Spring Log III

by Isuna Hasekura

  Its bitter and sour taste was unique, and one either hated it or loved it.

  “You really thought about it…Miss Hanna isn’t so fussy about rye bread.”

  Different types of grain produced completely different types of bread. The lowest among them was oats, which produced something that was not entirely bread, and at times even the horses ate them. The highest quality was of course wheat, which made soft and sweet bread.

  In between those two was the black bread made from rye, but it was hard and bitter and not very tasty, so it was often mixed in with wheat flour. The reason why a bathhouse that only housed the rich had such a dark bread was because the guests, who indulged in every luxury possible, occasionally observed moderation as a way to atone for their sins.

  “I swear…Who would’ve thought that the wisewolf, of all people, was secretly brewing and drinking her own alcohol?”

  Holo recoiled as though she had taken a hit but bounded back immediately.

  “You fool! I have set my wits to work so that it does not harm your wallet!”

  “Even though you were roasting and eating an onion, which we don’t look too closely after, on the stove on your own? And oil from the south sounds like olive oil. That stuff’s expensive, since it traveled such a long way.”

  He found it maddening yet that she ate it with herbs. It most certainly sounded delicious.

  In the end, instead of reflecting on the scolding, Holo pouted sullenly.

  Perhaps it was because of how she was the avatar of a wolf who lived in wheat and governed over its harvest that she was so attached to food.

  “Sigh…Ever since Myuri left, I thought we’d get a bit of peace back to the bathhouse…”

  Their only daughter, Myuri, was like an impatient puppy, who put all her energy into pranks at every chance she could get.

  Holo also had to preserve her dignity as a mother before her daughter, so she had shown composure that suited the wisewolf name.

  But Myuri had chased after the young Col, who had been helping out at the bathhouse, and left on a journey.

  Holo’s motherly guise was peeling away day by day, and the Holo who had traveled in the back of the cart had returned.

  She pestered Lawrence for good food, diligently maintained her tail at every chance she had, and tried drinking as much alcohol as she could each night. She fussed about waking up in the morning, sleepily closed her eyes before the fireplace at dusk, and reached out for him to carry her back to their room.

  He, of course, could not allow her to do all that. They simply lacked the manpower once Col and Myuri left, so Holo was doing her fair share of work.

  Ordinary days continued as there were no significant arguments or disturbances.

  Holo had said she was afraid of forgetting these ordinary days, despite how happy they were. But they had solved this problem by giving her a pen and ink and paper.

  And so, it was all settled, everything was peaceful, the family was safe, the business flourishing…Or so he had thought, and now this.

  Lawrence was more puzzled than he was annoyed. Is there still something that’s bothering her?

  No matter how forward she was with her demands, her utter charm made him feel as if he were the unreasonable one for not yielding to her every whim.

  And yet, it was clear that she had written of other misdeeds as well. There was no doubt that a number of further offenses were recorded within these pages.

  Why did she do it?

  It was not like Holo to leave such foolish evidence in the first place.

  Ever since she had started writing these documents, she seemed to not want anyone else to look, perhaps out of embarrassment, so he had respected her wishes and refrained. Perhaps she was relieved to have gotten away with it and proudly jotted it down like some kind of badge of honor.

  Lawrence felt less anger than he did sadness. He had not thought Holo to be so mean-spirited.

  He wanted to bake and eat the onion with her. Cracking open the clay and waiting with bated breath to see how it turned out sounded like so much fun. The kvass would have tasted much better had they and Selim and Hanna all drunk it together. He would have enjoyed brainstorming ways to brew it cheaply and deliciously.

  He thought Holo knew that well.

  But once his thoughts reached that far, it suddenly dawned on him that Holo might still have some troubles that he was not aware of.

  He could not wholly say that she did not have the tendency to gleefully keep all the good food to herself, but it was a different story altogether if she were brewing and drinking alcohol in secret alone. What if it was a distraction from something she could not tell him? What if she detailed all these signs on paper, as her own style of code, to remind him of special feelings she could not tell him directly?

  With those considerations in mind, Lawrence felt as though he understood Holo’s actions. He should imagine how she would act if she were sipping on a bitter, sour drink like kvass all on her own. He could not imagine it was a very enjoyable drink. He should have noticed earlier.

  Maybe what she needed now was not a scolding but a cuddle?

  Even if she really had dug up a mud-covered onion from the oven, coated its soft, baked body in minced herbs and olive oil, and finally coated it all in a sprinkling of salt and ate it…Wait, ate it?

  He changed his mind: No, there was definitely something strange here.

  Lawrence sort of understood if she craved things in secret to distract herself from her troubles. Drinking in frustration was a prime example of that. But would she not be perfectly content to prepare herbs and olive oil and even a sprinkling of salt with such attention to detail? Holo would have been grinning no matter how he thought about it.

  Lawrence looked straight at Holo. Nothing quite added up.

  He squinted at her, and his mouth twisted in annoyance.

  At last, he heaved a massive sigh.

  “Hey, Holo.”

  She sulked, as though wishing he would leave her alone, and gave him a sidelong glance.

  Lawrence scratched at his bangs.

  “Everything you’ve written here is a lie, isn’t it?”

  Holo’s wolf ears and tail, which had been drooped somewhat lazily, stood on end.

  “I read this and get angry, tell you I’m going to confiscate the kvass, then start searching around the chimney. But I don’t find anything. I ask you, What is the meaning of this? Then, like a drenched cat, you start shaking, insisting you don’t know. Then I keep pressuring you for more answers. Then what happens?”

  Holo, whose eyes were closed as she listened, took a deep breath as though to stretch, then exhaled.

  Finally, she smirked.

  “Then I would chuckle.”

  “…”

  Lawrence stared at her grumpily, and Holo began laughing, her shoulders shaking as she playfully embraced him.

  “Do not be so angry. I had no intentions of tricking you to tease you.”

  It was a humble smile, one that was searching for mediation, but Lawrence responded coolly.

  “I’m not so sure about that.”

  “Wha—…You fool!”

  Holo stomped on his toes.

  But it seemed she was reasonable enough to reconsider that; since he doubted her words, she had done just enough wrong that he would doubt her herself. Reluctantly, she explained.

  “Hmph. As I began to write down my daily activities, I found myself enjoying writing quite a bit. That being said, ’twas not enough to write about every day, so I began to write down what I would imagine would be fun.”

  Lawrence looked at the paper and wrinkled his nose.

  “All this?”

  “Well…about half.”

  Though she appeared calm and composed, her ears and tail clearly indicated that she was slightly embarrassed.

  Becoming completely absorbed in writing fiction was nothing but a pastime for noble girls who had too much free time in their manors. Lawrence sort of understood how Hol
o felt, not wanting him to read what she wrote.

  And yet, Lawrence himself had overlooked something.

  “I guess I was supposed to realize you don’t have such luxurious breakfasts in the first place.”

  “’Tis nothing but how pitiful I am, how starving I am, when I write about how much I wish to eat it…”

  She even pretended to wipe away tears from the corners of her eyes as she said this, but the reason why she never ate the previous night’s leftovers for breakfast the following morning was because there were no leftovers—she always devoured everything on her dinner plate.

  “And what about selling the vinegar wine for a high price?”

  “’Tis real. Though it was a drunken guest who spilled it after barely a sip, however. My little trick, spoiled.”

  Then he may have counted his copper wrong and given her too much.

  “And the kvass? You didn’t actually make it?”

  Lawrence probed for the truth, and Holo swiftly averted her gaze.

  “Hey, come on…”

  “I—I did not make it! I simply asked for directions how!”

  As he studied her closely, she glared back at him.

  Holo certainly had enough pride as a self-proclaimed wisewolf.

  It did not seem like she was lying.

  “…There are days we bake the black bread for the guests who fast on a whim, do we not? But they never finish it. I wish to tell them to imagine themselves in our shoes, having to feed on their leftovers!”

  “Oh yeah, taking care of it would be easier that way…”

  “Mm. And…I honestly did try it once, but I failed. Well, ’tis not a lie to say I did not actually make any.”

  “…”

  He looked at her, slightly vexed, and she tilted her head with a grin, like Myuri did when she was dodging a question.

  “To eat such a delicious meal first thing in the morning, then to have a delightful snack whilst doing tiresome work, and to even have a drink—is that not the ideal day? I wish to spend days such as those. Isn’t that so, dear?”

  She squeezed him again and rubbed her face on his chest, fawning on him. Her tail wagged the way it did when she was in a good mood, so Lawrence’s shoulders drooped.

  “I’m the luckiest man alive to have married someone so humble and with such modest desires.”

  “Eh-heh. Indeed, indeed.”

  Lawrence wondered for a moment how much she understood his sarcasm, but this was Holo—of course she caught on.

  He was not sure if he should be perturbed by her usual demeanor or just force out a smile.

  He wrapped his arms around her one more time and spoke.

  “So first, the onion.”

  “Hmm?”

  “You’re keeping a log of the days you spend in this bathhouse to read a looong time from now, right?”

  Holo opened her eyes wide, and the hair on her ears and tail puffed up.

  “And won’t eating onions make you really sick?”

  When he asked her this with a mischievous smile on his face, Holo pouted and stomped on both of his feet.

  “I am not a dog!”

  Unbothered, Lawrence ignored her and shrugged.

  “And the kvass will help make taking care of that bad dark bread a little easier, and I understand wanting a treat after taking care of the ash and cleaning the soot since it’s so much trouble.”

  Holo still looked at him doubtfully after being teased so, but she finally smiled in agreement.

  “There is no greater gain than turning the dreadful into the enjoyable. It must be the secret of having fun every day.”

  “Mm.”

  They smiled at each other as Holo’s tail flapped cheerfully, and Lawrence started again.

  “Well, let’s leave the onions and the kvass for tomorrow and get to bed now.”

  It was rather late. It had reached an hour where everyone was sleeping soundly, even in the late nights of Nyohhira.

  With his hands wrapped around Holo, he lifted her slender frame and carried her to the bed.

  His feet soon stopped because Holo planted herself in place.

  “Holo?”

  “Fool.”

  She slipped from his grasp.

  Then, ignoring Lawrence’s befuddlement, she gleefully put on the bandanna and sash she wore to conceal her ears and tail whenever she left the room.

  “You are a merchant who would give his life for money, are you not?”

  The moment the thought I have a bad feeling about this… crossed his mind, Holo readily tugged at his arms.

  “Time is money. And there are so many things to do for my ideal day.”

  She cradled Lawrence’s arm as she pulled him, motioning to the desk with her chin.

  There on the desk were the papers she had been glued to, writing both day and night.

  Lawrence directed his gaze back to the girl beside him from the bundles of paper, and she gave a wide, deliberate grin.

  “…We’re not going to actually make it all a reality, right?”

  A tinge of mischief colored Holo’s expression as one of her wolf fangs peeked out from beneath her lips and a dangerous light glinted in her bright, reddish-amber eyes.

  “I am Holo the Wisewolf, who lived in wheat, controlled its harvest, and was at one time worshipped as a god. Prophecies and the sort are highly valued in human society, no?”

  If their daughter Myuri was the type of wolf to run straight at her prey at full speed, then Holo was the kind to attack from behind under the cover of night.

  “Or is it that you are all right with me reading this alone to myself in the far future, wishing I had done such and such with my dear…as I weep?”

  “Erk—”

  There was Holo’s usual selfishness.

  If he were to refuse outright, then she would trick him as she usually did into thinking he was the narrow-minded one.

  Well? Her red eyes looked straight at him, brimming with confidence.

  Lawrence resisted for a while, but her hand gripped him even tighter, and he gave in.

  Because once he saw the joy on Holo’s face, that happiness would in the end become his own, too.

  “However.”

  Lawrence told himself that he was wiser now. “You have to help me as well, in order to clear up all the rumors in the village.”

  Holo did not age and would always remain in the form of a young girl. Similar rumors might spread in the future.

  Lawrence was still much too young to say that it was all right if only they knew the truth.

  And his self-respect as a man was also on the line.

  “Eh-heh.”

  Holo conceded like a collapsing heap of flour and chuckled.

  “Very well. You are a boy, after all.”

  She took his hand, sniffed his palm, and kissed the knuckle on his little finger.

  “I shall act well enough to make it seem like I am in love with you,” Holo said. Lawrence pulled his arm in and her along with it.

  “Not so that it seems but so that they know.”

  Holo blinked at Lawrence’s dejected expression.

  “No, seems like I am in love with you is the correct wording. For ’tis you that is in love with me.”

  “Really? Who is it that gets grumpy the moment I become busy, pestering me to spend time with them?”

  “Wha—?!”

  As they bickered back and forth, Holo and Lawrence left the bedroom together.

  Their faces contorted sarcastically as they digged at one another, pouring salt into each other’s wounds—but they quietly closed the door behind them and walked down the hallway hand in hand.

  “’Tis why you are nothing but a fool, even after all this time!”

  “The wisewolf herself is going to cry, considering she doesn’t seem to know me at all.”

  As they walked through the dark house without so much as a candle, Lawrence recalled the time when he first met Holo.

  They spent many nights together
on that small cart. When they argued back then, they would truly grow angry with each other, their fights so intense that looking back on it now made him wonder why things got so heated.

  For better or for worse, he could no longer fully recall how he felt back then.

  The passing of the months and days was a mysterious thing, and all his past experiences enveloped him like the layers of blankets under which he slept. Underneath these layers, he could weather any cold, and no blade would be able to pierce deep enough to reach him. He was confident that nothing would ever come between him and Holo.

  At the same time, in exchange, he felt a sense of loss. The feelings he so openly expressed back then now only existed in space somewhere in a faraway, distant world. He longed for them and felt sad that they were no longer with him.

  But only a fool mourned the number of coins lost from one’s wallet from shopping.

  As long as the goods purchased were worthwhile, then the spent coins were nothing significant.

  “One would be too few, yes? Here, hold it. I shall fetch the oil pot.”

  They crept into the food storehouse, and Lawrence laughed as he held the two or three onions that Holo handed him.

  “This definitely isn’t enough.”

  Any typical amount of preparedness would not be enough to enjoy all the time he received with Holo.

  “Get the ale cask while you’re at it.”

  Holo’s eyes gleamed visibly through the darkness.

  “’Tis your fault, after all. You shall be the one to explain to Hanna.”

  Lawrence was the master of the bathhouse, but the kitchen was Hanna’s territory. Even Lawrence could not escape a scolding if he pilfered food from the kitchen.

  “It’d be obvious whose fault it was if she saw you stumbling around with a hangover even if I did lie, wouldn’t it?”

  Holo pouted angrily, but the air escaped her closed lips and she cackled.

  “’Tis a challenge, then.”

  “Alcohol isn’t something you drink during a challenge.”

  “Oh? Are you running away?”

  “A gentleman takes the blame for their partner.”

  He and Holo, who bit her lip and grinned, prodded at each other.

  Lawrence felt like he was ten, twenty years younger as they played around like children.

  Like a bandit whispering to his partner, Lawrence said, “Hey, c’mon and get the goods ready. We don’t wanna be found.”