Chapter 513

Chapter 513

Thesaya spoke in a near whisper, and Ian’s gaze had already sunk deep with thought.

She tilted her goblet slightly, curling her lips into a wry smile. "You seem very surprised. But as you can see, in the end, I won, Ian."

Only then did Ian extend the bottle and begin pouring wine into her goblet as he replied, "I think I need to hear the history of that victory in a little more detail."

"Really? Is that okay? You don’t like long stories, Ian," said Thesaya, her face brightening.

A faint, wry smile touched Ian’s lips. "For someone who says that, you sure clung to me for a long time."

As he poured wine into his goblet, he added casually, "Besides, I’m the one who sent you back into the arms of your enemy."

"So you feel responsible? Hmm… in that case, maybe it’s better if I just don’t say it. Just kidding," Thesaya said with a smile on her lips.

She then roughly wiped her face with her palm and continued, "From the moment I first saw that old woman, I felt disgusted. It was like I hated her on instinct."

Right to the main point, as if she’s been waiting.

In the meantime, Thesaya, having moistened her lips with wine, said, "Her tone and the look in her eyes weren't very pleasant either. Plus, she kept testing me, trying to confirm if I really couldn't remember anything."

She had already crossed one leg over the other.

Ian frowned slightly, his fingers tightening around his goblet. "You revealed that you lost your memories?"

"Yes. From the very beginning. I said I seemed to be a member of Erenos, so they should let me check the family register. Or else I would leave."

Thesaya nodded, a slight smile curling one corner of her lip.

"If it were me, I wouldn’t have let someone like me in. But I guess they didn’t want to lose a potential elder. Or maybe they wanted to confirm whether I’d really lost my memory. Well, there were probably many reasons. She was a greedy old woman."

"That’s surprising. That’s surprising. I thought you’d keep it secret," said Ian, finally raising his goblet.

Thesaya shrugged. "I was planning to. But on the ship ride over, Kitty told me that if I pretended to know things clumsily, I might just end up being manipulated by the pointy-ears. So she said I should reveal it from the start and use it as a weapon."

She clicked her tongue and added, "She said a weakness revealed is no longer a weakness."

"Sounds just like her," Ian murmured, setting down his glass with a wry smile, recalling the black-furred beastfolk warrior—another friend from whom he’d need to hear updates soon.

Thesaya scrunched her nose in annoyance. "She had no shortage of lectures, either. Said since I was walking into a den of pointy-ears, I better not act like an idiot and keep my wits about me. Who does she think she is? Honestly, it still pisses me off just thinking about—"

"So, did they believe you?" Ian cut in.

Thesaya shrugged. "Probably not at first. But they couldn’t just kick me out. On the way to meet the old woman, I had already run into a few pointy-ears who recognized me. They looked like they’d seen a ghost. And also…"

She glanced at Ian with a sly grin.

"I dropped your name, too. Said the Agent of the Platinum Dragon saved me while I was lost and asleep. That you’re the one who made me a proper elder fairy."

Her gaze shifted to the Elixir of Life on the table.

"I also said that the Platinum Dragon told me of my origins. With physical proof like this, they had to believe me."

"That must have been Charlotte’s advice as well."

"How did you know? That’s right. She said pointy-ears are weak to backing, so I should absolutely do it that way. For someone who hates fairies so much, she knows them too well."

"Maybe that’s why she hates them."

Though it’s not like the beastfolks were purely victims either.

Ian swallowed the rest of his words along with the wine. Thesaya, far from being offended, nodded in agreement and picked a green grape from the platter.

"Thanks to that, they couldn’t approach me carelessly. But they said I couldn’t join the Council of Elders right away. I had to prove I was qualified first."

She popped the grape in her mouth and chewed slowly, like she was Savina herself.

"After that, she called me over every day under the pretext of education. She also occasionally throws in questions to check if I had really lost my memories."

"Must have been a very beneficial time in many ways," Ian said, a smile on his lips as he took out his cigarette case.

As Thesaya reached for the candlestick on the table, she shook her head in disgust. "It was horrible. Anyway, after a few months, she stopped asking. I think she assumed I’d been passed around as a plaything for nobles. I let her think what she wanted. Can I have one, Ian?"

"As long as you refill it." Ian readily offered the case. There was only one cigarette left inside.

"Don’t worry. I’ll fill it to the brim."

Thesaya nonchalantly snatched it and put it to her lips, bringing the candle flame to Ian’s cigarette first as she continued, "In any case, my suspicions were growing. The support funds arriving steadily from the capital were suspicious. The foul feeling I got whenever I saw the old woman never went away. And crucially, I sometimes had nightmares."

"Nightmares?" Ian asked, exhaling a puff of smoke.

Thesaya, bringing the candle to her cigarette, smacked her lips and answered, "They were always similar. Savina, that devil, would be looking at me and saying something. That it was a chance for me, who was utterly useless, to contribute to the family, something like that."

"That sounds like a sign of your memories returning," Ian said, his eyes narrowing slightly.

Thesaya nodded readily and placed the candlestick back on the table. "That’s right. That’s why I tried not to dwell on the dreams. Fortunately, nothing more came to mind."

"It seems you still have no desire to regain your memories."

"Of course not. I like myself just the way I am now. I never wished for my past self to be mixed in." Thesaya replied instantly, puffing out smoke.

Picking up her goblet with her left hand, she continued, "Anyway, around that time, I became almost completely free. The eyes watching me became sparse. Most importantly, the Black Wall’s erosion was getting closer. Everyone was in disarray."

"Aha, that must have been around the time I was touring the North," Ian murmured, moving the cigarette between his fingers.

Thesaya took a sip of wine, shrugged, and said, "So around then, I started secretly digging around, starting with that old woman’s lackeys. As you know, Ian, that’s my specialty."

"And it must have been fun."

"I won’t deny it. It really was." Thesaya smiled.

Ian let out a low scoff and added, "But I doubt she would have left any records of selling you to the Round Table."

"She didn’t. I was debating whether I should try to recover my memories when the Council of Elders was convened. That old woman had to leave the house for a few days, but I didn't, since we had decided I would go through the joining procedure after the erosion was over."

Thesaya’s eyes curved slyly as she stared at the spreading smoke.

"Thanks to that, I got the chance to search the old woman’s room. There was a locked drawer in the corner. It took me two days to find the key. Inside, there were a bunch of letters exchanged with her daughter."

"Her daughter, you mean…" Ian’s brow furrowed on its own.

Thesaya looked back at him. "Yes. Aela. The mother of that girl you brought with you."

"So she was the one involved with the council." Ian exhaled a smoky sigh through his nose.

Thesaya’s lips curled up. "That woman remarried a noble in the capital well over a decade ago. Her partner was a widower, apparently. They say there are many humans who want to marry or take fairies as mistresses, though the fairies in the capital don’t look upon it too kindly."

"That’s not surprising."

Diana would clutch the back of her neck if she knew.

Thinking, he let out a short scoff. Then again, she had more urgent things to worry about now, like keeping her head.

"It seemed that Savina was the one who recommended the marriage. It must have been to receive support. There was nothing she wouldn’t do for the family. Aela seemed to be enjoying it too, but anyway, that ‌alone wasn’t enough for Savina. Or perhaps, she just got greedier."

Thesaya took a deep drag of her cigarette.

"There was a letter mentioning that she had come to know a noble person who would consistently support the family. However, to do so, they would have to offer up the family’s weakest link as payment. I knew as soon as I saw it what that weakest link meant."

Ian’s eyes, with a cigarette between his lips, grew cold.

Thesaya continued, "Apparently, my parents died during the age of war. And do you know what they called me in this family?"

"The half-wit." At Ian's low murmur, Thesaya's eyes widened as she looked back at him.

"Didn’t expect you to know, but yeah. Half-wit. Weakling... I guess I was always the runt."

"You’re not lacking. And it wouldn’t matter if you were." Ian clicked his tongue and picked up his goblet.

He took a gulp of wine and said, "But it must have been difficult with just that much evidence."

"Normally, it would have been. But this is a den of pointy-ears, remember? And that old woman had been in power for far too long. There were many who were dissatisfied. In fact, besides her direct bloodline, almost all of them were."

"You made them your supporters. Impressive, Thesa." Ian smirked.

"I didn’t do much. They came wagging their tails to me first. I just pretended to give in." Despite her words, Thesaya tilted her chin smugly.

Ian chuckled. "So?"

"After the erosion, I officially became a member of the Council of Elders. This was when news of your disappearance hadn’t yet reached the South, Ian. The South was probably the last to find out. A few days later, I convened a family meeting."

A mischievous smile on her lips, Thesaya continued with a cigarette dangling crookedly from her mouth, "And I pretended my memories had returned. I said I remembered the head of the house selling me off. I spouted off a mix of what I had found out and lies. In front of everyone present."

"But Savina, of course, wouldn’t have admitted it meekly."

"Not at first. She even sneered that I was using cheap tricks to hide my dirty past. So I corrected her misunderstanding."

With a slight smile revealing her canines, Thesaya looked at Ian.

"I said that the truth was that the Agent of the Saints had saved me from the hands of vampires. That she had sold me into the hands of fiends. I mixed in a little exaggeration, of course. But it’s not a lie, is it?"

Ian shrugged one shoulder. "Well, I suppose not."

"The old woman’s face turned pale only then. It was a sight to see." Thesaya giggled like Yog and picked another green grape, popping it into her mouth.

Chewing as if savoring her moment of victory, she added, "Did you know, Ian? My hair was originally platinum blonde."

She ran a hand through her voluminous hair and continued, "I was tortured by those vampires for years. Only after my hair turned white and I lost all my memories did I become a monster like them."

"Then why didn’t you kill her?" asked Ian, who had been watching her for a moment.

Meeting Thesaya’s gaze, he tilted his shoulder. "Judging by the tone of the pointy-ear who came to greet us, it didn’t seem like she was dead."

"Honestly, I wanted to. With my own hands. Slowly and painfully," Thesaya muttered and put the cigarette to her lips, then let out a short sigh.

"But that would have made things too big. I would have had to report a valid reason for executing an elder to the council, and this was a matter that would have had to be reported to the Great Church. Then Erenos would have been shattered."

Thesaya glanced at Ian. "And if that happened, I wouldn’t have been able to keep my promise to you. I couldn’t let that happen."

Ian’s brow furrowed slightly.

Thesaya shrugged nonchalantly and continued, "So I excluded the parts related to the vampire clan. That alone was enough to strip her of her status as an Elder, not to mention her position in the family. And then, I kicked her out to the capital."

"You sent her to be with her daughter," murmured Ian.

Thesaya nodded. "I told her to live there as if she were dead and to keep sending the support funds, just as she had been doing. I said if she refused, I would tell the Great Church and the Platinum Dragon everything. And that I would tear the family apart with my own hands and throw the pieces to the other fairies’ families."

She turned her head, her eyes looking beyond the window where only the courtyard wall was visible. "Especially to the pointy-ears living across the way, Ameshita. I said I would give them the biggest piece since that old woman hates them more than death. It seems to have worked well. Until last month."

"Still, you managed to get what you needed," Ian finally murmured.

Meeting the eyes of Thesaya, who was looking at him again, he continued. "But even if you had just killed Savina and destroyed the family, I wouldn't have blamed you, Thesa."

"That’s touching. Thank you for saying that, Ian." Smiling brightly, Thesaya leaned her head slightly toward him. "But you’re mistaken. I haven’t given up on my revenge, Ian. I just made it so the old woman will suffer for longer."

Her voice grew cold. "She didn’t have much time left to live anyway, and I stripped her of the right to commune with the Tree of Life. She’ll wither away and die. Ugly and miserably."

"Long enough to match the time you suffered?"

"Perhaps, even longer than that."

At last, a smile spread across Ian’s lips. "Then that’s fine. You did well."

"I did, didn’t I?" Thesaya beamed back at him, then gave a slight nod. "Actually, I gained a lot more than just that. I secured my legitimacy and a pretext to shut the pointy-ears up."

She picked up her nearly empty goblet and added, "No one even tried to look for me when I went missing. In truth, they’re all practically accomplices, aren’t they?"

Grinning, she drained the rest of her goblet.

A wry laugh spread across Ian’s lips as well. "At this point, I wouldn’t say you’re just competent—you’re remarkable."

He was being sincere. She had handled it far better than he had expected.

Thesaya leaned back leisurely in her chair, a cigarette between her lips. "Tell me about it. I guess I’m a pointy-ear through and through. But don’t worry, Ian."

She then glanced at Ian and added, "I won’t hurt your comrade. I’ll just send her quietly to the capital."