The Scarlet Letter Mansion stood halfway up a hill in the northwest corner of Hethereau City.
From outside, it was nothing more than a somewhat imposing old Western-style house, three stories of gray-white exterior walls, with dead vines covering its iron fence.
But the instant Jin'en followed Inanna through the entrance hall, he felt as though he had stepped through an entrance into another space.
The corridor was far longer than it had looked from outside.
Jin'en instinctively glanced back at the door behind him, then at the corridor ahead, so deep he could barely see its end, and quietly filed this away.
Rain was still falling, but his sleeves were no longer dripping-at some moment he had failed to notice, his clothes had dried, and so had his hair.
The air inside the mansion was dry and warm, carrying an indescribable scent, a little like burned paper and a little like dried grass.
"Third floor, turn left, third room. That's your room." Inanna walked ahead without looking back, her heels striking the marble floor like some sort of metronome. "Tomorrow morning, seven o'clock. The dining room is on the east side of the first floor. If you're late, no breakfast."
"..."
"What, is there a problem?"
Jin'en stared at the walls on either side of the corridor.
There was a wall lamp every two or three steps. The light wasn't especially bright, but it spread evenly through the entire corridor, as if precisely calculated.
Paintings hung on the walls, some portraits, some landscapes, but the figures in the paintings made him uncomfortable. He kept feeling as though their eyes were following him.
"...How many people live here?" he asked.
"You mean, how many girls live here." Inanna turned her head to glance at him, the corners of her mouth curving.
Jin'en said nothing.
That was indeed what he meant.
Since entering the mansion, he had caught glimpses of girls in every direction. Some sat reading on the stair landings, some hurried past carrying trays, and some simply leaned over the railings and looked down, their gazes settling on him with a curiosity he couldn't describe.
That curiosity was neither friendly nor hostile.
It was more like... seeing an animal at the zoo that wasn't in the field guide.
"A dozen or so at present," Inanna said. "You're the first boy."
Jin'en's steps faltered.
"The first?"
"The first." Inanna climbed the stairs without looking back. "I've been waiting for a boy."
Jin'en didn't know what to say.
He followed her upstairs, studying his own hands in the dim light.
The cracks on his wrist lay quietly beneath his skin.
Inanna's earlier pinch of his fingertips had indeed temporarily stabilized the spatial rifts, but he could feel that oppressive sensation lingering, merely held down by something.
"Here we are." Inanna stopped before a door at the end of the corridor. "There are changes of clothes and basic necessities inside. See you tomorrow."
She turned, and Jin'en thought she was about to leave, but she didn't.
She simply stood there, looking down at him, her red eyes like two pieces of cold charcoal beneath the wall lamp.
"One last thing."
Jin'en raised his head.
"In this house, your hands are your life." Inanna's tone remained casual, but every word drove into his ears like a nail. "I don't care how you do it-endure it, hide away, get someone to help. I don't want to wake up one morning and find another stretch of corridor missing."
When she said "another," Jin'en noticed her gaze linger on his wrist for an instant.
Then she left.
The sound of her heels receded along the corridor, growing fainter until it finally vanished around a corner.
Jin'en pushed open the door and walked inside.
The room was larger than he had imagined.
A bed, a desk, a wardrobe, and even a window.
Outside the window lay the night on the hillside. The rain had eased considerably, and the distant lights of Hethereau City looked like stars scattered across the ground.
Jin'en sat beside the bed for a while, staring at his wrist.
He could feel something moving slowly beneath his skin, like a snake trapped in a glass bottle.
He took a deep breath, pulled the covers up to his chin, and closed his eyes.
He dreamed of the corridor.
The corridor was long, so long he couldn't see its end. The wall lamps on either side burned one after another, illuminating the paintings on the walls.
Every person in the paintings had their eyes open, watching him.
He wanted to run, but cracks began appearing in the floor beneath his feet, spreading in every direction from where he stood, like glass struck by a stone.
The cracks grew wider and deeper, and he saw someone standing at the end of the corridor.
A woman with silver-white hair and red eyes.
She was smiling.
By the time Jin'en woke from his dream, daylight had come.
He lay dazed for several seconds before remembering where he was.
The rain outside had stopped at some point. Morning sunlight squeezed through a gap in the curtains, drawing a bright stripe across the floor.
He glanced down at his wrist. The cracks were still there, but they didn't seem to have worsened.
"...Does that count as good news?"
It wasn't yet seven when he found the dining room.
The dining room was much larger than his room. A long table stood in the center, its tablecloth white and its tableware neatly arranged.
Several girls were already seated at the table, ranging from seven or eight to fifteen or sixteen. Some were drinking milk, others staring into space. When he entered, they all looked up together.
Jin'en felt as though he had wandered onto the wrong set.
His gaze swept over the long table and settled on the two girls nearest him.
More precisely, they had fixed their eyes on him first.
A girl dressed in black sat in the nearest seat on the left side of the long table. She looked seven or eight at most, with a few blue streaks in her black hair that seemed out of place for her age. Her bangs completely covered her right eye, leaving only one gray eye visible.
That eye was looking him up and down, its gaze as cold as frost on a winter windowpane.
The glass of milk before her remained untouched, and she had patted the tablecloth perfectly flat.
"You're the one Mother brought back last night?" she asked, her voice flat, her tone like someone checking an inventory list. "Male?"
Jin'en nodded.
"My name is Daffodil." Having said that, she shut her mouth and picked up her milk again, but stopped with the glass at her lips, seemingly realizing she hadn't received a response.
She frowned slightly, barely, but Jin'en saw it.
"Jin'en."
"Mm."
That ended the conversation.
Daffodil lowered her head and began drinking her milk in small sips.
Only then did Jin'en notice the other girl.
She was practically hanging off Daffodil.
Her white hair was tousled, as though she hadn't combed it after waking. She was half a head shorter than Daffodil, but her arms were locked firmly around Daffodil's waist, her whole face buried behind the other girl's shoulder. Only one bright green eye showed, peering at him through the gaps in her white hair.
Her gaze was different from Daffodil's. Daffodil's was a cold appraisal, while this one was simply-Jin'en thought for a long time and decided it resembled the stray cat in the alley behind the orphanage that always stared at the food in his hands.
"Broken Rainbow." Daffodil set down her glass and introduced her without much inflection.
"...You're in my way," Daffodil added, shifting her shoulders in an attempt to shake off the person behind her.
"No."
"Go back to your own seat."
"No."
"You've already finished your breakfast today."
"Still no."
Watching this tug-of-war, Jin'en realized he probably didn't need to interject.
Daffodil turned to look at the mass of white hair behind her and sighed without expression.
The sigh was brief, so brief Jin'en almost missed it. There seemed to be a faint resignation in it, practiced many times already.
"Stop looking," Daffodil told Jin'en, turning back.
"I wasn't looking."
"You were."
"..."
Jin'en found a seat two empty places away from them and sat down.
The other girls at the table were still watching him.
Some whispered among themselves, while others quietly ate their porridge, but every pair of eyes was doing the same thing-observing.
Jin'en knew those looks all too well.
At the orphanage, whenever a new child arrived, the others looked at them the same way, calculating whether they would steal their things, sleep in the next bed, or talk too much in front of the teachers.
And this mansion was much larger than the orphanage, with far more people and far more girls.
He was the only male.
Inanna's arrangement was clearly deliberate. Last night's words, "I've been waiting for a boy," surfaced in his mind. Jin'en turned them over several times without figuring them out.
"Are you the new one?"
A small, soft voice came from beside him.
Jin'en turned and saw a girl with twin ponytails clinging to the edge of the table, standing on tiptoe to look at him. Her eyes sparkled as though she had discovered some rare novelty.
"Mm."
"What's your name?"
"Jin'en."
"Jin'en... Jin'en." She repeated the name twice, as though tasting a candy she had never seen before, then laughed. "I'm Flora! How old are you? Where did you come from? Why are you a bo-"
"Flora."
Another voice interrupted her, older and lower.
A tall, thin girl approached from the opposite side of the long table. Her hair was tied in a single ponytail, and she looked about thirteen or fourteen. There was little expression on her face, but she carried herself with far more composure than the children around her.
She carried a bowl of oatmeal over to Flora and set it before her.
"Eat."
"But-"
"Eat."
Flora pouted and obediently sat down.
The tall, thin girl glanced at Jin'en without saying anything, merely giving him a slight nod in greeting.
Then she returned to her seat with steady steps, quite unlike those of the other girls in the mansion.
Inanna had said there were a dozen or so girls here.
Jin'en looked around. Eight were seated at the dining table. Including those who hadn't come, there might indeed be a dozen or so.
Several had clearly been here a long time. They ate quietly and quickly, leaving their bowls spotless, yet their eyes remained wary, as though ready to stand up and leave at any moment. A few others were younger, huddling together and talking softly, occasionally sneaking glances at him.
Daffodil finished eating.
She stood, folded her napkin, and placed it beside her plate, her movements meticulous.
"Broken Rainbow, let go."
"No."
"I'm going to train."
"I'm coming too."
"You didn't even finish the basic footwork yesterday."
"Then I'll do it today."
"..."
Daffodil sighed again. This time, Jin'en heard it clearly.
Then he saw the girl in black do something that surprised him-she reached out and gently patted Broken Rainbow on the head.
The movement was quick, so quick that he wouldn't have noticed if he hadn't happened to be watching.
"Finish eating before you come."
Only then did Broken Rainbow let go.
Daffodil turned toward the dining room door, pausing for an instant as she passed Jin'en.
"That thing on your wrist."
Jin'en instinctively tugged his sleeve down.
"There's no point hiding it." Daffodil didn't look back, her voice very soft. "My eyes are very good."
She left.
Jin'en froze for several seconds.
He glanced down at his sleeve. The cracks lay quietly beneath it; nothing was visible from outside.
That girl could see them?
"Are you looking at my big sister?"
At some point, Broken Rainbow had slid down from Daffodil's seat. She lay against the tabletop, her head tilted as she looked at him.
Only at this distance did Jin'en get a clear look at her exposed eye. Its green iris resembled crushed shards of glass, bright but fragmented.
"No," Jin'en said.
Broken Rainbow curved her lips, revealing two sharp canine teeth. "The way you look at my big sister is the same way other people look at me."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean-" She tilted her head, her white hair sliding off her shoulder to drape across the table. "You're thinking, 'Will this person hurt me?'"
Jin'en said nothing.
Because that was indeed what he was thinking.
"Don't worry, my sister wouldn't." Broken Rainbow rested her face on her arms, her voice growing muffled, as if she was about to go back to sleep. "She'd think forever before even stepping on an ant."
"You're not eating anymore?" Jin'en glanced at the barely touched plate in front of her.
Broken Rainbow lifted her eyelids a little.
"You're my big brother."
"What?"
"You're older than me." She lifted her face from her arms, her expression so serious it was almost funny. "You're older than me, so I can call you big brother, right?"
Jin'en opened his mouth, not knowing how to answer.
"My sister couldn't call you big brother anyway-she definitely wouldn't." Broken Rainbow pushed her plate toward him. "You eat it. I'm not hungry."
"I'm not..."
"You're hungry." Broken Rainbow's gaze fell on his hands holding the chopsticks. Malnutrition had left their knuckles and veins jutting out starkly. "Your hands are all bones."
Jin'en was hungry.
He hadn't eaten a bite from last night through this morning.
Steaming porridge, fried eggs, and bread sat on the table, their aroma like a hand constantly tugging at his stomach.
He picked up his chopsticks.
"This is for you." Broken Rainbow produced a piece of chocolate from somewhere, its wrapper crumpled, and tucked it beside his plate. "Compressed sweets. My sister taught me to make them. Really filling."
"If your sister made it, keep it for yourself."
"I have more." After saying that, Broken Rainbow seemed to find her tone too soft and added, "Stop talking and eat."
Jin'en glanced at her.
White hair, green eyes, and a smile like a little fox.
A moment ago, she had been clinging to her sister and acting spoiled; the next, she was pressing food on him.
Nobody in this mansion was quite normal.
But he didn't turn down the chocolate.
"Thank you."
Broken Rainbow didn't reply. She merely buried her face in her arms again and said in a muffled voice, "That crack on your hand lit up just now."
Jin'en looked down.
Along the inside of his wrist, the edges of the fissure glimmered with an extremely faint silver light.
He hurriedly pulled down his sleeve, but Broken Rainbow had already seen it. Without lifting her head, she spoke in a muffled voice-
"No need to hide it. I see my sister get hurt every day. I've seen every kind of injury."
"This isn't an injury."
"Then what is it?"
Jin'en didn't know how to explain. He couldn't even explain it to himself.
"It's... a switch," he finally said. "A switch that could turn on at any time."
Broken Rainbow fell quiet for a while.
Then she reached out and lightly hooked her little finger around his cuff, so gently it seemed tentative.
"My sister said, if you can't control something, you either learn to control it, or learn to-"
"Learn to what?"
"Learn to let other people help you control it." Broken Rainbow raised her head, her green eyes shining. "That's what my sister said."
Jin'en stared at her for a long while.
He couldn't help wondering just what sort of place this Red Letter was.
"How old are you?" he asked.
"Seven." Broken Rainbow sounded perfectly justified.
"...Liar."
"My sister said to tell outsiders I'm a year younger." Broken Rainbow betrayed her sister without the slightest difficulty.
Jin'en opened his mouth.
Forget it.
He picked up his chopsticks and speared the fried egg on his plate into his mouth. Hot and glistening with oil, it belonged to an entirely different world from the cold scraps in the garbage bin behind the orphanage.
He chewed twice, then twice more.
His throat felt a little tight as he swallowed.
Broken Rainbow lay across the table watching him eat, the corners of her mouth lifted like a satisfied cat.
"Good, right?" she said.
Jin'en didn't answer and kept his head down as he ate.
"Slow down. Nobody's going to take it from you."
"Mm."
"If that's not enough, there's more in the kitchen."
"Mm."
"You don't talk much."
Jin'en raised his head.
Broken Rainbow propped her chin on her hand, her green eyes curving into two crescents. "But that's okay. My sister doesn't talk much either."
"You talk a lot."
"That's because I'm not fully awake yet," Broken Rainbow announced. "Once I wake up, I'll ignore you."
With that, she really did turn her face away, lie across the table, and close her eyes.
Three seconds later, she opened one eye again.
"What was your name again? Jin... Jin'en?"
"Mm."
"Okay, big brother Jin'en."
She buried her face again, perfectly content, and finally fell quiet.
Jin'en ate his breakfast, with the faint clinks of knives and forks against porcelain plates in his ears and the gradually brightening morning light outside the window.
The fissure on his wrist remained quiet.
At least it was quiet for now.
He looked up at the dining room ceiling.
The ceiling was very high, covered in an exquisite mural: a bird's-eye view of an entire garden, filled with flowers in rich, vivid colors. But there was something strange about the way it was painted. At the very center of each flower was a small patch of shadow, as though the painter had put it there deliberately.
Staring at it too long made him a little dizzy.
Jin'en looked away and went back to his fried egg.
This mansion-this garden-probably concealed far more than he could see.
And all he could do now was finish the food on his plate, hide the fissure on his wrist, and stay alive.
Broken Rainbow mumbled something in her sleep that sounded like "Sister."
Jin'en didn't catch it, nor did he ask.
He just felt that the way that black-clad girl had patted her head might have been warmer than all the wall lamps in this mansion put together.
Meanwhile-in the mansion's west-wing corridor.
Daffodil stood against the wall behind a half-open door, looking through the gap toward the dining room.
She saw the new boy eating with his head lowered, saw Broken Rainbow asleep across from him, and saw an occasional thread of silver light escaping from beneath his sleeve.
Then she lowered her head and looked at her gloved hands.
On the back of her left glove was a crack identical to the one on the boy's wrist, only fainter and shallower, like an old wound on the verge of healing.
It had happened three days ago.
She had swung her blade at a wooden post in the training room, but the instant the blade fell, a fissure had opened in the space before its edge and swallowed the entire post, leaving not even a scrap behind.
She had stood there looking at her hand, feeling as though something had been drained from her body, leaving her hollow, as if a hole had been dug inside her.
After that, she would occasionally pull aside the bangs covering her right eye in front of a mirror and gaze into her own eyes.
Sometimes, a reflection that wasn't hers would appear in her gray pupils.
So she had put on an eye patch.
At first, she had only worn it during training. Later, she had started wearing it everywhere, all the time. Later still, she had discovered that wearing it was more comfortable than going without, because without it, she could see too much: the cracks in the walls, the shifting in the air, and-
The colors on other people.
Inanna called her "little narcissus."
She didn't like that name.
But she hadn't told anyone.
Daffodil closed the door, turned around, and walked back down the corridor.
Her footsteps were steady, each step landing right in the middle.