Spice & Wolf IV (20 page)

The only sound was the turning of pages.

Her evasion of the problem had been very forceful, but she had saved herself and Lawrence both.

She truly was a wisewolf.

On this count, Lawrence had no doubts.

Had the church been a monastery, it would have been time for the morning prayers thanking God for creating the new day.

Of course, it was far too early for the morning worship service.

The only sounds were of the turning pages and Holo’s soft breathing.

Lawrence couldn’t help but feel impressed at the fact that she’d fallen asleep. At the same time, he was a bit relieved that she had.

She had forcibly—so forcibly!—ended the conversation, demanding Lawrence neither say nor ask another thing.

Though she had not answered Lawrence’s question, her actions alone were enough.

After all, they made one thing abundantly clear: Holo did not wish to confront the problem any more than Lawrence did.

If she had changed the subject while the true answer to his question lay within her, Lawrence probably would have been angry. But as neither of them had that answer, he was grateful she had ended the conversation by force.

At the very least, this meant she did not have to come up with an answer right then and there.

Their travels were not over, and they had not arrived in Yoitsu yet.

It was the rare debt that was repaid in full before it came due, after all.

As he thought these things over, Lawrence put down the book he was reading and picked up another volume.

Father Franz had evidently been an intelligent fellow. Within the books, even the lineage of the various gods had been carefully organized, and a glance at the title of each chapter gave one a reasonable idea of its contents. This made the books easy to skim. Lawrence shuddered to think of how difficult this task would have been if Father Franz had simply collected tales at random as he heard them.

However, while flipping through the pages of book after book, Lawrence realized something.

In addition to the normal, common tales of snakes, frogs, and fish, there were many stories of mountain, lake, and tree gods. Likewise, there were tales of gods of thunder and rain, sun and moon and stars.

But stories of bird spirits and beast spirits—there were few
of
those.

In the pagan town of Kumersun, Diana had told many tales that concerned the bear spirit who destroyed Yoitsu. And near the Church city of Ruvinheigen, Lawrence himself had felt the unmistakable presence of a wolf-god not unlike Holo.

And Diana herself was a bird spirit larger than any human.

Given all this, the books should have been filled with beast legends. Yet Lawrence had found not one.

Did the books that they had brought up from the basement simply not happen to contain any such tales?

At that moment, Lawrence’s eye fell on a sentence written on a piece of parchment that was tucked into the book he had just opened.

“It is not my wish to regard the tale of the bear spirit in this book with any kind of special treatment.”

So far, every book Lawrence had looked through had simply been accounts of the tales Father Franz had heard, written in language as dry as any business contract. Having suddenly come upon this sentence in which he felt he could hear Father Franz's own voice, he was momentarily stunned.

“Regarding the stories in the other books—there are many which differ in time and place, but which I believe nonetheless refer to the same spirit. However, this particular spirit is the only one whose stories I have organized so thoroughly.”

Lawrence wavered, trying to decide whether to wake Holo.

He was unable to turn his gaze away from the yellowed page, Father Franz’s handwriting was neat, but at the same time, it seemed somehow excited.

“Is the Pope aware of this? If I am correct, then the God we worship triumphed without a fight. If that is proof of His omnipotence, how could I possibly remain calm?”

It seemed as though he could hear Father Franz’s decisive pen strokes.

The passage concluded: “I do not wish to let bias cloud my view of all the tales. Yet I cannot help but wonder if the pagans of the northlands themselves did not realize the importance of the Moon-Hunting Bear. No, perhaps the very fact that I am writing this means that I am already biased. As I assembled these books, I felt strongly the existence of these spirits. If possible, I hope that one would judge not with the narrow mind of a worshipper of our God, but rather with the open heart of those whose love of God is like a zephyr in an open field. That is why I have ventured to leave this book in among all the others.”

As soon as Lawrence flipped the piece of parchment over, the book’s story began, much like any of the other books he had read.

Should he let Holo read it first? Or should he pretend not to have seen it?

The thought flitted through his mind for a moment, but it was too late for that now—and in any case, it would be a kind of betrayal.

He decided to wake Holo.

He closed the book, whereupon he could hear a strange sound.

Plip, plip, plip-plip
came the small, dry sound.

"...Rain, eh?”

But as soon as he said it, he realized the raindrops were awfully large. Eventually he realized that the sound was of galloping hooves.

It was said that the sound of a galloping horse at night would draw a throng of demons.

When traveling by horse at night, one could never let it run.

Church follower and pagan alike believed this.

But its true meaning was common sense—a galloping horse at night never brought good tidings.

“Hey, wake up.” Lawrence closed the book and tapped Holo’s shoulder, listening carefully.

Judging by the sound of the hooves, there was a single horse, which entered the village square and came to an abrupt stop.

“Mmph...what is it?”

“I have two things to tell you.”

“Neither good, no doubt.”

“First, I found the book with stories of the Moon-Hunting Bear.”

Holo’s eyes widened in an instant, and she looked at the book near Lawrence’s side.

But she was not the type to have her whole attention stolen by a single thing.

Her wolf ears flicked smartly, and she looked back at the wall behind them. “Did something happen?”

“That seems very likely. There is nothing less welcome than the sound of a horse’s gallop at night.”

Lawrence took the book and handed it to Holo.

She took it, but he did not let go.

“I don’t know what you plan to do upon reading this, but whatever thoughts you have, I’d like you to tell me about them.”

Holo did not look up, but gazed evenly at the book. “Hmph," she replied. “I suppose you could’ve easily hidden this book.
Very
well. I promise.”

Lawrence nodded as he stood. “I’ll go look outside,” he said, walking away.

Naturally, the church was dark and quiet, though not so dark that Lawrence’s eyes were useless.

Once he arrived in the living room, there was a bit of moonlight filtering in through the cracks of the window, which improved visibility.

He could see well enough to be able to instantly identify the figure that was creaking its way down the stairs as Elsa.

“I heard the sound of a galloping horse,” she said.

“Any notion of what is afoot?”

He expected she did, otherwise she would not have come immediately downstairs.

“More than I’d like.”

A village like Tereo was too small for the hooves to be from a town lookout coming to warn of a mercenary attack.

It probably had something to do with Enberch.

But had the crisis not already passed?

Elsa trotted over to the window and peeked out through the crack as she had no doubt done many times in the past.

Unsurprisingly, the horse seemed to have stopped in front of the village elder’s house.

“I only know what I have been able to piece together, but judging from the papers on your desk, Enberch should not be able to strike, should they?” said Lawrence.

“A merchant’s eyes are keen indeed. But yes. I believe so myself.

However—”

“If you are going to tell me that the situation would be different if I’d betrayed you, I should tie you up immediately.”

Unintimidated, Elsa looked sharply at Lawrence.

She soon looked away.

“In any case, I am a traveler. If things go badly, my position becomes very dangerous. There are scores of tales of merchants who became wrapped up in local problems and lost everything.”

“So long as I am here, I will not allow anything like that to happen. But please, go and close up the cellar. If there is trouble with Enberch, the village elder will certainly come here.”

“And what of the reason we are here so late at night?”

Elsa’s cleverness was different than Holo’s. Somehow Lawrence felt an affinity with the girl. “...Bring a blanket to the sanctuary.”

“Agreed. My companion is a nun, after all. No argument, then?” Though Lawrence had only wanted to confirm their cover story, Elsa did not reply.

For if she had, she would have been telling a lie.

She was a clergywoman through and through.

“Elder Sem has come out,” said Elsa.

“Understood.” Lawrence turned and went to Holo.

In times like these, Holo’s keen ears were quite useful.

She had already returned most of the books to the cellar and put her robes back on.

“Take that one book with you. We’ll hide it behind the altar,” said Lawrence.

Holo nodded, handing the remaining books one by one to Lawrence, who had descended halfway down the stairs to the cellar. “This should be all of them,” she said.

“Then take the hallway opposite the living room. If you continue around the corner, it should take you to the entrance behind the altar. Head in there, and take the book—”

Holo ran off without waiting to hear the end of the sentence. Lawrence climbed out of the cellar, replacing the pedestal and putting the statue of the Holy Mother back on top of it.

He was nervous for a moment, unable to find the keyhole in the floor, but he managed to locate it, and after locking up with the brass key Elsa had given him, he gathered up the blanket and went after Holo.

Church construction was very similar the world over.

Just as he had expected, the entrance was there, its doors open.

He trotted down the narrow path that he knew should lead to the altar, protecting the candle flame with his hand. Soon his view expanded.