PandoraHearts ~Caucus Race~, Vol. 2 (7 page)

“Yeah, I got off with nothing worse than bruises; I’m really—”

“Ah-ha-ha. That’s not true.”

Leo contradicted Gerald’s words. He shook his head at him slowly; Gerald still looked perplexed.

“Well, either way, it’s only been postponed. Elliot isn’t likely to forgive you.

“
For Marcel
,” he said, and Gerald’s expression went tight.

“Not with his personality. And…if Elliot won’t forgive you, neither will I.”

His voice was matter-of-fact, but Gerald shuddered, and his face went ashen.

Under that shaggy hair of his, Leo smiled a smile that went no farther than his lips.

“Remember that,
senpai
.”

THREE YEARS AGO, AFTER
SCHOOL ONE RAINY DAY.

Josephine had left her dormitory to buy some tea leaves. As she was walking down the avenue, she caught sight of Elliot Nightray standing in an alley, holding an umbrella.

She was in the third year at the time, and Elliot was two years below her, but she knew about him: As a child of one of the four great dukedoms, he’d been famous ever since he entered the academy. However, she’d never seen him be particularly friendly with anyone.

Figuratively speaking, at school, he was like a rose blooming among wildflowers. His splendor made him stand out, but his thorns made it impossible to get close to him… That type.

However, that morning had been a bit different. Josephine hadn’t been there herself, so she didn’t know the details. She’d heard from a friend that he’d started a fistfight in class. She’d thought it was unusual for him to get involved with anyone that way, but apparently a student who was studying in the same classroom had said something disparaging about his family.

Although they were children of the aristocracy, the
first-years really were still children. No doubt some of them were ignorant of the ways of the world and didn’t know their place.

From what she’d been told, the fight had been nearly one-sided in Elliot’s favor: He’d knocked his opponent down, and that had been that. Josephine had only ever seen him being quiet, and it was difficult for her to imagine, but apparently he’d fought ferociously.

What in the world had the offending student said to set him off that way? She couldn’t imagine.

However— With this, she thought, his isolation at school was bound to grow even deeper.

“Elliot Nightray…”

As he stood there, in the alley, Josephine quietly spoke his name. She wondered what he was doing. Elliot was facing the alley wall, and his expression was blank and cold; she couldn’t read any emotion in it. At his feet sat a small wooden crate.

Hearing a “mew” from the box, Josephine murmured, “An abandoned cat…?”

A cat, abandoned in the rain.

Elliot seemed to be looking at it from under his umbrella.

Involuntarily, Josephine held her breath, gazing intently at the scene. She didn’t realize that her heart had begun to beat just a little faster.

Before long, Elliot reached into the crate and picked up the cat. He hugged it to his chest. Since he was holding the umbrella in one hand, he seemed to have a little trouble holding the cat, and she thought he was probably getting his clothes wet, but he didn’t seem to care.

Ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp ba-dmp.

Josephine’s heart was beating fast.

Not realizing he was being watched, Elliot’s face abruptly softened.
—Heh.

It was a gentle expression he’d never shown at school.

His lips moved, very slightly, as though he was talking to the cat.

You’re just like me, aren’t you?

There was no knowing whether Elliot had really said that.

In fact, he probably hadn’t.

Still, that was what Josephine had heard. Like glad tidings from heaven. A portrait of a juvenile delinquent (or, no, Elliot Nightray), with a sad little smile on his lips, confiding the loneliness he couldn’t discuss with anyone to an abandoned cat.

Josephine felt a poignant twinge, deep in her heart.

It wasn’t love. It was more like…admiration for something exalted.

Finally, Elliot returned the cat to the crate.

Setting his umbrella over it so that the cat wouldn’t get any wetter, he ran away down the alley, not caring that he was getting wet himself. He ran as if he was trying to shake off a lingering regret. The Lutwidge Academy dormitories didn’t allow pets. There was no way he’d be able to take care of it.

Looking into the depths of the alley where Elliot had disappeared, Josephine murmured.

She murmured to the figure that seemed burned into her eyelids. That shape like a flower blooming nobly in the shadows.

“Master……Blue Rose…”

That was it.

The historic incident that became the beginning of the Blue Rose Club.

“…phine-sama? Josephine-sama.”

Hearing her name called repeatedly, she returned from where she’d been wandering in memory. The common room on the third floor of the girls’ dorm. The members of the Blue Rose Club were already assembled there. Josephine, who was a prefect, had used her authority to borrow the room temporarily.

A low glass table sat in the center of the room, with sofas arranged around it in a hollow square.

The table held steaming teacups and a plateful of cookies for light refreshment.

Everything was ready.

“Everyone has arrived, I see. All right. Let’s begin.”

Smiling, Josephine opened the meeting.

“Yes, let’s,” responded ladylike voices, but one girl looked perplexed:

“Why are we meeting here today?”

At the question, Josephine glanced at Matilda, who was sitting quietly in a corner seat.

“Because today’s assembly is a rather special one.”

At the word “special,” a slight stir ruffled the elegant atmosphere. Every face held great expectations. However, Josephine was perfectly composed. The special report—the main dish—must be presented at the proper time.

When Josephine prefaced her remarks with the statement that the news would be revealed last, all the girls looked disappointed.

“Now then. Who will go first…?”

As Josephine looked around, a hand shot up energetically from a seat on the sofa.

“Yes! Um! I’d like to, if I may!”

“Heh-heh, yes, Mia-san. Go ahead.”

Encouraged, the girl called Mia bounced up from the sofa.

She was the only first-year member of the Blue Rose Club, and the newest member of the group. She was a little flighty and tended to chase after anything popular, and this sometimes made her stand out uncomfortably; however, the older students thought of her as a sort of pet and were quite fond of her.

“You have a report, Mia-san?”

“That hasn’t happened in ages.”

In the midst of these and similar comments, Mia puffed out her chest proudly.

“I’ve found something fantastic.”

Something fantastic? Josephine tilted her head, perplexed.
Yes
, Mia nodded enthusiastically; she reached into a paper bag she’d set on the floor, rummaged around in it, then pulled something out. For a moment, nobody knew what it was. The first to identify it was Josephine.

“Is it a blue…bookmark?”

“Yes! Everyone knows, right? About the bookmark in the book Master Blue Rose was reading today, I mean. This is just like that one!”

As Mia held up the leather bookmark triumphantly, cries of “My!” rose up.

“I guess it’s fairly rare; it was rather difficult to find. Still, I managed to buy it!”

“That’s…something Master Blue Rose received from ‘the other’ and uses with great care…”

The girls gazed at it with envious eyes. Words of praise were on all their lips.

“That’s quite marvelously rare.”

“The very best, I should say.”

“Ahhhh, would that I had one.”

“Truly.”

“Truly.”

“Truly.”

“But they’re quite difficult to find, aren’t they?”

In response to the group’s voices, Mia shook her head happily—“No, no”—and reached into the bag on the floor once more. Then she pulled her hand out again, quickly. The girls’ eyes were drawn to that hand. It held several bookmarks. “My, my,
my!
” Several cries of astonishment went up.

“‘Sharing happiness under the auspices of Master Blue Rose’… Is that not what the Blue Rose Club is?!”

Even though she was the youngest member, Mia stated the club’s founding principle eloquently, drawing admiring applause.

Mia began handing bookmarks to each member. The bookmarks didn’t look cheap, and several voices wondered if they hadn’t been quite expensive, but Mia answered cheerfully: “Please don’t worry about it.” As the bookmarks made their way around, one of the girls who held one suggested that if everyone had one, it might be nice to make the bookmark a symbol of membership.

No one objected. Josephine herself agreed that it was a good idea.

It was unanimous. Mia seemed deeply moved that the bookmarks she’d provided were being treated this way.

“—The Blue Rose Emblem.”

Matilda, sitting in the corner, murmured it quietly, and everyone approved of the name as well. Some gazed at their bookmarks in delight, while others hid theirs away in their breast pockets, and still others shut theirs in the volumes of poetry they’d brought with them. The atmosphere in the common room had never been so scintillating.

Watching the scene with a smile of satisfaction, Josephine urged them on: “All right, does anyone else have any news?”

A voice spoke from nowhere in particular.

“Now that you mention it…” said the slightly perplexed voice.

“I hear Master Blue Rose was sighted running around the school today—”

It was a good thing he’d left Leo in the dorm’s entrance hall, Elliot thought.

He was running full tilt, chasing after the white cat, which still had the bookmark in its mouth. In contests of pure physical strength, Elliot outmatched Leo, thanks to his swordsmanship training. If he’d brought Leo along, he was sure they would have lost sight of the cat long ago.

The white cat was agile, and on top of that, it ran easily through places that weren’t well suited to human runners. Of course Elliot chased it, along the tops of walls and over storehouse roofs.

When the white cat ran into a space between two buildings that was too narrow for Elliot, he’d run around to the other side and wait for it. However, maddeningly, he wasn’t able to catch it. By this time, he had no idea where on campus he’d run. Finally, the white cat veered off the path and dove into the bushes.

“……You’re n—……”

He tried to say it aloud, and almost choked.

You’re not getting away
!!

He screamed it inside his head.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Elliot dove in, too. His uniform coat and trousers were covered with leaves. He cut the back of his hand on some sharp weeds. Blood beaded up. He didn’t have the time or energy to feel the pain. He lost sight of
the white cat in the grass several times, but he found it again through sheer grit and tenacity, and he kept chasing it.

“Wa–Wait, you…!”

He started coughing before he was able to get the “little” out.

In contrast to the desperate, frantic Elliot, the white cat ran as lightly as if it were dancing, and it seemed to be enjoying itself.

It might have felt as if it was in the middle of a fun game of tag.

With a terrific leap, the white cat burst from the bushes. Elliot barreled straight ahead as well, running out of the bushes, and there—

He was in that back garden. Small flower beds, a shadowed space. It seemed deserted.

“…………!?”

He hadn’t been far behind the white cat, but he didn’t see it. Gasping for breath, Elliot hunted doggedly for the white cat, radiating a frenzied aura.

“Oh, Elliot-kun—”

A voice spoke behind him. Ada Vessalius’s voice.

Elliot turned; his gaze was sharp enough to cut. “Ahn?” Ada looked as if she’d just reached the back garden herself. Seeing Elliot suddenly plunge out of the bushes had obviously startled her. The sight of Elliot—out of breath, shoulders heaving—seemed to bewilder her.