The day after the family meeting, things were awkward between Mine and the rest of the family. Father's smile looked somehow lonely, Mother hugged me over and over, and Turi burst into tears without warning.
But as the days passed, we gradually settled back into our normal routine, no different from before the family meeting.
"You don't have to do it, Mine. I'll handle it."
"Huh? I'm going to do it too. Turi said I won't get better at things unless I actually do them."
Turi, who had been encouraging me to do chores for the sake of independence, suddenly started trying to take on all my work for me, becoming even more overprotective than before. Other than that, things were back to normal.
"Wow, it's clear out! We have to go pick parue today!"
That morning, I was woken by Turi's voice.
The sky was still dim, but it seemed there were hardly any clouds. Turi had opened the window to check the weather, and the sliver of light that came in brought a rush of cold air from outside.
"Turi, it's cold."
"Ah, sorry, sorry!"
She shut the window and immediately set about making breakfast. I hurried to eat too, caught up in the bustle of the family.
Father and Mother finished eating quickly and started preparing baskets and firewood. Father, who had begun lining things up near the entrance, looked back at me as I chewed through my bread.
"What are you going to do, Mine? Wait at the Gate?"
"Hmm, maybe I'll try going to pick parue too?"
From what Turi had told me, the parue tree was some kind of beautiful mysterious plant. It apparently glittered and spun around and was very pretty, but I didn't quite understand the descriptions, so I wanted to see the real thing.
The entire family's eyebrows shot up at my words, which came from nothing more than pure curiosity.
"No way! Mine, you can either stay home and keep house or help out at the Gate—pick one."
"Parue picking is exhausting. It's impossible for you. You'll definitely get a fever."
"That's right! You're bad at climbing trees and you can't walk through snow. There's no way."
My idea of joining the parue-picking trip into the winter forest was vetoed by every member of the family. They had a point—I couldn't even walk through the snow to reach the Gate, so foraging in a snowy forest was clearly out of the question.
"...Fine. Parue picking lasts until noon, right? Then I'll help out at the Gate and wait there."
I packed my tote bag and got ready to head to the Gate.
I had wondered whether
With parue-picking supplies and me loaded onto a slightly larger sleigh, the family set off.
So many people were heading toward the South Gate with their sledges that you couldn't say it was wrong that the townsfolk were all going parue-picking.
The air was sharp enough to sting your skin, but the atmosphere among the people swelling with anticipation for parue picking had the excitement of a festival, and even I couldn't help getting worked up.
"Sorry to burden you with this, but take care of Mine until noon. She'll be helping Otto."
"You got it!"
"Everyone, do your best picking parue!"
I was dropped off at the Gate and watched my family head off toward the forest. Waving to the familiar gatekeeper, I headed for the guardroom.
"Good morning, Otto."
"Oh? Mine? The foreman's off today, isn't he?"
I gave a small smile and nodded at Otto, who blinked in surprise.
"Yes, the weather's clear, so they went to pick parue. I'm staying at the Gate and helping out."
"Ah, I see. So until noon, then."
Otto caught on to the situation immediately, flashed his usual grin, and started stacking documents beside himself to check through calculations.
I thanked Otto for the consultation the other day, since he had made space for me to work.
"Otto, thank you for the other day."
"For what?"
"Well, for listening to me about work. I talked to my family about the devouring disease too, and we decided I should look for work I can do from home. Once spring comes, I was thinking of consulting
"Yeah. Well, your health comes first, and if nothing comes to mind on Benno's end, I can request work-from-home jobs from this side too, so just say the word."
"Okay!"
His smile still carried a hint of something dark, but I had managed to properly express my thanks, so I got to work on the calculations feeling a little lighter.
The family returned from the forest just past midday, and I rode the sleigh back home with them. Between the three of them, they had apparently picked six parue. Unlike last year, the pressed pulp was also useful now, thanks to Mother's enthusiasm.
While Mother prepared lunch, we pressed the parue.
Turi took the thinnest dead branch from the firewood pile, lit it in the hearth, and poked it into the parue. The next instant, the skin split open with a little pop at that exact spot.
"Mine, it's coming out!"
"Coming!"
I carefully collected the thick white juice in a vessel without spilling any. Drunk in on the sweet aroma, once the juice was all collected, Turi handed the squeezed parue to Father.
Father crushed the fruit and extracted the oil. Since we had a weight for pressing, he could squeeze the oil out in no time.
The pulp left over from pressing was useful in cooking, so we kept four portions at home and decided to bring the remaining two to
After lunch, I'd bring the pulp along with the new parue recipe. If we at least had an oven, we could make things like gratin and pizza, but with just a frying pan and a pot, the range of dishes was limited.
"Hello, Lutz. I've got eggs to trade. Also, want a new recipe?"
"Hey, Mine. New recipes are great and all, but I've got no hands free, so I can't make anything right away. Come on in and wait."
I had brought a new recipe, but it seemed the older brothers were out.
"Where did your brothers go? The weather's nice—sledding?"
"They went shoveling snow for pocket money."
I'd never participated, so I didn't know, but the grueling work of shoveling snow apparently served as a decent way for kids to earn pocket money.
"Why are you here, though?"
"I've got to press the parue. If I leave it like that, it'll melt, right?"
Fair enough, you couldn't just leave the parue sitting around either. But it looked like Lutz had been stuck with his family's share of work while getting no pocket money at all, and that put me in a vaguely bad mood. If neither Lutz nor his mother said anything, it wasn't really my place as an outsider to meddle.
At the very least, I wanted to help with the pressing, but squeezing the parue was essentially heavy labor, so there was nothing I could do. All I could do was watch Lutz pounding away with the hammer and
As I stared blankly at the work, I suddenly remembered I hadn't yet reported the family meeting to Lutz. He needed to know that I had decided not to enter Benno's shop.
"Hey, Lutz. I decided I'm not going to join Benno's shop anymore."
"What!? Why!?"
Lutz froze with the hammer raised, his eyes wide as he turned to look at me. Karla also turned with a slight look of surprise.
"Well, Mom was saying I'd just be dead weight for you. Besides, with my stamina, there's no way I could actually work even if I tried. And when I consulted Otto, he pointed out a bunch of other things too."
"Other things like what?"
Lutz moved the hammer again and urged me on with his eyes.
"Mm. If an apprentice who just started keeps getting fevers and missing work, how do you think the people working alongside them would feel?"
"...Ah. That's..."
Lutz made a vaguely conceding sound while pounding the parue. Karla squeezed the parue tight, her eyes narrowing.
"If you take too many days off, you're a burden on everyone else, and the one who suffers when you miss training is you."
"Exactly. Plus, I'm still planning on making various products, right? If I were getting a share of the profits from those, that'd add up to a pretty significant amount. An apprentice who's always absent but takes home a big paycheck—wouldn't that ruin the relationships in the shop?"
"...Yeah."
Lutz furrowed his brows and nodded in understanding, but Karla looked slightly taken aback.
"Well, regarding the salary, I think that would affect you too, Lutz. If you're actually working hard, things would be different. But I think you should talk it over with Benno for the details."
"Yeah, once spring comes, we'll have a proper talk."
We could separate the salary from the profits and quietly pocket the difference. Even now, all you had to do was combine guild cards and you got paid.
"If you're not going to the shop, what are you going to do after the
"In my case, we don't know how the devouring will go, so I talked it over with my family and decided to live more or less the same life as before—doing letter and document transcriptions at home, making products, helping out at the Gate..."
"I see. For your body, that might actually be better."
Lutz agreed with me, so I let out a sigh of relief. At the same time, Karla's expression brightened.
"Oh my. If Mine isn't going, then there's no need for you to go either, is there, Lutz? Now you can become a craftsman!"
I couldn't see what my decision not to go to Benno's shop had to do with Lutz's, and tilted my head in confusion. Lutz, on the other hand, bristled sharply at his mother's obviously relieved voice.
"Hah!? What are you talking about, Mom!?"
"What do you mean, what?"
Karla wore a completely bewildered expression. Lutz clicked his tongue lightly and shouted.
"I want to be a merchant! It has nothing to do with Mine! If anything, I was the one dragging her into it!"
Karla stared at Lutz, stunned, as though she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"What!? So you still intend to become a merchant?"
"Of course I do! I originally wanted to become a traveling merchant, but after hearing about citizenship from a traveling merchant, I decided to become a town merchant instead."
"Lutz, you never said anything like that!"
"I did! Were you not listening to me, or did you just forget!?"
It seemed like they really had never been on the same page. Karla looked at Lutz as though hearing this for the first time.
I decided it would be best not to interrupt their conversation and quietly watched.
"...I did hear that you wanted to be a traveling merchant."
Karla furrowed her brows troubledly and shook her head weakly, as though the truth lay somewhere she hadn't expected.
"But isn't that just a child's fantasy? It's like a daydream—there's no way it could come true. It's completely unrealistic. I never thought you were actually serious about it. I assumed you'd come to your senses eventually."
I could understand where Karla was coming from. People in this town rarely went outside the city walls, except to visit the forest or the nearest farming village.
Traveling merchants were just foreigners passing through—not the sort of thing you'd set as a life goal. It was a child's fantasy. Karla's thinking—hurry up and face reality—was probably the normal way of looking at things here.
"...I really wanted to be a traveling merchant. I wanted to leave this town and visit places I'd never been. I wanted to see things with my own eyes that I'd only heard about in stories. I still think that. My dream hasn't changed."
"Lutz, you..."
Karla half-raised herself from her seat, about to say something. From her expression, it wasn't criticism she had in mind.
But before she could open her mouth, Lutz spoke.
"But a man who used to be a traveling merchant told me. He said throwing away your citizenship was something only a fool would do. He said there were no apprentices among traveling merchants, so it was impossible for me."
"Well, that's true enough."
Karla let out a somewhat relieved breath and sank back into her seat with a thud.
Traveling merchants really were a profession people avoided. I had been naively thinking it sounded fun to go all sorts of places, but once again I could see that my understanding of local norms was seriously lacking.
"I was thinking about becoming a traveling merchant from scratch, and that's when Mine said it to me. She said even if I couldn't become a traveling merchant, I could become a town merchant. And once I was a merchant, I might be able to go to other towns on buying trips. That was a more realistic and achievable future than becoming a traveling merchant."
"Well, more realistic than a traveling merchant, at least..."
Karla said this with a tired voice and shrugged. She seemed genuinely shocked that her son had actually been serious about becoming a traveling merchant.
"So I asked a merchant to take me on as an apprentice. He knew someone who knew Mine, so at first he almost turned me down, but—"
"...I see."
Given the apprenticeship system in this town, Lutz's chances of becoming a merchant's apprentice had been practically zero.
So when he said he wanted to become a merchant, his mother had probably only half-listened. She might have only half-believed him even when Lutz reported that he'd actually been accepted as an apprentice.
"But conditions were set, and he promised that if I met them, he'd take me on as an apprentice. Mine and I already met those conditions, and I've received permission to become an apprentice. Whether Mine is there or not, I'm becoming a merchant."
Karla finally looked at her son—really looked at him—and saw that he had already begun forging his own path. Her gaze turned sharp.
"...Lutz, do you really think that just because you got permission to be an apprentice, you can overcome your parents' opposition and actually become a merchant?"
"Even in the worst case—being a live-in apprentice—I've decided I'm going to become a merchant. They listened to me, set conditions for me to become an apprentice, and finally a path opened up. I'm not going to give up."
"A live-in apprentice...?"
A live-in apprentice had the worst living conditions imaginable. First, as an apprentice you could only work half the week, so the pay was terrible. On top of that, you had no family to fall back on. A child suddenly living alone and doing all the housework alone—it was incredibly difficult, both physically and time-wise.
Your room would be an attic at the top of the building—sweltering in summer, freezing in winter. Leaky roofs weren't uncommon. Carrying your own goods and water was exhausting. And since it wasn't unusual for families like Lutz's to keep birds in their attic spaces, the smell was awful too.
Unlike a room rented to a family, there was no place to cook. You had to borrow the shop's kitchen or eat out, basically.
Naturally, with that kind of life, no money ever stayed in your pocket. You ended up taking advances and piling up debt. The shop kept you alive, but until you became a full-fledged worker, you were essentially working for free. That was a live-in apprentice.
"Lutz, think carefully! You can't possibly live like that!"
No sane parent would want to subject their child to such harsh conditions. Karla let out something close to a scream. But Lutz only gave a slight shrug.
"I can. I've already started preparing for it."
In Lutz's case, with papermaking he could save up money during the spring. If they used the white and black hides stored in the warehouse, he'd have a decent amount saved by the Baptism Ceremony. Even after setting aside money for clothes and other necessities to become a merchant's apprentice, there would still be some left over.
And during the apprenticeship period, half the week would be off. If he used that time to develop new products with me, he'd earn a share of the profits. In that case, the profits would surely exceed the apprentice's wages.
He wouldn't have a comfortable life, but it wouldn't be destitution either. I didn't think he'd have enough margin to rent his own room, so the poor living conditions were unavoidable, but still.
"...So you've already started preparing. You really are serious."
"I am."
After a long silence, Karla let out a deep sigh. Her face was a complicated mixture of resignation and unwillingness to let go, and her shoulders sagged.
"I think a craftsman doing steady, reliable work would be a more stable life than being a merchant with all its ups and downs."
"...If I became a craftsman just because Dad said so, I'd be stuck like this forever, wouldn't I?"
Lutz pouted, clearly dissatisfied. Karla narrowed her eyes—it was as though he'd criticized their current way of life, and the atmosphere grew tense.
"Stuck like this? What do you mean by that?"
"Getting used however my brothers feel like it, having my share taken away whenever they're in the mood, and ending up with nothing in my own hands."
"Well... you're siblings, so sure, things get taken sometimes, but you get things too, don't you?"
Karla frowned, troubled. Lutz brushed aside his mother's argument.
"Food doesn't come back once you've eaten it, and the 'things I get' are just broken hand-me-downs, aren't they? The hand-me-downs are so awful that when I occasionally get something new, it gets taken away right away."
Being the youngest, everything I got was hand-me-downs too—that much was the same. But Turi was always helping me, while Lutz, perhaps because of his older brothers' nature, got dominated rather than supported. The difference was enormous.
"Once I saw what a merchant's work actually looked like, and worked hard alongside Mine, I learned that the results of my own effort stay in my own hands. I want to try testing my abilities without anyone getting in my way. I'm not thinking about becoming a craftsman at all."
Lutz, who had always been kept underfoot, had finally found an environment where his family couldn't control him. He had secured a place where he might actually fulfill his dream.
Karla slumped and murmured.
"I never thought you were this serious about it. I thought Mine was just dragging you around..."
"I'm not going to decide on a lifetime career based on that."
"That's exactly why I was opposed to it."
She let out a deep sigh and lowered her eyes. After thinking for a while, Karla slowly raised her head and let a resigned smile cross her face.
"If this is what you want to do—something you've thought through this much and are serious enough to prepare to leave home for—then go ahead and give it everything you've got. Your father will object, but within this family, I'll be on your side."
"Really!? Thanks, Mom!"
Lutz's face lit up in an instant. He had given up on being understood by his family, and now he leaped up with joy, unable to believe it.
Seeing Lutz react with such childlike delight despite having been working so hard toward a far-off goal, I couldn't help but smile. Having even one person in the family on your side made all the difference.
After the older brothers returned, Lutz was still in high spirits. Together we cheerfully made my new recipe.
"
I delegated tasks to everyone and mixed parue oil and salt into the bowl where Lutz was grating cheese.
Once I tossed in the basil-like herbs Ralph had chopped up, all that was left was to mix well and cook.
"The pan's hot!"
"Then cook this, like a parue cake."
We fried it until the melted cheese turned crispy and golden. It looked a bit like okonomiyaki, but the grated cheese gave it a distinctly Western flavor.
It was one of my leftover-utilization recipes from my Reine days, the kind I used to make by chopping up leftover boiled somen or spaghetti and frying it up.
"It's simple and filling."
"It'd be good with chopped ham and vegetables too."
"Then it'd be like a meal, unlike the parue cake."
Everyone ate the same dish with cheerful smiles. In the middle of it, when Ralph tried to snatch a second helping from Lutz's plate, Karla gave him a whack on the head.
"Don't take other people's food. How greedy. Just cook yourself another one."
Both Ralph and Lutz stared with wide eyes after the smack. Then Ralph started making his own, and Karla smiled softly as she watched Lutz eat in peace.
With a powerful ally in his mother now, Lutz's family problems seemed to have settled down for the time being.
After that, our hibernation lifestyle continued.
I went through a cycle of handiwork, tutoring Lutz, helping out at the Gate, and bedridden bouts of cold. Lutz would bring the hairpin pieces to my house to study and occasionally deliver finished hair ornaments to Benno's shop, repeating the same routine.
Before long, the blizzard gradually weakened, and the winter of hibernation drew to a close.
Lutz's family problems got a little better too.
That wraps up the winter storyline.
Next time: the beginning of spring, and the resumption of papermaking.