Author: 唇亡齿寒 / Lips Gone, Teeth Cold
Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/
Chapter 163
Alveira lowered her head again. “Let me be alone for a while.”
“…Suit yourself. I’m done with you.” After saying that, her red figure disappeared at the door.
Alveira looked at the already activated control screen, feeling more and more like an outcast. This was a pirate ship, after all, and she… What was she? A Princess of the Empire? That was just an empty title—any daughter of the Queen could be a Princess. It didn’t necessarily have to be her. The White Radiance Palace was a massive cage… No, it was more accurate to say that everyone living in that palace was entrapping themselves, like her mother and her brother—he never got over the death of his lover. Alveira suspected it wasn’t the blow of death that was too much for him; rather, he simply didn’t want to move on, just wanting to escape from everything.
She wanted to leave that place. She already had. Now, she was aboard the pirate ship Dream of a Cold Night, a ship that would take her far from the Empire Capital to distant star systems she had never set foot in. She could escape far, far away, and never return…
Then she might as well do just that! Alveira felt as if a light had turned on in front of her, as if a messenger from the Lord had shown her the way. She could stay and try being a space pirate—though she had never done it before, she could learn slowly. No one is born knowing how to rob and pillage, right? She smiled, and the gloom in her heart vanished. She would do just that!
She joyfully climbed out of the gondola. The maintenance bay was dimly lit, with only a few lights on, making it appear incredibly dark. She thought Joanna and her companion had already left, so she was startled when the pirate woman’s voice came from nearby.
“Oh, you’ve finally decided to come out?” Joanna Begrel leaned against the gondola’s hatch, arms crossed over her chest.
“You… You haven’t left! Why are you still here?”
“This is my ship. I can go wherever I want.” She lowered her arms. “I’m heading to the mess hall now. You can come along if you want…” she said as she walked towards a door on the right.
Alveira quickly followed, and since the maintenance bay was very dark, she grabbed onto Joanna’s sleeve.
“I know someone named Alois too. That’s not a common name, is it?” She tried to find a topic.
“The one on my ship has the surname Lagrange, a damnable surname…”
“…Really? It’s the same person?”
They walked further and further away.
Several days later, in the communications room of Leyting Spaceport.
“Can you sing for me?”
“…I sing off-key, you know. Are you sure that’s okay?”
“Please sing for me!”
So Joanna began to hum a simple tune, without lyrics, just like a lullaby. Her voice was like a light, nimble bird, hovering in the communications room, sometimes soaring high, sometimes diving low. The melodious sound seemed to come from a distant past, worn smooth by time, leaving only a graceful and serene melody.
As the shuttle moved farther from the spaceport, the radio communication became intermittent. Once Alveira had become familiar with the melody, she began to sing along. At first, she just hummed softly, and gradually, she added some lyrics—though they were just syllables that didn’t form any words. But it didn’t matter; she didn’t need language. Language couldn’t convey the meaning she wanted to express. Or perhaps it was meaningless altogether.
She kept singing, singing continuously, until there was no sound coming from the speaker anymore, but she continued to sing, her voice traveling through the communicator into space, toward the depths of the vast starry sea.
Some days later, news arrived that Dream of a Cold Night had been sunk by Duke Winnet’s fleet, with no survivors.
When Alveira received the news, she was attending her brother Annot’s wedding. Her maid informed her of the unfortunate incident, and Alveira immediately turned and walked upstairs, pushing open the door to her brother’s room.
Annot was sitting dejectedly by the window, dressed in his groom’s attire but without any of the joy a groom should have. He looked as sorrowful as a young man who had just lost his lover—in fact, it was almost the same.
“Annot.” Alveira walked up to him and looked down at him. For a moment, she felt she was no longer the little sister protected by her brother. “Annot, I have something to say to you.”
Her brother looked up in surprise and stared at her. “You… Why are you here, Alveira? This isn’t proper…”
“How can you sit here calmly, Annot? Leia loved you so much, and yet you’re going to marry another woman? You couldn’t protect her, and you can’t avenge her. Don’t you feel any guilt in your heart?”
Annot remained silent.
“If I were you, brother,” Alveira took out a small handgun and placed it on the table in front of Annot. Ever since she escaped from Leyting, this handgun had never left her side. “I would choose to avenge her. Then I would become stronger, so I wouldn’t make the same mistake again, and then I could protect more people. I’ve already decided to do just that. You can join me. You will, won’t you?”
Annot stared at the gun on the table, his lips tightly pressed together.
“I’ll be waiting for you, brother. We’re siblings, aren’t we? We share the same blood. Is there anyone in this world closer than you and I? If you decide to go down this path, I will do everything in my power to help you, and you will help me too. If you make up your mind, come find me with this gun.”
She turned and left the room.
When she reached the first floor, she heard a gunshot from upstairs. The guests in the festive hall were stunned for a moment, then the men rushed to the second floor, and the women began to scream one after another.
Alveira said nothing, looked at nothing, and walked out of the wedding—or rather, the funeral—venue alone.
Coward. She thought in disappointment. I won’t be like him. If he had chosen revenge, we could have fought side by side. But he didn’t. Oh Lord, bless this poor soul; may he reunite with Leia in Your paradise. But I will survive. I will finish everything for him and for myself.
She walked farther and farther away.
After that, Alveira seemed like a changed person. The gloomy, introverted girl was gone, and the returning Alveira became an ambitious Princess. People said her brother’s death had turned her from a naive girl into a mature and powerful ruler. But only Alveira knew that she was merely imitating Joanna clumsily. Imitating her every smile, every gesture. She recruited the old royal guards, won over capable ministers, and built her own fleet. Whenever she encountered difficult problems, Alveira often thought: What would Joanna do in this situation? Her feelings towards Joanna were complex. It wasn’t just friendship, perhaps something close to love, but not quite. She admired that red-haired woman with a fervor, seeing her as an angel who had saved her. She admired Joanna, was captivated by her effortless grace. She wanted to introduce Joanna to everyone she knew, yet she also wanted to hide her away and have her all to herself. She wanted to become as independent and brave as Joanna, but in the dark corners of her heart, she also envied her, resented her. She was obsessed with Joanna, but often ordered herself not to think about her at all.
Alveira felt she was going mad or falling into some kind of sickness. Sometimes she couldn’t even tell whether she had become Joanna or Joanna had become her.
The Empire Princess eventually defeated Duke Winnet and reclaimed the throne.
After her coronation, she married her cousin, Count Darius Bayes, who was also the greatest hero in suppressing the rebellion. Although there was no “love” in her heart for Darius—her love had long been buried on that planet where day and night shared the sky—there was “affection”, “friendship”, and “responsibility”. Alveira knew that not all loving couples end up in marriage, and not all married couples love each other deeply. Darius wasn’t the one she loved the most, but he was the most suitable.
They had children. Many years passed, and the children grew up, started their own families, and had their own children. Among all of Alveira’s descendants, her favorite was her second son’s son, Eddie, who, strangely enough, had a head of fiery red hair.
About eighteen years ago, a bout of pneumonia claimed Darius’s life. In his final moments, he called Alveira to his bedside alone and told her, “I feel so relieved, Alveira. I can finally let go of everything I’ve been carrying.”
Darius had always kept a secret from her. He never spoke of it, and she couldn’t guess it, though she vaguely sensed the truth. But she would never confirm it with Darius, nor would she try to do anything to uncover it. Darius took this secret to the grave, to the end of time, so let it remain a secret forever.
Time flew by, and in Standard Year 1506, the 110-year-old Queen sat in the courtyard, a gaudy Bohemian-style blanket covering her knees. She calmly watched the children playing in the corridor, reflecting on her life.
Suddenly, Ian and Nara came running excitedly toward her, the boy holding a simple crystal radio in his hands.
“Great-grandmother, listen! It really picks up sounds!” Ian held the crystal radio up high.
Indeed, the radio emitted some static. The Queen focused her attention, hearing a young girl’s voice say, “…Can you sing for me?”
A voice, more familiar than any other, replied, “I sing off-key, is that okay?”
“Please sing for me!”
Then, a haunting melody began to play.
The Queen, with trembling hands, took the radio and asked, “Dear, may I have this?”
Ian thought for a moment. “Alright, but you have to give it back later. I want to show it to Teacher Sally!”
“I will. I promise.” The Queen patted the children’s heads. “Go play over there. I need to be alone for a while.”
Ian looked at his sister. “Nara, let’s play ball together!”
“Okay!”
The two children ran off hand in hand.
The Queen lowered her head and carefully caressed the crystal radio with her loose, age-spotted hands, afraid of breaking it. The song coming from the radio was unclear and mixed with static, but the Queen thought it was the most beautiful sound she had ever heard.
From a planet ninety light-years away from the Empire Capital, a radio signal broadcast into the universe had, after traveling for ninety years, finally reached the Empire Capital and returned to its owner’s hands.
Ian and Nara were playing with a ball, and the boy mischievously threw it high, sending it toward their great-grandmother. Nara, not to be outdone, shouted, “Great-grandmother! Throw it to me, not to Ian!”
But the great-grandmother, lying on the recliner, didn’t move.
“What’s wrong with her?” The two children exchanged glances and finally decided to check for themselves.
They ran over to the Queen and saw the white-haired woman with her eyes closed, lying peacefully on the recliner. On her lap was the crystal radio, still playing the beautiful song.
Strangely, they couldn’t understand a single word of the song’s lyrics.
In Standard Year 1506, Queen Alveira I passed away at the age of 110. She died peacefully in her sleep on a sunny afternoon, without suffering any pain. Her reign was known as the “Platinum Era” of the Empire, one of the brightest chapters in the Empire’s history.
The author has something to say:
Well, don’t worry too much about why radio waves could travel that far or how a crystal radio could pick up a song. Even the author thinks it’s pretty far-fetched…
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