Danger in the Royal Garden (1)

The royal garden was basically a walled backyard behind the castle. A very large backyard, as befitting of royalty. The area was well guarded; there were soldiers on the walls and guarding the entrance. They bowed and greeted us when we arrived, letting us pass without questions.

From what I knew, the garden was normally available only to the royal family, the gardeners, and the guards on duty. Sometimes the king or the queen would entertain guests here. Since I and the maid were accompanying the princesses, they naturally let us pass.

Of course, the garden was beautifully maintained by a handful of gardeners, two of whom were at work cutting bushes when we arrived. They bowed when they noticed us, but resumed their work when we basically ignored them.

I had to admit, the view was beautiful. There were colourful flower beds, flowering bushes, green bushes cut in various shapes, fruit trees, an arched pathway, and an artistic fountain in the middle of it all. The area was big enough to fit all kinds of elements without looking like a mess. Of course, there were paved pathways crisscrossing the whole area.

My attention was quickly grabbed by the huge tree on the far side of the garden. Although there were other trees, this one was way bigger than the others and stuck out like a sore thumb. It wasn’t ugly, quite the contrary, but it was quite conspicuous. It looked like an oak from the distance, but I couldn’t be sure before getting a closer look.

Either way, it looked like it would offer some nice shade on a hot summer day like this.

“Come on, Ed! Let us show you around!”

The twins grabbed my hands and started dragging me around. The maid stayed near the entrance, keeping an eye on us from a distance. She only moved if it was necessary in order to not lose sight of us.

The little girls seemed to have quite passable knowledge on flowers for their age. They proudly named at least one out of five flowers we saw. Although I wasn’t truly interested, I nevertheless out of habit tried to memorise the new knowledge they offered.

I hadn’t studied the subject, but I recognised a few of the more common plants just with my common knowledge. Some of the flowers and other plants I also recognised from Earth or some other world from my past lives. They had different names, of course, since the language was different.

On the subject of names and languages… There was something I had wondered ever since I got my past life memories: why did the Treds – the people of Tredland – largely use the same English names I knew from my past life on Earth? The pronunciation was sometimes a bit different, and there were occasional other differences, but the similarities between all the traditional Tred names and the English names were far too many for it to be a coincidence.

Apart from the names, the language of Tredland was quite different, and while there were similar words, Tredish could at most be considered distant kin to the language I knew from Earth. Furthermore, as far as I knew, there were no other such clear connections to Earth anywhere else in Vareda.

“Hey! Ed? Are you listening?”

I snapped out of my thoughts. The twins were staring at me, looking rather dissatisfied. I cursed my inquisitive mind for going astray at such an important time. Occasional absentmindedness was a bad habit I just couldn’t get rid of. It raised its ugly head often when I forcefully tried to memorise something I had no true interest in. It was a downright shameful weakness for a mystic.

“Sorry, I got distracted for a moment there. I promise I’ll pay attention from now on.”

I did my best apologetic look and tried to soothe the princesses.

“Are you bored? We can do something else if you are.”

That was Anna. Such a sweet child.

“It’s not that I’m bored, but… Um… Can you take me to that big tree over there? I’ve been terribly interested in it ever since I saw it.”

I decided that rather than feigning interest, it was a better idea to divert their focus on something else. After all, while I did want them to enjoy themselves, it would be better for all three of us to have fun.

“Okay!”

The twins cheered up and agreed in perfect harmony. They grabbed my hands again and ran towards the tree at full speed.

I didn’t really have any trouble keeping up with them, considering my longer legs, but it was still afternoon and the sun was still high up, so the heat was getting quite uncomfortable. I had to wonder how the little girls were able to stay so chipper and run so energetically in these circumstances.

“Wait! Let’s stop here for a while.”

I stopped them when we got to the fountain. I detached myself from them and went to the fountain, then scooped up some water and washed my face. The cool water felt comfortable on my overheated skin, and I let out a contented sigh.

Then I heard a large splash, and drops of water sprinkled on my body from my left side.

I slowly turned my head, fearing the worst…

Yep. They did it.

The twins had jumped right into the fountain water, now laughing and squealing as they splashed water on each other without a care in the world. I noticed their shoes on the paving next to the fountain, so at least they had had enough common sense to take them off. Their fine – probably very expensive – dresses were still on, though, and getting completely drenched.

Next thing I knew, they were both splashing water towards my face and I had to raise my arm to shield my eyes.

Oh, fuck it. Let’s be a child for once.

“Now you’ve done it!”

I took off my own shoes and jumped into the fountain. If we were to get scolded, we should get scolded together. That’s what friends are for, right?

We played in the fountain for a good ten or fifteen minutes. Of course, all of us got drenched from head to toe. Unexpectedly, the maid let us be.

It was fun. I felt that such playfulness was uncharacteristic of me, but on second thought, there was nothing wrong with letting loose once in a while and acting like a child of my physical age was expected to. The little girls’ cheer and playfulness were contagious, and I found myself in an excellent mood when we finally climbed out of the fountain pool.

“Come here, girls. Stand close to me. I’m going to dry us up.”

The girls were clearly puzzled, but did as I asked. I chanted a spell, and soon a gentle whirlwind of warm air wrapped around us. I and the girls slowly turned around and let the wind dry us from every direction. It took a few minutes, but the girls seemed to enjoy the feeling and didn’t get impatient at all.

Completely drying our hair and clothes would have taken too long, so I ended the spell with a few words of the spirit language when we were dry enough. The sun would soon take care of the rest.

“You can use magic!”

“They haven’t let us study magic yet.”

The little princesses, still standing right before me, stared up at me with shining eyes. Mira clapped her hands enthusiastically while Anna seemed a little envious.

I couldn’t resist anymore. I patted their heads, which felt nice even if their hair was still a bit moist, and ruffled due to the wind.

I figured that while my hair was short, it still probably looked a bit funny, but thankfully, the twins were too preoccupied with thoughts of magic to make fun of me. I graciously returned the favour, and stealthily tried to fix their hair up a bit while stroking them.

“Once you get permission, I can teach you some spells. Although I’m sure your magic teachers will be very knowledgeable, I’m a mystic’s apprentice, after all, so I bet I can teach you some things they can’t.”

“Really? Yay! I can’t wait!”

“It’s a promise!”

“Yes, I promise.”

The girls didn’t seem to mind my touching, but I didn’t want to push my luck on our first meeting, so I kept it short.

I glanced at the fountain again. Playing in the water had certainly cooled me down, but it hadn’t sated my thirst. I didn’t dare to drink the water directly, but I had a spell to cleanse it of most impurities. The only problem that remained was the lack of a container. Oh well…

I knelt next to the fountain and cupped my hands as tight as I could. I started reciting the spell even before I plunged my makeshift vessel into the water, in order to shorten the time for the water to escape.

There was no clear effect when the spell was cast, but the water in my hands rippled slightly. When it was still again, I knew the spirits had done their work, and quickly raised it to my lips.

Ah. Delicious. Even if it’s just plain water, it tastes great when you’re thirsty.

“Um, Ed… Elina said that we shouldn’t drink this water, because it’s more dirty than it looks…”

“She’s right, Anna, you shouldn’t just drink this water. That’s why I used a spell to cleanse it first. Are you two thirsty?”

The girls nodded their heads so vigorously that their twintails swayed, so I cleansed a few mouthfuls of water for them, too.

We then finally made our way to our destination, the huge tree.

“It’s really big…”

“Isn’t it? Father said that it’s older than the castle.”

I nodded. Mira’s, or rather the king’s, claim did sound plausible. This was, especially from a child’s point of view, a very big tree. I knew a bit about trees from my previous lives, and I could also tell that it was a very old tree, possibly over 1000 years old. Yet, it still maintained plenty of vitality, as could be seen from the dense foliage that provided us shade from the scorching sunlight.

“I’ve decided.”

The twins tilted their heads cutely and asked at the exact same time:

“What?”

I sat down under the tree, propping up my back against the wide trunk, and took a relaxed pose.

“From now on, whenever the weather allows and I have time, I’m going to come here to read. This place has a great view and the tree provides shade and a natural backrest. It’s perfect. Ah, but I suppose I’ll need permission to come here?”

The little princesses smiled and sat on the grass in front of me.

“Don’t worry about that, Ed. We’ll ask father to allow it.”

“Thanks, Mira, Anna. I’d appreciate that.”

We sat there, chatting, for quite a while. The twins were very interested in mystics and asked me all sorts of things. I quickly noticed that their view on us was somewhat romanticised and mostly based on tales, which often exaggerated and left out important information.

On the other hand, I asked them about their life, how their typical day went and such things. I discovered that despite their young age, they were already made to spend a lot of time studying. Unlike me, who greatly enjoyed it, the twins only had a few favourite subjects and otherwise weren’t all that keen on studying. They were mostly obedient, though, at least according to their own words.

I remembered that on Earth, where the study of childcare and education was very advanced, the age of 5 was still considered a tad too young to begin serious studying. I could see why. Of course, the princesses were given some time each day to play, but honestly, I thought they should be given more time to be children.

Perhaps I could come up with some ways to make their time studying more fun?

The hour we had been given was almost over, so I suggested we begin making our way back. The twins seemed a bit reluctant, but we started strolling back through the garden anyway. This time, they were in no rush.

“Oh, look! What’s that flower? It’s beautiful!”

Anna and I turned to look where Mira was pointing. There was a very conspicuous, large, crimson flower rising up from a flowerbed where the dominant colours were white and yellow. Unusually, as far as I knew about flowers in this world, this flower had a thick stem that branched into three stalks somewhere around the middle of its length. The middle stalk had the open flower, while the two other branches supported unopened buds.

The twins excitedly ran to get a closer look, but I frowned in contemplation.

There was no way this flower was placed there intentionally. Not by the gardeners, anyway. It was much too conspicuous and broke the harmony of colours in the flowerbed. Also, something about it tugged at a memory of mine, although I couldn’t immediately recall where I had seen it or heard of it.

Wait… Could it be… Not good!

“Mira, Anna, get away from it! Now!”