also shameless in his own way, got along with snappish Ren surprisingly well. Whenever it looked like trouble was about to start, Jepeto would dart in like an arrow and crush the other side with even greater shamelessness, or else put on a pitiful face and coax Ren out of fighting. Since none of it escalated beyond the kind of thing that could be brushed off lightly, Luman and Temar simply watched.
Both of them could feel that Ren had needed a process like this.
Only now did they realize that their own way of solving things had been somewhat too forceful.
Watching Jepeto left them with rather complicated feelings, but even so, there was no denying that this was a peaceful time. It was a warm, easy stretch of time, passing like ordinary people among a crowd again after so long. Just watching those two together, getting along like boys their own age, was enough to make them lose track of time. The noise and heat of the festival showed no sign of cooling, and all kinds of lights and performances kept going without end. Before they knew it, deep darkness had fallen over the village.
“Drink up!”
“I shouldn’t have bet on Richard! Damn it, ptoo!”
“Hahaha! What did I tell you? I said Seka might look like some pretty-boy parasite, but he sure can use a sword!”
“So is Seka on a date with Roshinna right now?”
As pitch-black night settled in, the village lights only shone more brilliantly. The lanterns hanging from the stalls and the lamps strung up around the square flickered beautifully. Ren had pushed his hood all the way back now. Everyone was drunk on alcohol and excitement, with no special interest in other people. The whole village street filled Ren’s clear eyes. Without realizing it, he started humming along to the sound of the instruments. Jepeto, who had been chattering nonstop until then, subtly watched him and listened to Ren’s humming.
Watching the two of them, Temar suddenly spoke.
“I think this might be what it’s like to have a younger brother.”
“Out of nowhere?”
Luman asked around a mouthful of gum he’d bought earlier, chewing noisily.
“What do you mean?”
Temar didn’t answer. He only kept staring at the back of Ren’s head. When Luman smacked his arm lightly, Temar finally turned his eyes toward him. Meeting those deep reddish-brown eyes, Luman found himself thinking again that maybe he really ought to improve this idiot’s communication skills before he left.
And then it hit him—damn it, he really didn’t have much time left.
Unlike what he’d told Ren, that they should leave on the third night after watching the fireworks, Luman actually had to depart at dawn that very day. Once he counted the dates, he realized he would barely avoid looking shameless if he left at dawn. In truth, he only had tonight and tomorrow to teach Temar anything at all, or to have any serious conversation with Ren.
“Temar. Mind if I give you some serious advice?”
“I’ll pass.”
After choosing his words for a moment, Temar answered in a blunt voice. Luman, who had known him a long time, could tell he was annoyed. Shaking his head, Luman gripped Temar’s arm hard.
“Why.”
“You need advice, Temar. So shut up and listen. When you talk, don’t just blurt out whatever’s in your head exactly as it is—explain it in a way the other person can understand. If you cut off the context of what you were thinking, nobody’s going to understand a damn thing you say. I mean stop lopping off the head and tail of what you’re saying and speak properly. Got it?”
“.......”
With his quiet face and rugged, masculine look, Temar usually came off stoic, but today he looked especially stupid. Luman felt like his chest was going to seize shut.
“God. This idiot, seriously......”
“Feels like I’m being insulted.”
“No. It’s not enough. Temar, are you some kind of machine-person that only acts human around strangers? Even Fiore in the royal palace is probably more human than you.”
Fiore was the first humanoid mechanical attendant made through magi-engineering, whose main duty was tasting food for poison. The word “machine” itself had only become widely used after Fiore’s creation. Most people still wouldn’t understand it, but nobles sometimes used the term.
At this point, Luman decided there was nothing he could fix tonight. Rather than souring the mood by stewing over it for no reason, he chose to hear Temar out, at least for now. The fact that Temar had brought it up at all meant that, for someone like him, he must have spent a good while agonizing over it inside.
“So. What were you trying to say earlier?”
“That other people having a good kind of interest in Ren.”
Luman nodded slowly. Was he saying it was fascinating? Admirable?
“It pisses me off.”
“......What?”
Did I hear that right?
Luman stopped where he stood, suddenly doubting his own hearing. Jepeto and Ren drifted farther ahead by the second. Temar watched the stall Ren had stopped at, then turned back to Luman.
“What kind of bullshit is that, ‘it pisses you off’?”
Not bothering to hold back the curse, Luman stared straight at Temar. His golden eyes flashed as he looked at him like a beast of prey.
For some reason, Luman was angry. If your little brother gets good attention from other people, shouldn’t you, as the older brother, be happy for him? Shouldn’t you congratulate him? Was that really something an older brother should say?
“Say it, you bastard. I’m asking you. What the hell do you mean?”
Luman couldn’t understand it. He barely held himself back from grabbing Temar by the collar, his hand clenching into a fist instead.
Temar’s eyes wavered. He looked like he didn’t understand it himself.
At that expression, the strength drained from Luman’s hand.
“Hoo.”
I got worked up.
Luman let out a breath and swept a hand back through his hair. Temar’s lips moved slightly. When he spoke, his voice had sunk low and quiet.
“Someday, he’ll make a family with someone.”
“.......”
Luman lost his words.
So that was what he’d been trying to say. It was an answer Luman had never expected. The shock hit him so hard it felt like being beaten over the head with a bucket on. For a moment, he felt dizzy.
I see. Ren too, someday, with someone......
Was that why Temar had looked so terrifying when Tommy confessed to him?
Luman touched his own face. He couldn’t tell what expression he was making. Even when he tried to force his stiffened facial muscles to move, a smile wouldn’t come easily.
Right. It does piss me off.
Luman forcibly pressed down the boiling in his chest. On that snowy day, he had already admitted to himself that he felt something special for Ren. But he still hadn’t given that feeling a name. He had felt that he shouldn’t. Ren hated heroes so much that Luman didn’t want to burden him with anything at all.
Now that he understood the disgust Temar was talking about, Luman realized the reason he himself had gotten so worked up just now was much the same.
Because he himself had a good kind of interest in Ren.
If Temar rejected other people, Ren would follow what his brother wanted. Luman had gotten angry because he was afraid he himself might fall into that category too. He laughed ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ bitterly at himself.
Then what about Temar?
Luman narrowed his eyes and studied him.
Was this some horribly twisted form of brotherly love? Remembering the way Temar lost his reason every time Ren collapsed, Luman began to feel genuinely uneasy about the relationship between Temar and Ren. The problem was not simply bad communication and piled-up misunderstandings between them......
Luman looked into Temar’s dark reddish-brown eyes, heavy and still, and thought of Ren’s smile. Naturally, a smooth smile rose to his lips. Wearing a smile beautiful enough to be dazzling, Luman spoke.
“Well, of course. That’s exactly how it should be.”
He couldn’t make any reckless conclusions yet, but whatever it was, it would be better to stop it before it spread any further.
That went for himself as well.
