The music that blended into the apocalyptic atmosphere resonated everywhere.

“Oh, damn it!”

Lil, who was walking and tried her best to only concentrate at Elodie’s back, suddenly changed her direction. 

She turned left.

Elodie belatedly found Lil’s misdirection and shouted.

“You’re not supposed to…”

Unable to raise her voice any further, the maid hurriedly followed Lil. But Lil had no time to care about the maid and quickly averted her eyes, looking for the entrance of the music room.

The quick strokes of music made a low hum of wind which blew ferociously against her left hand reaching for the doorknob. As if expanding the momentum, the sound gradually amplified. 

The closer Lil approached, the harder the music slapped her on the ear. She grabbed the door handle and threw her body into the raging storm…

– Dung!… – 

Ed’s left hand pressed down on the keyboard and stopped. It abruptly became quiet as if she had entered the eye of the storm. As it was the middle of the afternoon, Lil found it hard to adapt to the sudden dark interior for a moment and blinked rapidly. With almost all the curtains drawn, there was only one window that led in some brightness. Lil lowered her eyes to follow the beam of light, her gaze was eventually guided to the cembalo, standing out in white due to the swarm of lights wrapped around it.

Ed’s face was obscured by the lid, the tilted lid stick and the case of the instrument.

Lil, seethed with anger, raised her voice.

“Was that a threat?”

“…”

“Are you threatening me right now?*”

Elodie, who had followed Lil from behind, quietly closed the door and went out as Ed gestured.

Ed gave Lil no answer. He seemed unwilling to show his hidden face. But to Lil, it was rather fortunate, for she didn’t want to confront him yet. Her thoughts were unorganised, and she was afraid of what she would say if she faced him now. But above all, she wasn’t prepared to negotiate with his eloquence. Lil was the one who had the most to gain; from the blueprints of Gualtiero to the release of her crew. In addition, she hasn’t properly reflected on what to offer him in exchange for the lives of over a hundred people or how to fight if a battle would break out and where to draw manpower and resources. Besides, Ed wasn’t even friendly with her and Lil couldn’t get herself to be friendly with him either. 

‘No, I’m not supposed to act friendly, to begin with. It would be premature to do so. But why is this jerk playing such a misfortunate song? What good will it do him to play Love Song No. 5, a song written by Count Ior, who lost his lover and then killed himself?’ 

Lil grabbed the hem of her dress with her sweaty palms as her shawl clung to her sticky back and shoulders. She had entered the music room impulsively, in the heat of the moment and hastily spewed her words. Otherwise, she didn’t know what else to say, there was no other way to explain her behaviour. But, the fact that she was still here, right in front of him, less than a day later, indicated that she was being swayed by Ed’s emotions. Linhardt’s reprimanding gaze from the night before haunted Lil as well. That was why she came into the storm, unable to further ignore her guilt, hoping to talk with him about it in one way or another. And even though Lil arrived at this disaster, it felt surreal that she found herself facing Ed this very moment.

‘I can’t believe myself…’

“I’m sorry.”

“…”

The sentence she had been holding in all this time finally came out like a long-held breath. Lil shut her eyes tightly. Ed’s lies enraged her, so saying this to him felt like betraying herself. And to Lil, betraying herself meant betraying her crew, who were waiting for her somewhere…

“I shouldn’t have told you to hang me, too. I admit it was an unintentional slip of the tongue.*”

As the chair was pushed back with a grinding sound, the wine bottle hit by the chair’s leg rolled over. The moment Ed stood up from behind the cembalo, it became clear to Lil that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He was dressed in a robe, but it was unbuckled. Although flustered at first, Lil soon found it rather funny that she took a step back for the sole reason of seeing the man’s naked upper body.

Ed, standing in the dim light, glanced down at Lil. The latter instantly shuddered as she remembered her own appearance in a dress and her long braided hair with flowers attached to it. It might not be the first time he’d seen her dressed as a woman, but now it was unbearably awkward. Lil even felt a little ashamed that she had dressed up as much as she was when she came to see Ed. The situation could easily be misunderstood and explained in a way that she has dressed up for him.

Ed, who seemed aimless at first, started walking. Lil thought he would stop a few steps ahead, but he approached her without knowing the end. Even when he was close enough for the smell of alcohol to waft up, he didn’t stop. As Lil contemplated whether to pretend to be calm or avoid it, the shadow cast on the nape of her neck already pressed her down. She felt suffocated. Sensing his intentions, Lil winced and quickly tightened the shawl around her shoulders. Unfortunately, his hand gripping her waist slid onto her back so smoothly that her efforts were in vain. His fingertips running up her spine were hard as if he was trying to push her into his arms. As his drunken body leaned towards her, Lil pressed his shoulders to prevent him from coming any closer.

Or… to avoid getting caught.

But Ed was skilled. As soon as Lil’s waist belt loosened and slipped down her skirt, he grabbed the dagger stuck between the knots. 

Ed lowered his eyes to check it.

“You were hiding something cute.”

“…”

“Are you going to kill me?”

“If only I could.”

“Was that apology just now only bait you threw at me to get my guard down?”

The dagger that Ed let go of, fell to the floor with a loud thud.

“No. But what can I do? I hate you. I might be sorry for what I’m sorry for. But if I don’t like you, I’ll truly despise you.”

“Is that all you have to say?”

“…”

“Then, why did you come in?”

“I need to talk to you.”

“Then you should be polite.”

Lil snorted and put her hand on her left forearm, taking out the two daggers she had tucked between her smock and her outer dress before throwing them behind Ed’s back. Ed raised an eyebrow. Simultaneously, Lil too raised her eyebrows and shot at him.

“…What?”

Instead of responding, Ed waited patiently. The muttering Lil eventually pulled out another dagger which she had planted on her right chest and threw it away as well.

“There’s one more left.”

“There’s none.”

“Should I throw it away for you, then?”

“From where?”

“Are you acting like you don’t know?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

Out of nowhere, Lil’s body tilted. While trying to regain her balance by groping the wall behind her, Lil looked down at the leg Ed held up. Her shoe, which dangled dangerously from the tips of her toes, fell off after being tapped. Even though the only thing he had done so far was grab her leg, the action itself was enough to roll Lil’s dress up to above her knee. 

As the flesh clenched in his damp palm became soggy, Lil gave a meaningless warning.

“Do you want to die?”

“I don’t have the hobby of getting hurt twice. So don’t worry about me, you won’t catch me off guard again.”

“Is that so?… Are you sure?”

It was a clearly pointless provocation. Ed, who ignored Lil, held her leg with one hand and used the other to lift up the hem of her skirt. His hand then crept up her stockings and passed her knee. Lil tensed and drew back, but at the same time, Ed drew closer and pressed against her body.

“But if I do…”

“…”

Ed’s fingers wrapped around the dagger.

“…What are you going to do?”

Groping for the garter, Ed pulled at it as if tearing it off. With the ribbon torn, the dagger fell to the ground. The sound of the metal colliding with marble broke the silence. Ed’s stoic face gradually began to heat up. A thick vein ran along his neck, from his collarbone to his chin, and the sound of grinding teeth was faintly audible through his tightly closed lips. 

Lil thought to herself.

‘If I get hit now, I’m done for.’

When Ed’s body came closer, Lil considered getting out but quickly gave up on that. Instead, she flicked his hand away, which was still holding up her skirt.

Ed inadvertently lowered his hand, paused, and hardened his eyes. Lil assumed he was flustered by the lace-encrusted light pink garter ribbon in his hand. It was actually kind of amusing for her to see.

‘Ed was probably expecting something like a leather sheath underneath my skirt, but definitely not a garter belt.’ 

Lil lifted the corners of her mouth into a sneer.

“Do you like it?”

“…”

Now that they were already in this position, Lil raised her leg a bit further and brushed Ed’s chest with her stocking-wrapped toes. The way she rubbed his bare chest clearly tickled him and he eventually lowered his eyes with an expression similar to when he discovered the garter. The touch of her white stocking drawing circles on his skin was stimulating. 

Lil whispered to Ed, who was frozen stiff.

“…Do you enjoy rummaging through a woman’s skirt and finding something like that?..”

– – – – –

References:

“Are you threatening me right now?” = The threat Lil talks about is from the story behind Love song no. 5. Lil thinks that by playing that song, Ed is threatening to hang himself too, just like the musician did.

“I shouldn’t have told you to hang me, too. That was an unintentional slip of the tongue, I admit it” = This sentence has nothing to do with the song, Lil refers here to the Gualtiero vineyard, that Ed should hang her head like a grape.