These Reincarnators Are Sus! Sleuthing in Another World

When Ailn returned to Noué's childhood home, he found Elenira still sitting face down at the kitchen table, as if she'd never left.

"... Did you at least eat something while I was gone, Elenira?" Ailn asked.

"I made soup," Elenira said, sluggish, clearly regretful of every decision she'd made that brought her to this state. She looked up sharply, her glare aimed not at Ailn, but at the empty bottle of veenlyn that had rolled to the far end of the table. "Threw some bread in."

A single drop slipped from the bottle, pattering onto the floor.

It was then that Ailn noticed that Elenira had hung the portrait of Noué above the hearth. Evidently she'd found the time—and the will—to do so while she cooked.

Ailn walked up and peered into the pot.

"Soup is an ambitious word for water, salt, and herbs, don't you think?" Ailn asked, making a face. Looking around the house, he noticed she'd at least taken the time to light some candles before dark.

Elenira didn't respond at first. Instead, she just stared at Ailn, eyes fixed on the leather portfolio tucked under his arm, desperation slowly creeping onto her face.

"Did you get into her vault, Ailn?" Elenira asked. Her impatience had gotten the better of her.

Wordlessly, he drew up to the kitchen table. And when he reached inside the portfolio to pull out Noué's final piece and lay it on the table, she quailed, twisting her face away; her reaction was so strong someone looking in might've thought he was about to strike her.

"I told you I don't need to see it…!" Elenira's voice rose in both volume and pitch.

…But her stomach didn't seem to agree with her sudden movement. And Elenira's hand flapped to her mouth with a slight lurch.

"It's flipped over, Elenira," Ailn sighed. "If you really don't want to see it then just stick it in a drawer without looking. Or throw it into the river or something."

The elf slowly cracked a single eye open. She squinted suspiciously at the table, giving herself just enough visibility to affirm what he'd said.

"What, you think I'd trick you?" Ailn asked.

"It doesn't seem beyond you," Elenira said. She scowled, but it was a scowl with a tremor as she took in the gravity of what was in front of her. "...You really went and did it."

"...I did," Ailn said.

Then, astonishingly, despite everything the portrait must have meant to Elenira—despite the waiting, the longing, and the sorrow that had stretched beyond what could fit into a human lifetime—she focused on Ailn instead.

"You look beat, Ailn," Elenira said. She gave a small, tired smile herself. "...Long day?"

Ailn's gaze stilled for a moment and relaxed. "A lot of long days," he chuckled. "More, apparently, than I can even remember. But you know more about that than me, for sure."

He let the moment rest in the air.

"Cora's gone, you know," Ailn said.

"...The rusalka?" Elenira's eyes shook, but just for a moment, before they settled into a look of pity and resignation.

"I'd been… expecting it for a while now," Elenira admitted. "It's—She's been fading since she met the count's daughter." Her smile turned a little bitter. "But she's been holding on for her, too."

"And here I thought she moved on because I found her final resting place in the vault," Ailn said. He started to fiddle with his wrist.

"Maybe that last bit of closure was what finally loosened her grip," Elenira replied. The skin beneath her eyes creased with bittersweet memory. "She's… an old girl."

"I still don't quite understand why Cora looked like Lumitheia," Ailn said. "To Noué. To us in the antechamber."

"Did she…?" Elenira asked, sounding a bit troubled. "I only ever saw a clump of shadows. Although…"

"Although?"

"There's something about that creature that gave off the same energy as our divine eyes," Elenira said softly. "The same thing that was tethering it to this world."

Her ears twitched, before slowly disappearing—along with the rest of her elfin features.

Elenira looked like Ellen again.

"Noué could see through my illusions at the end," Elenira said, her eyes glowing a gentle gold. "But she wasn't always able to. Her eyes grew strong enough that she could see past all the pretenses."

"So, the progression of paintings in Noué's vault… was her eyes getting stronger?" Ailn murmured to himself. "And what we saw in the antechamber…"

Might have been the opposite—Cora getting weaker.

"Maybe… the power tethering Cora to this world started to dissolve," Ailn said, following the logic Elenira had laid down. "And so did all the illusions. The onion peeled back layer by layer."

He thought of Cora's decaying appearance right before she disappeared. "Until all that was left… was the truth."

The mood was somber, and silence filled the room. But the word 'truth' lingered in both their minds, and their eyes slowly settled on the portrait that Ailn had left on the table, turned over.

"It's a self-portrait, Elenira," the detective said, finally.

Elenira's golden eyes began to shimmer—as bright as Ailn had ever seen them.

"What…?" Elenira's brows knitted in disbelief. Apprehension. And hurt, which she failed to fully repress. Her next words came out in a hitching rhythm. "She drew a self-portrait…? After all that time…"

It said a lot that the short twenty, thirty years that would've marked Noué's life still registered as 'all that time' to the centuries-lived elf.

"Since it was her…" There was a tremor in Elenira's voice, and she swallowed hard, her eyes glistening a bit as a quivering smile rose to her lips. "I honestly started to believe it would just be something stupid."

She rested a hand lightly on the back of the wood and glass frame, as if it were a door that had quietly shut her out.

"She didn't want me to see her self-portrait, huh?" Elenira wondered aloud. It sounded like she couldn't believe it—that Noué could still hurt her, centuries after her death. "It… it makes sense, though. What could be more personal?"

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The gold in her eyes slowly began to fade.

Then, holding back every tear, she took just a few shaky, self-soothing breaths. And soon enough, she seemed mostly fine. The trembling left her voice, and most of the pain left her eyes, along with all the light in them.

And with a start, Ailn realized his emerald eyes had been manifesting.

Elenira gave a sudden small gasp. Holding her hand against her collar, she patted it a few times.

"You should have warned me," Elenira said, with a light laugh. "That felt like a bucket of cold water."

"...Yeah, I heard it was a bit unpleasant. Sorry," Ailn said. Though he was more confused than Elenira about what just happened. His hand drifted unconsciously to one of his eyes, resting on the upper lid.

Then he noticed Elenira's gaze had risen and wandered past him—fixated on the portrait she'd painted of Noué.

One of five portraits, in fact.

But this one—the start of the whole adventure, recovered from Noué's mausoleum, now hanging above the hearth—was now decisively different. Different from how it was. Different from the others.

Noué was malnourished.

She was alarmingly thin. Almost emaciated. Her stance slightly off-kilter, an unnatural flatness in the way her tunic draped over her left leg. The soft, tongue-in-cheek curtsy she performed in every version of the portrait took on a whole new meaning.

She was steadying herself, shifting weight away from her left leg… which was a prosthetic.

And it wasn't the only one. There was a shine in her right eye, but it lacked any real depth. Just a still glint, a clear indication that it was actually glass.

Then there was one more thing about her eyes… They weren't gold. They were brown. Both her real one and her prosthetic. Somehow, the simple common shade of her irises caught him off-guard. They were softer than Ailn expected. If he had to name it…

"Isn't it funny, Ailn? Her personality was so sharp… And she was so impossibly proud…" Elenira mumbled. She gave a small, affectionate chuckle. "But her eyes were puppy brown. And she had that wispy, fairy voice."

Ailn said nothing, as Elenira's gaze naturally settled on the darker parts of her portrait. Her smile tugged, and the corners of her eyes crinkled downward. "That's what… Noué really looked like when I painted her."

"Did she want to hide that?" Ailn asked, glancing casually back at Elenira.

"No," Elenira said. The crease in her eyes deepened. "I did."

She looked at peace, despite her words. It was a pretty raw portrayal, but Elenira didn't flinch at the sight of it. After everything, the elf still had love in her eyes. It was hollow, now. Distant, like she'd finally decided to step away. But she still cared.

"I didn't want her to be remembered like that… " Elenira said softly. "I don't think that was too selfish, do you?"

"...It wasn't, Elenira," Ailn said. "Of course it wasn't."

The elf gave the faintest hum of appreciation at his assurance. Slowly, she seemed to sort herself out. Standing up a bit taller, tucking her disheveled hair out of her eyes.

"Noué lost her leg when she fell from the scaffolding," Elenira said. "...It wasn't immediate. In fact, she just broke it. If she'd just rested, there's a good chance it would have healed on its own." Her eyes lowered, half-lidded with regret, and a soft frown crossed her face. "And we had something even better. The Saintess came by."

At that, Elenira stared into space for a moment, as if she were still processing it. It seemed she still couldn't figure out how things eventually took such a sour turn.

"That's how important Noué was," Elenira said. "Saintess Caela came from Varant and healed her leg."

The elf's expression darkened. "...But Noué went right back to work. And…" Now her tone took on a devastated lilt, matter-of-fact and disbelieving at the same time. "And it broke again. All on its own. Because she still wouldn't take care of herself. She was healed by the divine blessing… but it didn't matter. She wouldn't. Take care of herself."

Anger shone in Elenira's eyes.

"She couldn't even climb the scaffold anymore, but she kept going back into the cave. She slipped. She just… slipped, Ailn. It was a normal black eye, and a small scratch on her cornea." Grief and resentment kept pouring through. "But it never healed. She was already so starved by then. She wouldn't rest. She kept sneaking away, going back to the cave…"

Elenira froze, stunned by her own memory.

"And then… one day I found her."

That was all that needed to be said. And for a few minutes, the both of them waited in silence. Her voice was gone. The simple act of remembrance had stolen her words, and the room was so quiet that Ailn could hear the soft drip of her tears onto the floor.

"The only thing I wanted…" Elenira whispered. "...was for her to eat."

Empty and spent, she let her gaze drop to the portrait Ailn had brought back, lying facedown on the table in front of her.

"Was she… happy, Ailn?" Elenira asked.

There wasn't much of anything in Safi's eyes once Cora was gone. No seeming spark, no glimmer of hope. It was only natural in the wake of grief, but that didn't make it any less worrying—or painful.

She wasn't just silent. She didn't want to talk. She didn't want to share her feelings, or to reach for connection. For so long, Safi had kept away from people for fear of being shut out. But she'd never shut them out herself.

Naomi was stricken, and fretted over her at every moment—from afar, the only place she felt she deserved to be.

Leaning over a railing, Naomi gazed at the river, slumping forward with a gloomy sigh while Kylian gently patted her shoulder in consolation.

"If you worry for her, you should talk to her," Kylian said. "Isn't that sensible enough?"

"'Isn't that sensible enough?'" Naomi mimicked in a petulant tone. She blew hair out of her eye.

Kylian didn't exactly have a response to a reaction this openly childish. So he just sighed and patted her shoulder again.

Evening had long fallen, and the moon was just a fading crescent, but the Sussuro's lanterns kept a well-lit night. Their amber glow washed over the bluegrass, tinting the riverbank teal.

It was a gorgeous night to be in a lousy mood.

"I suppose for the upright knight, all of the world's messes can be waded through with sensibility," Naomi groused, squinting at nothing in particular. "Sometimes it seems to me you must have never had a petty thought in your life, Sir Kylian."

The knight thought it over for a while, then gave Naomi a subtle shrug. "I was somewhat vexed in the antechamber." He admitted after a pause. "After all was said and done, frankly, I found my answer truest still."

"How very mean-spirited," Naomi mumbled, rolling her eyes. Then she drew in a sharp breath. "Oh for… does this bird never rest?!"

As if the Sussurokawa itself were listening, and decided that Kylian needed a proper tutor in true pompousness and vindictiveness, the heron that seemed to plague their every step soared into sight.

'KRAWWWWWW!'

Coming in loud and furious, its manner desperate like a final, heroic charge into the enemy's breach, the heron flew toward Naomi's face, who had nothing for it but a thick shield of water which it flapped relentlessly against.

Stymied, but not defeated, it reared back with a mighty flap of its broad wings, then sharply turned to flank her.

The shield of water shifted to her side to once again block the heron, but it continued the good fight, perching momentarily on the railing to reposition, before it took off in an upward soar.

"Good grief," Naomi muttered in a skyward daze. "It returned with tactics."

She looked up at the heron and gave it a moment of honest regard. Then, with an irritated sigh, she awaited its last attack.

And when it came swooping down…

Naomi crumpled over the rail, falling completely limp. It pecked powerfully at her back, seizing upon the chance.

'Krawww! KRAWWWW!'

"Ow. Agh. Ow," Naomi said. Her voice was flat. And to the observant eye, a faint yet dense film of water could be seen shimmering over her back, quietly shifting to absorb each blow.

When the heron seemed to have satisfied itself—and tired itself out—she continued to lie there in a convincing pantomime of defeat.

It perched on the rail, eyeing her distrustfully. Sluggish and shaking, its throat fluttered as if it were catching its breath.

Then, it stretched its neck back, spreading its wings as wide as it could and puffed up its plumage.

'KRAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!'

The heron was victorious. It took off, once again the mighty king of the river, to fly home in triumph and glory.

And Naomi was still collapsed over the rail, even when the bird had turned into a dot in the distance.

"See here, Sir Kylian. This is my station in life," Naomi drawled sarcastically. "My peer is a heron. No, should I say, it is now my better?"

Then, after a moment, she added with some indignance. "...How is it that the bird never attacks you?!"

It was a good question. And seeing the heron finally fully vanish out of sight, Kylian had the strangest sense that he'd just learned a grand lesson in life.

"I can't help but wonder if…" Kylian paused, wondering if he was about to say something almost insultingly silly. "For all your fears, perhaps you'd do well to approach Lady Fleuve like this heron."

"...I do not think grief responds well to pecking and screeching, Sir Kylian."

"Take it as you will," Kylian sighed. "All I mean to say, Naomi, is that you cut yourself so small, while that bird just left here a dragon."