Chapter 9

Chapter 9: Scars

When I opened the skylight hut, there were various kinds of jams and breads. Other than that, vegetables and fruits were placed on top of it without being damaged. It was clear that he had done something strange, like a fire that would not go out in the rain.

I woke up late and spread some grape jam on my bread and ate it. The bed on the right was already empty. Sandoria seemed to have gone out already. I could see everything through the open window. The child was fooling around outside.

It was a smooth wall that was impossible to climb. I have climbed over the walls of other people’s houses but this shiny wall, as if it had been oiled up, could not be climbed without any tools. I needed something a little sharp and hard.

Neither of us seemed to have any intention of apologizing, so all that was left to do was to take each other down. We were at a dead end as we tried to bring each other to our knees.  At first I was not that angry with Sandoria but when I looked into that child’s spiteful eyes, she glared at me as if I were a stain on her life, but what did I do wrong here?

After chewing the bread a dozen more times, I finally concluded that it was not my fault. 

Don’t want me to pity you? Then don’t go around being all pitiful.

I put the rest of the bread in my mouth and went out. I could see Sandoria sliding down the wall even after climbing up with all her might. Both of us were in pajamas without a decent dress. It was pitiful seeing the child with pajamas rolled up to her thighs.

I kept walking around the hut looking for a pointed stone. I pushed it into the wall and was about to climb up the wall when I felt a gaze from the side. It was Sandoria staring at my stone. I scoffed and shook the stone.

“As expected, there is nothing useless in learning. Don’t you think so?”

I have climbed over the walls of many people’s houses to know this feeling. Having said that I was proud of it, I slammed the stone into the wall with all my might. 

I thought it’d leave a scratch, but the wall remained smooth. The walls are also just as hard as stone, and aren’t they made of great minerals? This wall is a rock, and this stone is a rock, and that’s why it’s not getting scratched*.

(* The wall is made up of special minerals and naturally the stones around it would be be made with the same composition of minerals in it, so the stone isn’t able to scratch the wall since they both are made up of high quality mineral)

“You,”

Sandoria, who was looking at me, said with a ridicule.

“You can talk to the wall, but I guess you decided to hack into it first. Even if you try to hurt it, the walls won’t budge.”

“Pull your underpants back down.”

“I’ll take care of my underpants.”

We were half fighting. We tried sticking weaved grass onto the wall and then we tried throwing rocks at it in an attempt to scratch it. We gave up before sunset and sat with our backs against the wall. In the meantime, our mouths were alive, and we scratched each other with languid faces.

Is your bruise big or is mine bigger? Should you apologize or should I? We stayed until the sun went down, wanting to sit back and receive each other’s submission.

The person my grandfather sent came to visit us when we were exhausted and closed our mouths. It was while I was sitting in the green field and watching the night sky full of stars. The man descended from above with the help of the light.

“Edrid?”

“Shh!”

Edritte ignored the happy call of Sandoria and put his finger on his lips while saying shhh. I cared more about the basket in Edrid’s arms than anything else. It was a basket that smelled delicious all the way here.

“At least one of you should apologize. Why are you making such a fuss?”

“Stop talking nonsense.”

I licked my dry lips with my tongue while making a quick gesture to Edrid.

“Let me see what you’ve got.”

He threw the basket in front of me with a bored face. I quickly removed the handkerchief covering the basket and took the ham out. I didn’t need a fork or anything. When I grabbed the ham with my bare hands and ate it, I felt like I was finally alive.

Edrid said in a stunned voice,

“Grandpa told me to ask you one thing.  Do you have any intention of saying sorry?”

“No,”

Sandoria answered at once, and I shook my head while devouring my ham. Edrid wrapped his head as if he was in pain.

“You’re driving me crazy,”

“If you’re done talking, you can go.”

Edrid looked at us helplessly. I waved my hand saying goodbye. He tried to ascend into the sky with a sulky face, but came back down again as if he had realized something. Now that I noticed, he could fly in the sky like grandfather.

“That’s what it is!”

While having dinner with the exhausted Sandoria, I had no interest in Edrid’s cheers.  But he approached us with a happy expression.

“I think you’re going to take this opportunity to do both.”

When Sandoria and I did not show much interest, it was Edrid who became rather impatient.

“Think about it. Why are you letting this quarrel go on to such an extent?!” 

As soon as I finished the ham, I rummaged through the basket. He pulled the basket away with a look of disapproval.

“Stop eating and listen to me.”

“What do you want to say, Ed?”

Someone finally responded to Edrid’s fuss. Edrid rubbed his hands together with a look of excitement.

“I mean, this was originally a very educational space.”

Edrid said too many words. If I had to pick out only the useful ones from what I heard, it would be this: Just like my grandfather and Edrid called the light to fly, he said that this was a place where they trained themselves to summon some sort of light. Originally, there was one such place for every family, but after thinking about it, I think this is the place. 

“That’s why he told you to climb over the wall. Whoever awakens the light first—”

Edrid snapped his fingers as if to give a dramatic effect.

“—will become the winner.”

The winner. When he said that, Sandoria and I looked at each other at the same time. For a moment, I could read absurdity, fear, and a weak competitive spirit in her eyes. The problem was that I didn’t know what it was, and that Sandoria didn’t seem to know much either.

“After all, you both are going to the academy this winter. I think he’ll make you awaken the lights before then. How is it? My guess.  Isn’t it perfect?”

Edrid did not stop showing off. Sandoria and I were distracted by different ideas that crossed our minds. What our grandfather is telling us, is to learn something and then get over the wall and not just climb up ignorantly

I kicked the stone next to me. I remembered that I had a hard time all day with bruises and pain. 

Edrid said someone else would come tomorrow and our hopes faded. Edrid, who said he had only stopped by today due to such circumstances that permitted him to, left. Soon after, a sense of peace, which was rarely felt between us, came over us.. I shut my mouth and looked at the night sky thoughtlessly.

Fortunately, the night sky was beautiful.

* * *

The next morning, as soon as I woke up, I searched the whole hut. I was wondering if I could get any clues. As I continued to rummage through the hut with bread in one hand, Sandoria, who couldn’t find any cluest, said,

“It’s crazy. And there’s no way he would have given a clue about this.”

Sandoria laid down the knife covered with jam roughly. Her body was aching and she couldn’t sleep last night. She might be feeling as sensitive as I am but her arm must be less in less pain than mine. My left arm suffered a lot yesterday because I was nailing the wall all day. What can I do if it happened because I was ignorant? I patted my back and sat down on the floor.

“Iara,”

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Sandoria saw me covered in dust, and stared straight ahead.

“You have no intention of apologizing.”

“Mhmm,” (she’s agreeing)

Sandoria wiggled her hands with a determined look on her face.

“Well then, let’s do this,”

said Sandoria, stepping out of bed and standing before me.

“Whether it’s training or clues,  I know a lot more about the light than you do.”

“So,”

“I’ll tell you everything I know. I swear on my name.”

It was a tempting offer. Still, that part was what I was worried about*. As I looked at her in disbelief, Sandoria lowered her head.

(* Iara is worried about the offer being too tempting)

“Instead, as Edrid said yesterday, this is a contest. There is a winner and loser.”

“So,”

“The loser will kneel down and apologize to the winner.”

The worst of all was Sandoria’s conviction that she would never lose to me. I scoffed and grabbed Sandoria’s slender wrist.

“We’ll see about that.”

“No way,”

Throwing ourselves into the fire of competition, we went outside more enthusiastically than on the first day. Sandoraia, who had told me everything, walked like a buffalo and sat down in the middle of the field. Then she looked at me as if telling me to do the same. I had doubts, but I sat down with her.

“You’ll also go to the academy in the winter.”

“Academy?”

“It’s a place called Idriheim. It’s a school floating in the sky of the capital—Sepsis. It looks like an island, but I’ve heard that there are all sorts of things in it. Everyday I’ve been looking forward to the day I’ll go there because I’ve only read about it in the books”

“It seems good,”

“First of all, in Idriheim, you should know the basics of dealing with light. There are no students who don’t know it. I was supposed to learn from my grandfather this summer, but the schedule was moved up because you showed up.”

It was the first time that Sandoria had spoken so much. I liked Sandoria’s calm, low voice but I didn’t show it because I felt like I was losing.

“In any case, yes. That’s why I said I didn’t know much. Still, there are a few things I learned from reading books…….”

Sandoria stroked the end of the growing grass. My gaze turned to her fingertips.

“They say there’s light in these little weeds.”

“Grass?”

“So you just have to feel the light.”

I’ve never heard of such dog shit before, which made my head go numb, but I mustered as much patience as I could. 

“And,”

“That’s it,”

“What?”

I wondered what great thing she was going to say, but that was it. I was so frustrated that I pushed sandoria’s hand out of the grass.

“What’s that? So you’re going to be fiddling with this grass all day?”

“You don’t want to do it?”

“Is there any other way?”

“I swear. If there was, I would have told you.”

We looked away from each other as we felt our voices were rising. I made a promise last night. We both are in bad shape, so let’s not raise our voices or fight as much as we can. It was a brief truce. I sat with my knees raised, grazing the grass and watching it. Without a word, Sandoria stroked the grass as if it were a puppy.

In a way, it was ridiculous. One (me) was pulling out a lot of grass and pushing it into her eyes, and the other was stroking the grass with a blank look. In the bright sun, with no one around. When I thought of the two of us sitting like that, laughter came out.

I tried to hold it in, but Sandoria’s expression was so funny. Her mouth was slightly open, eyes were closed, and she stroked the grass carefully, as if she were touching a great treasure, and it seemed like me and the girl next to me were sick.

“Huh,”

Eventually, it exploded.  I couldn’t hold back the laughter that erupted in an instant.  I grabbed my stomach and lay on my back. 

The more I vowed to be patient, the more the laughter grew out of control. Sandoria, who was next to me, looked at me strangely, and laughed after seeing me laughing with tears. 

She must have also tried to hold back her laughter. Her face crumpled strangely, and her lips were twitching.

Sandoria covered her lips, and I rolled over the meadow and laughed. We both were shedding tears until our eyes became swollen, and for a long time, the maid sent by my grandfather stared blankly at the two of us before leaving.

I still had no intention of apologizing. But the resentment had already disappeared, and all we had left was homework. It was the homework that my grandfather left with us. The homework that we have to solve and compete with each other. It wasn’t as confusing as it was the first time. There was only a kind of desire left: to complete this homework.

* * * 

I got into the habit of taking a bath once a day. The two of us peeled the dirt off our bodies on the shore of a small lake near the hut.  Our pajamas were hanging on the branches.

We were sitting with our backs turned, not looking closely at each other’s naked bodies. My back is itchy, but I don’t think I’ll be able to wipe it gently. 

I couldn’t wash every inch of my body thoroughly since I wasn’t feeling well yet. Last time, I reached out without realizing it and tried to scratch my back, but I felt pain when my muscles tightened. The situation was not much different from this time, and I let out sounds of pain throughout the washing.

Since I couldn’t touch my back, I didn’t feel like I washed it even after washing it. I quickly got out of the lake and wiped myself dry. But the place where I hung my pajamas was near Sandoria. It was the result of throwing it on the tree carelessly as soon as I had taken it off. I called Sandoraia with my knees bent in shame.

“Throw me that,” 

At those words, Sandoria reached out without looking back. As soon as she caught my pajamas, she just turned her hands back and waved wildly. I sighed and walked towards Sandoraia. But in the meantime Sandoria, who was impatient, looked back and urged me.

“What are you doing? Take it! Take it!….”

Sandoria, who was staring at me with her eyes wide open, suddenly stopped talking. Her eyes became as round as a full moon. She scanned every inch of my naked body. Feeling bad, I asked, taking my pajamas with me.

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“What,”

Sandoria’s gaze moved to where my navel was. I saw the burn marks there. It was only then that I understood what she was looking at.

“I was injured a long time ago. You didn’t do it.”

“Of course, but I feel like you received that burn from an open flame.”